The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-06-05
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

I think I can truthfully say that l do not belong to that class of my country men who have been accused of dearly loving lord, and when it was an nounced that Sir John Foster Fraser was neaIel this way q was not disposed to throw up my hat and give three cheers for the English aristocracy.
 Yet by the way if anybody is worth three .iurrahs, the nobility of England deserve it for the noble manner in which they have played their full part in the defense of their country. So don't gel 1t into your head that l have anything against a man just because he has been born into or adopted into the great fam lies of the mother country, which is dearer to me than ever before in all ;its great history.
 I was, somehow, afraid that Sir Johu Foster Fraser would be the typical mon ocled, patronizing, titled Englishman who has the power to set my blood atin- Sl6 Uy liio ouPCiiOl iiieihiiCif ~AAiU '1>' sides, Saturday was a busy day with ne and I had too many pressing duties to attend to without going lion hunting. l thought I would leave it to others who had more stomach for it.
 Saturday night I stayed downtown waiting for something to turn up but as | i,, tbo of na dA- l.veloped I dropped into the news room about g o'clock, and happening to re- member that Sir John was billed at the chautauqua, l concluded to run up and give him a look over and make quick getaway for home.
 walked leisurely to East park, few blocks away and took rear seat with view of doing the disappearing act, but there is where I made a mistake. for if I hadn't wanted to put in an hour and half listening to Sir John talk, should not have gotten in the sound oi his voice, or come anywhere close to his to him, for any man who could transfix me as tired as I was and hold me spell bound and fascinated until the clock rolled around is some talking man.
 
 If you failed to hear him you missed one of the great addresses of the war. I have heard no better. and so far as am cocnerned none so illuminating and gripping, for he had been in and know how to tell about just the things l most wanted to know-the things not in the dailies, weeklies, magazines, or books. H had seized upon the salient points and wove them into a wonderful picture, and then made you both see and under stand it.
 He gave rapid but graphic outline of the Balkans and made us visualize what was transpiring and had taken place in that seething cauldron of mixed nation , alities. He made what is known as the eastern question live before our very eyes This war must be won in the west, but no one will ever fully understand it who is unfamiliar with the east, and this is where our ally, England, is most uss- ful, and this is why I am so strong for the aristocracy, for they have been the imperiaiists and set their faces against the little Englanders.
 The heart of his message so far as was concerned was built in the story or Russia. He gave me many sidelishts for which had longed, I was glad to hear him acquit the Czar of wishing Germany to impose a separate peace It was heartening to listen to the story of how the Russians fought bravely even though l poorly armed, but it was sad to realize that German intrigue and influence had
 hopelessly undermined the fabric of the country and that it lay prostrate prey l to the wiles of the Hohenzollerns. ,, There was one part of his speech about Russia on which had not been so fully 1 informed before. and that was the part the Jews were playing in the country.
 He was careful to pay the Jews g trib- ute for the part they have played in tho
 world. H did not attempt to paliate in
 any way the .barbarous treatment which
 the Jews had undergone in Russia. He
 set it all out in lurid. damnatory colors