The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1918-01-01
TO THE SHARPHEADS.
By Hapsburg Lee of The vigilantes

am writing this solely to that elias
of Americans that we call here "sharI
heads. e., people with foreheads $
narrow that bullet won't take hold I'M
til small, fiat place is filed for it,
You are no sharphead, just put thi
down. stop reading right where you are
You don't need it, Better be out doin,
something for your country in it's ex
tremity, than reading messages intend
ed for somebody else.
All right; here we 60 Listen to thi
question, and then answer it:
What licked Russia, and then set he
to numbering herself?
"The Russians" you answer, quite
glibly, very sure of yourself, shave al
ways been serfs. They didn't know how
to behave themselves when they tasted
freedom. That and the German armies. F."
1t is the very answer | expected. II
provs that you think about as deeply a:
mudwasp. Here is the truth of the
matter:
The same thing that whipped Russia
nearly whipped Italy-and may do il
yet. The same thing that whipped Rus
sia has BACKED the eyes of France and
England, and at this minute has strong
hold on the throat of America. 1t is a
German army, but not the German army
you're thinking about. 1t is German
army. that works in the dark; that flat
tiers you, and gives you foamy beers,
and smiles upon you, and makes you
think that your government doesn't care
anything about you. This it is that
makes labor difficulties and creates inter
mai dissensions, and organizes such things
as the |. w. w. and that aggregation
that calls itself the Peoples Council of
America; it publishes such papers as
Niereck.s american" Weekly, and the
Irish World; it digs up the old, old feel
ing against England, and burns enor
nous amounts of food supplies, and
causes explosions in ammunition facto-
ries and is so subtle in its workings that
one can hardly recognize it. This is the
German army that we have to fear now.
If there is anything that makes me
want to get my thumbs behind your eye
balls sharphead, it is this: to hear one of
your ilk trying to resurrect the rust eat
en- Ratchet that has lain buried, buried
and forgotten, between America and Eng
land for so long. Don't you know that
the king who sprung that war upon us
was himself Hun? And don't you re-
member your history Tor did you go to
sehool?) well enough to know that that
king had to send hired fighters, Hessians,
if you please, over here to make war
upon us? And who were the Hessians-
Esquimaux They were Huns, sharphead,
Huns, So shift the burden of your Revo-
lutionary war hatred to Germany.
You're agaisnt this war, sharphead, |
simply because you're afraid to fight, and |
for no other reason. Remember, that; "A |
man who won't lay down his life for his |
principle, has no principle" The mere
fact that you are coward doesn't bar
you forever. | know a man who was born |
a coward; he has had to fight being a |
coward all his life, and he still has to |
fight it. And vet, he'd give his life for
what he thinks is right; he expects to
do it before this war ends. For Gods |
sake hit the sawdust trail to the altar ,
of manhood, sharphead and hit it at a
rapid gaitl
One thing more about that army that
works in the dark. ! have not over -esti
mated our danger from it, nor am |
merely expressing my opinions concern
ing it. One of the greatest of American i
diplomats, who was for years stationed
in Germany, and who is acquainted with
European intrigue from garnet to cellar,
says this: Our greatest menace is not
in the Teutonic armies who bear rifles
and machine guns, poison gas and can !
non, but in this underground German '
army" And the same, in substance, has !
been said by hundreds of others OF our /.
best American thinkers That secret II