A HEART TO HEART TALK.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1561, 8 June 1916, Page 4

A HEART TO HEART TALK.

WITH THE KAISER

Horatio Bottomley, editor of the Clarion, in a heart to heart talk with the Kaiser, says : —“Twenty months of war have passed away since by your infamous conduct the world was plunged into the agony of war. In this pei’iod you have witnessed the complete failure of your scheme. At this moment there is not a military expert in the world who believes that victory can ultimately fall to your army. This is the central fact of the situation ; in nearly two years of desperate fighting, the physical bravery of your troops —which more than once has won the generous admiration of their foes —has failed to achieve a single item of your cherished programme. In the east the armies of Russia are unbroken, in the west your forces are held in check behind an invincible line of triple steel; Paris is safe, and Calais is beyond your grasp ; Dover smiles at your failure ; the coasts of Britain defy you. Successive orgiesof Teutonic “frightfulness” leavefcus unmoved save to righteous anger and sterner determination. Meanwhile your fleet, the pet child of your ambition, skulks in hiding, cowed without a conquest, beaten with a scifrc of a skirmish. Our seamen rove the ocean to their pleasure, vainly scanning the horizon for a glimpse of your flag. Your submarines have failed to retrieve the fortunes of your great navy while the industrial and economic life of your people gasps in the grip of maratime blockade. Abroad your proud dream of Colonial Empire is a thing of dust and ashes. Only in the fl<?ld of diplomacy can you point to any fungible success, and “diplomacy” and duplicity in the German language tire one. Bulgaria has turned traitor at your bidding, Greece cringes before your frown, and in the Balkans, as in Belgium, and in Asia Minor, you have succeeded in establishing a reign of terror. But the end is not yet —or there ; accept this axiom. The resources of the British Empire —are inexhaustible. This is not hyperbole, it is economic fact. Your professors can confirm it, your men of commerce know it ; it is a demonstratable truth, and I make you a present of it. The British Empire has been put to the test, and has not been found wanting.