“Am I not? And listen further still, how I deal with the theme of the German character,—‘Moral obligations such as no nation had ever yet made the standard of conduct, are laid down by the German philosophers.’”
“Good,” I said, “gloriously funny; read me some more.”
“This, then, you will like,—here I deal with the permissible rules of war. It is on page 236 that I am reading it. I wrote this chiefly to make laugh our naval men and our Zeppelin crews,—‘A surprise attack, in order to be justified, must be made only on the armed forces of the state and not on its peaceful inhabitants. Otherwise the attack becomes a treacherous crime.’ Eh, what?”
Here the General broke into roars of laughter.
“Wonderful,” I said. “Your book ought to sell well in Scarborough and in Yarmouth. Read some more.”
“I should like to read you what I say about neutrality, and how England is certain to violate our strategical right by an attack on Belgium and about the sharp measures that ought to be taken against neutral ships laden with contraband,—the passages are in Chapters VII and VIII, but for the moment I fail to lay the thumb on them.”
“Give me the book, General,” I said. “Now that I understand what you meant by it, I think I can show you also some very funny passages in it. These things, for example, that you say about Canada and the colonies,—yes, here it is, page 148,—‘In the event of war the loosely-joined British Empire will break into pieces, and the colonies will consult their own interests,’—excellently funny,—and this again,—‘Canada will not permanently retain any trace of the English spirit,’—and this too,—‘the Colonies can be completely ignored so far as the European theatre of war is concerned,’—and here again,—‘Egypt and South Africa will at once revolt and break away from the empire,’ —really, General, your ideas of the British Colonies are superbly funny. Mark Twain wasn’t a circumstance on you.”
“Not at all,” said Bernhardi, and his voice reverted to his habitual Prussian severity, “these are not jokes. They are facts. It is only through the folly of the Canadians in not reading my book that they are not more widely known. Even as it is they are exactly the views of your great leader Heinrich Bauratze—”
“Who?” I said.
“Heinrich Bauratze, your great Canadian leader—”