As soon as we arrived at Eytkunen, the German inspector asked to see our passports, and seeing on mine no visa by the German authority, I was told to return to Berlin for the necessary signature. I informed him that the consul of Switzerland in New York put the visa on my passport, permitting me to cross Germany. This was not sufficient as the Swiss consul had lost this authority at the termination of the war. Fortunately the Lithuanians whom I met at Eytkunen appealed to the Mayor of Virbalis, a city of Lithuania, who came to Eytkunen and obtained my release.
What a joy it was when a German soldier came to me while I was preparing to return to Berlin and told me to proceed to Lithuania. He led me to the train leaving for Vilkaviskis.
I was very anxious to see that part of the country for I was well acquainted with it thirty-six years ago. I saw that Lithuania is more devastated than Belgium. The Germans crossed through Belgium once only, while Lithuania had been the regular battlefield for the German and Russian armies. It was alternately captured and recaptured by the contending armies. When the Russian army was fleeing it destroyed whatever opportunity afforded, likewise the German army in its retreat carried everything in its wake, pillaged, burned and destroyed whatever it could not take. I noticed in particular one village which had been, only a few trees were visible. Numerous farm houses had been destroyed and burned to the ground. People now live in huts made partly of straw, old boards and clay. Not only the war, but nature has made changes in Lithuania. Rivers, such as the Seimena and Sirvinta, are only brooks. As we approached Vilkaviskis, my native town, the passengers called my attention to the station. My imagination failed to picture the rudely constructed hut as the same station of former years, which had been entirely destroyed by the invading army.
When I descended from the train, my sister's son-in-law, whom I had seen in Germany ten years ago, recognized me and conducted me to his home nearby. After spending a few happy hours with my friends and relatives I proceeded to the rectory. The next morning I was fortunate indeed to say mass for the first time in the church in which I was baptized. That afternoon at a meeting of the Lithuanian Sales Corporation, I lectured on American Lithuanians and Americans in general. Monday I went to Kaunas, or Kovno, to meet the [A]President of Lithuania, Anthony Smetona, to extend to him the congratulations of the Lithuanian Total Abstinance Organization of America.
[A] When I presented to the president of Lithuania, Mr. Anthony Smetona, the said recommendation of the Lithuanian Total Abstinance Organization in America, which is indeed a suggestion to introduce the prohibition of the manufacture and sale of intoxicating drinks in Lithuania—in other words, to imitate the American government in this respect, he expressed himself sufficiently in favor of it, but it is quite self-evident that he, as the President of Lithuania alone, cannot accomplish it. In our conversation he made a suggestion to me that I should strive to get a chance to speak publicly in Kaunas and in other places as much as possible on the subject of total abstinance, to which I expressed my hope that some of the priests of Kaunas, no doubt, would give me a chance there. Then the President said to me: "I have read in the Lithuanian American newspapers so much of you as the apostle of total abstinance among Lithuanians in America, I wish you would do the same here." In Lithuania the opportunity to speak to the people is offered only on Sunday, and in that case it is better in the church. So I had an opportunity on Sundays and delivered sermons in seven churches. In one a good number of priests as guests were assembled and listened to my sermon. They were pleased and at dinner table were discussing about American prohibition. A great many of them are boldly opposed to it; some even expressing their doubt about total abstinance. But they all were curious to know what those Lithuanians will do who were arrested and punished for manufacturing at home and selling intoxicants without the license of the government, after hearing of that sermon in the church. Lithuanians in Lithuania have learned from the Germans when they were in occupation, not only how to make intoxicants, but also soap, sugar, etc.
At first I considered it might be an insult to speak about total abstinance in Lithuania, after the horrible war; that those people could not get any attraction to intoxicants having witnessed such horrors of the war. But I was soon informed by some good souls of the necessity of total abstinance and of the dangers and temptations of many to intoxication. So I could not part with Lithuania without making an effort to sow the seed that might produce some good effects in the field of total abstinance.
As soon as I came to Boston and Worcester the Lithuanian Total Abstinance Central Committee held its quarter-annual convention and caught me unexpectedly and cross-examined me on the situation in Lithuania. I was obliged to give an account of all I had done in Lithuania for total abstinance and prohibition. I told them that the President alone could not introduce prohibition, and that they will wait until a general convention of Lithuanians will take place. Then they appointed me to write to the President for an official answer to their communication, and that I should strive to find some way by which the Total Abstinance Organization of America could unite in co-operation with the same organization in Lithuania. So I undertook to do so, and am trying now to perform my obligation, but at present the correspondence with Lithuania is very slow.
The President of Lithuania was very thankful to the Americans and Lithuanians for the help they so generously extended to alleviate the sufferings of the people committed to his care. I visited the institution for teachers, called "Saules Namai", the Home of the Sun, which was almost miraculously saved from the devastations of war. While speaking of this institution I must also say a few words about the vast difference in spirit of the Lithuanians of the past and present. In former years the parents were free to send or not to send their children to school under the regime of the Czar. Few parents grasped this opportunity for they despised education, saying our forefathers were very good people without education, so we and our children will remain without it. I was very much surprised to see the spirit among the Lithuanians today. The young and old are eager to learn, to educate, to build schools and institutions of learning. The larger cities have gymnasiums or higher schools for girls and boys. They are creating new organizations to support these institutions and are exerting to the utmost to preserve them.
The Spirit of Patriotism
I would not dare to undertake to describe to you the spirit of patriotism of the Lithuanians in their native land, for I am a Lithuanian, and some may say that it is quite natural to praise one's own. But what I have heard from their enemies, the Germans, would seem to be legitimate. Even they are amazed to see the patriotic spirit of the Lithuanians, especially young boys eighteen and nineteen years of age who are so anxious to defend their liberty. They are presenting themselves in great numbers to the officials of the present government to be enrolled in the army, but for the lack of ammunition and clothing great numbers are turned away. In my conversation with some of these soldiers I asked them if they really thought they could defend their country from the yoke of their oppressors. Their answer was: "We will not submit to any yoke; we know well that our fathers and forefathers suffered for so many centuries, and we in turn shall defend our liberty to the last drop of blood." One of these soldiers was preparing to return to war against the Kolchakians and Germans, to expel them from the city called Siauliai, which they had lately occupied. After repulsing the Bolshevik from the Dvinsk, they had a few weeks' rest and then marched to Kaunas.