The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-12-29

United States. sE1e o1u s1NeSp Spet s1S I fine work in Europe for the New or ork | world He is back now, and zha mas contrfbuted to the papers or the United States the following; Herbert Bayard SWope,s who ss1c- eeeded first in getting to see the 0p- eration of the German armies on their own battle lines has returned to the United States with his heart full. of the misery and desolation in the wake of the war now devastating Europe MI Swope's trained newspaper mind has grasped the situation and he knows full well what the United States can do to relieve 1t. He has written the following description of the scenes In Europe for the Commit tee of Mercy, a neutral, non-partisan z ,rra.aizafaon. headed by Senator Elihu Root whose purpose is to alleviate. if that be possible, the suffering among the women children and other inn6cant non-combatants made hun- gry by the war.
 r. ssY-sr Tvords Of mine can faeIp the Committee of Mercy in it's noble work shall feel that [ have been partly compensated for the awful things I scenes that must be witnessed personally to feel their horror for, oflaervvfse. they are impossible of be- HeK They have left memories that can not be dul1eds many Of them too tersbls to be told.
 was fortunate enough. speaking from t1le standpoint of the newspa- YI1er1nen. to see action on two fronts. pas with the German armies both on the Russian border and on the lighting lines against the French from Be1fort to Verdun If had only seen action in the military sense I would think the nine weeks spent in Germany for the New York World would have brought me no regrets for in tho excifement that goes with battle one loses a true perspective EI. S4<<T CaerM more or less, though actual
 war means little at the time. This may sound brutal but it must be re- zneInbered that Killing and being kill ed is tho main business of a. soldier and so the correspondent looks at 1t In the days work
 But it is behind the lines, away from the glamor of battle, where the rifle and cannon sing paean of blood ing that war la unfoIded in its true color.
 Not in the fighting trenches. terri b1e as they are; not where che men 1n uniforms may be found not where the flags are flying. moi where the graves of the countless brave are dug, seen the real nature of war. It must be looked for away from those glor1fied scenes. among the women and children fatherIess, brotherless. O11e4 46SSS
 There the false coIors fall away from under eye and you see war as. it truly is-a vast terror, demanding as the least of the sacrifices, love, 1ifa and wealth. War may cleanse the fer soul or a nation,s but at what cost In France and Germany today there is not family that has not felt the agony of death and there are many from which every man has been obliterated. lying in unrecorded <--@= 4 tense of burial.
 But death is the least of the trag- edies that have befaIlen those who lived in the direct path Of the war. These have lost their men, who died iI1 battle: the houses that had been their homes for years: their every pos session save the clothes on their backs and the few poor trifIes they could seize in their flight. And, in flee ing. these innocent victims have been hopelessly scattered so that their z ia miles already shattered by death have been separated and lost to one another in the darkness of the war areas where there is no inter-co1n7 Tnunication, and, becouse of the nili- tary restrictions, search for the miss ing ones is imp possible
 he theme of Individual atrocities, staEkas they may have been, does not need to be developed to point a nor al the atroeity Of the thing in it's aRl886E S8l0es 1S1u4& heaF1eSL upon I4S helpless. is enough; indeed too much. War is crue1est to those not directly engaged in fts they are the ones who pay the price and only they can know how heavy that price is.
 In East Prussia and over the Rus sian border saw the Shattered. bIackened shells Of what had been hundreds of villages and towns. And saw the women who had dwelt in these peaceful little places, Staggering f7e frf,r had been their homes and falling by the wayside, heavy with sorrow and faint from Starvation What refuge was there for them Even if they reached place of shelter they had no means of life It is these that the GomInf tee of Mercy will saves it is thr0ugf1zt his work that m ore deaths and zsufferings will be checked.
 And saw these scenes repeated along the eastern border of France Always were there to be seen women and children. hopeless and helpless Now and then among these nornads driven here and there by the tides Of battIe-Wandering bands upon whom this heavy punishment had been. visited. although they had nc part in the crimes that brought it. tffere were to be seen men, old, dod- dsEing unfortunates, whose presence made the business of flight the more difficult
 Out Of the we1ter I select two scenes they are typical of thousands: saw a bride of four weeks-the daughter of prosperous farmer@whose hus band had been killed in battle. Or the day she got that news there was raid through the little town il which she lived. A ssskirmish so i was called in the official reports ane therefore unimportant from a rs1ili. tary view. But when the maraud CTS left, the village was in ashes an6 in the ashes lay the bodies of the wonnan,s father, her father-in- Jaw her fourteen and sixteen year oIt brothers, her bedridden uncle, and tt make the score complete, her mother brought down by a stray shot Sh, was left alo77e Sf q ruor.e Q drese Tar,