A WORD OF EXPLANATION.
May this book before quite leaving the hands of its author be permitted this word of explanation.
Its subject took its rise in, and derived its existence from, war. Without war it had no existence. The watchword, indeed one might almost say, the “war cry” of our country and of our people was “peace.” War was obsolete—out of date—out of taste—in fact, out of the question: hence there existed no need for providing relief for it; and thus the Red Cross has stood, unrecognized in the shadows of obscurity all the eighteen years of its existence among us, waiting for the sure, alas, too sure, touch of war, to light up its dark figure, and set in motion the springs of action.
A few believed, and like disciples, waited with it. If at any time, during that period, one had presumed to offer to the American public a book treating exclusively upon the Red Cross, the production would have found neither publishers nor readers; but now that the stroke of war has fallen and the interest comes home to ourselves, neither can wait for the book to be properly written, hence the unfinished and unsatisfactory condition in which it must present itself.
CONCLUSION.
In the foregoing pages is outlined the history of the American National Red Cross in peace and in war.
We have seen it grow year by year, from the persistent, almost unaccountable rejection of the Treaty of Geneva by our government for eighteen years. We have seen it beginning in the cordial recognition of Blaine, and Garfield, and Arthur, gradually increasing in the amount and scope of its labors, growing, in the slowly gained influence and support of public confidence, to its present condition of general recognition in all parts of our own country, and in the warm appreciation of all the nations that have acceded to the Treaty of the Red Cross. There is, we are happy to believe and to assure our readers everywhere, a warmth and an enthusiastic appreciation of the Red Cross that brings added honor to the country, and that everywhere recommends the principles and the practices for which the sacred symbol stands. No American citizen will hereafter travel in foreign lands any less securely since the American National Red Cross has been before him in Russia, and in Armenia, and in the high conferences where the treaty nations by their representatives from time to time assemble.
It is founded in the soundest and noblest principles, in the deep needs of human nature, and in the enduring instincts and feelings of mankind. It has come to quicken into fresh, new growth the best things in human life. Like the Banyan tree, wherever an auxiliary branch of the Red Cross exists, it will so drop roots into human character and life, that it will make it a parent trunk in turn to send out influences that shall bring other affiliating branches, so that it shall at last cover the earth with its grateful shade, beneath which the tramp of armed men shall cease, and the battle flags be furled. Then, although the original purpose and object of the Red Cross was indeed to heal the wounds and sickness incident to warfare, there will remain the work under the “American Amendment,” in which the Red Cross goes forth to heal other great ills of life.
The future of the Red Cross then will be worthy of the labors and sacrifices in which it originated, worthy of the care and tender solicitude with which its growth and progress has been watched and tended.
Into the hands of the coming generations it will be given as the best legacy that the All Father has at any time given to His children—the spirit and the power symbolized and consecrated forever by the Red Cross of Geneva.