Few well-read English-speaking people are likely to be ignorant of Southey's charming little poem, "The Battle of Blenheim." Old Kaspar's story of the great fight, of the skulls he found when ploughing, and the childish questioning of his two little _grandchildren, Peterkin and Wilhelmine, who wanted to know all about the battle, are so transparently truthful and beautiful that, were Sonthey's reputation dependent on this poem alone, his niche among the immortals would be secure. The lines which have suggested the subject we are now approaching are the last four But what good came of it at last?
Quoth little Peterkin—Why that I cannot tell, said he, But twas a famous victory. Though, in all probability, it is far too early as yet to talk seriously of the end of the war, it is not too early to look beyond it. By and by the conflict will cease, and when that consummation has arrived, there will be tens and hundreds of millions of Peterkin questions. In every tongue, in all dialects, from high and low, m icy north to sunny south, their tones will rise. Our Farthest East will echo back the cry of Fartest West, and the one sole burden of all will be, But what good came of it at last?"
What is known as International Law in its modern sense was born of the horrors of a great war, the Thirty Years' War, and it birthday was the date of the signature of the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. Men had been so terrorized during the frightful struggles of those hateful years that they were determined that something should be done to prevent, so far as that was possible, a repetition of the dire experience. Is it not certain that millions upon millions at this very hour are coming to a like conclusion? If an advance was possible then, great advance will be easy now. If after the losses consequent upon warfare waged by a comparatively few thousands, men longed for peace, should they not, after unheard-of slaughter by millions, determine at the dream of the past shall be the reality of the future? Such questions must move to action every. society having peace and arbitration for its object. Their members will look back upon the progress they have already made, Tt is only to 1871 they have to turn to find their first great success, the settlement of the Alahama claims in peaceful justice and perfect harmony. They will note that in the first twenty years of arbitration only eight cases in all were thus disposed of, while in the last twenty, from 1880 to 1900, there were no fewer than ninety, some of them being of great importance. Nor will it be forgotten that since the first Hague Congress in 1899 there have been negotiated more than a hundred treaties of international arbitration. So far, the only real difficulty has lain in the submission of points of honour and national policy. Recent treaties between the United States, Great Britain and France arrange for preliminary inquiry into facts, followed, at as long an interval as one year if neces. sory, so that passions may have time to cool down, by an effort at settlement by arbitration. riginal fron
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.