scientific. As now understood, the blockade is enforced only against
vessels belonging to the "quasi-enemy," and even such vessels, when
arrested, are not confiscated, but merely detained till the blockade is
raised. International law does not stand still; and having some
acquaintance with Continental opinion on the topic under consideration,
I read with amazement "M.'s" assertion that "the majority in number,"
"the most weighty in authority" of the writers on international law
"have never failed to protest against such practices as indefensible in
principle." The fact is that the objections made by, e.g. Lord
Palmerston in 1846, and by several writers of textbooks, to pacific
blockade, had reference to the abuses connected with the earlier stages
of its development. As directed only against the ships of the
"quasi-enemy," it has received the substantially unanimous approbation
of the Institut de Droit International at Heidelberg in 1887, after a
very interesting debate, in which the advocates of the practice were led
by M. Perels, of the Prussian Admiralty, and its detractors by Professor
Geffken. It is true that in an early edition of his work upon
international law my lamented friend, Mr. Hall, did use the words
attributed to him by "M.": "It is difficult to see how a pacific
blockade is justifiable." But many things, notably Lord Granville's
correspondence with France in 1884 and the blockade of the Greek coast
in 1886, have occurred since those words were written. If "M." will turn
to a later edition of the work in question he will see that Mr. Hall had
completely altered his opinion on the subject, or rather that, having
disapproved of the practice as unreformed, he blesses it altogether in
its later development. With reference to the utility of the practice, I
should like to call the attention of "M." to a passage in the latest
edition of Hall's book which is perhaps not irrelevant to current
politics:--