The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1918-07-22
The Gazette Des Ardennes---
A German Poison Paper

German soldiers happily at work IN
toy factory and German soldiers rest
ing on the borders of lake with their
arms literally crowded with little tots.
These Germans surely do love babies
only they are not French or Belgian
babies.
Secret Treaties" Again.
The center pages are devoted to
series Of maps purporting TO show
THE war aims of the entente as re-
vealed by the secret treaties" dug up
by the Bolsheviki in Petrograd. The
! maps are distorted, of course, and in
dictate that the allies were prepared to
gobble everything in sight. Some Of
our pacifistic American editors who so
prominently displayed these alleged
secret treaties, which were neither
treaties nor particularly secret, will
be pleased to learn how serviceable
the Gazette des Ardennes found them.
Additional Cannon Fodder.
There is also a photograph of
Swedish steamer returning German
and Austrian prisoners from Russia.
and a cartoon by Willette rescued
from some ancient file of lie Rire"
This whimsical bit of humor, titled
how to travel" pictures a hopelessly
suppressed Frenchman 4 in railway
compartment. his silk tile crushed
against the overhead racks, his hud-
died self sandwiched between a COM
fortably disposed British car hog and
his wife, the latter playfuliy fondling
a pet alligator and. the whole group
faced by a formidable English bull
dog.
The last page of the issue is like
wise devoted to humor-humor cal
culated to sting the unredeemed
Frenchman. Illustrated jokes clipped
from the Paris papers harp upon the
high prices and scarcity OF food. There
is one jibe at the Americans-a wine
merchant waves away two thirsty
poilus. telling them they can not af-
ford a drink "as I now sell only to
Americans" All this. comfortable and
kindly enough in Paris, might prove
gall and NORWOOD to some forespent
and famished creature in Lille.
The text of the paper is poisonous
throughout. Some Brief Thoughts"
from Gustave lie Bon, contain this
GEM" THE Latin state has become
an inferior form of government. It
had a utility. as formerly under the
feudal regime. but it no longer has
any today. In prolonging itself it will
have for it's final terms an equality in
servitude. then decadence" Quota
lions from Goethe are used to en-
courage the study Of German-"Ho
who knows not foreign languages
knows not his own"-and to appeal
for brotherly love for the invader
Hate is an active discomfort; envy
a passive discomfort. 1t is not sur
prising, then, that envy changes 50
quickly into hate
Very Strong on Peace.
There is any quantity of "Odes to
Peace and lots of misinformation
from Petrograd about the secret
treaties" There is a long and highly
moral outburst against anonymous
letters (of which tbs Gazette des
Ardennes doubtless gets a great
many. and an old passage from Sar-
cey on British bad manners. Finally
there is a very terrible extract from
Henri Barbusse's La Ecu" which.
with frightful detail. irradiates a will
derness of corpses. Evidently the
Germans find his book as repellantly
pacifistic in its effect as the Ameri-
can reviewers.
From the heavy German viewpoint
III Is ali done 10 tuTn-DuC IL Is over
done 1t scarcely fulfills Bismarcks
cynical dictum that a press is in
tended TO deceive" 1t aims at a po-
litical offensive on scale as thorough
as that of the military drive. But it
ends in being offensive in the mere
ordinary sense of the word. So the
contagion of this paper has worn it
self out. The French people laugh at
its infantile subtlety, scorn it's tears
for France as they do those Of the
kaiser and toss ii aside TO study in
secret the genuine French papers
Struggled in from Holland For these
they willingly pay Is francs apiece or
even rent them for francs an hour.
However. the Gazette des Ardennes
continues its publication for what
ever harm there may be in it, but
chiefly because II is part of a huge
propaganda system. When, in 1915
its editor wrote through Switzerland
to a we'll known contributor of LIE
Temps in Paris for the privilege of
using his articles anonymously at
good price, and certainly in mutilated
form. 1t was not merely the Gazette
that wanted them. And when the
now-suppressed Bonnet Rouge in Paris
picked up articles from the Gazette IL
was not just on account of their
quotability. Moreover
But the intertwisted trail of German
propaganda leads clear around the
world.