I am satisfied that the withheld answer relates to matters irrelevant to the issues here. It certainly can not be expected, in wartime, that an American court will ask for the disclosure of information deemed confidential by the British Admiralty, nor can I see any good reason for delaying a decree until some future date, when information may be forthcoming; for it seems to me that, no matter what other general advices of the Admiralty may have been given prior to May 7, 1915, the result of this case must be the same.

1 BOOK REVIEWS 1

A Treatise on International Law. By William Edward Hall, M.A. 7th ed. Edited by A. Pearce Higgins, M.A., LL.D. Oxford: University Press (American Branch, New York). 1917. $9.60.

A new edition of a legal classic, faithfully executed by a competent hand, is always welcome. In this volume Mr. Higgins has made it his aim to preserve the form of the original work, so far as he deemed it possible. Its relative proportions remain the same. He had a task which grew upon his hands from day to day, but he has not yielded to the temptation to rearrange and restate de novo, in the light of what had occurred since Hall's death in 1894. On the contrary, the original section numbers, which the editor of the fifth and sixth editions had changed, are restored, with occasional interealations of new sections, dealing with new states of fact.

Hall, himself, wrote with coming changes of international practice in mind. In the preface to the third edition, prepared in 1889, he expressed the fear that Europe was moving towards a time at which the strength of international law would be severely tried. "Whole nations," he adds, "will be in the field; the commerce of the world may be on the sea to win or lose; national existence will be at stake; men will be tempted to do anything which will shorten hostilities and tend to a decisive answer. But there can be very little doubt that if the next war is unscrupulously waged, it will also be followed by a reaction towards increased stringency of law.

I therefore look forward with much misgiving to the manner in which the next great war will be waged, but with no misgiving at all as to the character of the rules which will be acknowledged, ten years after its termination, by comparison with the rules now considered to exist" (pp. xx, xxi).

Mr. Higgins hardly feels the same confidence. "The Central Powers," he says (p. x), "have acted on the principle that, when war breaks out, there is no international law; and should the present

1 The JOURNAL assumes no responsibility for the views expressed in signed Book Reviews.-Ed.

war terminate in an inconclusive peace, the fabric of international law will fall, and the doctrine that might is right be enthroned in its stead." That this language is overstrained is shown by his own mention of apologies during the war promptly made by the greatest Powers for violations of international law committed by their naval commanders (p. 663).

Any work on international law which is published during a great war by a citizen of one of the belligerents, must be inevitably colored by the author's circumstances and surroundings. In treating such topics as the doctrine of angary, the creation of war zones, and the right of retaliation, Mr. Higgins writes from the standpoint of an Englishman anxious to vindicate the course of action taken by his country. He stands for interpreting the international law of today in view of today's conditions of the conduct of warfare. The right of visit and search he considers as fairly including that of taking the vessel, for the purpose, into a port of the belligerent. It seems a necessary incident of modern modes of navigation and maritime attacks (pp. 800, 809).

The creation by Great Britain, under Orders of Council, in 1915 and 1917, of war zones, Mr. Higgins justifies as an act of retaliation (p. 439), without inquiring whether it could otherwise be regarded as a legitimate incident of war. His ultimate conclusion is that the Eighth Hague Convention as to the use of submarine mines is in effect useless (p. 571).

The obligations imposed on the signatories by the Hague Conventions of 1907 have naturally engaged Mr. Higgins' special attention. After noting its discussions on the subject and those later in the Naval Conference of London, he concludes that it is still the general rule that neutral ships seized as prize can not be destroyed on account of the difficulty of taking them to a port of the captor, even if all persons on board be first placed in safety (pp. 791, 809).

Mr. Higgins recalls attention from time to time to the refusal of several of the signatory Powers to ratify certain of the Hague Conventions of 1907. From this cause, for instance, the fifth and thirteenth conventions, as to the Rights and Duties of Neutrals with respect to rules of warfare, are inapplicable to present conditions (p. 633).

He regards the rejection of the proposal made by Serbia to Austria on July 23, 1914, to refer the differences between them to the

Hague Tribunal, as a breach of treaty obligations (p. 377). This seems to ignore the fact that the Convention of 1907 for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes had never been ratified by Serbia.

The right of submarine navigation in neutral waters is examined with the aid of full references to the memorandum of the allied Powers presented to neutral Powers August 21, 1916, and the action taken on the subject by Norway, Sweden, and Spain (pp. xl, 674).

Mr. Higgins maintains that merchant ships armed for defence should be admitted to any port where they could touch if unarmed (p. 566). Holland's position, in excluding them from her waters, except when seeking a refuge in distress, he pronounces unwarranted by law.

Hall's assertion that mails on neutral ships should be seized only under very exceptional circumstances is not accepted by Mr. Higgins as justified either by the Eleventh Hague Convention of 1907, or by the general principles of international law (pp. 742-746). He holds the use of false colors by a merchant ship to avoid capture to be a legitimate ruse of war (p. 578).

The events of the world war are regarded by Mr. Higgins as confirming Hall's position that what constitutes contraband must vary with the circumstances of particular cases (pp. 721, 724).

Hall's statement that the American use in our Civil War blockades of the doctrine of the continuous voyage would probably find now no defenders in our country is not accepted by Mr. Higgins, who cites several recent American authorities as supporting that use (p. 720). He refers to the Maritime Rights Orders in Council of 1916 as now settling the question in the same way for Great Britain. (p. 782).

Mr. Higgins comes to the conclusion (p. 527) that there is no clear rule to determine when a private corporation of one nation. can, in time of war, be deemed an enemy in another, and without arguing the question, contents himself with a reference to a number of recent decisions of various countries.

He denounces, in strong terms (p. 368), the breach of the Treaty of Berlin by the incorporation of Bosnia and Herzegovina into Austria-Hungary. This he terms a cynical violation of a fundamental principle of international law, and he views the failure of the other signatories of that treaty to take collective action in opposition or

protest, as impairing the value of that law as a restraining force on public conduct more than any event of recent years.

He says of the Declaration of the Hague Conference of 1907 against dropping missiles from airships, that "its authority is of the weakest" (p. 569), and seems to regard the practice, at all events, as admissible by way of reprisal.

Hall's original work was as noteworthy an addition to the English literature of international law as Woolsey's had been twenty years. earlier. It belonged to the historical and practical school of thought, rather than to the speculative, but it was not lacking either in breadth or depth. Professor Holland voiced the general sentiment of his countrymen, when he said that no work upon the subject, so well proportioned, so tersely expressed, so replete with common sense, so complete, had ever appeared in England. This new edition adds new matter of permanent value. There are also frequent and helpful references to recent treatises and monographs on points of international law, such as (p. 400) Phillipson on the Termination of War and Treaties of Peace, Tambaro on L'inizio della guerra, Sir F. E. Smith on the Destruction of Merchant Ships under International Law, and Wehberg, on Das Seekriegsrecht.

Mr. Higgins had to contend, in the preparation for the press, with unfavorable circumstances, which have made the index somewhat unsatisfactory, and called for three closely printed pages of additions and corrections.

SIMEON E. BALDWIN.

A Guide to Diplomatic Practice. By the Rt. Hon. Sir Ernest Satow, G.C.M.G., LL.D., D.C.L. London: Longmans, Green and Co. 1917. 2 vols. pp. xxii, 407 and pp. ix, 405. $9.00 net.

The present war and the era of diplomacy certain to follow it will unquestionably awake a much larger and more general interest in the art and science of diplomacy and its fundamental relation both to the successful prosecution of war and to the establishment and maintenance of peace. There is distinct need for a ready and readable manual on this phase of international comity and practice for the use of members of the foreign service of different states; for students who are preparing themselves at our various universities, notably in the University of Pennsylvania and Princeton University,