Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1915-01-14
BERLIN, IN WAR TIME, GOES ABOUT
ITS BUSINESS WITHOUT EXCITEMENT
Correspondent Finds Life Apparently Gay Before the Con-
fCt, but Catches Glimpse of Tragedy When He Passes
Office Where the Casualties Are Posted-Cafes Doing
Business as USuaI-Marked Contrast to London

! necessities are kept stationary in sell
ing value.
At all these places the people were
all willing to tell me anything I asked.
They believe that the Americans will
be their friends once they hear the
truth"
And that version, am bound to say,
is identical wherever you go. If Prus-
STA believes in this war, then so does
Saxony, so does Coburg and so does
Bavaria.
What the Germans Believe.
Here is what every German in Ger
many believes today:
Russia, in her thirst for land, wants
to break up the Austrian empire so as
to gather in the SIavs who live there
and then absorb as much of Germany
as she is able to get
England is insanely jealous of Ger
many's growing power, of the superior
ity of her manufactured wares which
are fast monopolizing the world mar
kets, and that these two have en-
gineered this war for the purpose of
crushing Germany forever.
That, therefore, the Germans are
now fighting for their very existence
as a nation and that, since death is
better than dissolution, the German
kingdom must fight until the allies are
overthrow or until every man, wom-
an and child in Germany is killed!
The feeling for their various foes is
this:
Indifference for the Russians as an
unaided power.
Contempt for the Belgians.
Pity for the French.
Hatred, the most intense conceiv-
| able, for the English.
found the most profound respect
for the kaiser. He is looked upon as
the savior of the national existence,
and his conduct of the war and the
state under war is accepted as marvel
Gus.
German Life Normal.
German life has been kept so normal
everywhere-there is not a sign of
lack of employment, not a sign of dis
tTess, not a sign of tight money mar
ket-that gratitude to the powers that
| be is seen on every hand.
rs it not wonderful" every German
you meet asks you, that we do not
feel any effects here of this terrible
world-war? You would not know that
there was a war, would your"
And if you truthfully answer you
say you would not
At least you would not until by
chance some day you pass the war Of
fee on Dorotheen strasse just at the
corner of the great Tiergarten.
And then you know!
The war Office is a great, gray build
/ ing, with Il foundation of smooth gran
tie on which has been put high pol
lsh. This building must be 500 feet
long and certainly half as wide The
granite base makes an excellent place
TO paste lists of the ''verwundet" And
''verwundet" means wounded"
Post Lists of Wounded.
And, as you will find if you study the
lists closely. wounded" often means
! Killed.
You can find "gefaIIen" after a name
on these lists almost as often as you
can yerwundet" A cynic in Berlin
told me more often. And he had
watched them for five weeks.
You wonder what the crowd is
which chokes the road. You skirt the
! edges.
Periodically you watch someone-it
is generally a woman-detach herself
from it and start toward the paper
/ posters on the walls of the war office.
! Sometimes she goes directly to it, but
/ more often she stands stock still when
( she is some three feet away.
Women Afraid to Look
/ Then she turns quickly and walks
away. Walks away-without lookingl