The Daily News. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1915. SURPRISES OF THE WAR.

Taranaki Daily News, 14 December 1915, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1915. SURPRISES OF THE WAR.

Lord Rosebery is one of the few speakers in the front rank in Britain who, while keen and incisive, adorns his.utterances with interesting and apt idi*s. In speaking at Edinburgh lie took for the subject of his address the surprises of the war, limiting the number to two— Britain's surprise and that of Germany. His description of Germany's surprise is full of reality, and almost pathetic. He pictures the simple-hearted and trusting English people being easily hoodwinked by German smiles and Judas kisses, and overcome with professions of fraternal amity, while all the time Germany was plottifig a war which meant the ruin and devastation of the earth. With a lightness of touch, but with an intense undercurrent of feeling, Lord Hosebery gave a graphic sketch of dermany's surprise, which has upset all ber calculations.,"" She sent spies and emissaries everywhere—to India, Egypt, Canada, and Australasia, and every other place where she thought strife could be fomented, in the hope that the British Empire would have its hands full to overflowing with internal troubles that would need its full military strength to cope with. But what, he asks, was the result? Instead of trouble there was whole-hearted sympathy and co-operation. As.by a common impulse, J as soon as war was declared the units of the Empire rushed to the assistance of the Motherland, enabling her to confront any danger and proclaiming to the world that the British Empire was a fact with which the univeTse had got to deai. Both these surprises were unpleasant, but Germany certainly got the worst of the deal. Lord Rosebery might well have mentioned a third surprise—the British navy. If the German nation lias been misled over the unity of the British Empire and the intense patriotism of its people of all races and creeds, she has simply been fooled to the brink of her own undoing in relation to the position on the seas, which has led to the loss of her colonies. It may suit the purpose of the German authorities to boast that their fleet is ready for action night and day, and that the tireless and gallant officers are sleeplessly watching for and making ready to engage the enemy. It should almost move the German Chancellor to further tears at the thought of all bis gallant naval officers and seamen pining almost a year and a quarter for the opportunity of sending the British fleet to the bottom of the sea. We can spare for them a portion of pity, if only because they are practically prisoners, for the German fleet, which cost the country some three hundred millions sterling, is locked up in the Kiel Canal and Baltic behind booms and mine-fields, while German shipping is lying idle, empty, and rusting in its own ports or those of neutrals. To all intents and purposes, so far as warfare is concerned, the submarines are the only portion of Germany's naval power that is of service, and her losses of these piratical craft have been very considerable. They worthily represent German methods —espionage, intrigue, bribery, and barbaric cruelty and cunning—the product of that spurious intellectualism wlricli, under the guise of Kultur, regards mankind—other than of Teutonic origin —as noxious vermin. The final surprise has yet to come. The tremendous strain and terrible losses from which she is suffering have worn down her stupendous reserve forces, while the Allies are only rising to their full strength. It is when the final struggle goes against her that Germany's greatest surprise will arrive, and it will surely come.