street in old Japan, a-throng with the dainty, tiny women, as harmonious in their mingling as irised wood-doves, you can but honor the wee woman-ghost for her unselfishness as you delight in the artistry of her hands.

It is the key-note of this East, you will come to believe, as you know it better, the infallible rhythm of it. It has learned to smile and to accept. It does not strive and argue; it falls into step graciously, leisurely, unprotestingly, not in indolence, for indolence is not of the East; she is poor, and the poor do not buy bread with indolence, even a little bread, she falls into step because it is better so. She has come to know, at the end of the years, that some things are "written," and the mere beating of wings does not unwrite them. So she studies their rhythm, and then swings into step beside them, not always with progress and advancement, for those things have swung but newly into her ken, but with the old, big, simple

the knack of rhythm,-bolts of heavy silk, pieces of ponderous, carved teak furniture, bunches of green bananas, water in earthen carrying-jars, and the main concern of the lean, bare yellow bodies, writhing with sculptured sinew, is to keep in perfect rhythm with the mighty swinging burden; to measure the steady dog-trot and time the yielding of shoulder and torsion of body to meet exactly the swing of the load. And so they pad by, steady, rhythmical, unconcerned, picking their intricate way among tangled traffic, threading the narrow, rickshaw-swarming thoroughfares, crying their harsh, palateless warning to the too leisurely passer-by, and never once breaking that swinging miracle of step that makes the burden possible.

Nor is it only in Japan and China that you will find this thing-this yielding to that which is written, and smiling while one yields. Here among the little brown island people of the Philippines you will see it, too-something of that gracious

your almsgiving shall take, and flinging his subsequent contempt into the teeth of your gift-horse? Does he shuffle and whine, like your Neapolitan, until you buy release from his importunities? Does he uncover his infirmities as he would in Palestine, or cry his woes like an Indian Pariah? Not the small brown artist of the Orient, be he Chinese, Filipino, or indeterminate mestizo. He studies the scene like a master stage-setter, and fits in his part with taste unerring. Sit on your porch some morning and wait for himhe will come, never fear!-in his tattered brown rags and his palmleaf hat, and the little wizen, brown face looking out from between them, as old as his East herself, and chiseled and lined as whimsically as the faces of the ivory chessmen that the Chinese carvers make. He stops a moment on the lowest step and looks up at you, seated in the cool, shaded seclusion above him. There are flowers about you, orchids, perhaps, swinging under the

need not improvise; it is with him in the substance, and he lays it softly on the ground, and, reaching into his adjustable Oriental temperament as into a theatrical wardrobe, he draws about his little ragged shoulders as fine a cloak of reverence as ever swept the shrine at Kamakura. On the top step he kneels, lifting his small brown face to you earnestly, not twisted with a whining bid for pity, or covered with a hastily donned mask of specious misery, but serious, gentle-simply the face of a pilgrim who prays. And does he suggest what you shall give? Does he pour out a tale of revolting ailment or a story of sordid need? He does not, being an artist after his kind.

"Soy pobre, Señora," is what he says steadily, confidently, with a ripple of beauty under the soft Spanish syllables"I am poor, Señora." Only that, as harmonious a prayer as ever graced a shrine, compounded subtly, as it is, of dignity, modesty, craftsmanship, and flattery-a

flattery the more potent by far for its hidden intent. "I am poor, Señora, therefore you who are rich and benevolent will help me with no further urging. I do not suggest the manner of your help, Señora, for you are all-wise, all-seeing. I kneel waiting, I smile toward you, confident." So it reads, being interpreted. And he lays softly before you his battered hat-crown down, to be sure, but what of that?-and his little canvas bag of broken rice.

And when you have given, is there the ungracious Occidental appraisement of your gift, or is there any touch of abasement, any travesty of unworthiness or exaggerated gratitude? No, of a surety. It is received with eyes that are raised to yours before they are lowered to your offering. The gentle "Gracias, Señora,"

and the silver sibilance of Spanish blessing, seem first for the giving, and afterward for the gift. A moment more, even, he kneels, that you may know he does not hasten from you, having taken bounty at your hands.

And then, as you watch him going gently down the dusty, sun-white road, you are somehow not quite sure which one it was that gave and which received in that little tableau staged so finely; not quite sure but that it well might profit you yourself, should you seek out some shrine of many steps, and there betake you, in all your Western ungraciousness and rhythmless haste, all your unleisure of heart and unfaith of spirit, to say with your little Eastern brother of the road, "Pobresoy muy pobre!"

tries of raw materials by conserving for themselves "their natural resources" and establishing "special arrangements to facilitate the interchange of these resources." The commerce of the "enemy powers" was to be submitted to "special treatment," and their goods-let us not forget that this is to be after peace has been signedwere to be subjected "either to prohibitions or to a special régime of an effective character." "Special conditions" were also to be imposed on Teuton ships; more "navigation laws," we may suppose. As if these restrictions were not enough to remind us of the fiercest days of trade conflict in former centuries, we have revived the practice of excluding foreigners from all retail trade in the medieval town; the subjects of the Central powers were to be prevented from exercising in the countries of the Allies "industries or professions which concern national defense or economic independence."

This economic alliance was not, according to the resolutions, to be temporary. In the spirit of exclusive nationalism the Allies decided "to take the necessary steps without delay to render themselves independent of enemy countries in so far as regards raw materials and manufactured articles essential to the normal development of their economic activities." This self-sufficiency was to be achieved by subsidies, enterprises controlled by government, scientific and technical research, customs duties, and "prohibitions of a temporary or permanent character."

The Paris resolutions proclaimed Germany a people with whom the Allies would have no dealings. But what kind of peace can that be in which the Allies are grouped in one economic camp and their enemies in another?

MITTEL-EUROPA

The union of Central Europe presents a more comprehensive proposal for a trade war after the war than do the Paris resolutions. There exists in this grouping of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey, and captured territory under the

control of Prussia, made effective by preferential customs duties, loans, transportation control, and all the other subtle means of economic penetration, an alliance organizing all of the worst features of combative nationalism. Given an opportunity, this greater Prussia will be as unscrupulous and as ruthless in its use of discriminations, prohibitions, and boycotts as it has been in its military operations. "Middle Europe," as conceived by the Pan-Germans, is an actual fact, made doubly dangerous by the breaking up of Russia, and it to-day menaces the peace of the future world. If it is permitted to remain, dominated by the brutal military power of Prussia, the world can not expect a durable peace.

A VOICE FROM THE PAST

In a time like the present, when all relations of men and nations have been thrown into the melting-pot of war, the experiences of the past are frequently a valuable warning as to what to avoid, as well as a safe guide to the next step forward. When men began to seek a way out of the chaos of the Middle Ages, progress centered about towns or city states. Despite their narrowly exclusive policies, -their market dues, their tolls, their selfish attitude toward foreigners, their conflict with the surrounding country,-these were an advance in both political and economic life over the decaying feudal society about them. Town life was a stimulus to freedom. Only when economic needs outgrew the narrow confines of the towns did their policies become obstacles in the way of development. On the continent of Europe the district under the rule of a prince began gradually to construct for the larger area a political and economic system such as the town had had in its sphere. Its authority became the arbiter between town and town and town and country. Within its confines it made trade freer, unified currency, and modified the local restrictions on industry. But while it was transforming and unifying its life at the expense of the towns, it