Ernest Alfred Vizetelly. The Anarchists: Their Faith and Their Record. Turnbull and Spears Printers, Edingurgh, 1911.

THE ANARCHISTS

THEIR FAITH AND THEIR RECORD

CHAPTER 11: France -- Spain -- Protuga L -- Japan -- Great Britain and Other Countries

(1899--1911)

An Attempt in Paris on the Persian Shah--Another on the King of Spain--Another on President Fallieres--Anti- Militarism in France --Bebel's View of Anti- Militarism--French Strikes and Demonstrations--Riots at Trieste--Attempt on K'ng Leopold of Belgium-- Anarchism and Strikes in Germany--Food Riots in Italy and Spain --Switzerland, Anti- Milita rism a and the Right of Asylum--The Great Croatian Trial--Spain, Taxation and the Religious Communities-- Barcelona Strikes--Attempts on Senor Maura--Military Rule at Barcelona--Attempt on the King and Queen of Spain after their Wedding--Mateo Morral--Francisco Ferrer--Morral and Ferrer parted by Rivalry in Love--Morral and Jose Nakens--Fate of Morral--Ferrer's Trial and Acquittal--Anti- Clericalist Policy in Spain--Maura's Rule of Iron--The Great Barcelona Rising of 1909 --Ferrer's alleged Participation--His Arrest, Trial and Execution-- Recent Times in Spain--Growth of Republicanism in Portugal-- The Royal Civil List--Joao Franco's Dictatorship--Assassination of the King and the Crown Prince- King Manoel's Brief Reign-- The Revolution and the Republic--Glorification of the Regicides-- Rise of Socialism and Anarchism in Japan--Denjiro Kotoku his Principles and Adherents--A Plot against the Life of the Mikado --Trial and Execution of Kotoku and Others--Great Britain and the Anarchists--The Tottenham, Houndsditch, and Sidney Street Affairs--The Aliens Act and its Administration--Concluding Remarks.

OUR narrative has now been brought down to comparatively recent times, and it remains for us to chronicle the chief incidents occurring in the history of Anarchism during the last ten or twelve years. Let us first turn to France. Felix Faure, President of the Republic, died suddenly in 1899, and there came a foolish attempt on the part of M. Paul Deroulede and others to effect a Nationalist coup d'etat. It absolutely failed, and during the earlier period of the next presidency, that is M. Loubet's, the Dreyfus Case continued to absorb public attention. In 1900, a few days after Bresci assassinated King Humbert, the life of the then Shah of Persia, at that moment on a visit to Paris, was threatened by a workman, who pointed a revolver at his oriental majesty, exclaiming as he did so: " Death to all the sovereigns ! " Before the man could fire, however, he was arrested, and he afterwards escaped with a comparatively short term of imprisonment, though he made no secret of his Anarchist opinions. In the following year the Socialists were responsible for strikes which occurred at Marseilles and Montceau- les- Mines, but some of the acts of violence which marked those movements were probably due to the Anarchist element which had for many years made itself felt on such occasions in France.

Outrages that might be positively and exclusively ascribed to the French Anarchists were at the period we refer to very few in number. As we previously indicated,] many partisans of the Propaganda by Deed had already renounced bomb- throwing as an inefficacious practice, and had rallied to the Anti- Militarist policy propounded by Gustave Herve, and supported, to some extent at all events, by the Socialist Jean Jaures. When, one night in the early summer of 1905, a bomb was thrown at the carriage in which young King Alfonso of Spain and President Loubet were driving--they had just quitted the Paris Opera- house--the outrage was not the work of French, but of Spanish Anarchists. Several men were arrested on suspicion of being implicated in it, but the case against them broke down and they were acquitted, the real culprits having successfully evaded the vigilance of the French police. That same year, however, an Anarchist element was again at work in the serious Labour demonstrations at Toulon, Limoges, and other localities. Such was likewise the case in the more widespread troubles which occurred in France during the two following years, 1906 and 1907.

On the National Fete Day of 1907, while President Fallieres was returning from the military review held in the Bois de Boulogne, two shots were fired at him by a man named Maille, who had previously served in the French mercantile marine and also in the State navy; but although the Anti- Militarist party--composed partly of Socialists and partly of Anarchists--had arranged to make a demonstration that day, Maille's attempt had no real connexion with it, the man being, indeed, simply a lunatic, as was subsequently ascertained. The demonstration itself was a complete failure, as Herve the Anti- Militarist leader admitted with considerable chagrin. He had been promised, said he, the support of the General Labour Federation (otherwise the Confederation generale des Travailleurs), but it had left him and his friends in the lurch. Nevertheless, the diffusion of anti- militarist theories throughout the country and in particular among the rank and file of the army was now giving the Government serious concern, and whenever it was possible to prosecute an offender that course was vigorously adopted and a sharp sentence generally ensued.

In connection with this matter we should mention that in August of the year to which we are referring, 1907, an International Socialist Congress was held at Stuttgart, where Herr Bebel took occasion to protest against the spirit of militarism and imperialism, saying that whenever a war seemed to be imminent the working classes ought to do their utmost to prevent it, and that if their efforts to attain that object failed, that they ought to exert themselves to bring the war to an end as speedily as possible. But at the same time he rejected and denounced Herve's proposition that soldiers ought to desert and even rebel in the event of war. Propaganda to that effect was, in Bebel's opinion, fraught with very great danger. It was engaging the attention of the German military authorities, and was in existing conditions distinctly harmful to the diffusion of Socialism. It may be added that at the general elections for a new Reichstag some time previously the number of successful Socialist candidates had fallen from seventy- nine to forty- three.

As we have seen, except in the course of strikes and other Labour disturbances, the manifestations of the more militant Anarchism had greatly abated in France. Public attention had been largely absorbed by the great struggle between State and Church which ended in separation. There were some violent revolutionary features in the Labour disturbances of 1908; and in the autumn of the following year the execution of the Spanish ax- Anarchist, Senor Ferrer at Barcelona (to which we shall presently refer), provoked serious rioting in Paris, where the Spanish embassy had to be protected by the military. This affair at least showed that there was considerable sympathy with Anarchism among certain sections of the Paris populace, although Anarchism might be less en evidence in France than formerly.

Several strikes and threats of even greater ones marked the course of 1909 in that country. In 1910, a year which opened with disastrous floods in Paris, Gustave Herve was at last sentenced to four years' imprisonment for his antimilitarist propaganda. Then, on May I, a formidable revolutionary Labour Demonstration was threatened by the Confederation generale des Travailleurs. But M. Briand, a former Socialist who was Prime Minister at the time, took such vigorous steps to prevent all disturbances thatat the last moment this demonstration was abandoned. In October, however, came a great Railway Strike, beginning with the men of the Northern Line and soon including those of the Western Railway, which had of recent years become State property. The energy of the Government again saved the situation. There were undoubtedly several distinctly revolutionary acts at this period. So- called " Sabotage "--the wilful destruction of property by strikers--occurred in more than one direction. More than one bomb was thrown, more than one attempt was made to displace the metals and impede or wreck trains, but the Army Reserves were called out, the military were stationed in force along the various lines, soldiers with a knowledge of railway work--among them being those strikers who were temporarily reincorporated in the army--were called upon to assist in ensuring the different services, and with few exceptions did their duty in that respect, while the ringleaders of the movement were arrested, and such a profound impression was produced generally that the men of the Eastern, the Orleans, the Lyons and Mediterranean and other Railway Companies, whose participation in the strike had been anticipated, refrained from joining their comrades. The workers of the Paris Electric Light and Motor Power service certainly tried to terrify the capital by holding up its Metropolitan train service and plunging it into darkness at night, as they had done once before, but that affair collapsed, and its promotor, a cynical vain- glorious individual named Pataud, fled for a time to Belgium, from fear of arrest and imprisonment. It may be said that in the cases of Sabotage which occurred during the Railway Strike the promptings of the Anarchist spirit were again apparent.

Let us now retrace our steps. In 1902 there were serious Labour disturbances of Trieste, the workers of the Stabilimento Technico and the Austrian Lloyd service, coming out on strike to enforce their demand for an eight hours day. The movement was engineered by Socialist leaders, but certain Anarchist practices, such as bomb throwing, found exponents, with the result that the troops being called out, a conflict and loss of life supervened. In the end the demand for an eight hours' day was granted. In November the same year an attempt was made on the life of that astute ruler and financier, but neglectful husband and callous father, Leopold II. of Belgium, by an Italian Anarchist named Rubino, who fired at him three times with a revolver while he was returning from a service for the repose of the soul of his consort Queen Marie Henriette who had passed away two months previously. In 1904 some German Anarchists were prosecuted at Konigsberg for participating in a plot against the Emperor of Russia. They were acquitted of the principal charges but convicted on some minor counts of the indictment against them. In that same year the life of the Russian Minister to Switzerland was attempted-- in fact he was seriously injured in the head by a revolver shot--but it does not appear that the culprit, a refugee Polish engineer, had any connection with Anarchism.

This period, it will be remembered, was that of the Russo- Japanese War. There were troubles in Poland, and many Nihilist outrages in Russia, as well as a naval revolt at Sebastopol in 1905, when unrest was widespread on the continent of Europe. The iron and engineering works of Westphalia and Rhemish Prussia were seriously affected by a great coal- miners' strike for an increase of wages; and at a Socialist Congress held at Jena somewhat later Bebel vigorously advocated general strikes, declaring them to be the best weapon at the disposal of the working classes.

Food riots took place in various parts of Italy whilst Calabria was suffering from the effects of a terrible earthquake; at the same time disturbances--likewise due to the scarcity of the means of subsistence and the heavy burden of taxation--broke out in Spain (quite irrespective of the chronic unrest at Barcelona and the authorities had to exert all their energy to restore a semblance of order at such different centres as Bilbao, Salamanca, Santander, Malaga and Seville, in which last- named city the bakers' shops were pillaged. Fortunately Spain was favoured that year by an abundant harvest, which ended by quieting the country. France, as we previously mentioned, was the scene of numerous strikes at this same period. Turn where one would, indeed, there was discontent and turmoil of one or another kind. The state of affairs in Morocco seemed likely to bring about a Franco- German war, and for a moment, too, it appeared as if the separation of Norway from Sweden might not be effected peaceably.

In 1906, when there were tumultuous strikes in a dozen departments of France and four or five provinces of Italy --where, however, material conditions were at last showing distinct signs of improvement--while in Russia the revolutionary agitation became yet more pronounced and Jew- baiting reached a climax, Spain and Portugal, moreover, being in the throes of economic and political turmoil, a few incidents pertaining to the history of Anarchism occurred in Switzerland. In the first place that most pacific of European States found it necessary to take steps against the anti- militarist propaganda which had spread from France to her own territory. In quoting Bebel against Herve we have shown the difference between the anti- militarism of the Socialist and that of the Anarchist. It was against the latter that the Swiss Federal Council found it necessary to take action. Two deputies were prosecuted for writing anti- militarist pamphlets and distributing them among the troops, and it was decided that any foreigner who might incite Swiss soldiers to refuse to serve or to disobey orders should be immediately expelled from the Confederation. Towards the end of the year, moreover, the Government prosecuted an Italian Anarchist named Bertoni for contributing to " Le Reveil " of Geneva an article in which he attempted to justify the assassination of King Humbert. He was convicted and sentenced to a month's imprisonment.

The next year brought with it the great Dockers' Strike at Antwerp, the dismissal of the first Russian Duma and fresh outbursts of Revolutionism in the great Eastern Empire, with further strikes, mostly of an agrarian character, in Italy where, however, in despite of disorders and the damage done by earthquakes, the economic position were still steadily if slowly improving. Rome witnessed some disturbances on May Day when there were also so- called Labour demonstrations at Copenhagen, Madrid, and Paris, the last- named city being strongly held by troops to check all revolutionary proceedings. In Switzerland in 1907 a curious case affecting the Right of Asylum was decided by fifteen judges sitting in the Federal Court at Lausanne. Russia had applied for the extradition of three Georgians who were accused of stealing public funds in the Caucasus. The judges held, however, that the defendants were Revolutionaries and that their offence had been committed with a political object. Extradition was therefore refused.

In 1908 we find the Moderate or Reforming element in the Italian Confederation of Labour separating from the Revolutionary and Anarchist elements. There were again several agrarian strikes in the Italian monarchy, where the year ended with the appalling earthquakes by which Messina and Reggio were destroyed.

In 1909 one may note the Revolutionary proceedings of the Greek Military League which for a time threatened the existence of the monarchy, and the trial of the Croatian Separatists at Agram when the chief evidence for the authorities was given by an informer named Nastitch, who had outwardly professed Anarchist opinions and assisted in the fabrication of bombs with which some Servian conspirators had proposed to assassinate Prince Nicholas of Montenegro. The object of the Croatian Separatists had been to detach Croatia, Slavonia, and Bosnia from Austrian rule and unite them to Servia to which they had once belonged. Some thirty of the prisoners were convicted after a very prolonged trial and sentenced to penal servitude, a score of others being acquitted.

We now propose to turn back once more, and deal successively with Spain and Portugal during the years at which we have been glancing. We shall afterwards have to say something respecting Socialism and Anarchism in Japan, and shall finally refer to the position in our own country.

Going back to 1899, when Senor Silvela succeeded Sagasta as Prime Minister of Spain, we find the financial policy of the Government, which carried with it excessive taxation, provoking numerous riots in Catalonia and Valencia. General Despujols, of whom we formerly wrote, made himself extremely unpopular by arresting hundreds of people who could not or would not pay the heavy imposts demanded by the authorities. His conduct was impugned in the Cortes, but when a motion to censure him was submitted to that assembly it failed to pass. In and round the city of Valencia the disturbances took more particularly the form of attacks on the religious Communities, whose property was exempt from the taxation levied upon others, and for this reason one finds the hostility to the Communities increasing persistently during succeeding years, throughout north- eastern Spain. Complaints were made of the excessive number of religions; and, further, the dignitaries of the Church were attacked for the high emoluments they secured whilst the greatest penury prevailed among the lower orders of the clergy. In 1900 the struggle between the Government and the commercial classes of Barcelona, over taxation questions, reached a climax. The general discontent led to Carlist demonstrations in one and another part of Catalonia, while on the other hand the separatist movement, which would have detached the province from Spain, grew apace.

So great was the enmity which the religious orders had aroused, particularly by often turning their conventual establishments into factories whilst still evading the taxation paid by other traders, that in many instances the monks deemed it advisable to arm themselves in order to resist aggression. They were not merely detested, be it noted, by folk of the working classes, Socialists, Anarchists, extremists of various kinds, but the mercantile community of Barcelona was largely ranged against them. In 1901 a series of strikes, all springing from the taxation trouble which tended to keep down the remuneration for labour, began in Barcelona, and continued at intervals until 1904, by which time the prosperity of the city was greatly affected.

A Conservative and Clericalist ministry, headed by Senor Maura, was then in office pursuing a most reactionary policy, and the young King seemed a mere puppet in its hands. On April 12, while Maura was returning from a memorial service for the King's grandmother, ex- Queen Isabella, he was attacked with a knife by an Italian Anarchist named Artal, whose weapon, however, coming in contact with some of the gold braid which lavishly bedizened the ministerial uniform, failed to penetrate it, in such wise that no harm was done. A short time afterwards, while the Premier was returning to Madrid, after a trip to the south, he was fired upon, but again escaped injury.

Many stormy debates provoked by the severity of Maura's rule occurred in the Cortes about this time. The Premier was bitter in his denunciations of Don Alejandro Lerroux, the Catalan Republican leader, who had done much to increase the unrest at Barcelona, and among those whom he prosecuted for opposing his reactionary policy, which tended more and more to the advancement of revolutionary designs, was the distinguished author Blasco Ibenez. No extremist policy, however, can be permanently successful. Maura's excess of zeal was followed by the desertion of many of his adherents, and in the course of 1904 he resigned office, General Azcarraga and Senor Montero Rios succeeding him in turn until, later in 1905, a Liberal administration under Senor Moret was at last called to office In the meantime the Separatist agitation at Barcelona had grown apace. Azcarraga had suspended the Constitutional guarantees there, placing the city under the rule of the military, who seized every newspaper inimical to their authority, raided offices, destroyed presses, arrested journalists and citizens galore. Nevertheless, the agitation in Barcelona continued even under the Moret ministry.

On May 31, in the following year, 1906, young King Alfonso espoused Princess Ena of Battenberg, who, on her conversion to Catholicism, had taken the Christian names of Victoria Eugenia. While the royal party was proceeding along the Calle Mayor of Madrid, on its we, back to the palace after the celebration of the marriage rites at the church of San Geronimo, a formidable bomb was flung at it, and although both the King and his bride escaped unhurt, fifteen persons, soldiers or civilians, were killed, and a score or so of others more or less severely injured. The perpetrator of this outrage was a certain Mateo Morral of Rocca, the son of a wealthy cotton spinner of Sabadell in Catalonia. In order that the reader may fully understand the circumstances of his crime, we must now introduce other personages into our pages, and notably one whose name has often been before the public of recent years, that is Senor Francisco Ferrer.

He was the younger son of a certain Jaime Ferrer by his wife Maria de los Angeles Guardia, and was born on January IO, 1859 at Alella, a little place at a distance of some twelve miles from Barcelona. In his early manhood, Ferrer attached himself to the fortunes of Ruiz Zorrilla, the Spanish Radical Republican Leader of the days of Isabella II. and the Revolutionary period which followed her downfall. Ferrer joined Zorrilla while the latter was in exile at Geneva, and afterwards became an intermediary between him and his partisans in Spain. Ferrer's Republican activity was discovered by the authorities, and in 1885 he sought refuge in Paris, where he earned a somewhat precarious livelihood as a professor of languages. He was, let us add, a very well educated man. He had previously married, and had two daughters, but the union was by no means a happy one, and, as the daughters subsequently stated, there were faults on both sides. Eventually Serlora Ferrer attempted to shoot her husband and was prosecuted for the offence.

In course of time Ferrer became intimate with a certain Mlle. Meunier' who possessed considerable means. There is not a shred of evidence to suggest that there was anything immoral in their relations. They were attracted to one another by corresponding opinions in regard, notably, to educational work, and in the end Mlle. Meunier left Ferrer some house property in Paris to enable him to carry into effect certain educational plans which he had formed. Returning to Spain, he established at Barcelona an institution which he called the Escuela moderna, and where, to the horror of the Church and the Clericalist party generally, a system of Rationalist, Positivist, and one may add, from the standpoint of dogma though not from that of morals, anti- Christian education was put into practice. The Spanish authorities, who, unfortunately, are so neglectful of education (one of their country's greatest needs), had it in their power to suppress Ferrer's teaching, but they allowed it to continue undisturbed for a period of some five years.

The school exercised a certain amount of influence, though it appears that the total number of pupils who attended it during the period we have mentioned was only three hundred. Ferrer attached to it, however, a library and an educational publishing business, producing translations of French, German, and English scientists and sociologists of more or less advanced views, works which were regarded with disfavour by the authorities and with consternation by the clergy of Catalonia as they tended only too often to undermine the principles of Catholic dogma.

Now, Mateo Morral, who threw the bomb at the King's carriage on the occasion of the royal wedding, came into contact with Ferrer and ended by acting as librarian at the Escuela moderna. He was, we have said, the son of a rich man. Highly educated, partly in Germany, he had ended by adopting extremist social views, the undoubted grievances of his native province, Catalonia, making him at last an Anarchist of the type peculiar to Barcelona. Of a morose and brooding disposition, he was none the less susceptible to feminine beauty, and among the teachers at the Escuela moderna there was a particularly charming young woman named Soledad Villafranca with whom he fell in love.

His suit was rejected, however, for on her side the Senorita Villafranca had fallen in love with Ferrer, whose mistress she became. This naturally led to a breach between Ferrer and Morral. They could no longer work together, but were inevitably sundered. It was virtually the old story told by the fabulist: " Deux coqs vivaient en paix; survint une poule, et voile la guerre allumee." Morral quitted Ferrer. Was it his disappointment with respect to Soledad, was it his estrangement from his friend that impelled him to do something desperate ? In any case those matters may well have affected his mind, have inclined him to sombre views, to the idea of dedicating himself solely to the Anarchist principles which he had adopted, and carrying them to what he, like other fanatics, regarded as their logical conclusion. At all events he ended by hurling a bomb at the royal marriage procession.

We have before us what we wrote for a London evening newspaper when the first news of that outrage reached England. There was, as usual, a great deal of talk about the crime having been planned in London, about the young King of Spain having been sentenced to death at Anarchist gatherings in our metropolis, and so forth. " Enterprising " j ournalists hinted at all sorts of mysterious things which had come to their knowledge in London Anarchist haunts. Foolish things of that kind have been said and written every time an outrage has occurred on the Continent. But as we at once pointed out to the readers of " The Westminster Gazette," the state of Catalonia, during many years past, and the treatment meted out to Catalan Anarchists and others at Monjuich, sufficed to indicate the cause of the crime and the precise nationality of the culprit. We were not mistaken, for it was soon discovered that Morral, the Catalan, was the offender.

After committing his crime, he sought a refuge with Don Jose Nakens, the editor- proprietor of the Republ~can weekly journal, " E1 Motin," who induced another person to shelter him for the night and also sent him a change of clothes to enable him to effect his escape. On the evening of Saturday, June 2, however, Morral was identified at the railway station of Torrejon de Ardoz, some fourteen miles from Madrid. He shot a rural guard who tried to arrest him, and then turning his Browning pistol against himself, he again fired and fell dead.

Nakens was naturally arrested, and the Barcelona authorities, bearing Morral's past connection with Ferrer in mind, eagerly arrested the latter, to the great jubillation of all the representatives of Holy Church, who felt that they were at last rid of that schoolmaster whom the Devil had set up to assail their dogmas. Ferrer arrested and consigned to the so- called Model Prison at Madrid, the Escuela moderna was closed. A year elapsed before the prisoner was brought to trial, and when at last the authorities could no longer defer proceedings, they resulted in his acquittal on the charge of complicity in Morral's crime. On the other hand, Nakens who was certainly an accessory after the fact--he was generally accounted an estimable man and seems to have been led away at the time by a kind of good- natured weakness--received a sentence of nine years' imprisonment.

With reference to Ferrer's acquittal, it is quite certain that he had nothing to do with Morral's deed, though in earlier years the advanced Republicanism, which he had professed whilst associated with Ruiz Zorrilla, had beer temporarily abandoned by him for Anarchist opinions There is some documentary evidence to that effect. But Ferrer had soon renounced all idea of militant Anarchism in order to devote himself to his educational work, coming to the conclusion that the former could not effect any change in the social system, and that to bring about a better state of things in Spain, it was necessary to proceed progressively, and in the first instance to educate the young and free them from the domination of Clericalism. He was certainly not without his faults, and he went too far in a good deal of his teaching, being indeed as great a fanatic on the free- thought side as the most fervent disciple of St Dominic could be on the side of religious dogma. But, as we have said, he was blameless in the matter of Morral's crime. He and Morral had been parted by their love for the same beautiful woman, and we all know that the best of friends may drift apart from such a cause.

One result of the Calle Mayor outrage was the resignation of the Moret ministry, which was followed by one over which General Lopez Dominguez presided. But after a time Senor Moret returned to office, and some attempts mere made to check Clericalist domination in Spain However, the Church party indignantly opposed an Associations Bill regulating the status of the religious communities and a scheme of taxation reform by which those communities would have had to contribute on a proper basis to the national revenue. The Government wasted much time in attempting negotiations with Rome and when at last Senor Moret's colleague, Count de Romanones, asked the King to sign a decree which would render merely civil marriages between Catholics as valid as those celebrated by a priest, the whole Spanish hierarchy rose in wrath against such a sacrilegious proceeding. Young Kmg Alfonso was even denounced from the pulpit as a new Diocletian bent on persecuting Christianity ! Meantime there was a good deal of distress in central and southern Spain. Emigration to South America increased. Fresh Labour troubles broke out, particularly in Guipuzcoa where martial law was again proclaimed, and towards the end of the year some parliamentary squabbles between Moret and Lopez Dominguez led to the formation of a stop- gap ministry under the Marquis de la Vega Armijo, after which, towards the end of January 1907, Maura, the Conservative leader, returned to power.

The Liberals, whilst in office, had passed or adhered to some very illiberal measures, among which was notably a law by which insults to the army or the flag were to be judged and punished by military tribunals. They now asked for the repeal of that measure, but Maura refused his assent, and set himself to pursue his old policy of stern repression in respect to every manifestation of hostility to his rule. This succeeded so well in Catalonia that his heterogeneous opponents dropped all differences to band themselves together against him. Carlists, Republicans, Socialists, even Anarchists joined hands, and a so- called Solidarist party came into existence, and was led in the Cortes by Senor Salmeron. Maura's great weapon was the state of siege, which he confirmed in Catalonia and applied to Valencia also. Nevertheless he was unable to keep those provinces quiet. There were still frequent Anarchist outrages at Barcelona, where the police at last came under the suspicion of the authorities.] They were chiefly of Catalan nationality, and it is not surprising that some of them, at all events, should have sympathised with the aspirations of their province.

In 1908 the Government, becoming more and more disturbed by the frequent bomb- throwing at Barcelona, brought forward a drastic bill for the repression of Anarchist plots. Among other things it made the door porter of every house virtually responsible for every tenant occupying a flat in the house where he was stationed; and it further swept away every vestige of the liberty of the press. The Liberal party in the Cortes offered a strenuous opposition to this measure, submitting no fewer than 1200 amendments to it. While the matter was still in abeyance, an Austrian squadron visited Barcelona, and King Alfonso, in defiance of his ministers, instantly repaired to the city, and, in the course of the reception accorded to the Austrian seamen, repeatedly drove through the streets unattended. This created a favourable impression as regards the young King personally. The agitation was directed, indeed, much less against him than against his responsible advisers. For a few days (March IO- I3) no outrage was committed, but soon after the King had quitted Barcelona the bomb- throwing began once more.

The bill for the repression of Anarchism then passed through the Senate, but some of Maura's colleagues now became unwilling to follow him as far as he wished to go. The Minister of Finances, in particular, threatened to secede, and as Maura was at that moment very desirous of negotiating a State Loan, he gave way and offered to follow a policy of conciliation. Some bye- elections in Catalonia and Valencia resulted at this time in Republican successes, much to the chagrin of the authorities who seemed surprised at the result of their persistent endeavours to alienate Catalan and Valencian opinion.

At last came the year 1909 when matters reached a climax. Spain had engaged in an expedition to Morocco which aroused angry protests in the north- eastern provinces, where people became irate at the idea of sacrificing blood and treasure to further the claims of sundry financial jobbers interested in Moroccan mines. There were very serious riots at Barcelona, attempts being made to prevent Catalan and other regiments from embarking for Morocco. The taxation question also loomed up once more, and finally in July, the Solidaridad Obrera, otherwise the Labour Confederation, decided on a general strike. Great disturbances ensued. For three days, indeed, Barcelona was given over to desperate street- fighting. Various convents and the Jesuit college were attacked, and there were several cases of incendiarism. At the same time the earlier accounts of a massacre of priests and monks were quite untrue. One priest was suffocated in the crypt of his burning church, a nun also was killed, and two priests were shot, one of them being engaged at the time in firing on the rioters. On the other hand, several soldiers were killed or wounded, a much larger number of the insurgents experiencing similar fates.

Now Francisco Ferrer, ever since his acquittal on the charge of complicity in Morral's crime, had been trying to reorganise his Escuela moderna and educational publishing business. He resided at a house which he called the Mas Germinal and which was situated in the village of Mongat, a few miles from Barcelona. At the time of the outbreak in that city he had just returned home after an absence abroad of some duration. There is not a shred of evidence to show that he was at all privy to the Solidaridad Obrera's decision to organise a general strike, or that he headed (as the authorities afterwards asserted) the rising which supervened. Save for a few hours on the first day, when some business matters called him to the city, there is no proof that he was there during the rioting. It has been claimed that he at least initiated some disturbances in the neighbouring village of Premia, but even on that point the evidence is vague and shadowy.

Nevertheless, the authorities who, as usual, had decided on the arrest of all sorts and conditions of men, of everybody, indeed, noted for free- thinking and advanced political opinions, resolved to include Ferrer among them. He instinctively realised that such might prove the case, and remembering his former experiences in connection with Morral's affair, he quitted his home and sought an asylum with some friends. His disappearance enraged the authorities, who were greatly influenced by the Barcelona clergy in their work of repression and punishment, and after a perquisition at the Mas Germinal, all Ferrer's relatives, including his brother and his sister- inlaw, and his mistress, Senorita Villafranca, were deported to the town of Alcaniz and afterwards to Teruel, where they were long detained under conditions of great hardship.

Time went by and still Ferrer could not be found. But at last, on the night of August 31, he quitted his hiding place with the object of walking to a railway station whence he hoped to reach France. On his way, however, while he was near his birthplace he was accosted by a party of so~naten--volunteer citizen- guards for the protection of property--and one or another of them recognised him. His arrest speedily ensued.

Martial law still prevailed in Barcelona, and Ferrer was tried by a military court on the express charge that he had been the " author and chief " of the great rising in July. There was really no evidence to support that accusation. Even the evidence of complicity was of the flimiest character. It has been alleged, however, in a J esuitical spirit that although Ferrer may not have organised and directed the rising or even have actually participated in it, he was at least morally responsible for it by reason of the anti- clericalist teaching given at his Escuela moderna. Assuredly, however, it is very far fetched to suppose that this school, at which from first to last only some three hundred pupils were educated, and which was closed for nearly three years prior to the rising, was really the fons et origo thereof. In reality the rising was caused by a number of factors, primarily of an economic nature, with which political and religious questions became blended, and we feel certain that it would have come to pass even if no such individual as Francisco Ferrer had ever lived. There is not a particle of evidence to show that he incited the people of Barcelona to violence and incendiarism. The responsibility for the excesses rests largely with two Republican--not Anarchist--leaders, Don Alejandro Lerroux and Don Emiliano Iglesias, a member of the Cortes, whose newspaper " E1 Progreso " recalled with pride only forty- eight hours before the outburst, " the virile days of 1835," when the convents of Barcelona had been assailed and burnt !

Some old writings, dating from the prisoner's earlier Anarchist days, were raked up against him and applied to the Barcelona affair. The military counsel assigned to him made a gallant effort on his behalf, but the court, adhering to the arguments, not the evidence, for the prosecution, pronounced him to have been the " author and chief" of the rising, and sentenced him to death. We may strongly disapprove of Ferrer's anti- religious fanaticism, we may also condemn more than one feature of his teachings, but there can be no doubt that his trial and sentence constituted a gross miscarriage of justice. The condemned man was shot in a trench before the St Eulalia bastion of the fortress of Monjuich on the morning of October IZ--that is only twenty- four hours before the assembling of the Cortes. It seemed as if the authorities were anxious to put him out of the way in order that all appeals for leniency on his behalf might prove fruitless. Thus do governments make martyrs. However, the spirit of St Dominic must have been satisfied. The impious heretic who had dared to impugn Roman dogma was dead.

It is a question, perhaps, whether Senor Maura, the Conservative Premier, or Senor Moret, the Liberal leader, was the more responsible for the execution. Letters ascribed to those politicians have been printed, and, if genuine, show that the former consulted the latter on the question of clemency, and that the latter was in favour of the law taking its course. The execution was followed by indignation meetings, and in some instances by riots in a number of foreign cities; Maura had to resign office; and Moret once more succeeded him. The notorious General Weyler was then despatched to Barcelona to rule and overawe the stricken city.

In February 1910 a more advanced Liberal Administration under Senor Canalejas followed the Moret Ministry. Religious questions, by which we mean those affecting the privileges, emoluments and taxation of the Church in Spain, soon became acute once more. Labour questions likewise came to the front here and there, and strikes and demonstrations were not wanting. Barcelona, however, smarting under the wounds she had received the previous year, was on the whole much quieter than she had been during the previous decade, though it is true that on one occasion Senor Maura was assaulted there by a so- called Anarchist.

At the same time it must be said that the Ferrer affair still pursues the Spanish authorities. It is like an incubus which constantly asserts itself. It seems probable that the anniversary of the execution--for which many have sworn to take venegance--will long be regarded as a black day in Catalonia. Every now and again the affair crops up, under one or another pretext, in some debate in the Cortes, greatly to the confusion of ministers, however much they may strive to defend the military judges who officiated in this Spanish " Dreyfus case."

Let us now turn to Portugal. A Republican element arose in that country several years ago, but long remained in an insignificant minority. Under King Carlos the State was ruled in turn by a variety of parties, which often assumed very high- sounding appellations, but invariably pursued a policy of stagnation. The King, whose Civil List was comparatively small, though quite as much as the country could afford to pay, secured through various ministers several large advances from the State funds on the more or less valid security of certain Crown property. His mother, Queen Maria Pia, had been a notorious spendthrift, and had run up debts (which she was quite unable to pay) in several European capitals; but Dom Carlos, personally, does not appear to have been extravagantly inclined.

Nobody who knew Portugal in his time and that of his father, Dom Luis, ever observed any particular magnificence about the Portuguese Court. To us, indeed, it appeared to be run on economical lines. There were seldom any great festivities, the furniture and other appurtenances of the royal palaces were often quite shabby, while the salaries of the members of the royal household were on an average really small. The King may well have spent considerable sums on his somewhat frequent journeys abroad, but it is not easy to account for the large amounts which he obtained as advances from the State Treasury. Those advances were more or less illegal, and remembering the frequent corruption of Portuguese officialdom, we have some suspicion that the full amounts never reached the royal privy purse.

We do not know the amount of the dowry which the King's consort, Queen Amelie--daughter of the Comte de Paris--brought with her at her marriage. A handsome woman in her younger years, she may have expended considerable sums on dress, but Lisbon has never been the place for any excessive display of feminine finery. The King's personal habits were very simple--shooting being his particular hobby--and he certainly did not squander money on his appearance. Briefly, the question of the royal indebtedness to the Treasury remains somewhat of a mystery, though it undoubtedly helped to make the King unpopular, and tended, if not to his assassination, at least to the Revolution which drove his son, Dom Manoel, into exile. After some years of petty parliamentary squabbles, in which each party sought to feather its own nest, King Carlos at last entrusted the premiership to a certain Senhor Joao Franco, who was at the head of a political group styling themselves the " New Regenerators." This occurred in May 1906. A year later, after there had been numerous attacks in the Cortez and elsewhere, on the administration of the Civil List and its indebtedness, followed by indignation meetings of the gradually growing Repubhcan party in the larger towns, Franco, with the Kmg's assent, suddenly effected a coup d'etat, dissolving the Legislature and constituting himself Dictator. A Dictatorship may have been advisable in the interests of the monarchy, but it could only have been successfully exercised by a statesman of commanding influence and the highest ability--qualifications which Joao Franco did not possess. Moreover, he speedily abandoned all his earlier principles.

Numerous remonstrances followed his coup d'etat. The Monarchists of both branches of the Cortez waited on the King and pointed out, inter alia, that the suspension of Constitutional Government would seriously affect the national credit. Dom Carlos' only answer was that he would refer the matter to his minister, Senhor Franco. The latter, about this time, toured the country in order to assert his authority, and though he was hooted in some towns and received in others with the indignant protests of the municipalities, he blindly presevered in the course which he had adopted. He even alienated the House of Peers from the Crown by a drastic project of reform, which was his answer to the Peers' remonstrances against the suspension of the Constitution. For a while, however, Franco seemed to carry all before him, and when some attempts were made to throw up barricades in Lisbon (1907), they were promptly checked, and a large number of arrests were effected. Early in 1908 the Dictator regarded himself as triumphant. Portugal was apparently reduced to submission. There was still no Parliament, the press was more or less suppressed, suspended or muzzled, and a good many prominent malcontents had been lodged m prison. On February I, however, the King and his eldest son were assassinated. The royal family returned that day to Lisbon, after a stay at Villa Vicosa. The train in which they travelled having broken down near the station of Casa Branca they crossed by ferry- boat from Barriero to the Terreiro do Paco where carriages were waiting for them and their suite. It was in an open one drawn by two horses that the King, the Queen and their two sons took their seats. Quite a number of people were assembled on the line of route, but there were few marks of respect save on the part of fervent Royalists. Just as the royal carriage was about to turn the corner of the Praca do Commercio and enter the street of the Arsenal, on its way to the Necessidades Palace, a young man suddenly sprang forward and fired a revolver at the King, wounding him on the left side of the neck. The assassin was so close that the Queen was able to strike him in the face with a bouquet which had been presented to her on landing from the ferry- boat. Nevertheless, the young regicide fired again and this time wounded King Carlos mortally. But some police intervened and turned their revolverson the assassin who speedily fell to the ground dead. At almost the same moment, however, a black- bearded individual, who had been waiting under the arcades of the Ministry of the Interior, drew a carbine from under the cloak he wore and fired at the Crown Prince. In vain did Queen Amelie strive to save her son by interposing her own body. The Prince was hit in the breast by one bullet, and in the face by another, before the police were able to shoot this second assassin. Yet other shots were fired at the royal party, for the two regicides had confederates on the spot, and the younger Prince, Dom Manoel, was in his turn wounded in the arm in spite of his mother's attempts to shield him Again did the police retaliate, this time without effect so far as the conspirators were concerned though an unfortunate passer- by was brought to the ground. Meantime the royal carriage had been hastily driven into the Arsenal. On arriving there King Carlos was already dead and the Crown Prince was dying.

Europe was startled by the news of this crime which was promptly attributed to Anarchists. But there has never been any proof that the culprits belonged to the Anarchist sect. They appear, indeed, to have simply been Revolutionary Republicans, of the same type as Orsini and his confederates, who certainly never professed Anarchist theories. Of the two men who were shot the elder was named Manoel Buica, the younger Alfredo Costa. The former, after serving in the army as a sergeant of cavalry, had become a private teacher, the latter had been in the employ of a Lisbon ironmonger. There can be no doubt that their crime was inspired by Franco's tyrannical dictatorship. Whether it was in any way connived at by prominent Republicans, as some have asserted, is a question we cannot decisively answer; but the utterances of certain Republican public men in subsequent years and the glorification of the assassins at a Lisbon museum have certainly lent colour to the surmise.

As a result of the crime Franco immediately fell from power and hurried abroad, the Constitution was set in force again, and a ministry chosen from among members of all the monarchical parties and presided over by Vice- Admiral Ferriera do Amaral, assumed office. However, the new King, Dom Carlos' second son, Dom Manoel, had but a brief reign. The Cortez on reassembling reduced the Royal Civil List, but agreed that certain estates hitherto maintained by the Crown should be taken over by the Treasury. For a while there was much talk of other reforms. The old corrupt state of affairs gradually came back, however. Admiral Ferriera's ministry was followed by one under Senhor Campos Henriques, another under General Telles, another under Senhor Wenceslau de Lima, another under Senhor Beiras, and yet another under Senhor Teixeira de Sousa. But plus pa changeait, plus c'etait la meme chose. Thus there was much political unrest, particularly under the Lima administration, which made itself very unpopular.

Meantime the Republican idea spread and gathered strength with increasing speed, though this was not generally apparent. In fact, at the General Elections in August 1910 only fourteen Republican deputies were elected. It is true that this was twice the member that had sat on the previous Cortez, and that ten of the fourteen were returned by the city of Lisbon, which thus showed its detachment from the monarchy. In the provinces, no doubt, official pressure had prevented the election of several Republican candidates; but to those who did not take that circumstance into account, who looked at things only on the surface, the idea of a Republican Revolution may well have seemed ridiculous.

Yet scarcely five weeks elapsed after the general election we have mentioned, when that Revolution was brought to a successful issue. The Republicans had long carried on an active propaganda in the army and the navy. Most of the officers were loyal to the crown, but with the men who were the sons of the people, and did not follow the career of arms professionally, but merely served their time in accordance with the conscription laws, it was often very different. The navy in particular was largely won over to the cause of Revolution; and finally, on the evening of October 4, the storm burst, the young King was bombarded in his palace, dissuaded from putting himself "at the head of the Municipal Guards and other troops who were still loyal to him, and speedily fled the country with his mother Queen Amelie, his grandmother Queen Maria Pia, and his uncle the Duke of Oporto, the last named of whom had for a while gallantly endeavoured to stem the progress of the insurrection. The royal party repaired to Gibraltar, whence the King and his mother subsequently sailed for England which has since been their home.

One cannot impute the downfall of the Portuguese monarchy to Dom Manoel, he was too young and inexperienced to be able to direct the course of events; and we doubt, too, whether the responsibility rests, as some have asserted, with his mother. She certainly had clericalist leanings, but she does not appear to have interfered particularly with public business. The Revolution was rather the fatal outcome of a corrupt state of things dating back through numerous reigns, a long chronic policy of national stagnation in every possible respect. That could not last for ever; Revolution came at last as inevitably as the French Revolution came.

Whether the present Portuguese Republic will last is another question. We remember the attempts to establish a Republic in Spain, and there can be no doubt that the monarchical principle still retains many partisans in Portugal. The Provisional Government, established at the Revolution, certainly exercised its powers in a very high- handed manner, and it is only now, a year after the proclamation of the Republic, that parliamentary institutions have been revived. Even Joao Franco never exercised so stringent a dictatorship as that instituted by Provisional President Braga and his colleagues. One act of the Provisional Government calls for the sternest reprobation. It set up a Museum of the Revolut~on in a building appertaining to the old Guelhas College at Lisbon, and there it specially dedicated a room to the exhibition of " relics " of the assassination of King Carlos and his eldest son. Portraits of Buica and Costa, " the gIorious regicides," are displayed there, together with the former's cloak and the weapons with which the pair committed their crime. Four members of the Provisional I Government, and many other authorities attended the inauguration of this museum, thus officially linking the Revolution of 1910 with the assassinations of 1908. However, the Provisional Government has now been superseded, for as we write, we read that the new Chamber of Deputies has elected Dom Manoel Arriaga to the Presidency of the Republic (August 24, I9II). With respect to Anarchism in Portugal it has undoubtably counted adepts there during the last fifteen or sixteen years. According to one account a good many proselytes were made by a Spanish Anarchist known as " Cordoba " who at one period carried on a butcher's business at Lisbon Down to recent times, in any case, an Anarchist journal called ' La Vida " was issued at Oporto. It may, perhaps, still be m existence.

It is far from Portugal to Japan, but our chronicle now calls us to the so- called Land of the Rising Sun, where, in November 1910, a plot to assassinate the Mikado, while he was on his way to an inspection at the Military School of Okayama, was suddenly discovered. The affair profoundly impressed the Japanese, for it was the first recorded instance of a conspiracy against the life of the head of a dynasty which claims to have reigned for 2500 years. It would take us too long to retrace in any detail the rise and progress of Socialism and Revolutionism in Japan. We may mention, however, that the Socialist movement began in or about 1880, and was fostered in the first instance by such writers as Inagaki and Oi Kentaro, the latter of whom ended by establishing a Labour Association. After the war with China, the movement assumed greater proportions, and in 1898 there came the first Labour strike on European lines--one of the enginedrivers of the Northern Railway, who claimed an increase of wages. During the next ten years numerous Socialist sects or groups sprang up under the direction of d~fferent agitators. Among these was a certain Deni~ro Kotoku, a native of Tokyo, who, after receiving a fair education, started in life as a journalist. He at last established a print entitled the " Heimin Shimbun," which advocated Communistic- Socialism, and took to preaching the Antt- Militarism of the European Anarchists whilst Japan and Russia were in the midst of their deadly struggle in Manchuria.

In November 1904 Kotoku and a fellow- journalist named Nishikawa were prosecuted for their writings and sentenced to several months of imprisonment, at the expiration of which the former and some of his followers made their way to San Francisco, and establishing themselves on California Hill started a revolutionary journal in Japanese, which bore the title of " The Echo." A programme de combat was soon adopted. Mere AntiMilitarism no longer sufficed, the idea of Socialist pro paganda on constitutional lines was henceforth derided; it was laid down that the social edifice must be destroyed " from base to summit," and that this must be effected by fighting the principle of authority wherever it might display itself. One J apanese print,published at San Francisco, which adhered to these ideas, declared, moreover, that the Mikado must be overthrown as soon as possible and without any hesitation as to the means that might be em ployed. Briefly, the principles of the Kotoku faction may be described less as Socialistic than as pertaining to the school of revolutionary Communistic Anarchism.

Kotoku's journal ournal became at last so violent in its language that at the urgent request of the Japanese consul the Californian authorities suppressed it, and not long afterwards Kotoku himself drifted back to his native country. He and his comrades dwelt in the Tokio slums on the brink of noisome canals, and tried to put the Communistic life into practice, but it proved hard to do so, as they were all wretchedly poor, and by reason of their notorious opinions found it difficult, if not impossible, to secure any regular employment. Kotoku, for his part, lived with a woman who passed as his wife, but who was legally the wife of another person. Despite his narrow means he still contrived to issue prints from time to time, temporarily reviving the " Heimin Shimbun " in which, on February 20, 1908, he published a portrait of Gustave Herve, the French anti- militarist leader, with an article extolling Herve's career,and embracing numerous passages from his writings.

For some time past desertions from the Japanese army had been largely on the increase, and the military authorities denounced the propaganda carried on by Kotoku and his friends, declaring them responsible for the desertions in question. The others retorted, however, that insubordination in the army and desertion from its ranks were largely due to the fact that ever since the victorious campaigns of 1903- 1904, military discipline had become so stringent as to be unbearable. They quoted several instances of the injustice shown by officers to their men and the excessive punishments inflicted on the latter; and it must be said that the moderate Japanese press corroborated several of the assertions of the Revolutionaries.

These sectarians also strove to spread their doctrines by means of public speeches and demonstrations. More than once they held meetings in defiance of the police, or put the latter to ridicule by addressing street crowds from the roof of one or another house. They also organised little processions--little because their numbers were very limited; for instance, in June 1908, on the occasion of the release of one of their number, named Yomoguchi, from prison, they mustered but thirty- eight, all told, for the purpose of marching through Tokio, and among these thirty- eight there were two girls. Nevertheless, three red flags figured in the procession, one inscribed with the word " Anarchy," another in the word " Revolution," and a third with the words " Anarchical Communism." Not unnaturally the police interfered, the objectionable emblems were confiscated, and several of the demonstrators sent to prison.

After this affair, and a few similar ones, little was heard for a time about Kotoku and his adherents, and it was generally thought that their revolutionary fervour had abated. But, all at once, more than a score of them, including Kotoku and his mistress, were arrested on the charge of conspiring to assassinate the Emperor. The story runs that the plot was discovered in consequence of the chatter of some villagers, who talked of several explosions which they had noticed on the summit of Mount Kiso. The police resolved to investigate the affair, and came upon the conspirators while they were making preparations for fresh experiments with dynamite.

Kotoku and twenty- four others were tried on the charge of conspiring against their Sovereign's life. It is alleged that during the preliminary investigations into their case, several of them acknowledged their culpability. The actual trial, however, was conducted in semi- secrecy, only a certain number of lawyers and members of the foreign embassies and legations at Tokio being allowed in court. Journalists were rigorously excluded, and thus no such account of the proceedings as would enable one to judge of their fairness, the reliability of the evidence tendered for the prosecution, and the sincerity of the admissions or denials of the prisoners, is available. The Kotoku case differs, indeed, from the Ferrer case, respecting which the Spanish authorities at least published various reports and other documents, which enable one to see how flimsy was the evidence for the prosecution. We think, however, that if the Kotoku trial had been a miscarriage of justice some indications to that effect would have emanated, indirectly, of course, from one or another of the diplomatic representatives who attended it. We take it that the American, if not the British, representative would have had something to say on the subject had the proceedings been in his opinion unfair to the accused; but not a word of protest arose save from sundry European newspapers of advanced views, such as the Berlin " Vorwaerts," the Paris " Humanite," the Madrid " Pais," and the London " Daily News," none of which, we take it, knew anything of the evidence tendered for the prosecution. In the result, the twenty- five prisoners were convicted and sentenced to death, but only in twelve instances, which included Kotoku and his mistress, was the capital penalty enforced. In presence of the protests which arose in Europe it might have been well had the Japanese authorities issued a report of the proceedings. We are no partisans of secret or semi- secret trials. There is plenty of evidence that Kotoku, who began as an exponent of Marxism, and became a translator and disciple first of Tolstoi and then of Kropotkin, ended by professing Communistic Anarchism, and the anarchist form of Anti Militarism also. But he was not arraigned in connection with those matters; and in consequence of the silence and secrecy which have been observed, some doubt must remain as to whether he really plotted the death of the Mikado.

We now have to bring our long survey to an end with some mention of the position of Anarchism in our own country. We believe that very few natives of Great Britain profess Anarchist opinions, and that even fewer have ever been militant Anarchists, real partisans of the Propaganda by Deed. Here, however, as in Switzerland, and at times also in Belgium, there has long been a certain number of foreign Anarchist refugees. But it is difficult to assign to them any participation in the various outrages, notably the assassinations of rulers, which have taken place on the continent. All the chief crimes indeed, which have marked the so- called Propaganda by Deed, have been fully accounted for, and traced to men who never had any connection with Great Britain. Certainly, young Emile Henry, the bomb- thrower, sought a brief temporary refuge here, and there was also the mysterious case of Bourdin, who was killed in Greenwich Park, and who may have contemplated some terrible outrage either in this country or abroad. But these cases are, we think, the only exceptions to the proposition which we have laid down. Generally speaking, the Anarchists who have settled here, have belonged either to the more platonic school, or, having left their own countries in consequence of practicing militant methods there, have renounced those methods in England. We have previously given our opinion respecting the oft- repeated allegation that London has long been the headquarters of Anarchism, the centre whence orders for one and another terrible deed have emanated. We cannot find a shred of reliable evidence to that effect. Mere assertion is not proof, and we know of no instance in which proof has been forthcoming.

Nevertheless, the presence of a number of Anarchists in any community must give rise to some concern. We hold that the continental Anarchists generally have nowadays renounced the Propaganda by Deed in its original form, recognising it to be inefficacious. In France, we see it largely transformed into that Anti- Militarism which advocates insubordination and mutiny on the part of soldiers; and further we see French Anarchists participating in strikes and initiating the practice of " Sabotage." Example is often contagious, and men whose real ideas are by no means anarchical adopt practices introduced by Anarchist comrades. In like way the Anti- Militarist propaganda of the Anarchists infects others, makes proselytes in the ranks, and the discipline of an army becomes gradually undermined. For the most part the foreign Anarchists settled in London keep to themselves, but there are instances in which they associate with our own workers, and it is in such cases that danger arises. Our shipowners, moreover, largely employ foreign crews. Nothing would surprise us less than to find numerous Anarchists among them.

There is, however, a tendency nowadays to assume that every foreign criminal who appears in our police- courts must necessarily be an Anarchist. Nothing could be more absurd. In January 1909, a couple of Russians named Hefeld and Jacob, seized a bag containing [[sterling]]80 from a messenger outside a rubber- factory at Tottenham, and, on being chased by police and others, fired on them repeatedly and seized in turn a tramcar, a milk van, and another vehicle, in order to effect their escape. Hefeld, on being brought to bay, shot himself to avoid arrest, and Jacob took refuge in a cottage where he was shot by a police constable. During the chase the two desperadoes had used the firearms with which they were provided with deadly effect, a police- constable and a lad being killed by them, whilst three other constables and fourteen civilians were seriously injured, and six others slightly. Both Hefeld and Jacob were described at the time as Anarchists, but it was never established that they held any political opinions whatever. As they were Russians they may possibly have been Nihilists, but the name of Nihilist is sacred to the average English journalist, who has surrounded it with an aureole of glory. Anarchist, on the other hand, has become an everyday term of opprobrium, and to the journalistic mind it followed, of course, that Hefeld and Jacob must necessarily be Anarchists. A century ago, however, there was no lack of desperadoes like Hefeld and Jacob in this country--desperadoes of British birth--and nobody then thought of calling them either Anarchists or Nihilists. Our grandfathers were content with such good old terms as highwayman and footpad.

In December 1910 and January this present year there was a succession of sensational affairs in the East End of London. A party of foreigners contemplated a raid on a jeweller's shop, which they proposed to enter from the rear through premises of which they secured the tenancy. The police, on endeavouring to arrest them encountered an armed resistance, and loss of life ensued. One man, being badly injured, was carried off by some confederates, and for a short time the police were unable to ascertain his whereabouts. From information they obtained however, they finally resolved to raid a house in Sidney Street, Mile End, where some members of the band of burglars (in reality only two of them) were said to be concealed. Here again a sharp resistance was offered, and the authorities resorted to extraordinary measures to reduce the two desperate individuals who would not allow themselves to be arrested. Scots Guards from the Tower were called to the spot, in addition to numerous detachments of police, and half a battery of the Royal Horse Artillery, with three guns, was also requisitioned. To us, who witnessed the street fighting in Paris throughout the Bloody Week of 1871, the affair seemed extremely fantastical. In the end the beseiged house caught fire, and the two desperadoes, who, well- provided with weapons and ammunition, had long held the police and military in check, perished in the conflagration. Subsequently, in connection with the Houndsditch and Sidney Street affairs, several other men and two women were arrested. One of the latter was discharged however, and all the others ultimately secured acquittal.

Some of the persons implicated in these cases were Letts, and it is well known that there has been considerable unrest in Lithuania of recent years in consequence of the invasion of that Russian province by German settlers who have often dispossessed the natives of the soil, thereby fomenting an agrarian Revolutionary movement. How far the individuals concerned in the Houndsditch and Mile End affairs had been connected (if at all) with any such movement in their natve land, and what were their precise reasons for coming to England are matters which cannot be ascertained. These men were described, however, as Anarchists, on which point the principal evidence was that some of them had frequented a club in Jubilee Street, which the newspapers currently described as the " Anarchist Club," though it never actually bore any such name. It was, however, the resort of a certain number of Anarchists, as well as of many other foreigners having no connection with Anarchism. The individuals who proposed to raid the jeweller's shop were certainly possessed of explosives, and this again was regarded as proof that they must be Anarchists. Doubtless the Anarchist and the Irish Extremist of former times initiated the use of dynamite for criminal purposes, but the up- to- date criminal, who nowadays employs it to effect a burglary, is not necessarily either an Anarchist OI a Fenian. That the Sidney Street men and others were plentifully supplied with weapons and ammunition is certainly true, and this circumstance may be taken as some indication of their criminal propensities, but, again, it does not necessarily imply that they were Anarchists. Neither the man of the Camorra nor the man of the Mafia is an Anarchist, yet he is usually well armed. Briefly, in connection with the Tottenham, the Houndsditch and the Sidney Street affairs, it is fit to dismiss the question of Anarchism from our minds. It is sufficient to say that the men concerned in those affairs were foreigners of the criminal classes.

An Aliens Act is in force in this country. It was originally suggested far less on account of the presence of many foreign criminals in our midst than on account of the great increase in foreign immigration generally, the destitute state of many of the immigrants, the unfavourable conditions in which their competition placed many of our workers, and the over- crowding to which this influx of aliens led in the East End of our metropolis. A Report on these questions was submitted to Parliament in 1903, and in the following year Mr Akers Douglas, then Home Secretary, introduced a first Aliens Bill into the House of Commons. It was successfully obstructed by the Liberal Opposition, and failed to pass; but in 1905 a second bill proved successful, and became law on January I, the following year. In 1906 some of the regulations set up in connection with the Act were modified in a liberal spirit by the present Viscount Gladstone, who was then at the Home Office. The Act does not appear to have checked alien immigration to any appreciable degree; but some of its provisions have enabled the authorities to expel a certain number of alien criminals from this country. It is in respect to such criminals that the Act requires strengthening. Nobody wishes to deny the right of asylum to bona- fide political refugees, but the influx of foreign criminals must be checked, and the deportation of those who, once settled here, offend against our laws, must be rendered more effective. Over and over again we find individuals who have been deported from this country returning here after a time to resume their criminal courses. It is not easy to determine how this can be altogether prevented, but it might prove a deterrent if very severe sentences were enacted against those who might infringe one of deportation.

Further, the sale of fire- arms should be more strictly regulated than is now the case, and in the event of foreign immigrants bringing weapons and ammunition into this country without express permission to do so. severe penalties should be inflicted. We see no reason why the Customs Regulations should not be carried out more stringently. The persons as well as the luggage of many foreign immigrants should be searched, and in the event of these immigrants being found possessed of concealed weapons, deportation might well follow. It is notorious that in many if not most instances foreign immigrants bring weapons with them from abroad, a practice which should be checked by every available means. This, of course, would not entirely suffice to put down the free shooting which is becoming such a frequent practice. More stringent rules must be imposed on our own gunsmiths. In that event, no doubt, they will complain of " restrictions on trade," but the public safety is of far greater importance than free trade in death- dealing weapons.

In the newspaper articles and the parliamentary debates which followed the Sidney Street affair, a great deal was written or said on the subject of registering all foreigners in this country. The Government has hitherto refused to accede to this proposal, but we are fairly confident that it will ultimately be carried into effect, if not under this Administration, at all events under another, when the pendulum has once more swung round and restored the Conservative party to power. We see no reason whatever why there should not be some such registration of foreigners. It is practiced abroad-- in Republican France very stringently indeed, as all who merely repair to Paris for a few days must be aware. Not an Englishman ever spends a night at a French hotel, but his name is taken, and the bulletin bearing it, and other particulars respecting him, is collected by the police hotel- inspectors and lodged at the Prefecture. In this country nothing of that kind happens. England is the safest place of refuge that a foreign criminal can find, and this is one reason why there are so many foreign criminals in our midst. London and its suburbs swarm with houses where anybody can obtain lodgings without references, and merely on payment of a few shillings rent in advance. In France the arrival of any new lodger would be duly reported to the police. Allowance has to be made, no doubt, for the difference between some of our manners and customs and those of foreign nations, but we feel that it should be possible to devise a system by which account would be kept of the aliens in this country, and a means of tracing them, if necessary, provided. The question is a big one, no doubt, and those who object that the foreign element among us is too large to be adequately dealt with, have what is outwardly a very plausible case. However, though there may not be so many aliens in France as there are here, it should be remembered that some hundreds of thousands of Belgians, Swiss, Germans, Italians, Spaniards, English and others, are to be found on the territory of the Republic, and that with comparatively few exceptions their presence there is duly recorded.

We have little to add to our narrative of the deeds of the Anarchist sect. The best that can be said for their creed is that it represents a perverted form of Individualism and indicates a revolt against both Governmental oppression and authoritarian Socialism. There are some features in the Anarchist faith with which one can in a measure sympathise, but there are many others which one can only condemn. At one and another period it has undoubtedly recruited a very considerable number of proselytes; but it is manifest that Socialism has outpaced Anarchism, which of recent years has entered on a declining course. Its excesses foredoomed it to an unsuccessful ending, which has not yet altogether arrived, perhaps, but which is not far off. All history shows us that extremist theories never secure a triumph of any permanency. Moreover, the bomb- throwing of the Anarchists and their assassinations of rulers were as futile as were the victories of Napoleon. " Sabotage " has since ensued, but will prove quite as unavailing to advance the cause of the masses. That the bases of society will be ultimately modified seems certain, but we take it that the Anarchists, in spite of all the noise they have made in the world, will have no share in devising the new order of things which progress must eventually bring in its train.