Great Britain's Sea Policy by Gilbert Murray

And then the article tails off into vague horrors about the British censorship and the Defence of the Realm Act and the deplorable profits made by British shippers, and the "party of Lord North which is installed at the Foreign Office!"

Everybody knows that in war censorship is necessary; every nation employs it, Great Britain rather more leniently than the rest. It is a pure myth to suppose that in England we are kept in the dark about important sides of the war which are well known to neutrals. I have been in four different neutral countries since the war began, and have read their newspapers; so I speak with confidence. But it is just the sort of myth that Mr. Bullard accepts without question. As to the Defence of the Realm Act: of course the act gives the executive tremendous powers, and would, if continued in normal times, be incompatible with civil liberty. But everybody knows that some such special laws are necessary in war time; there is no nation in Europe which attempts to do without such laws, and Mr. Bullard makes no attempt to show that any other nation applies them more leniently than England does. As to the fortunes made by shippers, why drag in the word "British"? With the German merchant ships out of use, with Allied and neutral ships sunk to the number of some hundreds by submarines and extensively commandeered by the various governments for war purposes, there is an extreme shortage of ships together with an immense demand. Every tub that will float, of whatever nationality, is bringing its owner fortune. And we dare not discourage them, for we want every ship we can get. Mr. Bullard, dropping for a moment his lofty idealism, complains simply that the British are getting too large a share of the swag, an unproved and to me extremely doubtful statement. Naturally ships belonging to the Allied powers are less open to suspicion than neutrals are, and consequently are less harassed by certain restrictions. But the British, at any rate, are not only subjected to enormous war-taxation, but have in addition fifty per cent. of their war-profits confiscated. And Lord North at the Foreign Office! Really one smiles at Mr. Bullard's innocence. "The visitor thought we were naughty, papa; but of course he has never seen us when we are really naughty!" In every country engaged in war there is somewhere below the surface a growling mass of passion, brutality, lawlessness, hatred of foreign nations, contempt for reason and humanity. In Great Britain, thank heaven, the brute is kept cowed and well chained, though at times his voice is heard in the more violent newspapers. The brute knows the hands that hold him down and hates almost all the present Cabinet, but most of all, perhaps, he hates two men: the great and moderate Liberal who presides over the government, the great and moderate Liberal who guides the Foreign Office. -- And Mr. Bullard, in his innocence, would like to turn them out!