The reward of escape would be so high that the temptations to brave dangers would be correspondingly great.
Such a death of war against commerce is not necessarily probable, but it is in the possibilities none the less.
(2) International Complications.—In ancient times the neutral was very little inconvenienced if his trade got mixed with the designs of the belligerents. No one lived to give the neutral's version of the matter: and piracy was so common that the disappearance of a merchant ship more or less evoked no surprise. In later times the neutral ship had learned complacency before the belligerents, and its status was in any case that of a blockade-runner. Unless the case was very flagrant, interference with neutrals provoked no comment; it was accepted as part of the eternal order of things.
To-day this is in no way accepted, and in addition, countries are knit by trade relations of an intimacy that is of quite modern origin. For instance, Great Britain and America are connected by innumerable commercial ties, so interwoven in many cases that it is almost impossible to disentangle them. An enormous number of Americans earn their daily bread by growing food and raw material for the British market, and any interference with British over-sea trade would dislocate any number of American interests. Instantly the scene would bristle with delicate international
