[To THE EDITOR or THE "SPECTATOR...1 SIR, — The Spectator has always
proved well able to take care of itself, and you have already given a very adequate reply to the extravagant charge of Mr. Trevelyan that you have for years past "been engaged in the task of preaching British decadence to the world." There are, however, some things which perhaps are more easily added by a third person than spoken by yourself. As a constant reader of the Spectator for many years, I should like to say that the charge that you have persistently " crabbed " the national Services, and that you " have urged civil war in a part of the King's dominions and done your best to convince all and sundry of its justice, certainty, and imminence," is simply the idle and ont-of-date repetition of what the facts themselves have proved to be absurd. The first charge of "crabbing" the national Services is exactly that which was made so ignorantly and cruelly against Lord Roberts when he pointed out that the Regular Army was insufficient in numbers, and that the Territorial Army was also insufficient in numbers, and, further, was insufficiently trained, and could not be employed immediately upon the out- break of war. Have not the facts shown that this was absolutely true, and is not every one saying it to-day, except Lord Roberts himself? As to "urging civil war" and pronouncing it to be "imminent," does any one doubt that it was imminent? Did not the Prime Minister himself endorse the statement that some of the most responsible and sober- minded people in the country thought it was, and go on to include himself among the number F—I am, Sir, &c., A CONSTANT READER.
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