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Show SATS ENGLAND WANTS PEACE CONDITIONALLY Premier Asquith Declares, However, That Sacrifices of War Should Not ! Be in Vain. GUEST AT BANQUET OF NEW LORD MAYOR Scoffs at Idea of Separate Peace; Emphasizes That Cause of Allies Is a - Common One. j LONDON, Nov. 9, 9:35 p. m. The banquet of the new lord Snayor of London, Lon-don, Sir William Henry Dunn, was given tonight, and was attended by cabinet ministers, members of the diplomatic corps, including Walter Hines Page, the; American ambassador, and men promi- j Dent in the military and naval world, among them Lord Fisher, chairman of 1 lie invention board; A. J. Balfour, first lord of the admiralty, and Sir William. K. Robertson, chief of the imperial staff at army headquarters. j The leading 6peech of the evening j tvaa delivered by Premier Asquith, who, I in alluding to peace, declared that nobody no-body had greater reason than Great Britain to desire peace, but that it was desired on only one condition that the sacrifices of the war phould not have been made in vain. A feature of the speeches was a warm tribute of admiration on the stand made by Rumania Ru-mania and the expression of the opinion tliat although the attack on Rumania had not yet been defeated, it had been .successfully stayed. Refers to Turkey. Mr. Asquith began his speech with a reference to Turkey, which country t he described as a subservient agent of German Ger-man interests and ambition, as was in- stanced, he said, by the fact that by lifting a finger Germany might have arretted ar-retted the Armenian liorrors, but in- ptoad looked on unmoved, acquiescent and possibly even complacent. ''lhat," said the premier, "is a significant sig-nificant sample of what a continuance of the rule of Germanic Turkey in Europe Eu-rope will mean. 1 ' Mr. Asquith said he would refrain from any detailed review of the naval and military situation. He dwelt, however, how-ever, on tho continued entente allied successes, suc-cesses, and said the British navy was ivii.lv and more than read', whenever (pjioitunity was offered to it. Creek Situation. With regard to the Greek situation, Mr. Asquith said he wished he could speak with as much confidence as hope. The entente allies went to Salouiki as friends of both Greece and Serbia, he said. Their sole desire was to prevent Greece from becoming enmeshed in the Germanic net and to save her from internal in-ternal strife. Even apparently drastic measures were dictated solely by the necessity ne-cessity of preventing Athens from becoming be-coming the center of German propaganda propagan-da and intrigue. Declaring that the entente allies were in hearty sympathy with former Premier Pre-mier Venizelos, Mr. Asquith asked how Greece could possiblv stand aloof from a war for tho emancipation of smaller states. ' ' Greece, ' ' Mr. Asquith continued, "first lit the torch of liberty in Europe, Eu-rope, and withstood the inrush of eastern east-ern barbarism and tyranny. May Greece rekindle her lamp and show herself worthy of her immortal past!" General Situation. Dealing with the general situation. Mr. Asquith said: "Let there be no illusion about our enemies. They are sreat orxanizera and fine fighters in the field. They are also, if not skillful, yet frHefat liable workers In the sphere of propaRancUi., where they have a double motive to divide the allies al-lies and capture neutral opinion." In tills connection Mr. Asquith characterized char-acterized the German suggestion of a sinister sin-ister design on the part of the entente allies to combine against neutral coun- tries and build up an Impenetrable etone wall against their trade as childish fiction, fic-tion, which could only mean that the allies al-lies were bent upon economic suicide. Mr. Asqullh said it ought to be unnec-esHary unnec-esHary to affirm that whfin the time cornea for peace nothing will be more essential es-sential for the entente allien, from the standpoint of simple self-interest, than to establish and maintain the best industrial indus-trial and financial relations with neutrals. No Separate Peace. Alluding to the different methods of propaganda which he said were employed at different places with a view to dividing divid-ing the allies and influencing opinion in favor of a separate peace, Mr. Asquith said : I desire to declare without hesita- tlon or reserve that the allies are j ftcrhting in a common cause, that for the purposes of war their interests are identical and that a victory securing se-curing those interests is, in our judgment, judg-ment, the only condition of a lasting peace. Continuing, Mr. Asqullh said he desired de-sired to mendon that hit.iorio no German propagandist had ever sugars ted t hat Germany was prepared to concede anything any-thing to the demand of the ullies tor the reconstruction and independence of Serbia. Alluding to what he termed the propaganda propa-ganda in Russia to the effect that Great Britain's only desire to prolong the war and prevent any sort of peace was because be-cause she is making huge profits bv exploiting ex-ploiting her allies unscrupulously, the premier said: For us, who know what terrible sacrifices we are paying in precious lives in the unceasing, pitiless drain upon our reservoir of potential promise prom-ise and vitality who have greater reason than we to long and pray for peace? Peace, yea, but on one condl- tion only that the war, with '.is vast waste, its sacrifices. Us untold suffer-j suffer-j ings. its glorious and undying ex- ; i amples of courage and uns 'Jridhness, ! i shall n .t have been in vain. I ! "There can be no question of a separate , peace." declared. Mr. Asquith. "And, reace. when it comes, be it soon or late t and I will not disguise from you for a .moment my conviction that the struggle' : will tax all our resources and our whole ; stock of patience and resolve," Mr. Balfour briefly denied the state-j state-j menta that the British navy has accepted ' a passive, role in the war, saying the Ger-! Ger-! mans had refused to allow their ships to meet the British. Referring to tho recent re-cent raid by German torpedo erart In the English channel. Mr. Balfour said: "It did not disturb our transport services ser-vices for a moment." The first lord of the admiralty said he would not say that such a raid could not be repeated, but that if it were the Germans Ger-mans would not be able to get out of the channel again without heavy loss. |