thinking journalist. Herzl himself was the first to recognise that his original conception of the Jewish position had not been complete, and to proclaim that Zionism is the return home to Judaism, even before the return to the land.' He admitted here the predominance of the religious element; and after the discussions of the three memorable days over which the Congress extended, with the concurrence of Max Nordau, his co-worker, he definitively subordinated the political part of his programme in the formula unanimously agreed on by the delegates: The aim of Zionism is to create for the Jewish people a publicly legally assured Home in Palestine.'

Well might the Jewish Chronicle, the leading organ of the antiZionists in this country, say after this, 'The opposition must translate itself into an active rousing of the Jewish conscience all the world over, so that Zionists and anti-Zionists will in the end be able to cooperate in the general cause of Judaism ... If Zionism is merely to create for the Jewish people a "legally assured home" in Palestine, then all Jews are at one with the Zionists.' 17

All the fanciful details-the Gestor Negotiorum Judæorum, the Socialist seven hours working day, the White-Spangled Banner, the great Truck System,' the Republic in South America-all had disappeared; and Dr. Herzl, adopting in its integrity the old Greek political proverb, 'The half is often better than the whole,' had joined the ranks of the Philo-Zionists.

III

Dr. Emil Reich has many kind words for the Philo-Zionists, the true 'Lovers of Zion,' and his sympathies are evidently with them, notwithstanding his mild witticism on their scheme of Colonisation of the Holy Land, that they may thus steal a march on the Messiah, whom they expect.' But your reviewer has done the party an injustice by confounding their views with the 'religious Zionism' of the section of German and American Rabbis whose manifestoes on this subject he quotes.

The manifestoes prove these gentlemen to be mere Universalists-either spiritual or material—and not Zionists at all; and Dr. Reich is perfectly right in saying that Judaism cannot divest its religious from its nationalist character-the Rabbis may go on denying, ignoring, or dissimulating that as much as they please.'

The programme of the Philo-Zionists as defined in their printed constitution is as follows:

(a) To foster the national idea in Israel.

(b) To promote the colonisation of Palestine and neighbouring territories by Jews, by establishing new colonies and assisting those already established.

17 Jewish Chronicle, Leading Notes, September 3, 1897.

(c) To diffuse the knowledge of Hebrew as a living language. (d) To further the moral, intellectual, and material status of Israel.

The English Association, known as the Chovevi Zion, is presided over by Colonel Albert Edward Goldsmid, Assistant Adjutant-General of Her Majesty's Forces; it has 35 established 'Tents' spread through the length and breadth of the United Kingdom (including one at Cambridge University); and public meetings in support of it have been presided over by the Chief Rabbi Dr. H. Adler, the late Sir Julian Goldsmid, Sir Samuel Montagu, Sir Joseph Sebag-Montefiore, Sir Edward Sassoon, the late Sir John Simon and his son Oswald J. Simon, Dr. M. Gaster, and in fact all the leaders of the Jews in this country, as well as by such distinguished experts and philanthropists in the general community as Sir Charles Wilson, Colonel Conder, R.E., Holman Hunt, Hall Caine, and Father Ignatius.

Similar associations have been established in America, Germany, France, Russia, Austria, Denmark, Switzerland, and other countries; and there is a central committee meeting at Paris, where the organisation of new colonies and development of existing ones in the Holy Land is systematically carried out. Even before these associations had been called into existence Baron Edmond de Rothschild of Paris, encouraged by the success of the agricultural schools at Jaffa, founded by the late Charles Netter, had devoted his vast influence and his open purse to the work; and there is a separate administration in Palestine charged with the control and management of what are known as the Baron's colonies.'

To-day we have in Palestine between twenty and thirty distinct colonies or communities spreading along the coast from Askalon in the south to Carmel in the north, and along the Jordan from the Waters of Meron to the Sea of Galilee in the east. The population of these colonies varies from 100 to 700 souls, and they may safely be estimated to number 10,000 souls in all, independently of the large number of Jewish day labourers from neighbouring towns and villages, to whom they give occasional employment. There are 50,000 more Jews-mostly refugees-in the various Holy Cities, and the immediate problem is to get these or the better part of them— also on the land.

The current language of the colonists is the Hebrew of the Bible, although many of them have acquired the native Arabic, and also French, which is taught in their schools. They have their places of worship, their houses of study, their modest institutes, their public baths, and in fact the counterpart in small of all the features of the model European village; and they have, thanks to the Baron and the Philo-Zionists' Associations, the most modern appliances and complete installations for the prosecution of their agricultural works. How successful these have been let the reports of the British

Consul-General and the official publications of the Palestine Exploration Fund and of the Chovevi Zion Association speak! Even in the cursory survey which the Maccabæan' pilgrims were able to make in their rapid progress through the land last Easter, it was impossible not to be impressed with the evidences of general progress and wellbeing which were everywhere apparent in these colonies; and as one looked at the stalwart human product of this free and natural life, removed only by half a generation from the serfdom of the Ghetto, one was tempted to exclaim, as the Russian Emperor is reported to have said to the English Montefiore when he went to Moscow to intercede on behalf of his oppressed brethren, 'Oh that all our Jews were like this!' Why should they not be? That is the question for the Philo-Zionists of to-day all the world over; and they are determined to solve it.

While in the Ghetto we contracted into a bourgeois people, but we were not always that. Give us our share of God's earth, His open sky and free air, and we will resume our ancient nobility, and place in the van of the East a community which shall be a sign and example to those of the West, rivalling in the purity and simplicity of its pastoral life, not less than in the intellectual height of its achievements, those ideal States of which philosophers have only dreamed, while we have had them in our minds and hearts, as the goal of the practical religion of our lives.

18

As Green, the historian of the English people, used to say, 'A State is accidental; it can be made or unmade and is no real thing to me. But a Nation is very real; that you can neither make nor unmake.' We have no ambition for the petty glories of a kingdom, it is immaterial to us whether we are under the suzerainty of the Sultan, or the joint guarantee of the Powers-our history has always been more a history of religion than of politics.' What we desire-for the sake of our oppressed millions, not less than for that of their yet unchristianised oppressors; for the sake of our emancipated thousands, not less than for that of their noble emancipators-is a free field to perform our destiny as a nation; a vantage point to show how many institutions of universal importance we can give the world from our land as we gave in olden time the sacred Decalogue; an unfettered opportunity to assist, as a compact and living force, towards

That one far-off Divine event

To which the whole creation moves." 19

These are our aspirations for our land, and our people. For Zion itself they have been voiced once for all in the 'Swan Song' of Jehuda Halevi, the poet of Toledo, who, loving his native land with a great poet's love, yet left it to die in Jerusalem, the city of his dreams:

18 S. Schechter, Studies in Judaism, p. 76.

19 Tennyson, In Memoriam.

TO ZION

Thy God desires thee for his dwelling,
And happy is the man he has chosen

To be brought near to dwell in thy courts.
Happy is he that watches,

And, drawing near, sees the rising of thy lights,

And upon whom breaks forth thy dawn,
Who sees the welfare of thy chosen ones,

And exults in thy joy,

And thy return to the olden ways of thy youth."

HERBERT BENTWICH.

20 Jehuda Halevi in The Zionide.

OUR CUSTOM HOUSE REGULATIONS

It was Sir Roger de Coverley, I think, who made an entry in his diary to the following effect: Returned from all the horrid noises of the country to my nice quiet lodging over the Blacksmith's at Charing Cross.'

There must be thousands of our countrymen who at this moment are coming back from the Continent-some of whom have enjoyed themselves, but many more worn and jaded in their search for amusement which they have not found-whose return home, otherwise so joyfully anticipated, is clouded by the thoughts of the inconveniences they will necessarily be subjected to in passing through the Custom House.

Their grievances are duly aired in the columns of the Times and then forgotten for another year. I once heard a comparison drawn between two prominent politicians who were both said invariably to object to every proposal that was ever made by their colleagues in the Cabinet. The one never suggested, while the other always did, an alternative scheme. I am anxious to emulate the example of the latter, and while taking exceptions to the existing Customs Regulations as antiquated, out of date, and unworthy of this country, the mother of Free Trade, to suggest an alternative. Hooker says, 'Laws have been made upon special occasions, which occasions ceasing, laws of that kind do abrogate themselves.' It is not so with the laws, which I shall endeavour to show so needlessly excite the wrath and complaints of the travelling public at the present day, which I should like to see, if not abrogated, materially improved. These laws were all very well at a time when probably a week was occupied in crossing the Channel, and the weary and windbuffeted passengers were too glad to sleep at the port of their arrival, and pursue their journeys in easy stages by coach or post to the metropolis.

There was no hurry then. But in these days of rapid communication and frantic haste-when ladies even cross the Channel to try on a gown at Worth's and return within twenty-four hours-there is no room for the delays and interruptions which were so patiently endured by our ancestors. In the memory of men who are not yet