The Land of Deepening Shadow: Germany-at-War

by D. Thomas Curtin

At four years of age the German male child begins to be a soldier. At six he is accustomed to walk in military formation. This system has a few advantages, but many disadvantages. A great concourse of infants can, for example, be marshalled through the streets of a city without any trouble at all. But that useful discipline is more than counterbalanced by the killing of individuality. German children, especially during the war, try to grow up to be little men and women as quickly as possible. They have shared the long working hours of the grown-ups, and late in the hot summer nights I have seen little Bavarian boys and girls who have been at school from seven and worked in the fields from three o'clock till dark, drinking their beer in the beer garden with a relish that showed they needed some stimulant. The beer is not Bass's ale, but it contains from two to five per cent. of alcohol. Unhealthy-looking little men are these German boys of from twelve to fifteen during the war. The overwork, and the lowering of the diet, has given them pasty faces and dark rings round their eyes. All games and amusements have been abandoned, and the only relaxation is corps marching through the streets at night, singing their hate songs and "Deutschland, Deutschland uber Alles."

The girls, in like fashion, often spend their school interval in marching in columns of four, singing the same horrible chants.

Up to the time of the scarcity of woollen materials, the millions of little German schoolgirls produced their full output of comforts for the troops.

The practical result, from a military point of view, of training children to venerate the All-Highest War Lord and his family, together with his ancestors, was shown at the beginning of the war, when there came a great rush of volunteers (Freiwillige), many of them beneath the military age, many of them beyond it. In most of the calculations of German man-power, some ally and neutral military writers seem to have forgotten these volunteers, estimated at two millions.

A significant change in Germany is the cessation of the volunteer movement. Parents who gladly sent forth their boys as volunteers, are now endeavouring by every means in their power to postpone the evil day in the firm belief that peace will come before the age of military service has been reached. It is a change at least as significant as that which, lies between the German's "We have won—the more enemies the better" of two years back, and the "We must hold out" of to-day.

Of the school structures in modern Germany it would be idle to pretend that they are not excellent in every respect—perfect ventilation, sanitation, plenty of space, large numbers of class-rooms, and halls for the choral singing, which is part of the German system of education, and by which the "hate" songs have been so readily spread. The same halls are used for evening lectures for adults and night improvement schools.

It is significant that all the schools built between 1911 and 1914 were so arranged, not only in Germany, but throughout Austria, that they could be turned into hospitals with hardly any alteration. For this purpose, temporary partitions divided portions of the buildings, and an unusually large supply of water was laid on. Special entrances for ambulances were already in existence, baths had already been fitted in the wounded reception rooms, and in many cases sterilising sheds were already installed. The walls were made of a material that could he quickly whitewashed for the extermination of germs. If this obvious preparation for war is named to the average German, his reply is, "The growing jealousy of German culture and commerce throughout the world rendered necessary protective measures."

A total lack of sense of humour and sense of proportion among the Germans can be gathered from the fact that Mr. Haselden's famous cartoons of Big and Little Willie, which have a vogue among Americana and other neutrals in Germany, and are by no means unkind, are regarded by Germans as a sort of sacrilege. These same people do not hesitate to circulate the most horrible and indecent pictures of President Wilson, King George, President Poincare, and especially of Viscount Grey of Falloden. The Tsar is usually depicted covered with vermin. The King of Italy as an evil-looking dwarf with a dagger in his hand. Only those who have seen the virulence of the caricatures, circulated by picture postcard, can have any idea of the horrible material on which the German child is fed. The only protest I ever heard came from the Artists' Society of Munich, who objected to these loathsome educational efforts as being injurious to the reputation of artistic Germany and calculated to produce permanent damage to the juvenile mind.

The atmosphere of the German home is so different from that in which I have been brought up in the United States, and have seen in England, that the Germans are not at all shocked by topics of conversation never referred to in other countries. Subjects are discussed before German girls of eleven and twelve, and German boys of the same age, that make an Anglo-Saxon anxious to get out of the room. I do not know whether it is this or the over-education that leads to the notorious child suicides of Germany, upon which so many learned treatises have been written.

Just before the war it looked as though the German young man and woman were going to improve. Lawn tennis was spreading, despite old-fashioned prejudice. Football was coming in. Rowing was making some progress, as you may have learned at Henley. It was not the spontaneous sport of Anglo-Saxon countries, but a more concentrated effort to imitate and to excel.