From ‘Terms of peace’, The Spectator, 15 July 1916: As the man in the street might say, ‘The Allies are not going to give the Germans a chance to come at us a second time. Never again! is our motto.’ And if this is the object of the war, it will also be the object of
From ‘News of the week’, The Spectator, 8 July 1916: On the surface of London life there is hardly a ripple, and yet not a hundred and fifty miles from our shores is being waged the first stage of what in all probability will prove not only one of the greatest and momentous battles in all
From ‘Preparation for peace’, The Spectator, 1 July 1916: All industrial development relies in the last resort upon human energy, and the amount of human energy existing in this country has been enormously stimulated by the war. The country is awake, and will remain awake. But this readiness of every man and every woman to
From ‘English or British?’, The Spectator, 25 June 1916: We wish that this question of ‘England’ or ‘Britain’ could be settled satisfactorily, for the outbursts of the touchy champions of ‘Britain’ rather overwhelm us at times. Besides, it is always disagreeable to find that one has offended friends when no offence was intended. Peace and security might
From ‘Verdun’, The Spectator, 16 June 1916: As has been proved again and again in this war, if you are willing to pay the price you can always break the enemy’s line, and break it on a considerable front; but when you have broken it you are no better off than you were before. If you push
From ‘Lord Kitchener’, The Spectator, 9 June 1916: The central fact in Kitchener’s administration of the War Office is that he both invented and created the New Armies, and that he did it of his own motion, alone bearing the responsibility of the idea, and almost alone stubbornly asserting and reasserting the belief that this
From ‘President Wilson and the Lessons of History’, 2 June 1916: Emphatically it is not a war of what we may call the old eighteenth-century pattern, where any one could step in and say, as if speaking to a couple of duellists: ‘You have had a good honest fight. Honour is satisfied. Now don’t you
From ‘Food dictatorship’, The Spectator, 27 May 1916: Nobody would like to see the whole race of dogs exterminated, but there are undoubtedly more dogs maintained in this country than can reasonably be justified, and a substantial addition to the Dog Tax would diminish the number, and pro tanto economise the consumption of food.
From ‘The softening of street manners’, The Spectator, 20 May 1916: Generally the public opinion of the ’bus entirely upholds the conductor. The influence of the tyrant is too strong to allow of protest, but now and then cases of rebellion occur, and bold females who consider themselves slighted vow that they will write to
From ‘Colonel Winston Churchill’, The Spectator, 13 May 1916: The return of Colonel Churchill to the House of Commons, which we are told is to be permanent, has set going a number of rumours as to the future of the most audacious and brilliant figure in our public life. Colonel Churchill, it is alleged, is to come
From ‘Reconstruction’, The Spectator, 5 May 1916: What Ireland wants just now is firm and judicious military government. The rebellion of last week has been put down, but undoubtedly the embers of the fire are still red-hot, and a very little might fan them into flame again. All students of Irish history know that rebellions in Ireland
From ‘The Dublin Revolt’, The Spectator, 29 April 1916: If we are to do what will most disappoint the Germans, and that surely is a thing worth doing, we must pick up the pieces in Ireland with as little fuss as possible, and show the minimum of annoyance and disturbance… The insurrection in Ireland, seen in its
From ‘The Volunteer Training Corps’, The Spectator, 8 April 1916: If we were the Government, we would state plainly that in the opinion of His Majesty’s advisers no man over military age of good physique will be doing his duty to the nation who does not join a Volunteer battalion… it should be clearly understood that he
From ‘Observing: an average day’, The Spectator, 15 April 1916: 5.10 a.m. The signaller on duty at the telephone has just said cheerfully, ‘5.30, Sir.’ I agree, and ask him if the wires are all right. They are! 5.50 a.m. Unroll the mufflers round my head and the blankets and kick off the sandbags. Then get off
From ‘Per Mare, Per Terras, Per Coelum’, The Spectator, 8 April 1916: The very worst the Germans can do in the way of Zeppelin attacks is negligible from the military point of view. They are a great and grim annoyance, but nothing more… A scientific betting man, if asked what were the odds on John Smith or
From ‘The “Via Sacra”’, The Spectator, 1 April 1916: When the war is over, France, Belgium, and Britain will be faced with the problem of finding some form of war memorial adequate to the greatest and longest battle of which the world has any record… We propose that a wide Memorial Road should be laid out in
From ‘Common-sense and the command of the air’, The Spectator, 25 March 1916: The Air Service will be the great fighting Service, the Service which will seal the fate of nations. We say this, not because the Air Service is a novelty, but because of a plain, undeniable physical fact — the universality of the air…
From ‘Portugal and the war’, The Spectator, 18 March 1916: Portugal in coming into the war may seem to have taken a bold step, but she has really taken the only line of safety. Our alliance with Portugal has been in existence since 1373. When German merchant vessels sought shelter in the Tagus it was known
From ‘Colonel Churchill’, The Spectator, 11 March 1916: Colonel Churchill is being found out. The charm, once universal, no longer works, or works only occasionally and on a limited number of those exposed to it… To watch this fevered, this agonised struggle to regain the political fortune which the arch-gambler threw away by his own
From ‘Henry James’, The Spectator, 4 March 1916: Englishmen are not likely ever to forget the generous thought which inspired the late Henry James to become a naturalised Englishman at the moment of England’s greatest distress… Henry James was good enough to say in substance that he was proud of England and her cause, and
