Newspaper Page Text
4
THE SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL
/ ATLANTA. GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST "7
Entered at the Atlanta Postoffice as Mail Mattei
of the Second Class.
SUBSCRIPTION PRICE
Twelve months - * '
Six months ’ J
Three months L"2i*\n
The. Semi-Weekly Journal is published on
Tuesday and Friday, and is mailed by the shor
est routes for early delivery. .
It contains news from all over the wor .
brought by special leased wires into our o < .
It has a staff of distinguished contributors, witn
strong departments of special value to the horn
and the farm
Agents wanted at every postoffice. b,^ er ®‘
commission allowed. Outfit free. M rite
BRADLEY, Circulation Manager.
The onlv traveling representatives we nay
are R F. Bolton. C. C. Coyle. Charles H. TVood
Uff, J. M. Patten. W. H. Reinhardt, M. H. Bevil
and John Mac Jennings. We will be responsible
only for money paid to the above named travei-
* ing representatives ,
NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
Tbr label used for your paper the time
your sntwertption expire*. By renewing at least two weeks
lor the date on tbts label, you ineure „
In ordering paper <-Mnged. be sure to “ennonyooroi
well a* jour new address. If on a route, please glee the route
° W, carnot enter »v.b«ripUcns to begin wlth b * r * ''JT’.V*"'
Remittances should be sent by postal order or re<‘stered m •
. Address dll orders and notices for this Department to THE
SEMI WEEKLY JOVRKAL. 'Atlanta. Ga.
ServiceFlag
In Honor’of the Sixty Atlanta*Journal Men
in the Service of Their Country.
Stop the Food H aste!
The food situation in the United States is a
great deal more serious than the people are
aware.
Strict regulations are being enforced on all
food dealers, wholesale and retail. Practically
all of them are doing their best to carry out the
.wishes of the Food Administration. Those who
refuse are promptly punished by suspension of
their business. One suspension usually suffices
in any case.
But the best they can do will never relieve
the food situation unless the people pay attention
to the Government’s urgent appeals for voluntary
co-operation.
“Food will win the war—don’t waste it!” is
more than an advertising slogan. It is the most
serious and stupendously important fact in the
life of this Nation.
The man or woman who disregards the Gov
ernment’s appeal for food conservation Is fight
ing for the Kaiser, contributing as much to Ger
’ man victory as a German soldier obeying orders
to hold tha line at any cost.
The farmer who can produce food, but fails
vor refuses to do so, not only endangers himself
and his family, but subjects his State to the risk
of an embargo against the shipment of food from
other sections. Senator Hoke Smith gives the
farmers of Georgia and other Southern States
very sound advice when he urges reduction of cot
ton acreage and increase of food crop acreage.
Our Government will not resort to compulsory
food conservation unless it is forced to take that
step by the failure of its appeals. We have al
ways enjoyed such boundless plenty in this country
that we find it difficult to realize the solemn im
port of warnings from Washington. Wasteful
America must take heed and stop waste.
“They Are Coming.''
“The Americans are coming. It is use
less for Germany to hide from that fact. As
a certain percentage of provision ships are
torpedoed, so may a certain percentage of the
American troop transports be torpedoed. But
they are coming. It is better to look things
squarely in the face than to cling to pleasing
self-deception.’’—from the Breslauer Volks
wacht.
To those Americans who feared that “the mil
itary establishment of the United States had fallen
down” as well as to the Germans who were confi
dent that we would never wage anything more
than a. dollar war. these admonitory words from a
Prussian newspaper should be peculiarly interest
ing. The enemy is at least beginning to take no
tice of our military existence. Heretofore he left
us out of account, as far as the battle front was
concerned. With characteristic contemptuousness
for all things non-German, he considered it certain
that Americans (“the Fatheads.” be calls them)
could be either wheedled or intimidated into stay
ing on this side of the water while he disposed of
their fighting Allies. Then it would be time enough
to deal with America, he reasoned. As a captured
German officer calmly expressed it, “When this
war is over we can whip the United States over
night.”
It needs no word from Prussian scribes to let
us know that a marked change has come over this
cavalier contempt. Hindenburg’s heavy concen
tration of troops opposite those sectors of the Al
lied front on which American contingents have ap
peared is evidence enough that the German rulers
are no longer wholly deceiving themselves. But a
warning like that in the Breslauer Volkswacht is
particularly significant in that it betokens an
awakening on the part of the German people
themselves. Hoodwinked as they are, it is not to
be assumed that they yet realize the full earnest
ness and power which the United States is pouring
into the war. They probably still believe, as Ber
lin tells them, that our fighting force in France
numbers only thirty or forty thousand and that
the U-boats are preventing anything like .a.for
midable movement of troops across the Atlantic.
Nevertheless, it is being borne gradually in upon
the German public, despite the iron censorship,
that the United States is effectively in the fight,
not merely with money and supplies but, above all.
with man-power. That there are now some five
hundred thousand American soldiers at the front
and upwards of a million more in this country
training to go, with additional millions ready to
THE ATLANTA SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, ATLANTA, GA. TUESDAY. FEBRUARY 19, 1918.
till the training camps as fast as the need arises,
of this, the German public is not aware. But it
does realize, at last, that “the Americans are
coming.”
And that is the one argument which either
the Government or the people of Germany will
heed; it is the only argument they can under
stand. War weariness and elements of discontent
in Germany, there doubtless are; but if we depend
upon that to do the work of our own blows against
the Hohenzollern war machine, we shall find peace
further off than even the pessimistic now imagine.
The German people will not forswear .Prussianism
as long as Prussianism, unbowed in battle, offers
them kingdoms and empires for loot and world
domination for their self-glory. The Kaiser’s
country has its sprinkling of Liberals and its demo
cratic twinges, which some day no doubt will leap
into a mastering impulse. But for the present,
among the majority of the people, that “sinister
ego,” which always has marked the German na
tional character is predominant. The German pub
lic thinks no differently from the German Govern
ment over the invasion of Belgium, the sinking
of the Lusitania, the breaking of solemn pledges
to America, the defiance of international* law, the
trampling down of civilized usage, the abandon
ment of honor and humanity. In essential ideas
and aims of foreign policy, the people and the
rulers are at one; and they will' continue so until
those ideas are repudiated at the cannon’s mouth
and those aims are rendered forever unachievable.
It is through the coming of the Americans that
the defeat of Prussianism, which is as essential to
Germany’s real freedom as to the world’s perma
nent peace, will be accomplished. The defection
of Russia, relieving and virtually removing all
pressure on the Huns’ eastern border, gave them
a new chance on the decisive Western front, gave
them an equality if not a positive advantage which
only the continued inpouring of American power
can overcome. The worst thing that could happen
to the world’s common interests and to the par
ticular interests of the United States, short of a
downright German victory, would be the failure
to accomplish a downright German defeat. An in
conclusive peace, such as probably would -result
if American strength were not thrown decisively
into this critical stage of the conflict, would serve
but as prologue and preparation to another and
more terrible war. The noblest message, therefore*,
that ever swept eastward from our shores, the
gladdest tidings our democracy ever gave the
world since the.first Independence Day ft just this
—"The Americans are coming.” Without vain
glory, with reverent gratitude, indeed, for all that
their brave Allies have done, but with the glorious
strength of morning in their sinews and with love
of freedom in their souls, they are coming, these
soldier boys of ours, to win an everlatsing triumph
for the Right. Who of us that stay behind could
fail to support in every thought and in every
deed of our lives?
Our Training Camps.
To spread crazy rumors about conditions in
the training camps is to render free of charge a
valuable service for the Kaiser, which he would
gladly pay for if he could not get it another way.
German propagandists in this country start
these rumors, and good American men and women
spread them broadcast, never stopping to think
that when they do it they aid the enemy.
Spreading rumors about the camps is one of
the subtle methods chosen by Germany to under
mine the confidence and enthusiasm of the Ameri
ican people. The German government knows that
a weakening of the morale of the people at home
will inevitably reflect itself in a weakening of the
morale of American troops on the firing line.
Conditions in the training camps are enough
to make any man proud that he is an American
citizen. They are the product of the most mar
velous plan that was ever launched in the history
of the world to develop men's bodies and morals
and minds. None but millionaires can give their
sons the benefits of a training so perfect and com
plete as that which the humblest private is now
receiving every day at every cantonment.
The Government stopped all lumber in south
ern sawmills and took its pick of best selected
heart yellow pine to build the barracks. It lined
the walls with thick tar paper, and lined the floors
and lined the roofs. It constructed complete
waterworks and sewerage systems in every canton
ment. It built snower baths for officers and men.
It scoured the country for the finest cooks to run
the kitchens. It buys an abundance of the most
nourishing and finest foods that money can com
mand. It enforces the most rigid sanitation and
cleanliness in kitchens and dining rooms. Every
where in every cantonment, overlooking not the
smallest corner, it compels continual and contin
uous cleanup of trash. It is cutting down all
other uses of woolen goods to insure an abun
dance of the very best grade oDuniforms and over
coats. It gives every man a pair of shoes so good
that thousands of men in civil life are wearing
army shoes for economy and comfort.
To prepare the men for the gruelling test of
physical strength and physical endurance, which
presently the trenches will impose upon them, the
Government is daily giving them a course in phys
ical culture the like of which no other men get
except the members of a football squad. To see
the results of this wonderful training, one has
only to examine the first man he meets whom he
knew before the training commenced. One lad
out of The Journal’s business office went into
camp a few months, ago weighing 116 pounds.
Today he tips the beam at 151. He is as hard as
nails, as brown as a nut. and out of his eye beams
that level look of a man who has a task to per
form and is upon doing it to the utmost of
his manhood.
In previous wars it was taken for granted that
an army of men meant aq army of undesirable
women, an army of blind tigers and an army of
gamblers. It was taken for granted that an
army of men meant epidemics of every kind of
contagious disease. Behold this Government at
the outset announcing the proposition that our
training camps would have no undesirable women,
have no liquor, have no gamblers; that it would
create a clean environment in which to train its
men if it had to resort to martial law; that if it
couldn’t possibly get a clean environment in one
place, it would move that camp to some other
location where it could.
As late as the Spanish-American War. Y. M. C.
A. workers in a camp were there on sufferance.
They were neither recognized by the Government
nor welcomed by the army officers. The Y. M. C.
A. secretary had one little, miserable tent pitched
in a place unfit for other use, had no assistance
from the army, and worked twenty-four hours a
day because he was the lone man on the job. Be-
hold our Government at the outset providing in
its plans for cantonment cities a flock of Y. M. C.
A. buildings, and a building for the Knights of
Columbus, and a building for the Jewish boys, and
later buildings for Masons. Behold our Govern
ment providing a place where the Young Women’s
Christian Association should erect a Hostess
House for mothers and wives and sweethearts to
meet their soldier boys in camp under perfectly
refined and pleasant conditions. Behold our Gov
ernment organizing the 'National Commission on
Training (’amp Activities, which should
go into community adjoining a camp and organize
all the citizens who wanted to help in one grand
movement for entertaining soldier boys. Behold
our Government building theaters in the camps
and letting citizens pay the cost of theatrical per
formances by purchasing Smileage Books and
sending them to soldiers.
There neve* was a German soldier, and there
never will be a German soldier, for whom the Ger
man government spent as much money and as
much scientific care and as much human sympathy
as our Government is spending today for EVERY
ONE of our soldiers. Yet to hear the crazy ru
mors going the rounds about the training camps,
you would think our boys in khaki were half-fed,
half-clothed, disease-weakened, neglected, un
trained roustabouts, soon to go against the most
magnificently pampered army of favorite sons tha*
the world has ever seen.
A Call for Georgia Shipbuilders.
To the Government’s appeal tor two hundred
and fifty thousand competent workmen to serve
as shipbuilders and thereby materially hasten the
winning of the war, Atlanta in company with other
Georgia communities has made an initial response
that is highly encouraging. But the* number of
men thus far registered as volunteers for this im
portant service must be greatly increased if Geor
gia is to furnish her full quota of the required
quarter of a million. It is to be hoped, therefore,
that all who can see their way clear to enter this
field of war work will enroll at once. It will be
weeks or months, perhaps, before they will be
definitely called, but it Is essential that the Gov
ernment know on just how many patriotic volun
teers of this class it can depend.
The vital relationship between the production
of shipping tonnage and the winning of the war
is so plain as scarcely to call for comment. Even
though the submarine menace should be oblit
erated tomorrow, the need of vessels for trans-At
lantic cargo service would be urgent as ever: for
after we have overcome the Prussian pirates, there
remain three thousand miles of ocean to be mas
tered before we can supply our ever-increasing
army in France, or help to provision our low-ra
tioned Allies. Thus the man who helps to build
ships is welding a vital link of victory. He is seiv
ing the hundreds of thousands of gallant Ameri
can soldier boys now on the French front, and the
additional hundreds of thousands who soon will
be there. And through them he is serving his
country.
The Government has all the necessary equip
ment and material for producing ships at a gigan
tic rate, but lacks the men. Most of its ship
yards are working only one shift of eight hours
a day; all ought to be working three eight-hour
shifts every day. It is to meet this critical need
that the call .for two hundred and fifty thousand
volunteers has been issued. Let Georgia's re
sponse be a worthy one.
t
PLAIN TALK
BY DR. FRANK CRANE
THE official journal of the British national
war savings committee recently proceeded
to castigate the British public for their
slackness in helping win the war.
“The task which we have to accomplish is to
break and change the habits of the majority of
the people of this country,” it declares. “The bat
tleship Britain is in the thick of a hot fight and
yet people insist on being carried as passengers
and on being clothed and treated generally as well
as, or better than, in times of peace. The legend
of Nero fiddling while Rome was burning is a story
of dignified and noble conduct compared with the
people of Britain endeavoring to live as usual
while the soldiers are in the trenches, while 'the
fleet is at sea, and while the fate of civilization
hangs in the balance.”
Two fallacious 'excuses, the journal says, are
continually advanced in justification of this per
sistence in peace time modes of living. To the
first of these, that what any individual can do in
the way of economy does not count, the journal
retorts: “What ene individual does has its effect
in setting an example, and creating a fashion or a
custom.”
Extravagance on the part of a host in his club
or home invites extravagance in return hospitality
extended by his guests. One extravagance pro- k
duces many extravagances, and, just as surely, orfe
economy produces many economies.
The American people do not yet realize what
this war means. We are still buying luxurious
purple and fine linen, giving banquets at too many
dollars a plate, hellroaring and dancing in cab
arets, and flinging away our money in the profli
gate paths of dalliance.
Cutting down expenses is hard, but we will
have to dp it. If we have any money to spare,
Uncle Sam needs it.
To be sure, a general spasm of economy will
injure certain lines of business. Pandering to the
“softness and needless self-indulgence” of folks is
immensely profitable, as the motto of prosperous
Americans has been “Give us the luxuries of life
and we’ll dispense with the necessities.”
But it’s time we pulled up. There’s no sense
in our prating patriotism and damning the Ger
mans and cheering for our army, when we squan
der our wherewithal in things we do not need.
Buy Liberty bonds. There will be more to buy
pretty soon. Get ready!
And, if you can’t buy Liberty bonds, buy War
Savings Certificates and Thrift Stamps.
Fall in! And look pleasant!
(Copyright, 1918, by Frank Crane.)
QUIPS AND QUIDDITIES
Irving Fletcher said at the club, apropos of the
failure of one of those expensive, exclusive sort of
tailors who do not even display their wares in their
windows:
“The trend of modern business proves that if a
man won’t advertise his goods the sheriff will step
in and do it for him.”
• • •
The wrathful visaged dame was cuffing the
small boy so vigorously that the benevolent old
lady interpoesd.
“Surely he has done nothing to deserve such a
thrashing,” she remonstrated; “a sweet child like
that!”
“Sweet child is right,” shouted the virago.
“He’s been and swallowfid our sugar ticket!”
The scene showed a miser counting his money
and refusing to give his wife enough for supper.
“That man is certainly stingy,” remarked a girl
to her father.
“Yes,” he replied; “he couldn’t lose his step
without missing it*
THE COTTON MENACE
A Vigorous Campaign Must Be Waged Against the Pink 801 l Worm Which Threat
ens the Whole American Cotton Industry
BY FREDERIC J. HASKIN.
WASHINGTON, D. C., Feb. 15.—The coming
year will see a trial of strength between
the forces of science and the forces of de
struction. The deadly pink cotton boll-worm has
invaded the United States. One of our greatest
industries, a principal source of the clothing of
the world, is threatened. The pink boll-worm ex
acts an annual toll of at least ten per cent of the
Egyptian cotton crop, and usually much more. It
threatens to make cotton-growing in Brazil im
possible. It has completely eliminated the rais
ing of cotton from Hawaii.
The first live pink boll-worm to be found in an
.American cotton field was discovered as recently
as September 8, 1917. The gravity of the menace
was realized at once by American scientists and
cotton-raisers. Preparations were made for a war
of extermination. It will be one of those wars
that are truly characteristic of modern times —a
war not lacking in drama, in color, in strategy, a
war between humanity and the malign forces of
nature, with patience, intelligence and scientific
knowledge pitted against a foe who makes his en
try in the heart of a single cotton-seed and multi
plies until a field of ten thousand acres is left
ravaged* diseased and drooping.
Said Mr. Lever, chairman of the house com
mittee on agriculture in a debate in the house:
“If we are to be Invaded by another pest, which
they say is worse than the boll weevil, I foresee
that the cotton industry is practically doomed.”
This is not an exaggeration in the opinion of scien
tists, but luckily the invasion of the boll-worm can
and will be checked.
If the most vigorous measures are taken at
once to prevent further importations, and to stamp
out the pest wherever it appears, the boll-worm
will be eradicated. If the nation had taken sim
ilar measures against file boll-weevil when that
pest first made its appearance years ago, the value
of the American cotton crop would have been in
creased by many millions annually. We have learn
ed our lesson. At the last session, congress ap
propriated $300,000 to fight the boll-worm, and a
pending appropriation of $500,000 additional has
passed the house and is regarded as certain to
pass the senate.
The boll-worm peril has its international an
gles. The pest comes to us from Mexico. It came
to Mexico from Egypt. The exact place of its
origin is uncertain, but like most destructive plant
and animal and human plagues, it probably orig
inated in the ancient civilizations of the Far East.
The boll-worm takes a terrible toll of the cotton
crop in every country where cotton is raised, ex
cept the United States and Mexico. Japan, India,
China, Egypt and Brazil all pay it an annual
tribute. It has come to the American continent
principally from .Egypt. In 1913, the Brazilian
government, with a view of improving the quality
of their cotton, imported a large quantity of
Egyptian seed. The seed was infected, and its wide
distribution in Brazil was an ideal method fpr
spreading the infection.
The worm came to the United States, indirect
ly, in the same way. Certain Mexican cotton-plant
ers bought Egyptian seed with a view of raising
the long-staple Egyptian cotton. Some time be
fore, American agents had investigated the situa
tion in Mexico, and as they found no cotton para
sites there which we did not have already in this
country, the quarantine regulations were not
strict. The Mexican revolutions made it imprac
ticable for the cottonseed qil mills of Mexico to
press the oil from the seed. As a result, they ac
cumulated a three-years’ seed surplus, which they
INSIDE STORY OF ITALIAN RETREAT' V.—By Herbert Corey
PARIS, Dec. 16. (By Mail.) —One factor in thr
Italian situation that must not be forgotten
is that Italy, alone of the European
still has a great available man-power reserve.
There are very few soldiers over thirty-six years
of age serving tn the Italian armies. There are
thousands upon thousands of men from twenty to
thirty years old in the cities who have never been
called.
It must likewise be understood that these men
are of high military quality. There are few better
soldiers when they are well led.
These facts are of prime importance at this
time, when, in spite of their military successes,
Germany and Austria are approaching the end of
their man and material resources. They will as
suredly be able now to reprovision their armies to
some extent from Russia and to release many di
visions from the extreme eastern front.
Nevertheless, the central powers are in that
same condition of moral and material deterioration
of which I wrote from Switzerland. This encour
aging fact has been somewhat overshadowed by the
gloom of the last few weeks, but it remains a fact.
The central powers will undoubtedly stake every
thing on the events of the next few months. The
ability to draw on this man-power reserve of Italy
is of immense value to the allies now.
In view of the recent debacle my statement
that the Italian troops are of high military value
will certainly be challenged by the uninformed. Yet
the manner in which they have fought since the
great retreat should be convincing. I have tried to
show some of the moral reasons whieh brought that
retreat about. There are plenty more. Not only
were the men kept in darkness by the government,
but they were most inconsiderately treated by the
high command.
Italy . Had Good Army
The reason was the same in both instances. To
a medieval conception of the autocratic functions
of a government was added a complete failure to
realize that Italy in feeling, if not in form, is es
sentially a democracy. The government and the
great beadquarters alike feared to trust the army.
The Italian government very properly postponed
entrance upon the conflict to the last possible mo
ment. This was due primarily to the financial con
dition of the country. At the outbreak *of war
Italy was “broke.” The preceding war had emptied
her coffers. It was realized that a war of six to
eight months was all that the country could stand
without allied aid, and the Italian government then
believed the war would last no longer. Like the
rest of the world, Italy was deceived by a propa
ganda which wholly misrepresented the essential
strength and solidarity of the central empires.
If the war had proved to be a short one, Italy
would have gone through it with flying colors: At
the outset her troops were magnificently equipped.
They were well armed, clothed and fed. I saw
them in 1916 and a portion of them again in the
*arly months of 1917, and at that time the organ
ization was still excellent. But as time went on
the equipment deteriorated. Os late the men have
not been fed as they should have been, nor clothed
as they should have been. But the Italian peasant
soldier is a brave and patient creature. If he had
been properly treated in other respects he would
have fought on.
Always back of the lines has been the socialist
propaganda for peace and the German propaganda
for defeat. The government felt itself on unsafe
ground. It sought to keep the army out of contact.
In the effort to keep disaffection from spread
ing in the army, leave has been practically refused.
This is not to say that no leave has been granted,
but not upon the scale demanded. Men were kept
at the front for month after month. A large part
of the army, too, are “elderly” men from the Italian
viewpoint. Called originally because they had mil
itary training, they were kept in line. Most of these
men had families. When they heard from their
families, which was none too often, the news was
depressing. Food was scarce. The boys and girls
were running wild for lack of paternal authority.
Things were going wrong.
offered to American mills at a very tow price. Sev
eral hundred cars were imported, and with them
came the pink boll-worm.
The fact that the seed was infected was discov
ered before the planting season began. Every
effort was made to check distribution. Sellers
were urged not to distribute suspicious seed, and
legal measures were taken. Only one instance is k
known, where a distributor, in the face of advice
to the contrary, persisted in selling suspected Mex
ican seed. This seed was traced, and all through
the growing season, scientists watched the cotton
plants for the appearance of the boll-worm. In
September it was found, and later other infesta
tions were reported.
The way the situation at Hearne, Tex., was
dealt with is characteristic. Five hundred labor
ers were set to work. Every cotton plant in the
infected fields was cut down. The ground was
raked, and men on their hands and knees were’
sent down every cotton-row to pick up with thumb
and finger every scrap of plant remaining* The
whole was saturated with kerosene and destroyed
utterly.
It is a curious fact that the boll-worm plague
probably reached the United States at least a year
before it came in with the Mexican seed above
mentioned. Its presence was not suspected, and
it probably would have gone undiscovered for
some time except for the campaign started by the
importation of infected seed. During the hurricane
of 1915, several bales of cotton were blown from
the docks at Galveston to the shores of Trinity Bay. t
After the storm, the cotton was salvaged, and in
tlje process the bales were broken open. This
cotton is believed to have introduced the worm
into five counties.
Stringent quarantine measures against infected
foreign cotton importations have prevailed for
some years. Foreign lint is fumigated at ports of (
entry. Thefie measures did not apply to Mexico
until recently, however. Now a very strict quar
antine is being maintained along the Mexican bor
der. The importation of cotton is absolutely pro
hibited, and all suspicious shipments of whatever
nature are disinfected. This is, however, mani-«
festly an Inadequate way to meet the problem.
In order to make the cotton industry safe in
the United States, it is necessary to eliminate the
boll-worm completely from the North American
continent. Infection in northern Mexico is al
most as bad as infection in some American strfte.
Hence the scientists in charge of the work asked,
and congress after some debate granted, an ap
propriation, which is available for expenditure in
Mexico as well as in the United States. American
experts and American money will be used to clean
up the cotton fields of Mexico.
The Mexican planters, many of whom . are
Americans, have shown themselves willing to co
operate in every way. and the Mexican govern
ment, so far as is known, has made no objection.
This is a rather significant step forward In pur
friendly relations wtih Mexico. Both countries
seem to take the eminently sane viewpoint that
this struggle against the boll-worm is a struggle
between man and nature, and that to hamper it
by a religious observance of artificial boundary
lines would be In the nature of treason to the hu-.
man race.
The appearance of the boll-worm In the United
States has in it the elements of economic tragedy.
There is, however, a practical certainty that this
tragedy will be averted by quick action, a liberal
use of men and money, and a cheerful acquiescence
in whatever measures science deems advisable.
Men Could Not Go Home
When the men were released from the front
too, they did not go into rest camps, as do the
men ft the French-and British-armies. There was
a reason for that, for the Italians have been forced
to build thousands of miles of military roads —
many hundreds of these miles being unfortunately
now in the possession of the enemy. But the man
whose nerves were torn by months of constant
fighting and harassing anxiety for the folks at
home did not relish the idea of dropping a rifle
only to take up a pick. Yet that was the rule.
The military alternation was from the front
line and fighting to the rear and road-making.
They became tired, disgusted, stale. Meanwhile
they saw for themselves that there was a dispro
portionately small number of young men in their
ranks, except the young men taken from the coun
try districts. If they passed through a small town
back of the line they saw that town filled with
youngsters going to cinemas, eating ices in front
of cases, flirting. The peasant soldier began to feel
that he was being sacrificed unfairly. Rome reeks
with young men of military age who should be in
the army—and who it may be hoped will be put
there* *
What is of hardly less importance Is the fact
that the Italian officer of today is the weak ele
ment in the Italian army. This was not the case
with the officers of the first days of the war.
These men were of the old regular army, and had
been trained not merely to command, but to lead.
The peasant soldier has a pathetically childlike at
titude toward his officer. He expects that indi
vidual to care for him in camp and to lead him in
action. To the efficient officer he gives a wholly
childlike devotion. But as the old regulars were
killed or invalided out of service or detached for
the Important work of organization, their places in
the'expanding army were filled by a new class.
New Officers Inefficient
In her need of officers Italy hit upon the ex
pedient of summoning for that purpose men who
held university degrees. No doubt she had no op
tion. Men of intelligence and education are imper
atively demanded for such positions. Unfortunately,
the educated classes of Italy are precisely the ones
in which pro-Germ an ism is strongest. The peasant
is loyal to his country to the backbone. The mer
chants and bankers and professors lack that loy
alty as classes. Many of these men who were loyal
enough in spirit were would-be embusques. They
did not want to fight. They had no comprehension
of their task. t ,
“Too many of the ‘new’ officers look upon the
soldiers as mere peasants.” I was told by a man
who had been in close* observation from the begin
ning. “As though they were hardly better than
oxen.”
To this lack of care for and comprehension of
their men may be charged the spread of the dis
affection which flowered in the collapse of October
and early November. I do not wish to be under
stood as bringing these charges against the ‘new’
officers en masse. Thousands of them are of the
highest quality. Unfortunately there were other
thousands who were not, and a certain proportion
who were actively disloyal. Some of these are from
the borders and are Austrian in blood and feeling
though Italian in speech and residence.
To these causes for disaffection may be added
the folly of the government after the Turin riots
of August last. At that time the socialist workmen,
of Turin organized a demonstration which was
only quelled by the use of the machine guns against
the crowds in the streets. Wholly unofficial —for
there are no official statements of reliability—reports
are that from 400 to 500 persons were then wound
ed. The Turin regiments refused to fire and troops
were brought in from elsewhere. The ringleaders
were taken and incorporated in the army as a pun
ishment.
• Then, to put the cap on a history of ineptitude
these m?n were sent to the regiments at the front
in which conditions were the most threatening. Ii
was adding fuel to live flame. It was these regi
ments which led the “strike” which resulted in the
military collapse.
Yet some of the very regiments have fought well
since then, thanks to the birth of a new national
spirit by reason of the German invasion.
