Page:The New Europe, volume 1.pdf/317

 and regeneration of Europe, and it is evident that this cannot be attained merely by re-shaping the map. Europe's whole mentality must be changed. Her regeneration must be as much moral and spiritual as political. A policy sub specie æternitatis is not merely possible but even necessary, but it can only be worked out on a purely democratic basis. Its foremost demand is true equality—alike in the inward and the outward sphere—an equality which extends to every citizen and to every nation.

Author:Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk.

 

six or seven miles south of Livorno (which the English, for some inexplicable reason, continue to call "Leghorn") a rocky headland juts out into the sea, or, rather, forms a division between two bays. The headland is not accessible from the coast road. A gateway of forged iron shuts it off, but permits a glimpse of a narrow drive, which seems to lead towards a small square castle with a Tuscan tower that crowns the extreme point of the promontory. There are no houses near, but enquiry at the village of Antignano, a mile or so away, may elicit the information that the headland and the castle are called "Il Romito" (the Hermitage), and that the hermit is Baron Sidney Sonnino, twice Premier of Italy and, since November, 1914, her Minister for Foreign Affairs. If enquirers draw the conclusion that Baron Sonnino loves seclusion, and that his thoughts are scarcely less guarded from the world than is his seaside retreat, they will not be far wrong in their estimate of his public character.

Should good fortune enable a visitor to pass beyond the iron gate, his initial impressions will be at once deepened and modified. Aloes and prickly pear alternate with patches of the dark green Tuscan macchia, or scrub, while the deep red rock of the headland is seen to fall some hundreds of feet almost sheer into the sapphire sea, which breaks gently or violently, according to the state of wind and tide, against the jagged base. The castle is surrounded on the land side by a deep, dry "moat," or fissure in the rock, that is spanned by a drawbridge. Inside, the whole sea front of the castle is taken up by an immense room, half library, half drawing-room, with stout walls of masonry surmounted by a con-