Evening star., 1925-02-22
BY FRANK III. SIMONDS.

animation of Britains future relation to
the League of Nations In the present
dispatch l am going to deal with the
general appearance and state of mind
OF England, the background and
foundation of both national and in
terhatlonal relations. l mean also TO
say a brief word as to the domestic
political situation
For the American who comes to
London every year the Impressive
circumstance is the total absence of
any contract between the appearance
of New York and London. Within 10
days | walked uptown in New York
from Wall street to the Fifth avenue
district and from Fleet street to
Hyde Park corner in London and for
the first time in more than a decade
the impression was one of likeness,
not of difference, in the crowds-in
the expression oS~faces in the energy
and vitality of motion and the utter
absorption in the matter Immediate
ly at hand.
A year ago I went to Geneva, hav-
ing passed through London and Paris,
and there was an immediate and in
def1nable sense in the Swiss town of
being at last in a country which had
not been in the war and among a
people which had no vivid memories
of recent tragedy or recent struggle.
Today the American in London has
precisely this feeling.
Both Seek tranquility.
The America which 1 left was pro-
foundly plunged into that state
which the late President Harding de-
scribed as ''normalcy." The England
in which l arrived was equally de-
voted to tranquility" and the diff
ference is indiscoverable.
A year ago when L was here it was
unmistakable that Britain had recov-
cred from what you might describe
as the emotions of the war, but with
the Labor government just taking Of
flee there was still heavy emphasis
laid upon the problems of peace. To-
day one has the consciousness not
alone of recovery from war, but also
from what we have called peace for
the last six years. The tense nervous
atmosphere of war and the Kaiser
and again of peace and Poincare has
given way TO one in which a cross
word puzzle easily absorbs more at
tention than a cross-channel prob
lem.
In London Of the present hour the
American has no longer a sense of
tenseness, not alone in the express
sion of the faces of the crowd, but in
the atmosphere itself. There is no
longer that consciousness of anxiety
and apprehension perhaps resulting
from a vivid recollection of the war
period, but, in part at least, growing
out of uncertainty as to the future
and of no little actual privation in
the present.
Feeling of Satisfaction.
BY contrast one has in London now
the sense of dissipated apprehension,
of improved present conditions, of a
re-established confidence; the impress
sion perhaps of an athlete who has
run an exhausting race, won IT, be-
gun to recover from the feeling OF
physical exhaustion and arrived at a
Just apprehension of the underlying
physical endurance which made his
victory possible. Shall I say also to
something of an interested specufa-
tion as to the next race?
The fact is, that coming to London
now the American has a marked i'm
preston of a John Bull, who has
pretty nearly got back to normal
feels measurably like himself and
more and more acts like his old self
The American will note the differ
ence particularly since for the first
time in more than 10 years he will
find the purposes and policies of his
own country exciting relatively little
curiosity and less discussion. The
same would probably be the expert
i ence of any other foreigner. John
Il Bull seems to have returned to his
II traditional aloofness, to have regain
ed his old confidence in himself and
"a his conviction that the important
q thing is what he must do and what
s>he can do, not the decisions of any
other country, America included.
hack to Old Times.
Beyond all else you have the sense
of calm and confidence. To find a
parallel for the London of the CO.
temporary hour in my own personal
experience 1 have to go back beyond
all the nightmare years of the war
and the postwar period to the rela-
lively remote days when l came here
as a boy and for the first time mar
veled at the amazing and stimulating
spectacle of the British capital. For
the first time since 1915, the date of
nv original wartime visit, / have
4 the sense of business as usual, to en-
pioy the old familiar wartime legend,
not alone business in it's narrow sense,
but the whole business of national
Il living.
You cannot stay in England long
without perceiving that just around
the corner grave and tremendous
8 problems remain Unemployment, high
cost of living, restricted markets,
4 colossal taxation, they are all there.
Broadly speaking, the solution re-
mains to be discovered, but merely
to consider them from their statis-
tical side is to derive a mistaken
notion of England. Business depres-
sion undoubtedly remains in Great
Britain with all it's consequent hard
ships, but the great moral and the
mental depression has largely passed
away. If the balance of trade re-
mains unfavorable the balance of
mind is Enthusiastically returned.
This means, 1 take it, that in busi-
ness. finance and even international
relations, the United States must be
prepared to deal with a markedly diff
ferent John Bull from the one we have
encountered in the last decade The
gravity of his condition, which for
long period has depressed him, now
begins to act as a stimulant Unmis-
takably he feels that the war and it's
aftermath compromised his position in
the world. Equally obviously, he is out
to restore that position.
Changing Moods.
Perhaps the best measure of the
current British state of mind is the
character of the cotemporary British
press. When 1 was here in 1919, just
after the armistice, British public
opinion was dominated by two things,
continued wartime anger with Ger
many and rapidly expanding expecta-
tions of American action in Europe.
Three years later, just after the
Washington conference. the anti-Ger-
man passion had largely disappeared,
hopes of American performance had
, shrunk a little, and the outstanding
feeling was irritation and anger at
French policy.
Last year the long duel with Poin-
h06 of