28 DECEMBER 1918, Page 2

Spain has at last decided that the friendship of the

Allies is worth cultivating. The new Liberal Premier, Count Romanones, has invited the German Ambassador with his crew of spice and mischief- makers to leave Spain, and has paid a flying visit to President Wilson and M. Clemenceau in Paris. According to the Magni, Count Romanones said that "Spain stands by her deltas in Morocco, but it is her desire to avoid any possibility of differences with France." It may be hoped that the vexed question of the Spanish sphere in Northern Morocco will now be settled amioably. During the war this territory, including the neighbourhood of Tangier, has been the happy hunting-ground of German agents, liberally eupplied with money and munitions, who organized native raids into French Morocco. The Spanish authorities would not or could not do anything to check this abuse of their neutrality, but were only solicitous to prevent the French troops from pursuing the Germans' Moorish allies across the border of what is nominally a Spanish protectorate. It is clear that Spain should either police this region effectively or abandon her pretensions. The French have been very patient, but their patience has its limits.