Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-07-05

OTR old friend Doctor Dernburs, who
~ spent the first year of the war in this
country trying to disinfect the German
cause in the eyes of the American public,
is now a roaring success in Berlin as ar
Interpreter of the quaint and whimsical
Ideas that obsess the United States. His
leading articles in the Berlin Tageblatt,
| even when reverted and reverberated into
English syntaX, make merry reading.
APPARENTLY thoughtful Germans are
"A still puzzled to know why America en-
tered the war. 1t seems to them incom'
prehensible that any one should resent
such little pranks the slaughter or
passenger ships or the devastation of Bel
gium, or the deportation OF noncombatants'
or firing on the Red Cross, o. the phos-
phorescent and zigzag humor of the sug'
gestion that few million Americans
should be turned over to Mexico II the
latter would make war on us. All these
playful gestures should be endured with
the patience one accords to a pet mustang
in the front parlor fiicking the cut-slass
bonbonniere over with it's tail and putting
n hoof through the panel of the grandfather
clock
ttrTNHAT we are at war with America,
i prieyes Doctor Dernburg. seems al
most like a bad dream" II Germany feels
,bat way about 1t she will do we'll to look
| for the causes of the bad dream where
such nightmares generally originate. in
come surfeit of strong, rancid or bitter
| dishes. 1t is an overplus of the Welsh
a,,;S
Doctor Dernburg and his pals this un-
| wholesome night agony. The Kaiser seems
! % have wanted to revive the Holy Roman
Empire to become lin the old phfase) the
| Emperor of Almaine. Instead, he Is the
| Emperor Of Ptomaine, and the German
stomach. hardy as 1t is, will not suffer him
much longer.
rr,HIS strange and incomprehensible dream
| i that affiicts the Doctor must seem al
mos, as meaningless and grotesque as the
boots and hisses that greeted him when
he toured this country in May, 1918 ex-
r,ainirp why the sinking of the Lusitaria
was perfectly genteel act. Unhappy
man! With the utmost good humor ana
fr;endlincss he climbed platform after plat
| form. beaminS With uuiSet aho SiSSiy VIII
| siderations. After all, matter so aca-
| demic. so theoretical and remote from pas
sion as the murder of a few hundred
women and children, what was that among
| friends? Why shouldn't 1t be discussed
amiably, pro and con, pointing out al the
and of each paragraph that the Lusitania
was really a British cruiser in disguise?
| And that the unfriendiness III there were
any, was Englands for letting Americans
| travel on her?
| And to Doctor Dernburg's embarrass-
ment and chagrin his audiences me. him
| with yells of anger and scorn.
| DUT after the Doctor returned TO Ger
ID many, undoubtedly his genial mnd
| forgave the boorish Americans for having
been discourteous to him. A hasty people,
the Yankees! They had been annoyed
about the Lusitania because after all she
was a favorite ship Of theirs and they had
been sentimentally attached to her. But
they would get used to that sort of thing.
After the U.boats had sunk a few more
ships Americans would grow accustomed
to the novelty. and even feel a certain
gambling exhilaraton In wondering which
| ship would go next. So the Doctor turned
his mind to other matters, and created
great satisfaction In the Fatheriand by