elephant with a panther's tread, who gives us the official Communist viewpoint on America. Since his Chinese experience as Russian ambassador to Pekin, during which he embarrassed to mortification the ministers of the Western powers, he has been chief of the largest and most important division of the Russian Foreign Office, the Asiatic. It has three subdivisions, Far Eastern, Middle Eastern, and Near Eastern, and he retains concurrently the headship of the first. 'It's foolishness to talk about "the revolution" in America for another hundred years. We have given you up as utterly unregenerate for this generation at least. It is utter waste for a nation which has one pair of boots to every nine people to spend money propagandizing idealism within a nation which has a motorcar to every five people. We must make our masses rich first. By that time your masses will be getting poor under the capitalistic concentration of wealth and tendency toward serfdom.'

OSPITALITY is one of the most ingrained traits of the human being, and the more primitive the people the more pronounced it is. We have found this in Asia and we find it in Russia, which is of Asia. On the trains through Siberia or the boats on the Volga, where we buy our roast geese and hams and cheese and milk and great loaves of bread hit-andmiss from the peasant women at every stop, we are always offered a portion by some fellow traveler who likely has less than ourselves. And the muzhik's bed will always hold one more. Propaganda, like education, has some strange influences on the travelers. We are crossing Siberia when the news of the execution of Sacco and Vanzetti reaches the train. The dear, illiterate, old mother who, with her engineer son, shares our compartment has been concerning herself with our comfort. Suddenly she turns aloof, and regards us for half a day as deplorable creatures of some blood-thirsty and savage race. But she forgets it over the brewing of the evening tea. Commenting on the same incident young Attaché Huten of the Foreign Office, a member of a noted Polish family, says in excellent English: 'We are shockedterribly shocked! You have hurt us to the soul.' His Geypeyoo has just executed thirty alleged spies said to be in the service of England!

As we come out through the Stolpce customs house we Americans receive attention first, then a Japanese traveler. The Germans enjoy the most informal camaraderie, the least official attention. Russian-speaking Americans, particularly those of Jewish extraction, are,

however, closely examined and questioned. One investigator for an American-Jewish philanthropic society tells us that he found it desirable to pretend no knowledge of the language. Admitting it now would at once get him into a Geypeyoo jail.

When it comes to the red tape of visas, however, we all stand equal. Days of waiting in line for the permit to be stamped, having it expire before one can get to the head of the line, making it necessary to wait in line to get a new permit, only to wait in line again to have it stamped - these are the traveler's only unpleasant experiences in Russia. And one can, of course, hire the waiting done for him. But he cannot buy service from the officials.

The men clerks are impervious to gifts -more discouraging still, the buxom young women to flattery.

For three centuries Russia was forced into European make-up by the Germanized Romanov dynasty. You cannot, of course, artificialize a nation like Russia or China.

ceptance of conditions and capacity to compromise, with a European idealism. The result was his unsurpassed opportunism, which could tack with the wind and yet receive credit for honesty. When he died there was no man possessing this rare combination of qualities to succeed him. Followed the struggle between the purely and bluntly Asiatic Stalin, Tomski, and Voroshilov on the one hand and the purely idealistic and uncompromising Jewish Trotski, Zinoviev, and Radek on the other.

Do I confuse 'European' and 'Hebraic'? The Jew has always been, in mentality, the most Europeanized element in Russia, and the non-compromising and idealistic type of Jew is the exact antithesis of the Asiatic mind. The pure Slav, between the Jew and the Tartar, has been on the whole a neutral element, artistic rather than executive, dreamer rather than actor, or else phlegmatic and colorless altogether.

Stalin wins. We deal with a Russia that is frankly and purely Asian now, but which has adopted as its fetish 'Americanism,' meaning, to it, regimentation and mass production. Amazing combination: 'go-get-ism' as a national policy, not an individual ebullience, based upon Asiatic fatalism. Under the Red Fog, Asiaticism and Idealism are combining; and these opposing elements can come together only because they are overlaid with the lineament-hiding glue of Slavic mysticism.

Scratch a Russian, and this is what we find to-day.

E

By William R. Willcox

UROPEAN eyes are focused, just

now, on the presidential campaign in America, for Europeans are aware that on its outcome may depend the immediate future of such matters as the American tariff, war debts, and the related question of reparations, with which their own interests are so intimately bound.

Of course Europe is looking most of all at two men. Governor Smith is something of a puzzle. Hoover, in a way, Europeans think they understand. He has lived much among them. He won world-wide fame in Belgium. He is a familiar figure in France. For some years he resided in London. And during the most critical years of the war, as director of the interallied food control, he made his name known in every home and his economy programme felt in every kitchen between No Man's Land and the Mediterranean.

In general the European journalists who undertake to interpret the approaching American election seem to find the Republican presidential candidate a good deal easier to comprehend than the methods by which he was nominated and those by which, so many of them predict, he will be elected. A European beholding an American political convention for the first time, observes the Swiss Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 'will be as much amazed at its vast size as at its total lack of political discussion,' adding cynically that only a very few Americans ever know what really does go on.' The Tory Morning Post, which usually contrives to be more thoroughly condescending than any other London newspaper, comments sardonically upon American elections and the curious scenes of synthetic enthusiasm by which conventions are accompanied. 'It would never have occurred to the most enthusiastic Conservative,' it continues, 'to have provided himself for the last General Election with a gigantic portrait of Mr. Baldwin, so that in the hour of victory he might bear it triumphantly along the Strand. Nor could the Central Office have conceived the idea of gathering in London a bevy of the most beautiful girls to strew flowers before the victor.' Naturally, Europe thinks first of Mr. Hoover's services as a 'specialist in national disasters.' The Indépendance Belge, referring to his work as head of the

From the Passing Show, London

HOOVER IN BRITISH EYES

DAVID WILSON, a British caricaturist, famous for his ability to put people on paper, has a try at the Republican candidate

Commission for Relief in Belgium, deCommission for Relief in Belgium, declares that 'it was there, though without any desire on his part, that his political career and his great rôle in the political life of the United States began. It was there that he revealed his qualities of intelligence, energy, authority, and his capacity as an organizer.'

'He entered politics accidentally,' says this newspaper. 'Without the war, he would probably never have done anything of the sort. There is nothing of the politician about him,' and it ends by observing that if Herbert Hoover is elected President, there will be in the White House a strong personality whose action may include some surprises.'

In Paris, Le Temps describes him as 'an example of the American realist and organizer, with profound knowledge of the world's needs and a very definite feeling of the economic solidarity of all feeling of the economic solidarity of all nations.' Stéphane Lauzanne, editor of nations.' Stéphane Lauzanne, editor of Le Matin, praises him because he does not 'indulge in sentiment at the expense not 'indulge in sentiment at the expense of reason,' and because he is 'the leading business man in a country which has the greatest business men on earth.' Under

Mr. Hoover's administration, if he is elected, 'America will never perish of cold, hunger, or privation' - which does not, however, seem alarmingly probable in any case.

In the Écho de Paris, the acid Pertinax unbends sufficiently to describe Hoover as 'the inspired repairer of disasters.' He is, according to this famous observer of international affairs, 'retiring, imperious, laconic - more genuinely laconic, perhaps, than President Coolidge, for he has not at the tip of his tongue the pat, ready-made vocabulary of the professional politician.'

In Germany, the Frankfurter Zeitung avers that the Republican Party has 'done the wisest thing it could have done.' 'As his career demonstrates, Hoover is a man of superior qualities. In his seven years as Secretary of Commerce, he has shown himself not only a superior organizer and administrator, but also the possessor in high degree of the gift of statesmanship.' In spite of this, however, and in spite of the fact that he has the gift of knowing what to do in critical times,' the Frankfurter Zeitung predicts that he will have a hard fight, partly because he is not sufficiently known, partly because of his 'political neutrality,' and partly because of the forces arrayed against him. The Neue Freie Presse, of Vienna, asserts, however: 'No one can deny that he is known. He is somebody, he holds high rank in his profession, and his profession is no mere restricted specialty. Wherever he has had an opportunity to show that he is a practical man with practical organizing ability, Hoover has proved his worth.'

Neutral Switzerland, where one might expect Mr. Hoover to have impressed himself less than among the late belligerents, is most enthusiastic about him. 'It would be unjust and ungrateful not to remember,' writes William Martin, the famous editorial writer of the Journal de Genève, that if Switzerland somehow or other managed to live through the war, it was in part due to Mr. Hoover's work.' He is, says the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 'one of the greatest organizers and doers in modern business life."

In the opinion of the London Daily Telegraph he is the best example of the man whom modern America admires most, viz., the successful super-organizer,' and 'in times of special emergency

it has grown to be the habit for all eyes to be turned in his direction.' The London Sunday Times-which, by the way, has no connection whatever with the Times (London) says: 'Mr. Hoover stands as Disraeli stood, "on his head," on his efficiency, on the sheer excellence of his record as an executive officer.'

THE

HE editorial commentators of all nations are quite aware of the significance of the American elections for Europe and the world at large, and they take obvious satisfaction in the thought that the next President may be a man so intimately acquainted with world problems as Herbert Hoover. The London Observer, edited by J. L. Garvin, who is also editor of the Encyclopædia Britannica, calls him 'one of the biggest men alive,' who 'knows more of the world at large than any former president, even more than Roosevelt knew.' In the Journal de Genève, William Martin also declares that the next American President will be arbiter of the world's destinies.' Mr. Hoover, if elected, however, will not in his opinion be 'a European president.' Continues Mr. Martin: 'Europe does not look for a president of her own in the White House. But she will be glad to see there a man who knows that she exists and understands her needs.' Very much the same attitude appears in the Neue Freie Presse (Vienna), which says: 'It is of special importance to us that the new President shall not favor isolation, that he shall carry on the peace policies that Coolidge began and that Kellogg yesterday carried further, that he shall make his voice heard on behalf of righteousness in the great international assemblies.' Pertinax humorously points out in the Écho de Paris, however, that Hoover has an engineer's passion for efficiency and that 'Europe was made to scandalize him, by the excessive number of its national compartments. What waste! What loss! What folly! What absurd complications!"

In far-off Tokyo the Asahi declares editorially that, no matter who is elected, 'the national as well as the foreign policy of the United States will not be affected'; but later in the same editorial the somewhat inconsistent view is expressed that the change of the chief executive, his personal worth, and the advance of the times may bring phenomenal features into international life.' What he hopes one of these 'phenomenal features' may be, the editorial writer points out specifically. Mr. Hoover is 'a

THE WORLD LOOKS AT HOOVER

Californian, but a professed friend of Japan,' who 'will probably undertake to solve the immigration question.'

Le Temps says that 'whether victory goes to Hoover or to Smith, there is every reason to think that the presidential elections will bring to the White House a new policy as well as a new man. In view of the United States' large share in common action for the solution of the great problems now confronting the nations, we have here a fact of immense significance for the entire world.'

'Should destiny bear him to the White House,' says the New Statesman, a London weekly which supports the Labor party, 'Mr. Hoover would be the first of the American Presidents to represent in any full sense the world of American Big Business in its international aspect, and he would have the advantage of a personal experience rightly to be described as unique.'

At a time when the acquisition and protection of foreign markets is an increasing preoccupation of American manufacturers, says the Times (London), 'Mr. Hoover seems admirably fitted to control the machinery of government in the interests of foreign trade. By the circumstances of their apprenticeship in State politics, most American Presidents and Senators, and many American Ministers, know little of the world which exists outside the wide boundaries of the States. This is a defect in the organization of American public life which is coming to matter more and more as American interests abroad increase in importance and complexity. That the Republican Party should choose as its standard bearer a man who is not only not a politician, but who is credited with all the business man's contempt for the politician's calling, is a proof how completely the party accepts the dictum of President Coolidge that "the business of the United States is business." The Bolshevist organ Pravda, in Moscow, expresses somewhat the same view, but laments the nomination as a final capitulation' to the bourgeoisie.

Mr. Hoover, according to the Manchester Guardian, 'is a public man of the world's newest type, and as such is all the more significant when seen against the more significant when seen against the background of American party politics - the most unreal and mechanical politics in the world.' It refers to his nomination as 'an event of the highest moment to the world.'

The British press does not take seriously the suggestion that Mr. Hoover

35

is an Anglophile, though Germania, organ of the German Catholics, while recognizing his post-Armistice services to Germany, accuses him of a 'clearly British complexion' in his international dealings. Few British papers even mention the accusation, and the Sunday Times curtly dismisses it as 'preposterous' and intended to mislead voters 'who still cherish the ancient grudge.'

Several foreign editorial observers are already predicting a Hoover victory. None suggests the likelihood of defeat. The Indépendance Belge says: 'All our hopes are that this great-hearted organizer of human happiness will be elected to the place at the head of the American people once occupied by the man who liberated the slaves.' The Sunday Times (London) thinks there may be 'as close a fight as in 1916,' but the Times (London) regards a Hoover victory as 'unquestionably the probability.' In Japan, Osaka Mainichi says that the election 'is likely to go in favor of Mr. Hoover.'

If he becomes President, the Neue Freie Presse is careful to remind its readers, Mr. Hoover's position will not resemble that of the more or less powerless presidents who have succeeded kings and emperors in most European countries. In Europe, the real power remains in the hands of the prime ministers. American presidents, on the contrary, 'are their own prime ministers and, during the four years for which they are elected, possess such powers as no monarch ever had, even in the good old days of the monarchical idea.' The London Observer is even more emphatic: 'No monarch and no premier has the home-power and world-power belonging to a president of the United States.' Pertinax, in the Écho de Paris, says the same thing more succinctly 'imperial power unequaled in this century.'

WHA

HAT effect can pæans of foreign praise have upon an American presidential election? An estimate is difficult just now. But it is known that the powerful newspapers published abroad, in addition to their regular subscribers in the United States, influence profoundly the foreign language press of the United States, read by millions of voters. From this it follows that in a closely contested national election the enthusiastic support of the newspapers and periodicals of Europe and the civilized world outside of the United States might constitute an asset of substantial importance.

A

By Verax

T LAST the General received me. He came forward with his hand outstretched, a big man, rather stout, dressed in a tightly fitting khaki uniform and seeming scarcely to feel the weight of his fifty-eight years. The office to which he conducted me was a very much gilded room, in the centre of which stood a big table covered with documents and with maps of Morocco.

His cordial welcome-assisted by the offer of a cigarette and by the abrazo, the traditional Spanish hugging embrace - quickly brings about a certain familiarity. There is no constraint, for Primo de Rivera is always the military man, and every visitor knows at once whether he is regarded as an enemy or a friend. The General speaks volubly, and though in French a few words fail him, he makes up for that with gestures. In any case, he understands French well and his quickness in answering shows that none of its fine points escape him. He told me that he loved France and recalled the fact that he was one of the few Spanish generals who, during the War, had asked to visit the French rather than the German trenches. It was after

For two years he alone governed Spain, first with a Directorate of eight Spain, first with a Directorate of eight members, then with a few other collaborators less inadequate than the first, but not so much better that he entrusted them with distinct ministerial functions. He alone, therefore, was responsible to the King and to the country for all decisions made. Later on, the Directorate was changed somewhat and General Primo de Rivera's collaborators became ministers.

The powers of each, however, are restricted; and all important business is submitted to Primo. The General follows affairs closely so closely that during the Moroccan War and the Tangiers dispute the Secretary of State, de Yanguas, was forced to give up his portfolio. To-day Primo de Rivera is Secretary of State as well as Prime Minister; and during the most active period of military operations in the Riff, period of military operations in the Riff, he was also High Commissioner to Morocco and Commander-in-Chief of the troops.

Added to these tasks is the preparation of the numerous speeches which he delivers on every possible occasion, of the

ment journal, and finally the obligations of his very active official and social life.

Furthermore, he is easy to reach; and, in Spain more than anywhere else, business conversations involve long preambles in the course of which natural eloquence is allowed free rein. This is especially true in the case of the General, who is a brilliant conversationalist and loves to talk.

His activity, at first glance a little confused, is nevertheless orderly. His secretaries object because he arrives at his desk at nine o'clock — an abnormal hour for Madrid - though his mail is not brought to him until between ten and eleven. He stays at his office until two o'clock. Sometimes, when he does not have to preside at a banquet, he lunches in the city. Back in his office about five, he receives visitors and works until ten o'clock at night. Besides all this he confers with his ministers, calls them together in Cabinet Council, and goes to make his report to the King, who himself presides at the Council once or twice a week.

was made a Commander of the Legion of Honor.

Gray hair cut short; a broad forehead, rather bald; eyes sparkling with intelligence, full of light and gaiety; a closely clipped mustache; great mobility of features, with an engaging smile and a laugh always ready to break out at his own jokes and even at other people's jokes; amiable and good-natured gestures: the ensemble at once inspires friendliness. Even his voice, though it is hoarse and sometimes strikes high notes of command, is not without charm. He is the picture of the fine military officer, overflowing with health and good humor; and when he says that even the devil became a hermit when he grew old, this is feigned modesty, for Primo de Rivera is still as young and gallant as a

page.

Tireless, he is never sick. Always up and about at nine o'clock, he never goes to bed before three in the morning, and only then when he doesn't have to work or . . . dance until dawn. And this has gone on since September 13, 1923, the day he came to power.

Assembly, of the articles which he writes for La Nacion and for Monday's govern

ITH a fiesta that makes up

WITH

in careful planning what it may lack in spontaneity, Spain, on September 13, will celebrate

the fifth anniversary of Primo de Rivera's rise to power. The Dictator came to office proclaiming that he would stay at most for ninety days. He has already headed his government longer than any Spaniard in a hundred. years; and his latest pronouncement postpones his resignation until 1933. Mussolini, posturing before the world, is familiar to Americans. Primo is almost unknown. Yet the Spanish dictator has ruled nearly as long as the Duce, and holds his country in as firm a grip. What is he like? A penetrating French observer tells the story here.

accepts invitations willingly. He is a delightful guest. Always in good spirits, he eats heartily, drinks freely, and smokes a great deal. The biggest Havana cigars do not intimidate him. In the evening in the drawing room he is pleasant and interested in the ladies, who seem not insensible to his charm. At all events he apparently forgets his daytime anxieties completely. His day, however, is not yet over, and he works on until late at night after he has returned to the Ministry of War.

He lives there, for he is a widower; and his simple room would hardly satisfy some of his lieutenants. He and his friend and companion-at-arms, the Duke of Tetuan, Minister of War, keep house together. Each has retained his former orderly. One of the soldiers acts as housekeeper for the two generals, and the other serves as cook on occasions when they dine, often with friends, at the Ministry. It is said that when their accounts come to be balanced at the end of the month, each protests that the other has invited too many guests.

In spite of a life which no one else could stand, General Primo de Rivera

does not seem to age. One can scarcely see how he is rested by his numerous trips to Morocco, during which all his time is spent on the boat, on a horse, or in an automobile; or by his quick tours of the provinces where, arriving on one train and departing on the next, he speaks at banquets given by the Patriotic Unions, unveils monuments, visits factories, and harangues the authorities. Even when he goes to Jeres, his native town, he cannot refuse the invitations of his friends, who entertain him and make him drink the headiest of sherries under the most treacherous of suns.

One marvelous faculty enables him to resist this continual overwork: he can rest at will. At any moment he chooses, he can forget all his cares and fall asleep. Sleep comes instantly, if only for a few moments. After this restoring interlude, he is once more fresh and ready for work.

UCH a concentration of power in the

hands of a single man, so radical a change from the former system of government which meant so much profit to so many people, has naturally harmed the interests and aroused the hatred of many. Those who exploited the parliamentary régime, those for whom it is still an article of faith, have attempted to combat the dictatorship. But even they, though enemies of the government of General Primo de Rivera, Marquis of Estella, are usually friends of Miguel. Almost all who have approached him have felt his charm, admired his sincerity, and recognized the success of his methods.

He is certainly a dictator, but he is a paternal dictator who is horrified by blood and who seized power without shedding a drop of it, though under the circumstances perhaps he did not deserve much credit, since he encountered no resistance. The government of the Marquis of Alhucemas, which preceded the dictatorship, was not overturned. It fell like an overripe fruit, suffering from all the evils which are traditionally Spanish, military intrigues, Catalan separatism, terrorism, Moroccan difficulties, parliamentary corruption. Primo de Rivera, called by the King just after the resignation of this government, left Barcelona on the evening of September 14, 1923, blessed by the Bishop, embraced by the Mayor, and hailed by delirious ovations. He did not even have to march upon the capital to take possession of it. He had only to publish a proclamation and get aboard the train.

What did he come to Madrid to do? As representative of a military movement, was he, like certain of his prede

PRIMO DE RIVERA

cessors, going to establish himself in power and then exploit it? No. Immediately he announced that he had arrived like Hercules to sweep out the Augean stables.

He defined his programme as follows: (1) establish better order below, more authority above; (2) combat the corruption that had become general under the dissolving action of a political organization that was extortionate, incapable, and discredited. He planned to remain in power as long as necessary to complete this task. To the journalists he explained that his mission was only temporary, three days, three weeks, or at the most three months. Ninety days, he said, would permit him to honor the letter of credit drawn on the confidence of the King. He compared the members of the Directorate to surgeons; they would open the abscess, make an incision in the sore, and cut down to the living flesh. Soon they would place Spain, weak but successfully operated upon, in the hands of an honest doctor who would watch over her convalescence. Then, his duty done, Primo de Rivera would go back to his tent.

37

Photo Pacific and Atlantic

GENERAL PRIMO DE RIVERA, DICTATOR OF SPAIN

"... A BIG MAN, rather stout, dressed in a tightly fitting khaki uniform and seeming scarcely to feel the weight of his fiftyeight years'

He set to work immediately. About administration he knew nothing. He had fought in the Philippines, in Cuba, in Morocco; he had been stationed in many garrisons; and his political ideas were those of an officer who, in the military casino, had talked more than he had listened.

ence. He went forward. He dissolved the Cortes and the elected part of the Senate, suspended constitutional guaranties, suppressed the jury system and transferred its powers to provincial judges, established a rigorous censorship, replaced municipal governments by Juntas de Asociados, and finally demanded diligence of all government officials.

This last measure disturbed the life of Madrid and made the city tremble. At a stroke, one newspaper publisher lost all his editors. Every one of them had been on the government pay-roll. The head of a Ministry discovered an assistant whose existence he had never suspected, and who confessed that month 'Tell me, Miguel, where did you learn by month he had been drawing money to to govern?'

One day when he was holding forth in a drawing-room, the King approached his group and said:

'In the casino of Jeres, Sire.'

Several times, notably in a speech at Saragossa in June of 1924, Primo de Rivera has admitted his lack of preparation. 'I bow before the altar of my country with remorse,' he said, 'because I did not make better use of my youth so that I might have arrived at the position which God has reserved for me with a technical preparation which would have guaranteed my success."

His collaborators were even less competent than he. It made no differ

feed two mules that had once belonged to the Ministry's stables but had long been dead. There were heavy cuts, right and left. In two weeks six hundred officials vanished from the lists; and Madrid tailors began to complain that a good many honorable gentlemen were letting their bills go unpaid, for lack of government funds!

But though he had full power from the King, the General did not indulge in reprisals. It is true that there have been several investigations, that a number of suspects have been imprisoned for a