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114
ES32
TRENCH AND CAMP
Published weekly at the National can
lonmenta for the soldiers of the United
States.
ADVISORY BOARD OF CO-OPERATING
PUBLISHERS
JOHN STEWART BRYAN, Chairman.
IL C Adler, Chattanooga Times.
C. H. Allen, Montgomery Advertiser.
W. T. Anderson, Macon Telegraph.
F. S. Baker, Tacoma Tribune
W. W. Ball. Columbia State.
John Stewart Bryan, Richmond News
reader.
Harry Chandler, I on Angeles Times.
Amon C. Carter, Fort Worth Star. Tele
gram.
Elmer E. Clarke. Little Rock, Arkansas,
Democrat
Gardner Cowlea. Dos Moines Register.
R. A Crothers, Ban Francisco Bulletin.
Cha* H. Diahl. San Antonio Light
EL K. Gaylord. Oklahoma City Oklaho
man
F. P. Glass. Bl’minghm News.
Bruce Haldeman, Louisville Courier-
Journal.
Clark Hcwe’l. Atlanta Constitution.
Jamec Ramey, Trenton Times.
Victor F. Lawson, The Chicago Daily
New*
Charles B. Marsh. Waco Morning News.
Frank P. MacLennan. Topeka State Jour
nal.
A L. Miller, Battle Creek Enquirer-
News.
D. D. Moore, New Orleans Ttmes-Plca
ycne.
Frank IL Noyes. Washington Star.
Gough J. Palmer, Houston Post.
Bowdre Phimsry. Arrsrusta Herald.
Don CL Celts. New York World.
Rudolph O. StegHng, Charlestown News
and Courier.
IL D. Slater. KI Paso Harald.
W. P. Sullivan. Charlotte Observer.
Clia* n. Taylor. Jr.. Beaton Globe.
James M. Thomson, New Orleans Item.
Published under the auspieoe of the Na
tional War Work Council of the T. M. C. A
cf the United States with the co-operation
of the papers above aimed.
Distributed free to the soldiers la the
National cantonment*
WHAT WILSON ENVIES
When President Wilson wrote
that he envied the men who “on the
field and in the trenches” would
“fight the final battle for the inde
pendence of the United States.” he
only expressed a yearning that is in
the heart of ever? red-blooded man.
The laws of nature set limits to
fighting ability, but the snrings of
patriotism are not quenched by age.
When General Nelson leveled the
guns at his own home in Yorktown
he could not “go over the top,” but
he couM and did shoot ids hdme to
bits with as much spirit as if its roof
had been an enemy trench. So the
happiness that comes from dischar
ging emotion in action was his de
spite his years.
For those who can neither Doint
a cannon nor throw a bomb, nor
even perform lees dangerous, if
equally essential tasks behind the
line, there comes of necessity the
unrest of unexpressed emotion- It is
at best a dull and drab affair to stay
at home without uniform and without
rank, in safety if you will, but in
obscurity also, and watch the roaring
tide of life and joy and triumph that
is in the red front of battle co rush
ing by. Os course, the soldier runs
a risk and it is that risk that makes
his life glorious. If war were a mat
ter cf swords of lath and Darier bal
loons, if the men were manikins and
the stakes were make-believe, then
the whole business would be an affair
of mountebanks and not warriors.
But precisely because the game is
the biggest the world ever saw—so
big, indeed, that most other wars
look like vaudeville shows and the
world series becomes as child’s olav
—and because the hazard is death
with honor or life with triumnh and
the stakes are the freedom and haD
piness and safety for the world, the
fascination cf this adventure is so
great that no man is so old, so poor
spirited, so sordid or so immersed
in business as not to hear the call
of the bugles and feel the tugging of
forgotten instincts for conquest, for
growth and for glory.
Today President Wilson is the
most important personality in the
worM Not because he comes of a
lon & line cf robber Romanoffs or
cutthroat Hohenzollerns. but because
his brain and character stand at the
head of the most Dowerful and the
most peaceful people on earth. His
word will shape the peace negotia
tions; cn his judgment hangs the
lives and safety of millions: on his
efficiency depends our national se
curity. Surely these are tasks big
enough to occupy every energy and
every thought of any man.
And yet over the spreading laws
surrounding the White House and
through its still and guarded corri
dors has rung the shrill trumpet of
war, and in the great heart of that si
lent patriot and supreme servant —
Woodrow Wilson—the echoes have
wakened that make even him, the
most honored man of all this age,
wish that he, too, were with the boys
on the field and in the trenches.
What Wilson envies they have.
And how great is that power of serv
ice for and of participation in the tri
umph and victory of our nationl
Page 10
TRENCH AND CAMP
BAKER IMPRESSED
BT CHARACTER OF
MEN IN TRAINING
Secretary of War, in Welcom
ing “Trench and Camp,’*
Pays Tribute to Soldiers in
Cantonments
High compliment Is paid the
American men now in training
camps throughout the country by
Secretary of War Newton D. Baker
in a letter to "Trench and Camp."
Secretary Baker, who is making
the rounds of the camps and canton
ments and will visit each and every
one of them if tin: trill permit, says
in his letter:
"As I have gone from one camp
to another I have had a fresh im
pression of the splendid mental and
physical character of the young men
in training.”
Secretary Baker has been much
impressed with the fadt that the
books he found under the soldiers’
bunks were such as to show that
their owners were scholarly and that
their literary tastes and interest in
the news of the world had suffered
no slump, even though their time
and attention are taken up with mil
itary duties.
Following is Secretary Baker’s
letter to John Stewart Bryan, editor
in-chief of “Trench and Camp”:
“My Dear Mr. Bryan:
“Both officially and personally, I
am deeply grateful for the work you
and your associates are doing under
the auspices of the National War
Work Council of the Y. M. C. A. It
makes available in attractive form
the news of world happenings to the
men in cur forces here and overseas.
"As I have gone about from one
camp to another, I have had a fresh
impression cf the splendid mental
and physical character of the young
men under training. Under their
beds I have found books, not often
idle or worthless books, but very
often books cf the student and schol
ar, and their eager interest in news,
both cf the world and home has been
very evident from their conversation
and their taste in reading matter.
"It is clear that this medium which
you are providing for them will be a
source cf profit and that it will
arouse a fresh and constant interest
in things from which they are. at
least in part, shut off by necessities
of camp life and military training.
“Cordially Yours.
“Newton D. Baker,
“Secretary of War.”
COST OF WAR
A statistical shark has figured
that the aggregate cost of the war
to all the nations involved will be
$155,000,000,000 by next August,
provided the conflict lasts that long.
The expenditures thus far total
more than $100,000,000,000.
Further expert figuring shows the
daily cost of the war to be $160,-
000,000, or $6,500,000 an hour.
This means that for every second
that is ticked off $108,333 is spent.
Like everything else, the cost of war
Is going up, the daily expenditure
having been a paltry $50,000,000 in
1914 and $100,000,000 a year ago.
There are now 53,000,000 men ac
tively engaged in the war, the
Allies having 33,000,000 and the
Central Powers 20,000,000.
» THIS IS MY DUTY
To use what gifts I have as best I
may;
To help some weaker brother
where I can:
To be as blameless at the close of
day
As when the duties of the day be
gan;
To do without complaint what must
be done;
To grant my rival all that may be
just;
To win through kindness all that
may be won.
To fight with Knightly valor when
I must.
’TWAS EVER THUS
One of the novelists, referring to
his hero, says:
“His countenance fell, his voice
broke, his heart sank, his hair rose,
his eyes blazed, his words burned,
his blood froze.” It appears, how
ever, that he was able to pull him
self together and marry the girl in
the last chapter.
EWESIDEHT TH SMS AMERICA MUST
WIN THIS WAR TO INSURE PEACE HEREAFTER
“Suppression cf the Power of the Hohenzollern Dynasty That Is
Responsible for the Present Crime Against Civilization”
Imperative, Former Executive Declares
No statement of America’s war
purpose is complete without refer
ence to the proposed international
agreement by which President Wil
son and the foremost statesmen of
cur European allies hope to keep the
world safe, after our armies and
navies have rescued it from the peril
of German autocracy and military
greed. This, in essence, is the object
of the League to Enforce Peace, an
organization which is urging a vig
orous prosecution of the war as the
first and most necessary step toward
the realization cf its aims. The fol
lowing explanation of the purposes
of the League to Enforce Peace was
written for “Trench and Camp” by
its President, William Howard Taft,
formerly President of the United
States.
The League to Enforce Peace Is a
plan for making the peace which
follows this war a permanent peace.
The plan looks to an international
agreement of all nations, by which
they shall enforce peacable proce
dure before a court, or commission
of conciliation, of a hearing, the
submission of evidence, argument
and a decision, either in the form of
a judgment or a recommendation of
compromise. If any nation begins
war before this procedure has been
completed, all the other nations
agree to resist the war thus pre
maturely begun, in violation of the
plighted faith of a member of the
League.
The League does not look to the
enforcement of the judgment or of
the recommendation of compromise,
but it counts on the delay and de-
The Frightfulness of Peace
By DR. FRANK CRANE
As deviously and as vastly as Germany prepared for war, so devi
ously and vastly is she now preparing for peace. The same pestilential
espionage, so repulsive yet pervasive and prevailing; the same loathsome
perfection of forgery, falsehood and intrigue; the same stark insensibility
to the usual decencies, the common nobilities of the game of life- the same
shameless rejoicing in every form of human infidelity and dishonor—these
with added modes and messengers polluting, are now co-ordinated in a
ramified propaganda for a peace that shall leave Germany relatively unde
feated, if not obviously victorious.”
These are the electric words of George D. Herron in his book, “The
Menace of Peace,” recently issued. And a more tonic book for the few
doubtful and hesitant Americans of these times I do not. know.
It is a curious situation that has worked itself out, but it is true that
a peace at the present time, a peace leaving the monstrous, superegoistic
criminal of all history unrebuked by the world consciousness, unwhipped
by the processes of world justice, and still lustily rampant to unroll fur
ther chapters of horror and diabolism, In its childish and vain dream of
race-glory and military puissance, would be frightful—infinitely more
frightful than any of the unnatural, beastly crimes it has already com
mitted.
I am a pacifist; but to me pacifism means a reign of law means that
concord which results from the co-operation of all, restraining the mali
cious outbreaks of the few.
Meekly to let the lewd ravisher of our most tenderly reared daughters
have his wild way might be a Christian virtue among helpless slaves but
among men who are kings, who own the government, and who are respon
sible for the laws of earth, among such it could only be the curious pros
titution of a debased mind, or else sheer moral lesion.
To let the burglar of the world talk peace while his arms are full of
loot and his hands yet red with the blood of his victims that is not
pacifism; it is a dirtier crime than war itself.
To let this Prussian government, tearer up of treaties, sit at the
council of the nations unrebuked in its old egotism—that is not pacifism*
it is sheer brutal incapacity to see right and wrong at all.
Some gentlemen do not seem to realize that this German monster has
piled up such a record that for the nations of the world to visit upon him
anything else than utter, unqualified, and absolute defeat and condign
punishment would be a greater moral vileness than war till kingdom come
A peace now, with this gray wolf's back unbroken, might be made*
but upon it would fall the scorn and abrogation of heaven, as was spoken
by the prophet Isaiah to the “pride of Ephraim”:
“Because ye have said, we have made a covenant with death and with
hell are we at agreement,
“Therefore saith the Lord God: Judgment will I lay to the line and
righteousness to the plummet;
“And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your aerree
ment with hell shall not stand.”
(Copyright, 1917, by Frank Crane.)
A PARDONABLE ERROR
Captain Jones was a very round
shouldered and eccentric officer.
On a particularly dark night in
Egypt, while practising his company
in outpost duty, he approached one
of the sentries, who failed to halt
him.
In a great rage the officer de
manded of the now trembling sentry
the reason why he had omitted to
challenge him.
“If you please, sir." stuttered the
confused soldier, “I thought you
was a camel.'’
Oct. 31,1917.
liberation in such a peaceable proce
dure, taking at least eighteen (
months, to bring thA parties to the '
quarrel to their senses, to bring
the issues fairly before the world,
and to afford an opportunity for a
settlement other than by arms. The
projectors of the League believe
that in most cases war can thus be
avoided.
We are now in a League to En
force Peace. We are using the unit
ed forces of the democracies of the
world to strike down irresponsible
military autocracy. If that is al- >:
lowed to live, no peace made after |
this war will be permanent. It will
last as long as it is to the interest of
the military dynasties to have it
last, and then when the opportunity
comes to them to strike for further
conquest, peace will cease and war
will begin again.
An indispensable condition, there
fore, of a successful and useful
League to Enforce Peace, after this
war is over, must be the winning of
the present war and the suppression
of the power of the Hohenzollern
dynasty that is responsible for the
present crime against civilization.
The first purpose of those who
wish to promote the League to En
force Peace must be to win the war.
That the Allies, with the aid of
America, are going to do, no mat
ter what it costs.
THINGS WORTH WHILE
The bards sing of the oriole, but
who extols the bustard?
They praise ambrosia’s sickish
sweets, but all ignore the mus
tard.
They burble of the knights of old
and trill of kindred brawlers,
But never give a compliment to till- •
ers and to toilers.
And that is why I’m sore on bards, ?
the whole long-haired caboodle;
They never sing of things worth
while, but always of flapdoodle.