13 APRIL 1901, Page 16

- . April 66, you may care to recall some

words of C. H. Pearson, "National-Life'and Character," pp. 104-5' (second edition, 1894) "Nowhere in the world has the struggle for existen ce been so fierce as in Great Britain ; and it has been the mainspring of English energy.. In the sixteenth century Meteren declared that Englishmen were as lazy as Spaniards. They were, in fact, like the Spaniards of that time, ready for adventure, able to endure great hardships, unsurpassable explorers and privateers, hut indisposed to the plodding industry for which Germane and Flemings were conspicuous."

C. H. Pearson adds in a footnote :— "It must be borne in mind that the ploughman was scarce in times like the sixteenth century, when mist of the land was in pasture, and that we owe our manufactures to Flemish settlers. The two classes most distinguished for steady toil were there- fore scantily represented."

—I am, Sir, &c.,