Richmond times-dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1914-current, 1915-04-30
Stripping Romance From War.

QUITE number of amiable theorists who
Y at the outbreak of war discoursed
learncdly Of the responsibility Of this King
or Emperor, or that Premier or Foreign Min
lister. or the other military clique or expan-
sionist faction in the light Of events have
had to remold their views. Early in the war
and greatly to their surprise, they discovered
That war was highly popular in every nation
drawn into the conflict and that the people,
to induce them to join the colors, required
little urging.
The theorists discovered something else,
still more surprising. perhaps 1t was that
the people not only consented to war, but in
overwhelming majority wanted it. If Kings
were willing to abandon peace and embrace
wars horrors, were their subjects. Leav-
ing aside those Socialists who were true and
convinced Observation-Disclosures they proved
to be distressngly few-the pyotestants
against strife came almost wholly from the
comfortable middle classes of the population
writer in the current number Of the At
lanic Monthly attempts an explanation Of
this phenomenon. He finds it in the fact
that war is more menacng than
peace to large elements of the population who
live, anyhow, from hand to mouth, and that
1T is far more romantic and interesting. 1t
ministers to that eternal craving for equality
and fellowship opportunity and recognition
as individuals, which animates the unsuc-
cessful The ditch digger who dons SOL
dier's tunic leaves sordidness behind. He is
in a trice one Of the prospective saviors of
his country, with excellent chance, he
thinks, to transform prospect into reality.
AS for dying-well, life is not so glamorous
where he lives as to give large Importance TO
that possibility Men die, he observes, while
peace reigns and with great ease and fire.
Guency.
The Atlantic Monthly writer thinks the
answer the pacifsts should make to all this
&c. TO- to, -l>,
rather more interesting and rather less un-
comfortable to the masses of the people.
That is commendable purpose, surely. but
also rather large order FIR the pacifsts or
any one else to undertake.
Is it not true that this mighty struggle is
doing something to the other side of the
equation, in stripping war of much of its
glamour and romance Surely, there has been
mighty little to induce the soldier in the
ranks to regard himself as anything other
than so much food for cannon or disease. He
has spent winter digging in the earth and
being shot at every time he lifts his head
above the trench wall. He has seen great
forts destroyed by siege guns operating ten
miles away. He has witnessed the destruc-
ton Of thousands of his comrades by the hail
Of the mitrailleuse or bursting shrapne Just
latterly he has learned what it is to be
chokcd TO death with poisonous gases. He
has found that women and little children can
be slain IN their sleep by bombs that drop
from the sky He has heard that unarmed
vessels may be sent to the bottom without
warning and without regard to the age or
sex of their passengers. He knows nat
boys and old men in villages. where some
hothead has fred shot at the invader have
been proppcd up against nearby wall and
put to the slaughter.
There is no romance in all this-it is
merely hideous and revolving. War is losing
its disguise, its drapery of gallantry and
chivary and proud consideration The air
is filled with the threat of reprisal. Before
the is over there will be less romance
than there is to-day. In this consideration
resides all hope Of substantial advancement
CT the dream of universal peace.