Few Englishmen could stand much of an examination on American
history, and even in his audience of Pilgrims there were pretty cer- tainly some' whom Mr. Marshall's catalogue of Anglo-American dis- putes carried out of their depths. The War of Independence, of course, is matter of common knowledge. So, on the whole, is the war of 1812, though it is not commonly realised that if the submarine cable had existed then there would have been no war, since the British Orders in Council, which formed the chief casus bell, were withdrawn two days before hostilities began. But the annexation of Texas controversy, the Oregon boundary dispute, the Behring Sea sealing conflict, the Alabama affair and other clashes during the Civil War, the Venezuela frontier question and President Cleveland's provocative declaration—all this belongs for the average educated Englishman pretty much to the fog-zone of history. It is all to the good if Mr. Marshall sets us enquiring.
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