New-York tribune., 1915-01-04
WAR RELIEF PLEA
BY HENRY JAMES
Novelist Appeals for Aid
for American Motor
Ambulance Corps.
TELLS OF WORK
ORGANIZATION DOES
Much Depends on Generosity of
Those on This Side of At
lantic, Writer Declares.

Those on This Side of At.
lantic, Writer Declares.
London. Dec. o. Henry james, the
novelist, has written n description of
the work of the American Volunteer
Motor Ambulance Corps, of which the
following are the salient passages:
Several of US Americans in London
are so interested in the excellent work
OF this body, lately organized by Mr..
Richard Norton, and now in active
operation at the rear of a considerable
part of the longest line of battle known
10 history, that | have undertaken TO
express TO you our common conviction
that our countrymen az home will share
our interest and respond to such par
ticulars as we are By this time able to
give. The idea of the admirable enter
prise was suggested 10 Mr.. Norton
when early in the course of the war
we saw at the American hospital at
Neuilly scores of French and British
wounded who would have incurred life
long disability and suffering through
the long delay of their removal from
the field Of battle.
"To help struck him at once as pos
sible, and his application Of energy
was so immediate and effective that in
just three weeks after his return to
London to take the work in hand he
had been joined by number of his
countrymen and of others possessed of
cars, who had offered them as ambu-
lances, already fitted or easily con-
vertible, and had not less promptly
offered themselves as capable chauf-
feurs.
"To this promptly gathered equip
ment, the recruiting of which no red
tape had hampered and no postpone
ment TO committee meetings had de-
layed, were at once added certain other
cars of purchase, these made possible
by funds rapidly received from many
known and unknown friends in Amer
ica. The fleet so collected amounted to
some fifteen cars.
L. s. Generosity Depended Upon.
at has been brought home to me how
much the success of the good work de-
pends on American generosity. both in
the personal and the pecuniary way
exercised, that is, by the contribution
of cars, to which personal service, that
of their contributors or other volun-
teers attaches itself, and, of course, by
such gifts of money as shall make the
corps more and more worthy of its
function and of the American name.
It's function is primarily that OF
gathering in the wounded and those
disabled by illness though the ques-
tion is almost always Of the former
from the postes de secours and the
field hospitals, the various nearest
points to the front, bestrewn with
patient victims, TO which motor car
can workably penetrate.
"The great and blessed fact is that
conditions of recovery are largely Sc
cured by the promptitude and celerity
that motor transport offers as COM
pared with railway service, at the
mercy OF constant interruption and ar
rest, in the case of bad and already
neglected wounds, those aggravated by
exposure and delay, the long dying or
the poisonous field before the blessed
regimental brancardiers or stretchel
bearers. waiting for the shelter OF
night, but full also of their own strain
of pluck. can come and remove them
Carried mostly by rude arts, mercy
much hindered at the best, to the
shelter, often hastily improvised, at
which first aid becomes possible for
them, they are there as Immediately
and tenderly as possible slowed in our
waiting or arriving cars, each Of which
receives as large a number as may be
consistent with the particular suffer
ing state of the stricken individual.
"Some Of these are able to sit, az
whatever cost from the inevitable
shake over rough country roads; for
others the lying posture only is think
able and the ideal car the one which
may humanely accommodate three men
outstretched and four or five OF the
seated Three outstretched is some
times tight fit, but when this is pos
sible the gain in poor blesses assis is
the greatr wedged together though
broken shoulder or smashed arm may
have TO be with a light shrinking and
shuddering neighbOr.
Can't BE Done Cheaply.
ave Americans are as little neutral
as possible where any aptitude for any
action, of whatever kind, that affirms
life and freshly and inyentively eX-
emplifies it, instead Of overwhelming
and undermining 1t is concerned.
Great is the chance, in fact, for eX-
hibiting this as our entirely elastic,
our supremely characteristic social ap-
titude. We cannot do so cheaply, in
deed, any more than the opposite
course is found, under whatever fatu-
ity of presumption, inexpensive and
ready made.
"What | therefore invite all those
whom this rotice may reach to under
stand is that the expenses of our en-
lightened enterprise have 10 be con-
tinuously met. and that il it had con-
fidence in such support IL may go on
in all the alert pride and pity that
need be desired. ! am assured that
the only criticism the members of the
corps make of it is that they wish
more of their friends would come and
support il, either personally or finan-
cially-or, best of all, of course, both.
"As an extremely helpful factor on
the part of volunteers is some facility
in French and the good will TO stay on
for whatever reasonable length Of time
/ assume the excellence of these gem
tlemen TO include those signal merits.
Most members of the staff Of thirty
four in all (as the number till lately
az least has stood have been glad 10
pay their own living expenses, but il
Is taken for granted that in cases
where individuals are unable to meet
that outlay indefinitely the subscribers
TO the fund will not grudge its un-
dertaking TO find any valuable man in
food and lodging. Messrs. Brown Bros.
& Co., of of SO Wall ct, New York, is
our recipient of donations on your side
of the sea"
WHAT IS GOING on TO-DAY.
Free admission TO the American Museum o, Natural
Uisfnr. Van COrtlandt Park lflseum and The