is the only statesman of the day who is up to the level of the imperialistic policy. Now it has taken to blaming, more or less openly, the present Prime Minister, and one may be reasonably sure that the opinions expressed by the Morning Post are those of the majority of that party which, with an audacity almost sublime, calls itself the Conservative. And thus Chamberlain gains support and finds apologists wherever the Imperialists predominate. The Figaro of November 19th last publishes an interview with Stanley, who, born an American, has become the most furious of Tories, in which, after expressing his admiration for "that great man called Cecil Rhodes," he constitutes himself the mouthpiece of Chamberlain, and absolves him from all responsibility for the war, for the reason that he was not in favor of Jameson's raid. As proof of this, he asserts that Chamberlain sent a despatch to Jameson, which the latter put into his pocket without reading, and that this despatch forbade him to enter the Transvaal. Could any proof be less convincing? Might not Chamberlain and Jameson have agreed together that the despatch should be received and not read? And even had Chamberlain not approved of the raid, it does not follow that he did not want the war; it only proves that he was aware of the designs of both Rhodes and Jameson. Nevertheless, I hold the opinion of Mr. Stead, proprietor of the Review of Reviews, namely, that Chamberlain was aware of Jameson's plan, and entirely approved of it, but was in doubt as to its timeliness, because, occurring at that moment, it precipitated events, laid bare his own projects, and retarded the execution of those plans which he now seeks to carry out by means of a war, into which he has plunged the whole English nation. That he is the sole person responsible for its issue, no one who has read his despatches

and his answers before the Committee of Inquiry can, for an instant, doubt. The war is without excuse, and is bound to end ingloriously for the reason that, when a nation, notoriously rich and powerful, and able to increase its resources by enormous loans, goes to war from motives of cupidity solely with a people relatively poor, small in numbers, and devoid of external support, no victory gained by the greater at the expense of the smaller nation can be dignified or noble.

The most illustrious thinkers of the day, such as Herbert Spencer, John Morley, Frederic Harrison, have vehemently protested against the madness which draws away the regular army, as well as the reserves, from home, to plunge them into the depths of South Africa, in order to serve the material interest of the Chartered Company. But their protests pass unheeded, for the reason that it is easy to intoxicate a people with a beverage that gratifies their vanity and their blood-thirstiness, but hard to make them listen to the counsels of wisdom and human justice. Chamberlain carries on the work begun by Disraeli, but has brutalized and vulgarized it, and the result is the conflict in the Transvaal. The really fine qualities of the English are being lost and forgotten. When the people greeted Kitchener with frenzied enthusiasm, they altogether forgot the most glorious traditions of their past, for Kitchener had violated the sanctity of a tomb, and insulted the relics of the dead. In the present crisis the English are suspicious of all those who are op posed to them, and assert that they are bought with Boer gold; they suspect treachery and cowardice in every quarter, but they tamely submit to the falsifications of the reports by the War Office, and the censorship of the telegraphic despatches-dealings which, in former days, would not have been tolerated, so repugnant are they to the

well-known bold and open character of the English people. The reign of Queen Victoria has been marked by a long succession of wars, of which not one was, in my opinion, necessary or unavoidable. Nor was any one of them an internal war, for neither the English citizen nor the English peasant knows anything of the real agonies and horrors of a war within his own borders. He has never suffered personally by seeing his house burned, his children starving, his fields devastated, his babies killed by flying shot and shell. He has never seen in his country, or his city, a battle or a siege; he does not comprehend, therefore, the fearful wrong he commits when, listening to the persuasive voice of the politician, he unconcernedly lets loose the infernal agencies of war upon a distant country and people. This is the Nation's excuse, and at the same time the inexorable condemnation of those who, for personal interests, mislead and pervert, by appealing to their most brutal instincts and unscrupulously abusing their ignorance, a people naturally generous and of kindly and humane impulses. Nor is all this, as many would have us believe, without interest to Italy and the Italians, so long as England continues the course she has hitherto pursued of endeavoring to draw Italy also into Imperial ventures in Nuova Antologia.

Africa. At this very moment England is sending to Rome her own political agent in Egypt (the attractive and congenial diplomat, Rennell Rodd), with the object of engaging the Italian in dark and dangerous ventures against the Negus Negesti. "Save me from my friends," should now be Italy's motto. For many years the friendship of England has been more than a doubtful good to Italy, for she has always tried to push her into expensive and useless enterprises for her own advantage. If England really loves Italy, why not give her the island of Malta? This would be a solid proof of affection, and, perhaps, no more dangerous gift for England to make than that of Heligoland to Germany. That act of inconceivable folly was but ill-paid for by the German gift of some useless lands in the interior of Africa.

Finally, the moral of this short study for my Italian readers is this: Do not wish for the English an easy conquest in the Transvaal, for this would certainly mean the rise of Joseph Chamberlain to the highest post in the Government. And do not lend an ear to the insidious propositions which the English Government will make to endeavor to persuade you to follow her in her costly, brutal, and aggressive march toward universal empire.

Ouida.

"The gun on the Castle will pierce the fog better than all the other lights round."

This was the assertion of the lookout-man on the coast at Dover one thick night during the late meeting of the British Association. In the experience of the old Coastguardsman,

who had kept watch on the same guards for many seasons, the flash of the light-loaded evening gun outshone in hazy weather all other lights in the town. He had thought the matter out after his own fashion, and had come to the conclusion that by virtue of the explosion the flash was flung towards

it would follow that were the dense fog layer anything like fifty or sixty yards in depth even the light of the sun would be entirely extinguished, and mid-day would be as pitchy dark as a moonless and starless midnight. It is never thus, however. The equally typical, but infinitely less intolerable, dark day, when the cloud canopy lies at some distance overhead, leaving the streets fairly free for purposes of respiration, is of another order; but my experience is that this canopy will, in a general way, have its upper limit somewhere between 2,000 and 3,000 feet aloft. But, regarding the graver visitation of the true ground fog, it hardly seems too much to hope that means may be devised of removing an obstacle so easily surmounted. It has been asserted that, where there is a free wind passage through a town, fog will lie straight over and around such a passage. remarkable and continuous highway exists right through London, in the line of Oxford Street and Holborn, which, when followed up in either direction, may be considered to extend from Uxbridge all the way to Stratford. It is very questionable, however, whether the central parts of this line are not far more liable to dense fog than, say, the poorer, equally crowded, but higher, locality northward of the Pentonville Road.

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But be it noted that a very distinctive feature of the true town fog is its sharply-defined boundary. If the air be still, as is almost always the case, the traveller by an up train along any line of rail will probably notice that he plunges into the fog bank with a surprising suddenness. If then the choking cloud lies, like a true isolated cloud, compact, continuous, and well defined, with the additional characteristic that its depth is very shallow, it might seem reasonable to hope that by some artificial disturbance atmospheric equilibrium might be so far affected that the

entire cloud could be made to rise, if not to disperse.

Only those who are accustomed to make voyages into cloudland, and above it, clearly realize how, on dark days, the sun is commonly pouring down its heat incessantly and intensely close above the heads of earth-bound mortals. The upper fringe of the cloud stratum may, indeed, be seen vanishing into the sky, through the day hours, with ceaseless energy, suggesting that there are forces within reach, of a giant power, if they could but be lured to lend their aid. One method, at least, has been long talked of, namely, the disturbance of the air by the impulse of explosion. Rather more than forty years ago, i. e., shortly after Crimean times, when it was a favorite practice to hold reviews on a grand scale on Southsea Common, with much heavy firing, the writer remembers it being confidently asserted among the officers that such cannonades generally brought up wind or change of weather. This, indeed, is a doctrine very generally received, and attempts have been made to connect big battles with consequent storms; so that were there but the germ of truth in this it would be no extravagant idea that even a London fog might be borne up and away on the back of an eddy, say, produced by a well-ordered salute on Primrose Hill.

But besides the mere heating and rarefying effect of the sun, there is the unknown and unexploited might of his electric energy, and to what extent this is always playing, or ready to play, a potent part, perhaps few meteorologists would be bold enough to say. A curious record may, however, here find a place, whatever be the scientific value attaching to the theory based thereon. A few years since a letter appeared in one of our scientific journals, pointing out that on the island of St. Thomas the seasons had completely changed their character in thirty years.

Rain had been short in quantity, owing to cloud not resting in the island; for though the customary rain clouds would come up, they now passed by without pause or fall, discharging themselves only in the ocean. The explanation suggested by members of the local Agricultural Board was that, since the introduction into the island of telegraphic and fencing wires, these seemed to "act as conductors," diverting and dispersing the clouds out at

sea.

That a London fog is sometimes made to "move on" must be a familiar fact to any observant sojourner within twenty miles of London, perhaps particularly on the West. A low current, in this case from the East, will set the entire fog layer rolling, or rather creeping, and out and away it travels in a transient stream, bidding every place it visits note how it is passing, partly by a murkiness strangely out of place in open country, but still more by that particular smell and savor which, I submit, is wholly unmistakable.

The cost of a day's genuine fog in Town can be estimated in different ways. About a dozen years ago, i. e., just before the electric light had seriously interfered with the street illumination by gas alone, the calculation in £. s. d. worked out thus:-Statistics furnished by one chief company showed that 35,000,000 cubic feet in excess were consumed on a single day of fog. This was computed to be a quantity sufficient for a year's supply of gas to a town of 10,000 or 12,000 inhabitants. Adding to this the extra supply demanded, at the same time, of two other Metropolitan companies, the total excess of gas amounted to 150,000,000 cubic feet, or, put in another way, the cost of the day's fog in gas to London could not be put at a less figure than £7,000 or £8,000.

Then, as to the cost in health, we

have a statement in the Lancet from a Health Officer, who is prepared to take the lenient view that, in spite of a few days' discomfort, people, after a fog, live on pretty much as before. He is ready to admit that, to counterbalance the bad effect of mechanical irritation, there is possible good to be derived from inhaling carbonaceous matter, by reason of such matter being a disinfectant, while, as the result of actual measurement, there is shown to be present all the while pretty much the normal amount of oxygen. For all this, the writer is convinced that the mischief wrought goes far beyond streaming eyes and smarting nostrils. There are other products in the baneful air besides the particles of simple soot, sulphurous ammoniacal acid, and organic particles which, when added to the usual accompaniment of a lowering of temperature, must tell materially against the infirm or aged.

But this question has been approached in yet another way. Professor Oliver, in a preliminary report to the scientific committee of the Royal Horticultural Society a few years back, details the result of scraping twenty square yards of the roofs of glass houses at Kew and also at Chelsea, which had been carefully washed down previous to a visitation of fog. In both cases the weight of deposit was about the same, thirty grains per square yard, or six tons per square mile. Proceeding to analyze the deposit collected at the more densely-inhabited locality, there was found about forty per cent. of mineral matter to thirty-six per cent. of carbon, while the analysis yielded five per cent. and 1 1-2 per cent. of sulphurous acid and hydrochloric acid respectively. There was also a considerable proportion-viz., fifteen per cent.of hydrocarbons, to which was attributed the familiar oleaginous character of fogs as we know them.

It is impossible to omit in any mod