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Title: The Sequel
What the Great War will mean to Australia
Author: George A. Taylor
Release Date: December 2, 2008 [EBook #27382]
Language: English
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THE SEQUEL
WHAT THE GREAT WAR WILL MEAN
TO AUSTRALIA.
Being the Narrative of "Lieutenant Jefson, Aviator."
By
GEORGE A. TAYLOR.
First Edition, June. 1915.
2nd Edition. July. 1915.
Printed and Published by Building Limited.
17 Grosvenor Street. Sydney,
Australia.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
1910.--"The Air Age and its Military Significance."
1911.--"The Highway of the Air and the Military Engineer."
1913.--"The Balkan Battles." How Bad Roads Lost a War.
1913.--"The Schemers." (A Story.)
1913.--"Songs for Soldiers."
1914.--"Town Planning for Australia."
"Ah! when Death's hand our own warm hand hath ta'en
Down the dark aisles his sceptre rules supreme,
God grant the fighters leave to fight again
And let the dreamers dream!"
--Ogilvie.
PREFACE
These are mighty days.
We stand at the close of a century of dazzling achievement; a century
that gave the world railways, steam navigation, electric telegraphs,
telephones, gas and electric light, photography, the phonograph, the
X-ray, spectrum analysis, anæsthetics, antiseptics, radium, the
cinematograph, the automobile, wireless telegraphy, the submarine and
the aeroplane!
Yet as that brilliant century closed, the world crashed into a war to
preserve that high level of human development from being dragged back to
barbarism.
And how the scenes of battle change!
Cities are being smashed and ships are being torpedoed. Thousands of
lives go out in a moment. And these tremendous tragedies pass so swiftly
that it is risky to write a story round them carrying any touch of
prophecy. I, therefore, attempt it, realising that risk. The story is
written for the close of the year 1917. Its incidents are built upon the
outlook at June, 1915.
It first appeared in an Australian weekly journal, "Construction," in
January, 1915, and already some of its early predictions have been
realised; as, for instance, the entry of Italy in June, the use of
"thermit" shells, and the investigation of "scientific management in
Australian work."
To many readers, some of the predictions may not pleasantly appeal. But
it must be remembered that, being merely predictions, they are not
incapable of being made pleasant in the practical sense. In other words,
should any threaten to develop truth, to materialise, all efforts can be
concentrated in shaping them to the desired end.
Predictions are oftentimes warnings. Many of these are.
The story is written to impress the people, with their great
responsibilities in these wonderful days--when a century of incident is
crowded into a month, when an hour contains sixty minutes of tremendous
possibilities, when each of us should live the minutes, hours, days and
weeks with every fibre strained to give the best that is in us to help
in the present stupendous struggle for the defence of civilisation.
GEORGE A. TAYLOR.
Sydney, Australia, June, 1915.
The map, on pages 6 and 7, shows the lines followed by the German
armies through Belgium and France during August and September, 1914.
The main line of the Allies' attack, through Metz, in August and
September, 1915, culminating in the defeat of Germany (predicted for
the purpose of this story) is also shown.
You can facilitate the early realisation of this prediction by
enlisting NOW.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
[Illustration:
They often met before and fought.
To gain supremacy in sport.
They meet again now side by side.
For freedom in the whole world wide.]
CHAPTER I.
Winged!
It was the second day in February, 1915.
I'll not forget it in a hurry. That day I fell into the hands of the
German Army. "Fell," in my case, was the correct word, for my monoplane
was greeted with a volley of shots from some tree-hidden German troops
as I was passing over the north-eastern edge of the Argonne Forest.
I was returning from Saarbruck when I got winged. Bullets whizzed
through the 'plane, and one or two impinged on the engine. I tried to
turn and fly out of range, but a shot had put the rudder out of action.
An attempt to rise and trust to luck was baulked by my engine losing
speed. A bullet had opened the water cooler, and down, down the 'plane
glided, till a clear space beyond a clump of trees received it rather
easily. I let the petrol run out and fired it to put the machine out of
use. Then a rifle cracked and a bullet tore a hole through my left side,
putting me into the hospital for six weeks.
That forced idleness gave me plenty of time for retrospection.
I lived the previous energetic five months over and over again. I had
little time before to think of anything but my job and its best
possibilities, but the quietness of the hospital at Aix la Chapelle made
the previous period of activity seem a nightmare of incident.
I remember how surprise held me that I should be lying wounded in a
German hospital--I, a lieutenant in the Royal Flying Corps, who for
years before the war, had actually been a member of an Australian Peace
Society!
Zangwill's couplet had been to me a phrase of force:--
"To safeguard peace--we must prepare for war.
I know that maxim--it was forged in Hell!"
I remembered well how I had hung on the lips of Peace Advocate Doctor
Starr Jordan during his Australian visits, and how I had wondered at his
stories that Krupp's, Vicker's, and other great gun-building concerns
were financially operated by political, war-hatching syndicates; that
the curse of militarism was throttling human progression, and that the
doctrine of "non-resistance" was noble and Christianlike, for "all they
that take the sword shall perish by the sword."
I remembered how in Australia I had grieved that aviation, in which I
took a keen interest as a member of the Aerial League, was being
fostered for military purposes instead of for that glorious epoch
foretold by Tennyson:--
For I dipped into the future far as human eye could see,
Saw the vision of the world and all the wonders that would be,
Saw the heavens filled with commerce, Argosies of magic sails,
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales.
I remembered I felt that the calm of commerce held far more glories than
the storm of war; that there was no nobler philosophy than:--
"Ye have heard it said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth;
but I say ... resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy
right cheek, turn to him the other also. If any man take thy coat,
let him have thy cloke also."
Then came the thunderclap of war; and in the lightning flash I saw the
folly of the advocacy of peace. I felt that I, like others, had held
back preparation for this great war, that had been foreseen by trained
minds. I felt that extra graves would have to be dug, because
dreamers--like myself--had prated peace instead of helping to make our
nation more secure.
"Non-resistance" may be holy, but it encourages tyranny and makes easy
the way of the wrongdoer. If every man gave his cloak to the thief who
stole his coat, there would be no inducement for the robber to lead an
honest life. Vice would be more profitable than virtue.
"Non-resistance" may be saintly, but it would make it impossible to help
the weak or protect the helpless from cruelty and outrage.
All law, all justice, rests on authority and force. A judge could not
inflict a penalty unless there were force to carry it out.
Creeds, after all, are tried in the fires of necessity. "They that take
the sword shall perish by the sword." Well, the Kaiser had grasped the
sword. By whose sword should he perish except by that of the defender?
Christ's teachings are characterised by sanity and strength. He speaks
of His angels as ready to fight for Him; He flogged the moneychangers
from the temple: He said that no greater love can be shown than by a
man's laying down his life for his friend; and the Allies fighting
bravely to protect the oppressed, were manifesting to the full this
great love. Germany's attack on a weaker nation, which she had signed to
protect, called for punishment from other nations who had also pledged
their honor.
Unhappy Belgium called to the civilised world to check the German
outrages on its territory and people.
My peace doctrines went out like straw before a flame. I was a
"peace-dove" winged by grim circumstance; and that is how I became a man
of war.
[Illustration: HOW HISTORY REPEATED ITSELF.
England to Belgium, in 1870: "Let us hope they (Germany) will not
trouble you, but if they do--"
(Tenniel, in "London Punch," at the time of the Franco-Prussian War.)]
CHAPTER II.
The First Three Months of War.
I was in England when the war cloud burst, having just completed a
course of aviation at the Bristol Flying Grounds; so I volunteered for
active service; and, after a month's military training, was appointed a
lieutenant in Number 4 Squadron of the R.F.C.
I remember how the first crash of war struck Europe like a smash in the
face. How armies were rapidly mobilised! How the British Fleet steamed
out into the unknown, and Force became the only guarantee of national
safety!
It is hard to write of these things now that many days have passed
between, for events followed each other with the swiftness of a mighty
avalanche.
How Germany thrilled the universe by throwing at Belgium the greatest
army the world had ever seen. An awful wave of 1,250,000 men crashed
upon the gate of Liege.
How the great Krupp siege guns slowly crawled up, stood out of range of
the Liege forts, and broke them at ease.
How through the battered gate a flood of Uhlans poured to make up for
that wasted fortnight, preceded by their Taube aeroplanes spying out the
movements of the Belgium army; the German artillery following, and
smashing a track through France!
How that fortnight gave France and England the chance to interpose a
wall of men and steel, which met the shock of battle at Mons, but was
pushed back almost to the gates of Paris.
It was at the battle of Mons that the squadron to which I was attached
went into active operation, reconnoitring the battle line on our left
flank. It was my first taste of battle, but I do not remember any
strange feelings.
I was in that awful shock of forces that stopped the southern progress
of the German juggernaut like a chock beneath a wheel, when on September
2 it recoiled back--back to the Marne--back to the Aisne--back almost to
the Belgian frontier. Then winter dropped upon it, turning the roads
into pools of mud, checking all speed movements necessary to active
operations, and the troops dug in like soldier crabs upon a river bank.
[Illustration: "The Aeroplane had been a ... curiosity."--Chapter III.
(The first Aeroplane to fly in Australia.)]
All surprise movements had to be made at night; the dawn finding our
aeroplanes out in the frosty air spying out any changes in positions of
the day before. A smoke-ball fired as we flew above a new trench gave
our artillery the range; then till night fell a rain of shells would
batter that new position. In the dark our troops would creep forward,
rush that trench, and dawn would find them dozing in their newly won
quarters. The war had become a battle of entrenchments.
CHAPTER III.
The Flying Men.
For ages man walked the earth.
To-day he is the only living creature that can travel in the air by
other than its own substance.
'Till the Great War the aeroplane was a scientific curiosity. The Battle
of the Nations blooded it; and its wonderful utility in speeding the end
of the war has proved its right to be recognised as a distinct factor in
human movement.
When the war crash came there were two aerial types; the lighter than
air type, the dirigible balloon; and the heavier than air machine, the
aeroplane. This is how the Powers stood in aerial furnishing when the
first shot was fired. Germany and Austria had 25 airships, including 11
Zeppelins, as well as 556 aeroplanes.
England, France, Russia and Belgium had 33 airships and 1019 aeroplanes.
The English dirigibles had not made long flights, and not being very
dependable had not received much attention from the military
authorities. A non-dependable factor in war is worse than useless. A
mistake may be made in tactics, but when ascertained may be retrieved
and, perhaps, turned to good account. Non-dependability is fatal, as
many a commander would not know how to act, and in war, he who hesitates
is lost.
The French had experimented a good deal with the dirigible, but mostly
of the non-rigid type, which was a type "without a backbone" and was as
uncertain, so that its general non-dependability turned French attention
to the aeroplane.
The Germans, however, pinned their faith on the balloon, and for long
made it a feature for observation purposes, so that when Zeppelin
brought out his rigid framework balloon, Germany fancied she saw in it
the command of the air.
The Zeppelin, however, had many disabilities over the aeroplane. It had
to have its own kennel. It was almost impossible to get it into its shed
if the wind was against it. The kennels had, therefore, to be either on
wheels or floating. Furthermore, not being able to replenish its gas, a
Zeppelin had always to return to its base for supplies. But the gas
balloon suited the smug character of the German. Unlike the aviator who
threw himself into the air on a bundle of steel rods and rubber, a
propeller and a petrol engine, the phlegmatic German took no risks with
a balloon. He found, however, that Zeppelins were expensive freaks. They
had a habit of catching fire in the air, because the tail created a
vacuum and sucked back some escaping gas into the engine where the
contact spark ignited it.
One recently alighted in a field and a country bumpkin came over with
the crowd to see the fun. He had a pipe in his mouth. He was told to go
away. He wouldn't for a while, but he soon left in a hurry. After the
explosion they found bits of him and sixty-seven other people!
The Germans pinned their faith to the Zeppelin because it could carry a
heavy load of explosives and would be an easy way of damaging an enemy;
and it was only a few months before the war that considerable enthusiasm
ruled Germany because a Zeppelin had made a record trip from the
southern to the northern fringe of Germany, or, as "Vorwarts" said, "as
far as from Germany to England and back again."
Here, then, was an easy way to fight. Just rise up out of danger and
drop bombs.
They tried it at Antwerp.
On 25th August, 1915, a Zeppelin flew over the sleeping city, guided by
flash lamps from German spies on roofs. It was a night of terror--a bomb
dropped to fall upon the royal palace, missed and injured two women; a
bomb aimed for the Antwerp Bank missed and killed a servant; but one
fell into a hospital and another into a crowd in the city square. Five
people were blown to atoms.
It must have been an awful night, for it is recorded that the city
watchman of Antwerp announced: "12 o'clock and all's hell."
On September 2nd (the anniversary of Sedan), the Zeppelin came again to
give its stab in the dark, but finding it was recognised, retreated. It
did not rise higher to get out of danger of the air guns and put up a
fight. The German in the air takes few risks. It is his temperament. Not
so with the Frenchman. He is by nature dashing and volatile. The
easy-going of the dirigible little appealed to him. The risk, the speed,
the adventure of the aeroplane touched his soul, which explained why
France had 2032 military aviators, whilst Germany had only 300 qualified
military pilots.
The German lacks the dash, nerve, vim and initiative essential to a
successful flier. He is moulded as a cog. He is part of a system--out of
that he must not move. It has wrecked his initiative, and the sneer of
the greatest German in history, Frederick the Great, has to-day grim
significance.
"See those two mules," he said satirically to one of his officers, who
lacked initiative, "they have been in fifteen campaigns and--they're
still mules."
The German training system has taken all the humanity out of the men.
They move like machines, either destroying or rolling on to destruction,
and they often act with the dumb sense of the machine to pain and
suffering.
Lloyd George has very truly put it: "God made man to his own image, but
the German recreated him in the form of a Diesel engine."
No one questioned the efficiency of the German machine. The Allies were
disputing its right to go on destroying.
[Illustration: "The New Arm."--Chapter IV.]
CHAPTER IV.
The New Arm.
"It strikes me that these fool commanders don't know what to do with us.
We aviators seem to be too new to come into all their stunts. Here we've
been flying over eight years, and we're still novel enough to be
repeatedly fired on by our own side. Why the beggars in our own battery,
when they see an aeroplane overhead in their excitement let fly. They
don't bother to notice that the plane of our Bleriot hasn't claw ends
like the enemy's Taube. Neither do they note we carry our own
distinguishing mark. We're the circus show. We're the 'comic relief'
sure."
He was about to spit his disgust on an unoffending fly, but quickly
changed his mind.
He was a Yank from the U.S.A. Military School at San Diego, and "hiked
over the pond as there was nothing doing."
In appearance he was tall and wiry with a thin face and hooked nose that
suggested the bird-man. His name on the roll was Walter Edmund Byrne,
but his bony appearance won him his nickname--Nap.
We knew nicknames would shock those who stand for the rigid rule of
military discipline, but aviators clear the usual wall of demarcation
between officers and subordinates. A nod supplants the "heels together
and touch your cap."
The Aviation Sections seemed to be communistic concerns, in the air rank
being only recognised by achievement. In fact, the new arm was too new
to be brought under the iron rule of military etiquette or into most
Operation Orders. I told Nap as much.
"Yes," he said, "I guess we're too new. Even when cannon first came into
war it was novel enough to fire as often from the wrong end and teach
things 'to the man behind the gun'; but I've a bit of dope here that
ought to be pasted into every book of your field service regulations,
and every officer ought to repeat it before breakfast three times a
week. It's the flyers' creed."
Fumbling amongst some newspaper scraps in his note book, he produced
this bit of verse.
The snake with poisoned fang defends
(And does it really very well).
The cuttle fish an inkcloud sends;
The tortoise has its fort of shell;
The tiger has its teeth and claws;
The rhino has its horns and hide;
The shark has rows of saw-set jaws;
Man--stands alone, the whole world wide
Unarmed and naked! But 'tis plain
For him to fight--God gave a brain!
Far back in this world's early mists
When man began to use his head;
He stopped from fighting with his fists
And gripped a wooden club instead.
But when the rival tribe was slain,
The first tribe then to stand alone
Had once again to work its brain
And made an axe--an axe of stone!
The stone-axe tribe would hold first place;
And ruled the rest where'er it went.
Because then--as to-day--the race
Was first that had best armament.
But human brain expanding more
(Its limits none can circumscribe);
The stone-axe crowd went down before
The more developed bronze-axe tribe.
Then shields came in to quickly show
Their party victors in the strife:
By warding off the vicious blow
And giving warriors longer life.
The tribe's wise men would urge at length,
No doubt as now, for tax on tax,
To keep the "Two tribe" fighting strength
With "super-dreadnought" shield and axe!
The bow and arrow came and won
For Death came winged from far away.
Then came the cannon and the gun;
And brought us where we are to-day.
And now we see the shield of yore
An arsenal of armour plate;
With crew a thousand men or more;
And guns a hundred tons in weight.
Beneath our seas dart submarines,
Around the world and back again.
But every marvel only means
Some greater triumph of the brain.
For while the thund'ring hammers ring;
And super-dreadnoughts swarm the sea;
There flits above, a birdlike thing,
That claims an aerial sovereignty!
A thing of canvas, stick and wheel
"The two-man fighting aeroplane."
It screams above those hulks of steel:
"Oh! human brain begin again."
[Illustration]
Nap was busy with bad language, a size brush and some fabric remnants
patching the plane, whilst I read his treasure by my pocket lamp. Then
he came over.
"Mind you," he said, "I don't greatly blame folks here. It can't be
worse than in America--America, where the first machine got up and made
good--where the man the world had waited for for ages, Wilbur Wright
(though he's been dead some years), hasn't even got a tablet up to say:
'Good on you old man, God rest your soul.'"
We were standing by our machines, waiting for the dawn light to call us
aloft for our daily reconnaissance when Nap let his tongue loose.
"Five years ago, when the Wright Brothers first flew, Europe went dotty
and began to offer big prizes for stunts in the air. Wright took his old
'bus across the pond and won everything. Next year our Glen Curtis went
over and brought back all the scalps. Then America got tired. We live in
a hurry there. We're the spoilt kids of the earth, always wanting a new
toy. When we tired of straight flying, we went in for circus stunts;
such as spiral turning, volplaning, upside-down flying and looping the
loop. We interested the crowd for a while, as there was a chance of some
of us smashing up. But when flying got safe and sane and the aeroplane
almost foolproof, the public got cold feet, and the only men flying when
I left, were young McCormick, the Harvester chap of Chicago,
occasionally hiking across Lake Michigan in his 'amphoplane,' and
Beechy, dodging death in 'aeroplane versus automobile' races.
"Curtis has a factory that had been shooing the bailiff till Wanamaker
came along and financed that Atlantic aeroplane that was too heavy to
carry its weight; and Lieutenant Porte, who was to take it across, was
in a fix till this war came along and called him over. Orville Wright is
trying to make a do of his factory. It is significant that Captain
Mitchell, of the U.S. Signal Corps, the other day asked the U.S.
Government 'to help those fellows out or they'll have to quit the
business.' So you see Jefson, that's why I get the huff when I see the
same sort of thing over here, especially in times like these 'that try
men's souls.'"
Then the dawn light streaked the eastern sky rim. We pulled the plane
from under the tree screen. The propeller hummed, dragged us across a
dozen yards and up into the cold air of the early New Year morn.
[Illustration: "When flying got safe and sane."--Chapter IV.]
CHAPTER V.
The Tired Feeling.
Our quarters were outside Epernay, about fifteen miles south of Rheims,
with the Marne between us and the enemy.
To the north the horizon was fringed with the ridge-backed plateau cut
by the Aisne. The enemy had been holding that fringe since October,
having pushed back our almost daily attempts to get on to it. We got a
particularly bad smack early in 1915, after crossing at Soissons.
To the north east was the ridge covered by the Argonne Forest; a sealed
area to the man in the air.
We had been here three months, and our daily flight over the same area
robbed the view of any scenic interest.
Perhaps, in the clear air of the winter morning, we would see far off
silhouetted against the pale green of the brightening eastern sky, the
dove-like aeroplanes of the enemy moving over the distant forest like
bees above a bush.
Sometimes an "affair of aerial patrols" would result in the exchange of
long shots, but seldom with any effect, for the reason that our enemy
took few risks in the air and, furthermore, we could not pursue, as our
orders were for speedy reconnaissance and early report. This was no easy
matter over a country covered with the snowy quilt of winter, when even
trees were unrecognisable, except at an angle that would show the trunks
beneath: an angle that would call for low flying, bringing us within the
6000 feet range of the enemy's "air-squirts."
By day we "trimmed our ship," examined every screw and bolt and
inspected our bombs and fuses. These "cough drops" were radish-shaped
shells, each weighing thirty-one pounds; and were fired from an
apparatus which could be worked by the pilot and which carried a
regulator showing height and speed of the machine. Fair accuracy could
thus be achieved.
One evening, the commander of the battery to which we were attached came
over to our quarters, the skillion of a wrecked farm house.
He brought word that another Zeppelin had been rammed by one of our
machines. Both machines and their occupants had been smashed.
He spoke in French, and we understood, which explained why we were
stationed so far east on the fighting line.
"Magnificent it must have been," he said, "we groundlarks always have a
fighting chance, but there is no chance for you bird-men. Ah! who can
now say the romance has gone out of war with the improvement in range of
weapons. Time was not long since when the general headed his men with a
waving sword. As your Shakespeare said it--'Once more into the breach,
dear friends.' And my comrades are fighting through this campaign,
banging at an enemy they may never see. But the aeroplane has brought
back the romance again. Ah! it is fine."
When he strolled out Nap ventured his opinion.
"Romance in war! There's not a scrap of it. The fool-flyer who rams a
Zepp. deserves what he gets. It's wasteful for a flyer to so risk his
speedy plane, when he has a better fighting chance of rising and
dropping 'cough-drops' on the slow old 'bus beneath him; as Pegoud told
us the other day: 'The Zeppelins! Ah, they are slow as geese, but our
aeroplanes, they are swift as swallows.'
"The trouble is there's not enough opportunity here to do things. This
daily 'good-morning fly' and cleaning engines the rest of the day is
getting on my nerves, we've been marking time here for months. I want
something to happen along 'right soon.'"
And something did happen along next morning.
CHAPTER VI.
Civilised Warfare.
Nap was in a bad humor.
The breeze from the north-east had kept us up for three days. It came to
us over fields of long-unburied dead. It explained our morbid craving
for tobacco--and Nap, during the night, had lost a cherished half-cigar!
We felt the cold that morning, as we wheeled the 'plane into the open
space. The engine was also out of sorts, coughing like an asthmatic
victim.
The first sun ray shot into the sky and called us aloft. So with engine
spluttering the 'plane climbed over the Marne-Vesle Ridge and above the
cloud of smoke that hid Rheims 5000 feet below us.
Looking far to the north-west, a great fog cloud lay over the wet
country of the Yser. About twenty-five miles off, near Laon, we spotted
one of the enemy's observation balloons being inflated.
"Shall we drop a 'cough-drop'?" Nap shouted to me through the speaking
tube.
"No chance," I shouted back, "there's something coming at us."
A swift Taube was racing up to challenge. It was rising to get the
"drop" on us. We carried an aerial gun, but hesitated to fire, as we
wanted all our speed to get above our rival. Our engine lost its bad
temper for a change. Round and round we began to circle like game cocks
spoiling for a fight; rising, forgetting, in the excitement, the cold of
the upper air--higher and higher, till Nap shouted, "We'll get her
beneath us in the next round and then for a 'cough-drop' or the gun."
But the Taube had seen our advantage. It banked up on a sharp turn,
dropped like a stone fully a thousand feet, making a magnificent
volplane, and scurried away like a frightened vulture, dropping and
dropping in a series of gigantic swoops.
"We won't chase," said Nap, "she wants to bring us into range of their
'air-squirts,' and 'Archibalds' are not pleasant on an empty stomach."
[Illustration: "ONE OF THE ENEMY'S 'AIR-SQUIRTS.'"
A German Aerial Gun.]
We turned home and then the engine sulked again. I could see Nap was in
trouble. It was was just as well that the roar of the engine and the hum
of the propeller compelled the use of speaking-tube communication, for
when a man uses bad language he isn't cool enough to pour his sentiments
through a pipe. But we were coming down, gliding down on a long angle,
with the engine giving a spasmodic kick. Down, down towards a light fog
that the breeze had brought down from the north-west; down, down till we
could see below us trench lines that were not our own! Then the engine
stopped!
Nap looked out, turned to me and pulled a face. Putting his mouth to the
tube he shouted "Lean over and wave your hand like...."
Several grey-coated soldiers were now running over to a bare patch to
which we seemed to be sliding. I waved frantically--the soldiers
hesitated to fire and waved back again! Down, down, with Nap working
like a fiend at the engine! Down, down to within a few hundred feet of
the ground, when something happened. The engine, after a splutter, set
off at its usual rattle, the propeller caught up its momentum and
descent was checked.
Nap leaned over and joined in the waving demonstration and, knowing that
an attempt to rise abruptly would give away the fact that we were trying
to escape, he kept at a low level, flying over waving Germans, past a
long line of German troops breakfasting behind the trenches; then back
again to try and convince them that we were of their own, then circling
around till we reached a safe height above the thickening fog, our
aching arms stopped waving. We headed for home, and repaid the kindness
of our German friends by having their position shelled for the rest of
the day.
"That was a tight fix," Nap ventured, as I gave him a tribute from the
Squadron Commander--one of the most coveted of prizes of the campaign--a
cigar!
"Yes, that waving stunt was a bit of spice," he said.
"But what beats me," I replied, "is why they didn't fire on us, as we
carried our distinguishing mark."
"That's easy," said Nap, sucking his cigar, "they've got some of their
own 'planes carrying our mark and guessed we were one of them. But as
the song says: 'We're all here, so we're alright.' Some of these days
I'm going to invent an apparatus that can change signs--press a button
and the Germans' black cross will cover our mark, and so on--and then
we'll fly where we like."
"It's unfair to fly an enemy's flag, you know, Nap," I ventured.
"How?" he queried. "That's where the Allies, particularly you
hypersensitive British, make the greatest mistake. Everything in war is
fair. Get the war over, say I, even if it comes to smashing up the
enemy's hospitals. The wounded, nowadays, are getting well too quickly.
There's a fellow in that battery yonder who has been in the hospital
twice already, and, if this war lasts out Kitchener's tip of three
years, practically the whole of the armies will have gone up for
alterations and repairs, and be as lively as ever on the firing line.
The Geneva Treaty, that prohibits firing on the Red Cross in time of
war, is like any other 'scrap of paper.' I'd wipe out the enemy's
hospitals and poison his food supplies. It's an uncivilised idea, I
guess, but so is war. What's the difference between tearing out a
fellow's 'innards' with a bayonet, and killing him by the gentler way of
poisoning his liquor? What's the difference between poisoning the
enemy's drinking water and poisoning the enemy's air with the
new-fangled French explosive--Turpinite? It's all hot air talking of the
enemy's barbarism--scratch the veneer off any of us and we're back into
the stone age. If I had a free leg or free wing, I'd drop arsenic in
every reservoir in Germany. Why, we're even prevented dropping 'coughs'
on those long strings of trains we see every day, crawling far beyond
the enemy's line carrying supplies from their bases to the firing line,
feeding 'em up, feeding 'em up all the time."
We chafed at this restriction of our possibilities.
It gave Nap a fine opportunity for nasty remarks.
"Here we've got the most wonderful arm of the war, and the men over us
don't know how to appreciate it. It's the same old prejudices, as my old
Colonel, Sam Reber, used to say, 'every new thing has to fight its way.'
It's the same with wireless. Here they're only using it for tiddly
widdly messages, like school kids practising with pickle bottles, when
they could use it to guide a balloon loaded with explosives and fitted
up with a wireless receiver and a charged cell, so that it could be
exploded by a wave when it got over a position or a city. I'd like to
see this fight a war of cute stunts, a battle of brains against brains,
but I suppose we'll have to stick here till our fabrics rot whilst those
fellows out yonder are burrowing into the earth like moles, coming out
at night, like cave-men, and battling with a club."
CHAPTER VII.
What Australia was Doing.
That day I had a letter from Australia. Here it is:--
"Dear Jefson,--Your cheery letter from the front was full of the powder
and shot of action and riotous optimism. I'm afraid mine will be a
contrast.
"Our Australia isn't faring well. Our vigorous assertion of the strength
of our young nationhood has been manifested only in a military and naval
sense--commercially, we are nearly down and out.
"We are outrageously pessimistic. There was an excuse at the beginning
of the war, when we dropped behind a rock, stunned at the very thought
of an Armageddon; then we clapped our hands on our pockets, tightened up
our purse strings, and, with white faces, waited for the worst
and--we're still waiting. There was an excuse for us to be absolutely
flabbergasted when the Kaiser's crowd rushed on to Paris. There may have
been reason then for more than ordinary caution, but since the 'great
check,' there has been no valid reason for people to still sit tight and
wait. People with money to invest are holding up most of the former
avenues of activity. 'Till the war is over' is the only excuse they can
mumble.
"Take building investments in Sydney alone. A friend showed me a list of
ninety-one plans held up, totalling over £4,000,000; held up 'till the
war is over,' held up till the accumulated business will rush like an
avalanche, running prices that are now low to such a high figure that
the fools who waited will find they will have lost thousands. Building
prices are now fifteen per cent. cheaper than before the war and
twenty-five per cent. cheaper than they will be when the war has broken.
Twenty-five per cent. means a distinct loss of £1,000,000 in one avenue
of investment alone, not counting the tying up of the many hundreds
other lines depending upon building construction--and when you consider,
Jefson, that such inactivity is almost everywhere, you can guess we're
in for a bad time if people don't buck up. To make matters worse, some
firms are stopping advertising, forgetting that advertising is the
life-blood of their business, and by stopping advertising they're
stopping circulation of money. The firm that thinks it can save money by
stopping advertising is in the same street as the man who thinks he can
save time by stopping the clock.
"These are no ordinary firms, but what the local Labor League is so fond
of describing as 'capitalistic institutions.' They hold many thousands
in reserve and their annual dividends have been at least 10 per cent.
for years and years and years. Moreover their businesses have not
materially suffered. In some cases, indeed, there has been improvement.
But 'profits' evidently supersede humanity; the interests of gold are
greater than the welfare of human flesh and blood and even the call of
country. It seems hard, Jefson, that you should be risking your life and
other brave fellows shedding their blood, for such men who have neither
commercial instinct nor human feeling. I fully expected some of those
firms to start their jobs as an incentive to others. We only want
someone to start and do something big to galvanise the smaller investors
into action. It's not capital they lack, but confidence.
"I often wonder why the men who have had the acumen to amass money have
not the common sense to realise that unemployed capital is a
rapidly-accruing debt. Sovereigns by themselves are not wealth. It is
their purchasing capacity and their equivalent in the requirements of
life that represent fortunes. Investment, not idle capital, is wealth.
"Australia is being held back a great deal by the operation of State
Enterprise. It has always been extravagant, inefficient and slow; but
the effects are being more keenly felt at this time. At Cockatoo Island,
the Federal Shipbuilding Yard, a cruiser was built that could not be
launched. (I don't want you to mention this because we feel mighty
humiliated.) Someone blundered. Who that someone was I do not suppose we
shall ever know. That is the worst of being an employer of politicians.
They run your business when they like, how they like, and with whom they
like. You only come in on the pay day. However, the difficulty is being
got over by the construction of a coffer-dam--at a cost of £30,000. We
have been confidently assured by the men running our business that
everything will be all right in the long run. Perhaps that assurance is
intended as a guarantee that we shall get a long run for our money.
Anyhow, at time of writing the coffer-dam is being constructed.
"In N.S.W. the position of the Public Works Department must be much the
same as the Sultan of Turkey's--no money, no friends. And no wonder! It
drained the State of all spare cash for the edification of its day-labor
joss, and is about to pawn the State to foreign money lenders for more.
Being now on its absolute uppers, the Public Works Department is handing
over work to a private syndicate to be carried out on a percentage
basis. The longer the work takes and the more it costs, the better for
the private company. Here again the public pays.
"State Enterprise has wrecked the people's self-reliance and initiative.
As soon as a man gets out of work now his first aim is to demand that
the State make him a billet. This, of course, the State cannot do, and
the rejected job-seekers, who are growing in numbers daily, are like a
lot of hornets round the ears of Ministers.
"There is one way out of the difficulty, and that is, the abandonment of
the whole system of State Socialism and the re-establishment of private
enterprise. If that policy were to be endorsed to-morrow, plenty of
capital would be found for many schemes that are held up at present, and
Ministers would be relieved of all worry and responsibilities. But
they're not game, they're just hanging on--hanging on, and, I tell you,
something is going to snap somewhere, sometime.
"From a military point of view there is no reason to worry. We have a
big army in Egypt on the road to back you up, with more to follow. I
must not say much on that matter. The censor will chop it out, but we're
coming to the point that every man who doesn't go to the front must
learn how to shoot straight. Let's hope he'll also learn that he can do
a good deal to help fellows like yourself that are keeping the flag
flying abroad, by keeping up confidence and the flag flying at home."
I read the letter to Nap.
"There are two points in that letter," he said. "The funk at home and
the readiness to enlist. We've also got that funk-bee, sure. Why, when I
left U.S.A. a ten million dollar war tax was launched, unemployed were
swarming into the cities, factories were closing down because of the
falling-off of exports, and the situation was getting so desperate that
the Wilson-Bryan crowd were talking of forcing the British blockade of
Germany with ships of contraband stuff. But there's no readiness to
enlist, Jefson, not on your life. I'm sorry to say the physically worst
are offering themselves for their country's service, and only ten per
cent. of those offering are accepted; and though they advertise 'bowling
alleys,' 'free trips round the world,' and other stunts as inducements,
the response is so flat that when I passed through Chicago last August
to come here, the recruiting stations had a notice up 'colored men
wanted for infantry!' You know there's a sure prejudice against the
nigger, we grudge giving him a vote, but when it comes to fighting for
the country, well, he's as welcome as the 'flowers that bloom in the
spring, tra-la.' I guess you Australians lick us right there."
[Illustration: "Information had been received of a new type of
Zeppelin."--Chapter VIII.]
CHAPTER VIII.
A Prisoner in Cologne.
A military operation order is crystallised commonsense. It is a
wonderfully concise bunch of phraseology.
Our squadron commander read the latest by lamplight over a spread map of
the theatre of war.
The general situation of the campaign explained that a Zeppelin raid on
the east coast of England had been made on the 19th of January, thirteen
days before.
Information had been received that a new type of Zeppelin had been
constructed, a "mother" type, capable of carrying a number of
aeroplanes.
The intention of the operation order was to destroy all known Zeppelin
sheds; each air squadron supplying special officers for the purpose.
I well remember the particulars of that order. They printed their
details upon my memory because I had been selected to destroy the sheds
at Saarbruck. I was to leave three hours before the following dawn.
I remember Nap's disappointment that I was to go alone. He helped my
machine out without a word. He may have had a premonition that I was not
to return as I watched him silently fixing the compass and map-roller,
testing the spring catch and guide of the bomb-dropper and packing into
it its heavy load of "cough-drops." Then he stood like a dumb figure
waiting for my starting signal.
"Buck up, Nap," I ventured, climbing into the seat. "One would think
this was a funeral. I must get a hustle on as I've got to do 120 miles
before I can get to business, so if everything's right, I'll swoop up."
Nap looked up.
"Fly high, and good luck," was all he said as he gripped my hand. Then I
pressed the starter, the propeller hummed and pulled me into the
star-specked sky.
I steered easterly, leaving on my left the red fire-glow of Rheims and
passing over the sleepy lights of Valny. Within an hour I was over the
great black stretch of the Argonne Forest, and crossing the Meuse, a
long line of fog with Verdun 7000 feet below. The engine was working
well, throwing back the miles at about 60 per hour. A glow of lights to
the right showed Metz next to a streak of grey, the Moselle River; and
as the dawn-light came into the sky, the Saar River came under me,
covered by a fog with a fringe that flapped over its right bank and
covered Saarbruck.
According to the sketch-map the Zeppelin sheds were near the railway
station. So I flew low into the mist to get their correct position. The
noise of my engine brought a shot from an aerial gun, but the fog saved
me. A bunch of lights brought the station into view with the
unmistakable long hangar of the Zeppelin adjacent to it.
I turned to get the sheds beneath me, and three foot-treads sent as many
bombs chasing each other earthwards.
The first hit the ground near the shed, exploding without doing any
damage. The second crashed through the roof of the hangar, its explosion
being almost coincident with a fearful crash; the resulting air-rush
almost overturning my 'plane. The third bomb fell into the back end of
the shed, but I guessed it was not required.
My job was done, so I rose high above the fog line to get a straight run
for home. Three Taubes were patrolling high, evidently on the look out.
I saw they would have the drop on me, so I sank back into the fog and
under its cover swooped across the river for home. I was over the
enemy's country where I guessed I was being searched for, so taking
advantage of the fog I maintained a 1000 feet level and made a bee-line
for Epernay.
[Illustration: THE ZEPPELIN SHED, AT SAARBRUCK.
Chapter VIII.]
My job was done, and I remember I was particularly elated.
I got a surprise near the Argonne Forest, striking a breeze that
suddenly came up from the south, lifting the fog curtain and showing me
dangerously close to the earth.
I swiftly jerked the elevator for a swoop up as a rifle cracked. I was
spotted!
A volley of shots followed and--I was winged.
I remember, like a hideous dream, a long, evil-smelling shed in which I
lay, a stiffly stretched and bandaged figure on a straw-strewn floor.
I was afterwards told it was Mezieres Railway Station, and that I was
one of many hundred wounded being taken from the field hospitals to the
base.
I need not detail my experiences for the next six months. I was taken
from the hospital at Aix-la-Chapelle to Cologne to be attached to a gang
of prisoners for street cleaning.
I remember our daily march across the Great Rhine Bridge with its
wonderful arches at its entrance, and the great bronze horses on its
flanks. I had occasion to remember that bridge, for there, some time
later, the sunshine was to come into my life.
For six months I had not heard much of the war. My hospital friends had
been wounded about the same time as I. My street-gang mates, a Belgian
and a Frenchman, knew little except that up till June the Ostend-Nancy
fighting line was still held by both armies. The lack of news did not
worry me during my days of pain, but as the strength came back to me it
brought a craving for news of the Great Game. Where were the Allies?
What of the North Sea Fleet? How was Australia taking it? What was Nap
doing? were questions that chased each other through my mind. Five
Taubes had flown over us the day before, going south, but--what was
doing?
It was on the Cologne Bridge a week later that a rather pretty girl,
with an unmistakable English face, stopped to converse with one of my
guard. At the same time she pointed to me: at which the guard looked
round, frowned and spat with contempt.
"Are you English?" she queried.
"Yes," I replied, "I'm from Australia."
I had touched a sympathetic chord and she "sparked" up.
"Australia! Do you know Sydney?" she asked.
"I'm from Manly," was all I replied.
Then she did what I thought was a foolish thing--she came over and
nearly shook my arm off!
The officer of the guard resented it, but she jabbered at him and
explained to me that Australian prisoners were to have special
treatment, then glancing at my number she stepped out across the bridge.
I found she was correct. When my gang returned to the barracks my number
was called and I was questioned by the officer in charge. I was informed
that Germany had no quarrel with Australia, hence I was only to be a
prisoner on parole, to report myself twice a day and come and go as I
pleased.
That is how I came to win great facts regarding Germany and her ideals.
That is how I found out how it was that with Austria, Germany for nine
months could hold at bay the mighty armies of the world's three greatest
Empires, British, French and Russian, as well as the fighting cocks of
Belgium; and at the same time endeavor to knock into some sort of
fighting shape the crooked army of the Turks; how three nations of
109,000,000 people could defy for nine months the six greatest nations
in the world with a joint population of 622,200,000!
The facts are of striking import to-day and should be understood by
every man who is fighting for the Allies on and in the land, sea and
air.
[Illustration: "On the bridge across the Rhine, at Cologne."--Chapter
VIII.]
CHAPTER IX.
Some Surprises in Cologne.
My unexpected freedom in Cologne was but one of many surprise.
There was the surprise of meeting an Australian friend in such
unexpected quarters. I ascertained her name was Miss Goche. Her father
was a well-known merchant of Melbourne, but was now living in Sydney. He
had sent his daughter to the Leipsic Conservatorium to receive the
technical polish every aspiring Australian musician seems to consider
the "hall mark of excellence."
But the war closed the Conservatorium as it did most other concerns, by
drawing out the younger professors to the firing line and the older men
to the Landstrum, a body of spectacled elderly men in uniform, who felt
the spirit wake in their feeble blood and prided themselves as
"bloodthirsty dogs," as they watched railway lines, reservoirs, power
stations, and did other unexciting small jobs.
Miss Goche was staying with her aunt and grandfather in Cologne. At
their home I was made welcome.
Little restriction was placed on my movements, than the twice daily
reporting at the Barracks.
I wondered at this freedom.
"It is easily explained," said old Goche, who could speak English. "The
Fatherland knows no enmity with Australia. We have sympathy for the
Indians, Canadians and other races of your Empire, who have been whipped
into this war against their own free will."
"But," I interrupted, "there has been no whipping."
"Tut, tut," he continued. "We of the Fatherland know. Have we not proof?
Our "Berliner Tageblatt" tells us so. We have no quarrel with the
colonial people. Our hate is for England alone; and when this war is
over and we have England at our feet, we shall be welcomed by Australia
and the colonies, and we shall let them share with us the freedom and
the light and the wisdom of our great Destiny."
There was no convincing the old man to the contrary, and his
granddaughter informed me that the same opinion was universal in
Germany.
"The best proof that it is so is the freedom you enjoy," she said.
"And yet there are times," she continued, "that I feel there is a subtle
reason for this apparent kindliness for the colonies of the British
Empire. You know Germany cannot successfully develop her own colonies.
She has not that spirit of initiative that the Britisher has in
attacking the various vicissitudes that every pioneer meets with in the
development of a new land. That is why she let her colonies be snapped
up by Australia without a pang; that is why as you say, she let her
people hand over Rabaul and New Guinea to your Colonel Holmes without a
battle. She fancies that when she wins this war as she has convinced
herself she will, it will be a simple matter to step into the occupation
of ready made colonies of such wonderful wealth and development."
The chief surprise of my freedom, however, was my changed opinion
regarding the way Germany was taking the war.
I, like the average Britisher, had believed that in checking the German
rush on Paris and driving it to the Aisne, we had whipped Germany to a
standstill.
We had pictured her checked on the east with her Austrian ally on the
verge of pleading for peace; her fleet cowering in the Kiel Canal like a
frightened hen beneath a barn.
I, like every other Britisher, had fancied that Germany was undergoing
an awful process of slow death; that she was faced with economic ruin;
that her trade and manufacture had been smashed, causing untold
ruination and forcing famine into every home; that the German populace
were being crushed under the terrors of defeat, were cursing "the
Kaiser and his tyrannical militarism," and waiting for the inevitable
uprising with revolution and general social smash up.
And I knew such was the belief of the Allies and the world generally.
Never was a more mistaken notion spread!
Germany, notwithstanding what blunders and miscalculations she was
accused of making, believed she would win.
This belief obsessed her.
Every movement, whether it achieves its direct object or not was made to
nail that belief more secure.
A great philosopher wrote many years ago the following maxims:--
"To the persevering--everything is possible."
"They will conquer who believe they can."
Germany believed she would conquer, and for forty years she had been
building up that belief.
[Illustration: "German aeroplanes were built from English types."
Chapter X.]
CHAPTER X.
"Made in Germany."
Grandpa Goche told the story of Germany's development with mingled
pride, yet with a tinge of regret.
We sat before his wide fireplace where a great fire crackled.
Puffing at his long pipe Grandpa Goche peered into the fire for a space
before answering my query as to Germany's destiny.
"The destiny of the Deutschland?" he finally exclaimed. "Ah! It will be
great and wonderful. But where it will end--who knows! Will it be like
the Tower of Babel, great in conception, great in execution, but
overreaching in its greatness? Will our destiny be like the snowball,
accumulating as it rolls till it becomes immovable in its immensity?
Then--stagnation! And yet the start of that snowball was but 50 years
ago.
"I remember as a boy when Bismarck was Prime Minister of Prussia, and he
forced through the Reichstag his great army re-organisation scheme. In
'64 he attacked Denmark and took Schleswig-Holstein. That is how we got
Kiel. Two years after he crushed the Austrians in six weeks, and took
Hanover, Hesse, and Nassau; and four years after that he smashed the
French and took Alsace-Lorraine.
"Flushed with victory, proud Deutschland, with Denmark, Austria and
France humbled in the dust, wiped her sword and peered at the Dawn. But
she did not sheath that sword. No! In the ecstasy of triumph she was
trying to formulate a policy of carving a destiny great and glorious.
She looked first to peaceful development by legislation; and then, in
that passing period of uncertainty, Bismarck threw out his famous
declaration that the destiny of Deutschland was to be won, not by votes
and speeches, but by Blood and Iron.
"It was what you call a 'happy hit.'
"It appealed to the animal strength of the German race. Bismarck knew
that beneath the surface most of the men of Germany were of a wild
nature; he knew that in less than a century they rose from the
degradation of conquered barbarians to the heights of victors of three
nations, and the 'blood and iron' policy ran through Germany as a new
inspiration.
"Bismarck floated the great new Ship of State, and stood at the wheel
peering keenly into the troublous waters of the future. There was one
great rock of which he wished to steer clear, so on the Ship of Destiny
he placed a maxim. It was: 'War not with England.'
"There were other simple rules of navigation that irritated a new young
officer on the bridge, who felt that the Bismarckian policy, though
perhaps sure, was not speedy enough for his vaulting ambition.
"I remember well this young Kaiser, a man of wonderful vitality, who
revelled in the strength of developing manhood, and who early began to
assert himself. Those who tried to curb his youthful impetuosity went
down before him till there was but one great personality left who could
talk to him as a father would to his wayward son. It was Bismarck, he
who dragged Prussia from the depths and gave her the ideal for a world
power. The cool calculating wiseacre said, 'Steady, lad,' so--he had to
go.
"Then the Kaiser took the wheel.
"He found Germany a comparatively small country, with a great and
prolific population of sixty-six millions. He found the German woman not
the mild and simple 'hausfrau' of folk lore, but a virile woman with a
creed that the production of children was her first duty, not only to
her husband and herself, but to her country. He knew that in Germany
illegitimacy was no disgrace, and he saw Germany's population increase
ten millions in the course of ten years.
"He looked at his restricted boundaries and saw his people being bottled
up. That's why he gave the declaration that 'Germany's destiny is upon
the water'.
"We needed colonies, but all the colonies worth having were taken
by--whom? Your England!
"We were hungry for trade and influence in distant waters, but your
England held the gateways to the world's trade channels.
"The road to Asia and Australia was lined with England's forts, and
Gibraltar, Malta, Port Said and Aden watched the way like frowning
sentinels.
"It was then that we prepared for 'The Day.'
"Our Kaiser gave the call 'Deutschland Uber Alles' (Germany over all).
It was a new creed, and it soon gained the strength of a religion.
"I know you English ridicule the idea of the Kaiser and his Divine
Right--but do not forget an English King claimed the same thing."
[Illustration: "DROPPING THE PILOT."
Tenniel's Cartoon in "Punch," showing the reckless irresponsibility of
the Kaiser began early.]
"Yes," I interrupted, "and we chopped off his head."
He went on, ignoring my interruption--
"You English speak of God as the God of Hosts and the God of Battles,
but you only mouth it. We Germans believe in it, and we work for it. It
permeates our life like a divine call. It makes every man feel he is a
part of a great whole, a working unit in an immense machine, whether it
be in the field of battle or in the field of industry. We feel we are
doing a divine duty.
"And this divine spirit is in our work.
"We associate all our tasks with a sense of service to our fellow
citizens. We make trade and civic education compulsory to all boys from
14 to 18 years of age and to all girls from 11 to 16 years of age. Your
England has only 26 per cent. of children at school between those ages.
"We train our children and people to discharge specialised functions. We
associate practice with theory. We amalgamate science with manufacture.
"Your England at one time was the chief glass manufacturing country, but
thirty years ago a professor of mathematics at Jena joined a glass
maker, and to-day we lead in the world's glass manufacture.
"In 1910, your England exported one and a half million pounds worth of
glass, and Germany exported five million pounds worth.
"In 1880, your England led the world in the output of pig iron,
producing nearly eight million tons to four million tons produced by the
United States.
"In 1910, the United States produced twenty-seven million tons, Germany
fifteen million tons, and Great Britain ten million tons.
"In 1856 an Englishman named Perkins first produced a coal tar dye.
"In 1910, Germany exported nine and a half million pounds worth, while
Great Britain exported only £336,000 worth.
"So you see Germany has beaten England in peace as you will see we shall
beat her in war."
Then he spat into the fire, put his pipe away, and as he was going out
to bed flung this final shot:
"And there again we differ from you English. That is why we go into this
divine struggle as a grim and serious business. One great united army
with a hymn to God, and one great battle cry, 'Deutschland Uber Alles.'
You English take it as what you call 'a jolly sport,' with your battle
cry, 'Are we down-hearted?' and your battle hymn, 'It's a long long way
to Tipperary,' ah-ha-ho"--and he laughed his way up to his bedroom.
I sat looking into the dying flames, dwelling upon all his jibes.
I thought how each German felt he was a cog in the immense national
machine, and had his work systematised. I could then understand how that
killed initiative in the individual, and why Germany had not made any
great discoveries in science or manufacture, but had simply stolen ideas
of other countries and adapted them to her own ends.
Grandpa Goche had spoken of coal tar dye, then I recalled how Germany
had also taken Marconi's wireless invention and Germanised it; how it
had taken the French and the English ideas in airship and aeroplane
construction and worked upon them; how even the English town planning
movement was imitated. In the latter case I remembered reading that the
"Unter den linden" had been widened by the process of pushing the
dwellings back until they each housed 60 families. Germany, on this
occasion, had grabbed the idea but missed the spirit, in the absence of
which town planning is merely a name.
Even the manufactures of Germany had been built upon those of other
countries. There was a case I recalled, that of the Australian cordial
manufacturer, who desired to introduce his stuff into Germany. He was
met with a stiff tariff, but informed that if he established a factory
there there would be no need to import it. Why, now I came to remember
it, even the original "Rush-on-Paris" plan was stolen. Hilaire Belloc,
the Anglicised Frenchman, had written of it in the "London" Magazine, of
May, 1912. When that plan failed what had Germany done? Why, dug itself
in on the Aisne!
The idea of the German submarine raids was not original, as it formed
the base of a story by Sir Conan Doyle that appeared in the English
"Strand Magazine" and in the American "Colliers' Weekly" many months
before!
Germany, in fact, built its fame on assiduous imitation rather than
originality. But at what cost? Its people had degenerated in the process
from thinking humans to dumb, driven cattle, going, going, for ever
going, but non-comprehending the why or the wherefore of it all, beyond
the arrogant assumption of "welt-politik." Every refining trait was
subordinated to the exigencies of the gospel of force. Not only the
plebeian mass, but the exclusive aristocracy, revelled in the brutish
impulse that associated all appeals to reason with effeminacy and
invested the sword-slash on the student's cheek with the honor
ordinarily claimed by the diploma.
This gospel of exalting animal strength developed a living passion for
tyranny and grossness. We have seen it evidenced in the orgies that have
reddened Belgium and France.
And I had given my parole to a nation without a soul--a nation that
expected honor but knew not what it meant.
I crept to bed disturbed in mind, but resolved next day to take certain
action.
[Illustration: "I remembered our march across the great Rhine Bridge,
with its wonderful arches and great bronze horses."--Chapter VIII.]
CHAPTER XI.
The Escape from Cologne.
Next morn I rose from a sleepless couch.
Thoughts grim and gaunt had purged my brain the whole night long. There
was a flood of reasons why I should leave that German home. I chafed at
being a guest in the house of old Goche, whose animosity to the Cause
was undying. I could see that our discussions on the war were increasing
in bitterness and would, ere long, terminate in a storm. I desired to
avoid this for the sake of Miss Goche, whose friendship was the only
balm in that period of stress. I had little further desire to accept
hospitality from a stranger simply because I happened to be from the
same country as his granddaughter.
But greatest of all reasons why I should leave was because I had now
completely recovered from my wound, and the War of the World was waging
within 100 miles of me.
My job was "action on the firing line" and not lolling in security as a
guest of an enemy! Now that my wound had healed and my strength had
knitted firmly again, I felt I was a traitor in giving my parole not to
escape.
That August morning, when I made my first daily call at the barracks, I
stated to the officer to whom I generally reported, that I was going to
try and escape. He first seemed somewhat surprised, but soon broke into
a laugh. Turning, he spoke laughingly to another officer, who joined in
the hilarity.
"So you're going to escape, eh?" he said. "Well, we don't think you
will. If you intended to escape you would not be so foolish as to tell
us about it; and then, if you did attempt it, you could not get out of
Cologne with an English face like yours. That's alright," he repeated,
"you will report this afternoon as usual."
I stood awhile.
"There is the door," he said. "Good morning, we are busy."
I returned and acquainted Miss Goche of my action.
I explained there were two reasons for my giving notice. I could now
attempt to get away without breaking my parole; and now no blame could
be placed on the Goche household for my escape.
I need not here mention the scene that followed, but I may state I was
aware that my departure had taken on a new aspect. I knew I was leaving
one for whom I had now more than friendship, one whom I found had risked
much to make me secure. She admitted that, without doubt, my duty lay
beyond the Rhine.
"But you will please me greatly if you will report at the barracks this
afternoon, as usual," she said.
I did so, and was met by an officer with an "I told you so" smile.
I left the Goche home that afternoon at dusk. I did not intend to cross
the river at Cologne. The way west would be too black with grim
forebodings. The best opportunity of escaping seemed to be south, down
the right bank of the Rhine to Coblenz, then crossing to the Rhine
mountains, going south into Luxembourg, and then keeping east, trusting
to good fortune to get through the German lines into the Vosges.
Miss Goche accompanied me as far as the park on the river bank, where in
a quiet alcove I somewhat Germanised my appearance. I shaved my short
beard and trimmed my moustache with the ends erect, the now universal
fashion of the German menfolk; and with an old felt cap and unmistakable
German clothes, I felt I could probably pass muster until I opened my
mouth.
I had, thanks to my good friend, learned off a few German phrases for
use at odd times, so, as night fell we parted.
Down the pathway I stepped with a world of mystery ahead of me. I
remember now it took no slight effort to leave, but though the call away
was unmistakable, I knew the reply was the hardest task in my
experience. But I set my teeth and trudged down the track till I
reached the bend, then I looked back. At the top of the road a figure
stood, a hand waved and--yes--a kiss was thrown, then she turned away.
I felt alone in a new world, so marked my way and went into the night.
[Illustration]
During the first hours I stepped along in fear and trembling. I peopled
every dark corner with a sentry; I pictured every distant tree as
covering watching soldiers. I wondered at the lack of challenge, till it
dawned upon me that I was not in the fighting country. There was no war
in these parts, so I tramped along at the side of the road till early
morning, the only incident being a hail from a man on a bridge which I
had passed but did not have to cross. The bridges were evidently
guarded. As dawn light came into the sky I saw an aeroplane pass flying
low and stared at by an early morning ploughman, then I crept behind a
hedge and stole a sleep.
CHAPTER XII.
The Waste of War.
I could not have been long in slumber, when a slight noise, perhaps the
cracking of a stick, drove sleep from my anxious brain, and I sat up
with surprise, staring at a long figure in black that stood peering at
me. The black gown, the beads and the broad-brimmed hat told me it was a
priest.
He spoke to me in German. It was one of the sentences Miss Goche told me
I would be asked--he wished to know where I was going. So I fired at him
a second of my readied German phrases: "I'm going south to fight," I
said, which was true.
Then he let free a flood of German that floored me. He waited for a
reply that hesitated; then with a queried look into my face, he said:
"English! you're no German," and his eyes began to twinkle.
"You can confess," he said, "remember there is no war with men of God.
I, too, am going south, I am going to France, our journey will seem
quicker in company, let us step forth."
He was a Christian Brother. He had been to Australia, where many of his
Order were established. I explained I knew of their work in education;
in fact, I happened to know many of the fraternity by name. I ran over a
gamut of names of those I knew in past years. There were Brothers Paul,
Wilbrid, Aloysius and Mark.
"I may know some of those you mention," he said, "but I do not think it
possible. We seldom know each other by name unless we are beneath the
same roof. There are hundreds called by the names you mentioned, I
myself am a 'Brother Wilbrid.'"
It is a wonderful fact that there is nothing that knits strangers
together, as the hitting on the name of a mutual friend, so we became
close companions.
He had been born in Lorraine, but had lived most of his time in Berlin.
His close-cropped grey hair showed he was well on in years. He had been
an artisan before he joined his Order, and he lightened our long tramp
to Coblenz with his idea of the trend of things.
The road was good and the air was clean and sweet. We passed by some
farms where women were behind the plough.
Summer was breaking, and the Autumn sunshine was drying the last
dewdrops from the grass.
"Note," Brother Wilbrid said, "how all Nature welcomes the sunshine,
hear the birds twitter, see the cattle slowly moving on that rise. All
Nature here joins in a hymn of peace, yet far beyond those western
ridges three million men lay trenched through the winter and stared in
hellish hate at each other across a narrow strip.
"All Nature welcomed the Spring with a pæan of praise, but by fighting
men it was welcomed as the opportunity to rise from winter holes and
rush across the Spring sun-warmed earth to warm it anew with flowing
blood. But it is not the waste of blood that so appals, it's the waste
of effort and the waste of heroism. The labor of three million men
could, in the wasted months of war build much to ensure unending human
happiness. Thirty-two thousand men cut a channel through Panama and
shortened the world's journey to your home by a third! Think what the
labor of three million men could do!
"And then there is the waste of heroism.
"Men with large hearts will risk their lives to drag a comrade out of
danger. It is heroism--yes--but it is wasted on a cause of
foolishness----"
"But," I interrupted, "there is other heroism than that on the fighting
line," and I told him the story of Abbe Chinot, of Rheims, the young
priest in charge of the cathedral; how, when German shells were crashing
into the grand old pile which was being used as a hospital for German
soldiers, Chinot, aided by Red Cross nurses, dragged the wounded into
the street, where surged a mob, maddened that their beloved church was
in flames, and that their homes and five hundred of their folks had
been smashed with German shells. The sight of the grey uniforms on the
German wounded drove the mob into frenzied screams of revenge, but the
fearless Abbe placed himself between the uplifted rifles of the crowd
and the German wounded. "If you kill them," he said, "you must first
kill us"; and how the mob, struck with his perfect courage, moved away
in silence.
[Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS.]
[Illustration: "Smashed with German Shells."
(The Rheims Cathedral Front.)]
"Yes, that is fine, very fine," he said--"yet it does not prove that
the war made the brave Abbe heroic.
"This war is unnecessary. It is the most unnecessary of all wars. It is
not a war of the people. It is a merchants' war. It is not a war of the
workers. It is a war for commerce--and four million or more lives will
go up to God in the interests of Trade.
"I fear the consequences of this war. I feel this war spirit will bring
on a sequel that will surprise humanity.
"A great writer[1] likened the war spirit to a carbuncle on the body.
The poison flowing through the blood localises itself, and a painful
lump forms in the flesh. Relief is sought in salves, ointments, and
poultices. But the lump continues to swell, and the pain to increase,
until at the very time when the soul is in mortal agony the carbuncle
bursts and spews out the poison. The pain ceases, the swelling subsides,
and the flesh regains its normal color.
"The poison of injustice flows through the veins of society. Men are
denied their natural rights; and when the oppression becomes
unendurable, their oppressors make all manner of excuses. The affliction
is due, they say, to the wrath of God, to the niggardliness of nature,
or to the encroachments of foreign nations. Ah, the encroachments of
foreign nations! When all other excuses fail, there is this to fall back
upon; and each ruling class of oppressors holds its victims in
subjection by charging the trouble to the others.
"But the people are awakening. A few already see their real oppressors.
It is for each who sees the truth to tell his fellow, and that fellow
his fellow, until presently all will know the truth, and the truth shall
make them free; free from industrial tyranny at home, and free from
military tyranny from abroad. The work of the peace advocate is not
negative. It is not enough for him to cry peace, peace! He must first
lay the foundation for peace. To cry peace while the people writhe under
injustice is like trying to heal the carbuncle without cleansing the
blood."
[Illustration: "The Waste of War."--Chapter XII.
(The Cartoon, "Advance of Civilisation," by Bradley, in the "Chicago
Daily Mail.")]
[Footnote 1: Stoughton Cooley.]
[Illustration: "It is not the people's fight."--Chapter XIII.
(The Cartoon, "Must Peace Wait for This," by Bradley, in the "Chicago
Daily Mail.")]
CHAPTER XIII.
How the War Wrecked Theories.
I shall never forget that wonderful walk on the Coblenz road: the grave,
hard-cut featured face of the man of religion, pouring out his
socialistic theories, like a long pent-up torrent bursting through years
of accumulated debris. At one moment he would be calm and clear, but at
times, in his excitement, he would lash at wayside flowers with his
stick like a soldier with a sabre.
"The people are not sincere at heart in this Great War," he said, "it is
not the people's fight. If soldiers only had their own way this war
would be short lasting--in fact the war nearly ended on Christmas Day.
You have heard how the Germans and the English ceased firing at the dawn
of that holy morn. How a bayonet from a German trench held up a placard
with those magic words of good cheer that ever move the world--"A Merry
Christmas." How each side sang hymns at the other's invitation, crossed
the zone of fire, and exchanged cigarettes. Surely the spirits of Jesus
and Jaures moved along that line that wonderful morn."
"And yet," I said, "when time was up, back to their trenches the
soldiers crept and fought again like devils."
He went on, ignoring my interruption.
"And German officers, high in rank, held up their hands in horror at the
idea of an armistice being arranged without their consent. That is the
spirit that is going to end war--that human spirit that came to the
surface on Christmas morn and that proved that this awful war is but a
thing of Business."
Our road passed along the cliff tops of the Rhine. There was little
traffic on the river and no sign of war. Everything seemed peaceful. The
war, in draining the men and youths from the countryside, had placed a
mantle of calm upon life in the villages of the Rhine Valley. Even
across the river a long length of railway line lay as a long road of
emptiness. Not a train, not a truck, not any sign of life was upon the
long stretch of metal.
"And yet," said Brother Wilbrid, "that is the main line from Bonn to
Coblenz. All railwaymen, stock, and traffic are confined to the Theatres
of War."
We had walked in silence for quite a while. My companion was lost in
thought. I ventured an interruption.
"You are a Socialist," I said.
He looked at me a while before replying.
"A Socialist? Well, no, I'm not--that is so far as Socialists have gone.
I describe myself as a 'Humanist.' Socialism as we had it before the war
was synonymous with revolution. Its creed, 'Revolution before
evolution,' spelt destruction and anarchy. It aimed to get what it
wanted by force instead of striving to get it by constitutional means. I
broke with them just there--and yet--and yet," he mused, as if to
himself, "they were hounded down as outlaws of society for promising
force--for threatening to do what the armies are to-day doing in the
'interests of civilisation.'
"What a shuffle of theories this mighty conflict has brought about!
Strange that your Allies claim they are fighting to save civilisation
from being destroyed by the 'German barbarians,' whilst the German
convinces himself that he is fighting to impress his 'higher culture'
upon an unenlightened world!
"Listen! I was once an engineer in the Krupp Works, at Essen; that nest
of the German War Eagle. I was but a unit in a mighty mass. We were all
well treated. Our health was well served. Our masters had learned that,
just as they watched the health of horses, it was just as necessary to
study the well-being of their human workers; so model homes and villages
were built for us, our masters realising that if we were healthy they
would get more work from us. They were philanthropists with an eye on
the output. And the average German worker was getting contented--getting
into a groove."
[Illustration: "That Nest of the German War Eagle."-Chapter XIII.
(The Krupp Works, at Essen.)]
"Then," I ventured, "if a man's contented and has nothing to growl
about--why worry?"
"Ah," he replied, "that's just the trouble, the German worker, as a
worker, has little to complain of, but he is becoming systematised. He
cannot rise, he is forced to be content and do his job. His health is
insured by groups of employers sharing the responsibility. If workers
get hurt too much or sick too much, the insurance syndicate begins to
lose money; hence safety devices are considered and sanitoria built to
prevent illness; and this German social insurance speeds individual
initiative to top speed. It makes the German worker a splendid
animal--and there is the danger.
"You know it's human nature to complain--progress is built upon
discomfort, contentment means stagnation. I could see the workers fixed
in their contented groove under the studied philanthropy of his
employers and ending as in the dumb-driven-cattle age of the Feudal
Barons."
"It strikes me," I said, "that the Socialist is of that type of Irishman
that's never happy unless there's a chance of a fight. You might at
least admit that many employers have hearts like other human beings.
There are many that recognise that profits are not everything."
"No doubt," he said, "but they're not in Germany. Prior to the war the
workers were moving close to a war with employers--the rise of Labor has
been steady and sure the world over. Why in your own country, Australia,
Labor already controls the Governments. It was coming to that in Europe.
The worker was climbing, climbing, all the time--organising,
organising--but against the increasing demand for labor the employers
had a powerful weapon in the invention of labor-saving machinery.
"Every day saw more and more of the work of the world taken up by
machinery. Did a labor union demand increased wages, then a machine was
devised to do the work with less assistance. In a return issued by the
U.S. Government, it was estimated that 4,500,000 factory machine workers
of that country were turning out products in quantities equal to the
hand labor of 45,000,000 men. That meant that 90 per cent. of the work
in factories was being done by machinery; that one man, with the help of
machines could produce ten times more than he needs. It was more acute
in Germany. In other words, to satisfy the wants of one man for one day,
a factory worker with a machine requires only one hour instead of the
ten he formerly worked. For whom was he doing the work of the remaining
nine hours? Why, for rulers, soldiers, and other parasites, who do not
work but have to live.
"When I was a worker in Essen I saw the set lives of the workers--noted
how a new labor-saving device threw out so many men at a time. I looked
back at the development of machinery and saw that a very large part of
machinery is driven by steam-power, which meant largely coal-power, and
I knew with the getting and burning of the coal there was not only a
terrible waste of human labor, but 90 per cent. of the heat generated
escaped unused, and not more than 5 per cent. of the stored energy in
the coal became available for human needs. Even the finest quadruple
expansion engines, with all the modern devices for super-heated steam to
augment their capacity, did not utilise more than 15 per cent. We
engineer workers knew that if an engine were invented to economise this
waste there would be a further reduction of labor--and this device came.
It came in the Diesel motor."
"This wonderful engine meant the production of power from crude oil at a
cost of one-eighth of a penny to a farthing per horse-power, far beyond
the economy of any other form of engine and five times cheaper than the
ordinary steam engine. Its only rival was water-power--and water-power
is not everywhere.
"We could see, at no distant day, nine-tenths of the workers of the
world supplanted by the machine! We could see that new labor-saving
machinery would mean a fearful catastrophe in the labor markets of the
world. Think of it. We could see wonderful engines, put together by the
hands of the workers in the factories, pushing out the useless laborer,
pushing him out into the crowded avenues of unemployed. We could see
this awful Frankenstein of machinery--a huge soulless metal monster,
stalking through the world, bringing starvation, anarchy and destruction
in its wake. 'It should not be--it must not be,' we said, and lots were
drawn."
Then he stopped short and sat upon a bank at the roadside.
I watched him stare in thought at an ant creeping over a twig at his
feet.
"Well?" I said.
He started and looked at me with lowered head. He peered at me beneath
his long grey eyebrows and quietly whispered--"Diesel had to die."
"Then he was killed!" I said, starting up. I remembered he had
mysteriously disappeared in October, 1913.
"Yes," he replied, "and it was my task."
He turned from me and looked across the peaceful Rhine. In the silence
faint booms seemed to come from the western battlefield, but it may have
been the throbbing of my brain. I looked at the man with his hard-set
jaw and quivering lips.
I sat down again at his side, and for many minutes silently scratched
lines upon the road.
Fully ten minutes passed, and he turned his face to me.
"Listen!" he said. "Can you hear those distant guns? They tell me
there's no Socialism in the world to-day. That war came in and smashed
the barriers. At Ghent, not long before the war, an International
Congress met and formed an Association for the best development of the
world's cities; at Paris, one month before the strife broke out, 2000
delegates from Chambers of Commerce, representing 31 nations, met to
ensure the world's commercial peace and commercial prosperity; and just
before the war a World's Congress of Socialists met in Berlin, and
Jaures won every heart with his denunciation of human strife.
"Within a month a city-destroying army passed through Ghent and wrecked
the greatest constructional glories of the world. Within a month the
world's commerce was paralysed. Within a month Jaures was shot and
Socialists the world over became blood-blinded. To-day they 'see red.'
They know not what they are fighting for, but there they fight like
bloodthirsty fiends because they're told to. What are they fighting for?
Will life be any harder for them what flag flies above their city? The
people fight and the people suffer, and when their job is done those
left are given scraps of metal to wear and are sent back to clear up the
mess."
"Stop!" I said. "Don't forget there is such a thing as Patriotism.
Listen!
"'Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land.'"
Then he looked at me for a moment with his grave grey face--and smiled.
"Listen, my boy, I am not a Frenchman, though born in Lorraine--I am not
a German, though living most of my life in Germany--I am a Worldsman. I
am a Christian. To me all men are as brothers. I do not love any country
more than any other. I prove that by making a friend of you. I should,
in the casual order of things just now, hate you with the awful German
hate of England. Patriotism is the love of the land in which you
accidentally happened to be born. Why should any one love a particular
geographical district upon the face of the earth because there he
happened to first see the light?
"Let me tell you," he continued, with a strange fire in his eyes and
slashing at a flower by the way, "God, or Nature if you like, will enact
a punishment to fit this awful crime of the murder of five million men,
and the heartbreaks of mothers, wives and children. This, the greatest
tragedy the world has ever seen, will call for a fearful atonement. I
foresee, in this war, with its daily expense of three million pounds,
and the additional waste, a general bankruptcy of the world, the
downfall of classes, of wealth, the wrecking of privilege. I foresee,
when peace is declared, the fruitless return of millions of men to jobs
that have vanished, and to employers shorn of all power to employ them.
Mark me! The world to-day is on the verge of a mighty cataclysm far
greater than the present awful clash of armies. Wise are the man and
country that are preparing."
He paused awhile as if in deep thought.
"Listen, my boy, you quoted me some verse just now, let me quote you
lines from the new version of the 'Watch on the Rhine':
"Dear Fatherland, we'll soon be free,
From Prussian Kings' autocracy:
The world shall see all the battles cease,
With dawn of universal peace.
Each German worker has to pay
One-fourth of what he earns per day
To keep two million marching feet
And please a Kaiser's mad conceit.
Oh God! we're punished bitterly
For Kaiser Wilhelm's blasphemy;
Three million of our sons are slain,
Let sacrifice be not in vain!"
He rose abruptly, grasped his stick, and set off down the road.
I stood for a moment half-dazed; then I followed him.
[Illustration: "If soldiers only had their own way, this war would be
short lasting."--Chapter XIII.
(The Cartoon, "An International Conference that would bring about
Peace," by Bradley, in the "Chicago Daily News.")]
CHAPTER XIV.
The Restless Masses.
What sort of man was this? "A man of God" and yet a murderer! A man
without a spark of patriotism. A man without a country. What a curiosity
in these days, when at the first blast of war almost every man on earth
ranged himself beneath a nation's flag be it for strife or neutral!
Here was a man:--
Whose heart had ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he had turned,
From wandering on a foreign strand--
And the rhyming lines kept jogging through my brain as I trudged behind
that long straight figure in black.
A turn of the road brought a house in sight and my companion quickened
his steps. I hung back as he went up to the house. He turned, looked
around, and waved me on. I passed by and waited some distance along the
road.
An hour later he came up. He brought some brown bread and salt meat to
me, and even better, some news of what was doing; and he told it to me
as I sat and ate upon the bank. I remember, as he talked, and I kept
watching far to the west where some aeroplanes hovered above the now
greening tops of the forest hills.
"You get the truth from country folk," he said. "They win their news
first hand from wounded fathers and sons. In the city the war news is
ground, sifted, and only what is of little interest is dispersed. There
have been great deeds. The German armies hold the line between Ghent and
Mulhausen and are wearing out the Allies by exhaustion. Many armies have
reinforced the British and the French, but the German lines hold fast
and wear out the Allies. The Russians are still upon the defensive in
Poland. London is in a panic as it has been attacked by Zeppelins, and
the German Fleet has come out from Kiel and claims a victory. That news,
of course, you can doubt, as it does not come first hand. The Allies,
however, threaten Constantinople and the Turkish armies are demoralised.
But the greatest of the news," and here the fire came into his face
again, "is that the workers of the world are uneasy. Strikes rage in
England, in Australia, in Canada, in the United States, and--yes in
Germany. The English shipyard workers on the Clyde and at Southampton
have at various times since March held up British naval construction;
and it is now August. There is a universal demand for shorter hours with
increased wages, and food prices are high. The Australian workers are
striking against their own Labor Governments, and refusing to fit out
troopships unless they get treble pay for night work, and in Germany the
workers are rising because they are tiring of forced employment. All the
civil, as well as military factories, have been working treble shifts;
and huge stocks of all kinds of manufactures have accumulated everywhere
and cannot be distributed. Workers are losing heart. This war is
stretching out too long for them. It was to be a short, sharp war, and
they now fear time is on the side of the Allies, so a general uprising
is threatened. But alas--alas!" he continued as if to himself, "this
news is a fortnight old."
Then he turned to me with anxious face.
"I knew not of these things when I went on this road to Coblenz," he
said. "For fourteen days I had been in silent seclusion in a monastery
at Deutz, as each of our brotherhood must do once a year; and now I must
retrace my steps. I feel this new rebellion is a call to me. Listen, my
new found friend," and he peered into my face. "I left the world two
years ago. I could see that a change in great human conditions was
inevitable. I was what you call a labor leader. I went into a monastery
for two purposes. I can confess to you. It is safe, as we will never
meet again, and all ideas of justice will upend in the coming cataclysm.
Listen I say," and he gripped my wrist with a vice-like clutch of his
bony fingers. "I went into a monastery to escape the suspicion that I
had removed one whom we felt would bring much unhappiness upon the
earth. I went into a monastery to think. The turmoil of a busy worker's
life gave little opportunity for serious thought. I felt the day was
coming when the workers of the world would rise. I wanted to study the
proposition and its possibilities with all the clearness of vision that
the calmness of a monastery could give. I feel now that the day is
coming fast. It is near. All the signs of the approaching storm are
being manifested. I am ready.
"Some clear-visioned people in high office saw the portents in the sky
and feared the toppling of the thrones, so threw this war into the ring
to give the toilers opportunity for their heated passions, but this war
will be like blood to a tiger, it will quicken up the fighting spirit of
the animal, and on those who forced this war it will recoil with awful
effect. They saw the labor storm approach and put off the evil day. It
was like neglecting to physic the human body--the longer deferred, the
worse the disease.
"I am going back again," he continued. "You had better go on into
France. Your trouble will be to cross the Rhine."
He paused awhile and looked pityingly at me.
"Alas!" he continued. "You're a poor fool in these wild parts with only
your English and your bad French."
He took a sheet of paper from his pocket and sketched a rough map upon
it.
"You can cross the Rhine," he went on, "just here at Neuwied, it is but
a mile along this road, then you go directly west to the Coblenz-Treves
Road, which follows the Mozelle. That road will take you to Luxembourg;
but keep away from Coblenz. They tell me at the farmhouse that it is
full of wounded soldiers and others are coming in by the Treves railway
that skirts the road you will take. Beyond the Rhine there is much
danger to you, but take this," and he wrote some words on the back of
the map. "God pardon me, for I know it is not all truth. Those words are
German--they say you are 'deaf and dumb' and that 'you are going to the
front.'"
"Then you are going back to Cologne?" I asked.
"Yes," he said, "and beyond. I know not yet--perhaps to Berlin."
A distant bell chimed.
"The Angelus," he said, standing and bowing his head in prayer. Though
not of his religion I also removed my hat and stood beside that man of
deep mystery. His steel grey hair and care-lined face seemed foreign to
his strong built frame and iron hand grip, and as he prayed upon the
road, my thoughts rolled back to Cologne and dwelt upon that brave girl
whose friendship had made so sweet my prison days in that City of the
Bridges. I pictured my last vision of her upon the hill, wafting me a
farewell.
The man of prayer interrupted my reverie.
"It is now good-bye, Australian," he said. "Though all countries are
alike to me, your nation seems to promise much. It leads the world in
justice for the men who toil, and perhaps that is why I would like to
see you safely out of this maelstrom of human passions; but our ways
must part just here--good-bye!"
He left me as the evening shadows began to encircle the hills, and
though I felt a strange feeling of loneliness as he passed up the road
and out of sight, I felt brave and cheerful--for my friend had taken a
love-letter to Cologne for me.
CHAPTER XV.
Figures on the Road.
I reached the Rhine at dusk. The ferry barge, a small rope affair with a
hand wheel, was at the water's edge. All was quiet this side of the
river, but across the water anxious voices called. Close to me a door
opened and a shaft of light split the darkness as the little old and
white-haired ferry keeper came clattering out, wiping his mouth and
muttering savagely. He stepped upon the barge. I followed and took the
wheel from him. He smiled and spoke, but as I pointed to my ears and
tongue and shook my head, he nodded. Between us we worked the barge
across the river.
As the ferry neared the bank my heart beat fast, for I saw the waiting
figures were soldiers! There were five of them and they seemed
impatient. Before the barge had touched the shore they had jumped
aboard, not noticing me walk off. They were without rifles, this struck
me at the time as very significant, and the soldiers began to hurriedly
work the ferry back again. I turned and watched the barge fade into the
darkness, but hearing footsteps, looked up and saw more soldiers
outlined on the skyline of the high bank. The road zig-zagged up the
hill, and by keeping in the shadow of the cliff I passed along without
trouble. From the hilltop I discovered to the left the light-dotted city
of Coblenz. I took the road to the west and walked through the night. At
times many people passed along that road to the river, including
scattered bands of soldiers. I knew them by their spiked helmets
silhouetted against the sky.
It must have been midnight when I struck the main Coblenz Road. A string
of waggons and carts rumbled along towards Coblenz with many soldiers
walking between. Close by a railway line ran parallel with the road and
continuous trains slowly crawled, hissing and shrieking like wounded
things. I plodded along the tree-screened roadside, the cloudy darkness
of the night helping my security. And all through that night and early
morning silent tramping figures passed along--all going in the one
direction!
As dawn began to break I left the high road, tired and foot weary and
struck into the bush to snatch some sleep.
I woke with the sun well up in the sky. I still could hear the squealing
of the railway trains, and when I climbed to a distant ridge and looked
around me I saw the Coblenz-Treves road stretching far to the south-west
and dotted with figures--grey soldiers and others, hospital waggons and
farm carts, all moving along like a great procession.
I felt that road was not safe for me.
Beyond the belt of timber between myself and the road were fenced
paddocks with scattered farm houses. To the west the forest stretched
where far ahead a speck of white caught my eye. I made it a guide mark
and worked towards it.
Beyond the ridge I stumbled on to a small farm, and as I came in sight a
barking dog brought a woman to the door. I felt hungry and took a
chance. She watched me approach, then closed the door, and as I came up
she opened it again, but held a gun in her hand and talked fiercely at
me.
I pointed to my ear and tongue and shook my head; at the same time held
out the sheet of paper. I remember the simple old lady put down her gun
and pulled the spectacles from her forehead to her nose, read my note
that I was 'going to the front' and--kissed me! Possibly this was
because of the suggestion of a retreat, whilst I, a mute, was going to
the fighting line. Then she pointed towards the road and went off into a
temper, rattling off a torrent of excited German, and again looking
towards the road, spat vigorously.
As she handed me bread and cheese there were tears in her eyes. I
remember as I left I kissed her and as I made for the strip of white I
had seen earlier in the day, I carried the vision of those tear-dimmed
eyes. "Somebody's mother," I mused. "Somebody's mother."
CHAPTER XVI.
From February to August.
It has been said that, if coincidences did not happen, stories would not
be written, and what I am about to write seemed at first strange, and
yet, as events proved, was only natural.
Before I reached the white mark upon the tree I heard the noise of the
breaking of bushes, so I carefully reconnoitred, and before long a
swishing near by caused me to drop beneath a shrub, as there passed me
within one hundred yards a figure dragging two saplings. I clapped my
hand over my mouth to prevent shouting. It looked like Nap!
In my excitement I had moved. A sun-ray struck my white jacket. The
figure stood, dropped the bushes, drew his revolver and turned his face
toward me. It was Nap!
I rushed out.
"Nap," I shouted--but the revolver was still pointed.
"Hands up," he called, nonplussed at the German-looking figure rushing
towards him. I threw his old phrase at him: "Fly high and good luck, old
man." Then his arm dropped.
"The voice is Jefson's, sure enough," he said, "but the darned mug licks
me."
"Wait till I cover up the mo'," I said, putting my hand over my mouth.
"Well, old chap, shall we drop a 'cough drop'?" I asked; and he nearly
wrung my arm off.
"I fell near here three nights ago," he explained, "engine trouble--and,
although it's enemy's country I don't like to burn the old 'bus, so I've
backed its tail as far as I could into the bush and am screening the
exposed part with bushes so that it won't be spotted from aloft. There's
not much wrong with it, rather a bad strip of the fabric ripped off as I
was coming down, but I struck an abandoned farm yesterday a mile from
here, and when I cover up the jigger, I'm just going over to see if I
can fossick out something to patch her up."
"I guess I know where your strip of fabric is," I said.
I then told him of the white mark on the tree and how it led me to him,
and as we went to salvage it, he told me of the mighty doings of the
war.
"Let me see," he said, "you went out on your Zep. raid last February?
Well, lots have happened since.
"Shortly after that Germany started to blockade England with submarines
to starve her out, and began to sink all sorts of ships. They bagged a
fine and large lot including some Americans--just sunk 'em on sight,
asking no questions."
"Did America buck up, Nap?" I asked.
"Don't ask me, Jefson--that's the sick part. I want to dodge that. Let
me get on--where was I? Oh, yes, Germany's submarine piracy; but that
didn't do much harm, and she got tired of that stunt after a month or
so. Then her fleet came out of Kiel to make a grand attack: at least, a
bit of it came out, but only a bit of that bit got back again.
"Turkey, in the meantime had butted in and went for the Suez Canal, but
your Australian fellows, who had been dropped at Egypt, made those bucks
hike back quick and lively, then your Australians helped to chase them
off the banks of the Dardanelles: and the British and French Fleets,
smashing their way through, had threatened Constantinople--and then
Turkey got the axe.
"All through February, March and April, Belgians, British and French
held that line from Ostend to Nancy, getting a trench to-day and losing
it to-morrow, all the while Kitchener was waiting for the winter to
break and the Spring to come along and dry the roads for the cavalry and
the big guns.
"In the east the Russian Army was just sitting like a rock. The Germans,
relying on their idea of attack, were simply chucking themselves away on
that Russian rock and smashing up like spray.
"Kitchener had six great armies waiting, but during May, June and July
those armies doubled! The French and Russian Armies also practically
doubled and streams increased from Australia and Canada.
"It was the most extraordinary thing of the war--and a young woman did
it!
"She is a Belgian. She saw her mother being outraged by a German
soldier. She slipped in, took up his bayonet, and skewered him, shot his
companion, and with the weapon escaped to France. Through France and
England she preached a crusade of Revenge. Crowds came to hear the
sweet-faced woman speak frankly of unprintable horrors, and the fire of
her tongue as she preached in her simple country dress with the
bloodstained bayonet in her hand, won thousands of recruits. On top of
her crusade out came the official report, that among other awful things,
over 4000 Belgian women who had been maltreated by German soldiers would
become mothers this year. Men with memories of dear mothers and sweet
sisters tumbled over one another to hear and bless the world's new Joan
of Arc, and marched in hundreds to recruiting stations with a fearful
song of Revenge.
"Then she went to Italy! and though she spoke in a foreign tongue, the
crowds understood and the Italians, passionate to the extreme, rose in
storm--and Italy declared war!
"Italy got busy early in June, invading the Tyrol and smashing Pola on
the Adriatic. Then its armies worked north, finding the great Austrian
fortresses abandoned and destroyed, the big guns having been removed to
be used against the Russians.
"Greece, when it found that Turkey was in danger of being smashed,
joined with the Allies. It hung fire for a bit as its king was a
relative of the Kaiser, but the people got sore, and at an election sent
a popular Premier in who got the Greeks into the firing line.
"The principal Balkan States are also joining in the rumpus, as I guess
they're anxious to be in the "top dog" so as to get some pickings after
the scrap. Then in August we got the tip to get the big move on."
CHAPTER XVII.
How the Great War Ended.
I remember how Nap sparked up as he described the happenings of the past
fortnight.
"We got the tip to prepare for the 'Grand Advance,'" he said. "Our stunt
was to thoroughly screen from German aerial reconnaissance all our
movements between Rheims and Metz; and so for a week the air actually
swarmed with our 'planes. Gee! but the smash-up of aircraft was awful.
We lost quite a collection, but the Germans must have very few left. And
the way we went about it was a caution! We had a real aerial
fandango--smashing bridges, trains, railway stations and any old thing.
You see our commandants untied us--let us loose. Why one of my 'goes'
was the bust up of the big balloon and 'plane 'deepo' at Laon; but in
chasing a Taube three days ago I came to grief right here--engine
trouble, sure."
"But what was the game, Nap?" I asked excitedly. "What was the reason of
your aerial razzle?"
"Simple enough, Jefson," he replied, "we were screening a big transfer
of our forces towards Metz. You see, the Germans, during June and July,
had been pushed back to a line along the Lys, where they dug in on the
right bank and waited.
"The great new armies Kitchener had in training during the winter were
to be flung at that German line between Courtrai and Antwerp, to try and
force their way through Belgium to Liege.
"We on the south were to put up a big bluff between Rheims and Metz in
order to divert German attention from that big smashing attack on the
Lys. Gee! How I'm itching to be back before the game starts!"
Then it all came back to me; the incident of the impatient German
soldiers at the ferry on the Rhine; the tramp-tramp, rattle-clink of the
German troops and carts on the Coblenz road; the anger of the little
German woman at the farm--and one line of reasoning linked all the
incidents.
"They've started," I said. "The Germans are retreating! That Coblenz
road is a crowded procession of despair!"
He stopped and looked at me in surprise.
"How?" he queried. "Why we're 100 miles from Metz. Bless me, they must
have started just after I lit out. Gee! but we must hustle."
So we stepped out briskly and reached the white strip on the tree. It
was the piece of fabric from Nap's 'plane. That night we repaired the
machine, and after many hours coaxed the engine back to sanity. Before
the dawn the leafy screen was cleared, the 'plane wheeled into the open,
the engine coughed, spluttered and "got busy"; and up to greet the
morning sun we rose and turned southward with the sky clear of cloud,
fog or 'plane.
As we climbed, we could discern the Coblenz road and the River Moselle
below us, the former still a long length of moving figures. In half an
hour, up came the sounds of big guns. Far to the south the opposing
armies were evidently in touch. It was round Metz that the fighting was
taking place, and we could see the "grey coats" retreating along at
least five roads.
As we passed over Metz, I remembered my last crossing it in a fog and my
dash to the Argonne Forest seven months before. Things had changed
somewhat since.
We crossed the fighting lines and were lucky to descend without being
hit, as several shots were fired as we volplaned down.
I remember, in those excitement-laden days, how for a while I was
surprised that we were only welcomed back with a nod. There were
evidently more important happenings to consider than the return of two
lucky aviators, so we were soon again in operation with our squadron
reconnoitring on our right to watch for any German reinforcements coming
against our right flank.
It was evident that the Germans understood that our attack from the
south was only a feint, as our advance was poorly retarded; in fact the
German rearguard defence was so weak that our mounted forces began to
push ahead rather quickly. The enemy was evidently concentrating on the
Lys to oppose the Allies' main attack in West Belgium.
I remember that our forces to the left of Metz, the left wing of the
southern armies, found an opening in the enemy's line at the Argonne
Forest, and poured through: and being mostly French, Italian and
Australian mounted troops, with artillery; speedily moved ahead, dashed
into the Ardennes; and, being reinforced with our Metz forces joining
them at Longwy, pushed on with a six road front through the Ardennes
Forest. They concentrated in force at the edge of the forest on the left
bank of the Lesse River to wait for the engineers.
Oh, what a mad dash that was! There seemed to be no thought of taking
prisoners. It was a wild rush north, with, of course, every precaution
taken for providing defence on both sides of our advance.
I remember that I wondered, at the time, why the Germans were almost
without horses. Their dash across Belgium in the previous year explained
the mobs of broken-backed, split-heeled and fleshless wrecks we met in
the paddocks along the Meuse.
Within four days we occupied the whole of the country south of the Lesse
River; with two railways, one a double line, feeding us with
reinforcements and supplies.
Then our second dash began, and within a week our front was entrenched
at the junction of the Meuse and Ourthe, with our artillery banging into
the swarms of German infantry pouring into Liege!
What a sacrilege it seems to tell of this wonderful week in plain
matter-of-fact language!
A week of feverish excitement, when one hardly remembered meals, sleep
or rest, when our spirits raced in front of us pulling our responsive
flesh!
I remember that when the French mounted troops, who led the way, lined
the ridge beyond Nandrin and looked down upon the City of Liege between
the hills they fairly screamed in their frenzied delight.
The main attack of the Allies had changed from the west to the south!
In the meantime our forces on our right extended along the Ourthe, with
those on our left along the Meuse, two natural defensive positions, as
the troops kept pouring in from the south to strengthen our attack.
We were as a spear-head at the heart of Germany, and great armies of
French reinforcements were coming up behind us to drive that spear-head
home!
Against that "spear-head" German reinforcements drawn from the eastern
army flung themselves, but their attacks seemed spiritless. Russia had
already broken their power.
Beneath a fearful fire from the Liege forts the Allies' armies poured
across the Ourthe, climbed like cats on to the 200 foot ridge to the
east of Liege; and within ten days all supplies for the German armies in
Belgium were cut off!
On the second day of September, the main German armies in Belgium, that
had held the line at the Lys, retired to their second line of defence at
the Dendre, but almost before they could deploy the British were upon
them and they unconditionally surrendered.
Thousands had fled to the Meuse, where the relentless French shells
plowed passages through their ranks. Thousands had rushed, demoralised,
northward, to be rounded up like wild cattle by the Dutch troops at the
border line.
Then the British armies marched through Brussels and across the
battle-blackened country easterly through Louvain; and at Liege joined
hands with the armies from the south, as news came of the surrender of
the German armies of the east.
The armies of Russia and Italy had been closing in on Vienna from the
north and south.
Germany having no desire to get upon its own soil the awful devastation
it had bestowed upon Belgium and France, through President Wilson, of
the United States of America, asked the Allies for the terms of peace.
Then ensued a rather interesting situation.
The United States had not acted through the war with any admiration from
the Allies.
Even when the German submarines had sunk the "Lusitania" and drowned
over 1000 Americans, President Wilson did not take any action beyond
practically asking Germany to frame any "old excuse." He was a man of
peace. He seemed to have forgotten that the foundations of the U.S.A.
were carved with a sword, and that Jefferson's first draft of the
Declaration of Independence was militant and resistant. "For the support
of this declaration," he wrote, "we mutually pledge our lives, our
fortunes and our sacred honor."
President Wilson had previously informed the Allies that he was "too
proud to fight," so when the message requesting the terms of peace came
through Wilson, the Allies received it in a cold and formal fashion.
There are some phrases in the world's history that will live for ever.
There is Kitchener's reply to General Cronje in the Boer War: "Not a
minute"--there is Nelson's immortal message on the "Victory" of "England
expects----"; so the reply of the Allies to America will long endure:--
"They who conquer can dictate the terms of peace."
Next day Germany and Austria pleaded for cessation of war.
Within fifteen months a world's war had begun and ended, and the events
at its close had moved as swiftly as those at its beginning.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A Campaign of Errors.
So the Great War had ended.
In fifteen months the greatest tragedy the world had ever known came and
passed. One could now calmly review the awful affair with an unbiassed
mind. When one studied events during the war, there was always a
prejudice against the enemy. His virtues were only "accidents" or
strokes of luck. Our successes were always "brilliant affairs."
Yet the Great War was a campaign of blunders.
Victor Hugo said: "Alexander blundered in India, Cæsar blundered in
Africa, Napoleon blundered in Russia."
After all, every book of war is a catalogue of errors, and the errors in
a campaign, though unrealised at the time by those who make them, became
palpable after the deed is done, and increase in notoriety as time
passes.
British, French and German Generals blundered through the Great War.
Only one nation came out of that awful clash of arms without criticism.
It was Belgium.
The war opened with two mistakes on the part of Germany.
The first and greatest, as it proved now she was defeated, was the
mistake of entering on a campaign that ended in her disaster.
Germany's second mistake was that of using heavy assaulting columns to
charge the Liege forts, with the resultant horrible carnage. It was the
old military rule of thumb. It went out at Liege, and the Mars of old,
with his blood-dripping sword, had to stand aside as Modern Science
stepped out of the Krupp factory with the great 42 centimeter gun. It
took thirty horses to drag the first of these monsters out of that nest
of the Prussian war eagle, and soldiers had to give way for that great
weapon as it was drawn into place, accompanied by its retinue of
mechanics and engineers, who set it up, armed, and fired it.
The monster required a concrete base; and concrete took 14 days to
harden, but the Krupp experts brought a new concrete that hardened in 24
hours, and, within a week from leaving its home, the great Krupp demon
began to batter a road through Liege.
France made the third blunder of the war as Belgium bravely held the
gate at Liege and awaited aid from France and England.
France, mistaking the main line of the German advance, massed the main
army of her forces along the upper Meuse from Belfort, two hundred miles
away from the right position.
Britain's first blunder was in not being prepared to immediately help
Belgium. So the Krupp monsters smashed that Belgian gate and the German
hordes swept towards Paris.
Britain somewhat retrieved her delay by quickly rushing to block the
triumphant tide of Germany. And two British army corps saved the war by
holding up five of Germany's best armies at Mons; holding them whilst
they waited for the French to move up from their first mistakenly-held
position; till, finding that aid not forthcoming, they fought back to
the Marne.
Germany now blundered once again. Its aerial scouts failed to see a
great French army coming at its right flank; failed to note it, because
it came so swiftly out from behind Paris. It drove the German right
towards its centre, past the British forces, which, catching the Germans
on their flank, smashed them back to the readied trenches on the Aisne
Ridge.
Then the Germans came round the north of Belgium, and Britain blundered
again in sending a force of marines and reserves to hold Antwerp. They
had to ignominiously retire as they found the country too flat for
offensive manoeuvring, and they had arrived too late to do the
necessary extensive trenching which really meant the making of
artificial land contours. That British force, however, helped to cover
the retreat of the Belgian army.
Germany's final mistake was holding their position on the ridge of the
Aisne. It could not have retreated without fearful loss as that ridge
was the last conformation of any military value in the practically flat
country between the Aisne and Liege.
After the war, experts maintained that it would, for many reasons, have
been better strategy for Germany not to have crossed the Meuse in the
first place.
The Germans were fired with the false idea that the capture of Paris
meant the end of French aggression.
They had forgotten the lesson they learnt in 1870, when the capture of
Paris did not end that campaign. They had forgotten the lessons of the
Boer War, that the capture of the South African capitals did not
terminate that long struggle.
They had their fixed plan. It had been prepared many years before and
been put away till required, though military strategy had moved along in
the meantime. At the first blast of war they blindly threw themselves
across Belgium with their battle cry of 34 years before: "A Paris."
They could have occupied the country to the east of the Meuse, fortified
the long length of high cliffs along its right bank, and sat there like
a rock, letting the Allies smash themselves against it, whilst vast
armies could have been free to push the Russians back to St. Petersburg,
obtain supplies from Russia and so neutralise any British blockade.
Furthermore, having the fight nearer German soil would have given the
German people a better idea of the actual state of the war and helped to
stifle any lack of enthusiasm on the part of German Socialists which,
later on, was to develop into serious trouble.
It was a war of surprises.
Science had laid its new-won gifts at the feet of Mars.
It brought as new factors into human warfare, wireless telegraphy,
aeronautics and motor traction.
Wireless telegraphy, one of the greatest gifts to mankind in the saving
of human life at sea, and in the sending of messages of peace, utterly
failed during the stress of human strife.
It seemed that just as clashing human passions in war stultified all
thoughts of brotherly love and goodwill, so the ether waves from
military wireless plants clashed in the air and destroyed all
intelligence in messages.
In aeronautics, the swift aeroplane asserted its superiority over the
balloon, and where movements were in open country as between Liege and
the Aisne, it furnished a new and wonderful aid for reconnaissance.
It failed when the movements took place beneath cover, as in the
fighting in the thickly wooded country to the south of Compeigne; again,
when the French army moved out under cover of the houses of Paris and
environs before the battle of Marne; and finally when, in the conclusive
phases of the war the Allies moved north beneath the screen of the
forests of the Argonne and the Ardennes.
Motor traction counted most in the new aids of science. It brought into
the war the most vital factor of all human element--speed.
The great smash on the German right at the Marne, which gave the first
check to the German advance, was only possible because the French
General, Gallieni, moved 70,000 soldiers out of Paris in taxicabs and
other motor vehicles, and in six hours had them in action before even
the German aerial reconnaissance knew about it.
The motor brought speed into the fighting in running the cheering
soldiers to the front, and with auto hospitals brought the sorry wounded
as speedily back again.
It was a triumph for the machine, and yet the machine, in the end, gave
place to the hand to hand death grip of primitive man.
As Kipling wrote:--
"What I ha' seen since ocean steam began
Leaves me no doot for the machine; what, what about the man?"
The Great War answered that question.
There was a doubt about the man--he dropped off the veneer of the human
and became the animal once again.
When foe came face to face with foe the world dropped back ten thousand
years.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XIX.
The Revolution.
And now the war was over--bar the shouting.
I remember the soldiers had strange emotions at the sudden ending to
fifteen months' activity. At times they would be excited, and at others
disappointed. It seemed like the feeling of the London 'busman who left
off work for a week's holiday, but found himself on a 'bus next day
asking the driver to "let him hold the ribbons for a bit."
The war fever had got into our blood, and the camps, instead of being
orderly in arrangement, became moving masses of wandering soldiers.
Discipline snapped as the news of Peace passed through the ranks. Some
soldiers would cheer--they had loved ones awaiting their return. Others
took it as a matter of little concern--they, no doubt, had cut all ties
in enlisting, and, perhaps, wondered if their old places had been kept
open for them.
Troops still poured in from the south, adding to the demoralisation.
I remember that the commandant of my air corps rose with me in the
'plane and surveyed the wonderful scene.
Around Liege troops were moving in a wonderful mass, not unlike the
mixed crowd that one sees in a city street after a procession has passed
along, but with the crowd increased a thousandfold.
Yet it was not a disorderly crowd. It seemed a crowd of good fellowship.
The German soldiers in the west had fought against the British and found
them brave enemies. The revulsion of feeling made them friends. The
tension of hate snapped.
It has ever been thus. With a quarrel over, the greatest haters become
the warmest friends.
For two days the armies at the Meuse fraternised.
Our soldiers learnt much from their former enemies. They found, through
some papers that had slipped the eyes of the censors, that the
Socialists of Germany were in revolt.
I could then understand the excitement of my religious friend, Brother
Wilbrid, on the Rhine road, and his anxiety to get back to Berlin
without loss of time.
It appears that the first public indication of the insurrection took
place as far back as December 2, 1915, when a party of fifteen Socialist
deputies in the Reichstag, led by Karl Leibknecht, refused to vote for
the second war credits. Four of these members were from Berlin. One,
Stadthagen, represented a popular workmen's suburb in Berlin, while
another, Geyer, represented a workers' suburb in Leipsic. The Socialists
of Bremen, Stuttgart and Hamburg endorsed the Socialist Deputies'
refusal by a majority of two to one. Not only were the Socialist party
rising in revolt, but the Moderates, under Bernstein, were opposed,
because the war was entered into by Socialists exclusively as a war
against Russia, whilst the authorities had cleverly turned the reason as
a war against England. Though the Socialists may have hated England, the
war proved that they were used as a cat's paw. So riots broke out in
Berlin, Stuttgart and Hamburg.
In Berlin, down the Unter der Linden, a mighty mob of workers marched
and stoned the Government offices. The military police dispersed them.
Fate helped the revolt.
At the surrender of the German armies, thousands of German soldiers,
rather than surrender, had retreated along the roads leading into
Germany, sullenly shouting the news of the defeat.
Bad news travels fast, and to the German people, who had been kept in
ignorance of reverses, the news came with stunning effect.
Only a few days before had the authorities at Berlin announced to the
Socialists that ultimate success was certain, and bade the people be of
good cheer. Now, like a crash, came the news of defeat with the
additional disgrace of being brought by retreating soldiers of the
Empire!
Then the revolution crashed on Germany. It was a riot that rolled round
the earth.
I remember it was a week after our arrival at Liege that the armies of
the Allies began their march to the Rhine. They had not yet reached
German soil, and the Peace terms would not be disclosed till the Allies
were in Germany.
To my delight, the French army of the Argonne was given the post of
honor. It must have been a wonderful sight to see the Air Squadron of
twelve aeroplanes moving backward and forward over the heads of the
moving columns. Nap accompanied me in my 'plane, and I remember I kept
somewhat in advance of the rest to catch the first sight of Cologne
Cathedral.
It came upon the horizon, its two great spires piercing the sky
unscathed. How unlike the Churches of Rheims, Ypres and the other cities
of France and Belgium. Germany well knew the value of its historical
buildings to protect them, even at the price of peace. We flew low to
give a more spectacular effect to our advance.
Soon the great piers of the familiar Rhine Bridge came into sight as the
order was given to descend on a plain to the west of the river.
That night the army bivouacked on the outskirts of Aix la Chappele, but
sleep did not come to my eyes. At times I desired to fly ahead to
Cologne and tread the familiar ways--but strict regulations tied all
troops to the camp lines.
I comforted myself that to-morrow I would reach Cologne and someone
would be pleased to see me.
Next day we crossed the Rhine, circled the city of Cologne, and parked
our 'planes in the gardens I had left but three weeks previously.
The Allied troops were marched through the city and encamped two miles
beyond it. A regiment of French soldiers were deputed as military police
to take possession of the city; and within an hour, from the poles of
the official buildings, French, Belgian, Russian and British flags
fluttered, and an order was issued that all arms must be handed in.
I remember the happy feeling as Nap and I hastened through the city to
Goche's house.
I was in my uniform and felt I would cut a smarter figure before my
sweetheart, than I did in the ragged "cast-offs" I wore as a prisoner.
I walked on air when I entered the familiar street and saw, in the
distance, the house I knew so well. The street was silent. I reached the
house, pulled myself together and knocked at the door. Happiest of
thoughts coursed through my mind. What a wealth of news I had to tell
her!
The door slowly opened, and Grandpa Goche's whitened and aged face came
to the light. His under jaw seemed to shiver in terror. He gave the
impression that he was expecting some dreadful calamity. As he
recognised me, his jaw fell and he retreated into the room, sank into a
chair, gripped its arms with shaking clutch, looked at me with hollow
eyes and said: "Ja wohl."
"Where is Helen?" I asked.
"Forgive me," he said, "forgive me," shaking his head. "They came to me
and asked for the Englishman that escaped--'the English dog' they called
you. I told them I knew not, but as I hated you and hated her, for I
knew she cared for you, I told them she could tell, as she saw you
leave. Then they took her," and he bowed his head in his hands, "took
her away----"
"Where, where?" I almost shouted at him.
"To Berlin, a week ago," was all he said.
[Illustration: "In Berlin."]
CHAPTER XX.
Footing the Bill.
It is difficult at this distant date to give in detail the story of the
riot that began in Berlin and thundered round the earth toward the end
of 1915.
While the Great War was under way the belligerents were like gamblers
crowded round a table, as they threw down their millions in men and
money to beat the whirling finger of Fate.
Great Britain and her Allies had 12,600,000 men and had spent
£1,180,000,000. Germany, Austria and Turkey had 8,800,000 men and had
spent £1,282,000,000. When the awful game was over there were over
18,000,000 people to go back to civil life, many of whom were crippled.
Withal the belligerents had lost over £9,000,000,000 in direct
expenditure, loss of production and capitalised value of the human
sacrifice.
These 18,000,000 men were flung back into civil life at a time when
almost all productive industry was crippled or paralysed. The world
could not immediately reorganise her industries and taxation promised to
be colossal.
When men came back to their homes, or what was left of them, took off
their uniforms and put their guns behind the doors, they sat down and
pondered. They began to count up the cost and wondered how to foot the
bill.
One can, therefore, easily understand they did not form a high opinion
of the wisdom of those who had governed them and exacted unquestioning
obedience from them.
Was it any wonder then that they should consider they might as well take
a hand in governing? They could not make a worse mess of things than
those who claimed to have had a divine commission for the job. When the
masses, who had furnished the bulk of the soldiers, began to think, the
position became dangerous, especially as real thinking had stopped
fifteen months before and there was a call for overtime in thinking to
make up.
The man with the gun would remember that before Britain entered the war
there was a heavy tax per head. He would find out that though Britain
had been attempting to cheer herself up during the war with a motto of
"Business as Usual," her exports had diminished by £50,000,000, and the
actual cost had been £1,250,000,000!
Then he would think very hard.
If he were French he would remember that before the war opened France
had a permanent debt of £1,269,223,600, or £32.05 for every man, woman
and child.
If he were Russian he would remember that before the war the national
debt was £1,461,000,000, with annual loss of revenue from the Vodka
monopoly of £140,000,000.
If he were German he would remember that the war tax had been
£74,700,000, and that the war had cost £2,770,000,000.
One question would come into the minds of those 18,000,000 thinkers. Who
was going to pay for this loss of £9,000,000,000?
One answer came from Germany.
It was voiced by Wilbrid the Humanist.
The "psychological" had arrived for sounding the note of revolt. It was
struck and echoed round the earth; even throughout America!
"Europe is filled with human wrecks," Wilbrid preached.
"All the time the physical stamina of Europe was being destroyed on the
battlefield, national debts piled up, adding phenomenal burdens to the
already crushing taxes cast on the toilers.
"Millions still unborn must toil the harder and live the meaner for
every day of the monstrous lunacy.
"There is only one reason for the ocean of blood and tears.
"Eighty per cent. of the world's population belong to a class supported
by its own exertions--the working class. It only gets back half the
wealth it produces; the other half goes to the 20 per cent. that does
not toil; but as that 20 per cent. cannot consume that half, markets
must be found for what is over, and some nation must yield markets,
colonies and dumping grounds to another nation able to put into the
field stronger battalions and deadlier guns. Those conditions must be
altered or this peace will be only an armed truce.
"War can be abolished by giving the 80 per cent. who produce the result
of their efforts, instead of paying it to the 20 per cent.; in short,
let all the results of labor go toward the Common Good.
"Men should work for humanity generally, not for an individual. That
system would kill competition in manufacture between individuals and
nations.
"All men should be prepared to fight for humanity, not for an
individual. That would kill monarchy.
"The Great War debts can be paid by taxing those 20 per cent.
non-workers who have been taking more than their share since time began.
"It is those non-workers that made the war by their competition for
trade, for individual power and personal wealth. So let them pay for it.
"The age of individualism ended with the war. There will be no further
need for that 'joke of the ages' at Hague. A 'Palace of Peace' erected
by a 'millionaire'! No wonder the Hague conventions were 'scraps of
paper.'"
It was such doctrines that brought about the revolution.
It was not a revolution of force, although at its outset a mob of
irresponsibles stoned the Government offices in Berlin. The distinctive
note preached by the Humanists was abolition of armed force and reform
by constitutional means. So when Wilbrid's mighty "Army of Humanity"
marched through Berlin as a demonstration of numbers, half of its ranks
were soldiers. But they walked with arms reversed as a proof of the
death of "Armed Force."
The presence of the soldiers in the crowd was evidently misunderstood at
Potsdam, for that day the Kaiser and his staff fled and the Government
resigned.
Then the wonderful organising ability of Brother Wilbrid asserted
itself. Within a few days the socialistic doctrines of the Humanists
covered Germany.
The doctrines found ready acceptance. The Humanists pointed out that
their advocacy of the control of production by the Government for the
Common Good was not so novel in its application.
They showed that, before the war, the railways were Government-owned,
and it was ready to nationalise the electrical industry.
They showed that, during the war, every nation had taken over railway
traction and was manufacturing and supplying to citizens certain
necessaries of life.
They showed that in Britain for many years men who had argued that the
Government should take over and operate the privately-owned railways
were looked upon as revolutionaries, extremists and fanatics; yet on the
very day war was declared the British Government reached out and seized
every railroad and began to operate it.
"During the war Germany was manufacturing and supplying citizens with
food, clothing and shelter," preached Wilbrid. "If Governments can do
that for the sake of war they can do it for the sake of peace. If they
can operate clothing factories to clothe soldiers, they can operate them
to clothe citizens. If they can operate food factories to feed soldiers
on the firing line, they can operate food factories to feed starving
citizens. If such things can be done to destroy life, they can do these
things to preserve it."
These fantastic phrases struck home.
The fact was that the masses foresaw colossal taxation following the
war, and jumped at any opportunity of letting some one else pay it.
It was the old story of the "have-nots" and the "haves," with the result
that the Reichstag became almost unanimously a Humanist assembly.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XXI.
Into Berlin.
It seemed strange at the time that the Allies' forces were being kept
out of Berlin till the elections were decided. The wisdom of it was
afterwards ascertained, however.
The allied armies were kept out of Berlin because their presence there
would have given opportunity for tumult, and perhaps seriously
interrupted the course of events the Humanists were, perhaps
unconsciously, shaping in favor of the Allies.
The change in German politics cleared out the Hohenzollern regime,
deposed the Kaiser and his class, and as the chief policy doctrine of
the Humanists was disarmament, it suited the Allies to let the people do
the work for them.
The wisdom of this step was evident when news came through that the
Humanist movement was spreading across France and England.
In Belgium and France it met with more opposition than it did in
Germany. Strange to say the Belgian "Joan of Arc" was the leader. She
preached the cause of "the capitalist" with much vigor. I do not know
why she took up this political campaign. Maybe the wonderful response to
her appeals for financial aid for the starving Belgians won her sympathy
when she saw the capitalistic class that helped her in danger of being
destroyed.
Her eloquence, spiced by anecdote and parable, won many followers. She
pointed out that the doctrine of the Humanist in abolishing world
competition hit at the fundamental principle that made for initiative
and made man utilise thought and self-improvement.
"Abolish competition or distinction," she said, "and all men come under
the one rule, like so many animals."
She pointed to Joffre and Kitchener as successful examples of the old
and well-tried system.
She pointed to Belgium's King, Albert, who fought throughout the war in
the fighting line, sharing the lot of the soldier. She was joined in
her campaign by many of her own sex, even from Berlin, whence many had
departed, at the advent of the Humanist campaign which was spreading
throughout Germany.
When the Reichstag elections were decided, a force from each of the
Allied armies entrained for Berlin and, to my delight, my company was
among those favored.
It is difficult for one accustomed to plain writing to tell in fitting
phrases the wonderful enthusiasm that reigned as our troop-trains slowly
rolled into Berlin.
Along ten lines, crowded with continuous trains, we were conveyed to our
destination. Our trains were preceded by slow trains which dropped
guards at each bridge and station.
As our train steamed into the depot outside Berlin, I saw the wonderful
system of getting away troops. As soon as a train arrived columns poured
into a great park adjoining and took up allotted places.
As we passed along the streets the populace did not show any of the
fright and fear we fancied our presence would cause. They chatted,
smiled and pointed at us as if it were an ordinary parade of troops and
not the triumphant conquerors of their country.
Truth to tell, they were mighty sick of the war and the long
preparation, and our presence proved it was all over.
I remember, best of all, the frenzied welcome we received from the
Russian forces who had trained in from the south east.
They had kept the enemy busy on the east whilst we were moving up. It
was like the meeting of many friends who had come through adversity
together.
I can only picture one simile. I remember a story of two miners
imprisoned in a mine. They were cut off from all help and separated, but
began digging to meet one another. After many hours they cut through the
wall of clay that stood between them. Their hand-grip must have been as
ours was on that wonderful day in August.
It would take three days for all troops to detrain, so I sought the
earliest opportunity of finding Miss Goche. Nap came with me. The only
clue I had was that she had been removed to a concentration camp at
Berlin. I found that camp. A military officer who could speak English
saluted as we approached and informed us that all foreign military
prisoners had been transferred to Belgium and given their liberty.
"Was a Miss Goche among them?" I anxiously asked.
"I cannot say," he replied.
My heart sank. I felt that it was a difficult task for a stranger
unacquainted with German and a former enemy to attempt to trace the
information.
Nap tapped me on the shoulder, and in order to cheer me said: "You've
got a friend here, come and look him up."
There would be little difficulty in finding Wilbrid, he was now a public
character. So we took a car for the Humanist headquarters and there we
found him seated at a large desk in his shirt sleeves. On either side of
him were two dictaphones, and into the cylinders he was alternatively
dictating his correspondence. As one cylinder would fill it would
automatically ring, and he would turn to the other, an assistant
removing the filled cylinder.
We stood behind him at the end of the room afraid to interrupt, but he
turned and, seeing me, rose and came with outstretched hand.
"My brother Jefson," he said. "I know your first desire. You have been
to the concentration camp. I found your friend there. When I returned to
Cologne I found she had been arrested for assisting your escape. I
traced her to the camp, gave her your letter and saw much of her for
your sake. But she has gone--to Belgium. She was high-spirited. I talked
much to her of the Humanist creed, but she would have none of it: so on
her release she left for Belgium and she joined the woman called the
Belgian "Joan of Arc."
CHAPTER XXII.
The Great Combine.
"Your war has ended at last," said Wilbrid, after a long pause. "Ours is
but beginning; and our conquest will not be limited by an empire's
boundaries, or even by those of a continent. It will embrace the earth."
Having spoken he turned to the window and peered at the blood-red sunset
contemplatively.
I surveyed his tall, spare figure, his steel grey hair and sharply-cut
features, the latter pinked by the evening glow.
Here is a new Kaiser, I thought.
"You said a 'world conquest,'" I remarked to him. "Don't you think the
days have gone when persons should 'talk big'? The great war should
henceforth limit the ambitions of those who dream of world's dominion by
conquest."
"Do not misunderstand me," he said. "We shall conquer the world because
of the human appeal of our creed. Its basis is that the strength of a
nation lies in the welfare of its producers--the working class, and not
in its mighty armaments or individual wealth. There is not an atom of
national strength in the accumulation of much money by any individual.
Where wealth is in the hands of the few, misery stalks among the many;
and, where the masses are ill-fed and hopeless, moral and physical
strength cannot exist."
Then he walked from the window to his desk and back again; his arms
still behind him, flinging his phrases at us as he passed to and fro.
"Great things can only be achieved by combination," he went on. "The
victory of the Allies is proof of that. We are going to combine all
workers, and, in order to make our combination supreme, we will not
only organise those at work, but, also, those out of work. It is going
to be a combination of all who can labor," he snapped out.
"Up till now," he continued, "there have been more men in the world than
there have been jobs to go round; so there have always been many
unemployed. Those unemployed are the men who keep down the wages of the
workers. If there were no men or women to take the jobs from those who
work, then the workers could demand shorter hours and a better share of
the wealth they produce. It is the unemployed who have been keeping up
the competition in wages. That is where they have been useful to the
employer.
"Up till now the workers have struggled to hold their jobs; and have
fought to maintain or raise their wages without taking into account the
thousands of unemployed who need work.
"Those out of work are humans after all, and when hunger drives them to
take the work at lower wages, they're called 'scabs' and other vile
names; and we have treated them as our bitterest enemies.
"Can you blame a man whose wife is sinking and whose children cry for
food, if he is willing to take a job at less than the wage you get?
"Would not any man lower the wages scale and take another man's job for
less, in order to save the life of his wife and the new baby? Should any
union principles stand between him and his wife's life? That is why we
are going to combine with the unemployed."
It had grown dark, so he stepped to the wall and touched a switch. As
the light flooded the room I ventured a reply.
"Don't you think the human appeal in your creed is rather one-sided," I
remarked. "Why not purge your workers' unions first! You know there are
certain trade unions that make the entrance fees so high, that many of
their own trade are excluded."
"There is a Wharf Laborers' Union in Australia that has an entrance fee
that is considered to prohibit new membership, and it has as its
secretary a Federal Minister of the Crown."
"I guess you're right just there," Nap put in. "The Union of Glass
Blowers of the U.S.A. demand 1000 dollars as initiation fee; so they get
fine pay and they're 'some' people, I guess."
"There are unions in Australia," I rejoined, "that not only demand a
high entrance fee, but, in order to continue a monopoly of employment,
are limiting the number of apprentices who desire to learn their trade.
"There are unionists who, when work is slack and members are unemployed,
will advocate shorter hours at the same rate of pay so as to make room
for their unemployed mates.
"And, perhaps, you are not aware that Australia is a land where Nature
is so generous that in its short history it has reached the highest
level in the world's wheat and wool production. Yet in that land, twenty
times the size of your Germany and with one-thirteenth of your
population, the workers discourage immigration of people of their own
British race, because they foolishly fancy the newcomers would create
competition in their high-priced work; and that is in a wonderful land
crying out for development and only having an average population of one
person to the square mile."
I finished in a highly-strung manner, but Wilbrid came forward and put
his hands on my shoulders.
"My boy," he said calmly, "you are right, and I am also right. That
selfishness on the part of the workers is but the fear of having their
wages cut and becoming unemployed with the advent of further
competition. Remove that fear and keep the unemployed from cutting wages
and the selfishness will disappear. The Humanist creed recognises all
men as sparks of Divinity. There will be no 'scabs,' 'pimps,'
'blacklegs,' or other vile, cruel epithets. The men and women who work
will combine with those unemployed. The result will be such a world's
combination of labor that all sources of profit-winning will be in the
hands of the men who toil. It will indeed be a conquest of the world.
"Already we control the Governments of Germany and Austria. France and
England will certainly follow at the next elections. The French workers
do not forget that, during the war, their Government successfully
organised the whole of the industries; and the English toilers remember
how the Asquith Government successfully controlled all the great
munition factories and limited the employers' profits to 10 per cent.,
giving the surplusage to the State. Now I note that the British workers
are demanding that just as the State successfully controlled great works
during the war and claimed the profits in excess, so it should control
all works now and let the profits go also to the Common Good--yes,
that's the term. It's almost a divine inspiration. The Common Good is
the doctrine of the Humanist! Watch the cause! It will sweep the earth!"
As he shook hands with me, I could feel his nerves twitching.
Nap and I walked back to the great camp almost in silence, and little
sleep came to me that night.
CHAPTER XXIII.
The Terms of Peace.
I shall never forget the grand march of the Allies through Berlin, and
the sealing of the Treaty of Peace.
There had been much delay regarding what the Terms of Peace should be.
Great Britain was the stumbling block.
Eighty years before, Washington Irving wrote of "John Bull":--
"Though no one fights with more obstinacy to carry a contested point,
yet when the battle is over and he comes to reconciliation, he is so
much taken up with the mere shaking of hands, that he is apt to let
his antagonists pocket all they have been fighting about."
England proved that once again in South Africa, for after fighting five
years with the Boers, she actually gave them what they were fighting
for--their independence.
With Germany she was inclined to be generous, but the French, Belgian
and Russian delegates urged firmness, and the Terms of Peace were
finally settled.
It was estimated that the actual expenditure of the Allies was
£1,180,000,000, and the loss in shipping £250,000,000, a total loss of
£1,430,000,000.
Germany and Austria had to hand over to the Allies the whole of their
Navies to be held for the protection of the world's peace, and each
nation had to pay an indemnity of £1,000,000,000. The German prisoners
had to be kept in Belgium for nine months to repair damage done to
Belgian towns. The boundaries of France and Belgium were to be extended
to the Rhine. Holland was to be absorbed by a joint protectorate that
took in the Schleswig-Holstein Peninsula. Poland was to go back to
Russia, Servia and Italy being allotted the shorelines of the Adriatic.
The Dardanelles was to be an open, undefended waterway. Bulgaria was to
absorb Turkey in Europe, Russia obtaining further concessions in
Caucasia.
There were other details of the terms that need not be here mentioned.
But on the 1st day of December, 1915, the Treaty of Berlin confirmed
them.
There was little demonstration in Germany. The new political party in
power, the Humanists, had already agreed to disarmament; so the first
part of the treaty did not trouble. The policy of "universal
brotherhood" subdued any qualms that might have arisen regarding loss of
territory. Regarding the indemnity: it could be met by imposing a heavy
income tax on all incomes over 3000 marks (£150). By this means the
Humanists would make the capitalists pay for the war.
The Humanist Government readily accepted the demand of the Allies that
the German prisoners should not be returned to Germany for nine months.
They were drafted into great work-camps in Belgium, and were put to
replacing bridges, reconstructing buildings, and making good all they
had devastated.
I remember at the time, how the world jeered at the so-called "Humanist"
Government in Germany, because it so readily agreed to the harsh
treatment of the "Sons who fought for the German Empire." But the Berlin
officials were wise. For nine months an army of 800,000 men were being
fed and kept at the Allies' expense. That mob was thus prevented from
returning to an overstocked manufacturing nation. They were being held
back to give their country nine months' opportunity to "put its house in
order."
CHAPTER XXIV.
What Happened in England.
On leaving Berlin our squadron was part of the force that had to return
to England. I had hoped to break the journey at Brussels, to meet Helen
Goche, but Fate stepped in. To my disappointment the troop-trains passed
on to Ostend along a line to the south of Brussels.
On arrival in England, the Flying Corps were not disbanded, but were
attached to the permanent forces.
Nap, however, desired to return to the United States, and as we shook
hands in "good-bye," I felt I was losing a friend to whom adventurous
days had linked me by heart-grips.
"I'm going along through to that country of yours," he said to me as he
swung into the train. "From what you tell me, it must be 'some place.'
We'll grip again there, sure." And the train pulled out and tore him out
of my life for many days.
The months succeeding the Declaration of Peace were troublesome times
for England. Troops were pouring back from the Continent and being
dismissed to return to jobs they found had disappeared.
During the war a fine spirit of "cheer up" generally prevailed. People
tried to put vim into themselves by tacking the motto over their shops:
"Business as Usual." They knew full well that business was nearly dead;
but they were like the boy who whistled going through the graveyard in
order to keep up his courage.
Apart from the trades making munitions of war, few factories maintained
their full output. Recruiting lessened the number of employees, and
those who stayed behind fought for shorter hours and higher wages.
Investors generally eased off, as money was too high in value to risk in
new concerns in such uncertain times. Even the highly boosted scheme to
bring back to England from Germany the Aniline dye industry failed for
the want of the necessary capital.
Then a great movement was inaugurated throughout the British Empire.
"Trade only with the Allies." It seemed a fine idea in theory, but when
Russia, in desiring to place an order for £1,400,000 worth of railway
plant, found English prices inflated by labor demands and placed the
order with America, the "Trade-only-with-the-Allies" movement began to
wobble.
Then the troops began to pour back into England in thousands.
Manufacturers and investors kept off of any new enterprises as they saw
the Asquith Government, always rather radical, lending a sympathetic ear
to the workers' demand that the State should control all industries.
Cities and towns now began to fill with unemployed and riots broke out
everywhere.
Then the Government took action. All steel and woollen industries were
placed under military control with "preference to returned soldiers."
The outcries of the owners were pacified by the promise of 10 per cent.
of all profits on work done, with proportional profits according to the
value of the plant and enterprise. But under the military control, as
increased wages were given and shorter hours worked in order to absorb
all unemployed, profits diminished rapidly.
The General Elections in February, 1916, divided the country into two
parties. The Humanist party, headed by Lloyd-George and Blatchford,
aiming at Government control of all production, and the Individualist
party, in which Winston Churchill was prominent, standing for "private
enterprise." Though the latter had behind it the full force of British
capitalists, the Humanist party, elected on a general franchise, swept
the poll. Thus England became Socialistic. Heavy land and income taxes
followed with high wages ruling for the working classes. It was a
bloodless revolution!
CHAPTER XXV.
Belgium Holds the Gate Again.
It was shortly after the Humanist Government assembled in London that
considerable disbandment in the British military forces took place, my
squadron, amongst others, being marked out. I lost no time in crossing
to Brussels. I remember when I again met Helen Goche I felt, at first, a
strange reserve, fearing that our short friendship in Cologne had no
deeper meaning for her; but we both realised that henceforward our paths
would be together; so I joined her in her work with the Belgian "Joan of
Arc."
I never knew the name of this wonderful woman. We simply called her
"Madame"; but her power of organising was remarkable and recalled to my
mind the similar success of Wilbrid in Germany.
Madame was the head of an organisation that had a branch in every town
in Belgium.
Tall and somewhat thin, without any striking personal beauty, she stood
erect before her audience, and, with the sincerity of her purpose,
carried all before her.
The second night of my return, I went with Helen to a great assembly
where, for two hours, ten thousand Belgians absorbed the purpose of her
phrases.
"Men of Belgium," she said, "we are asked, in these days of peace, to
forget and forgive; but can you ever forget those terrible days of
'frightfulness' the German swine inflicted upon us and our beloved
country?
"Return to your homes, your farms and your factories, but take with you
a hate for the Huns--a hate that time can never heal. To forgive may be
divine, but justice is the prime attribute to divinity. Justice in this
case calls for our undying hate. And now these Germans, not content with
having tried to subjugate our flesh, are trying to subjugate our minds
and our very souls. Think well upon the tempting creed of the Humanists
that was 'Made in Germany.'
"It is a creed that calls for State control of all production; a creed
that cuts out all private enterprise and initiative; a creed that forces
men to shut down upon their self-development and independence and to
rely upon employment by the State.
"I ask you, men of Belgium, to look at those whom the State employs
to-day. Eight hundred thousand Germans are under State control to make
good the works they have wantonly destroyed. They may repair the bridges
and the highways, but there are broken hearts they cannot heal,
and--there are many empty chairs in Belgian homes.
"Do any of you wish to have the brand of shame those wastrels wear? Do
any of you wish to have broken that national independent spirit that
made our brothers bravely hold the Gate at Liege?
"To-day this German-made Humanist creed has gripped Germany, England,
France and Austria. It stands for the levelling of the human being. None
can rise above the common level. They call it the gospel of the Common
Good, but there is nothing good in anything that clips the wings of
those who would dare to excel; that baulks the aspirations of those who
would use the brains their God has given them that they may rise.
"I tell you this 'Humanist' creed, rating all men as equal, and only
recognising each man and each woman as one in a mob of similar animals,
will lower the race till even your name will be replaced with a numeral.
It is a creed akin to the German ideal of the man-animal that dragged a
bloody trail across our country.
"I tell you, the creed must fail that cannot recognise any degrees of
mental capacity; that cannot understand that man has a soul that cannot
be confined within any man-drawn boundaries. This German-creed sweeps
the earth with all the bombast of a war-mad Kaiser. It is going to fail,
but not till men who think will rise and fight for recognition of their
immortality. It will be the War of the Ages!
"And in the fight Belgium will stand firm once again as the Buffer State
of Civilisation. It will hold the gate for the future of Humanity."
I came away from that meeting impressed with the air of prophecy in the
discourse, for Belgium was standing firm for Individualism. A lonely
State in a developing world of Socialism, and though Kings in other
lands began to fear the safety of their crowns, Albert of Belgium was
still the beloved sovereign of a prosperous people.
It was strange how Belgium quickly recovered from the war!
The energy generated by that conflict, the confidence engendered by
success, and the adaptability and resourcefulness taught by the war, set
off the loss of many of her manhood.
The war was a forerunner of a vigorous period of expansion of Belgian
industry, for the employment of 800,000 German prisoners on national
works set free the population to develop various enterprises.
Another incentive to excel was the practical sympathy the world had
shown to Belgium in her days of distress. It put such stimulation into
the nation that it felt it had to make good to merit the world's high
regards.
I write at length on this remarkable sequel to the war on the part of
Belgium, as other nations did not rise to the occasion like it did. The
Socialistic doctrines of the Humanist countries sapped at the initiative
of the worker, advanced his wages, but crushed the men of wealth and
forced them to seek new fields for their enterprise.
It is a trait of the human nature that he, desiring to excel, will
eventually rise; so the men of enterprise, the men of initiative, the
men who do things, came to Belgium though many sought wider fields of
enterprise across the seas.
CHAPTER XXVI.
What a Letter from Australia Told Me.
Australia had sent 100,000 men to the front at a cost of £18,000,000,
which was covered by a loan from Britain.
Though the decline in trade on account of the war caused widespread
unemployment, the sending off of 75,000 men eased matters considerably.
As these men were paid at almost the same rate as their ordinary wage,
and as a big proportion of their pay was held in Australia, the war did
not hit the Commonwealth so very hard in this respect.
So people did not trouble much. They went about their business almost as
usual and enjoyed the many entertainments arranged by "society people"
for any object, however remotely connected with the war--"Sheepskin
Waistcoat Funds," "Comfort for Horses Fund," "Knitted Socks Fund," and
others. It was all so much work and gave people opportunity to have a
busy time, flavored with the knowledge that it was an act of patriotism.
Six months before the war had ended the manufacturers began to get busy.
When public bodies begin to get busy in Australia, the first thing they
say is: "Let's have a Dinner."
The manufacturers saw a chance of influencing High Protection by the use
of a new gag: "Don't buy German-made goods." They, of course, wanted
people to buy only the Australian made, but they were cute.
They put it this way:
"Only trade with the Empire and its Allies. Every pound," it was said,
"that is spent with Germany means another gun to our future menace." So
the public were exhorted to confine business to the Empire and its
Allies--with Britain, Africa, India, Canada, France, Belgium, Russia,
Servia and Japan, and to cut the rest of the world. That is to say, to
trade with three quarters of the world!
Their decision practically meant free trade with nearly the whole world,
and so their hands were tied so long as Britain was joined up with
foreign allies!
A striking proof that this slogan, "Trade with the Allies," was only an
after-dinner sentiment was given when, in May, 1915, the Australian
Postmaster-General rejected a Japanese tender for electric insulators,
although its price was £1000 cheaper than a local tender, the total
amount of which was £3281/6/8--a thirty-three per cent. preference being
given against the work of an allied nation.
In the meantime the N.S.W. Government found their system of State
Socialism so expensive that the Treasury began to rapidly empty. The
war, with its upsetting of the British money market, stopped the usual
method of loan-raising, but some smart English capitalists, more
experienced in finance than the average labor politician, offered to
take over the public works of New South Wales if they were paid 10 per
cent. on their expenditure.
They 'cutely pointed out that by the system of State Socialism, the
N.S.W. Government had gathered an immense army of laborers. It had built
up an enormous civil service, and if men were thrown on the market
consequent on the State's lack of funds, they would make it
uncomfortable for the Government. That action would bring home to the
workers the utter fallacy of State control of industries. They also
whispered, with their tongues in their cheeks, that "private enterprise"
would then become prosperous and the Labor movement would be thrown back
for "years and years and years."
The temptation proved too strong and the compact was signed.
"Of course," said the Government, "you will give preference to
unionists, the maximum wage, and all that?"
"Oh, of course," said the Syndicate, rubbing its hands with glee.
It was getting 10 per cent. on all the expenditure!
What though the men loafed through the work, the percentage of the
outlay went on just the same!
So the N.S.W. Government signed the compact, practically threw over
State Socialism, so far as public works were concerned, thanked goodness
for the riddance, and sat back for a while, stripped of responsibility,
a Syndicate's collection of "rubber stamps."
Some of the Ministers, however, tired of the "nothin'-doin' policy,"
hankered after the tinpot glory they had when in charge of men, so they
began to look for new fields of enterprise not touched by the Syndicate.
They saw an opportunity in Government bread-making.
The Government had heard a good deal about the profit possibilities of
great American "combines." Why not introduce the thing into Australia as
a great Government scheme, and combine all the small bakery
establishments into one big concern, in which great automatic baking
machinery would supplant the small ovens of the small employers?
This would not only knock out the "hated employers," but it would
capture all their profits--and the Government wanted money rather badly.
So, immense bread-making factories were built. A standard price was put
on wheat the Government wanted, which knocked the farmer rather hard and
hundreds of employees were thrown out of the bakehouses.
It was an awkward situation for a Government pledged to Socialism. The
unionists had shouted for Socialism, yet when Socialism brought in
labor-saving machines, when, in fact, it hit the chap who shouted, he
objected. Socialism seemed alright "for the other fellow." It was like
the old story of the Irishman's pigs. He believed in sharing alike,
except regarding pigs--he happened to have a few.
The Socialist Government was in a quandary with its mob of unemployed
baker unionists, till the voice of the tempter came again.
The Syndicate quietly whispered, "Give us a little more power and we'll
absorb them."
They got it, and got further power as the Government installed
labor-saving machinery into other concerns; and for a while the
Syndicate proved a fine "haven of rest" for the out-of-work unionists,
so that the Government encouraged it even to the extent of absolving it
from having to pay income tax.
"You see," whispered the Syndicate in the ear of a harassed Premier, "it
would be unjust to have to pay you income tax on what you have to pay
us."
The "syndicate" idea began to appeal to the Governments of the other
States, which were now all Labor ruled. The fact that the British
Government had taken over private factories and distributed all profits
over 10 per cent., gave Socialism such an advertisement that before the
war had ended, Queensland and Victoria had joined the other Australian
States and declared for Labor.
The Syndicate idea appealed to Labor Governments.
It seemed an easy way to get rid of responsibility. Of course, the time
would come when the bill would have to be paid--but that was a matter
posterity would have to look at--and besides, as one Minister blatantly
shouted: "What has posterity done for us?"
CHAPTER XXVII.
The Rise of the "Syndicate."
The failure of the Australian manufacturers' campaign had its ludicrous
side.
Prior to the termination of the war, all their talk was based upon these
war-cries--"German manufacturers must be wiped off the earth." "Kill
German trade and you kill their capacity for mischief." "Smash Germany
now for all time." So "Trade only with the Empire and its brave Allies."
It was noticeable what fraternal consideration the manufacturers gave
"the brave Allies."
As they put it ... "Those brave brothers of freedom are fighting
shoulder to shoulder with the sons of the Empire, mingling their blood
upon the fields of Europe in the battle for the world's civilisation."
So the "Brave Allies" were mentioned on every pamphlet issued during the
war.
Of course, there were a few oversights regarding the Allies.
For instance, in an exhibition of manufactured goods, only the
"Australian-made" were given any prominence. There may have been some
"made by the brave Allies," but they were not very conspicuous.
It was also an oversight forgetting the "Brave Allies" when the U.S.A.,
taking the occasion of the stoppage of trade with Europe, joined hands
with the Australian Governments in encouraging trade across the Pacific.
But the "Brave Allies" were mentioned in all the after dinner
speeches--till the end of the war.
Then came a change. The manufacturers dropped their cloak of hypocrisy
and made a straight-out appeal--"Only Buy Goods Made in Australia." The
"Brave Allies" were dropped. Heavy duties were requested on all imported
goods, whether they were made in Britain, Belgium, Bagdad or
Beloochistan.
But the manufacturers were too late. They should have played that
trump-card nine months before. Their first duty should have been to
Australia. Their battle-cries from the beginning should have
been--"Australia First"; and: "By being true to ourselves we can best
contribute to Empire solidarity"; also: "The increased strength of the
units will mean the more powerful whole."
Then the soldiers began to return from Europe. They found the same
trouble their comrades were meeting in England, most of the jobs they
had left had disappeared.
Many of the employers who had loudly boasted that the jobs of those who
enlisted would be kept waiting for them, had done practically nothing to
keep their promise.
During the war, when they should have been busy keeping the wheels
moving, they had lost confidence.
They had forgotten that the times called for the best in every man and
woman; that the first duty of those who could not go to the fighting
line of Europe was to get in the fighting line of business at home; that
full speed at home was absolutely necessary not only to keep a level of
prosperity that would, at the end of the war, find the country well
prepared to meet the inevitable heavy taxation, but to keep business at
full strength so that when our soldiers returned they would have found
places ready to be filled.
They had forgotten that slump is often only a mental attitude, and that
even bad times can be bettered by putting an extra ounce into every
pound of business energy. They had forgotten that if everyone made a
move business would shift along at a faster pace. But they had done
nothing but talk; so trade slackened generally and lack of business made
many other vacant places besides those vacated by the men who went to
the Front.
Australia wanted a commercial Kitchener, to get together business
managers and labor leaders, and talk them into a better business
output.
Instead of uniting together for the one common end to speedily end the
war with credit to the Empire, politicians still kept up their bitter
contentious legislation.
Instead of concentrating the whole of Australia's political machinery on
the defence of the Empire and heartening the men with the knowledge of
whole-souled support and sympathy, Australian Labor Governments devoted
most of their attention to paltry party politics.
Instead of inviting workers to put in a little extra vim in time of
stress; in fact, to be a bit more generous in their output, the labor
leaders urged the workers to be more militant, to grip bad times as a
fitting occasion to demand more wages and less hours. So the employers
sat entrenched behind their desks, watching the political moves of the
workers, as the Allies peered at the Germans across the trench edges of
the Aisne--sat there till the soldiers came home and found no work to
do.
There were cheers for them when they went out and they got some more
when they came back, but they did not get much else. And they kept on
coming back. A foolish politician blurted out: "Those unemployed
soldiers are becoming a public nuisance."
The Federal Prime Minister, by whose Ministry the military forces were
controlled, was in a quandary.
On one side, the manufacturers were telling him how to solve the
problem.
"Put on thumping big taxes and help our factories to get busy, then we
can take on the unemployed soldiers."
On the other side, the importers were advising the Prime Minister to
drop the customs tariff and allow imports free. That, they explained,
would cheapen the cost of living, and those out of work would have a
better chance to live.
Then the "Syndicate," which had now grown to a great size, which, in
fact, was controlling Government work in all the States, had a long
consultation with the Prime Minister.
"Never mind the manufacturer," it said. "Remember, there are three
stages in this country's development--Pastoral, Agricultural, and
Manufacturing. The latter should be the last considered by Australia,
which is a pastoral and agricultural country. We can develop Australia
as it should be developed, by constructing irrigation schemes and
opening agricultural areas. We could solve your unemployed problem, give
your soldiers a good living wage and increase your country's prosperity.
All we ask is that the Federal Government follow the States' example,
and pay us 10 per cent. on the first five years expenditure, the whole
amount of which we shall return at the end of that period with five per
cent. added, provided you arrange with the States to give us, free of
taxation, land they do not require."
A hurried conference of State Premiers was called and the situation was
carefully studied. Unemployed were crowding Australian cities. Private
enterprise was being crippled by the heavy income taxes imposed by State
Governments to pay the increasing cost of the "Syndicates" controlling
the Public Works of the various States. It was admitted that these works
were being efficiently carried out, and being mostly railway and
developmental constructions, they would be productive when completed.
Still, with private enterprise choked off, investment was at a low
level. The manufacturer was also being hard hit, for although some of
the tariff duties imposed by the Federal Government helped him, each
State appointed a Necessary Commodities Commission to regulate prices.
The manufacturer, who was being helped by the tariff, had to pay high
wages to manufacture his goods, but the Commodities Commission prevented
him raising his prices so that he could not sell at a profitable figure.
He, therefore, shut down and threw another mob of unemployed on the
market.
Another factor that affected the matter was the great flow of
immigration forwarded to Australia from Europe.
The Great War had put a sort of terror into the souls of men, and the
fear of heavy taxation that threatened to follow drove them across the
seas.
Every boat carried its full complement; so that when the "Syndicate"
declared its intention to open up agricultural areas, each State
recognised that this would not only absorb the unemployed, but as land
development meant development in other quarters, a general prosperity
would naturally follow. Hence they vied with each other in offering free
of charge the choicest Crown lands.
The States recognised that the Crown lands had cost them nothing, and
that the Commonwealth, having control of customs and land taxation,
could easily raise the money for the cost of developing them.
So the "Syndicate" idea began to develop, and many capitalists who were
being driven out of Europe by the uprising of Socialism, came to
Australia and quietly invested in the "Syndicate" until the world saw
the anomaly of a Socialistic country having all its public works and
great armies of workers under the control of a capitalistic syndicate,
which was now getting the opportunity to extend its scope of action by
being offered tax-free land areas!
* * * * *
I will not soon forget the joy of having that letter from Australia. It
was the second I had received since the Great War began.
I read it to Helen in a pretty little house which was perched upon the
cliff above the Meuse, at Dinant, and which was our honeymoon home.
Madame had come in to spend some days with us, and as I read the letter
before the glowing fire, for it was in the winter of 1916, I could see
her eyes sparkle with interest.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
The Age of Brain Passes.
The war was a blessing to Germany. In cutting out the old military
system it gave wider opportunity for manufacturing. Young men, instead
of spending their days in military training, went into business, and
things boomed.
The war had caused a great outcry against German-made goods, yet when
peace came and dropped the barriers, the manufactures of Germany began
to flood the world.
Germany's indemnity of £1,000,000,000 could only be paid from its
manufactures, so the Allied nations took every opportunity to see that
those goods got into circulation.
Though British, Russian and French merchants during the war had tried to
"kill German trade," as money was urgently required the Allies had to
let it live, and see that it had a vigorous life in order to get their
indemnity without delay. That was why Australia, as well as other parts
of the British Empire, was advised to lift tariff restrictions on German
goods. It was an extraordinary request, and later on was to have a
world-wide effect.
I remembered a remark Nap once made to me during one of our yarns whilst
waiting behind the fighting lines on the Aisne for the dawn to call us
into the air.
"It's blamed hard," he said, "to have this war in our life time. It's
going to throw the world back thirty years, and thirty years in a
fellow's life is a mighty big hunk. This war had to come. The world had
been moving too quickly during the last ten years, which saw wireless,
flying, radium, and other marvellous stunts--in fact, the world had
rushed ahead so swiftly that it had to pull up to take breath. This war
is giving the earth breathing space, but it's going to take thirty years
to clear up the mess, wipe the stains away and patch mankind up
physically and mentally."
But time proved that Nap, like all the other gloomy prophets of bad
times, was wrong. The war speeded up things. Men, flushed with the
activity of the battlefield, came back quick-witted. Country louts and
city boys, who had been taken in hand and trained to physical perfection
for the battlefield, came back in twelve months--men.
There was prosperity everywhere. All Western Europe, with the exception
of Belgium had declared for Socialism. The Humanist (Socialist) trend of
things made high wages for the workers everywhere. But the capitalists
were being hit hard. Their factory profits were dwindling away under
Humanist rule, and as each one went under, the Government would take
over his business. Great estates were taxed and super-taxed, till the
owners had to relinquish them.
The Socialistic ideal of "all sharing the wealth of the wealthy" was
rapidly approaching, but bringing with it a social cataclysm.
There was no doubt of that. It was being hastened by the lessened output
of the workers. The ca-canny system ruled everywhere. With good pay for
little work there was no incentive to excel, and from "little work" to
"no work" was an easy step for many, as under the Humanist rule the
unemployed were also paid.
The people were rapidly losing self-respect. With their false idea of
equality, discipline was difficult to maintain, and lawlessness was
rife.
People were so sick of war that in most of the nations disarmament was
an easy matter. Even the German Navy, that was passed over to the Allied
nations at the termination of the war rapidly deteriorated from lack of
discipline and reduced votes for upkeep.
War was looked upon as a waste of blood and a waste of heroism, so the
manufacture of arms was declared to be illegal.
Invention practically ceased.
There was no incentive to invest, as the Humanists had gradually taxed
the capitalist out of existence; and it is interesting to note how time
proved that the capitalist was essential to inventive progress.
The State desired to improve the flying machine, as flying was still
confined to the aeroplane and the dirigible.
The then type of aeroplane could not rise or descend vertically, and
only kept in the air when at great speed. The dirigible balloon was of
the Zeppelin type, and was not always dependable.
It was decided to invent a machine that could easily rise and descend,
and could rest in the air and be independent of all atmospheric
conditions. So a State flying machine factory was commenced in England
on Salisbury Plain.
The first trouble arose when the building was being erected. Many
workers objected to what was called the waste of labor. It was pointed
out that under the Socialistic rule, the product of labor had to go to
labor, and as the building of the flying machine factory was not
producing food or clothing, and the workers on it had to be supported by
the labor of the whole community, it was making a distinct class of
them, which was illegal. However, the Government went on with the work.
The first machine made was not successful. Then an agitation ensued that
it was not equitable and just that the community should support any
labor engaged in such a foolish enterprise. It was demanded that the
factory should be closed, and the workers set at useful employment,
instead of being a burden on the state and reviving the old system of
classes.
I remember reading at the time that a leader in the experiments named
Cooley, pointed out that the successful machine would save much labor in
after years, by giving more efficient means of transport, and that when
the successful machine was built the whole community would enjoy the
result of the labor expended on it.
[Illustration: "The First Wright Aeroplane."]
He pointed out that in the production of the first aeroplane, the Wright
Brothers had spent years of effort in the solution of the problem of
aerial navigation, and that a vast amount of labor and material was
consumed before the first practical machine was made, so it was,
therefore, reasonable to consider that much expenditure of labor and
material would have to continue till the perfect machine was found, and
that it was worth it all to win that ideal means of transport. The labor
of the hand and brain to achieve the perfect flying machine would have
to be directed either by a capitalist or by the State. There were now no
capitalists, and it was, therefore, the duty of the State to take the
matter up notwithstanding the so-called waste of labor and material.
He pointed out that all industry involved waste. That millions of pounds
had been spent in experiments in evolving the machines we were using
to-day. He also mentioned that he remembered, when in America, that
millions of dollars were spent in attempting to tunnel under the Hudson
River, at New York, and that many failures were met with before the work
was successfully achieved.
He might also have mentioned that all this expense was borne by the
capitalist, and that if the State had had charge of it, the enormous
waste of money in experiments would have caused a public panic.
He pleaded that all great inventions were developed on expensive
experimenting, and the perfect flying machine could only be won in the
same way.
The State flying machine factory was, therefore, given another
opportunity, and the second flying machine was made. On its first test
it failed to rise, so the public objected to the mad enterprise and
refused to support the experiments in unprofitable labor. The factory
was closed, and the workers put at employment that "showed results."
I mention this incident of the flying machine, as the same opposition
was met in other branches of science.
Thus the spirit of invention was suppressed. There was no anxiety to
achieve, no desire for individual excellence. With invention ceasing the
Age of Brain went out--that Age of Brain that brilliant period in the
world's history which only covered one hundred years, yet saw the rise
and development of the most brilliant scientists the world had ever
seen!
Great brains rose in one brief space of a century, and gave the world
railways, steam navigation, electric telegraphs, the telephone, gas and
electric lighting, photography, the phonograph, the X-Ray, spectrum
analysis, anæsthetics, antiseptics, radium, the cinematograph, the
automobile, wireless telegraphy, and the aeroplane; all perfectly new
departures from anything previously devised!
That wonderful Age of Brain passed out, giving place to the Age of
Brawn!
It was the sunset of ambition, and the remarkable events that followed
are all so recent that to give details seems like telling news of
general knowledge.
CHAPTER XXIX.
The Trumpet Blast.
It will be remembered that, at the close of the European War, the allied
nations of Western Europe had requested Canada, India, Australia, and
Africa to open their ports to free admission of German-made goods. Those
colonies at first demurred, but assented and gradually drifted towards
independence.
During the war these colonies had sent their contingents to help the
Mother Country, and at the declaration of peace desired an Imperial
Federation throughout the British Empire, but the politicians in the
Humanist Government saw no profit in Empire connections. Sentiment had
no place in Socialistic policies.
Canada gave free trade to the United States of America, and the barriers
between India and the surrounding nations were dropped, whilst the
various parts of the British Empire gradually drew apart from Great
Britain.
In Asia, freedom of exchange between the nations had welded Russia,
India, China, Japan and Siam into a great federation of wonderful
prosperity. It was called "the United Nations of Asia."
The barriers of trade that formerly existed between these nations seemed
as absurd as a farmer dividing his farm into little plots and trying to
cultivate all kinds of plants on each plot instead of putting only wheat
in wheat land and corn in corn land.
As Owasi, the great Japanese statesman who brought about the coalition,
put it, "Let Asia have the intelligence to utilise its lands to the best
advantage. Let it develop each nation's products as the result of
natural selection. We can grow rice in India, we can grow wheat in
Russia. We can put up a high tariff wall and grow rice in Russia, if we
grow it in a hothouse; but it would not be so profitable as raising
wheat. Tariff walls are trade restrictions. They are as obsolete as the
great wall of China."
"But freedom of exchange will close up some industries," said a critic.
"Yes, if they are run at a loss," Owasi replied, "and besides, some one
must pay for that loss, and a loss to one nation instantly acts upon
others. Freedom of interchange of trade is reciprocal, both nations gain
or they wouldn't trade--and there is amity. When trade is restrained
competition commences. Competition soon becomes jealous of the
restricted territory and war begins. Commercial wars often begin with a
tariff and end with a shell. It is at first a commercial war, but as its
intensity develops the bullet and the shell come in. Artificial barriers
are obsolete in these days of flying. The airship should be the
peace-bringer of the world."
So Eastern and Central Asia developed into great producing nations with
the consequent desire for trade expansion--particularly with Australia
and with the markets of Western Europe.
The great Asiatic federation opened up close trade relations with
Australia. This movement, strange to say, had been predicted in Sydney
as far back as April, 1915, when at a public reception to some Japanese
journalists, it was pointed out that a most serious moment in the
history of Australia would occur when the Australian came back from the
big job in Europe, that when he had put his gun in the corner and had
taken off his coat for business, he would see the rapidly developing
nations of Eastern Asia about to dominate the Pacific trade, and that he
would then be wise if he decided at the outset to formulate a policy of
peaceful progress and preserve the closest and most friendly trade
relations with Japan and Eastern Asia.
Australia, therefore, joined in a trade treaty with Eastern Asia, but
Western Europe refused.
It considered that the flooding of its markets with cheap-made Asiatic
goods would mean serious opposition to home factories, which were being
run under high wages.
Belgium alone stood for freedom of trade exchange with Asia. This single
nation in Western Europe that had stood against Socialism was now a
nation of great manufacturing capacity, a country of wealthy people, a
haven for the thoughtful and the ambitious who were forced out of
Humanist nations. Belgium was the centre of European invention.
It could foresee trouble in restricting Asiatic desires for trade
exchange, and pleaded with the nations of Western Europe to open their
ports. It was pointed out, that out of 300 of the wars in the history of
the world, 272 were due to trade causes and only 28 were due to
religious or other causes.
It was pointed out that freedom of trade between German States had made
Germany so strong, that in 1914 it could fight a fifteen months war with
the greatest nations of the world.
But the Humanist nations, being non-militant, turned a deaf ear.
Then a threat of war came from Asia!
It came like a trumpet blast in the ear of a sleeping man, and it found
Western Europe unprepared--with its energy wasted under the rule of
Socialism, and with its armies and navies almost deteriorated out of
existence.
CHAPTER XXX.
Wilbrid Passes Out.
I remember it was the afternoon of Christmas Day, 1916.
Madame had come across to our little home at Dinant for a few days'
rest.
She had almost worked herself to sickness in her active campaign of
organising in preparation for the war-storm that threatened Europe.
We were sitting on the verandah, overlooking the river, when we noticed
far down the zig-zag track that led to the house, a black-cloaked
figure. It was coming towards us and walked with the aid of a stick. As
it approached, it brought to my memory a similar figure I had met on the
Coblenz road; and I told Madame the story of my meeting with Wilbrid.
"If that is Wilbrid," she exclaimed, "he is spying. He must not see me
here."
I explained that it could not be the Great Humanist, as, eighteen months
before, he had changed his clerical garb for that of a civilian; and
this figure was old and bent, whereas Wilbrid was tall and erect.
I then went down the track to investigate. Within a hundred yards, the
person stopped and raised his hand.
"Jefson," was all he said.
It was Wilbrid!--but old, careworn, and almost out of breath.
"Why this change?" I asked, as I came up to him and we moved to a seat
at the side of the track.
"I'm down and out," he said. "My mission failed." And his chin sank upon
the top of the hand-clasped stick. "The crowd did not understand. You
know that I began to preach the doctrine of the Humanist to help the
masses to come into their own. You know we won upon the wave of reaction
that followed the war. We should have stayed at that level and moved
along, but the momentum was too great, the pendulum had swung too far;
for when the masses ruled they sinned worse than the party they
supplanted. They became more bitter autocrats than the rulers we
suppressed.
"Instead of 'Justice for the People,' it was 'Brute Strength for the
Mob.'
"I could not stem the flood that I had let loose. Heaven only knows how
hard I tried, for when I pleaded that a moderate track be taken, the mob
insisted that I sought a place to dominate, and put me in the rut.
"To-day they fear no law of man or God. To-day their self-satisfaction
has made them indifferent to anything that elevates. I had led them into
a morass, and deeper in the mire have they rushed!"
He sat silent and watched the shadows creeping along the river.
"And what now?" I asked.
"I am going back--back to the monastery. I misread the world, I misread
human nature. I was one of the fools who think they know all the
statesmanship that controls the destinies of nations, who think their
petty untrained minds can grasp the great problems of diplomacy.
"I have found you can only qualify for high administrative posts by
unselfish study. You cannot create a statesman by the mere toss of a
coin at a political meeting. Though people fitted to rule and lead men
to build mighty nations are sometimes born in obscurity, they cannot
develop there.
"But I meant rightly--I meant rightly. In my ignorance I have played
with a sharp-edged weapon, and it is turning upon me and--civilisation."
"How?" I queried.
"A cataclysm is coming," he said. "I can feel it. No, it will not be
within Asia, as many people fear, but within Europe.
"The hasty structure of Humanism cannot stand. Even now it is toppling.
It is going to crash, and from the ruins another creed will rise, a
creed, I trust, more rational.
"I was passing home, so came to tell you."
Then Madame came down the track.
Wilbrid rose as she approached. His hand shook as he removed his black
broad-brimmed hat. They stood before each other for a moment without a
word.
For the first time, these leaders faced each other. Then Wilbrid bent
his head.
"You have won," he said. "You have won."
"It took you some time to find that out," she remarked, with a trembling
voice. "I could have told you that soon after you began. You cried for
the destruction of the very things that have made the world progress.
You aimed to destroy individuality and you did so--but only with your
own class.
"You have preached that all wealth is the result of labor, but now you
have realised that intelligent supervision is required to make labor
effective, and that brains are just as necessary to the world's
prosperity as is manual toil.
"You went out to reform society and level down; and your party no sooner
won some power than your women-folk tried to form a "social set" of
their own--you don't know women. You are as ignorant of their desires as
you are of your own. You do not know it is woman's instinct to be
something more than a drab. There is more of the divine spark in the
woman than in the man. It should be so with the producers of men. She
yearns for uplift, even if it be the sneered-at "society" you sought to
crush.
"You have only to note how, when Socialist politicians in any country
win any power, their wives crowd each other into those circles of
society, that husbands had won notoriety by attacking as "loafing on the
workers."
"You have only to note the social columns of the daily press of those
countries to see how anxious these wives of Socialist members are to
have their names in print that they have had "afternoon-tea" with ladies
of any title.
"Deep in the heart of every woman is respect for the title or the
decorative side of human life. A flower to her is something more than a
thing.
"You women will tell you you do not know them--and how could you?--you,
a man who lived the greater part of your life in a monastery apart from
your fellows, apart from the problems, apart from the battle against
conditions that make men--men. You, in the seclusion of your own kind,
conceived dreams of Utopian madness and you came forth and cast your
foolish fancies like a net upon the ignorant. And now you find your
failings; you see the petty smallness of your ideals and you
retreat--back into your abbey like a frightened crab creeping beneath
the cover of a stone."
"I know it now," said the crestfallen man. "We can only learn our
lessons through bitter experience."
He turned upon his heel as if to leave.
She was touched by the pathetic figure and held out her hand to him.
He took it in his and bent over it.
"Good-bye," he said. "I go home on this day of days, this day of 'peace
on earth and good will to men'--and alas! the world a seething mass of
discontent!"
I brought him to the house and gave him some wine to drink.
"Good-bye," he said. "God bless you." And he waved his hat as we watched
the careworn figure slowly stroll down the track and pass out of our
lives.
CHAPTER XXXI.
The Wonderful Month of War.
Then the great war crashed upon Europe, and it did not come from Asia!
Its sudden outbreak proved many things; first, that invention had not
been entirely exterminated; and second, that artificial laws could not
destroy the divine in humanity.
Above all, the war proved that brawn could not suppress the aspiring
flights of the brain; for during the socialistic era of "human
equality," men with more highly developed inventive faculties, men who
wished to cultivate the spirit that inspires the human to ever excel,
met in mysterious places and plotted!
They felt the time must eventually arrive when the unnatural social
position the Humanists adopted must overbalance itself; hence they
prepared for the impending cataclysm.
It is strange, in the history of the world, how a thread of sympathy
mysteriously binds together those whose souls are suffering from a
common tyranny.
Throughout Europe bands of scientific militants of both sexes met in
secret conclave and plotted for "Another Day."
Yet the great secrecy observed by these insurgents was unnecessary. The
Humanist policy of non-considering and non-observing, of suppressing
originality of thought as being useless in an age of equality, had
dulled the thinking faculty in its followers. Nature has no use for the
non-used, so the socialists were developing into living and working
human automata, in fact, taking life more like an advanced kind of
animal. Was it, therefore, any wonder that they were blind to the
developing danger?
The same circumstances quickened the inventive faculty of the oppressed.
Danger quickens intuition, and the spark of invention shone brightly in
many covert places.
Thought was, however, concentrated on one object, the quickest and
surest method of overthrowing the Humanist policy and installing an
ideal method of living in which not only would there be "equal
opportunities for all," which, though it was the policy of the Humanists
at their inauguration, had developed into "equal opportunities for
leaders," but there would also be the rule of "payment by results."
Inventive genius concentrated upon two objectives:--First, an ideal
method of secret communication between followers; and second, the most
efficient fighting machine--a weapon that would only require a minimum
of personnel to operate. With such a weapon, a small force, such as the
Individualists numbered, would be a match for a multitude.
The ideal means of inter-communication was invented by a Belgian. It was
simply the improvement of the method of transmitting and receiving a
certain type of ether wave through the earth. This wave did not need
aerials, and could only be received and transmitted through certain
instruments that were kept in sacred seclusion in secret places.
With these instruments followers were ever in close touch with each
other, and co-operative measures were detailed for the day of general
uprising.
The fighting machine was also invented by a Belgian. It was the ideal
flying machine, sought since the Wright Brothers conquered the air ten
years before.
The old style of aeroplane only kept in the air when at a great speed,
hence it could not hover. As a weapon of offence it had, therefore, many
disadvantages in bomb-dropping or other belligerent action. These
disadvantages increased according to the height from which the aeroplane
would have to operate; and as the German War of 1915 had improved the
range of air cannon, the old type aeroplane was almost useless for
offence purposes. The dirigible balloon, being lighter than air, was
not always dependable, and having also to operate from a great height,
the rarefied air in those regions seriously affected the gas carriers.
The Belgian "Heliocoptre" carried its propellers above the machine; the
axles, having "universal" joints, enabled them to revolve in any plane,
whilst engines, operating by means of powerful, non-clogging explosives,
generated the enormous power. These "Heliocoptres" were armed with great
"Thermit" shells, which, when they struck and burst, would not only set
free a paralysing gas, but would also produce a molten "thermit" mass of
a heat of over 5000 degrees, which could burn its way even through
armored plate.
It is too recent for me to detail, at length, the remarkable
circumstances following the prescribed day, when these machines
simultaneously rose in various cities, and after but a week's reign of
terror took possession of all Governments in the Humanist nations.
The people generally were not antagonistic to a change of rule. They
were tired of the unnatural life and almost listlessly waited
developments. These did not tarry, for within a very short period the
present systems of Commission Governments were adopted, and Royalties
were recalled to their various kingdoms as governing figureheads.
I only briefly mention this, the shortest war in history, because it was
so recent. Yet it had the greatest bearing upon human development.
Belgium came through it untouched, though it held the centre of
operations.
I shall never forget that wonderful month of war, and the almost
superhuman energy Madame displayed in assisting to direct operations. It
was not strange that her constitution collapsed under the remarkable
strain, and that for a while death hovered round the sick room. Her
complete recovery called for a long sea voyage, which explained why we
entered Sydney Harbor some weeks later.
CHAPTER XXXII.
What Happened in Australia.
I found Australia in a strange way.
Every State had a "socialistic" Government, and yet all public works
were controlled by combines of capitalists. The business interests of
these combines were so interlocked as to be one huge concern generally
known as the "Syndicate." It carried out all constructional works at a
percentage on the cost. The percentage and interest on the capital
invested were raised by the Commonwealth and State Governments mainly
from customs duties at first and, when these slackened, as they did
later, from land taxation.
It seemed strange to find that the Socialist Governments had actually
handed over the Australian States to the oft'-maligned capitalist; and,
stranger still, the people did not complain. The fact of the matter was
that the people had found that socialistic theories were very fine for
platform platitudes, but not for practical politics.
Australia learnt over again the lesson she should have remembered from
an experiment of twenty years previously.
It was the old story of "New Australia": the story that taught the world
that ideal socialism is impossible whilst human nature is as it is. And
yet Australia had forgotten it! It is strange that people rarely profit
from past failures. Countries as well as peoples usually insist on
buying their own experience, and the history of the socialistic
experiment in Australia between 1910 and 1917 was simply a repetition of
the great failure of William Lane's ideal.
It is interesting, at this stage, to study the analogy.
In 1890, a brilliant-phrasing Socialist, named William Lane, set
Queensland workers' minds aflame with his Utopian dreams of the ideal
socialistic life that could be lived on a large tract of country
offered them in the heart of South America. Three years later 250
Australians, including 60 single men and many single girls, put all
their wealth into a common fund and sailed away from Australia in a
specially chartered ship.
It was a unique experiment in Socialism. The men were not the scum of
cities, but enthusiastic and hearty individuals; clean-thinking
Irishmen, for the most part, trained in the tasks of settlement. All
were equal, and the warmest comradeship existed between men and women.
Here was the first weakness of the Socialistic creed: by all
contributing to a common fund, Lane had provided for communism of goods;
by recognising all children as belonging to the State he had provided
for communism of children; but as a father and a husband he feared
communism of morals. Hence he framed a regulation aimed to preserve the
conventional relations between the sexes, especially on board ship. To
prevent "flirtations" he issued a decree forbidding women to appear on
deck after sunset!
The first dissension arose through the women objecting to remain in the
stuffy atmosphere of the ship's hold below the water line from sunset to
sunrise, and, as each woman claimed equality with Lane, the notice was
torn down. Lane, however, produced a bundle of proxies from members of
the movement in Australia, so that his single vote constituted a
majority! He then assumed the post of dictator.
The party then split into two factions; one that believed in Lane, and
the other that objected to his despotic control and questioned his right
to allot to them the "dirty jobs," such as "washing up" and "scrubbing
the decks."
After many trying adventures the socialists reached the site of the
communistic settlement and found opportunity to study and compare
Socialism in practice and in theory. They had at last done away with the
bad old methods of capitalism, which "ground the people down and robbed
them of rest, energy, food and life"; so the "New Australians"
determined to avoid drudgery in their new life, and were very keen on
being properly "uplifted." There were a number of musical instruments in
the stores, so thirty-six socialists formed a band and practised
assiduously in the pleasant shade of the trees for a considerable
proportion of the time they should have been clearing timber and
building houses under the tropical sun.
Those who toiled hardest protested, but Lane, with a stern hand and a
revolver in his belt put down revolt and punished those who disputed his
decision by setting them the most disagreeable tasks.
Against Lane's decision there was no appeal. Three men disobeyed him and
he ordered them out of the colony. One of them had put £1000 into the
venture and wanted to argue. Lane, however, called in a posse of native
soldiers, armed to the teeth. They marched into the camp with fixed
bayonets, and the three malcontents were taken out and cast adrift.
One of the "faithful" wrote at this time:--
"We have surrendered all civil rights and become mere cogs in a wheel.
We are no longer active factors in the scheme of civilisation: in fact,
each man is practically a slave. Lane does the thinking; we do the work.
Result--barbarism!"
A third of the party soon broke camp and threw themselves upon the
charity of Paraguay. Those who stayed behind shortly afterwards expelled
Lane. With forty-five sympathisers he set out to establish another
Paradise!
Those who stayed behind drew up a series of regulations that made any
change a subject for universal discussion, and as the regulations were
being continually altered, public gatherings took up most of the day's
work. Convening meetings and arguing thereat was found much more
interesting than toiling in the hot sun; so practically little work was
done.
A Frenchman had a little farm close by and was making a small fortune
from it for himself, whilst thirty-five Australians next to him could
not make a living for each other! So much for the advantages of
Socialistic co-operation!
Soon the "New Australians" had to get busy to prevent starvation. One of
the many authoritative writers said:--
A brief but brilliant span of existence may be attained by a
Socialistic State living on the capital of its predecessors, but it
soon runs through the capital and goes out like a spent squib and
leaves a nasty smell.
(New South Wales also found this out ten years later.)
Instead of the "New Australians" getting busy and making the profits
that awaited the exploitation of the wonderful timber on their area,
they looked for easy work and fancied they found it in the cultivation
of ramie fibre.
The fibre failed; money was being exhausted; the leaders were faced with
two propositions. They had either to set the people at productive labor,
such as timber-getting, or raise money somehow, somewhere. They followed
the latter as being the easier task. So they sold to an outside
capitalist the exclusive right for three years of cutting timber on the
area. They sold it for an absurdly small consideration, to find later
that they were also prevented cutting wood for their own uses!
Although Lane had started a new colony, he made but two innovations. He
ruled that as woman's only sphere was in the home, he would abolish the
woman's vote. His other innovation for an ideal Socialist community was
the employment of cheap native labor. He thus revived the "wicked
capitalistic idea of cheap--nigger labor."
It was also found that the inclusion of the native element had a serious
effect upon the morality of the Socialists. There was a remarkable
increase of half-caste children without the formality of marriage with
the Paraguayians.
Communism was still advocated, yet to the communistic dining table each
man brought his private bottle of treacle, which he stowed away between
meals under his pillow or in some other secret hiding place. Children
grew up godless and ignorant and--Lane disappeared!
The original population was reduced to 22 men, 17 women and 51 children.
It was decided to abandon Socialism and let each man work for himself
instead of "each for all and all for each." Then things began to
prosper. The ambition of each was to become a capitalist. There was no
talk of an "eight-hour day"! From sunrise to sunset men, women, and
children worked, and in an incredibly short time houses rose, gardens
developed and later teachers came to uplift the children and to start a
Sunday School.
What is left of "New Australia" to-day is an average community of sane,
sober and hard-working farmers, taking as their motto: "What we have, we
hold"!
Yet the failure of that experiment was forgotten in the rush of
Socialistic legislation that gripped Australia before and during the
war; and the rise of the "Syndicate" saved Australia from a similar
wreck that followed the previous experiment.
The "Syndicate" idea began to develop. It became another name for
co-operation. The keen people at the head of it saw that its continued
success depended on the people having an interest in the profits of
their work, so they gave the public opportunity to share in it.
The "Syndicate" expanded its sphere of co-operation. Did a State factory
fail, then, if there was a chance of profit in the material it
manufactured, a co-operation "Syndicate"--a subsidiary branch of the
combine--took it over. The workers, supplanted by labor-saving
machinery, were taken up by the great farms the "Syndicate" was
developing throughout the country.
The "Syndicate," however, did not encourage manufacture unless the goods
could be made cheaper and better than they could be imported duty free.
It studied every new manufacturing proposition apart from any tariff
possibilities. The first point it considered was whether it was
advisable to establish in Australia a factory with necessarily expensive
power to compete with Canadian or other factories that utilised cheap
water power.
This policy naturally brought about two conditions. It established
manufacture on an honest basis by doing away with the necessity for the
usual political wire-pulling for the imposition of tariff duties, and it
gradually brought about free trade in goods not worth manufacturing in
Australia.
From an industrial point of view the "Syndicate" system revolutionised
the lot of the Australian worker. It fixed a minimum wage, much higher
than the then ruling rate, and instituted piece-work. The regular wage
was guaranteed whatever the output, and the piece-work rate was added to
it.
The "Syndicate" introduced scientific management and, from a business
point of view, considered men first and profits second. It knew that
better working conditions resulted in easier and more profitable work.
It considered the conditions of labor by grading employees. It studied
their equipment and noted if tools, benches or machines were best fitted
for the people who used them. It saw that a "five-foot" man was not
given a "six-foot" shovel, or that a short girl-worker was not sitting
on a seat that would be more comfortable for a tall girl. It fitted the
equipment to the worker just as a shoe is fitted to the foot.
It studied the work as well as the equipment. Each part of the work was
specially arranged to eliminate unnecessary movements until it became so
standardised as to give the worker the easiest way of doing it properly.
Working hours were shortened; yet more work was done. Each worker did
what he could do best. Profit-sharing was introduced in all ventures,
but it was based upon individual effort; in fact, the "Syndicate"
combine was a system of organisation and profitable co-operation, a
system that put the Socialist out of business.
Organisation and co-operation stopped the mad war upon private
enterprise and industry. It found the value of men lay in their ability
to think individually and act collectively. Trade Unionism did not do
that. It is true it helped the workman to secure higher wages, better
working conditions and shorter hours, but it was not satisfied with
that. It sought absolute ownership of factories and all means of
production, with evasion of responsibilities and no provision made
against deficits.
The Trade Unionist called for opportunity for all, but denied it to
those workers who could not afford to pay the entrance fee to the union.
Whilst the Trade Unionist, on the one hand, was getting highest wages
from private enterprise, on the other hand, he demanded from the State
cheap house rentals--as at Daceyville and other State-controlled
suburbs.
The Australian worker, therefore, practically lived upon Government
charity, until the Government was beggared and the capitalist
"Syndicate" providentially stepped in and saved the country.
It was well for Australia that the capitalists considered the
individual, and that it was just as good business to have efficient
machinists as well as efficient machines.
It was well for Australia that the capitalists knew the value of human
flesh and nurtured it. And Australia understood. In the stress of the
German War it had sobered up. It had dropped the Utopian dreams of the
impracticable and used its head. It saw an analogy in the system of the
"Syndicate," "Organisation and Co-operation," to a similar system that
had led them to victory on the battlefields of Europe.
The perfect organisation that military training gave, and the intense
co-operation the call of the blood demanded, instilled these two great
principles into Australian character.
The great German War was worth while to Australia.
It is evening as I write these concluding phrases. I look across Sydney
Harbor from my Cremorne home, and I see the city skyline edged with a
glistening fringe.
Beyond the distant hills of purple blue the sun is sinking in a saffron
sky.
Into the evening air the homeward 'planes are rising from the city park.
A faint report comes from the sunset gun and starts a train of vision
running through my mind.
I hear again the gun that brought me from the sky into the Forest of the
Argonne, and then "Nap" passes through my thoughts. (He is now in charge
of a Syndicate concern.)
Madame then comes into vision. (She is now the "gran'ma" of my home.)
Then Wilbrid totters across my field of thought.
And then Helen--but my reverie has ended....
She calls me in.
(The End.)
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