New-York tribune., 1918-04-23
War-Lord Country
By Captain Lord Dunsony

h USS1A, in concluding peace with cu
IN many, has no formal treaty D.
sia merely demobilizes, whila AZ
Kaiser moves HIS eastern armies awav ~
be shot down somewhere else, Russ;s =
quite right: when you cease to d.
yourself against hungry tiger you dr.a'
up no treaty with it, you merely unload ena
trust to the beasts better nature Az
then again there is the shortage of nan.r
and the moral shortage Of the Kaiser :,
whom treaties are no great matter arvbo.,
so why have treaty?
The difficulty that the Russian. w.,. :;
when they came to the question of tre,tr
is one that confronts the whole worJs
England went to war to defend brol..
treaty. Shall the Kaiser be bound not "a A.
it again by another treaty, nicer root.
with a prettier seal? How simple tb;n.s
would be if only nc could, and stnn.es
cheques could be paid for by other stumers
and murderers be solcnniy sentenced no,
to do 1t again. 1t IS very natural for ths
Ukraine to want peace, but Belgium want.
ed peace in 1914 when the war lord wanted
a war.
There are certain persons to whom ~.
Ca
man bands are to you or me; they canno+
stand its continual dulness year af,or
year; and at last it gets on their nerve. so
much that they have to do away with it II
isn't their fault; they must. And so thew
break 1T, according to their station and or'
portunities. Bill bashes policeman vii
helm breaks treaty, and then things h.
gin to liven up for Wilhelm and Bill. II
should be understood that neither of th.s
can help it. Only Bill is the better fellon.
Of the two.
II comes up and outs him." saw Ri,
II outs him with this bit of bottle.p
"The sword has been thrust into INV
hand" says Wilhelm. "Gcd is undoubt.
edly with me-"
Bill is the better fellow of the two You
may meet Bill in repentant mood. didn't
want to hurt the bloke," you may hear him
say; but Wilhelm you will find repentan,
never. After what is YEARLY trendinp 10
four years now, after all the blood he has
shed, after all the wrong he has done
against Belgium, and the ruin he has
brought upon Germany, both on her cities
and name, yet he talks of his sword still,
And he talks as though he had fought
some knlghtly fight, not as though he had
used poison. "My destructive sword" he
y. said once, "has smitten the Russians"
Bill has given up long ago talking Of
that jagged bottle.
There should be made great reserve
like the Yellowstone Park a perfectly law.
less country. And there should people like
Bill and Wilhelm live, unbound by treaties
tree OF hampering laws, and never ANNOYED
by the petty boredom of peace There
should be houses with nice low window,
there for Bill to slip into at night and
servants easily bribed to tell where the sill
yer was; and little kingdoms for Wilhelm.
not too we'll defended and already peace
July penetrated. There would be fine
swords there for show, and for use big
reservoirs Of chlorine and phosgene. No
one would cross its borders, the news Of
the world would be conveyed there BY spies
and the country would be defended by poi
soned rivers. 1t would be the bad mans
PARADISE You might name it "War-Lord
Country" 1t would be that place in the
sun which the German heart has lonced for.
There all would flock who were weary Of
the lrksome restraint Of international
laws; there, as spontaneously and unre-
strlcted as the lark sings in heaven. the
alrman would drop his bombs, while the
submarine on ornamental lakes would
drown whoever rowed on them, and, after
all, the people of such country would
we'll deserve 30 be drowned
But those that elected to remain in
Europe and live among other nations
would have to keep the law of those ma
tlons, abandoning the idea that only might
was right theory that the Germans have
not yet been able to prove to us either by
force Of arms or appeal of logic