As a matter of fact, talk about Signor Mussolini's honor is pretty idle. He not only has no honor as we understand it but is immensely proud that he hasn't. The official philosophy of Fascism is basically the philosophy of that Machiavelli about whom Signor Mussolini once wrote a doctor's thesis. And under that philosophy, lying--or murder--for the achievement of an end is not only allowable but glorious. Honor, so far as it does exist under the code, consists precisely in the ruthless achievement of one's ends by murder and lying.

Such being the case, what happened at London yesterday was the most natural thing on earth. Having given his most sacred word, early in the week, for the withdrawal of "volunteers" in Spain, he began yesterday, and characteristically, to prove that he was once more lying. First, he wouldn't sign the agreement unless Russia agreed to recognize Franco as a belligerent, though he knew when he gave his word that Russia had already refused that. Then--he would not be bound by the findings of the commission which the Non-Intervention Committee is to send to Spain to determine the number of "volunteers" on each side--which, of course, is to say that he means to insist that he has only 40,000 troops in the country instead of the 100,000 he is known to have. And which, of course, reduces the whole agreement to nonsense.

More and more the gloomy fact emerges that the only representations the Signor will ever understand are the representations of sixteen-inch guns.