11 APRIL 1925, Page 3

of the General Council of the British Trade Union Congress.

We wish they were not. Their aim in life is to make trouble, whether by substituting revolutionary action generally for evolution, or in smaller matters of tactics : and we suspect that they have among them very much nimbler and more unscrupulous wits than are possessed by the British who confer with them. They will revel in the tangle of circumstances. The Amsterdam International Federation has refused to grant affiliation to the Russians until they ask for it and give satisfactory assurances of good behaviour. The British are now conferring with the Russians to find out how to remove the difficulties in the way of Russian affiliation to Amster- dam. They have no leave from Amsterdam to do any- thing of the kind, and there seems to be no good reason why they should offer themselves as catspaws. Further, it is uncertain whether such action was contemplated or authorized by the Trade Union Congress at Hull. These Russians are likely to cause trouble for the British at Amsterdam and possibly in their own Trade Union ranks at home. Intrigue is. what they love : on mischief- making they thrive, and we do not like to see our country- men made into their tools.