Page:Secrets of Crewe House.djvu/110

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72
SECRETS OF CREWE HOUSE

for example: though she is almost incapable of sustaining a war against the world by herself because of her weakness in the matter of coal, she can as an ally be at once of enormous importance. Take the case of Spain again, a very similar case. And whatever the war ability of Latin-America may be to-day, there can be no question that this great constellation of States must count very heavily in the framing of the world of tomorrow. Then, again, we have to consider the vast future possibilities of the Chinese Republic, with coal, steel, and a magnificent industrial population, and the probable reconstruction of Eastern Europe and a renascence of Russia which may give the world a loose-knit but collectively-important Slavonic confederation. While an isolated small Power within the orbit of attraction of a large Power, a State of 5,000,000 people or less, must always remain a difficult problem in the world representation, it is clear that something like an adequate representation of small and weak Powers becomes possible so soon as they develop a disposition towards aggregation, for the purposes of world politics, into associations with States racially, linguistically, and historically akin to them. The trend of Allied opinion is to place not Peru