Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1912-12-14

her moral courage is being tried 20
the utmost, and it has compared fav
Orably with the physical courage dis
iplayed by the men in the field. Nat
uraIly proud and patriotic to the core.
she would scorn to betray her vocation
as the encouTager and helpmeet of the
cOmbatants. For it is the women of
Servia who have. even more than the
men, kept alive the old religion, the
old traditions, the old ideals They
have been the motive power and the
great incentive which have inspired
the men TO war; they have whetted
their appetites for battle While the
man will fight to protect wife and
home. the woman, without thought of
H individual home, sends him forth, to
Il death maybe, for country only. No.
thought of self enters into the almost
i incredibly disinterested attitude to-
ward her country, unless it is that she
so Identifies herself with it that il be-
! comes a part of herself. Here it is
the better part, for no sacrifice de-
/ manded is Considered sufficiently
great. .. f ....:.e -.
1 Like most of her sex, the Servian
woman knows how to wait. Her life
/ is divided into periods of waiting
marked off by great days. The day
Iof her marriage is the first of real
happiness, but she takes it in a mat
ter-of-fact way. Up to a very short
time ago, marriage was the inevitable
goal, not to say fate, of every girl,
and came as matter of course. There
! is never any doubt as to the possibil-
! ity of getting married. There are
plenty of men to pick from, and a
! dowry and trousseau have been con-
tinually increasing since her baby
1 hood None of the initial obstacles
that may obtain in other lands exist
! for her.
Proud OF Son.
A really great day comes when she
finds herself the mother of God-sent
'junak, hero. man child, for her
{ orear as a soldier A baby-girl is held
10 be of little account in comparison
When a. mother bends over her little
sleeping son, her thoughts are all of
the latent combantant, the Fighter of
her country's wrongs, the deliyerer of
her oppressed brethren. 1t is her mis-
SION to train him in the path of pat
rfotic love and<duty, it is his to Justi- /
fy that training. Her lullabies are the
long Servian epics of almost world
wide fame that she learned on by
heart at school, and she sings them to ]
the weird and melancholy melodies |
that the village "guslars" Groom on
their two-stringed instrument.
When a little boy is old enough, he |
is invested with the picturesque attire |
CT the country. The peasants muslin |
shirt and short ducks are most appro-
Pirate, and with his brightly-colored |
belt into which is stuck toy re-
.yolver, he looks very martial. Four
childish toys and adopting serious
political opinions. The public schools |
playground is often a hotbed of po-
litics and the nursery of statesmen,
though at heart everybody is primarily |
soldier. ..z
Every Boy Soldier. /
When her son attains his eighteen
summers, another great day comes to
his mother, for he now assumes the /
uniform of the military cadet, or of a.
simple recruit entering upon his. two i
years of service. This it is the aIIbi-
ton of every boy to do so as soon as
he is old enough. 1t is only the physi-
cally unfit who are preeluded from
this honor Moreover, there are COM
paratiyely few healthy boys who are
not ambitious to adopt altogether a
soldering career. When they choose
medicine or law of science instead, it
causes distress to their dearest rela-
tiVes, and they do it with certain
amount of apology. II, r. -s~-.
But the greatest day, of all is the
day when the "maika' as the mother
i, called by the son who idolfZes her
even more than re does his wife, bids
him adieu, and with swelling heart
and unmoistened eyes, blesses him.
'.ttti sine, mex tie sam Bog tchuva."
EGo, my son, God himself protect
tEee!') That is her day of browning
glory the day when her mission of
motherhood is indeed completed, when
nor hopes are realized, when she gives
her dearest of what must after all be
Gearer-her country This day has
daU ned for many Servian woman. A
day Ionged for, and dreaded, a day of
gratified pride and supreme agony.
And for many mother the las; If
great day of her conscious existence
has, come. After this, though her
country as taken what she desired to
give, with (should it be called. (
''Nsual?") feminine Inconsistency. all
tife becomes a blank. for she has gaz- {
ed on the face of her dead son,
brought home to her with a Turkish
bullet through that body. once so small
and frail. which she reared for no 9th
er purpose.
In peace-time wakes are held and
keening still practiced, but wnere a
hero lies in death the night IS passed
in silence, and laments would be un- l.:
seemly. What would he have said .
il he know they would have grudged
him his valor? And how could the
mother face her countrymen again if
it were known she had shed a tear?
And all the time mothers hearts are :
breaking for each 'junak" lying on