It was a cruel fate that drove Lord Balfour from the well-guarded security of the Holy Land, where the public expression of popular opinion has long been smothered by means of armoured cars and effective military supervision, to the freer atmosphere of Syria where he had such a rude awakening from his idealistic dreams. If we know anything of the sentiment of our continental neighbours with regard to the Zionist experiment (as it is euphemistically called) now being carried on in Palestine under the armed protection of the British Government, we can imagine how Europe must have rocked with laughter at the sight of that philosophical statesman flying for dear life from Damascus and the wrath of the Arabs. We cannot resist the temptation to remark that he missed a great opportunity. If only he had had the presence of mind to be let down from the walls of Damascus in a basket! But after all there is something of a parable in the fact that Paul, the friend of the Gentiles, escaped from his Jewish enemies in a basket, while Balfour, the friend of the Jews, escaped in a motor. Saint Paul fled from the Jews and took refuge in Arabia; but Lord Balfour would find the whole country of the Arabs too narrow after his recent experience of Arab opinion in Damascus.

Such a ludicrous ending to his pilgrimage has changed indignation into pity, not unmingled with amusement. For a week we read patiently of his triumphal progress through the Jewish settlements as he was shepherded from one to the other, and listened with resignation to the much-repeated assertion that the supposed antagonism of Jews and Arabs was a myth; then came the anti-climax of'his exodus from Damascus, which gave the lie to this assertion once and for all.