And the universal confidence in his energy and earnestness is what keeps him in office.

Nobody sees any other man who can push and inspire as well as he does.

It would be a mistake, therefore, to pay too much heed to any particular utterance of this electrical creature of moods, on any subject.
Nevertheless, he hasn't thought out the project of a league to enforce peace further than to see the difficulties.

He sees that such a league might mean, in theory at least, the giving over in some possible crisis the command of the British Fleet to an officer of some other nationality.

That's unthinkable to any red-blooded son of these islands.