The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-11-08
DoRoFMY DIX TALES .
BY DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer.


The Casualties of War.
! If the local war news published in
our papers were veracious it would
/ read something like this:
"A fatal engagement took place last
night between Private Thomas Jones
of Troop S, End infantry. and Miss
Maude Smith, in the parlor of Josiah
| Smith, on Main street. Dressed in
full uniform and looking fit and
smart Private Jones went over the
| top at D. m. and advanced to the
attack.
Miss Smith was camouflaged in
| pink chiffon and blue ribbons SO art
i fully arranged that it was impossible
/ for Private Jones to perceive his dan
ger until it was too late to retreat.
He was met by a whitening barrage
fire of tender glances from two love-
ly eyes, both of which went into ac-
! ton at his approach This was fol-
| lowed up by a ceaSeless bonn ardment
| of bombs that when they exploded
! emitted a noise that sounded like.
| My hero! Shall miss you so?
! shall think of you all the timen Be
| wildered by being thus gassed, and
having neglected to bring along his
! gas mask, Private Jones made futile
effort to escape, but was pierced thru
the heart by two clinging white hands
| laid upon his breast.
cred and presented arms to his fair
captor. Later on he made his way
| back to camp in a half maudlin con-
dition, raving somewhat about the
only girl in the world. Private Jones
says that the honeys are using very
| superior brand of powder 1t tastes
and smells like violets, but is partic-
ularly deadly in its effect
This is no joke. 1t is a sad record
of one of the perils of war, for to
! thOVSa ndS Of n11r soldier hOVe the most
fatal engagements they will ever take
part in are the precipitate and ill
| a V i d matrim onial engagements
they are recklessly making on the
eve of their departure for the front.
Why call to the colors should also
be a call to matrimony is a mystery
past finding out. However, there
seems to be something in the horrors
of war that makes the peace of the
| ftreSide seem irreSiStibly attra ctiVe
| Or, perhaps, in the larger fear of bat
| tie and sudden death men lose their
fear of the domestic fight and curtain
| lecture.
Be that as it may, war always
! booms matrimony. Men who have
been case hardened bachelors take to
themselves wives. Men who had not
expected to marry for years rush to
| the altar. Men find themselves
| popping the question to girls to whom
| they had never given two thoughts
before, while as for getting engaged,
| men enter into that as casually as
they would buy a box of cigarettes.
OF course the psychology of this IS
as plain as the nose on your face. The
whole country is worked up to the
highest pitch of emotionalism and
sentiment. For the time being we are
living in a world of hearts, not heads,
and we are feeling lot more than we
are thinking.
The men who can put on the khaki
have put aside their every day af-
fairs. They have given up their situa-
lions or wound up their business. They
are going away into the unknown.
Whether they shall come back or not
they do not know. Whether their life
is to be only a few short months or
many years they have no idea
| All of this quickens their sensibili-
ties and keys their emotions up to
concert pitch Above all it gives them
an imperative need to love and be
loved, to have some hand cling to
their own, to know that when they go
on their journey to somewhere in
France they will leave behind them
someone who will miss them, someone
who will watch the papers with anx-
ious eyes for tidings of them, some
one who will weep if i'll betakes them
"over there"
This is what makes the soldier boy.
who is bubbling and sloshing over
| with his own sentiments, bestow them
upon the first girl who happens to be
handy and solemnly pledge himself to
come back at that indefinite date
when the war shall be over and marry
her for keeps.
Even when the girl is a nice girl
and would make a suitable wife for
the young man under normal condi-
l lions, it is a suicidal thing for him to
do under the circumstances.
To begin with, at the most impress
sionable time of his life almost, the
young man Is starting forth on the
greatest adventure that any human
being ever undertook. He is going to
thrilling new environment, to undergo
crucial experiences.
These may make him a better man
or a worse, but they will make him q
different man, with different ideals,
tastes, and habits, and with a different
point of view. He will be as changed
as if he had changed his skin, and
whether he will want the kind of a
1 girl for a wife when he comes back
that he asked to marry him when as a
ingly doubtful.
In addition, no man knows what
the war is going to bring him. Some
will inevitably come out of it with
broken bodies. Some with empty
pockets and no immediate way of re-
trieving their fortunes. Lucky under
such conditions will be he who has no
. one but himself to provide for and
who is not hampered by the knowledge
that some girl back home is waiting
, for him to come back and make good
his promise to marry her. He travels
the fastest who travels alone with a
light load on his back.
Given a moonlight night, and a man
a little heart sick at breaking old
ties, and going off among strangers
!. and homesick at leaving the place
where he has lived all of his life, and
he will propose to any girl who is
properly sympathetic and looks as if
she were ready to shed tear or two
over his departure.
1t is just this situation that has
made hundreds Of thousa nds of young
men pop the question to the Iandlady's
daughter, or to the girl next door, on
the night before thev started to the