FRANCE AND THE WAR. [To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIR,—I read in the Spectator of December 16th that "the French shriek with exultation, and seem really to believe that the hour of downfall for their 'hereditary enemy' has at last arrived." May it not be asked if this is not a rather sweeping assertion, and somewhat unjust ? For, while it is true that the Nationalist Press is exulting over the recent British reverses in South Africa, the French are not all Anglophobes. On the contrary, many of the most respectable newspapers, and the most widely circulated, maintain an impartial attitude in their appreciation of the military situa- tion in the Transvaal. Indeed, some of the best Paris news- papers have repudiated the attacks made upon England during the present war by their contemporaries. Two at least, Le Siècle and L'Aurcore, have bravely taken up the cudgels in defence of the British. In the Si&le of December 20th Monsieur Yves Gayot, in a carefully written article, explains to his readers the exact position of the British Government in relation to the Boers. He tells them the truth concerning the Conventions of 1881 and 1884; he refutes the accusations of his Bulletin des Hanes, and ends by saying: —" Les Anglais pratiquent la politique de la porte ouverte us n'essaient pas de fermer leurs colonies aux etrangers. C'est leur sup6riorite sur lea autres peuples. Dana l'affaire du Transvaal, ce swat des interets intenaationaux qu'ile de- fendent. Evidemment en France et en Allerna,gne, lea hommes perspicaces le savant et le comprennent; male, pen osent le dire." It would be hard to find a more equitable recognition of the merits of the cause, even amongst English journalists. In reading the French papers it would be well not to overlook the fact that the attacks come from those very newspapers which were most unscrupulous in persecut- ing Captain Dreyfus ; whereas those which defended the late prisoner of Devil's Island are just those which are at the present moment dealing fairly with England and upholding her policy. Is not this significant P—I am, Sir, &c.,
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