The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1918-02-16
THEY GAVE.
THEIR ALL!
IN ODAY we enroll the Tuscania's dead. And in
so doing we renew our solemn resolve to OBJ
literate from the earth the ruthless Might
worshippers who clutched them from the living

Pale, exhausted, sObbing, gasping, she returns.
from the Valley of the Shadow of Death to turn a
mothers first look upon the tiny creature upon the
pillow beside her.
God for the glory of it. The agony is forgotten.
She has given to the world man!
She puts an arm around the child, an arm that
will always be there to guide and protect. Beauti-
full visions of the future, with her son, her son. in
all OF them, possess the world that's been
created in her heart, and, with the heavenly smile
of motherhood glowing upon her face, she falls
asleep.
Time slips along wings of the lightning. The
wee knit bOotees not two inches long, give way to
sturdy shoes of leather and are put away in some
sacred hiding place as keepsakes.
What mending, brushing, advising, as her boy
starts off to school! What nights and days of
work, worry, sacrifice for his sake!
Mothers boy must look well, behave well, live
well, and God alone can keep record of how much
of her hope, soul and life mother puts into it.
But it will pay Some day, she II go shopping, or
to the theater, or to church on the arm of fine,
manly fellow her boy
Some day, it will always be 'Dont do that,
mother; let me do it!' Some day, it will be the
strong of her boy about her, to protect and to
return the nights and days Of care and unselfish
love.
\ ND, behold; the boy is a man, and thruout the
~ world goes up cry for all true men; mad
beast ravages the earth, would befoul all
motherhood, would make all men mere brutes and
human happiness the hopeless plaything of greed
Of power; beast that says to mothers: "Your sons
are but fodder for my guns!' to sons, "Your
mothers are but brood sows for my power!
Her man, her boy that was, answers that call.
Here he says, ''is my all and mothers all. JUS
tce happiness, mothers love shall not perish from
the earth. My life for it''
How handsome and noble he looks in his new
unifOrm How true and brave he will surely be!
But oh! how dear he is! How her heart fills to
bursting, memory piles upon her all the joys,
struggles, sacrifices that made him hers since
that day when she turned upon her pillow and gor-
flied the Creator who had sent her boy who would
some day, play mans part!
Then comes the cruel February night when her
boy her man, is tossed by the icy waves of foreign
SEAS corpse; for, the beast has snealzed up thru
the spume and blown ship to bits.
The stricken mother is alone No husband no
friend, no relative, none save Him who knows all,
can know her heart. She goes to her chamber and
puts in her bosom the little knit shoes, while her
hungry eyes seek his toys, his books, his clothes
anything that was part of him; and all is darkness!
n H! let us who lose no sons who feel no loss
I that wrings the heart and pictures all the fu-
- ture black, let us, too, offer all we have that
war may be killed and, all thru the coming years,
mothers may have their sons
What is day of meatessness, or wheatlessness,
of moneylessness beside the life of suffering srug-
gle, sacrifice of a single American mother? God
help us! let save, sacrifice and give the moth
ers must!