Within a very short time a Labor member of Parliament, J. Ramsay Macdonald, rises in his place, able and fearless, and, on the basis of the "White Paper," as published and put in the hands of the British public, attacks Sir Edward Grey for having so committed Great Britain in advance to both Russia and France that, in spite of the representations of the German Ambassador, he dared not discuss the question of neutrality. This member of Parliament manifestly belongs to the powerful anti-war party of Great Britain, a party two of whose members, John Burns and Lord Morley, resigned from the Cabinet rather than condone iniquity; a party which before the outbreak of the war made itself heard and felt, and protested against the participation of Great Britain, desiring localization of the struggle.
Mr. Macdonald says that in his opinion this talk about the violation of Belgian neutrality, from the point of view of British statesmen, is absurd, because as long ago as 1870 the plans for the use of Belgium, both by France and by Germany—in other words, the violation of its neutrality—were in the British War Office, and that Mr. Gladstone rose in his place and said he was not one of those whose opinion was that a formal guarantee should stand so far in thwarting the natural course of events as to commit Great Britain to war; and that has been the announced and avowed policy of Great Britain all the way down since 1870, and that therefore talk about the violation of Belgian neutrality is a mere pretext.
That is another instance of this secret agreement that goes on, which so commits a man like Sir Edward Grey that in the pinch, when the German Ambassador substantially proposed to yield everything to him and asked him for his proposition, he cannot make any.
These facts are in the "White Paper." As far as I know, no editor in the United States who claims to have studied thoroughly that "White Paper" has ever brought this out, and they had not been published in that paper at the time when Sir Edward Grey and Mr. Asquith made their respective speeches and committed the British Nation to the war.
Another unhappy use of language which has been noted in the public press is due to the literal translation of words. Americans simply do not know what the word Emperor means. To most of them it connotes the later Roman Emperors, or the autocratic Czar of Russia, or the short-lived but autocratic quality of Napoleon III., so that when we use the word Emperor we are thinking of an absolutely non-existing personage, unless it be the Czar of Russia.
We like very much to make sport of phrases from languages unfamiliar to us, and we enjoy the jokes of ludicrous translations, and so we take the term "Oberster Kriegsherr" and we translate it "Supreme War Lord." What conception the average American forms of that is manifest. Whereas, as a matter of fact—and this has already been pointed out both in conversation and in public prints—the term means nothing in the world but Commander in Chief of the German Empire, has not any different relation whatsoever in the substance of its meaning than that which Presidents of the United States have been in time of supreme danger to the country. Mr. Lincoln was just as much an "Oberster Kriegsherr" at one period of his term as the German Emperor could ever be; in fact, rather more.
Sherman's March to the Sea.
In truth, the sense of outrage which Americans feel over the horrors of war, while most creditable to them, is very often based upon an ignorance of the rules and regulations of so-called civilized warfare, and upon a sentimentality, which, though also very creditable, is unfortunately not one of the factors in the world's work. It would not hurt Americans occasionally to recall Sherman's march to the sea, during which every known kind of devastation occurred, or to recall Gen. Hunter's boast that he had made the Valley of Virginia such a desert that a crow could not find sustenance enough in it to fly from one side to the other, and yet at that time, in what we considered the supreme danger to our country, the conduct of those men was approved, and they themselves were almost deified for their actions.
While parallels are dangerous and the existence of one wrong does not make another action right, yet at the same time a very considerable amount of open-mindedness must be exercised in a neutral country when regarding the passionate devotions of combatant nations to their culture, to their safety, to their interest; and it should be recalled that in the heats and horrors of war it is extremely difficult, however trained or disciplined troops may be, to prevent outrages, and that so far as we have gone in accurate information the least that can be said is that it is slowly dawning upon us that horror for horror and outrage for outrage there has been no overwhelming balance on either side.
The Allies (this interview was received Tuesday morning) firmly believe that the struggle on the west is so indecisive up to this time that what will count for them is the duration of the war. Lloyd George has just said, not in the exact language, but virtually, what Disraeli said in 1878: "We don't want to fight; but, by jingo, if we do we have got the ships, we have got the men, we have got the money, too." Those are the words that brought into use the expression "jingoists."