That this has great compensating advantages we shall also see, but for
the moment we are taking the disadvantages separately, and, so
counting them one by one, we must recognize that England's being an
island (her social structure industrialized and free from
conscription, her interests not only those of Europe but those of such
a commercial scattered empire as is always characteristic of secure
maritime Powers) produces, in several of its aspects, a geographical
weakness to the Allied position, and that for several reasons, which I
will now tabulate:--

(_a_) The position of England in the past, her very security as an
island, has led her to reject the conception of universal service. She
could only, at the outset of hostilities, provide a small
Expeditionary Force, the equivalent at the most of a thirtieth of the
Allied forces.

(_b_) Her reserves in men who could approach the continental field in,
say, the first year, even under the most vigorous efforts, would never
reach anything like the numbers that could be afforded by a conscript
nation. The very maximum that can be or is hoped for by the most
sanguine is the putting into the field, after at least a year of war,
of less than three-sixteenths of the total Allied forces, although her
population is larger than that of France, and more than a third that
of the enemy.

(_c_) She is compelled to garrison and defend, and in places to
police, dependencies the population of which will in some cases
furnish no addition to the forces of the Allies, and in all cases
furnish but a small proportion.