Part 20

France has suffered in her ravaged fields and in her ruined villages. The freed provinces have had to submit to intolerable, vexatious, and odious outrages, but you are not to answer these crimes by the commission of violences, which, under the spur of your resentment, may seem to you legitimate.

You are to remain under discipline and to show respect to persons and property. You will know, after having vanquished your adversary by force of arms, how to impress him further by the dignity of your attitude, and the world will not know which to admire more, your conduct in success or your heroism in fighting.

I address a fond and affectionate greeting to our dead, whose sacrifices gave us the victory. And I send a message of salutation, full of sad affection, to the fathers, to the mothers, to the widows and orphans of France, who, in these days of national joy, dry their tears for a moment to acclaim the triumph of our arms. I bow my head before your magnificent flags.

Vive la France!

(Signed) PETAIN.

Translated from the French of Alphonse Daudet.

THE CALL TO ARMS IN OUR STREET

There's a woman sobs her heart out, With her head against the door, For the man that's called to leave her, --God have pity on the poor! But it's beat, drums, beat, While the lads march down the street, And it's blow, trumpets, blow, Keep your tears until they go.

There's a crowd of little children That march along and shout, For it's fine to play at soldiers Now their fathers are called out. So it's beat, drums, beat; And who will find them food to eat? And it's blow, trumpets, blow, Oh, it's little children know.

* * * * *

There's a young girl who stands laughing, For she thinks a war is grand, And it's fine to see the lads pass, And it's fine to hear the band. So it's beat, drums, beat, To the fall of many feet; And it's blow, trumpets, blow, God go with you where you go.

W. M. LETTS.

THE KAISER'S CROWN

(VERSAILLES, JANUARY 18, 1871)

The wind on the Thames blew icy breath, The wind on the Seine blew fiery death, The snow lay thick on tower and tree, The streams ran black through wold and lea; As I sat alone in London town And dreamed a dream of the Kaiser's crown.

Holy William, that conqueror dread, Placed it himself on his hoary head, And sat on his throne with his nobles about, And his captains raising the wild war-shout; And asked himself, 'twixt a smile and a sigh, "Was ever a Kaiser so great as I?"

From every jewel, from every gem In that imperial diadem, There came a voice and a whisper clear-- I heard it, and I still can hear-- Which said, "O Kaiser great and strong, God's sword is double-edged and long!"

"Aye," said the emeralds, flashing green-- "The fruit shall be what the seed has been-- His realm shall reap what his hosts have sown; Debt and misery, tear and groan, Pang and sob, and grief and shame, And rapine and consuming flame!"

"Aye," said the rubies, glowing red-- "There comes new life from life-blood shed; And though the Goth o'erride the Gaul. Eternal justice rides o'er all! Might may be Right for its own short day, But Right is Might forever and aye!"

"Aye," said the diamonds, tongued with fire; "Grief tracks the pathways of desire. Our Kaiser, on whose head we glow, Takes little heed of his people's woe, Or the deep, deep thoughts in the people's brain That burn and throb like healing pain.

"Thinks not that Germany, joyous now, Cares naught for the crown upon his brow, But much for the Freedom--wooed, not won-- That must be hers ere all is done,-- That gleams, and floats, and shines afar, A glorious and approaching star!"

"Aye!" said they all, with one accord, "He is the Kaiser, King, and Lord; But kings are small, the people great; And Freedom cometh, sure, though late-- A stronger than he shall cast him down!" This was my dream of the Kaiser's crown.

CHARLES MACKAY--1871.

THE QUALITY OF MERCY

There is an old saying, "Like king, like people," which means that the king is usually not very different from the people whose executive he is. If this is true of kings, it surely must be true of American presidents. With this in mind, contrast the German Kaiser, William II, with Abraham Lincoln. The first constantly talked of himself and God as ruling the world. Boastfully declaring that he was the greatest of all men and that he ruled by divine right, the former German emperor brought upon the world the greatest evil that has ever befallen it through selfish ambition for himself, his family, and for the German autocracy; the other claiming to be a common man, a servant of men, seeking no riches, no throne, no personal power, entirely unselfish, gave his life at last to save a united democracy. Shall we not say that Lincoln served by the right of the divine qualities in him, while the Kaiser turned the world into a hell because of the selfish aims of his nature--aims that are just the opposite of divine?

During the American Civil War, Mrs. Bixby, a Massachusetts mother, lost five sons. President Lincoln wrote her the following letter:--

"I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom."

During the World War, Frau Meter, a German mother, lost nine sons. Kaiser William wrote her the following letter:--