ours; because our island position, our international trade and our world-wide dominions demand that no other nation shall dare to challenge our supremacy.  That is why.  Oh, yes, the cost would be great, but we could raise it to-day all right, and we should get it back.

     If the struggle comes to-day, we shall win—­and after it is over,
     there will be abounding prosperity in the land, and no more labour
     unrest.

Yes, we have no fear of Germany to-day.  The only enemy we fear is the crack-brained fanatics who prate about peace and goodwill whilst foreign Dreadnoughts are gradually closing in upon us.  As Mr. Balfour said at the Eugenic Conference the other day, man is a wild animal; and there is no room, in present circumstances, for any tame ones.—­John Bull, Aug. 24, 1912.

The italics and large type are those of the original, not mine.  This paper explains, by the way, in this connection that “In the Chancelleries of Europe John Bull is regarded as a negligible journalistic quantity.  But John Bull is read by a million people every week, and that million not the least thoughtful and intelligent section of the community, they think about what they read.”

One of the million seems to have thought to some purpose, for the next week there was the following letter from him.  It was given the place of honour in a series and runs as follows:—­

I would have extended your “Down with the German Fleet!” to “Down with Germany and the Germans!” For, unless the whole ——­ lot are swept off the surface of the earth, there will be no peace.  If the people in England could only realise the quarrelsome, deceitful, underhanded, egotistic any tyrannical character of the Germans, there would not be so much balderdash about a friendly understanding, etc., between England and Germany.  The German is a born tyrant.  The desire to remain with Britain on good terms will only last so long until Germany feels herself strong enough to beat England both on sea and on land:  afterwards it’ll simply be “la bourse ou la vie,” as the French proverb goes.  Provided they do not know that there are any English listeners about, phrases like the following can be heard every day in German restaurants and other public places:  “I hate England and the English!” “Never mind, they won’t be standing in our way much longer.  We shall soon be ready.”

And John Bull, with its million readers, is not alone.  This is how the Daily Express, in a double-leaded leader, teaches history to its readers:—­