there was little to choose between the combatants, inasmuch as both were apparently fighting for about the same things.  Mr. Wilson’s purpose in this paragraph is not obscure; he was making his long expected appearance as a mediator, and he evidently believed that it was essential to this role that he should not seem to be prejudiced in favour of either side, but should hold the balance impartially between them.

It is true that a minute reading indicates that Mr. Wilson was merely quoting, or attempting to paraphrase, the statements of the leaders of both sides, but there is such a thing as quoting with approval, and no explanation could convince the British public that the ruler of the greatest neutral nation had not declared that the Allies and the Central Powers stood morally upon the same level.  The popular indignation which this caused in Great Britain was so intense that it alarmed the British authorities.  The publication of this note in the British press was withheld for several hours, in order to give the Government an opportunity to control the expression of editorial opinion; otherwise it was feared that this would be so unrestrained in its bitterness that relations with the United States might be imperilled.  The messages which the London correspondents were permitted to send to the United States were carefully censored for the same reason.  The dispatch sent by the Associated Press was the product of a long struggle between the Foreign Office and its London correspondent.  The representatives spent half an hour considering whether the American correspondents could cable their country that the note had been received in England with “surprise and irritation.”  After much discussion it was decided that “irritation” could not be used, and the message of the Associated Press, after undergoing this careful editing by the Foreign Office, was a weak and ridiculous description of the high state of excitement which prevailed in Great Britain.  The fact that the British Foreign Office should have given all this trouble over the expressions sent to American newspapers and should even have spent half an hour debating whether a particular word should be used, almost pathetically illustrates the great care taken by the British Government not to influence American opinion against the Allies.

The Government took the same precautions with its own press in England.  When the note was finally released the Foreign Office explicitly directed the London newspapers to comment with the utmost caution and in no case to question the President’s sincerity.  Most of them acquiesced in these instructions by maintaining silence.  There was only one London newspaper, the Westminster Gazette, which made even a faint-hearted attempt to explain away the President’s statement.  From the first day of the war the British people had declared that President Wilson did not understand the issues at stake; and they now declared that this note confirmed their worst forebodings.  The comments