Design for a figure of Britannia, as certain people would like to see her. (See reports of debate on the proposal to reduce expenditure on the Navy.)]
In the spring of 1911 the proposed reduction of expenditure on the Navy inspired _Punch's_ "Little-Navy Exhibit"--a design for a figure of Britannia, "as certain people would like to see her, "with a pointless trident, diminutive shield and helmet, in spectacles and elastic-sided boots, leading a starveling lion with its tail between its legs. Simultaneously Germany's idea of the _Pax Germanica_ is satirized in a picture of the Teuton Dovecote, with cannons pointing from each door, surmounted by the German Eagle warning the Arbitration bird: "No foreign doves required; we hatch our own, thank you." Our relations with the U.S.A. are symbolized in "Dis-armageddon," President Taft and Sir Edward Grey shaking hands over a grave with the notice, "All hatchets may be buried here." Hostility to the "Declaration of London" had grown throughout the year. It had been described as "a sword for the Unionist Party"; picture posters represented the destruction under it of neutral ships carrying food to Great Britain, and _Punch_, without going the lengths of the _Morning Post_, the Imperial Maritime League, or Mr. T. Gibson Bowles, was far from enthusiastic over its ratification. "I'm sure," his Britannia remarks, looking at herself in the glass, "my costumiers want me to look my best. But I have a sort of feeling that this thing may rather hamper my sea-legs." Germany's complaints against the policy of "isolating" or "surrounding" her were now frequently heard, and are unsympathetically treated in the portrait of the German officer in full uniform, with his knuckles to his eyes, dolorously protesting, "Nobody loves me--and they all want to trample on me!" Nor was _Punch_ inclined to look more favourably on Italy's policy of aggrandisement in North Africa. The inglorious war with Turkey in Cyrenaica brought no credit to the combatants or to the Concert of Europe. _Punch_ summed up the situation by showing Dame Europa (of the Hague Academy for Young Gentlemen) looking sourly with folded arms at two boys "scrapping" in a corner, and observing, "I thoroughly disapprove of this, and as soon as ever it's over I shall interfere to put a stop to it." The conduct of the war led to ugly charges against the Italians, and in "The Euphemisms of Massacre" Turkey, surveying a scene of carnage at Tripoli, sarcastically remarks: "When _I_ was charged with this kind of thing in Bulgaria, nobody excused _me_ on the ground of 'military exigencies'!"