THE UNSEEN BOND.

SOME say that American sympathy with the Allies-is stronger than it_was ; others say that it is weaker. For ourselves, we do not, muds mind what people say, for so long as the Allies do nothing to forfeit esteem in their conduct of the war-the sympathy of the great majority of Americans is bound"to be with us. It can fail us only if we estrange those who are naturally and instinctively on our side. •There is an-unseen bond between us and all Americans who derive racially from Britain. This bond holds the majority of white Americans. It even holds many of those who, though not of British descent, are conscious of practising a scheme of life which is mainly Puritan in its motive and has been passed on from the earliest settlers. It is strange that so little, comparatively, has been said of this racial union between Americans and Englishmen—a union that transcends mere intellectual appreciation, and would probably survive even a certain degree of political condemnation— because we have heard much of racial sympathy with the -Germans. " Once a German always a German," is said in extenuation of Americans who have behaved as arch-traitors to their adopted country. We have not hitherto heard any one say in this war : "-Once an Englishman always an Englishman." Yet'that 'would be as true fundamentally of British-Americans as -it is of German-Americans, though of course sympathy would not be displayed in blowing up bridges and factories in the United States. But now a brilliant band of Americans of British' descent have said outright that the unseen bond of race does exist, that it is a powerful reality, that it is a thing to be recognized, and that it must necessarily govern the feelings of the majority of Americans.

The confession appears in a " John Bull Number " of Life, that very popular illustrated satirical journal, enjoying a. very large circulation among what wo might call the intellectual rich and the well-to-do professional classes throughout the Union. It is published in New York, but circulates throughout the American Continent. We have nothing in Britain to correspond to Life. It is like a mixture of Punch, of a serious weekly journal, and ofssomeother illustrated paper which indulges in more levity than we. should find in Punch. During the war the. editorial articles in Life have been -written with deep and strong feeling, and they- have reached the zenith of their sympathy with the Allies in- the article in the " John Bull Number." When the articles._ were full of unconventional turns of phrase, we liked them the better and thought them the more powerful. Sincere

feeling in undress is. always a compelling thing, as Lowell well knew when the passions of ,his soul surged out in dialect. We

know-that many of these articles were written by Mr. Edward S.

Martin, as they have since been reprinted in a volume reviewed in the Spectator of February 27th, 1915. Whether or not the

latest article was written by him we do not know, but it is characteristic, and if (being judges in our own cause) we may venture to say so, worthy of him. The article says that a

complaint has -been made against President Wilson that he is " practically an Englishman "—that is to say, he speaks English, thinks in English, and is of British descent. " Fifty or sixty. millions of the present inhabitants of this country," says the- writer, " are open to the same objection." The writer admits that it is a hundred and fifty years since it was openly popular in America to be " practically English." A trouble that happened when America " set tip housekeeping "—a pleasant Nam for the Revolutionary War—made it necessary for the Americans of the day to emphasize the fact that they were sod Englishmen. In the middle of the last century, again, the great Irish immigration sharpened the point of American dislike and

•

mistrust of England. There were many other reasons and incidents which prevented Americans from being " too great admirers or lovers of their blood brethren." But—here comes the confession—" nature is not to be balked by mere politics":— "Race is race, though seas divide and interests conflict. Quarrels heat the blood, but do not change it. Jew is Jew, German is German,

Irishman is Irishman, and what is born English lives English, as a rule, on whatever soil and under whatever flag. A crisis, a shiver

up the back, and you know what was born in you and who at the pinch is with you and you with him. In spite of all jealousies and rivalries, the ties between the British Isles and these States have growneloser and closer as the distance between them has diminished. Literature has constantly fed and intermarriage strengthened them. Out in Samoa in a hurricane the cheers of American seamen on the stranded Trenton reached gratefully to the British Calliope, struggling past to the open sea, and American blood ran warmer at the story. A little later, in Manila Bay, we found a friend. Things have gone better between the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes since '98. The backbone of the United States is made of precisely the same materials as the backbone of the British Empire. It is English, Scotch, and Irish. The language, literature and political ideals of . the United States arc of the same derivation. That is why in this world-crisis we have seen things as we have. It has not been that the British propaganda has captured us. It has been that, with the minds we have, we could not see the case otherwise than we have seen it. We have been for the Allies because we were born so ; born to the faith that is in them and to faith in them who hold that faith ; born to the duty which they have accepted—to keep liberty alive in the world and maintain it against the domination of calcu- lated and machine-made efficiency. To us of the English stock the Great War seems to bring a summons to wear our English derivation with somewhat more assertion. The Irish love Ireland openly and are not expected to apologize ; American Scots show an open kind- ness for Scotland ; Germans love their -fatherland under any sun. Is it Only to be England that men sprung from her loins may not care for ? Who says that ? Surely not we whose English derivation is all the root we have, who arc lawful heirs of a tradition and litera- ture the greatest, all counted, since Rome and Greece. We have been too modest. Poll us in these States and we are a greater company by much than all the rest, the longest planted here, and surely not the least powerful or least worthy. Who is the anchor at the end of the Allies rope in the great tug-of-war ? Who but -our blood-cousin, John Bull ! There he stands, with planted feet, sweating and sore beset ; his muscles lame, but holding on. , Hold on, John Bull, hold on ! There are those across the seas who care for you ; who hold with you now in daylight and in dark so far as yet they may, and will gladly hold with you in face of all comers when Fate permits it. Hold on, John Bull !"

It is impossible to road these words without a thrill of gratitude and pride in the sense of union. We know that it is real.- "Propaganda" may go hang so long as the unseen bond is there. Kinship counts for something, indeed for infinitely much, after all. It may slumber when profound peace makes couainly jars seem not too dangerous. But it means deep down a common way of looking at life. So now ! We find ourselves in such circumstances as those when the American naval officer rushed to the rescue of British seamen in a Chinese war, although his country was not at war with China, or when Sir Edward Seymour .threatened to interpose his ships between Admiral Dewey's Fleet in Manila Bay and the ships of the interfering German Admiral. We do not assert that we are model cousins. We simply respond heartily to the desertion that we are cousins. When we find the relationship acknowledged in adversity (of all times), there can be no doubt that it is a real and valuable tie. As says an Arab proverb, " I and my cousin quarrel ; but it is I and my cousin against the world." As for any appre- ciation of our political faith and methods that may be added to the sense of kinship, we shall be satisfied if it goes no further than in some verses by Mr. Bertrand Shadwell which arc already familiar to our readers :-

" I've been meditating lately that, when everything is told,

There's something in the English after ail : They may be too bent on conquest and too eager after gold, But there's something in the English after all ;

Thotigh their sins and faults are many, and I wont exhaust my breath

By endeavouring to tell you of them all.

Yet they have a sense of duty, and they'll face it to the death,

So there's something in the English after all."

There is much else in the "John Bull Number" of Life that we should like to quoie. We can give only a few extracts. Here is a verse from a poem entitled " A Prayer of the English " :- " We drew the swordbut not for selfish gain—

That we might keep our faith, and help the weak. Wherefore, 0 Lord, have pity on our pain ; We listen. Speak." -

Here again, in a homely vein, is an acknowledgment of certain domestic blessings duo to British fashion :-

"Germany invented sausage,

And Jamaica gave us rum, France discovered wine and logic, And the U. S. chewing-gum ; But of all recorded blessings In the land of Stars and Stripes

Three there are we owe to England—

Beef and beer and briar pipes ! "

The following verses occur in a poem called "To an Old Friend "

"Together, John, a thousand years And seven hundred more ; Apart, the merest wink of time — Say, six or seven score. Together, blended, cradled, schooled, Tempered and tried and taught ; Apart, by kindred methods ruled And close in trade and thought — We're not so vary separate, John ! Lo, there, our northern shore !

No need to guard what vast expanse Your triple cross floats o'er !

Squabble we may—a passing whim—But when the call is Who

Lines up with us and we with him ? ' Our choice, John Bull, is you !"

And our American sympathizers evidently do not believe for a moment that we are going to fail in this war. They know that we shall worry through, or even bungle through. Possibly they have at last fathomed the depths of our national habit, or vice, of self-depreciation. In a dialogue called "Fear and Faith," and supposed to take place in England, a servant, John, explains to Sarah, the cook, that his master's despondency about the war must be due to indigestion, as there is no other traceable reason for it :-

" JOHN (indignantly) : Master's gone an' et more o' that curried

mutton at 'is club ; 'e's goin on somethink awful abaht old Heagland bein done up.

SARAH (contemptuously): Old Hengland bein done up ? Not

likely !

JOHN (with enthuuiasm) : That's wot I scz : Not likely ! SARAH (impre-ysteely) : Done up ! Lumme ; 'e'll be 'aviii` the

Bank smashed next. If old Kitchener 'eard 'im grousin like that, 'e'd give him wot for. Joins (admiringly) : That 'e would, mate ; an"e'd say, "Ere ! Don't you eat no more o that curry.' "

Our last quotation is a simple and touching adaptation of

Burns's "John Anderson, My Jo," by Mr. Arthur Guiterman :—

"John Bullikins, my jo, John,

We've known each other long.

I've sometimes thought you right, John, And often thought you wrong. We've had our little tiffs, John ; Yet, whether friend or foe, I've nursed a high regard for you, John Bullikins, my jo.

John Bullikins, my jo, John, When all is said and done, A better friend than you, John, Is not beneath the sun.

You've planted noble realms, John, Where men may freely grow ; I wouldn't lose you for the world, John Bullikins, my jo.

John Bullikins, my jo, John, What bunglers we have been !-

For I'm a bungler, too, John,—

Which makes us closer kin.

We'll somehow blunder through, John I Then humbly we will go To school together, hand-in-hand, John Bullikins, my jo."

To talk of thanks to the gallant and generous band of poets and prose writers who have put their hearts, in tears, laughter, and sound sense, in the "John Bull Number" would ho a gross and vulgar error. Yet may not an Englishman who has been

deeply moved by Life's new number, and read it with a very big lump indeed in his throat, be allowed to send them a message which they will value much more than thanks ? Let them remember that Byron's words express the nation's true mood to-day :-

" Here's a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And whatever sky's above me, Here's a heart for every fate."