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here without molestation, once we had left German shores. No obstacles were put in our way; we were told that if we could find a way of making a living we might settle down and be comfortable, and we have found a way. Davis'-here he grasped my hand-'I am now in the dentist line myself. I had learned so much of the business from you, during our stirring talks while I was in my chair, that I decided to be a dentist. Of course, I can never have such a position as yours, Davis, for I am not qualified, but this is a poor neighborhood and they don't mind that. If you would like me to have a look at your mouth, Davis-' "But I excused myself, and he continued: 'Tho I don't pretend to be the best dentist in Shepherd's Bush, there are people who say I am the second best; and, at any rate, I am doing well.'

ANDRÉ MESSAGER,

Leader of the French orchestra now in America, who declares that our musical and artistic future should be conserved by the establishment of a national conservatory and a Ministry of Fine Arts.

He looked at me longingly. 'I don't suppose, Davis,' he said, 'that you would consider a proposal for our going into partnership? I had to nip this suggestion in the bud, and, to change the conversation, asked him about Willie.

"He frowned a little. 'Willie had a bad time at first,' he admitted, 'but it was his own fault; there was so little he could do. Also he sulked a bit. I don't know if you ever noticed it, Davis, but Willie's tendency was to be a lazy fellow. I hadn't been here a month myself before I got a job, but Willie used to sprawl about smoking, and saying it was infra dig. for him to work. Of course, we weren't set up so comfortably then as we are now. We were digging in a second-floor back, and at last I had to tell Willie that I would fire him unless he paid for his own keep.

"After that he got an occasional shilling by running after cabs and the like; but I was against it, Davis; the glorious spirit of democracy had sprung to life in me, and I looked on Willie's hand-to-mouth way of living as little better than cadging. I made him go to the newspaper offices and look over the advertisements, and after many disappointments he at last got a place as a clerk in the Dental Emporium. He gets thirty-five bob a week, Davis, and was complimented by his master last Christmas. It has been the making of Willie; a more sober, industrious lad you wouldn't meet anywhere. And it's English democracy that has done it. England, oh! my England!'

"I hastened to say that tho all had turned out so well for him he could not, strictly speaking, call this land his England, but

he took me up stoutly. He told me that he now was an Englishman, for those hospitable people had allowed him to become naturalized. He had also dropt the name Hohenzollern (by letters poll) and taken that of Holly. He gave me with not unnatural elation one of his business-cards, with 'William Holly for the Guinea Jaw' on it. He told me that he had voted for Havelock Wilson at the last election."

At this point we are introduced to Willie, who arrives home from his job:

"I saw him first from the window, as he walked smartly up the two-yard garden, and I thought him the beau-ideal of a brisk London clerk. He was in a silk hat, black coat, and dark gray trousers, with neat paper cuffs, and carried a little black bag. His lackadaisical manner had quite gone, and he was cheery and friendly. He received me warmly, and asked me to leave my card with him, as they made a hobby of collecting visiting-cards. "They impress the neighbors,' he explained, and he showed me a saucer containing already nearly twenty cards. I willingly added mine to the saucer.

"While he changed his coat and cuffs he talked to me freely of his situation and work, and especially of the stamp-licking part of it, at which he is evidently an adept, for his hours are largely confined to it. 'My chin never gets in the way,' he said simply. I asked him if he was happy in the new life, and he assured me he had never been so happy. 'It is so satisfying,' he said, 'to have at last found something that I can really do well.'

"He was as enthusiastic as his father about the British, and I noticed that in any reference to the Germans he always added parenthetically, 'Gott strafe them!' I pointed out that they were now a very harmless people, and he replied heartily, 'True, Davis, true; but still Gott strafe them.' He and his father were on the best of terms, but during supper, to which we presently drew in, they had a few momentary tiffs, in which I noticed that they called each other Huns.

"I was particularly pleased with the frankness with which Willie spoke to me of his only trouble at the office. Only one of the bad old ways sticks to him, he said; he still finds it difficult not to pick up and take away with him any little articles of value that he sees lying about the office. He does not take them consciously, but somehow they find their way into his bag.

"The firm have been very considerate with him in the matter, and have made an arrangement that 'the girl' is to search his bag every evening and return anything it contains that was not there when he set off in the morning. They are seldom articles that he would have cared to take in the old days, he said-'the clock would not go into my bag'-chiefly pen-wipers, pieces of india-rubber or sealing-wax, and the like. 'I suppose I have an instinct, Mr. Davis,' he said thoughtfully, 'against arriving back absolutely empty-handed.'"

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LONDON'S THEATER PROSPERITY — While plays come and go in New York and never find their way to the envied "road," it must make managers green to read how easy a time such wares are having in London. The Manchester Guardian pictures that town at present as the Elysian Fields of theatrical prosperity. Thus:

"Visitors to London who have the time and the taste for the theater must have noticed the great difficulties that have to be surmounted before they can see even the worst of the many poor plays that occupy at present the London theaters. There has never been quite such a flood of prosperity there. When you ask a playwright, for instance, why he does not produce the fine play which he told you months ago was about to 'knock the town,' he replies with groans about all the plays being overdue, and most theaters now being five deep in plays to be produced.

"The fact is that almost anything will go just now. People are simply fighting to fling their money into the box-office. No one will take off a play if he can help it, and no manager will part with a lease without a premium that may be as low as £500, but is likely to be £1,000. Two years ago things seemed to be all up with the London theaters. Four years ago soldiers were being invited to come in free, and prices of seats were being reduced. To-day there is talk of further increases in the present high figures.

"And it is not all officers on leave. The prosperity of almost every class in London, along with the curtailment of holidays and the closing of many former outlets of luxury, such as motorcars for one class and skating rinks and beanfeasts for others, accounts for the main part of it."

TURNING FRENCH LIGHT ON OUR MUSIC

Ο

UR NERVOUS SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS will never desert us. No foreigner lands on our shores but we must know what he thinks of us. Time was when these opinions were demanded of visitors while they were coming up the Bay; now we let them get ashore and quiet down a bit. André Messager, who has brought the great French orchestra to us and given delight with the organization that is the oldest and best in the French capital, has one advantage over many. He had already paid us a previous visit, tho he did not find us enthusiastically appreciative of his operetta, "Véronique," which he came here a number of years ago to conduct. It is safe to assume, tho, that he has known something of music in America, so that when Mr. O. P. Jacob asked him, in behalf of Musical America (New York), what effect he thought the war would have on our artistic endeavors, he did not need to fall back on academic generalities. Indeed, he puts America more or less in a class by itself, for as to Europe he declares that he doesn't "know of a single instance in which anything of artistic merit has resulted from the war," nor does he think that the war and the many changes it has wrought will have been influential in the future development of French music. Because war is no new thing to France:

"To us French, for example, the war has not, exactly, been a revelation. For forty-four years we have had this possible war hanging over us as a sword of Damocles. Whatever we undertook, whatever were our pleasures or enterprises, there was always that menacing specter looming up over the horizon. For the threatening German military Colossus across the border would insist that ever-increasing armaments beyond the power of human endurance had become urgent to safeguard the Fatherland against the dangers of French chauvinism. Our life therefore, and with it, of course, our musical life, has continued more or less along the same lines as before."

Mr. Jacob is nonplussed at the breakdown of his own prophetic divagations, and, in the inevitable language of our own social efforts, asks the visiting Frenchman how he "accounts for the unprecedented musical uplift in America since our entry into the war." And Mr. Jacob learns that "that is an entirely different matter." Such as this:

"If to us French the war has only represented but another step in the last half-century's evolution, a consummation, so to speak, of forty-four years of impending war-atmosphere, and therefore has not been able to change us vitally, you in America have been completely transformed. The war has changed your habits, your economic and social customs, your ideas, possibly also your ideals, and even your laws. The moment the United States hurried so nobly to the assistance of her French sister republic and the other Allies, your Monroe Doctrine became obsolete. For it became evident that such a doctrine could no longer remain in force in the face of such a threatening common enemy. What will you have? The world changes continually, and every country therefore must change with it. Did any one believe that you would ever change for the time being to the military nation you have become? Who ever thought that Americans could be brought to sacrifice their most important interests so whole-heartedly for war-purposes? Assuredly, then, it is but natural that with such a complete and vital transformation there should also have come a greater stimulus, a warmer inspiration for musical art. But to what extent this emotional musical uplift eventually will lead to a higher state of artistic culture will largely depend, I think, on the establishment of a national conservatory and, of course, a Ministry of Fine Arts.

"It is odd, is it not, that among all the great Powers it is only the United States and England that still lack such self-evident governmental institutions? But herein rests the salvation for a country's musical and artistic future. Just see what the state conservatories of Rome, of Bologna, of Milan have done for Italy's musical cultivation. The influence of the Paris Conservatoire requires no discussion. Look at Russia, at Germany. . . . A Ministry of Fine Arts and the National Conservatory not only lend the appropriate significance to a country's musical art as an educational factor, but through their controlling influence also exterminates in embryo all contaminating aberrating mediocrities."

Mr. Jacob queries whether Mr. Messager was "really convinced that in all European countries equipped with such national institutions musical art has been markedly developed," and he got this retort:

"Frankly speaking, I am not! Outside of Russia and France I fail to see much progression. In Russia it has been the national folk-lore upon which musical art has been developed to such a striking degree. And in France it has been artists like Vincent d'Indy, César Frank, Debussy, if you will, who have striven and who have succeeded in breaking away from the limitations of the classical, the iron-bound sonata form. No one

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can deny the value of the classics. But just as you can not crowd a number of people into a room ever so spacious without opening the windows and replenishing the air-if the people are to live-so no art can remain alive that is not replenished with newer, fresher elements. And an art that does not progress is not alive, it is dead."

The "delicate subject" was there ready to hand, "Had Germany progressed musically?"

"Since Wagner, certainly not. I do not ignore the ability, yes, even genius, of a Strauss. But I look upon him as a supreme artist of the orchestra rather than as a musical creative genius. He has not said a single thing musically that has not been said before. Where has he created anything new, as did a Wagner, a Beethoven? No, Wagner seems to have been the last of what may be termed the Beethoven era in Germany. And since Wagner-rien!"

The inevitable question after this enthusiasm for the German musical classics-one of which figured on Messager's earliest programs here was whether voices are raised in objection to the production of Beethoven, Schubert, and Schumann in France. We reproduce the interviewer's report thus:

"Why, no.' Here Mr. Messager became infinitely diplomatic. 'You see the question has never been raised as to whether or not these works should be produced. Of course, I can not tell you what the answer to such a question would have been.'"

:

S

TO CHARGE, OR NOT, FOR SOLDIERS' COMFORTS?

HALL THE SOLDIER PAY, or shall he have "every

thing free" that the Y. M. C. A. and the Knights of Columbus provide for his comfort? The policies of the two organizations are at variance both in theory and practise, and the discussion of their change to uniformity is still on. The Y. M. C. A. charges, and must charge, since its ministrations are in an allied sense a part of the army organization. Report, according to the Catholic organ America (New York), represents General Pershing as requesting the Knights of Columbus "to establish canteens in France and to retail the little comforts and luxuries they have been giving away at prices tallying with those charged by the Quartermaster's Department." Some misunderstandings have arisen over the canteen or post exchange conducted by the Y. M. C. A. in France, and a statement has been submitted by Mr. Fred B. Shipp, who, according to Dr. John R. Mott, "knows more about the facts involved than any other man in the United States." In an official statement issued by the Association he clears up points that were apparently misunderstood by our boys who were among the first over there, who bore the brunt of our initial efforts when organization was in its earliest

some

"Unfortunately for the 'Y,' the ship carrying our first cargo of supplies was submarined off the French coast. Before another ship arrived it was necessary, in order to meet the demands of the men, to pick up in the cities and towns of France at retail war-prices such small quantities of supplies as could be found. No profit was attempted on these high-cost goods,

A SALVATION LASSIE.

She takes the soldier's sous, if he has any to give; but he gets the doughnuts just the same, anyway.

stages, and who are with us again with the honorable badges of their devotion. We read:

"In the summer of 1917 the military authorities inquired as to how fully the 'Y' was prepared to assume responsibility for canteen service with the American Expeditionary Force. After several conferences with General Pershing's Headquarters, it was agreed that we should assume full charge of this service, including the purchase of stock in America, in Great Britain, in France, and in the neutral countries of Europe.

"Bulletin No. 33, issued by General Pershing's Chief of Staff, stated that goods were to be sold at the several 'Y' centers at purchase cost price, plus cost of transportation, with a slight margin added to cover goods lost in transit; that if any profit should arise, the 'Y' would use it exclusively for the men of the Army; that these canteens would be operated under the general direction of the respective army officers; and that the plan was designed to release enlisted men for direct military service. "A few of the men, accustomed to the canteens operated by the Army, were not entirely pleased with this arrangement. Several 'Y' leaders also felt that the plan had in it possibilities of embarrassment for the Association, particularly in view of the shortage of supplies under war-conditions and of the scarcity and excessive cost of ocean transportation. When the Army Bulletin authorizing the arrangement was issued, however, we all entered heartily into the plan.

and frequently they were sold much below the purchase price. Many of the soldiers, however, accustomed to prewar prices at home, could not understand what seemed like 'high prices,' and thus the charge of profiteering began.

"About the time our first shipment from America arrived, the Quartermaster's Department also received a large stock of canteen supplies which had been ordered before this service was turned over to the 'Y.' These goods were placed on sale to the soldiers at the few Commissary Sales Stores which the Army had established and were sold at government prices-cost at the factory in America, with nothing added for transportation. The contrast between these prices and ours, which included the heavy ocean transportation cost, again placed the Association in an unfavorable light, notwithstanding the fact that we added nothing for motor transportation or for overhead expenses.

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"The fact that one or two other organizations were, by agreement, allowed to furnish limited canteen service at a few designated points, and that this service was usually free, established a precedent in the minds of some of the soldiers which they felt the 'Y' should follow at its many hundreds of centers. While our free distribution of supplies on the front line in times of important actions aggregated considerably more than the free distribution of other organizations, the average soldier was imprest by the fact that most of the time he paid for his supplies at the 'Y' canteens, while on such special occasions as this other canteen service was available to him it was on a free basis. It was unfortunate that the plan provided in Bulletin No. 33 placed the Association in the position of being practically the only American agency in France dealing with the soldier on a commercial basis. Our extensive program of regular service to him, at the base ports, in the training areas, and in the front-line trenches: for example, the furnishing of reading matter, writing materials, movies, concerts, theatrical entertainments, athletic supplies, and all else that goes with a 'Y' hut or dugout in France-all of it without charge-was obscured in the minds of many because we were also handling merchandise at what often appears to them to be exorbitant prices."

A further occasion for misunderstanding with some, and especially among those of our boys whose patriotism tolerates no language but English and no economic system but that of "good old United States," is the fact that business is necessarily done with French money. Mr. Shipp offers a simple explanation: "In appearance the franc looks much like our twenty-five

cent piece, and unconsciously one feels that it should have the same purchasing power. Its actual value, however, is about seventeen and a half cents. When used in one of our canteens to purchase a standard article which until recently retailed at home for ten cents, but which now costs probably that much at wholesale, and to which increased cost the 'Y' has added five cents for ocean transportation, it yields the soldier so little change that unless he takes all the facts into consideration he feels he is being robbed.

"We must also recognize that among the several thousand workers whom the 'Y' has sent to France, there are necessarily some who are entirely unsuited to this service, and altho these workers, after a fair trial, are sent home, their stay is often long enough for them greatly to injure the Association, particularly when they are employed in canteen service. I am glad, however, to bear testimony to the fact that while most of our workers in France came to us without previous experience in Y. M. C. A. service, these lawyers, manufacturers, merchants, clergymen, college professors, and men and women from nearly every other walk of life in America, have in most cases 'made good,' and have performed an unselfish service for the welfare of the soldiers. A significant testimony to this is the fact that many of them have been wounded or gassed and that several, including two women, have lost their lives under enemy fire.

"The cause, I believe, of a good deal of recent criticism has not been so much the prices charged as the fact that the 'Y' in certain instances was unable fully to carry out its plan to provide free canteen supplies to the men as they were going into action or as they were coming out. The reason for this was not a shortage of supplies, but the absolute inability to secure the necessary motor transportation. Over and over again, the Y. M. C. A. worker has found himself on the extreme front battle-line with absolutely no supplies to give to the fighting and wounded men, while at the same time our stores back of the line were well stocked. Any one familiar with the motor-transport situation in France during the past few months will immediately free the 'Y' from responsibility in this matter. It is one of the inevitable results of the exceptional fighting activity of recent weeks."

The Knights of Columbus, however, prefer to stick to their original principle. Mr. William J. Mulligan, Chairman of the K. of C. Committee on War Activities, is quoted by the New York Times as saying: "We have made it a first principle of our work to charge for nothing, and that principle will be maintained by the Knights of Columbus. The other war-relief organizations cooperating with us have given their concurrence to this policy." America answers the criticism that the free policy is "pauperizing" the men, and goes on to consider the financial condition of the average soldier:

"His overseas pay is very limited, when allotments, insurance, and so on, are deducted. He receives his leave and naturally 'blows' himself to elaborate food and entertainment in any near-by city that has these things for sale. When young men have been through mankind's finest imitation of Hades, they emerge a little eager for the good things of life, and who shall deny them? The good things of life are only to be obtained upon a certain tariff, which, if sedulously consulted, will be found to bear rather a condescending relation toward a soldier's spending money. The soldier, then, often finds himself in a position where he is not able to afford the light little luxuries given to him by the Knights. Now who shall say that he be denied these luxuries until such time as he earns more money to pay for them?

"Take the case of our men at home. Refer to the newspapers again, and this time we are sure of the truth of the reports because we have witnessed the fact with our own eyes. Our soldiers and sailors, in a big city, spending their furloughs, exhaust their scanty funds, carelessly, perhaps, but do we stipulate that they must consider all the risks before they plunge into an enemy barrage? They have nowhere to lay their heads, and they have no money, or very, very little. Is it better for them to go to a cheap lodging-house, where they will meet some of the vile specimens of humanity which our grotesque civilization produces? Or would you, were the particular soldier or sailor your own son or your own brother, prefer to have him accept the beneficence of the American people through the Knights of Columbus, who conduct servicehouses containing good, clean beds in good, wholesome surroundings, for these very boys? . .

"Moreover, the Knights are the trustees of a public fund

raised for the benefit of the nation's defenders. If, through wise and economical administration, the Knights find that they are able to supply the boys with beds and other necessities or luxuries entirely free of charge, why in the sacred name of charity should anybody challenge their right to do so? Scout the thought that our soldiers and sailors are spoiled by this happy application of a public fund. Our soldiers and sailors may have a cogent reply to this ridiculous assertion when they return from the wars; they may even go so far as to say that we have been spoiled, that we have sat at home investing our money at four and more per cent. a year after Uncle Samuel has dusted his knees in an attempt to get us to do so, while they have been facing the dangers of the sea and struggling through the horrors of the battle-field."

G

CHRISTIANITY'S VICTORY

LOOMY WORDS uttered during the past four years about the failure of Christianity have their very corrective in concurrent events. It only needs a historic sense, as The Churchman (New York) points out, to prove the falsity of these dark forebodings. Moreover, the prospect of victory in no wise offers us the likelihood of its acceptance in unchristian mood. In fact, to prove the enormous advance of present-day Christianity over that of earlier days, the writer turns to the records of "Christian wrath" shown by Godfrey of Bouillon, "type of the perfect crusading knight, fighting solely for the faith with Christian devotion and humility." How his behavior at the capture of Jerusalem "differs from plain brutal cruelty is not clear to the disinterested reader of history." The writer quoted from is Raymond of Agiles, who was one of the clergy in the train of Count Raymond of Toulouse and an eyewitness of this event ending the first crusade:

"Among the first to enter was Tancred and the Duke of Lothringia (Godfrey), who on that day shed quantities of blood almost beyond belief. After them, the host mounted the walls and now the Saracens suffered. Yet, altho the city was all but in the hands of the Franks, the Saracens resisted the party of Count Raymond as if they were never going to be taken. But when our men had mastered the walls of the city and the towers, then wonderful things were to be seen. Numbers of the Saracens were beheaded-which was the easiest for them; others were shot with arrows, or forced to jump from the towers; others were slowly tortured and were burned in flames. In the streets and open places of the town were seen piles of heads and hands and feet. One rode about everywhere amid the corpses of men and horses. But these were small matters! Let us go to Solomon's temple, where they were wont to chant their rites and solemnities. What had been done there? If we speak the truth, we exceed belief: let this suffice. In the temple and porch of Solomon one rode in blood up to the knees and even to the horses' bridles by the just and marvelous Judgment of God, in order that the same place which so long had endured their blasphemies against him should receive their blood."

So the Crusaders wrought; and what joy did they feel! Raymond continues:

"When the city was taken it was worth the whole long labor to witness the devotion of the pilgrims to the sepulcher of the Lord. For their hearts presented to God, victor and triumphant, vows of praise which they were unable to explain. A new day, new joy and exultation, new and perpetual gladness, the consummation of toil and devotion drew forth from all new words, new songs. This day, I say, glorious in every age to come, turned all our griefs and toils into joy and exultation."

Eight centuries after the First Crusade, "General Allenby, merely a British soldier with no crusader's pretensions, enters the Holy City as conqueror, but he passes through the gate on foot and he issues orders that the Mosque of Omar is to be respected, and he places a guard to enforce his order." This is an augury for the future that "we shall behave better than Godfrey." The writer concludes:

"What, after all, gives us ground as we look back over history for not being altogether crusht to earth by the war's revelations of bestiality and materialism, is that some things which

so-called Christians did in the Middle Ages, without self-rebuke or scandalizing public opinion, could not be done to-day under any circumstances by Christian nations. Even the German High Command could not go the whole length that the good Christian knight Godfrey went in his victory over the Saracen. When we get too downhearted about the failure of twentiethcentury Christianity or the utter materialism of the modern world, let us remember that it was Germany's sin of cruelty more than any other cause which brought upon her the wrath of the world. An age less Christian than ours would not have felt the concern about Belgium which the nations allied against Germany have felt. It may also be considered an asset in modernity's favor that the altruistic and Christian sentiments of Mr. Wilson's program for world peace have been willingly espoused by his countrymen at the sacrifice of, if need be, five millions of men and billions of wealth.

"But we think that victory will offer us the opportunity to reveal still further gains over the Middle Ages in Christian mood."

H

THE SOLDIER'S LACK OF HATE

OW THE SOLDIER VIEWS THE ENEMY is one of the paradoxical but cheering manifestations of the war. Tho he has seen hell let loose he can speak of his brutal foe with a calm that is bewildering to the civilian. The blood has often boiled as we have read of wanton destruction of property and pitiless cruelty to people helpless in the German's hand. An intimate picture of the French soldier's attitude toward the German is given by Dr. Karl Reiland, of St. George's Church, New York. Dr. Reiland was asked by the Red Cross to go before the men in the cantonments here and present particularly to them the assurance of the care their families would receive from the Red Cross while they were absent in France. He felt, says the New York Sun, that "it was not right for any man to appear before men who were going into the inferno of the battle-field unless he, too, knew something of what they were to go through." So he has visited the battle-line from Soissons to Reims, and his testimony on the particular point we mention is valuable for those who hold bitterness in their hearts toward a defeated foe, particularly those of them who were helpless instruments in the hands of ruthless leaders. He says:

"In spite of what France has suffered at the hands of Germany, her soldiers have the least hatred in their hearts and display the most kindness toward the German prisoners of any of the Allied soldiers. Why, when I was talking to the little Boche in the hospital a French general who was passing through the ward came up, looked down at him, patted his blond head, and sighed with a shake of his head, 'Too young! too young for war!'

"I saw another French officer lift a wounded German up and take a pillow from under his head because the pillow was too high and, when the ambulance moved or went over a rut, the German's head would be bumped. He held the man's head on his arm until the stretcher was lowered, when he put the pillow back. You can't put down a spirit as divine as that."

That this can be the spirit in face of Germany's military rôle is matter for wonder. The thing that is overpowered at last is not changed, as is shown in the dispatch dated November 11 to the New York Times by Walter Duranty, concerning the fate in the very last hours of the struggle of the city that had been the Kaiser's headquarters:

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the effort to reenforce under the pitiless hail-storm their scanty detachments on the eastern bank. For the moment no other succor is possible.

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"At six last night the torment of Mézières began. Incendiary shells fired a hospital, and by the glare of a hundred fires the wounded were evacuated to the shelter of the cellars in which the whole population was crouching. That was not enough to appease the bitter blood-lust of the Germans in defeat. Cellars may give protection from fire or melinite, but they are worse than death-traps against the heavy fumes of poisonous gas.

"So the murderous order was given to-day, and faithfully the German gunners carried it out. In a town that has been protected by miles of invaded territory from war's horrors there were no gas-masks for the civilians and no chemicals that might permit them to save lives with improvised head-coverings. Here and there, perhaps, a mother fixes a mask, found as by miracle on the body of a dead enemy, across her son's face, that he, at least, may escape the death she knows will take her. Others may pass the shell-barrier and reach, stunned and torn, the comparative shelter of the neighboring woods, but they will be fortunate exceptions. The great majority must submit to martyrdom-final testimony that civilization is a thing apart from the unclean barbarism of the Boche."

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GERMANY'S MORAL DEFEAT

10 TURN A PROPHECY INTO A MORAL is all that one needs in reconsidering many of the things written in the early days of the war. IN THE LITERARY DIGEST for December 19, 1914, we printed an article on "Germany's Moral Force," which makes illuminative reading at this time. It ran thus:

German defeat is figured out by Prof. Henri Bergson, the French philosopher and academician, in the Bulletin des Armées (Paris). He bases his statement on the fact that she is destined to exhaust her stores not only of material but also of moral forces. Quite contrary is the condition of France, as he sees it, whose power, both moral and material, "does not exhaust itself," but "renews itself unceasingly." Professor Bergson's argument is that Germany's spirit is animated by false ideals, which will fade when she begins to want for material resources. After canvassing the resources of both sides, in foodstuffs, munitions, and men, and striking a balance in favor of the Allies, he asks:

"What of moral forces, which are invisible, tho of the greater importance, because they can supplement the others, and because without them material forces are worth nothing?

"The moral energy of races, as of individuals, subsists only through an ideal that is superior to them and stronger than they. When courage wanes, they hold fast to this ideal. Now, what is the ideal of Germany to-day? The time is past when her philosophers proclaimed the inviolability of right, the eminent dignity of the person, the obligation of one people to respect another. Germany, militarized by Prussia, has cast aside these noble ideas, which for the most part she imbibed from France of the eighteenth century and of the Revolution. She has created a new soul for herself, or rather she has meekly accepted the one that Bismarck gave her. The famous line, 'Might makes Right,' has been attributed to this statesman. In truth, Bismarck never said it, for he knew the distinction between right and might. Right, in his eyes, was simply the will of the strongest, which is embodied in the law that the conqueror imposes on the conquered. In this consisted his morality; and Germany of to-day knows no other."

Furthermore, Professor Bergson says Germany makes a cult of "brute force," and, believing herself the most powerful among the nations of the earth, "she is wholly absorbed in selfadoration." We read then that-

"From this pride proceeds her energy. Her moral force is only the confidence that her material force inspires. That is to say, here again she is living on her reserves, and has no means of replenishment. Long before England began to blockade her coast, she had blockaded herself morally by isolating herself from all ideals capable of revivifying her."

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