New-York tribune., 1918-05-06


1 during the years 1914 and 1915 re-
manned under a pail of mystery and
silence; one would have said that that
strip of our territory had fallen into an
abyss. SO vigorously did the Germans keep
our compatriots in secret durance. 1T was
not until after year of this seclusion
that some repatriated persons began to
cmcrge-at first at rare intervals, then in
frequent patches; but in what state of
pallid exhaustion! Let this one physical
fact suffice: all Of them, without cxcep-
ton even in 1916 had lost fifth, a fourth
or a third of their weight. They all looked
as if they had escaped from torture cham
ber. Morally, they are unconquered, all
quivcring alike with indignation and con-
tempt for the barbarians; or if there are
some who prefer to hold their peace they
do it only from excess of inward horror,
and in this way give voice, perhaps, to an
even more tragic protest.
Special Notifications
Indeed, as we shall see, the German tyr
amy does not consist simply in an exorb-
tant application Of the dogma Of might.
1t has special notifications, peculiar to
the race, which make it even more painful,
if that is possible. 1t is not inspired solely
by the systematic despotism and immoral
ity cynlcally adopted by Germany; it is not
a pure, unadulterated application of any
doctrine; it springs from a genuine lack
of morality, and from a wel-spring of
vicious animaism, which psychologists have
so often detected in the German blood
Not that am so foolish to hold that
all Germans are low, malignant and brutal;
but it can be said without hesitation that
such is, generally speaking, the psychical
type, more or less emphasized; that such
are their racial characteristics, as appears
from innumerabe facts gathered from the
lips Of our repatrjates of every locality.
One of the most amazing manifestations
of the Germanic spirit in invaded France is
the compulsory salutation which the officers
impose upon all males and, by refine
ment Of tyranny, upon the women and girls.
Even in ancient Latium, at the Caudine
Forks, only the men were made to pass
under the yoke, and that but once. But
the Teuton, in his insensibility TO human
dignity, is never weary of trampling upon
other mems souls and of treating man like
beast of the field.
Horrid Symbol
This enforced ragi-comc salute to the
invaders and intruders naturally wounded
to the quick the high sense of their own
dignity and of the truth characteristic
of Frenchmen. Resistance appeared on all
sides. Force necessary to crafty a
caprice that Gesser might have delighted
in. At Noyon, at Vergnier, in hundreds of
places, those who infringed the regulation
were thrown into Jail. Sexagenariun priests
who had neglected to bare their heads be-
fore sub-lieutenants were dragged away to
prison beyond the Rhine. Officers did not
blush to horsewhip passersby who did not
salute them, or who did not bow low enough
At Etreux a blind man struck by a
colonel whom he could not see.
Above all, the salute eXtorted from
women displays to the full an innate vul-
garty peculiar to the German. We recall
cur Louis XIV, always the first to
salute the women in his service, absolute
master as he was. Our secular French tra-
dition of courtesy and chvalry rises in
revolt. But nothing is more German than
to lay the heavy hand of oppression on
women. Why, at Saint Quentin, in 1915,
an elderly woman, in her terrified haste
to salute an officer and make way for him
on the sidewalk, fell and broke her leg.
Sometimes this female salute is elaborated;
women are compelled to smile when bow
ing. These anxious and grief stricken
women, torn from their husbands and chill
dren and brothers, these women who are
robbed and whose homes are constantly
searched and tossed and turned over like
the bedding of cattle, are commanded to
smile upon the invaders!
1t is not the salute alone which shows
us the Germans engaged in actively per-
scouting women In September, 1914, the
troops constantly pointed their guns at
French women to force them to wait upon
them; the officers as constantly had their
fevolvers in their hands. In the districts
where game is abundant, girls, whatever
their station in life act as heaters yvher