Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1915-05-31
Bennett Is Touched by DOting
Manner in Which Entire
Nation Ministers to Comfort
of the Wounded.
C0NVALESCENTS HEAR
OPERA AND CONCERTS
Food Supply of Country Shows
No Sign of Depletion and
Cost of Living Is Falling
Instead of Rising,
nY JAMES oDoNNrLL BENNErr)

Copyright. 1915. hy the Chicago Trbune)
Koblentz, Germany, May lit was
"a wonderful experience to fare from
silent, smoldering French villages into
the peace and sunshine of the valleys
of the Mosel and the Rhine.
After being stuffed to sickness Of
soul and body with the squalor and
devastation Of war, we turned the car
eastward and glided away from all
that toward the things that assuage
and ameliorate, the things that help
to keep alive ones faith in the race.
From Metz we Travelled by auto
down the banks of the Mosel through
ancient Trier to Koblentz, and all
along these peaceful ways We caught
glimpses of the old, old finale to
mans warmaking and adventuring-
the sight of the bruised and broken
lads who had come home TO be made
well again.
A Nation of Mothers.
Often we could see an old mother
totter ng from the cottage door te
the arbof 20 minister to her boy where
he lay in the sunshine. But more Of
ten the government has gathered the
sons of a thousand mothers in some
villa or seminary and is playing a
mothers role to them.
It is so here at KoblentZ under the
shadow of Ehrenbreiten, where the
Mosel comes to join the Rhine, and it
is so all the way down the Rhine to
Koln.
And Germany mothers her wound
ed to the point of doting. Even the
aftermath of war can produce a
cheerful sight and there is none
more serene and homelike than the
sight of the eonvalescents, who are
petted to their hearts content, sun
ming themselves these beautiful spring
days on the lawns in front of private
or government buildings which have
been converted into hospitals
The soldiers wear a kind of COM
bination uniform of pajamas made OF
washable fabric of blue and white
stripes. superb gardens are their play
ground. The Rhine flows al their
feet. The blue Draehenfels guard the
horizon line
Many Of them are making their
convalescence in places that contain
picture galleries which were once,
points of pilgrimage for every Amer
ican traveller in the Rhineland. Nor
are these treasures lost upon the sol
diers. They have the feeling for them
and they spend hours before them.
Music for Wounded.
In the evening they sing, and often
their impromptu concerts have for
soloist an artist who has come from
one of the subvertioned opera houses
to contribute her music to the scheme
OF eonvalescence.
N XNiogh..Inr ho tNatnna1 who
are able to leave their beds are in
vited to the opera twice q week and to
a concert every day. Many of them
are quartered in the best hotel Of the
city and are served with five meals
day.
In Berlin I saw a little group OF
soldiers occupying the best seats in
the Royal theater and sitting Ill
complete absorption before a presen-
tation of Peer Gynt' that ran from
Z o'clock in the evening until nearly
midnight.
And such intelligent critics Of the
presentation were they that after
they had witnessed Or. Bruck's stag
ing of the play at the great subven-
toned theater, their first wish was to
90 to the Deutsches theater on an
other evening and see how Rhine
hardt had applied his revolutionary
ideals to the INSTALLATION of lbsen S
poetic masterpiece.
Throughout the empire schools
have been opened for the instruction
in other trades of those wounded
men whose amputations make 1t I'M
possible for them to return to the
trades they relinquished when they
were called to the colors Special So
licitude is manifested i'll the trainlnsI
of blinded soldiers TO new occupa-
tons. and on every hand the organi-
Zation of funds for the assistance OF
their families is progressing.
The Cost of Living.
The prices of bread and eggs con-
tinue to fall. The price of butter re-
Gently dropped 5 pfennigs tl IL
cents) in forty eight hours.
The allowance of bread per indI-
vidual is in many cases discovered to
nave been made on too liberal a
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WEATHER FORECAST. n