New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1918-08-11
Tnconceivable the Germans
l Could Win

But 1t seems to me amazing that any
American whether in France or elsewhere
could believe that the Germans might win
particularly now that the United States has
entered the war. Nor is it true that the
French the exhaustion of their man
power
when I was in Paris in 1915 found
France settled down to a state of war,
more normal attitude of mind in Europe
than state of peace. Daily l met women
who had lost husbands. fathers ard mothers
who had lost sons, and although they were
sad at times, was but natural they knew
that lighting. in Europe at least, is the com
mon destiny of men, and, with the exception
OF one or two insignificant pessimists, VINO
liked TO hear themselves talk, and TO get off
such phrases as France is being hled white
/ never heard a doubt expressed as 10 the
issue of the war, nor any encouragement
over the future of the French race France
mas mad wars since the beginning of her
history and survived them. Her population
has been dccimated and her lands ravished,
aQd she has carried on and waited for
time and her indispensable energy and
courage to make good the loss She is also
riches of all contries to draw upon. Even
If we had not entered the France and
Great Britain would have CONQUERED tn.
Germans in the end, but the end would have
been much further off and the losses so
much greater
"lf Mrs Delard had been here and in the
enjoyment of normal nerves she never for
moment would have worried over our com
ing N too late. Our late entrance was in
eVltaole, as our educated allies know: and
despite some faults, natural enough in
nation long devoted TO the ways of peace
we made some mistakes. But cur accom-
plishments, in a short time, are one of the
most. marvellous achievements in history,
and if Mrs. Deland had taken in an Ameri
can newspaper or had been properly in
formed by her correspondents sic would
have been of all this. Why, know
ing The American race as she should did
she not take it for granted? Why could
she not assume that before he article ap-
pearad there would be over a million Amcri-
can soldiers in France Being 4 first rate
write Of fiction, she has imagination, and
she never had better opportunity to put it
to good use. AS it is, she succumbed I'd the
pure female in her mental makeup and
wrote an article that the Germans are re
JoIclng over and using as propaganda in
Soura America Her Imagination being
asleep and her naturally gentle soul torn
with the actual sight of the horrors of war
she wrote an article which places her in the
pacifist class, and is dangerously close to
sedition. In her fcrvent sympathy with the
sufferers of and with her perspective
entirely out of gear she wrote an article
which does gross injustice TO the women
OF her country, and aimed as hard a blow
at the morale of the United States as if the
act had been deliberate instead of merely
thoughtless.
NO doubts Mrs. Delands courage for
she remained in France doirg valuable
work for many months, but that she
united by temperament to regard great
events impersonally is sufficiently proved
Why could not she, being of intel
lect, and presumably of wide reading,
alize that she was living in history instead
OF reading about it between covers, Every
thing she experienced saw or heard was
but the inevitable adjunct Of all wars; in
TINS case, with certain new trimmings. War
is business like any other never was
so struck by this fact, not even while talking
to my many French friends in Paris or in
other cities l visited as when travelled in
the var zone with trainloads of French Off
GERS and poilus. One and all looked as
business men do when they start out for
work in the morning Some of the officers