the Ruhr as a means of permanently crippling German industry, and he still believes that the Rhine is the proper defensive frontier of France, which accordingly, in the words of Marshal Foch, must be 'occupied and organized in peace time . . . and further, on account of the fortified towns by which it is reënforced and the means of communication (roads and railways) which converge on it or run laterally along it, is a magnificent basis of manœuvre for a counter-offensive.'

The rulers of France still dream, as

they dreamed in 1919, of a Germany irretrievably crippled, militarily, economically, and, if possible, politically. Through week after week President Wilson held out, preaching the very doctrines which British statesmen are preaching to-day. If Mr. Lloyd George had acted then as he spoke last Monday the outcome might have been very different.

Of the closely allied question of Reparations the same is true. Mr. Baker makes it perfectly clear that never from the first day of the Conference did the French expect or desire Germany to pay the sums which they proposed to demand of her. Their original proposal was that the damages should be assessed at £40,000,000,000! They reduced this fantastic figure step by step, caring little or nothing what they surrendered so long as the total remained larger than Germany could possibly pay; and they bitterly and consistently vetoed any proposal to take the question of Germany's 'capacity to pay' into consideration in the Treaty in any form.

Time and again it was argued by President Wilson and Mr. Lloyd George that the prolonged maintenance

of a great army on the Rhine at Germany's expense would mean a serious reduction of the sums available for Reparations. But

France desired safety more than reconstruction. That was the inevitable logic of the military spirit. . . . For, if Germany were allowed to build herself up economically in order to pay Reparations, she would at the same time reëstablish her old predominant position as a power greater in population and with a more highly developed industrial organization than France, and therefore, according to military logic, again dangerous to French safety.

M. Poincaré uttered in the French Chamber only a few weeks ago an almost exact paraphrase of this sentence of Mr. Baker's. The one thing British interests most urgently require is the one thing France is most determined to prevent the economic recovery of Germany. To argue that she is killing the goose is a mere waste of breath, for that is precisely what she wishes to do. Can it be wondered at that the Entente is broken?

The value of Mr. Baker's book is, as we have said, that it places these matters beyond doubt. There can no longer be any excuse for ignorance or misunderstanding of the real aims of the French Government. They have not been changed since the Armistice; they have not been concealed. If we have not yet grasped them it is our own fault. They are not our aims or anything like our aims. They are the very antithesis of our aims. No more grave and fundamental conflict between two nations can, indeed, be imagined than that which now exists between France and Great Britain; and British interests in this case, as it happens, coincide with those of all the rest of the world.

A LITTLE While ago the great public somewhat abruptly discovered that for three years and a half there had existed such a thing as the problem of Memel, the secret of which seemed hitherto to have been closely kept by the statesmen and the diplomats, together with a few special students of foreign affairs. What is this question? What are the interests involved? How does it concern us? Such are the questions I wish to study in the present article.

The Treaty of Versailles devotes Section X of Part III to Memel and the single article of this section reads as follows:

Germany renounces in favor of the Principal Allied and Associated Powers all rights and title over the territories included between the Baltic, the northeastern frontier of East Prussia as defined in Article 28 of Part II (Boundaries of Germany) of the present Treaty and the former frontier between Germany and Russia.

Germany undertakes to accept the settlement made by the Principal Allied and Associated Powers in regard to these territories, particularly in so far as concerns the nationality of the inhabitants.

The German delegation under the leadership of Count Brockdorff-Rantzau having been permitted by the Allies to offer its remarks on the conditions of the treaty which it was about to sign, took advantage of its opportunity to object to the legitimacy of a number

of the stipulations. In a long memoir dated May 29, 1919, it made special protest against Germany's obligation to give up the Memel territory. The chief argument was that the inhabitants of this district, even including those whose native speech is Lithuanian, did not desire to be separated from Germany.

To this statement the Allies replied on June 16, 1919, by finally rejecting the German thesis. They asserted that the region in question had always been Lithuanian, that the greater part of the population was still Lithuanian in origin and language. They refused to regard the fact that the city of Memel itself is largely German as serious ground for keeping the territory as a whole under German sovereignty, because this port is Lithuania's only outlet to the sea. Finally they justified keeping the territory in their own hands because the status of the Lithuanian country had not yet been decided.

As a result, Article 99 was sustained, and after signing the treaty of peace Germany had to conform to it. She evacuated the territory that the Allies thought they ought to detach from East Prussia, and it was occupied by a small body of French troops commanded by General Odry. The Memel district lies wholly on the right bank of the River Niemen and stretches out in a half moon from a point west of

the little Lithuanian town of Jurborg as far as the little Baltic port of Polangen in Latvia. Thus it separates German East Prussia from the state of Lithuania proper. It is about 150 kilometres long, about 20 wide, with an area of 2450 square kilometres, and it has a population of about 160,000.

After the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, while awaiting the arrival of General Odry, affairs of state were carried on by a Provisional Committee. As soon as he took charge, the French General proceeded to a reorganization of the departmental administration which remains to-day, although eventually this military administration was replaced by a wholly civil administration and General Odry was recalled. M. Petisné succeeded him at the head of the government, with the title of High Commissioner of the Allied Powers. To-day, and until the Conference of Ambassadors decides otherwise, the whole authority, both legislative and judicial, is vested in the High Commissioner.

The administrative organization, created out of odds and ends and modeled according to circumstances, could not, in the opinion of the Allies, be anything more than purely provisional. Why, then, has it maintained itself so much longer than they foresaw? It was easy enough to take Memel from the sovereignty of Germany after the victory of the Allies and the downfall of the imperial régime. But to decide the final fate of this tiny district by attaching it to a definite political entity would constitute a far more complicated problem.

We must not forget that, when hostilities ended on the Rhine, Eastern Europe was still in the agonizing process of readaptation and reorganization. The little Baltic states, which had barely got on their feet, seemed destined to the most precarious existence.

Could one recognize them as independent political entities? The chancelleries of Europe were full of doubts. Would it not be better to wait until Russia, free of the Bolshevist yoke, should enter once more into the concert of the Powers? Time enough then to make definite decisions and trace the frontiers of this portion of our continent. Moreover, none of the surrounding nations, Lithuania, Russia, or Poland, had any frontiers anywhere on the outskirts of their territory. War had broken out between Russia and Poland, and Red bands from Moscow were making ready to invade the plains of the Vistula.

The diplomats, never in great haste to settle international problems, in the case of Memel had a thousand good reasons for postponing the solution. Some of them were economic. Although the territory of Memel at first sight seems to be of secondary importance, its geographic situation assigns it an important part in the commercial life of Eastern Europe. Controlling the lower part of the river Niemen, it affords access to the sea from the whole basin of that riverthat is to say, a hinterland of 192,000 kilometres and 9,000,000 people.

Before the war the chief commerce of Memel was in lumber from Lithuania and Poland. According to statistics of that time, commerce in lumber constituted 79 per cent of the total export, and reached about 1,000,000 cubic metres, of which Poland furnished 65 per cent, Lithuania 20 per cent, and Latvia, together with territories now forming a part of Russia, the remaining 15 per cent. Memel is joined to Poland by the river Niemen, its tributaries, and a whole system of canals. It is, moreover, closely linked with the railway system of Poland. One may say that the eastern districts of Poland depend economically on Me

Memel is obviously destined to become the centre of Polish commerce with the Baltic states. In view of the immense importance to her of reaching the sea by way of Memel, Poland demands that that port with its territory shall constitute a free and autonomous city under the protection of the chief Allied Powers. This arrangement, according to the ideas of Warsaw, would not be very definite. It would be established for a certain period with the express provision that Memel should never return to Germany, but would be susceptible to any modification by mutual agreement of the city itself, the Lithuanian Republic, and the Republic of Poland.

The Lithuanian Government at Kovno will have none of this combination. It demands the outright attachment of the territory of Memel to the Lithuanian Republic, basing its claims not on the text of the Treaty of Versailles, which is silent as to the ultimate fate of the city, but on the spirit of the Treaty, and above all on the reply made by the Allies to the protests of the German delegation. As we have already seen, in that reply the Allies insisted on separating Memel from Germany because it is Lithuania's only outlet to the sea. The Poles replied that when the Allied forces spoke of Lithuania they were not thinking of the present republic but of historic Lithuania as a geographic whole. To set up a free city at Memel would open the Baltic not merely to all portions of ancient Lithuania, but also to Poland, whose interests in this region have often been expressly recognized. And they insisted that we have here the real the spirit of the Treaty of Versailles.

Is it really necessary to involve the territory of Memel in the complications

Lithuania and Poland by making it a part of the Lithuanian Republic? It seems necessary to reply in the negative. Under the Interallied occupation the territory has enjoyed a period of peace and prosperity. The people of Memel have no war debts to pay. They are doing business and they are getting rich. Their port, thanks to dredging, building, and new construction, is becoming better and more important. They are so keenly conscious of the advantages of their present situation that recently the members of the Directorate besought the intervention of the High Commissioner to induce the Allies to keep them under their protection. However, last November a delegation from Memel requested the Conference of Ambassadors to set up a free city under the protection of the Great Powers, and with special port privileges for Lithuania and Poland.

Incorporation with the Lithuanian Republic would give no special advantage to Memel. There is agriculture enough in the territory to enable its inhabitants to live from the product of their fields, and even to export cereals in good years. The profitable lumber trade, reduced though it is to-day, enables the Administration to levy taxes enough to balance the budget. Memel needs nothing but coal, chemical fertilizer, salt and sugar, fabrics and tin. As for natural products or manufactures that Lithuania does not furnish for herself, these can readily be procured in Poland, and a commercial agreement with that country has been signed and has just come into force. Moreover, attachment to the Lithuanian Republic, which is quite without advantages, presents grave inconveniences, notable among them a disguised reannexation to Germany. The Government of Kovno

has a party which is closely linked with Berlin, and which acts according to instructions received from there. If one had any doubts on this subject, the various phases of the present adventure of Lithuania in Memel would be enough to end them.

One of the main errors committed by the statesmen in charge of executing the provisions of the Treaty lay in believing that the most crucial problems of the Treaty of Versailles could be put off indefinitely. When you are going to cut and slash in the living flesh of peoples, you must operate swiftly and with decision. Delays, hesitation, temporary measures, stir up fever. One can understand why the Conference of Ambassadors did not think the time opportune for final adjustment of the question of Memel in the very beginning. They had the excuse of waiting until Northeastern Europe settled down. But when this state of affairs was slow in coming, the Conference ought to have had the courage to make a decision and show its determination to have that decision respected. What it ought not to have done was to put off the solution for three years and give Germany an opportunity to embitter the disagreement between Poland and Lithuania, then exploit it and once more sabotage the Treaty of Versailles.

The Conference of Ambassadors had already discussed the question of Memel on two occasions, once in the month of June and again in the month of November, 1922, in the presence of delegates from Memel, Poland, and Lithuania, who had presented the claims of their respective Governments. The Conference was getting ready to take up this decision and reach a solution at last when the Lithuanian coup of January 10 took place. Let us observe in passing that it exactly coincided with the entry of our troops into

the Ruhr. The preparations for this invasion were worked out at Kovno in the month of November by an organization of Lithuanian guerillas, at whose head was Colonel Polovinskis, Chief of the Second Bureau of the Lithuanian General Staff, the same colonel who, under the pseudonym of Budrys, took command of the activities against Memel with a number of former German officers who had settled in the Lithuanian capital. As for the pretended volunteers who took part in the expedition, they consisted mainly of Lithuanian regular troops disguised in civilian clothes.

There was nothing heroic about the 'operations.' Before entering the territory the invaders scattered a proclamation dated January 9, signed by a socalled Committee of Safety of 'Lesser Lithuania' and addressed to the officers and soldiers of France. They urged our little band of chasseurs-alpins 'not to raise a hand against the strength of the national will.' Colonel Budrys's bands, from two to three thousand strong, crossed the frontier without any resistance, occupied the towns of Pogegen and Heydekrug, and, when the local police yielded without a struggle, reached the gates of Memel, where the little French garrison received orders to take defensive meas

ures.

At the first news of the invasion, M. Petisné, the High Commissioner, appealed to the cool-headedness of the population, protested against the violation of the territory entrusted to him, and declared that he would not give up the port. However, on the tenth of January, in conformity with instructions received from the Conference of Ambassadors, the representatives of France and Great Britain at Kovno urged the Lithuanian Government to set a guard on its frontier and keep armed bands from crossing into