New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1

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n Northern France. As most people know, his words ran: "It is my royal and imperial command that you concentrate your energies, for the immediate present, upon one single purpose, and that is that you address all your skill and all the valor of my soldiers to exterminate first the treacherous English and to walk over Gen. French's contemptible little army." The rudeness of the remark an Englishman can afford to pass over. What I am interested in is the mentality, the train of thought that can manage to entangle itself even in so brief a space. If French's little army is contemptible it would seem clear that all the skill and valor of the German Army had better not be concentrated on it, but on the larger and less contemptible allies. If all the skill and valor of the German Army are concentrated on it it is not being treat

rnack's

it equally in their instant and joyful recognition of the flaxen hair and light blue eyes of the Turks. But it is still the abstract principle of Prof. Harnack which interests me most, and in following it I have the same complexity of inquiry, but the same simplicity of result. Comparing the professor's concern about "Teutonism" with his unconcern about Belgium, I can only reach the following result: "A man need not keep a promise he has made. But a man must keep a promise he has not made." There certainly was a treaty binding Britain to Belgium, if it was only a scrap of paper. If there was any treaty binding Britain with Teutonism it is, to say the

When he wants to imagine what an Englishman is like he simply photographs the same German over again. In both cases there is probably sincerity, as well as simplicity. Haeckel was so certain that the species illustrated in embryo really are closely related and linked up that it seemed to him a small thing to simplify it by mere repetition. Harnack is so certain that the German

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d the sea by one or two twisted and narrow paths, as people find a subterranean lake. Thus the British Navy is really national because it is natural. It has cohered out of hundreds of accidental adventures of ships and shipmen before Chaucer's time and after it. But the German Navy is an artificial thing, as artificial as a constructed Alp would be in England. William II. has simply copied the British Navy, as Frederick II. copied the French Army, and this Japanese or antlike assiduity in imitation is one of the hundred qualities which the Germans have and the English markedly have not. There are

patriotism and religion, as have the English and the French. Nay, the mistake of Germany in the modern disaster largely arose from the facts that she thought England was simple, when England is very subtle. She thought that because our politics have become largely financial they had become wholly financial; that because our aristocrats had become pretty cynical they had become entirely corrupt. They could not seize the subtlety by which a rather used-up English gentleman might sell a coronet when he could not sell a fortress; might lower the public standards and yet refuse to lower the flag. In short, t

trength of

that he is contradicting himself has a great advantage in controversy, though the advantage breaks down when he tries to reduce it to simple addition, to chess-or to the game called war. It is the same about the stupidity of the one-side

eason or record-a potential infinity of excuses. If the English had been on the German side the German professors would have noted what irresistible energies had evolved the Teutons. As the English are on the other side, the German professors will say that these Teutons were not sufficiently evolved; or they will say they were just sufficiently evolved to show that they were not Teutons. Probably they will say both. But the truth is that all that they call ev

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yers letter the other day, so effectually answered by Gen. Botha. But such instances, I believe, are so rare that really they are the exceptions which seem to prove the rule. Of course, it goes without s

frica. This party overlooks the fact that the Germans have for long been preparing to invade them; also that if by

e visited India, Australia, New Zealand, Newfoundland, and Canada. I have recently traveled throughout South Africa as a member of the Dominion's Royal Commission. It was my first visit there after the lapse of a

ar. South Africa, down to its lowest Hottentot, has, I believe, but one object, to help England to win in this vast battle of the nations. Why, even the natives, as you may

ers, which had their roots in foolish and inconsistent acts carried out by the Home Gover

ey before the Boers were finally subdued. Only about half a score of years have gone by since peace was declared. Within two or three years of that peace the British Government m

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history of the world, so shortly, at any rate, after a prolonged and bitter struggle to the death. I might give many instances, but I will only take one. At Pretoria I was asked to inspect a company of Boy Scouts, and there I found English and Dutch lads serving side by side with the utmost brotherhood. Again I met most of the men who had been leaders of the Boers in the war. One and all professed the greatest loyalty to England.

liberty and the fullest powers of self-government, plus the protection of the British fleet. There may be something in this view, but I am sure tha

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case of South Africa. The German war lords hoped that India and Egypt would rise, they trusted that Canada and Australia would prove lukewarm, but they were certain that South Africa would seize the opportunity to rebel. How could it be otherwise, they thought, seeing that but yesterday she was at death grips with us. Then came the great surprise. Lo and behold! instead of rebelling, South Africa promptly cabled to England saying that every British soldier might be withdrawn from her shores, and, further, that the burghers of the land would themselves unde

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, I suppose it must be almost twenty years ago, sending to the late Mr. Chamberlain, who was then Colonial Secretary, information to this effect which reached me from undoubted sources in South Africa. Again, not long ago, I was shown a document which was found among the papers of the Zulu Prince Dinizulu, son of King Cetewayo, who died the other day. It was concluded between himself and Germans, and under it the poor man had practically sold his country nom

old, I do not know with what accuracy, that they have accumulated there the vast arsenal of war material that was obviously intended to be used on some future occasion in the invasion of the C

Hugueno

utch against all the power of Spain. Well, the Boers are descended from these men and women (for both fought). Also, they include a very large dash of some of the best blood of Europe, namely, that of the Huguenots. For instance, Botha himself is of Huguenot descent. It is impossible for a person like myself, who have that same blood in me, to talk with him for five minutes without becoming aware

the only man who knows all the inner political history of that event. Afterward I held office in the Transvaal, and was in the country during all the disastrous period of the first Boer war. For instance, I dined with Gen. Colley the night before he started on his ill-fated expedition. I thin

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aal, in 1877, and with my own hands hoisted the British flag over the land, I listened to my health being proposed by the Dutch Chief Justice of the Transvaal territory, once more a part of the British Empire. Such was my greeting everywhere. Three and thirty years before I had left the shores of Africa, believing that soon or late the British power was doomed to failure and probably to extinction there. When I left them again, six months ago, it was with the glad knowledge that, by the united wish of the inhabitants

aggard's Dea

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by Private C. Derry of the Second Battalion, Welsh Regiment. It concerns the fall of my much-l

young widow, and other members of our family, to give the rest of it as it was collected by them from the lips of Lieut. Somerset, who lay wounded by him when he died

ning the other men. Arrived at the Maxim in front of him, with the rifle which he was using as Derry describes, he shot and killed the three soldiers who were serving it, and then was

UPTMANN. S

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h from time to time he uttered in his agony, will not soon be forgotten in his regiment. Of that end we who mourn

ame, but by the noble manner of their end they give the lie to Bernhardi and his school, who tell us that we English are an effete and worn-out people, befogged with mean ideals; lost in selfishness and the lust of wealth and comfort. Moreover, t

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onsiderably changed, and I hope that our people will see that it is primari

es of their political philosophers, and that they have heartily consented to do this and freely commit every cruelty that

and proper means of attaining success in all things. Shortly, you are not to do to others as you wish they should do to you, but you should

only as utilitarian policy, it is stupid; and that they blundered in neglecting the moral force (for that is also a force) of the antagonism that they were bound to arouse in all gentle minds, whether simple or cultured. It was stupid of them not to perceive that their hellish principles would shock e

ting in the holy cause of humanity and the law of love. If the advocacy of their bad principles and their diabolical conduct do not set the whole world against them, then the world is worse than I think. My belief is that there are yet millions of their own countrymen who have not bow

pretended and ill-conceived. The particular contention against us-that we were betraying the cause of civilization by supporting

nd wherever it goes it will leave desolation behind it and put all material progress back for at least half a century. There was never anything in the worl

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Artists'

enhove, Art Adviser to the Belgian Government. Those who have signed include well-known collectors, Trustees of the British Museum, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, and the National Galleries of Scotland; the Director and Principal Librarian of the British Museum; the Directors of the National Galle

are on helpless inhabitants of Belgium and France, and on ancient buildings and other w

standpoint; but it seems certain from present information that in some signal instances, notably

e Ages which have been destroyed or damaged are the inheritance of the whole world, and that it is the duty of all civilized communities to endeavor to preserve them fo

vasion of Belgium and France by the German Army, and we wish to enter a protest in the strongest terms against the continuance of so barbarous and reckless a pol

ty, but we feel compelled to publish to the world our horror and detestation of the barbarous acts committed by t

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