Chapter I: Am for Peace! (5)

HEADQUARTERS OF GERMAN NTH ARMY, "Somewhere" in France, Dec. 6.--Sensational duels between hostile aeroplanes are regular occurrences now, and not infrequently aerial battles take place between whole squadrons. I heard this from the chief of an aeroplane squadron, who was returning from a reconnoitring flight around Rheims. When I met him he was traveling in his luxurious private limousine which he had brought with him into the field from Berlin. My military motor car had executed a flank attack on the road embankment with disastrous results, and the aviator kindly gave me a lift into town and some interesting information.

"We are all eagerly awaiting orders for a raid on England," the Captain led off. "Yes, I have flown over Paris. Going to Paris is mere chauffeur's work. The six machines of my squadron have covered 15,000 miles since the war began. The French machines are about twenty miles an hour faster than ours; but there is no advantage in going so fast, for you can't make good observations. At a height of 6,000 feet, you are quite safe against fire from below. We also find the safest thing to do is to circle right over a battery. They can't get at you then.

"Fights in the air are regular occurrences now. We attack every chance we get in spite of the fact that we have only our revolvers against the machine guns which they have mounted on their aeroplanes. We find the best defense against their machine-gun fire is to get up close to the French aeroplane and then dodge and twist in sharp dips and curves, spoiling the aim of their mounted machine gun, and giving us an advantage with our revolvers.

"One of the most interesting engagements was between a squadron of four of our aeroplanes armed with revolvers and a big and a little 'Bauerschreck,' [the German nickname for the armored French aeroplanes armed with machine guns.] The fight lasted for nearly an hour at an altitude ranging from 5,000 to 6,000 feet, the big 'Bauerschreck' being finally forced to land, while the little one flew off. One of our aviators did a fine piece of work recently, landing behind the French lines, destroying the railway at that point and flying off again. The French are magnificent fliers, and so are the English, but we Germans have the training. Especially in trained observers we have a big advantage."

I saw one of the German flier heroes in a base hospital. To the nurse's chart over his cot were pinned the Iron Cross of the second and first class and a bunch of flowers, and the Surgeon General coaxed him to give the details of the winning of his decorations.

Sergt. Luchs and his observer were returning from an aerial reconnoissance when they were overtaken and attacked by a fast French aeroplane. The effectiveness of the French machine gun fire was later shown by seventy holes in the wings of the German aeroplane. For forty-five minutes the battle in the air lasted--6,000 feet up--revolver against machine gun, ending only when Luchs was shot through the lungs and liver. He was able to guide his machine safely to the ground within the German lines before he lost consciousness. But one of his revolver bullets had gone home, probably puncturing the gasoline tank, for the French aeroplane was also seen making a forced landing.

Gen. von Heeringen, Commander in Chief of the Nth Army, told me a similar story about two officers who fought with revolver against machine gun until their motor and tank were shot to pieces, forcing them to glide to earth. The General said he had learned about their bravery only by accident, as they had reported only the results of their reconnoissance.

That the German aviators are at a disadvantage in fighting against the Allies' aeroplanes armed with machine guns was freely admitted by Gen. von Heeringen, who said significantly that that would be attended to in the near future.

"French aeroplanes have paid me a number of visits," the commanding General said with a laugh, "Our aviation camp seems to be an attraction for them. We have shot down six of them in the last few weeks. Our gunners are really only just beginning to get the hang of it, with practice. The trouble in peace time was always to find some sort of a target to train our gunners in the use of the new motor gun. We couldn't very well ask of our own aviators to go up and let themselves be shot at. But now the French are affording us just the moving target we have been looking for, and our shooting is improving splendidly."

Gen. von Haenisch, von Heeringen's brilliant Chief of Staff, who as former Inspector General of the aviation arm had more to do than any other one individual with bringing German military aviation to its present high pitch of efficiency, supplemented his chief's remarks by saying:

"We recently brought down a French aeroplane from an altitude of 8,100 feet. Our new gun can shoot four miles high."

I had the interesting experience of visiting an aviation camp in the field, inspecting a full sample line of aero bombs, and looking over the very latest thing in German military aeroplanes, a big new Aviatik biplane. For the benefit of THE NEW YORK TIMES readers, who have grown accustomed to headlines about "German Taubes over Paris," it must be explained that, just as all German cavalry are not Uhlans, so all German aeroplanes are not Taubes. "Taube" is the name of the German military monoplane, of which there are comparatively few in use; and I am informed that hardly any Taubes have flown over Paris, the bomb-throwing visitors having been the more practical double-decker Aviatiks. The new model which I inspected had a monoplane body, observer and pilot sitting tandem fashion, the Mercedes motor (several cylinders) being in front. It was designed, not for speed but for weight-lifting, as indicated by its formidable arsenal of bombs.

The beauty of workmanship and finish of these infernal machines was interesting. The forty-pounders and twenty-pounders looked like miniature torpedoes, with slightly bulb-shaped bodies and tapering rounded noses, with a tiny three-bladed propeller for a tail and a steel ring to serve as a hand grip. When the aviator is ready to drop a bomb all he has to do is to make a simple adjustment, taking not more than a second, which releases the propeller, and then throw the bomb overboard. As it drops the propeller is set into rapid motion and drives the clockwork mechanism inside the bomb. After a hundred-yard drop it is all ready to explode when it strikes. There are also round cannon-ball-shaped bombs, and special bombs for starting a conflagration when they strike.

Following the lead of the French, the Germans have also adopted the "silent death," and half a dozen of the German aerial darts were given me for souvenirs. They are of steel, about three inches long, with one end pointed and the other flanged, so as to give a rotary motion as they whizz through the air. They look more murderous than they really are, for I was told by one of the aviator officers that they were not very effective. The Germans, methodical in everything, wanted no doubt left in any one's mind that the "silent death" was introduced by the French and only copied by them in self-defense; so every one of the steel darts--a touch of grim humor--bears on one side of the point, in French, the legend "French invention" and on the other side "German manufacture."

German Generals Talk of the War

IV.

GERMAN GREAT HEADQUARTERS IN FRANCE, Dec. 9.--I have just eaten my way along the German front in France, for a second visit to the German Great Headquarters. This week's lunch and dinner "bag" included Gen. von Heeringen, "the Victor of Saarburg"; Gen. von Emmich, "the Conqueror of Liége"; Gen. von Zwehl, "the Hero of Maubeuge"; Gen. von Wild, the new Quartermaster General, who before his appointment fought a twenty-round draw with the English at Ypres, though he thinks he won on points, and hosts of coming champions.

It is literally necessary for an American correspondent on this side of the fence to eat his way to the firing line and back again, for the German afield is as hospitable as the tented Arab, and, thanks to their wonderful field telephone service, they "have you." The A.O.K. (Armee Ober Kommando) telephones to the Corps Kommando that you are on the way, the Corps Kommando relays the news to the Division Staff, the Division Staff rings up the Regimental Commander, who 'phones the Battalion or Battery Chief. To reach the firing line you have to run the gauntlet of anywhere from three to six meals, and if you happen to be one of those "amazing Americans" and insist on being shown to an orchestra seat in the first trench, you will be sure to find some sort of a table spread for you in the very shadow of death, for their habit of hospitality is fireproof.

But while robbing war corresponding of all its old-time romance, the German, gastronomic way has the great advantage of giving you the maximum of information in the minimum of time and of letting you meet the masters of modern warfare, the men who have done big things, under ideal conditions, for over after-dinner coffee and cigars you can and will--if you are an American--ask the most imprudent questions with the certainty of getting a good-natured and courteous answer.

Von Emmich makes the most instant appeal to an American. Short and stockily built and looking every inch a fighter, he gives you the impression of possessing tremendous, almost Rooseveltian vitality, with a saving sense of humor. Von Emmich is the General with a winning smile. He could have been a successful machine politician if he had emigrated to America instead of remaining in Germany and becoming the most popular General in the German Army, among the men, for he has the rare gift of inspiring his followers with a sense of personal loyalty. His troops idolize him. They break out into hearty hurrahs at the slightest provocation when they see him. It is lèse-majesté, but none the less true, to say that they think as much of their General as of their Kaiser. They tell you proudly that he rode at their head when the City of Liége was taken by storm, and after seeing him you could never picture von Emmich bringing up the rear in a motor car, after the manner that more prudent Generals use. He has iron-gray hair and a bristly, close-cropped mustache to match, and a very florid complexion, and looks absolutely unlike the sleek individual whose photograph was published with his obituary notice in the London press while the forts of Liége were still "holding out" on paper.

Asked point blank, Gen. von Emmich stoutly and with great good humor denied that he had ever committed suicide or even contemplated the step.

"But you know, Excellency, that you were reported to have lost something like 120,000 men before Liége," it was suggested.

"That's three times as many as I had," he answered with the "winning smile."

Gen. von Emmich will talk quite freely about anything but himself and military matters, but a few odds and ends were snapped up. It was interesting to learn that he was in Liége only a day and a half, then pushed on ahead in the direction of Namur with the bulk of his corps, leaving only his heavy artillery behind to finish up the remaining forts. He did not even know that Zeppelins had taken part in the bombardment of these forts until he heard about it afterward. Later he turned up at Mons and had a hand in beating the British or expediting their strategic retreat, according to the point of view. His subsequent movements and present whereabouts are interesting, but would never pass the German censor.

"Did you feel proud at being selected to lead the way into Belgium, Excellency?" I inquired.

"Yes, of course I did," he replied.

"Would you like to lead your corps into England?" For just an instant what looked very much like the light of battle was in his eye.

"I will go anywhere I am ordered to go--anywhere," he replied with smiling emphasis.

I was interested to discover that the staff of the Nth Army Corps had also been racking its brains about quite other than tactical problems when Gen. von Emmich led the way into the dining room of the very modest so-called "château" of the French village, where he and his staff were quartered, and pointed to the extensive but quite mongrel art collection on the walls. "The absent owner does not appear to have been much of a connoisseur," he laughed, "That picture over there worried and puzzled us for a long time," pointing out a large impressionistic canvas over the mantelpiece representing a nude male and female figure kneeling on the seashore and looking out over the impressionistic water at what looked like an island. "Finally my Chief of Staff hit upon a satisfactory solution, suggested that it represented 'Adam and Eve Discovering Heligoland.'"

Gen. von Emmich's headquarters produced another interesting story. At 3 P.M. a general alarm was sent out to the reserve troops to prepare for immediate retreat, as the French were coming. Every bit of baggage was picked up and loaded on wagons, the infantry in full marching kit lined up--everything ready in record-breaking time without rush or confusion to withdraw on the word of command. But no command to march came--instead a "well done" from the General as he rode down the long column. It was just a little "fire-alarm drill" to keep the reserve troops up to the high-water mark of efficiency.

Gen. von Zwehl, nicknamed Zwehl-Maubeuge, is probably almost unknown in America, though the dark blue enamel maltese cross of the Pour le Merite order at his throat tags him at once as worth while. Von Zwehl is the outward antithesis of von Emmich. He looks like anything but a fighter--a quiet, gentle-looking soul with kind and a bit tired eyes, soft silverly hair, and a whimsical sense of humor, a gentleman of the old school. "But you should just see him in the field during a fight--he's a regular whirlwind," one of his staff said.

He confirmed the fact that Maubeuge had fallen on schedule time in ten days and that he had taken over 40,000 French prisoners, that he had given the French commandant till 7 P.M. (German time) to surrender, and that the appointment was kept with great promptness, also that the French were a bit chagrined when they learned they had been "taken in" by a single corps. I also learned that he and his corps had arrived in time to stop the first English corps which had crossed the Aisne and was marching on X.

Gen. von Zwehl praised the English troops against whom he had successfully fought, and who are now in the North, saying, "The English soldier is a splendid fighter, especially on the defensive." Asked if the remark of one of his staff that "the English can't attack" was a fact, von Zwehl said: "I can only speak as far as my own experience goes, and that is that the English never were able to carry through a bayonet charge with success against my troops. They came on bravely enough, but when our troops would open fire on them at 50 yards and follow it up with a counter attack, the English would invariably go over into the defensive, at which they are at their best. They are particularly experienced in 'bush warfare,' and display the utmost skill in making the most of every bit of cover."

The commanding General confirmed the following gruesome story which one of his staff officers had told me:

"The English apparently do not bother to bury their dead, but let them lie. We are still burying English who fell on Sept. 14 and later. We found and buried two only yesterday. That the abandonment of their dead is deliberate is indicated by the fact that we have found the bodies of dead English soldiers in corners and nooks of the approaches to the English trenches, where the wounded had evidently crawled to die, and where their comrades must constantly have passed them and seem them."

More Generals were met during a visit to the "office building" of the Great General Staff in the Great Headquarters. Here, too, I was allowed to examine the historic room where around a large mahogany table the chiefs of the staff hold their daily conferences, at which the Kaiser himself is often present. A huge map of France and a slice of Belgium covered the table and hung down to the floor on either side. I noted with interest that it was a French General Staff map. On one wall hung another map showing the exact location of all the armies in the West.

In the unavoidable absence of the combination Chief of Staff and War Minister von Falkenhayn, the new Quartermaster General von Wild did the honors in the long Louis XIV. Room where the Great General Staff eats together--an interesting sight, for it represents the round-up of the brains of the German Army. Gen. von Wild, until his promotion, commanded a division against the English at Ypres and spoke in generous terms of his opponents.

"The English are excellent fighters," he said. "I have walked over many of the battlefields in the North--gruesome sights, beyond words to describe. From what I saw, I am convinced that the English losses have been much heavier than ours."

Gen. von Wild said that a puzzling and unexplainable feature of these battlefields was that so many of the dead were found lying on their backs with rigid arms stretched straight up toward heaven--a ghastly spectacle.

Here, too, was a German General who knew more about the American Army than most Americans, the Bavarian General, Zoellner, the great General Staff's specialist on Americana, and it was interesting to note that, in spite of its own pressing problems, the General Staff is still taking a keen interest in those of America and deriving valuable lessons.

"I have been particularly interested in the Mexican troubles," Gen. Zoellner said. "To my mind, the lesson for America is the need of a larger standing army. I was particularly impressed by the speed of your mobilization and your dispatch in landing your expeditionary force at Vera Cruz. I was also especially interested in your splendid Texas cavalry division. We have nothing like it in the German Army, because such a body of men could not be developed in a closely settled country. You may not know that only a short time before being sent to Mexico the Texas cavalry had received brand-new drill and exercise instructions, but in spite of this they acquitted themselves splendidly, showing the remarkable adaptability of your soldiers.

"In sending your coast artillery as infantry regiments to Mexico you anticipated us in a rather similar use of our marine divisions on the coast. The most valuable lesson we have learned from you is typhus vaccination. This we owe to the American Army. I believe it goes back to the fact that your Gen. Wood was a medical man before becoming Chief of Staff."

Gen. Zoellner intimated that the whole German Army either had been or was being vaccinated against typhoid on the American plan. "And there is also a very American flavor about our volunteer automobile corps--their dash and speed they have learned that from you Americans," he concluded.

My previously formed suspicion that the Germans were making war on the American plan, managing their armies like so many subsidiary companies of a big trust, was fully confirmed by my second visit to the office of the Great General Staff. Instead of a picturesque bunch of Generals spending anxious days and sleepless nights over their maps with faithful attendants trying to coax them to leave off dispatch writing long enough to eat a sandwich, I found a live lot of army officials, keeping regular office hours and taking ample time out for meals. The staff was quartered in a handsome old municipal building; the ground floor, devoted to living purposes, quite like an exclusive club; the business offices upstairs.

Gen. von Haenisch took me aloft and explained to me how business was done. A good telephone operator, it developed, was almost as important as a competent General--the telephone "central" the most vital spot of an army. Here were three large switchboards with soldiers playing telephone girl, while other soldiers, with receivers fastened over their heads, sat at desks busy taking down messages on printed "business" forms. In the next room sat the staff officers on duty, waiting for the telephone bell to jingle with latest reports from the front. There was no waiting because numbers were "engaged" or operators gossiping; you could get Berlin or Vienna without once having to swear at "long distance." Gen. von Haenisch had his chief of field telephone and telegraph trot out what looked like a huge family tree, but turned out to be a most minute chart of the entire telephone system of the --nth Army. It showed the position of every corps and division headquarters' regiment, battalion, and company, and all the telephone lines connecting them, even to the single trenches and batteries.

Gen. von Haenisch suggested having some fun with Gen. von X., commanding the army next door on the right, and I was made Acting Chief of Staff for two minutes, getting von X.'s Chief of Staff on the phone and inquiring if there was "anything doing."

"No; everything quiet here," came the reassuring answer.

An art exhibition within sound of the guns at the front by the well-known Munich artist, Ernst Vollbehr, the Kaiser's own war painter with the --nth army, was another real novelty. The long-haired painter, wearing the regulation field gray uniform, brought his portfolio of sketches into the billiard hall of the headquarters and showed them with sprightly running comment:

"Here is the library of Brimont. You can see most of the books lying on the ground. It wasn't a comfortable place to paint because there were too many shells flying around loose. Here is the Cathedral of Dinant. Very much improved aesthetically by the shells knocking the ugly points of the towers off. Here is a picture of Rheims Cathedral looming through the fog, as seen from the German lines. I painted this picture of the battle of the Aisne from a captive balloon. Here is a picture of the surrender of Maubeuge, showing two of the 40,000 French prisoners. I can usually paint better during a battle because there's nobody looking on over my shoulder to distract my attention. I have about 140 sketches done in all. His Majesty has most of them now, to pick out those he wants painted. This sketch of a pretty young Frenchwoman is 'Mlle. Nix zu Macken,' so nicknamed by some sixty-odd hungry but good-natured Landsturm men quartered in a tavern of a French village, where she was the only woman left. Every time they made signs indicative of a desire for food she would laugh and say in near-German, 'Nix zu macken,' and that's how she got her name."

Painter Vollbehr was authority for the following Kaiser anecdote:

"One day as the Kaiser was motoring along a chaussée he met a herd of swine under the guardianship of a bearded Landsturm man, who drove them rapidly to one side to keep them from being prematurely slaughtered by the imperial auto. As the motor slowed up the Kaiser asked him if he was a farmer by profession. 'No; professor of the University of Tubingen,' came the answer, to the great amusement of the Over War Lord."

Human Documents of the War

Swift Reversal to Barbarism

By Vance Thompson.

[From The New York Sun, Sept. 13, 1914.]

I.

There is in Brussels--if the Uhlans have spared it--a mad and monstrous picture. It is called "A Scene in Hell," and hangs in the Musée Wiertz. And what you see on the canvas are the fierce and blinding flames of hell; and amid them looms the dark figure of Napoleon, and around him the wives and mothers and maids of Belgium scream and surge and clutch and curse--taking their posthumous vengeance.

And since Napoleon was a notable Emperor in his time, the picture is not without significance today. Paint in another face; and let it go at that.

War is a bad thing. Even hell is the worse for it.

War is a bad thing; it is a reversal, sudden and complete, to barbarism. That is what I would get at in this article. One day there is civilization, authentic, complex, triumphant; comes war, and in a moment the entire fabric sinks down into a slime of mud and blood. In a day, in an hour, a cycle of civilization is canceled. What you saw in the morning was suave and ordered life; and the sun sets on howling savagery. In the morning black-coated men lifted their hats to women. Ere nightfall they are slashing them with sabres and burning the houses over their heads. And, the grave old professors who were droning platitudes of peace and progress and humanitarianism are screaming, ere today is done, shrill senile clamors for blood and ravage and rapine. (Not less shrill than others is the senile yawp of that good old man Ernst Haeckel, under whom I studied in my youth.)

A reversal to barbarism.

Here; it is in the tearoom of the smartest hotel in Munich; war has come; high-voiced women of title chatter over their teacups; comes swaggering in the Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria; he has just had his sabre sharpened and has girt his abdomen for war. His wife runs to him. And she kisses the sabre and shouts: "Bring it back to me covered with blood--that I may kiss it again!" And the other high-voiced women flock to kiss the sword.

A reversal to barbarism.

It has taken place in an hour; but yesterday these were sweet patrician ladies, who prattled of humanity and love and the fair graces of life; and now they would fain wet their mouths with blood--laughingly as harlots wet their mouths with wine.

The unclean and vampirish spirit of war has swept them back to the habits of the cave-dwelling ages of the race. In an hour the culture so painfully acquired in slow generations has been swept away. Royalty, in the tearoom of the "Four Seasons," is one with the blonde nude female who romped and fought in the dark Teutonic forests ere Caesar came through Gaul.

Reversal to barbarism.

War is declared; and in Berlin the Emperor of Germany rides in an open motor car down Unter den Linden; he is in full uniform, sworded, erect, hieratic; and at his side sits the Empress--she the good mother, the housewife, the fond grandmother--garmented from head to foot in cloth the color of blood.

Theatricalism? No. The symbolism is more significant. The symbol bears a savage significance. It marks, as a red sunset, the going down of civilization and the coming of the dark barbarism of war.

II.

BREAKING POINT OF CIVILIZATION.

There was war; and the whole machinery of civilization stopped.

Modern civilization is the most complex machine imaginable; its infinite cogged wheels turn endlessly upon each other; and perfectly it accomplishes its multifarious purposes; but smash one wheel and it all falls apart into muddle and ruin. The declaration of war was like thrusting a mailed fist into the intricate works of a clock. There was an end of the perfected machine of civilization. Everything stopped.

That was a queer world we woke in. A world that seemed new, so old it was.

Money had ceased to exist. It seemed at that moment an appalling thing. I was on the edge and frontier of a neutral State. I had money in a bank. It ceased to be money. A thousand-franc note was paper. A hundred-mark note was rubbish. British sovereigns were refused at the railway station. The Swiss shopkeeper would not change a Swiss note. What had seemed money was not money.

Values were told in terms of bread.

It was a swift and immediate return to the economic conditions of barbarism. Metals were hoarded; and where there had been trade there was barter. And it all happened in an hour, in that first fierce panic of war.

Traffic stopped with a clang as of rusty iron. The mailed fist had dislocated the complex machinery of European traffic. Frontiers which had been mere landmarks of travel became suddenly formidable and impassable barriers, guarded by harsh, hysterical men with bayonets.

War makes men brave and courageous? Rubbish! It fills them with the cruelty of hysteria and the panic of the unknown. I am not talking of battle, which is a different thing. But I say the men who guarded the German frontier--and I dare say every other frontier--in the first stress of war, were wrenched and shaken with veritable hysteria. At St. Ludwig and Constance those husky soldiers in ironmongery, with shaved heads and beards and outstanding ears, fell into sheer savagery, not because they were bad and savage men, but simply because they were hysterical. The fact is worth noting.

It explains many a bloody and infamous deed in the tragic history of sad Alsace and of little Belgium. The war-begotten reversal to savagery brought with it all the hysteria of the savage man. The sentries at St. Ludwig struck with muskets and sabres because they were hysterical with terror of the new, unknown state into which they had been plunged, not because they were not men like you and me. Surely the savage Uhlan who ravaged the cottages of Alsace was your brother and mine, and the Magyar beyond the Danube and the Cossack at Kovna. Only they had gone back to the terrors of the man who dwelt in a cave.

Traffic stopped; and when it stopped civilization fell away from the travelers. That was strange. Take the afternoon of the day war was declared, the date being Aug. 1, in the year of our Lord 1914, and the hour 7:30 P.M., Berlin time. It was the last train that reached the frontier from Paris. Between Delle and Bicourt lies a neutral zone about three kilometers--say, nearly two and a half miles--in extent. On one side France and invasion and terror and war; on the other side of the zone the relative safety of Switzerland. Six hundred passengers poured out of the French train at noon into that neutral zone and started to walk to Swiss safety. A blazing August sun; a road of pebbles and stinging, upblown dust.

The passengers had been permitted to bring on the train only what luggage they could carry; so they were laden with bags and coats, dressing bags and jewel cases--all they had deemed most valuable. Mostly women. German ladies fleeing for refuge; Russian ladies; English, American; and a crowd of men, urgent to reach their armies, German, Swiss, Russian, Austrian, Servian, Italian; withal many of the kind of American men who go to Switzerland in August.

And the caravan started in the dust and heat of a desert. A woman let fall her heavy bag and plodded on. Another threw away her coats. Men shook off their bundles. The heat was stifling. And through the clouds of dust a panic terror crept. It was the antique terror of the God Pan--the God All; it was a fear as immense as the sky.

A woman screamed and began to run, throwing away everything she had safeguarded so she might run with empty hands. A score followed her. Men began to run. They thrust the women aside, cursing; and ran. And for over two miles the road was covered thick with coats and bags, with packages and jewel cases. The greed of possession died out in the causeless fear.

These hoarse, pushing men, these sweating, shameless women had gone back 10,000 years into prehistoric savagery. Lightly they threw away all the baubles and gewgaws civilization had fashioned for adorning and disguising their raw humanity, and the habits of civilization as well.

They had touched but the outermost edge of war, and their very clothes fell off them.

III.

BARBARISM AND WOMEN.

War; and it takes eighty-four hours to make a twelve-hour journey from the Alps to Paris; the cable is dead; the telegraph is dumb; letters go only when smuggled over the frontiers by couriers; you look about you and find you are in a mediaeval and mysterious world. You stand amid the melancholy ruins of canceled cycles. The mailed fist of war has smashed your world to pieces. You do not know it.

The man you thought of as a brother looks at you with eyes of passionate hatred; you have eaten bread and salt together; you have drunk together; you have been uplifted by the same books; you have been sublimed by the same music; but he is a German, and your blood was made in another land, and he looks at you with suspicion and hate--perhaps you are a spy. (The spy mania! Dear Lord, what absurd, bloody, and abominable stories I could write of this madness which has Europe by the throat, this madness which is only another form of war hysteria.) A reversal to barbarism; you and the man who was your friend have gone back to the fear and hatred of primitive savages, meeting at the corner of a dark wood. All of humanity we have acquired in the slow way of evolution sloughs off us.

We are savages once more. For science is dead. All the laboratories are shut, save those where poison is brewed and destruction is put up in packages. Education has ceased, save that fierce Nietzschean education which declares: "The weak and helpless must go to the wall; and we shall help them go." All that made life humanly fair is hidden in the fetid clouds of war where savages (in terror and hysteria) grope for each other's throats.

The glory of war--rot! The heroism of war--rot! The scarlet and beneficent energies of war--rot! When you look at it close what you see are hulking masses of brutes with fear behind them prodding them on, or wild and splendid savages, hysterical with hate, battling to save their hearth fires and women from the oncoming horde. Reversal to barbarism.

Think it over. Upon whom falls the stress of war? Not upon the soldier. He is killed and fattens the soil where he falls; or he is maimed and hobbles off toward a pension or beggary--both tolerable things; anyway he has drunk deep of cruelty and terror and may go his way. By rare good grace he may have been a hero. In other words, he may have been a Belgian--which is a word like a decoration, a name to make one strut like a Greek of Thermopylae--and become thus a permanent part of the world's finest history.

* * * * *

I would like to write here the name of a friend, Charles Flamache of Brussels. He was 21 years old. He was an artist who had already tasted fame. He had known the love of woman. That his destiny might be fulfilled he died, the blithe, brave boy, in front of Liége. It was the right death at the right time--ere yet the massed Prussians had rolled in fire and blood over his fair small land. Wherefore, hail and farewell, young hero!

* * * * *

But upon whom falls the stress of war?

In a time of barbarism those who suffer are always the weak. War is in its essence (as said Nietzsche, the German philosopher of "world power") an attack upon weakness. The weakest suffer most.

I saw children born on cinder heaps, and I saw them die; and the mothers die gasping like she dogs in a smother of flies.

Some day the story of what was done in Alsace will be written and the stories of Visé and Aerschot and Onsmael and Louvain will seem pale and negligible; but not now--five generations to come will whisper them in the Vosges.

What I would emphasize is that in the natural state of barbarism induced by the war the woman falls back to her antique state of she animal. In thousands of years she has been made into a thing of exquisite and mysterious femininity; in a day she is thrown back to kinship with the she dog. Slashed with sabres, pricked with lances, she is a mere thing of prey.

Surely not the dear Countess and Baroness? Of course not. War is made in the palaces, but it does not attack the palaces. The worth of every nation dwells in the cottage; and it is upon the cottage that war works its worst infamy. Go to Alsace and see.

Pillage, loot, incendiarism, "indemnity"--you can read that in the records of the invasion of Belgium; that is war; it is all right if war is to be, for all this talk of chivalrous consideration for foes and regard for international law is all nonsense; necessity, as Bethmann-Hollweg said, knows no law, and necessity has always been the tyrant's plea; it is the business of a soldier to kill and terrify; if he restricts his killing and terrifying he is a bad soldier and bad at his work of barbarism; but--

There is a more sinister side to Europe's lapse into barbarism. The women are paying too dear. And to make them pay dear is not really the business of a soldier, not even a bad soldier. Yet the woman is paying, God knows. A tragic payment.

IV.

AFTER BARBARISM, WHAT?

One morning at dawn--it was at Amberieu--I saw the long trains go by carrying the German wounded and the German prisoners, who had been taken in the battles of the Vosges. There were 2,400 taken on toward the south. There were French nurses with the wounded. I saw water and fruit and chocolate given to the prisoners.

This was early in the war. The sheer lapse into barbarism had not yet come. Soon the German newspapers announced:

"Great concern is expressed in press and public utterances lest prisoners of war receive anything in the line of favored treatment. Newspapers have conducted an angry campaign against women who have ventured at the railway station to give coffee or food to prisoners of war passing through; commanding officers have ordered that persons 'demeaning themselves by such unworthy conduct' are to be immediately ejected from the stations, and in response to public clamor official announcements have been issued that such prisoners in transport receive only bread and water."

And the French followed suit; no "coddling" of prisoners; back to barbarism, the lessons of humanity forgot and savagery come again.

Civilization in the old world is smashed. I have traversed the ruins; and my feet are still dirty with mud and blood. But I can tell you what is going to come out of that welter of ruin. There will come a sane and righteous hatred of militarism. What will be surely destroyed is Caesarism. Prophecy? This is not prophecy; I am stating an assured fact. Even at this hour of hysterical and relentless warfare there lies deep in the heart of the democracy of Europe a consuming hatred of militarism.

Drops of water (or blood) do not more naturally flow into each than did the English hatred of Caesarism blend with the high French hatred of the evil thing; and when the palaces have done fighting, the cottages of Europe, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean and from the Black Sea to the Hebrides, will proclaim its destruction.

And you will see it; you will see Caesarism drowned in the very blood it has shed. And the German, mark you, will not be the least bitter of the foes of militarism. He will be indeed a relentless foe.

Reversal to barbarism, say you? A shuddering lapse into savagery?

Quite true; that is the state of Europe over the fairest and most highly civilized provinces. The picture of Sir John French strolling up and down the battle line smoking a cigarette does not give a fair idea of it; nor do you get it from the Kaiser on a hilltop surveying his massed war bullocks surging forth patiently to battle; all that belongs to the picture books of war.

The real thing is dirtier.

Civil Life in Berlin

[From The London Times, Oct. 17, 1914.]

_A gentleman, the subject of a neutral country, who has just
returned from a visit to Germany, has furnished The Times with
the following statement as to his impressions. He says:_

I did not hear any boasting over German successes. When I spoke to Germans of their victories they would reply: "Yes, we have had victories--but what of the dead?" This thought is present even in places where one might think that for the time being every effort would be made to prevent its intrusion. In Berlin, for example, where all the theatres are open and attracting crowded audiences, it is the burden of a song sung during one of the patriotic plays, of which several are now being performed.

I went to a theatre on the night of the fall of Antwerp. A play entitled "1914" was acted, in the course of which many topical allusions were made by the well-known comedian Thielscher. Even in these serious times the Berliner, who is famous for the form of humor known as Berliner Witze, cannot refrain from his jokes. One of these was the question: "Why does Germany understand war so well? Because it has been declared upon her eight times!"--the point of the jest lying in the fact that the German word _Erklaren_, "to declare," means also "to explain." Another pun of the same kind was made out of the word _Niederlage_, which means both "defeat" and "dêpot." "Germany," said one of the characters, "is surrounded by enemies on all sides." "Yes," was the reply, "she is the head establishment, while England, France, and Russia only have the _Niederlage_."

There were some serious scenes in this play, in the middle of one of which some one stepped quickly on to the stage and, interrupting the actors, exclaimed: "One moment, one moment, if you please! Antwerp has fallen!" Of course, there was tremendous enthusiasm at this announcement, but when it had subsided, one of the company came forward and sang:

Nicht zu laut!
Nicht zu laut!
Denkt g'rad' jetzt wo Ihr jubelt und lacht;
Nicht zu laut!
Nicht zu laut!
Fiel ein Krieger vielleicht in der Schlacht
Und er liegt beim zerschossenen Pferde
Und nimmt Abschied von Mutter und Braut--
Nicht zu laut!
Nicht zu laut!

(Not too loud! Not too loud! Think just now while you laugh
and cheer; Not too loud! Not too loud! Perchance a warrior
fallen in the battle lies beside his shot down steed, and bids
farewell to mother and bride; Not too loud! Not too loud!)

I have mentioned this to give an idea of the kind of life which the Berliners are living just now. There are other popular theatres in which similar plays are now running with titles such as "Der Kaiser Rief" ("The Emperor Called") and "Fest d'Rauf" ("Hit Hard!") the latter being borrowed from the words of the famous telegram sent by the Crown Prince at the time of the Zabern incident. These theatres are crowded. At the principal theatres classical plays such as "Hamlet" and Lessing's "Minna von Barnhelm" were being played while I was in Berlin.

Berlin keeps open many places of amusement until the early hours of the morning, and the war has not made any difference in this respect. What is known as the "night life" of Berlin continues. For years past the fast element in Berlin has been one of its most notorious features. This accompaniment of the prosperity of the capital since the war of 1870 has struck with surprise many observers of German life accustomed to the idea of German simplicity and purity of morals, rendered classical by Tacitus and exemplified by many representatives of German national life in the earlier part of the nineteenth century, when Germany was rallying from the blows inflicted by Napoleon. All that need be said upon this head is that, as far as report can be accepted as evidence, vice is the only commodity which has become less expensive since the war began.

The spy fever seems somewhat to have abated. At present, however, the public are not allowed to walk on the footway beside the headquarters of the army or the General Telegraph Office, obviously with a view to protecting these buildings against damage from hostile persons. The Germans still think that many spies exist in their country. The presence of women acting as tramcar conductors struck me as strange. These are the wives of men summoned to the colors. Notices are affixed to the interior of the cars stating the reason for the presence of these women, and requesting the public to be considerate toward them, and to help them over any little difficulties they might encounter in the discharge of their duty. Traffic in Berlin is absolutely regular. There are as many taxicabs as before, but instead of benzine, which is wanted for the army, they now use other spirit. The streets are as brilliantly lighted as ever. Riding exercise is taken by gentlemen in the Thiergarten every morning as usual. Sport is reviving, and there are a good many football matches. Two recently played were those between Berlin and Vienna and Berlin and Leipsic, the latter for the Red Cross. The universities will open on the 25th inst., the regular date.

The population, as a whole, is serious and confident of victory; but the war is by no means the sole topic of conversation. England is the enemy most bitterly hated, the Germans maintaining that her only reason for entering on the war was to destroy German trade. England's desire to preserve the neutrality of Belgium is scouted. The common people in Germany say that having fought the Belgians and defeated them they will retain their country. This, however, is not the attitude of the more educated section of the population, who express the opinion that the difficulty of ruling Belgium would be greater than the advantage to be derived from it.

As Head of the Naval Administration He Is Second in Authority to the Major Admiral in Chief, the Kaiser.

(_Photo_ © _by Brown Bros._)]

In Supreme Command of the German Battleship Fleet.

(_Photo from Bain._)]

The fierce hatred of England in Germany is due in large measure to what the Germans call "the shopkeepers' warfare" of the English. They maintain that the English confiscation of German patents is a wholly unfair method of fighting, and it has caused the deepest resentment. When asked as to the future, they reply that they will do all in due time. After Belgium will come France, and then the turn of England will arrive. They are not discouraged by the failure to reach Paris, since the strategy adopted by the French would have rendered the possession of Paris of little value. It will still be taken.

With regard to England not much is said of an army of invasion, but German confidence is evidently reposed in her Zeppelins, of which a large number is being constructed with all possible speed. They are to be employed against England, whose part in the war is the least honorable of all. Belgium's attitude at the outset they can understand, France's desire for _la revanche_ is natural, but England's only motive was jealousy of Germany's industrial development and the desire to cripple her trade and commercial prosperity. Therefore, Woe to England!

Belgian Boy Tells Story of Aerschot

[From THE NEW YORK TIMES, Nov. 18, 1914.]

_The following letter from an American civil engineer, lately
in business in Belgium, whose reliability is vouched for by
the person named in his letter as having been associated with
him in business in Pittsburgh, has been received by_ THE
TIMES:

B----, ----shire, England, Oct. 3, 1914.

_To the Editor of The New York Times:_

I have just read an article in your issue of Sept. 16 on the German killings at Aerschot, Belgium. You suggest an investigation into this crime. I happen to have a first-hand contribution, which I herewith inclose.

The writer is an American citizen, civil engineer, late partner of ---- ---- of Pittsburgh, Penn., to whom you can refer. When war was declared I had an engineering office in Belgium. As the use of telegraph and telephone was suddenly stopped there remained nothing but to close the office. I therefore paid off my employes, among whom was a young office boy, a Belgian, about 16 years old, frail stature, small build, almost childlike appearance, but well educated and intelligent.

The inclosed narrative is a strict translation of a letter received from the boy. This is, therefore, first-hand information, and my knowledge of the character of the boy, as well as the ring in what he has to tell, justifies me in vouching for the correctness of his narrative.

In reading these pages, you will note a weak point in our administration of charity, which has been repeatedly brought to my attention. England has every intention to act generously and warm-heartedly with the Belgian people, who you may say have been sacrificed for the Allies. They tender homes for refugees and transportation from Belgian shores to England. They give out money liberally, but when this boy, utterly without means, friends or papers arrived in Antwerp, there is no help for him. If he had been smaller, somebody would have treated him as a child and brought him along. If his father had not been dragged off into slavery in Germany he might with an old aunt have represented a family. Had he been able to preserve his legitimatization papers the Belgian authorities would have given him some support. Had he been older, he would have been enlisted in the defense of his country.

Here, therefore, is an individual, not small enough, not large enough, not having relations enough and not having any documents. He was worthy of help, but did not fit in anywhere. I am now doing my best to get money over to him through the Belgian National Bank, also to get him some sort of a paper, through the Belgian Legation in London, which will enable him at least to cross the frontier to Holland, whence he might be able to pay for his way to England.

I hope you will publish the boy's letter, _but it is necessary that you suppress both his and the writer's name_. Should either be given and the boy remain in Belgium, _it may cost him his life_. The mention of my own may later on cause me difficulties with our German friends of liberty. Yours truly,

---- ----.

[Inclosure.]

Translation of letter received from one of my employes, a young Belgian boy of about 16 years of age. Received in England Sept. 28, 1914.

ANTWERP, Sept. 23, 1914.

Dear Sir: As you correctly said in my testimonial when you were closing the office, the war has isolated Belgium. Really I can well say that I have been painfully struck by this scourge, and I permit myself, dear Sir, to give you a little description of my Calvary.

Your offices were closed in the beginning of August. As I did not know what to do and as the fatherland had not enough men to defend its territory I tried to get myself accepted as a volunteer.

On Aug. 10 I went to Aerschot, my native town, to get my certificate of good conduct. Then I went to Louvain to have same signed by the commander of the place. This gentleman sent me to St. Nicholas and thence to Hemixem, where I was rejected as too young. I then decided to return to Brussels, passing through Aerschot. Here my aunt asked me to stay with her, saying that she was afraid of the Germans.

I remained at Aerschot. This was Aug. 15. Suddenly, on the 19th, at 9 o'clock in the morning, after a terrible bombardment, the Germans made their entry into Aerschot. In the first street which they passed through they broke into the houses. They brought out six men whom I knew very well and immediately shot them. Learning of this, I fled to Louvain, where I arrived on Aug. 19 at 1 o'clock.