Evening star., 1925-03-29
SPIRIT OF YOUTH SEEN
! AS PLEDGE TO GERMANY
Mighty Outpouring in Berlin Honors
Ebert at Death-People Seem
Confident of Republic.

sibility after the past six years.
Then at last the real developments:
of the day came. Toward midnight,
having dined in a restaurant off the
Linden, where the rigid hand of the
police had been revealed In a sudden
inspection to make sure no music
was playing, L walked back toward
my hotel, which faces the Linden and
the Pariser Platz. Half way to the
Linden it was apparent to me that
something had happened. Dense
masses of people were seen lining
the street, the automobiles were be-
ing turned back, not so much by the
police as by the crowds of people.
Boys on March.
Coming out on the Linden. which
is still only relatively obscurely
lighted, broad avenue, 200 feet wide,
and having in the center a pathway
under the famous lindens, the first
impression was of moving masses.
Then down the central path came
several hundred boys, marching like
soldiers, wearing gray khaki coats,
many of them with bands of red,
gold and black on their sleeves or
their hats and carrying what seemed
to be wooden slaves.
You had a sense OF some organized
and even Semi-military movement
taking place, although practically ali
of the participants were boys of Is
and 90. Other souadrons arrived
similarly, and presently it was ap-
parent that they were wheeling into
line on either side of the Linden and
through Pariser PlatZ right up to
the Brandenburger gate, by which
one enters the inner City of Berlin
from >the Tiergarten. All the way
hA 70 ofxfya I'D hA
Linden to the point where Wilhelm
strasse comes in, and then down Will
melmstrasse to the Presidents Pal
ace, a quarter of a mile away, this
double Gordon formed itself, two three
and even four deep, perfectly organ
ized, manifestly disciplined, with
their officers, even with their Red
Cross aides ready to care for any
one injured in an accident.
Paying Final Honor.
The significance of this mobilization
was instantly apparent. The Republi-
can president had died, he was at
midnight to be brought through the
streets from the hospital in which he
died to his official residence and the
republican youth of Berlin had turned
out to pay him final honor-and perhaps
to prevent any nonarchial demonstra-
tion-should may be undertaken. Those
boys, thousands of them, with girls of
the same earnest sort behind them and
a part of the demonstration, were
themselves members of that organiza-
ton of the republican youth of Ger
many which week before had |
mobilized $50 900 young men in Magde- |
burg drawn from the whole republic.
Nothing was to me more impressive, |
more memorable than the faces of |
those boys; you had a sense of
measuring the future of their country |
in their presence and in their patent |
In a certain sense, the |
republic was in danger; for long time
to come one will not be sure, utterly |
sure, that the German republic can
last; the battle between reaction and
the republic has for the moment gone
been adjourned, but the |
forces are still in presence. Some day, |
this year, next year, 10 years from now, |
one cannot prophesy. these boys might |
be called upon to fight for the republic |
and they were there that night to in |
dicate their complete readiness. You !
had a sense of stepping back into |
earlier history when republican ideas !
were far newer in the modern world. |
BACKGROUND Is Historic.
I wish 1 had only capacity to give |
the impressions of the moment. |
the nearby Brandenburg
gate all the famous regiments of the |
empire and of old Prussia had come |
in triumph from many vic
torious wars. The magnificent bronze |
chariot on the top of the gate had |
been carted off by Napoleon and |
brought back in triumph when Ma
poleon fell. The very name of the |
square, Pariser PlatZ, recalled the VIC |
torious taking of the French Capital |
in 1871. On the same platform with !
the bronze chariot the Revolution of |
1918 had planted its machine guns.
You had sense of moro than two |
of European history audible |
and visible at this moment and in this |
place where the youth of Germany, |
one part of il, were now choosing to |
disclose with an earnestness, a calm |
which was Impressive, |
their faith in the new order which !
Ebert had so nobly represented.
Time passed and the crowds con- |
tinued to grow denser, but still there |
was complete order. Two or three |
of police, visibly armed
and ready for business, slid through |
the crowds. halted in the Platz by the |
old Rluecher Palace which a grateful |
Prussia gave the victor of Waterloo. |
the men. got out, formed up and
quietly slipped into the shadows be-
hind the line of trucks and taxicabs. |
Lines Strengthened Out.
Then suddenly there was sense of
an electric shock. No one has ever
been able to measure or explain that !
telegraph system by which things
themselves through |
masses. You had knowledge, al
though there was nothing to explain
it, that the moment was at hand
Tho lines of boys on the streets
up. You realized what
1t means to be a military nation by
the very swiftness with which these
thousands of boys voluntarily, auto
came to attention.
Almost Immediately thereafter there
was a new and supremely astounding
began to light up with thousands of
torches. The sticks the boys had been
carrying turned out to be flares. The
spectacle now became something be-
yond description. Thousands and
thousands of these flares, flaming and
smoking, gave a well nigh: barbaric
sense to the entire scene. In the
dim, smoky light the Brandenburger
gate stood out like the ancient
Greet gateway it reproduces. Moth
ing was quite visible and nothing
quite hid. Faces, uniforms. every
thing, took on an unreal aspect.
Body Passes Through.
Then, finally, through the rigid
lines of the boys there came clatter-
ing two or three lines of mounted
police-not more than one would use
in New York to precede the Presi-
dents carriage-then the enormous
black hearse containing the body of
the republics first President
hearse surmounted with an enormous
crown, the crown of Prussia. Thou
sands of hats came off, but there was
NOT O uhjsper mt a sound fhe Si-