VI

EUROPE AFTER THE TREATY

235

ance is reached at last and counsels of despair andmadness stir the sufferers from the lethargy whichprecedes the crisis. Then man shakes himself, andthe bonds of custom are loosed. The power of ideasis sovereign, and he listens to whatever instructionof hope, illusion, or revenge is carried to him on theair. As I write, the flames of Russian Bolshevismseem, for the moment at least, to have burnt them-selves out, and the peoples of Central and EasternEurope are held in a dreadful torpor. The latelygathered harvest keeps off the worst privations, andPeace has been declared at Paris . But winterapproaches. Men will have nothing to look forwardto or to nourish hopes on. There will be little fuel tomoderate the rigours of the season or to comfort thestarved bodies of the town-dwellers.

But who can say how much is endurable, or inwhat direction men will seek at last to escape fromtheir misfortunes ?