Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1914-10-07

Oyrl0nC, 1914, by II. q. We
Thames opposite the ancient dignity
of Somerset house. Such thought was
interviewer with the very fabric of
that pioneer school in the educational
renascence in England. After the
customary exchange years in Heidel-
berg and Paris, he went into the classi-
cal school Of London university. The
older so called "classicaP' education of
the British pedagogues, probably the
most paralyzing, ineffective and foolish
routine that ever wasted human life,
had already been swept out Of this
great institution in favor of modern
methods, and he learned Greek and
Latin as we'll as he had learned German,
Spanish and French, so that he wrote
and spoke them freely and used them
with an unconscious ease in his study
Of the foundation civilizations Of the
European system to which they were
the key. (This change was still so
recent that he mentions an encounter
In Rome with an "Oxford don" who
spoke Latin with Wiltshire accent
and manifest discomfort, wrote Greek
letters with his tongue out, and seemed
to think Greek sentence a charm
when 1t was quotation and an i'm
propriety when 1t wasn't.")
Barnet saw the last days Of the coal
steam engines upon the English rail-
ways and the gradual cleansing of the
London atmosphere as the smoke ere
ating sea coal fires gave place to elec-
trio heating. The building Of labora-
tories at Kensington was still in prog
ress, and he took part in the students
riots that delayed the removal of the
Albert memorial. he carried banner
with I'VE Like Funny Statuary" on
one side and on the other Seats and
Canop1es For Statues. Why Should
Our Great Departed Stand In the
Rain" He learned the rather athletic
aviation of those days at the univer-
sity grounds at Sydenham, and he was
fined for flying over the new prison for
political libelers at NORWOOD Scrubs
lin a manner calculated to exhilarate
the prisoners while at exercise" That
was the time Of the attempted sup
preston Of any criticism Of the public
judicature, and the place was crowded
with journalists who had ventured to
call attention to the dementia Of Chief
Justice Abrahams. Barnet was not a
very good aviator. BE confesses he
was always little afraid Of his ma
every one to be afraid of those clumsy
early types-and he never attempted
steep descents or very high flying. He
also, he records, owned one Of those
oil driven motor bicycles whose clum-
~ completely and extravagant filth
ness still astonish the visitors to the
museum Of machinery at South Ken
sington. He mentions running over a
dog and complains of the ruinous
price Of "spatchcocks" in Surrey.
"Spatchcocks," it seems, was a slang
term for crushed hens.
He passed the examinations neces.
sary to reduce his military service to
a minimum, and his want of any spe.
cial scientific or technical qualification
and certain precocious corpulence
that handicapped his aviation indicated
the infantry of the line as his sphere
of training. That was the most gen
eralized form Of soldering. The de-
velopment Of the theory of war had
been for some decades but little assist
ed by any practical experience. What
fighting had occurred in recent years
had been fighting in minor or uncivi-
lied states with peasant or barbaric
soldiers and with but a small equip
ment OF modern contrivances, and the
great powers of the world were con.
tent for the most part to maintain
armies that sustained in their broader
organization the traditions of the Eu.
ropean wars Of thirty or forty years
before. There was the infantry arm to
which Barnet belonged and which was
supposed to fight on foot with the rife
and be the main portion of the army
There were cavalry forces (horse SOL
diers), having ratio to the infantry
that had been determined by the ex-
perlences OF the Franco German war In
1871. There was also artillery, and
for some unexplained reason much of
this was still drawn by horses, though
there were also In all the European
armies small number of motor guns
with wheels so constructed that they
could 60 over broken ground. In ad.
dition there were large developments
of the engineering arm, concerned with
motor transport, motor bicycles scout.
Ing, aviation and the like.
No tirst class intelligence had been
sought to specialize in and work out
the problems Of warfare with the new
appliances and under modern eondi.
tons, but a succession Of able jurists =
Lord Haldane, Chief Justice Briggs
and that very able Kings Counsel
Philbrick-had reconstructed the army
frequently and thoroughly and placed
it at last, with the adoption of national
service, upon footing that would
have seemed very imposing to the pub.
lie Of 1900. At any moment the
British empire could now put 1885,.
600 arguable soldiers upon the board
Of welt-politik. The traditions of
1apap and the central European ar.