[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—If " there is
nothing incompatible between 100 per cent. enthusiasm for the British Commonwealth and 100 per cent. enthusiasm for the League " (Spectator, May 23rd, page 810), then, enthusiasm being the same genre—viz., political— in either case, the two propositions are identical, which is obviously fallacious. A fifty-fifty ratio is the only- logical alternative by such reasoning ; but such a principle would not be fair to the Empire which has the flesh and blood claims of a mother as against the purely diplomatic claims of a mother- in-law.
British is as British does, and a preferential fostering of Empire relationships should in nowise provoke the -hostility of foreign powers, who have their own Empires to look after, and make no beating about the bush in doing so. Neither should it preclude adequate co-operation with the League in a common endeavour to establish a freemasonry of nations, but rather institute an example and precedent which might be advantageously pondered and compared.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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