Evening star., 1936-11-14
By Mary.Carfer Roberts

10.
TIME dolorous day Of Armistice.
which has just passed, Is
indeed f1ttingly commemorated
= in the publication Of this work.
OF all the books which have been
written on war, there have been few
which give n more moving and COM
prehensive exposition of wars mean
ing--its effects on peoples and its
Vaccinations in governments. Writ
ten during the conflict, day by day as
that miasma Of horror unrolled,
spread and enveloped civilization, the
journal of Brand Whitlock will read
today, for all Of US who can remem-
Der, almost too grievously to be borne.
And to those who are yet too young
to have known war, but who have
lived in world Of alarms and rumors,
1t should take its place, tragic and
unanswerable, among the already
abundant warnings.
For It should be borne in mind that
this is not q novel, a fiction composed
out Of the bitter emotionalism of
some remembering artists imagina-
ton. Nor Is 1t mere recording Of an
individual experience, in the ordinary
sense. 1t Is broad panorama of war
enveloping an entire nation, reported
by one whose high position enabled
him TO see all the aspects Of the envel-
opment.
1t was not written to serve as an
anti-var document. And yet, no
novel from the pen of . soldier home
from the front can surpass 1t in its
force as an expose Of the pointless-
ness Of war. A memorable Armistice
day publication, indeed.
1t is finely written. Its editing by
Mr.. Allan Nevins, moreover, cannot
be praised too highly. As it stands In
It's published form, it charts with dra.
matically satisfying fullness the rise
and fall Of public sentiment through
the years from 1914 to the end Of
1921; 1t makes harmonious and
stately tragedy of the dominant fac
tors involved-of the violence of war,
as set forth in the savage occupation
of Belgium; of the spontaneous hon
est revulsion of the American people
expressed first In their outpouring of
help and later in their dream of the
League of Nations as a lasting instru-
ment for peace, and, finally, it comes
to the old stale denouement where the
Leagues author stood discredited and
politicians began their survey of the
ruins to see what might be found
vherewith to line their pocketbooks.
No stage has yet been built which
could contain so vast q movement.
Yet as one reads this account, that Is
the thing which, esthetically, i'm
presses one most-its utter perfection
as . formal tragedy. History here
followed art. and art has given back
stgntficance to history.
The first entry of the published
Journal is dated August ], 1914. It
u ominously direct.
Il was awakened suddenly out of
. sound sleep this morning" wrote
the late Minister, ''by loud, insistent
knocks at my door. got up; 1t was
9 o'clock; opened the door and there
stood Omer Ohis servant) in uniform
the rough blue tulnic, linen panta-
looms, and the little bonnet de police.
He stood at attention, his hand at
the salute.
"'C'est Ia guerre, Excellence"
And thus it began.
The narrative is occupied first with
the invasion and establishment Of the
German troops. The good naivete of
minds that had developed in a world
that was unconscious or disbelieving
of potential realities behind Germany's
saber-rattling through the years. Is
expressed more than once in Mr..
Whitlock's early pages. He tells, for
example. of his conversation with
Burgomaster Max, after the Germans
were in Brussels. Max told him they
had demanded hostages.
%. the word hostages has such q
medieval sound" he writes. my hair
almost stood on end ." He was then
only learning, as the world was to
learn, how war predicates reversion.
He gives . moving picture of the
sallying Of the Belgian people around
their King. He writes of patriotism
as patriotism was conceived in 1914
. virtuous emotion-not an evidence of
selflshness or ignorance. He tells with
mingled weariness and humor of the
yivalries involved in the establishment
OF Belgian relief. And he reports |
and as one who would not |
write such amazing evil without GER
tainty Of its truth, the seizure of the !
Belgian unemployed, the slave |
drives" the long toll of brutalities
visited by the Germans on Belgium's
civil population. He was weary Of it
by 1916, and expressed rather
petulantly the hope that Hughes would
be elected so he would be freed from
his labors. But when the first report
brought him the mistaken news that
Wilson had been defeated, he wrote,
MY poor country! To have deserted
her high ideals in this hour Is in
sad"
Through all this central portion of
his journal issues and events are
largely In flux, as is proper in the
middle acts Of q tragedy. There is
tIlS ElEub COflIuS Oh dCtfON mere,
together with the right clarity of mo-
tives. It will be said today, perhaps-
no, certainly-that Mr.. whitlock was
a man of simple mind. He saw events
and Issues in those troubled days as
the world saw them, however, and SO
his book admirably reflects the history
Of world sentiment then. That senti-
ment is summed up in his comment
when America Joined the Allies. II
ls as follows:
Early this morning Campbell sent
me q synopsis of the Presidents mess
age, and I read 1t with tears, q kind
Of JOY, to see us ut last-much as
hate war-ranged on the side Of the
right" Right and wrong-they were
absolutes in those times. They had
10 be.
It was only after the Armistice that
The reverse process began--the clarifl-
cation of action and the confusion of
issues. A Mr.. whitlock saw 1t, France
bore the responsibility for that de-
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