Newspaper Page Text
■’larch ti.
,
* ( '
K
[Lil
J2|l
■'■■:..■ g $ 1118
0T\IIOU)!IH iw/'A
/• W|/ 111 A> ’ I
I w ■
' ' ■>?. ? w _ JKL ■
I
z Jy
JU/
(>.
■ '■• -44S —- ;■■ BTKY
THE GLAGKERS
Under this title, in a recent number
of Collier’s, William Slavens McNutt
gives some of the stories of the terri
ble German efl£ciency and German
frightfulness which morbid people are
thoughlessly retailing, and makes the
following caustic comment:
“Click-clack. Knit-knock. The
knitting knockers were at it. The
ciackers were in session. A roomful
of patriotic American women sat
there clacking. They were all knit
ting for soldiers. There they sat mak
ing sweaters and trouble for the men
who were enlisted to fight in their
protection. There they sat knitting
for the comfort of American soldiers
and releasing the most deadly of all
the poisonous gases thjit the German
mind has invented.
"Every lie that those women were
uttering was a lie first uttered by a
paid German .spy and carefully fos
tered by German propagandists. The
damage they were doing was a damage
that Berlin would be glad to pay real
money for. Those women were invol
tary traitors, and,, because they did
their work of treachery all uncon
scious of its nature, the work was the
more to Berlin’s liking. The damage
to America was the greater because
it was done—-all unwittingly, but nev
ertheless done —by loyal American
women.
“Clack-clack, knit-knock. Making
garments to warm a soldier’s body and
sentiment to cool his courage! Ameri
cans speaking aloud the things that
Germans dare but whisper; loyal
American women working the will of
the kaiser! Clicking their needles to
the glory of Uncle Sam and clacking
their tongues to the good of von Hin
denburg! At worst the slacker with
holds aid from America; the clacker
does definite enemy work. The clacker
Is worse than the slacker.
He then gives a number of exam
ples of the injury done hy the clack
ers, one of which should be a sufficient
IKE.NUH Anu CAMP
warning to the folks back home whose
attitude toward their boys is in dan
ger of making them inefficient sol
diers, and thereby lessening their
chances of coming back whole and
sound from the war:
‘A soldier friend of mine visited me.
He was about to return to camp after
a short furlough spent at home. I
asked him when he expected to be in
town again on leave/
“I don’t Want to come home again
till the end of the war,” he said hotly.
“Believe me, Bill, I'm sick of it.”
“Sick of what?”
“This everlasting drooling and
bawling and boohooing that I have
to stand for when I come home. I
can’t put up with any more of it. You
know, Bill, I’m no braver than the next
man; I'm no up-an-at-’em guy. I
don’t care anything about rare meat,
and I’m one of the most innocent by
standers that ever kept out of trouble.
I read a lot about this war before we
got into it, and everything I read gave
me the willies. I used to think of
those French and English soldiers go
ing over the top and fighting with the
bayonet, and all that, and wonder what
kind of stuff they could be made of to
go through with it. I was perfectly
certain that I couldn’t do it. Then
we got into the mess! That’s the way
I felt. I knew I had to enlist, just the
same as I’d have to jump in and fight
if I saw a couple of burglars trying to
murder my mother; but, Bill I was sick
from the thought of it. I tried to kid
myself into going into some non-com
batant branch of the service where
I could keep clear of the real fighting
but I couldn’t make it stick. I knew
I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t
come to life and enlist.
“Finally I took the worst of it and
enlisted in the infantry. When I took
off my clothes to be examined I was
hoping there might be something
wrong with me and that I’d get turned
down. I was that bad. I went through
flying. Good night! For a week or
more after I enlisted I was simply
sick! Then I began to try to make a
soldier out of myself. You see, I was
afraid I’d run when I got under fire, or
just lie down and shake, or some darn
fool thing. So while they were drill
ing my legs I began to drill myself
d-lSt'l » WH ■ , J** “ —•
inside. I argued* it out with myself
for weeks, and finally I became con
vinced that I was no more of a cow
ard than hundreds of thousands of
other men who’s taken the gaff in this
war, and that when my time came I’d
stay up and keep going until I got
knocked down. It’s all right, Bill. I
know now that I’m going to be able to
stand up and take it, but it’s going to
be an awful job. I've got to watch
myself all. the time. I can’t be feel
ing bad and worrying and homesick
and keep up; and if I don’t keep up
good night! I won’t take it like I ought
to when my time comes. And that’s
why I wish I couldn’t get home any
more, Bill. My mother and both my
sisters are glad I’m trr uniform, and
they’re proud of me, and all that, and
yet they do al! they can to break me
up and make a bad soldier out of me.
That’s a fact! Every time I come home
they moan and groan and sigh around
til I’m a wreck. I think all the world
of my mother and the kids, Bill, but I
just can’t stand it to come home any
more.”
“Why don’t you tell them frankly
how they affect you?”
“I can’t, Bill. I’ve tried, but it's no
good. If I try to keep them from
crying over me, they think I'm getting
heartless, and they cry all the more.
When I get bucked up so I can laugh
about the work in the trenches they
seem to think I’m forgetting the se
roiusness of the war and need to be
told how tough it is. It’s the limit,
Bill. They’re perfectly willing for me
to go and get killed if necessary in the
performance of my duty, but they seem
to think it’s some kind of a crime not
to cry and moan over me whenever I’m
here. I haven’t got any superfluity of
starch, and they take out of me what
little I’ve got. The quicker I get to
France the better I’ll Jike it.”
Fish are higher in price because of
the war. Os course, there are just as
many fish, and they are just as easy
to catch. But, you see, metal has ad
vanced in price greatly, and it takes
metal to make the hooks; and then,
you see, cotton is away up yonder, and
you catch fish with a cotton line; and,
you gee . —Lakeland, Fla., Tele-
gram .
ARMY RELIGION
He was a magnificent fellow in the full
vigor of his intellectual life and with a
real love for men in his heart. He was
not a professor of theology, but he be
lieved that the only approach to religion
was through a clear conception of the
dogmas of the church. As the boys say,
he was long on theology, but short on
practical religion. He could not help it;
he had been taught that way. Well, we
all believe in theology. The great car
dinal doctrines of the church are funda
mental to the life of the church, but this
war and the massing of great bodies of
men for moral and religious training is
teaching us a great •••.any things. We
have got to unlearn a lot of things at the
same time that we get new conceptions
of method.
So our friend came to Camp Dix. He
actually thought that he was coming to
a godless sort of place, where morality is
at a discount. He had believed every idle
tale of gossip and slander that had come
to his ears. He was deeply concerned, he
was dead in earnest; he wanted to give
the boys religion and he was convinced
that the way to do it was to make a fly
ing tour - of the camp, speak in every
building and convince the men of the real
ity of the great doctrines. His first audi
ence was a group of about 250 men, fine,
splendid fellows, all in uniform, all com
mitted to the supreme task and the su
preme sacrifice, a fact of which they
were deeply conscious. They were rev
erent, open minded, susceptible, hungry.
Ninety per cent, of them were members
of some church back home. Their new
life in the army, their whole-souled con
secration to a gigantic, lofty task had
quickened into new life the inward
springs of morality and religion. They
had been baptized into the spirit of a new
ideal and a splendid goal. But it was all
so new, so vital, so inarticulate that they
longed for someone to vo -a the deep
yearning of their hearts. Those were the
I fellows to whom he spoke. \
For ten minutes this great minister
argued for the exlstei .e ci God; for ten
minutes he argued for the existence of a
personal devil; by this time the boys be
gan to leave one at a time, sometimes in
clusters. Disconcerted, chagrined and
now convinced that most of the men were
reprobate in mind, the preacher stopped
with a sarcastic warning. At the close of
the meeting one brave, frank lad came to
him and said: ‘‘Doctor, we fellows all
know there is a God, you did not need to
tell us that, and sometimes our fight
against temptation is mighty fierce, but
what we want to be sure of is that God is
with us in this awful business and that
Christ will go with us into the trenches.
If he will go with us we will go anywhere.
Do you think He will go with us?” ‘‘Of
course he will go with you,” was the an
swer. “But we want to be sure,” insisted
the young soldier.
“Come let us sit down and talk it over,"
suggested the preacher very wisely, and
soon he found himself the center of a
deeply interested group of fellows from
which he found it difficult to break away.
He was being converted.
For three hours our friend shut himself
up in his*room and would not havj any
interruption. At five o’clock he emerged
with a happy, triumphant smile on his
face. "I have torn my sermon to pieces
and have thrown it away,” he said, “and
here is a new one born out of the experi
ence of the morning.” That evening he
preached with unusual power and at the
close of the esrmon a young rookie came
forward and asked permission to say a
word. It was readily granted to him and
this was his testimony: “I have been in
this camp for two weeks,” he said, “and
this is the first time in ten years that I
have been where everybody wanted to try
and help a fellow be what he wants to be.
I have been a professional gambler and
for three years a dope fiend —not because
I wanted to do these things, but because
all my acquaintances seemed to be try
ing to drag me down. When I was draft
ed and found that I had to go to war, I
thought it would be hell to come down
here. Nov.' I think it will be hell if I
have to leave this place and go back
home. If this is what they call religion,
then I want it and I want all I can get of
it.”
After the meeting the man woh wanted
to make a flying tour around the camp
and preach at all the boys went to the
secretary with this request: “Can’t you
cancel half of my speaking engagements
and ju,st let me stay here where I can
visit with these boys and get some of
this real religion that they seem to have?
Perhaps God will allow me to be of more
real ues in this way than I ever, could be
in just jumping here and there.”
So it was that he helped the fellows
sweep out in the morning; he messed with
the soldiers: he talked with them about
this great new experience into which they
were going and in which so many were
finding the Christ of the ages and his
blessed cross. When he came to leave
he left this parting word behind him:
"Good-bye, old fellow. I have had the
timfe of my life and I have gotten re
ligion." About two weeks later a letter
came from a layman thanking us for
what we had done for his pastor.
From Association Men.
YOUR MOTHER’S THOUGHT
FOR YOU
I seek in prayerful words, dear son,
My heart’s true wish to send you.
That you may know that far or near
My loving thoughts you.
I cannot find a truer word,
Nor fonder to caress you,
Nor song nor poem I have heard
Is sweeter than God Bless You!
God bless you! So I’ve wished you all
Os brightness life possesses.
For can there any joy at all
Be thin unless God blesses
God bless you. So I breathe a charm.
Lest grief’s dark night opress you.
For how can sorrow bring you harm
If ’tis God’s way to bless you.
5,917,976 WOMEN SIGN ANTI-BEER
PETITION.
Headed by the name of Mrs. Frances F.
Cleveland Preston, a petition representing
nearly 6,000,000 women, urging the pro
duction of malt liquors in the United
States be stopped in the interest of con
servation of foodstuffs was presented to
President Wilson Thursday. The peti
tion states the grain being used in the
brewing of beer and ale and other malt
beverages in America is enough to make
more than 4,000,000 loaves of bread daily.
Page 11
L
ll in I Jhl|Q
ywl L*
V
\ ’ c;
SB
I
j
