Up from the land of fair Provence,
Land of the vineyard and olive green,
Flushed with a new hope's radiance
Glow of glorious visions seen,
Joyous Marseilles' Battalion came,
Singing a song since known to fame.
List as the drums the quickstep beat!
List to the Chant of Liberty!
Ringing through dawn or noonday heat—
"Allons enfants de la Patrie!"
List to the chant on the dusty way,
"Death to the tyrant! Vive le Marseillais!"
Orchards and vineyards caught up the song,
France seemed but waiting that martial lay,
Born of poet's heart-beats strong!
Sung by the sons of the South that day,
Voicing the hero-soul of strife,
Marching song of a nation's life!
Days of Terror that chant ushered in,
Falling of thrones and baubles and crowns—
Bastille walls and guillotine,
Sack of Tuileries, Temple frowns.
Heard that Chant of the Marseillais,
"Le jour de gloire est arrivé."
Reds of the Midi! The song you sung
Thrilled the hearts of all who heard!
Song of a people with hearts tense-strung,
Rhythm that every pulse quick stirred!
Echoes that song as France now pays
Honor to singer of "La Marseillaise!"
Depression—Common-Sense and the Situation
By Arnold Bennett
Copyright, 1915, by Arnold Bennett
The pessimistic attitude toward the military situation assumed by a large part of British society, after the arrival of warm weather, without the heralded concerted advance of the Allies in France and Belgium, is dealt with by Mr. Bennett in the subjoined article, which appeared in the London Daily News of June 16, 1915. It is here reproduced by Mr. Bennett's express permission.
IN a recent article I said that for reasons discoverable and undiscoverable the military situation had been of late considerably falsified in the greater part of the Press. This saying (which by the way was later confirmed by the best military experts writing in the Press) aroused criticism both public and private. That it should have been criticised in certain organs was natural, for these organs had certainly been colouring or manipulating their war news, including casualties, chiefly by headlines and type, and even influencing their expert analysis of war-news, to suit what happened to be at the moment their political aims.
Even the invasion scare was last week revived by the "Daily Mail" as an aid to compulsion. The "Daily Mail" asserted that, whatever we might say, invasion was possible. True. It is. Most things are. But invasion is responsibly held to be so wildly improbable that our military, as distinguished from our naval, plans are permitted practically to ignore the possibility. Compulsion or no compulsion, those plans will be the same. They will be unaffected by any amount of invasion-scaring, and therefore to try to foster pessimism in the public by alarums about invasion is both silly and naughty.
Newspapers quite apart, however, there has been in the country a considerable amount of pessimism which I have not been able to understand, much less sympathise with; pessimism of the kind that refuses to envisage the future at all. It has not said: "We shall be beaten." But it has groaned and looked gloomy, and asked mute questions with its eyes. It has resented confident faith and demanded with sardonic superiority the reasons for such faith.
Of the tribe of pessimists I count some superlative specimens among my immediate acquaintances. The explanation of their cases is, I contend, threefold. First, they lack faith, not merely in the Allied arms, but in anything. They have not the faculty of faith. Secondly, they unconsciously enjoy depression, and this instinct distorts all phenomena for them. Thus they exhibited no satisfaction whatever at the capture of Przemysl full of men and munitions by the Russians, whereas the recapture of Przemysl empty of men and munitions by the Germans filled them with delicious woe. Thirdly, they lack patience, and therefore a long-sustained effort gets on their nerves. Others I can inoculate with my optimism, but the effect passes quickly, and each succeeding reinoculation has been less and less effective, with the monotonous questioning, ever more sardonic in tone: "How can you be deluded by the official bulletins?" or: "What do you know about war, to make you so cocksure?"