FRANCE AND ENGLAND.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXX, Issue 28, 19 September 1914, Page 4

FRANCE AND ENGLAND.

Tvvice since this most dramatic war began, M. Hanotaux has attracted attention by his enthusiastic laudation of England, and the part she : s playing in the defence of France, says a writer in the Auckland “.Star, ’ j and continues: —Nothing could well [demonstrate more clearly the icIremarkable change that the mutual relations of France and England have undergone in recent years than M.j Hanotaux’s assumption of this particular role. For M. Hanotaux was Foreign Minister of France in the days when the mere mention of “Fashoda” or “March and” was enough to arouse a French audience to furious demonstrations of wrath against England and her Imperialism. M. Hanotaux is not only a distinguished historian and man of letters, he is a far-seeing statesman; and after the fall of Khartoum, when the Egyptian and British troops had been withdrawn from the Soudan, he urged French explorers and soldiers to penetrate into the Upper Nile valley for the purpose of taking possession of the territories that England seemed to nave abandoned for ever. But ill 1893 Omdurman was fought, and Kitchener had reoccnpied Khartoum. The Sirdar then learned that a body of French troops had already seized the upper reaches of the Nile, and had fired on a small British steamer. Proceeding to the locality, the Sirdar found that Lieutenant Marcliand, the leader of the French expedition, had hoisted the French flag, and claimed the surrounding country by right of occupation. Kitchener ran up the British flag, and issued an ultimatum to Marchand. The French Government was furious, and for some days there was imminent clanger of war between the two countries. There is ample evidence on record to prove that the Kaiser did his best to exasperate France, and to urge on the French Government to attack England. But happily M. Delcasse had just succeeded to power and his profound distrust of Germany and his strong determination to secure a friendly understanding with England, overbore his weaker colleagues. M. Hanotaux was no “Chauvinist,” hut it was only natural that he should resent the defeat of his cherished colonial projects, and, there is little doubt that if the French nation had followed his lead at the time war would have ensued. But the world has altered prodigiously since 1898, and to-day it is M. Hanotaux, who leads the chorus of praise and congratulation that greets England’s great achievements in the war. Assuredly we need no more conclude proof than this that Fashoda is forgotten, that the breach between the two nations is completely healed, >nd that France and England' stand side by side, united in a firm and enduring friendship that has already obliterated all the bitter memories of the past.