23 JUNE 1917, Page 2

This interference was, of course, through no wish of the

British people or arbitrary action of our Government. It was solely due to the fact that unless we interfered with neutral trade we could not exercise pressure upon Germany, pressure which at the beginning of the war and till half-way through was almost the only effective weapon which we possessed. It is nonsense to say that the American merchants and manufacturers endured our interference beeause they were making money. Nothing could be further from the truth than such .a statement applied to the shippers and exporters to Europe. They endured it -because -they believed in our cause, because they weret-for4sightedrehough'te see that the Germain:8'441k- about- thi,

freedom of the seas was a compound of falsehood and sophistry, and because they realized that the British Government, though arbitrary in their immediate acts, were fighting not only for their own national life, but for liberty in the widest sense.