Whatsoever of pessimism appeared in the British Press was telegraphed to America.  Pessimism was not permitted in the German Press.  Imagine Germany holding control of the cable and allowing press dispatches from Germany to pass over it with the freedom that England allowed.  Imagine Germany having waited as long as England before making cotton contraband.  The British Press demanded information from the government which the German Press would never have dared to ask.  I have known an American correspondent, fed out of hand in Germany and thankful for anything that the fearful German war-machine might vouchsafe, turning a belligerent when he was in London for privileges which he would never have thought of demanding in Berlin.

If an English ship were reported sunk, he believed it must be, despite the government’s denial.  Did he go to the Germans and demand that he might publish the rumours of what had happened to the Moltke in the Gulf of Riga, or how many submarines Germany had really lost?  Indeed, he was unconsciously paying a compliment to British free institutions.  He expected more in England; it seemed a right to him, as it would at home.  Englishmen talked frankly to him about mistakes; he heard all the gossip; and sometimes he concluded that England was in a bad way.  In Germany such talk was not allowed.  Every German said that the government was absolutely truthful; every German believed all of its reports.  But ask this critical American how he would like to live under German rule, and then you found how anti-German he was at heart.  Nothing succeeds like success, and Germany was winning and telling no one if she had any setbacks.

If there were a strike, the British Press made the most of it, for it was big news.  Pessimism is the Englishman’s natural way of arousing himself to fresh energy.  It is also against habit to be demonstrative in his effort; so it is not easy to understand how much he is doing.  Then, pessimism brought recruits; it made the Englishman say, “I’ve got to put my back into it!” Muddling there was and mistakes, such as that of the method of attack at Gallipoli; but in the midst of all this dispiriting pessimism, no Englishman thought of anything but of putting his back into it more and more.  Lord Kitchener had said that it was to be a long war and evidently it must be.  Of course, England’s misfortune was in having the war catch her in the transition from an old order of things to social reforms.

But if the war shows anything it is that basically English character has not changed.  She still has unconquerable, dogged persistence, and her defects for this kind of war are not among the least admirable of her traits to those who desire to live their own lives in their own way, as the English-speaking people have done for five hundred years, without having a verboten sign on every street corner.