sketch of the past relations of the two countries to an end. I have
written this book because I wish, once and for all, to be done with my
friend Professor Whirlwind of Prussia, who has long despaired of really
defending his own country, and has fallen back upon abusing mine. He has
dropped, amid general derision, his attempt to call a thing right when
even the Chancellor who did it called it wrong. But he has an idea that
if he can show that somebody from England somewhere did another wrong,
the two wrongs may make a right. Against the cry of the Roman Catholic
Poles the Prussian has never done, or even pretended to do, anything but
harden his heart; but he has (such are the lovable inconsistencies of
human nature) a warm corner in his heart for the Roman Catholic Irish.
He has not a word to say for himself about the campaign in Belgium, but
he still has many wise, reproachful words to utter about the campaign in
South Africa. I propose to take those words out of his mouth. I will
have nothing to do with the fatuous front-bench pretensions that our
governors always govern well, that our statesmen are never whitewashed
and never in need of whitewash. The only moral superiority I claim is
that of not defending the indefensible. I most earnestly urge my
countrymen not to hide behind thin official excuses, which the sister
kingdoms and the subject races can easily see through. We can confess
that our crimes have been as mountains, and still not be afraid of the
present comparison. There may be, in the eyes of some, a risk in
dwelling in this dark hour on our failures in the past: I believe
profoundly that the risk is all the other way. I believe that the most
deadly danger to our arms to-day lies in any whiff of that self-praise,
any flavour of that moral cowardice, any glimpse of that impudent and
ultimate impenitence, that may make one Boer or Scot or Welshman or
Irishman or Indian feel that he is only smoothing the path for a second
Prussia. I have passed the great part of my life in criticising and
condemning the existing rulers and institutions of my country: I think