The Pall Mall Gazette of Wednesday is very angry with
the Duke of Westminster because in a letter to the Grosvenor House Committee he says that he regrets and deplores deeply the German Emperor's acceptance "of the hospitality of a Monarch who by a series of crimes unparalleled in history had placed himself outside the pale of civilisation." We cannot at all agree with our contemporary in censuring the Duke of Westminster for using these words. The German Emperor is fond of proclaiming himself a Christian Sovereign, and has lately been kneeling at the places venerated as holy by the Greeks, the Latins, and the Armenians, and the rest of the Christian Churches, and yet he has not hesitated to support by his policy, and to express his personal devotion and goodwill for, the ruler who certainly allowed, and probably suggested, the massacre
o f the Armenian Christians. We are glad, then, that the Duke of Westminster has strongly expressed what thousands
o f Englishmen are feeling. The Pall Mall suggests that it is not wise to annoy a ruler with whom we may be glad to co-operate, but we may depend upon it that the German Emperor will only be our ally if he thinks it will be to the interest of Germany, and not because we treat him as above criticism. If the muzzling of public opinion is to be the price of an alliance with Germany, we much prefer isolation. But in reality there is no such alternative. Germany and England will act together when both States think it worth their while, and on no other condition.
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