It is within my province only to express a hope that the contradiction between existing law and new military necessities (if, indeed, such contradiction exists) will not be solved by a repudiation of all law as "nonsense"; and, further, that, if a change of law is to be effected, it will be done with due deliberation and under a sense of responsibility.

It should be remembered that operations conducted with the apparent approval of the highest naval authorities, and letters in _The Times_ from distinguished admirals, are in truth the stuff that public opinion, and in particular that department of public opinion known as "international law," is made of.
The ignorance, by the by, which certain of my critics have displayed of the nature and claims of international law is not a little surprising.
Some seem to identify it with treaties; others with "Vattel." Several, having become aware that it is not law of the kind which is enforced by a policeman or a County Court bailiff, have hastened, much exhilarated, to give the world the benefit of their discovery.

Most of them are under the impression that it has been concocted by "bookworms," "jurists," "professors," or other "theorists," instead of, as is the fact, mainly by statesmen, diplomatists, prize courts, generals and admirals.

This is, however, a wide field, into which I must not stray.

I have even avoided the pleasant by-paths of disquisition on contraband, privateering, and the Declaration of Paris generally, into which some of your correspondents have courteously invited me.