declaring that 300,000,000 Mohammedans would always find in him their truest friend. How could England, with her many millions of Mohammedan subjects, be expected to receive such a statement by the Kaiser himself with equanimity? The German ideal of an economic imperialism embodied in the projected Baghdad railway, was not regarded in England as an economic move, but as a sign of a political desire for expansion, which again was looked upon with great anxiety.
England made every effort to frustrate these plans. As a matter of fact, all these differences were adjusted in one way or another, but they nevertheless contributed largely to the growing distrust between the two nations, and feeling between them ran so high that a final breach seemed imminent.
All the minor points of opposition and the whole tendency of the Kaiser's policy created the conviction in England that Germany was a danger to the British Empire. Many people feared a sudden invasion, and everybody felt that Germany's power was such as to render her a serious menace to England, to which some counteraction must be found. The Navy, according to English ideas, is a necessity for her but a luxury for Germany, and therefore it was almost regarded as a challenge that Germany, without taking any notice of English anxiety in this matter, continued to increase her navy.
The real purpose of Germany's naval activity was, as a matter of fact, the emancipation of Germany from
