Now and then the subject of its settlement is mentioned—­Belgium and Serbia, of course, to be saved and as far as possible indemnified; Russia to have the Slav-Austrian States and Constantinople; France to have Alsace-Lorraine, of course; and Poland to go to Russia; Schleswig-Holstein and the Kiel Canal no longer to be German; all the South-German States to become Austrian and none of the German States to be under Prussian rule; the Hohenzollerns to be eliminated; the German fleet, or what is left of it, to become Great Britain’s; and the German colonies to be used to satisfy such of the Allies as clamour for more than they get.

Meantime this invincible race is doing this revolutionary task marvellously—­volunteering; trying to buy arms in the United States (a Pittsburgh manufacturer is now here trying to close a bargain with the War Office!)[78]; knitting socks and mufflers; taking in all the poor Belgians; stopping all possible expenditure; darkening London at night; doing every conceivable thing to win as if they had been waging this war always and meant to do nothing else for the rest of their lives-and not the slightest doubt about the result and apparently indifferent how long it lasts or how much it costs.

Every aspect of it gets on your nerves.  I can’t keep from wondering how the world will seem after it is over—­Germany (that is, Prussia and its system) cut out like a cancer; England owning still more of the earth; Belgium—­all the men dead; France bankrupt; Russia admitted to the society of nations; the British Empire entering on a new lease of life; no great navy but one; no great army but the Russian; nearly all governments in Europe bankrupt; Germany gone from the sea—­in ten years it will be difficult to recall clearly the Europe of the last ten years.  And the future of the world more than ever in our hands!

We here don’t know what you think or what you know at home; we haven’t yet any time to read United States newspapers, which come very, very late; nobody writes us real letters (or the censor gets ’em, perhaps!); and so the war, the war, the war is the one thing that holds our minds.

We have taken a house for the Chancery[79]—­almost the size of my house in Grosvenor Square—­for the same sum as rent that the landlord proposed hereafter to charge us for the old hole where we’ve been for twenty-nine years.  For the first time Uncle Sam has a decent place in London.  We’ve five times as much room and ten times as much work.  Now—­just this last week or two—­I get off Sundays:  that’s doing well.  And I don’t now often go back at night.  So, you see, we’ve much to be thankful for.—­Shall we insure against Zeppelins?  That’s what everybody’s asking.  I told the Spanish Ambassador yesterday that I am going to ask the German Government