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fb ill! fl UH ffi r w V I ? J ijj . 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.