The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-09-25
Dorothy DaI Says
BY DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer

Even war has its humors,' said
the woman philosopher. land the way
it affects the people you know makes
you want to laugh and cheer when
it doesn't make you want to hide your
head and weep. The call to arms
brings out the best and the worst
that is in humanity, as a hot poultice
brings out the measles.
And the results certainly do give
you the surprise of your life Men
and women before whom you have
been koWtowing, they were so slosh-
ing over with noble, patriotic senti-
ments, have taken to the cyclone cell
lar and shut up like clans as soon as
they were called upon to back up
their words with a few sacrifices and
a little fighting
And other men and women, who
have never pipped about their feel
ines about their country and who
couldn't sing two lines of the Star
Spangled Banner to save their lives,
have risen quietly up, put away their
own personal affairs and grabbed
gun or put on a nurses uniform and
have gone out to do the work OF saw
ing their native land.
Funny, isn't it, how in war some
give their all to their country, ana
others hold up their country for all
they can get out of it, and you never
can tell beforehand which is going to
do which Some people cash in their
pa triotism and get to be mil1iOnaireS,
and other people. who were nothing
but millionaires before the war, turn
out to be patriots. There's nothing
like war to give you the real number
of your friends and show you where
Now there's Mrs Robinson. For
years and years 1 have worshipped at
hot 0r1'0 oh a
of Perfect Patriotism. She is pres
ident of chapter of the D. A. RS
and a Colonial Dame, and charter
member of every patriotic society
from Maine to California. and they
simply couldn't hold convention un-
less she was present.
Tn wager she has been on a mil
lion committees, more or less, to mark
the graves of Revolutionary and Civil
war heroes, and put up tablets to
show where great battles were fought
and historic marches made, and she's
scattered tons of flowers on Decora-
ton Day, and been living reproach
to US slackers who have been so busy
with present day affairs we have left
the glorious past 10 look after itself.
why, L don't remember that l ever
saw Mrs. Robinson when she didn't
have a little American flag pinned
somewhere on her person, and just to
hear her discourse about MY COUN-
TRY was nothing short of a sacred
privilege. 1 never listened to her as
she talked with shining eyes and rapt
voice about the glory of being an
American citizen and the blessings of
being able to live in this land of lib
erty, without getting choky in the
throat and feeling like getting up and
waving The Stars and Stripes. Oh,
she was the Mrs George Conan, all
right.
so, of course, when the president
1n,l TO dof nd
try against Germany, I naturally
thought that Mrs. Robinson would be
the first woman to set an inspiring eX-
ample by offering up her son to fight
for freedom and his native land. But
nothing of the kind happened. Mrs.
Robinson loved her country and
gloried in it's freedom, and she was
perfectly willing to offer up every
other woman's son on the altar of her
country, but not her own. She was
wild with fear until the draft was
drawn, and her Sam escaped con-
>scription.
1T would kill me- she said, to
think of my darling boy being in those
dreadful trenches and perhaps getting
manned or killed. Besides he has
gotten a splendid situation now that
so many men in his office have gone
to the war, and 1 don't want him to
give it up
You have property 1 said to her,
you have beautiful, tenderly-reared
young daughters. How would you like
as the Belgians have seen their prop
erty? How would you like your
daughters to be treated as the mothers
in France have seen their girls
treated?'
~ didn't raise my son to be SOL
der she repeated, and 1 am doing
my bit I roll bandages at the Red
Cross every day.
Yes 1 said, you roll bandages for
some other woman's son whom you
expect to defend you and yours
"A little farther down the street 1
met Ann Stebbins, who was simply
drolling with joy because the examin-
ters had declared her son to be exempt
because he had a weak heart, incipient
Bright's disease and bad lungs.
II should think anybody that badly
off would be as safe in first line
trench as anywhere else and that it
would have been a comfort to his
mother to have thought he died de-
| Tending his country instead of merely
helping out the undertaken, but she
rather know he had seven deadly dis
eases than that he was exposed to a
bullet
came to see me. You know Mamie
thin, cowed, scrawny little thing
who has been stenographer to big
| bullying brute of an employer until
J she looks as if she was so scared she
| couldn't say boo to a goose. OF
/ course, l had heard that Mamie had
| been married very suddenly to Bob
i Thomas-that she was one of those
war brides who would never have
been brides at all if a big husky man
I hadn't been hunting for petticoat to
hide behind to escape the draft.
/ IT thought pretty badly of Bob, but
| l liked Mamie and so 1 congratulated
her and asked after her husband"
He's in training camp. He has
enlisted she said with a queer little
smile.
~ am surprised 1 exclaimed.
- SO is he replied Mamie grimly
You know Bob and I had been en-
gagged for a long time, she went on
| one of those long drawn out engage
ments that never end at the church