Omaha daily bee., 1914-08-26


proudly to the blare of martial music,
with the cheers Of an admiring world in
his ears, and victory reckoning TO him
over the hilltops.
The woman sits alone in solitary
home, a thousand fears gnawing at her
soul, her very ignorance of what is hap
pening to the man who is all OF life 20
her making his danger seem greater 70
her. She fights, not some one great bat
tie against visible foe. but daily and
hourly battle that never ends against u
shostly foe that rises again to confront
her as soon as she Stays It.
No man on battlefield ever suffers
one 1.-THE Of the agony that the woman
suffers who loves him and who sits at
home, waiting. waiting. waiting for the
news that may quench the light of day
forever for her.
Those who oppose granting the ballot
TO women have used as one of their chief
arguments against the acknowledgements of
women that it would discourage militar-
ism. They are right
Suppose the mothers Of England, and
Germany, and France, and Russia and
Austria had been called upon TO vote upon
the question OF war. Do you believe that
majority of those mothers would have
voted 10 have sent their splendid young
sons out to be moved down by machine
guns as grain is moved down by q
steam reaper?
Suppose the wives OF all of those coun-
tries had been called upon to vote upon
The question of war. Do you believe that
the majority of the wives would have sent
their husbands forth to be cut and
siashed, and manned, and perhaps killed
in battle?
Do you suppose that the tender sister
would have voted to devote her brother
10 death? Or that the maiden would have
torn her lovers arms from around her.
and cast the ballot that would make his
slain body but one of the pile of bodies
en- which some ambitious. conqueror
climbed to heights OF military glory?
No. thousand times no. Women
know what war means. Women know
that the echo OF every shot fired in bat
tie ends in a woman's sob. Women know
that it is women who pay the real war
debt, and when they have a voice in gov
eminent their vote will be for peace
Yesterday in England, and France. and
Germany, and Russia, and Austria there
were millions Of happy prosperous little
homes, with children playing about their
doorsteps, with a contented wife and hus-
band living their simple, useful, normal
lives.
Today these millions OF homes are
homes of desolation and sorrow. The
husband has been snatched away to fight
in war whose purpose he does not I'M
derstand. The little business that he fol-
lowed and that made a living for a wife
and children will go to rack and ruin
There is want where there was plenty !
They will be widowed who should have
been welded. The children who should
have known "a fathers protection and
guidance will be left fatherless. That is
what war means to women. That is why
the cry of its desolation browns out the |
paeans Of its glory in a womans ears.
After the Civil war I'm our own country !
there was a generation of women in the !
south who never left off the mourning |
they put on when battle robbed them OF
son, or husband. or father or brother, |
or perhaps of all these. for there were
many families I'm the south In which not a !
single male member survived the conflict f,
Through the years that followed these I
nereaved women went about clothed in |
black, sombre and ghostly figures, a
living monument TO the horrors of war |
That is what war means TO women. a
srief that is never ended, mourning that |
Is only silenced in their own graves. Not !
many women would choose this martyr |
dom, of themselves, and so when women I
have the vote they will not give their sons |
10 be murdered nor sacrifice the men |
who are the very core Of their hearts 10 |
crafty the greedy ambition of some |
ruthless war lord who would wade |
through slaughter to power or cement !
with blood tottering throne.