Class JD.^„a^- Book.. ._a CDEXRIGHT DEPOSm Blue Eye to Berlin BY UNCLE BLAIR Ben McCann "On Root" THE AVIATOR It was June In Saskatoon — - June in London, June in the Moon. It was noon At Saskatoon — Noon at Gunnison, Dusk at Verdun.* Over the wheat-field billows . Loiter light clouds at noon. Drifting beneath in their shadowJi, Dream I of far Verdun. My body lies in Dead Man's Hill, And my soul is at Saskatoon, TWO PARODIES Here I raise my Ebenezer — Susan Jane and Adoniram; EmMy, Ann, Joab and Joseph, Jejoshaphat and Joshuway — Ttach them all to chaw tobacco. Teach them to make apple cider, Catch raccoons and patch the harne»« Were I reyal Antiquary To the Bank of Timbuctoo, I would paint its Dromedary, Paint the sacred Dromedary, From dusty dun to dim book blue, I surely should make him look new. ^Please pronounce Vairdoon, Blue Eye to Berlin AmaEtttg War SercrJ /^7; OF CHEVALIER McCANN A Twentieth Century Marco Polo Traveler and Strategist Fiction Marvelous Almost as Pact Edited by Uncle Blaij ©aklmtb, CHaL rii BUSHED BY THR Al rfK.>K J.E.WHINNERY 1920 All rights resfrc'd U52t W4-? Copyright 1920 by James Everhart Whinncry "Uncle Blair" Published January. 1920 Printed in the United States of Amerioi All Rights Reserved M 14 1920 ©CI.A550680 PREFACE The aim, intent, purpose of tin's book is to amuse and instiuct, to be taken, in t^e main, as a friendly salife on the Decline, Fall, and Picking Up Again of the War Correspondent, On the last pa^e the Mar-Casey (Marchese di Mirandola) calls McCann chevalier. What Grand Duchess gave him the title we know not. In the American Civil War Charles A. Dana held the Government steady in support of the Vicksiburg campaign. Whitelaw Reid's story of Shiloh overbore that of the Commanding General. Albert D. Richardson, Henry Villard, George W. Smalley, with others of the press, made the struggle near and real to the men and women at home, ^^Bull Run" Russell's taunts spttrred the North to her stride. Meade insisted on a Correspondent being drummed out of camp— and allowed him to return quiet- ly. The War Correspondent reached his high- est estate when Archibald Forbes was invited to headquarters by Altxand^r III, praised and consulted. In the war of 1914-19 the Military conceded to the War Correspondents scant rec- ognition.. Many came home discruraged. A few PREFACE 'able men found recompense in the approving confidence of American readers. When one's characters use a dialect outland ish and grotesque, the author or editor is often tempted, compelled sometimes, to collaborate. In this book, in a few instances, the language used drifts from Hero to Author, and back, without explanation, without puizling a reader. **Bein ezhow"is Ben McCann^s countersign. In the days when Allan Thorndike Rice or Lloyd Bryce edited the North American Review that Review came in so-called exchange to the author's newspaper office, as did also Scientific American. One day a yonng gentleman called and asked to see a copy of the North American. We had taken the Review home, per custom, so gave him a note asking the Lady-in-Charge to get him a copy. He saw it contained no draw- ings, and said, doubtfully: *'I don't believe this is it, but bein' ez how Tve come, Til take it along." (It was the Scientific American he wanted.) Our vocabulary having no crisp translator of Spanish asi como, we adopted bein' ez how. Gen. Sherman's Memoirs are the only books we know, by a military man, that contain no maps. Sherman mentions official maps soon to appear, to supply this want. He naively adds that they will reduce the cost of his Memoirs. In our book no place is mentioned that is not PREFACE in any one cf several good Atlases, and it is more convenient to use a separate book of Maps than to turn back ihe pages of this volume. Once we ventured to amend a writer who credited Gen. Sherman's brother, Senator John, with the phrase **The way to resume is to re- sume,'* which belonged to Horace Greeley, in 1868, ten years before Sherman and our great financiers had 6nished piling: up gold and silver which were not needed, to prepare tor Payment in Specie. As Horace foresaw, as soon as we began paying out gold, the balance of trade *d do the rest. If Europe had to have our food- stuffs, she'd send her gold, if there were no profit dickering for cheaper paper. Our history in 1914-19 makes '78 statesmen a lit tie absurd. Statement of Federal reserve circulation, on page 214, is for all U.S.A. Dec. I3,'i9, the total had increased to $2,907,000000; Dec. 2c, 1919, $2,988,000,000; Dec. 27, $3,057,646,000, an im- mense paper circulation, of which every dollar is interchaH^eable with gold on demand. Dec. 20, ^iS, $2,663,701,000. On Dec. 27, i9^9? loans of New Vork banks had increased to $5,005,- i52,ooo;,check and time deposits, $4, 158,142,000. The rule of fiction is, not "Did it happen ? *' but '• Might it have happened ? *' Chevalier McCann's personal adventures arc imaginary: when he drops into history he is fairly accurate. On p. 174 King Albert's uncle Leopold is mis- called his father. Victor Immanu«l III is called II, Victor Immanuel I. was King of Sardinia PREFACE only. Second was First of United Italy. The autkor is not sure that the system of numbering regiments used in the 1917-19 was adopted at the President's suggestion, as seems to be implied on the last page. Perhaps it was to permit veterans of former wars to stand forth more distinctly. Last Sunday (Dec. 28, 1919) Mr. Wilson at- tained the age ot 63. Many more birthdays, Mr President. It is not the fault of the most em- inent writer, of all our Pre'^idents, that in his Administration Author and Publisher have been comparatively least prosperous. ' For twenty years we had assumed Wilson's, voice is high: To hear it, in 1919, low and rather heavy, shocked us as when we saw Lamar.: *'Cau that raw-boned, coarse-haired giant be the orator of the most beautiful tribute to Charles Sumner? Several writers have dated the sudden rise in the cost of Food from 1914. It began in Fall of 1916, coincident with the Squeeze. In Spring and Summer of 1916 food was cheaper than in any of four preceding years. On July 20, 1916, Uncle Blair (the author) bmght 49 lbs of good Walla Walla flour for $1.25 cheapest we ever. Uncle Blair's eostof food for Deamber, I9i9,was $7.68: Nov. $7.29; Oct, $765; Nov., '17, $4-S4 Nov. t6, $4.90; Nov., 15, $3.90. Monthly Av'ge, 1915, $4.48; I9i6,$4 36; first ten mo. '16, $4,^7; first 6 mo. of '14, $5-20^; 19^^, $6.32; 1919, $6.84^; 1913,15.61. No milk or butter iised; no eggs since May, '17. In '13 not watchful. Exports tabulated p. 217, are all from U.S.A. On-Redeemed Italy Blue Eye (Mo.) correspondence of the States- Democrat, Oct. 19, 1915: '*Ben McCann, who conducted the horseshoe- ing and repair shop on the Arkansas line road, 1871-92, is in town. At the suggestion, of a ti- tled friend, as an expert in Missouri horses, he has been appointed a non-combatant inspector and is en route for Italy. At the age of twelve, Ben was present at the battle of Pea Ridge." Borgo-on-the-Brenta/Nov. 19, 1915. Nobody calls it that, but I votes for the west-of-the-mountains style, like Chalons-sur- Marne, Waeht-am-Rhein, und so weider; here in Tyrol they say Voels-near-Innsbruck, Voels- near-Botzen. I 'How it's easier to find a town by follcrin' up an' down a river than to find some other town, an' figger from theh wheh ye gwine to. This kentry hez dooplicate names ez thick ez France — or worser yit, mo' towns than they hez names to go roun':(countin' this here Borgo [Borgo di Val SuganaJ ez b'longed to Ostry till we come) they's four Borgos in Italy I knows about — some say they's five — be- sides one Borgo in Hungary. The bes' known 2 FROM BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Borgo is Borgo di San Marino, on the aidge of the tiny independent republic enti'ly sVounded by Italy. Taint so independent ez it used to be. The Eyetalian consul is on-common like the British agent in Egyp'. I cal'late "Borgo" means much the same as ''Burg" in Chermin, or "C. H." in Appomattox C. H. On top of all, mos' towns an' rivers an' sich hez two names : one Chermin, one Italian. [Uncle Blair tried to make me pernounce it Ee~ talian, butj Iiperfers to translate furrin names into English like French writers translates ours — Nouvelle Orleans fur New Orl'anSjEtats Unis fur U. S. A.J The Adige an' the Etsch air the same identicle river. One time Uncle Blair come to me with a map of the Battle of Pea Ridge: ''Heah's the Ben- tonville road an' the Fayetteville road, and the Keetsville road, but I kaint find Keetsville in either Arkinsaw or Mizzoory, in any atlas." They wor, and is yit, a county seat in middle Mizzoory, by the name of Keytesville, bigger'n Keetsville, an' lots of folks kaint spell eether name. Some of the maps of the battle hez Keetsville spelt Keytesville. Even the natives after the war didn't allers git it right, so when a ex-bushwhacker or bandit or one of the James boys writ a 'nonymous letter to a ex-gorilla in Keytesville, like ez not it 'd go to Keetsville, or viva voce, au' miss makin' the trouble intended ■ — an' so President Rozyvelt (or mebby it was ON-REDEEMED ITALY 3 Andrew John sing) tells his postmaster general to change Keetsville to Ma37flower, a purtier name. They kaint do that over here, the towns is too old-established, and in the old tiniesTyrol folks didn't travel so much, or git many letters. A man in Voels then often didn't know they was another Voels not sixty mile away. Mayflow^er is a few mile west by north from Blue Eye — they's only one Blue Eye in United States: got its name the same way. Trent is Trento in Italian, Trient (tree-aint) in Chermin; Botzen hez a alias, Bolzano; Inn- chen is San Candido, and so on. San Michele is Irish for Mike; they's two of him in this postal-zone or war-zone 3'e might say. One is over on the Isonzo, close to Gor- itzia — it hez a shorter Chermin name, too, one syllable (Goertz.) The other is eleven mile north of Trent at the change cars for the Val di Non (rhyme with loan) and Val di Sole (rhyme with holy). So when Franz Josef sees them Italians hez took St. Mike he don' know whether to be skeert about Trent or Trieste. In school at Blue Eye we learned jography singin' or chantin', startin' out: "State of Maine, Augusty, is on the Kennebec river; **♦*»»» Oregon, Salem, is on the WiU'ni-mette river " 4 FROM BLUE EYE TO BERLIN After I come to the coast I learnt to say Wil- lalimet river. One teacher hed us draw maps. We made France like a fat teapot, and Italy the shape of a boot. The Italians is tryin' to smooth off the top of thet boot, with high tops. Ostry favors the old military style, sich as vi^as called Napoleons, Italy them worn by a Hofer or John Bull. Cortina is neerd the highest p'int of the boot. Ever sence then, It- alia irridenta hez been fussin' to hev thet boot- top fixed, but the folks right theh wan't anx- ious to fight theh neighbor tooris-busters. By the big-road, Borgo is about twenty mile inside the Ostrin boundry. Trent is some twenty mile furder on, but it seems a lot mo' — some them miles is almighty long ones. The army is mostly sumwer a-haid. It was a town of 5,000 or so before we come, and is the capital of Yal Sugana. Off to the south the boundry is not mo^ *n five or six mile, but they's a pow'ful cima or precipice in between, 'bout 7,000 foot above the bed of the Brenta. Peggy would say is jest grand. This kentry is fuller of scenery than any I ever see. In fact the scenery is its best fortifications. It's worth $300,000 to h'ist a $200,000 gun up some of the steep places in the scenery, so they took to sendin em acrost from one high mounting to another, by a-eriat single-track railway; the Italians is mighty cunnin' at new ways and short-cuts; seems like ez ef they knock the spots off the Connecticut folks and other New Englanders. ON-REDEEMED ITALY 5 The mountings looks jaggeder, mostly, than the Olympics from Seattle, and they live up to theh looks; but the colorin is mo' like the 5an Francisco Fair bildins'; the snow don't come so fur down per elevation. Cortina, tho sixty mile northeast, by airy- plane flyin' high, is neerder the Italian boundry than Borgo, owin to the high-front boot-top. Irrridenta means on-redeemed Hke the stores that sells on-redeemed pledges at phenomenal low prices, tho they don't truly shave off the price much of solid gold. The folks at Cortina and some other p'ints is pow'ful sore about this war. Forty year or more ago a tooris' who could wear his old cloze an' keep his mouth shet could live nice in Cor- tina or its sooburbs fur a dollar a week, with, ten million dollars' worth of scenery throwed in. But a lady come who could write jest lovely [Amelia Edwards] — "To the Red East-Alpine mountings Come a stranger in the Spring — '^ An' sp'iled it all. The idle rich see her book, and come a-runnin',so the honest, friendly Ital- ian-Chermin boys and girls come to be high- rollers. The simple life oncet hed no prouder clime than the Tyrol. I 'How the sojers aint spendin' much, an' theh own men, so many, is off in the Balkans or in Galicia. Cortina hez they say, the finest views in the known world, 6 FROM BLUE BYE TO BERLIN but is on open ground itself, so kaint be easy defended. I cal'late Ostry won't make mucli of a figbt fur it, fear of spHlin' the fine hotels, al- bergos, auberges, gasthauses and sich-like. I 'How, when we git to Trent, the view will fine, but they's some horrible forts two mile and a half this side. Most any Catholic kin tell about Trent, tho some of the men don' stay very closet to theh cattykism. The las' big round.up of the docterns of the Church was at the Council of Trent. In the early ages they held councils most ez oiFen ez Sunday school picnics — in Europe, Asia an' Afriky — and at airy one some alleged heresy got done up. In the sixteenth century Dr. M. Luther and others kicked fur a new council to re-form the battle line; but when it come it wor a boomerang; the Ole Guard hed a bigger sheer of the electors than Woodrow the Scholarly first time he run; I perzoom the re-formers claimed frodd; some say they was skeert of a ambush on root. \ After buckin' fur quite a spell, Pope Paul III decided he could call the bluff, any'ow he calls the council at Trent, wheh Lutherans was skeerce, an' the grocers wan't organized, an livin was cheaper than anywers outside Tyrol. It met Dec. 13, 1545, and spent about 50 cents a week per capita till March, 1547, when the Trent health officer got on a bender, and the cholera crawled in thro a crack in the fence. Bologna sausage was reckoned the best antidote ON-REDEEMED ITALY 7 an' so the council moved to Bologna, but bolo- ney disagreed with all but the Franciscans, so the Pope sent 'em all home in September, 1549; he started 'em up agin May i, 1551, at Trent: that is Julius III did. In 1552 Maurice of Saxony marched a Protestant army in, after whippin Charles V: the council lit out fur theh several homes. Ten year later, Paul IV started it up agin at Trent, and in two year more the platform was completed, without a look-in fur the Lutherans or the Presbyterians: the doc- tern of Purgatory was settled, and the Index Expurgatorius pervided, and publishers noti- fied. This would of let out Hall Caine's latest book. Rabelais was already hidin' out, (and layin' all-fired low) behin' the ex post facto law. It concluded ez foUers: " Anathema to all heretics! Anathema!! Anathema ! ! ! The council begun 1545, ended 1564, but its work was all done in three two-year tricks. The members was law-abidin, and spent a little money, and the Tyrol hez bin strong Catholic ever sence. Pius IX held the next council at Rome in 1870, endurin' no mo' 'n a few weeks. It didn't kivver many p'ints: ez how the las' percedin council hed been slow but sure, "not fur its day only but fur all time , 8 FROM BLUB EYE TO BERLIN Leastways its enactments is still in use, and workin' satisfactory. Trent is 'bout the same age as Rome, and is quite interestin'. Ef I git tlieli, I may write it up. Some say it's wu'tli a long visit. I kaint send mucli war news, bein' ez How I don't know much, and ef I did I aint dead sh©' I kin git it thro'. Italian censors is said to be right smart perliter than the Chermin; the last- named will say ''Verboten," and waste no mo' time on ye; the Italian will say, ''A brilliant letter, sir, and will please our friends in your kentry very much." But they do say the Cher- min will let go twiset ez much ez the Italian jest the same. MARCHKSE DI MIRANDOLA TO OUR HERO Udine, Sept. 19, 191 5. — You remember say- ing that, you were concerned in supplying the French cavalry in 1870 with horses from Mis- souri *'an' round theh." Our chiefs are im- porting what horses ^they can get, tho where this army now is, goats would seem to do bet- ter. However, we may later be somewhere where the hills are'nt so steep. Today I had an opportunity to mention your experience; you may hear of this thro' the regular channels soon. Can you tell a good mule? Not morally good, you know, but his barrel, heels, et cetera. Miss Yates can inform you why I can't visit the Fair as planned. With regrets sincere and ' dearest love to * * — di Mirandola. Sette Communi and Thirteen St. Mike (San Michele) Dec. i8.— In '83 at Blue Eye, chickens got to disappearin so all- fired frequent the township ifusties held a special meetin. Jeff Purdy sejested offerin a cash reward of Ten Dollars dead or alive. Bill Jasper asked to hev it made ten dollars dead or twenty dollars alive. Jedge Purdy p'inted out it'd be a sight mo' dangersome to ketch the bandit 'live than to sneak up behind him in the bresh and shoot him. Bill 'llowed thet as one reason he sejested the extry ten, the other ez how he (or she) 'd be mo' of a curiosity: so ordered. I 'How the Austrians must of put it up to the King and Gen. Cadorna to totely destroy Trent befo' they could git it. Leastways we didn't go no neerder Trent than Levico. The Italians, I jedge, hated to spile the antiquated bildins and bric-a-brac of Trent, cal'latin, ef they git it, to make some money later on, out of tourists: them from Rome re-lizes how much they is in the tooris biznez. They was right smaht early fightin' between FROM BLUE EYE TO BERUN 10 Levico and Pergine, but I wan't present. The Val Sugana ends east of Levico. Pergine, 7 miles from Trent, is in the valley of the Fersi- na, which runs thro a deep ravine 'most to Trent, commanded in every pertickler by mod- ern artillery. Off to the northeast is five Chermin villages surrounded by an Italian population. The place they yodels so fine is mostly farther north, When Bill Jasper and me was in Minneapo- lis in '86» we see Vernona Zharbeau in ^'Star- light.*' She yodeled and talked in Chermin dialect in defiance of her French name. She told how ahe had a little colt when she sang at Monkey-Tail Hall in Cincinnati [Mercantile.] She danced in Wooden Shoes, and come down on the stage like a thousand of brick. Ln a drug store scene the37^ was a show-keerd on the wall — Ring the bell softly — They's mud on the knob. It was a parody on Ring the bell gentle, They's crape on the do'. Bill laffed fit to kill. I got shamed of him, but got to goin' bad as he, laffin at every blessed thing that come along. The prosperty of a jest is domiciled in gittin' em started so they kaint stop. I got so I'd laugh every darn time she opened her mouth, befo' she could git a word out. I felt shamed, too, when I come to think of SETTI COMMUNI AND THIRTEEN 11 it; then I laff, feel sheepish that I done it, and then loflF at the very next one. I 'How the Italians don't keer much forTrent — fur some years it aint wot it used to be. At one time it was the richest town in ail the Tyrol, but them times has passed away, and tooris' will be sca'ce next summer. Off to the southeast from Trent is the Sette Communi, or Seven Communities, German villages inside Italy. This region is a high plateau, up about 3,000 feet, t covered with snow five months of the year, with a fringe of forest round the aidges. They made theh livin raisin, cattle and broad-rimmed straw hats, the latter in the winter mostly, after the cows was fed. Asiago is the biggest town, seven or eight thousand people. It has several fine biiildins, most of which will be damaged if the Ostrins take a notion to bumbard the town, which is at the mercy of big guns on the mountains ten to fifteen mile northwest. Toorists used to come in from the great woild afoot mostly, by a climb south from Borgo sometimes, oftener westward from Valstagna, in the Brenta valley after the Brenta bends south a few miles east of Borgo. The path from Valstagna leads one through the beautiful wild Frenzela gorge. Here at San Michele (Micheleis the Irish for Mike) we are eleven nnle north of Trent. I had meant to go to the olber vSan Michele, in the Isonzo valley, and take part in the offensiv agaist Goritzy. I didn't know they was two. I hed a hard time to git hyeh, too. This San 12 ; BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Michele is on the Adige, and is wheh toorists got off the keers for the Val di Non (rhymes with phone) and the Val di Sole (rhymes with Holy) which they traveled via backboard, or better yet on foot. The troops went in that way, laekin bnckboards. Val di Non perdnces wine and silk, and is only middlin' cold at this time of year, and the troops is still workin full time at comparative low wages. Folks in both these valleys is mostly Italian. South of Trent it's mo' than | twenty-seven mile to the Italian boundary, and jest inside of Italy is the Thirteen Communi, German settle- ments not so important as the Seven, which are thirty to forty mile northeast. The Thirteen are plumb south of Trent, and only a few mile due north of Verona, Juliet's home city. Xong here is wheh Ostry took the biggest bite out of Italy's boot-top. It's about twenty- two miles to Arco, where lots folks used to go for tooberkylosis. It has beautiful gardens. I hope they won't git damaged. Heavy fightin' round theh this winter. up in the Air SuMWERS in Back of Caldonazzo, Jan. 9, ^16. — Christmas eve a airyplane dropped a bum on my quarters at Borgo di Vai Sugana, sp'ilin my clothes some. I got a permit to move back six mile in the direction of Venice and Bagdad wheh 1 'llowed it 'd be safer. New Year's was all-fired cold. Endurin' the day twt) airyplanes got into a fight about 1400 feet up in the sky from my place. They did mo' moukeyshines than Art Smith did at the S. F. Expozay. Leap-frog, Summer-sets, any way to git the Enemy,one to run each plane, another shootin' By and by one comes down, shot through his lights, 'bout ten rod off. I goes to him, still livin; he pints feeble to his inside pocket, then off north towrds Salzburg. When he's good sho' daid, I find six florins and two pictures. One I 'llowed was his best girl, the other his sister, with a chin jest like his'n. "B37 Jing, the sojer of Bingen over again. That night I gits so blamed cold it woke mc up. Jest as I woke, I felt a pistle in my face. *^Gid-dup," he says, in good U. S. Then he makes me show him wheh his pard- ner lays, a-leavin his airyplain bitched out in 14 BI,UE KYK TO BERLIN front. I never see anything so dang cheeky. We kerries him, and straps him on the floor. /Now, gid-din." •*That^s another man's cheer.'* * He's gestorben wesen, and won't mind. Gid in, kervick !" "I kaint — my haid is too dizzy." He gives me a punch in the chist with his pistle-bar'l, and I takes the cheer. ^'Highness," I says," don't try any han'springs, please." He didn'V. we lit out down the big-road S. E. ez if plumb fur Venice, tight ez we could drive. When we got up about ten thousand foot, we made a long turn, smooth as silk, an' heads about ten p'ints no'th of west. I look cautious- like, to see off north, snow mountings of all shapes and sizes — mostly high ones— -Tofana, Civetta, Sorapis, Cristallo, Marmolata, Antelao, Pelmo. Acrost a lake, beyant the Austri'n lines we see a place fixed nice fur us to land, and we slid down, jest as Jan. % was dawnin.' A. Tourist Prisoner CaprilE, or as near to town as I^m allowed to go, Jan. 25.— We stayed 'round Trent four or ^vt days, till the Archduke got skeert of losin us. In spide of the cold and snow, the renewed ivity on this front gave us to onderstand that the King and Gen. Count Cadorna have missed the key to the oats-bin at Borgo, which I had in my pants-pocket, and had ordered a counter- Smash to repatriate the oats-bin key and me. So our captors sent and took enough mo' pi'iz- ners to make a car-load. We didn't come in a a car, however. We walked, and carried a shov- el, a long-handled shovel, apiece to clear the rood for the teamsters as did ride. We came a roundabout way, bein' ez how [censored]. I got a fine view on root for hours of Marmolata, the biggest of the Dolomites. All the Dolomite part was kivvered out of sight under the snow. Ole Marmo. is over 11,000 feet high, nothin' like Mt. Blanc or Rainier or Shasta, but pretty good for this flat kentry. [Flat? I mean jag-ged. The Dolomites are steep and 16 FROM BLUE EYE TO BERLIN sharp or rough, and iniddlin tall. Speakin of Mout Blanc, Uncle Blair said the only times he ever made bulls or blunders bad enough to make him blush every time he recol- lects them: He was walkin from Chehalis to Centralia with the Sheriff, not in custody: they was both walkin home, bein as how they wan't no trolley then, and steam trains didn't run often or convenient. Blair got to braggin up Rainier, hov»?, standin with one foot at sea level one's -eye takes in all of old Rainier's 14,000 foot — when it aint rainin, whereas in the case of many mountains, you're up half as high as the mountain when he comes first iu view. I paused for breath, and the Sheriff says quiet- like he growed up in sight of a taller mountain — Mt. Blanc. Blair was goin to bet the sheriff Blanc is only 12,500— he'll bet yet itas that in Monteith's & McNally's in '68. He's had Mt. Blanc right ever since, 15,782-3. The other time was when Uncle Blair in the hearing of a reti'd sea captain, who hed been theh, pronounced Barbadoes Barby-doze. Not long after he see something in London Punch that led him to believe that editor bad a similar notion of the word, such as had been ours since the blissful day of our first meeting with Rob- inson Crusoe. Blair made a jingle to show the true rhyme and sent it to the editor^ for his eye to read it all alone: Those little darkieSjTeddy-Bears, and dadoes Are recent importations from Barbados. A p'int agin Bianc, comparin with Rainier, the A TOURIST PRISONER 17 peaks around Blanc's highest is so near as tall, while Rainier has no other peak within forty miles: St. Helens and Adams, southeast; north the only high peaks are Baker, near the Cana- dian border, ii,ooo foot high, in the Cascades, east of Pnget Sound, and Olympus, over 10,000, between tlie Sound and the Pacific, each more than a hundred miles away. Our cominon-dant speaks United States bet- ter 'n I; he kin handle bigger words, too. He worked on a vSeattle paper 1905; got took on in 1 901 on Westliche Post, St. Louis (that Carl Schurz orice edited: gestorben mit a few year sence.) Ilappei^ed to be in Vienna and had to do his army duty. Talks to me middlin' free, bein' ez how he claims to be a sort of Himeri- can; 'llowed'he'd try to git throo a postle card I writ to the Himerican ambassador. A citizen of the world he is; says he's s'prized at the showin Huugairy and Ostr}^ is a-makin^ bein ez how they aint hed no truly war for fifty year, ard then the}/ got done up in six weeks. He's dumb Mt. Blanc, says 'taint no harder 'n Mt. Tofana, out in plain sight from hyeh and only 10 000 foot high, vStill, some few hez got killed, mo-^t alleis comin' down, all from over-confident; looks so all-fired easy they gits started too fast and kaint stop when they git to a jumpin-off place they didn't notice goin up. Then they's a few places wheh once in so offen stones rolls down libel to bust yo' haid. Civetta, Marmolata, Cristallo, Sorapis, Pelmo, 18 BI.UE EYE TO BERLIN Croda Rossa— 'most all the Dolomites, is harder to climb than Blanc. I see a San Francisco paper spelt Cristallo Christabel, which is pur- tier. He says all ye kin see of Mt. Blanc from 'most anywers is jest his snoot, but its allers solid white— that's ez how he got^ his name — Blanc is Friuch for white: Even the big 14000- footer peeks close by turns gray mo' or less in midsiiufmer, but the snoot of old Blanc sticks up white and glistenin on the hottest days, when the ice cream is meltin pow'fu>Mn the vale of Chamounix, about 4,000 foot up; but ye kaint see the tip or snoot from the town or the railroad terminus-station; ye see some under- study mountings but not old Blanc. And in the summer about three-quarters of the days Blanc has his *^toppy" buried in a cloud of fog, like tlie srjow banner of Shasta, only mo' con- ceHltji'. It's so danged hot below, so danged cold at the top. On top o( Blanc hisself the view from the top of his tip aint much, nothin' like Monte Rosa or the Matterhorn from Zer- matt, or cl<:»se by, or the Jungfrau, Eiger or Moench from Lake of Thnn, or of several Dol- omites from the big road jest beyant Cortina,or . Civetla froi;) Capri le. On top of a low mount- ing out in front, like Nuvolau, Generoso, Rigi, the Faulborn, Swilzerlivud, is the best place to see a bunch of llieni biggest nioinitings from to once. lie says in? • higle moviutitig looks ez big and imposiTi as Isainier from Puget Sound, or Shasta from a S^^'itheni Pacillc train that keeps circlin' rouv'^ --•'■•d jound hlvi for half a A TOURIST PRISONER 19 day, till ye kaint tell wheh ye air. Uncle Blair once told me the bes' view of Rainier is at Xakeview station, on the North- ern Pacific, 'bolit nine mile south of Tacoma. To one postjsd there he shows only one highest peak, that on a sullny day seems to rise almost directly per||ndicler above you, like a great shadow, though many miles southeastward. Rainier has a great many rainy and cloudy days, when he kaint be seen at all, to balance the fogs of Mount Blanc. The «0mmon-Danty (I call him that when I talk in Italian) kin read Italian as good Cher- min. ( I shouldn't wonder he kin speak Irish.) He got a Milano paper tellin ez how the Itali- ans had been shellin the station at Toblach, in the Pooster Thai. I had no idee they had got no'th so fur. Looks like ez ef that endan- gers this bunch, but I aint and the common- dant don't act skeert. Toblach is wheh mos' tourists gits off ths cars for the Dolomites via Schluderbach, Cor- tina and the Ampetzo. Mebby they's tired climbin' mountings, and want to ride on the keers, or mebby they want to git to Toblach jest to stan' aroun and see the cars come in, like we used to in early days at Berrvville. *l Schwester fiartmann Salzburg, Feb. 14, via Amsterdam und so welder. — I wor allers an admirer of Admiral Van Tromp and old Peter Stuyvesant and hope mebby they'll let tbis go past. They's six Salzbergs in tbis part of Austry, but only one Salzburg: Salzberg near Iscbl, ditto near Aussee, do. near Hall^ ditto near Bercbtcsgaden, ditto near Hallstadt. Salzburg is the most Cbermin city in Franz Josef's empire, wbicb isn't sayin much, bein ez how said empire is awful mixed up fur raccs^ nations, dialects and languages. But even iu Prooshy, they aint no large town that's purer Teutonic than Salzburg; here the people are 99/^ pel" cemt (99.5) Cbermin. In the whole provinz only one-half of one per cent belongs to other nations or races. Somehow it seemy like ye strikes the most beautiful places at the wrong time of year. In 1877 ^ man come to Blue Eye. He come in a private car till he got to the end of the railroad. He come to the foot of the Rainbow SCHWESTER HARTMANN 21 after travlin a few mo* mile, mostly up-hill — some one had tol' him the fishin' was good. In a whole week he got only four or five bull- heads and two squirls. In spide of its common, cheap-by-the-ton name, Salzburg (Saltville) is one of the purti- est places that lays out-doors. How much pur- tier it must be in beauteous May ! Green and white matches beautiful; but the white is out of all proportion now, I reokon the green wil,l be too much in Ma}^ probly not. They's enough snow mountings in sight all summer long to make a nice, white trimming. The city is split in two by the river Salzach (Salt River). The Cathedral and big biznes« is on the left-hand side coming down stream, or going up from the railroad station. When many years ago the Grand Duke of Tuscany was fired, and his folks j'ined united Italy, his 'Ighness bought the big Residenz Schloss or palace, right acrost the Residenz Platz from the telegraph oince aDd the Cathedral. Along the west side of the Schloss is the Kapitel Platz, on the opposite side of which is situated the fine old antique, the Archbishop's palace, restored some years sence. Close by, high above the town, and right in town, too, 400 feet above the Kapitel Platz, is the old fortress of Hoheri-Saizburg. It dates from the 9th century, and still looks threatenin and fierce, high, stern, forbidding, rugged; but 22 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN present-day artillery would tumble down quick the grim, imposing pile. In old times they wan't no way to take the Fortress except by starvin the garrison to death. Salzburg castle or fortress minds me some of Edinburgh Castle, though I 'How Salzburg has Edinburgh beat most ways. Each is right in town, and each nevertheless marks quite similar the deadline, "Thus far and no farther." The three Platzes that surrounded grand olc Tuscany and his Palace on three sides — Dom plaiz, Residenz platz, Kapitel platz — has most of the fine bildinS, wealth and biznez. The beer gardens and cheap real estate is acrost the Salzach, at the south end of the east side, just outside the suburb of Stein, which is like the city of Piedmont (by Oakland) surrounded on all 'sides by Salzburg City. Otherwise the salt city's suburb resembles Emeryville more than Piedmont; but Emer3^ville has Oakland on three sides only; on the fourth is the Bay. Stein does not approach the river. In time of peace a big beer stein is this suburb's Emblem. But when the blasts of War break on our ears, the stein is remanded SCHWESTER HARTMANN 23 to the cellar, and St. Francis Joseph Mars is set forward in liis place. [In the old steamboatin days the party that got licked went ''up salt river'' after election. Above this town the Salzach is too steep in places for skatin; and much of the scenery is like Edgar W. Nye's perpendicular farm; lots of retairuing walls to keep the mountings from jurapin' into the river, and also blockin' the railroad. They paraded us prizners in front of the iCathediaj to show the ladies what their men have been a-doin. But we're a-p^oin to laugh last, my dears. They didn't march us far tor fear of makin' us mo* hungry. Scliwester and The Betrothed were out to see us, but they didn't know me then. Our common-Dante smiled pleasant at me, and I asked how kin I deliver the lock of ha'r and the pictures to the avvytor's sister who lived in the northeast part of the city, on the right or east bank, to the north of the Capuzinberg, not far from the Park and the railroad station. This part of the city has done most all the growin that's been done in the last thirty years. The older city lies be- tween two great hills or mountains: The Moenschberg, west of the river, about two miles long, and the Capuzinberg, east of the Z4 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Salzach. The common-Dante some time sence applied for more dangerous service; he today received an order granting his request, and he goes to Trieste tomorrow. He is right smart elated, and believes now he will be given command of a submarine or a airyplane. He kin navigate either. He says to me, off-hand like, he hisself be my guard when I go to de- liver the lock of flaxen hair to The Betrothed, and will then turn over his command. A gently-warming sun had softened a little the snow when the common-Dante and I set out, each equipped with a permit from the General commanding the Garrison of Salzberg. He had to have one, same as I. We crossed tlie river on the footbridge, and walked through the Municipal Park, which had come to be re- nowned for its summer beauty. In a quaint and comfortable-seeming cottage iu a quiet strassy, not far from three or four costl}^ villaSj we found Frau Hart m an n and Sch wester, mother and sister of Lieutenant Reinhold Hartmann, shot down from a airy- plane on the banks of the Brenta. One and only one glance showed to us that the two women had learned of his death. Something akin to resentment was expressed in Frau Hartraann's proud, fine face, as if she would herself demand of the Kaiser: Franz Josef, geben sie mein Sohn h era us ! SCHWESTER HARTMANN 25 Schwester seemed Cliermin enough to match her pet-name: what her truly, Christian name is I haven't asked her yet. She had the calm and quiet ways, tlie mild brown eyes and light- brown hair, clear, cream and peaches skin, one found so often among German girls before the war. She wore a house-dress of homespun butternut-brown. The common-Dante persented me to Fran Hartmann as the Himerican who had received the Herr Lieutenant's last message. I riz to take her pmlTered h^nd when the street door was pushed open as if by one accustomed and a tall girlj an inch or so taller than Schwester, a year or two 3/ounger like as not, with hair the sheen and color of that blonder gold they used to coin into $5 and $10 pieces at the Mint which John C. Calhoun persuaded Uncle Saml to establish near one of his three plantations. [Near Dahlonega, Georgia. The other two one discovers were in South Carolina, neither of all a large one.] Her skin was even fairer, whiter than Schwester Hartmann's. Her eyes blue- azure. A pathetic touch was given to the pic- ture by a black dress, mad^ nid worn quite simply. February's frosty air had sent into her cheeks a faint under-curreul: of color. Sh« was presented to us both as The Betrothed. She talked frahkly of the Herr Lieutenant. From the beginning of the war sT-e ■ ' " ''' a 26 BUTE EYE TO BERLIN presentiment that it would bring misery and grief to her: Adieu, mein allerliebt Schaelchen, Wir sehn uns nimmermehr. When Uncle Blair was a small, half-orphan boy, he used to visit on Saturda3^s the family of his mother's sister. The two women were daughters of a Pennsylvania German and the former, before her death, had arranged for these visits. When it was time for the visitor little boy to go home, his host would approach the home authorities with a request to go ^'part way'' with his guest. When Bayard Tay- lor, in 1845, set out on foot fiom Frankfort for Vienna, a number of Frankfort boys and girls went **part way." I thought of this when the Schwester asked her mother if The Betrothed and she might go part way with us. Before we started' The Betrothed sang the old ballad, 'Xenore," by Buerger: "Oh mutter, mutter, bin ist hin — Verloren is verloren ! Der Todt, der Todt is mein Gewinn; Oh, waere Ich nie geboren !" The sun was right smart lower, the air more frosty, and the snow beginning to crunch nnder our feet when we four turned into the portal Capuzinerberg from which, by 250 steps, we ascended to the gate of the Monastery of the Capuchins. In the park we inspected the SCHWESTER HARTMANN 27 "little house'' that belonged to Mozart, which was brought hither all the way from Vienna; the latter city is a leetle over two hundred mile east by northeast from Salzburg. It was con- sidered best to consolidate all the Mozartyanna in this town, which has jest reeked of Mozart, fur some years. They keep his skull sumwers in town to show tourists, but I cal'late our two girls won't take us to see it. In this ^'Mozart- hauschen" the great composer-pianist finished his "Zauberfloete." In front of the little house is a bronze bust of Mozart that has been genius loci of the hauseschen sence 1877. If Mozart were livin now, he might like as not be besiegin Warsaw, and I. J. Paderewski defending. My w^ord 1 but Schwester is a walker ! She swung up the 250 stone steps to Mozart's little house, breathed one sigh and started to once on the 400 more steps up thro the woods to the Aussicht nach Bayern — the Out-Look over Bavaria. Salzburg corners on Bavaria — that iz, the southeast corner of Bavaria is jest im- mediately acrost the river from this cit}^ You see the south boundary of Bavaria runs westly from Salzburg. Both banks of the river, inside this city, belong to Austry. North of the city the left bank is in Bavaria. To the southward, and right in the city, it's hilly, even mountain- ions, but northward is plenty of level ground. On the east side, some forty rod north of Frau ^8 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Hartman's cottage, stands Maria Plain, a fam- ous pilgrim church. Northwest, the Bavarian plain starts right here, and stretches away to Munich, ninety miles. The Betrothed stood beside Sch wester at the x\ussicht, the fast-descending sun converting the flying strands of breeze-entouzeled hair into a halo of glory about her golden head. On the north at the left is the suburb, of MuUn, at the right Maria Plain, iu the center the Salzach, from now Bavarian, speeding o'er the levels. Farther and higher, the two pow'ful girls led us to the Obere-stadt Aussicht. Baedeker, so the common-Dante said, pronounced this the finest view on the Capuzinberg. The Aussicht is 682 feet above the river and discloses the Fortress, the City, and the Hochstauffen, Un- tersberg and Berchtesgaden mountains. The sun was setting as we hurried through the stone portal into the Lienzergasse street. Then we walked'^part way"homewithSch wester and The Betrothed. I got two Valentines today, one from each, both painted by the Betrothed. Hers was & portrait t)f Seh wester, with a bunch of Edel- weiss, or some sieli, in her hand. Schwester's was a head of Mozart, who was born here. Salt of the Earth ISCHL (Salzkammergut) March 17, 1917 (a hol- iday in Austry) — Sence the common- Dante went away, our guards is mostly ladies. Isn't that fine? The Chermin is a great language, of depth and power, but is s'prizin different at several p'ints from our free and easy United States. Hell in Anglo-Saxon is a bad word, or at best a bad place; it is one of the finest words in the Chermin language. ^ Yesterday the sun come out sudden and lit up a dark and shadowed co'ner of the Traunsee, and I overheered the Countess in command ejeculate: *'Hell!" Then I remembered that Hell in Chermin translated means bright and clear. She doesnt look like a lady who'd zwear wantonly. Our old com- niondant is sumwers on a sekert mission, and they's probly big doin's ahead; mebby he 'Hows to capture Venice; a Venetian (Venediger) mit us says Venice jest now is long on gondolas & palaces und short on tourists, tips and home folks. He 'Hows it might surrender to 'Meric* 30 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN but not to Austry. He's a voter in New York, and is for Hughes, and Chauncey M. Depew. He aint got n rvlliiu agin the King of Italy, but didn't caVlate on gittin captured when he volunteered. Salzkammergut is a prettier name in its own speech than in United States. It means Treas- ury Salt Reserve. They's one other Merican prisoner here A lady guard slapped him for speakin of Dr. Dumb-Bells (Dumba.) The lady was repo'ted, but I kaint blame her much. Such a pun would of made Theodo' Hook nervous. Fired at her by a supposedly friendly pow', too. Salt is a Government monopoly in Austr}^ and gives the official a dead mortal clutch on not the folks alone but the cattle, sheep, hogs, horses, dtQv^ bear, potatoes and celery. They all got to have salt. They run the salt thro pipe lines for quite a ways like Standard Oil. Fur instance here at Ischl don't make it up but run it down to Ebensee at the head of the Trauusee, a beau- tiful lake — in spring. This provinz is small, comparin with Salzburg : 250 square (most of them is crooked) miles, and not mo' than 20,- 000 people. The scenery is grand but not thick. In that small space is two fine lakes: the Traunsee and Atterod See, and one little one, the Amsee. They niarclied us up the lake from Gmuenden. Off to the left is the SALT OF THE EARTH 31 Traunsteiu, not quite six thousand foot high, but all-fired steep. Winter befo' last Peggy read to me 'bout Bayard Taylor hoofin it (or climbin) up the Traunstein [Views Afoot]. We see a town of Traunstein on the map, on the aidg of Bavaria, 'bout seventy-five miles from here, and cal'lated that was the place; but I ^llow this here is it. In back farther is the Wildekogl a thousand foot higher; also the Erlakogl, the Gruenberg and Kleine Sonnstein — all nice tor tourists after the Wah. . When Gen. Sam Gary spoke at vSpringfield in '76 he denounced the Republican party for taxin' salt, and Jedge Purdy, in a front seat, laffed sneerinly. Sam looks fierce an' repeats: '* Taxes yer salt — sugar, I mean Then he takes a drink of water and chokes. He'd been a Democrat Lieutenant Governor of Ohio, and allers choked on water. He turns and stage-whispers to the cheerman: ''Which is it they tax — salt or sugar ? " *' Danged if I know"^ — which madeit wusser. Them Italians is awful at keepin things to theirselves— had Cortina since last May, and I didn't know it. Our Countess says they kin feed them remittance invalids, and welcome. I spect the}^ guv up Cortina without a fight to save the new hotel, and the Italians kept away from Trent to save the old Cathedrals. A grain of salt, even a spooful, may sift in this. A Horsetrader Hero Wot fur they sent us to Innsbruck I dunno unless it got out that we were plot tin to es- cape and go to see the Oppery in Vienna. Grub may be skeerce, aud bizuez not as usual, but Vienna has got to hev Oppery. I fears one of my cherished dreams is busted that my stately figger won't never adorn the Ringstrosse, even for an hour. To git to Innsbruck from Ischl we had to come past Munich, wliere we had the choist of two railroads part way up. Wc were paraded thro Munich like w^e was at Salzburg, mebby to show the city what kind of hoss-styles they air up against. Munich is a fine city, and lots of ladies dressed beautiful was out to 'dmir® us. [Since the foregoing, Munich aiithorities have forbidden women to wear liiie clothes on the street.] I was pow'ful sore they didn't in f ite us to visit the Pinnakothek, which is one- of fonr or five greatest art collections. They wan't much danger of us kerryin noile of the great Pain tins off. * ^ As I was say in, we had to cut acrost Bavaria A HORSETRADER HERO 33 Bavaria, but that wan't no trouble, bein ez how the two kentries is on good terms now; they didut even paw over our baggage at the front- ear of Ostry; cause why our trunks had gone astray, so we hadn't none to speak of. The poet Campbell lived and died in the delusion that the Battlefield of Hohenlinden was right on the river Isar so they jest rolled the dead bodies into the river and floated them down to the Crematory like they used to float logs down the Skookumchuck. Hohenlinden is full twenty mile from the river Isar, which comes no nearer than the city of Munich. On Linden, when the sun was low All bloodless lay the untrodden snow. And dark as winter was the flow Of Iser [Isar] rolling rapidly. The fact is Hohenlinden is as fur from any river or any railroad as any town kin be nowa- days. The Hohen has some to do with that. Like Bethany (VV.)Va. or Damascus, O., Hoh- enlinden was quite a place before railroads was drempt of and thot the railroads had to come to it even if they had to climb a ladder to git to their high and healthful site. Andy Johnson opposed vigorous the charter- ing of the first railroad in Tennessee because it would put the six-horse teamsters out of busi- ness. When the railroads had got to goin good, the teamsters was doin' more business than ever. Our train passed within nine mile 34 BUTE EYE TO BERLIN of Hohenlitiden. It is out on the perairy most due east of Municli. If there is a crick, spring or Water-Hole anywers near, taint shown on a recent map. Nobody could of fit a battle where it would do less damage to abutting property. Gen. Moreau commanded here for Napoleon, and the Little Corporal hisself could of hardl}^ done better. He was jealous after that of Moreau. Up to 1813 Bavaria fit for the French aginst Austry, and there was cordial hatred between Bavaiii and the Tyrol, whose people had ever displayed friendship and loyalty to the family of Haps burgh. One of the two Railway lines from Munich to Innspruck is twenty miles longer than is the other. I kaint see how the longer line kin do biziiez, as the longest is only T09 mi. But the short line is mo' Hilly and picturesque, which enables the longer line to keep even by faster running. Mo' towns is on the long route. I got a good look at the Tegernsee, a favored haunt of the Empress Elizabeth of Ostry. King Ludwig II was drownded here. Two blacksmiths was called to the colors, so I'm a-doin their work. They don't watch me cloast, relying on professional ethics to charge wot's right, or wot's plenty. Prices is low, com- parin with Blue Eye. I repaired a J'int in the Hof Kirche, where Emperor Max. I. has a fine stattoo. He died A HORSHTRADER HERO 35 1519. He don* git as much notice as Andreas Hofer, humbly born but of romantic fame, who was a shipper of horses and kep' a wine shop. The latter occupied the corner store on the one best street of Innsbruck, in the same building with the hotel that Andreas, and his father before him, also kept. Sich a store, in a similar location (situation is a better word) in Cleveland, O., or Oakland, would rent for $200 a month. In Innsbruck, owing to the low cost of living, it 'd bring in less 'n $9. Each of the Hofers sold wine at wholesale and retail. Horses they never re-taikd (though Andreas, so Napoleon asserted, would once in*a%hile paint a zebra for a Hamburg menagerie-supply house) — horses they ^'shipped" in droves or in bands rather to Italy. The Inn valley is noted lor good horses. Innsbruck (Inn's Bridge) has been called the second most beautiful town of the German Alps, Salzburg first: fights not big for the Iselberg are held in the Exerciser Place. Hofer was born 1767 at St. Leonhard, in the Passeyr valley, near Meran; he led a corps of riflemen operating against Napoleon on the shores of Lake Garda in 1796; in 1803 helped to organize Tyrol's militia. In 1805 Napoleon transferred Tyrol bodily from Austria to Bava- ria. In 1808 Hofer became leader of Tyrol and went to Vienna on invitation of the Archduke John to concert a rising. In 1809 he defeated the Bavarians in three battles near Innsbruck. Two of these were fought on the Iselberg, a big wooded hill just south of town. At school, wc 36 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN used to say to the other boy, who was often the biggest: *'I dare you out of doors If he wanted to start a fight. That was the way at the Iselberg. Hofer would gether his Tyrolean warblers and shootzen men on the Berg, then send a Ultimattum to the French and Bavarians at Innsbruck te come up aud fight. If they refused, Hofer's sharpshooters gits busy, men brung up to hit the Chamois or Mountain Sheep standin' on the p'int of a rock acrost a mountain valley several hundred higher than the shootzen man, and fix it so it falls in the psychic, accessible spot. That^s as how they always come out. In one of these battles Hofer wiped the ground with the French under Marshal Lefeb- vre. Lefebvre was husband of Madame Sans- Gene in What's-His-Name's play. Madame was Napoleon's wash-lady, laundered his shirt and unspeakables when he was a poor young man. His bill was shocking small, yet ke was owing her nearly thirty-five francs when his ship come in and he was given command of the Army of Italy. She never did his laundry free: that wasn't her idee of biznez; but she gave him things to eat and scolded him awful for starvin' hisself. After he got to be Emprer she scolded him oftener yet, and slapped him » few times. The A HORSETRADER HERO 37 Emprer made Lefebvre Duke of Dantzic for cleanin' up in 1806 what was left of the Prus- sians after Jena. Lefebvre didnt use his title a great deal. One day a stranger accosted him: ^'Is the DuTce of Dantzic accessible? '^ **Duke of Dantzic? That must be that d — near-sighted Russian that was hangin 'round headquarters yesterday." He would of answered to Lefebvre. Hofer was elected Oberkommandant of Tyrol and for six weeks he resided in the Schloss Tyrol. Hofer wore whiskers. Then for the third time Tyrol was invaded, this time by 40,000 French and Bavarians. Hofer fled, de- feated. By the armistice of July 14, T3^rol was given unconditionally to Bavaria. Emperor Francis sent a chain and medal to Hofer, signifying gratitude. Andreas took it to be encouragement to do more, so broke out again. He was captured by some of Napoleon's Italian soldiers, taken to Mantua, tried at the head of a drum, and shot Feb. 20, 1810. All the officers who convicted Andreas asked that his life be spared. But Napoleon was piti- less, insisted on something besides Maria Lou- isa to show for whippin Austry onct; more. Endurin them six weeks in Schloss Tyrol, he governed well and fairly. In 1823 his body was returned to Innsbruck, seyenteen years be- fore Napoleon's was brought back from Saint Helena. In the Franciscan Church is a fine 38 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN stattoo in marble of Andreas Hofer by Scballer witH reliefs by Klieber. The costly and elab- orate monument of the Emperor Maximilian, in the center of the nave, surrounded by many (28) colossal statues of "heroic aijcestors" and twenty-four reliefs on the sarcophagus have not attracted more attention from tourists than the less sumptuous (the word Baedeker uses) mon- ument to Hofer, with its six Tyrolese binding themselves by an oath over a lowered banner, in relief. These six represent the six districts of Tyrol. On either side are the tombs of two devoted followers: TheCapuchin monk Haspin- ger and Speckbacher the chamois-hunter. The Franciscan cathedral is called by home folks the Hof kirche. Andreas was the fust horsetrader I call to mind whose counterfeit has been handed down in marble, and who wa'nt never accused of cheatin. Healthy Meran I wor puzzled when they told me to pack up and go to Meran, which is a hunderd mile the way we come, but cal'late now it wor ez how I'm too handsome, too interestin to the ladies, but when five or six women get jealous, what is a man to do ? The three weeks I was at Innsbruck the day patrolwoman on our block was changed six times. They all would look in and snnle as they marched past Ladies 'dmire a muscled, brawny arm. One guv me a bunch of vi'lets when I quit work at six; the nex day a new one come on; her second day she left a can of peaches in the shop by mistake; that night two Italian blacksmiths arriv, and I was sent fur to Meran. My guard looked as if she was going to cry, but said that Meran is healthy. From 6 a. m. to 7 the Plauptman teached tbc ladies how to shoot — they^s mostly too all-fired accurit to suit us prizners — was all I didn't like. We laid over a da}^ at Boatzen, to see train 40 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN after train of troops pass, headed, I ^llow for sumvvers in Italy. Boatzen is twiset bigger *n Meran but not so much to see, but is right smart mo' important militarih^, stragetically, and commercialistically.lt is ravishingly situate at the confluence of the Talfer and the Eisack rivers. The'Eisack falls into the Esch (Adige) three mile below town, but that junction don't amount to no confluence. I kaint jest onder- stand why, but jest this moment it dawns on me mebby a confluence has to have a seprit vc.lle}^ to back it up. At Coblentz the Moselle and Rhine form a confluence (the town used to be named Confliientia by the old Romans.) If the Rhine is the bigger, mo' famous river, the Moselle and its valley are far mo' important to Coblentz. Like the railroad that ends at Ber- ryville is mo' valne to the town than if it went on to Springfield and Kansas City. The San Joaquin and Sacramento, comin' from opposite directions, have a meeting place but no conflti- ence. They aint no city theh. The Ohio and Mississippi have a confluence at Cairo, but the Missouri jest Jines the Mississippi without no Confluence. In olden times mo' towns was built in way up high places like Jerusalem than at the lower down Confluences. But when the railroads ap- peared everybody see tliat the Confluences had 'em beat. That's ez how Bound Brook, N. J., and Havre de Grace, Md., or Quincy, Mass., each had a railroad fifty year before Jerusalem, which was an important city 800 B. C. or mo'. HEALTHY MERAN 41 Between Sterzing ar^d Brixerj, close b}?' Sterz- ing, ib^ Franzenfeste, armed to the teeth and toenails. It is up 2,460 feet, and is supposed to command both val]e3/s, the Eisack southwest, and the far-famed Pust^rthal. I 'How the Ital- ians don't keer fur Franzenfeste, and that them shootin up Toblach was a Faint, or mebby an attempt at Flan kin, rather than tackle her (or is a Fortress him?) in front at a cost that wood stagger humanity, as Oom Paul 'd say. The Pusterthal is one of the largest valleys ot this region, wide enough to farm in several places. It has two rivers. The folks along the Rienz west of Lienz is Chermin, and them on th Drave, east of Lienz, is Slavs. A couple of mile southwest of Botzen the Eisack jines the Adige, w^hich takes a kink jest above, comes in from the northwest, turns here and runs plum south into Romeo & Juli- et's town and on past. Our road follered the Adige northwest until a mile from Meran, twenty mile from Botzen. Meran is short for Merry Ann or Mary-Ann. It is the old capital of Tyrol. When Napoleon Bonaparte was young and slim, he cut down to one meal a day to get a copy of Plutarch's Lives. But things got to comin so fast and so easy that he furgit the lessons it learnt him — furgit the dry and crinkly hide of a buffalo that the Seieucian spread on a flat little piece of ground in front of Alexander to show how when he went to one corner the other 'd tip up —intimatin that his empire was already too 42 BLUE BYE TO BERLIN big, 'thout waitin to take them in. Napoleon made sumwers aloug here the boundary 'tween Italy and Bavaria, teetotaly obliterating Tyrol. In 1813, when the Tyroleans heered that the Russian corner had tipped up on Napoleon, they riz. These bones shall rise again. And purty soon Bavaria shook him, too, bein* ez how he'd got so many of their men-folks Slayed. On a house in the Rennweg is a tab- let ez how Andreas Hofer spent there his last night in the Tyrol. Fur some reason, Tyrol was allers great friends with the Hapsburg family. One of its gre;atest ladies — I used to know her name as I do Peggy's, but I disremember now, used to live a good sheer of her time at Schloss Tyrol (ax-scent on the roll.) After the war ye kin inspect the castle fur seven cents ef they don't h'ist the price, as they's libel to, to pay fur the War. Schlcss-Tyrol is hard walkindistance from town — some three mile. I cal'late the Italians won't try to come here, on account of the invalids and cure-houses, probly pertected, like Cortina, by the Gold Cross, like the Red Cross pertects the sick soldiers. Tliey'll push to Vienna probly up past Goritzy, Laibach and on northeast if they kin. These town aint so much elevation as I reckoned. Botzen is 880, Meran 1050: Meranlies cozily sheltered in the Passer valley, at the foot of a vine-clambered HEALTHY MERAN 43 mountain, the Kuechelberg. The Adige is half a mile from town, at its neerdest, where the Passer Confluences with it. Ez the lady said, Meran makes a special of bein' healthy. It has a whey cure in Spring. By the time grapes is ripe the invalids is tired of whey. The grape cure which they have in the fall (ottum) is also renowned. Meran, as have all German and Austrian towns, levies a visitors' tax of one florin (four-bits 50 cents) a week. Well folks have to pa}^ this, same as invalids. No strangers exempt except prizners of War. English and Himericans buck awful at this visitor' tax, and allers did. That's wot made the Vienna Exposition of 1873 a financ- ial failure. It cost like Sam Hill to get there, and the visitors' tax was the last straw. If you git out of town within three days you are not taxed. Quite a number got out. The English mostly knowed about this tax, which fact never diminished their holler one bit, if it did lack the element of surprise, which was the keynote of the typical Himerican roar. Quoth a guest, a veteran General of U. S. A.: '^Don't you want visitors here ? " ^'It is immaterial (Das macht nicht aus)." ** Then why do you solicit travel custom?'^ *'That is the innkeepers, this is Guvverment. On the right bank of the Passer (Pass-Air) is the Gisela Promenade, a fancy modern name 44 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN for the old Wassermauer or bulwarks (a ento- mology of Boulevards. In more 'n one city the old ramparts afforded the most available place for an evening Ramble, and in time Boulevard come to mean Ramble-Place. No smoking is or was allowed on this Prom- enade, or on the piazza of the Cure-House, or in the Cure-Garden up-stream. The Passer is a frolicsome river, and the Promenade is useful still sometimes as a levee or bulwark, The of- ficial name of the Cure-Garden is the Untere Wiutere Anlage. On the left bank is a contrast. The Band plays in front of the Cure-House on the right bank in the middle of the mild winter-days; it plays both Spring and Fall on the left bank, in the Untere und Obere Sommer Garden, only in Winter does the Band play for the Invalids and in the Under and Over Garden the folks, drink beer snd smoke twenty-five hours a day, ef ye kin save that much daylight. In the Under and Over Garden, folks is drinkin wine and beer while the invalids on the right bank is drinkin whey. Ye aint allowed, in times of peace even, to drink mo' beer than ye kin hold, yet ye kin drink beer on both banks of the picturesque Passer. But on the left bank ye are not obstructed by signs Smokin Verboten That's where the left batik has the right bank HEALTHY MERAN 45 beat, and they put it onto the right bank by havin* an under and over garden both. Meran has jest one long biznez street, with arcades (uuter den Lauben) on either side — handy to hitch horses in front of. Some comes in from valleys on horseback, mo' on Shanks' mare, special since the War started. Acrost the Passer, dividin' np with the under and over gardens, are the two villages of Unter Mais and Ober Mais. It is cooler in Ober Mais than in Meran or Unter Mais. Most folks think* that Scliloss Tyrol took its name from the kentry or provinz, but jest opposit is true. The Tyrol took its name from the Schloss. It is on the northwest slope of the Kuechelberg, round the bend from Meran. From its windows are several piuDSpects of wondrous beauty. From its elevation of 214 ^ feet, one can see for twenty miles adown th : Adtge, with the porphyry mountains bordering the picture on the eastern side. Westward is the rich Meran \ alley and the B'alls of the Ad- ige, alias Esch, where the river drops 600 foot. The Tom Jasper even couldn't git past such a current, but a hydroplane could make it. The hauptmann liked my shoein' his horse, and sent me to the Toell (divide) and the Falls. The valley is like a great orchard of walnuts, chestnuts and grape-vines, enclosed by beautiful porph3'ry mouutains. It's Spring now — the girls of the Tyrol, and the orchards, is bloomin. The valley of Meran is thick-settled, dotted 46 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN by many villages, before the War inhabited by happy and prosperous folks, as folk go in this-old Europe. Meran and Schloss Tyrol, even more than Innsbruck, and the Passeyr valley, have been regarded as the nucleus from which grew the Tyrol, from which it became a Land, Country, a political entity. RAUCHEN VERBOTENl Death or Liberty La Libertad es uno de los mas prtciosos dones que los cielos dieron a los horn- bres * * Pdr ^la libertad, asi come por la honra, se puede e debe aventurar la vida * * " [wbieh means tliey's nawthin like Libert}^, and one ought to resk his life fur it.] "Cato learnt Greek at eighty." So when I come acrost the stormy 'tlantic and the balmy Mediterranean, I br^ung along a Spanish exer- cise book to rest up on when I git tired sted- yin Italian and Chermin: the above is the first pernouncin sample in it. Spite of the glorious scenery and nice folks, I bin frettin right smart to get that key to the oats-bin at Borgo back to wheh it b'longs. At Innsbruck I planed to 'scape by follerin up the river Inn, past Landeck and Nauders into the upper Engadine in Switzerland. A lady told me the folks up there is pow'ful friendly to Austry, onlike so^me of the Sweitzers, around 48 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Zurich and Geneva, who stand in with Italy and France; besides, that key belongs to Count Cadorna. So I didn't go. The Engadiue is a valley sixty mile long, less 'n a mile wide on the avveridge, part in Tyrol, but most in Switzerland, the Inn neerd its middle all the way, headed up southwest, past places with Chermiii names at one end, Italian names (for Sweitzer places) at the other. The truth is, endurin this War, all nations has been a-doin their best to stand in with the (genuine) Republic of the Alps, the Mountain Land of Tell. [Erratum: — Hofer wan't in command of the Tyroleans when they *'wiped the ground'* with Marshal Lefebvre at the Pass of the Sachsen- klemme, near Sterzing. The monk, Haspinger, and Speckbacher, the chamois hunter, were in command. Haspinger was a fighting parson. Later Brownlow, of Tennessee, preacher, goril- la^ Governor and Senator, was called that. The English has been corrupt in the western Swiss, sendin wounded officers there to board, but the Engadine is too cold for such in Winter and Spring, but is fine for tuberkylosis, which I haven't got. Somehow I kaint git no map at Innsbruck or Meran, One day a soldier 'bout 77 year old come and got me to go to Trafoi to do some two days' work. His nose was on- common red DEATH OR LIBERTY 49 fur this kentry, which made me suspicious. We hed to hoof it the last twelve mile: horses and motors is both infrequent now: wheh used to be sixty hitched along that one Meran street were commonly only four or five this Spring. We left Meran befo' the sun riz, but had to go slow, ez how the old hero could only toddle. I offered to kerry his gun. He bucked (balked) but after four kill 'im meet 'er he let me kerry it except in villages and twice we met officers. He has two sons and a daughter in U. S. A. We lit out plum acrost the Adige valley, i}4 mile wide here, and the one swampy spot this part of the valley, made so by the Tiafoi Bach or Brook of Trafoi, which is a 'mighty deep swift-runuin brook this time o' year. Then the road begins to climb, and climbs steady nearly all the way to the summit of the Stelvio pass, up 9,045 feet. Like most Italian names Stelvio has a Chermin alias, the Stilfser Joch. This is claimed to be the highest keridge road in the world, or was, some years sence. The street in Pasco (Peru^ not Wash.) is 14000 feet up in the sky, but isn't nawthin like so good a road-bed as the Stelvio; all the street traffic in Pasco is llama-back. [More than a year follerin the above. Kaiser Karl, of Austry, in his motor-car, is reported to have made the seventeen miles from the Pass to Brad, with loi curves (mostly safe ones) in eleven minutes, hotly pursued by an Italian motorcycle squadron. The road falis 6005 ^^^^ S0 BWJB KYK to BHRtil^ iii^tliem seventeen miles. He passed Trafoi,' Half-way down, and tlirce-qnarters of the drop' ^t decli n ati on , at over a b undred-mile clip; he WkWt captured, but danged near it.] The Trafoier Bacli or brook looks like fishinf it makes a bigf noise, a regler brawler-^several ^teep My. I VI mi red the big show of snow mountains oiOr to the left: Monte Li vrib, 10,470; Nagler Spitze, 10,685; Pleisshorn, 10,312, Nas- horn Spilze, 9,442; TrafoiEis wand, 11,246^ the black Madatsch Spitze, io;i74; Kristallfen Spitzen, 11,300; Ortler, 12,812; Geisterspitze, ^^)3.S5- Ortler looms huge, but you kaint see his highest peak till you git to Franzenhoe, six mile above Trafoi, and 2,080 foot higher. NearTrafoi, at thei base of Ortler, are Three Holy Springs. I meant to visit them, but got a ch^nst to git back to Italy. Some of the bends in the big road itself is dizzy fur me; but the views is fine; my escort hadn^t no eyes fur anything but gittiti a drink. AtTl-afbi ht got b^ilin, pMntin his gun at ev- erybody but me. He goes to sleep on the back i^toop. Pnrty soon the hotel lady comes out, ties his hands behind him, looks significkant at me, and takes his gun into the hotel. At dusk he was snorin' good/ and T walks ofFnp the big road, keepin in the shadder like ? a U.S.A. policeman: '^Make tvay for Libery,'* I said "Make way for Liberty I *' and fled. DEATH OR LIBERTY 51 Ortler is the biggest and tallest mountain iii Austry, and has quite a fine collection around him, in the so-called Ortler district. Stelvio pass is the boundry between Austria and Lombardy, which is Italy. Half a mile north thfe southern boundry of Switzerland itb- tersects Tyrol's west-side line-fence. . I 'How the surveyors made a joggle. Qn San Pablo avenue, Oakland, the east and w^$t (E.S.E. and W.N.W.) streets miss each other in crossing the avenue, by almost half a block. Fur instance cdmitigto'rds the bay down 23d street, a stranger kaint.tell whether to turn to the right or the left at the avenue to get 23d west of the avenue. You see those dignified, genial Spanish C.E.'s surveyed at one try only wot land they wanted to use that same day. If somebody found an error, a CE. 'd say: "Fll look up the notes, and fix it manana (Spanish fur tomorrow.*') The street got built up along the old wagon-road that parallel* or meanxjers the bayshore (quite a ways inland) befo' manana came. (Oakland, Cal.; 44 Oaklands in U.S.A. but only one ever under Spain. At Franzenhohe, five mile above Trafoi, was when I first see the top of Ortler. The moon, herself on-visible, shone on his highest peak. iGrand. Magnifiqiie! Hermoso! Bello! Schofen ! I sneaked past the Italian guard-house at th^ summit at midnight, an' dawn was jest breakin 52 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN when a sentry at the aidge oF Bormio, 2i*mile from Trafoi, calls out shrill: '^Chi va la?'» I walk up to him big as life and bold as brass, an' say: " Wie geht's ?" A absent-mind error. He tells me I'm a spy, which scandalizes me, and I pertests vigorous. They hurries me to Sondrio, 40-mile in a auto, and co't sets at once. The finest scenery is on the Tyrol side of the Pass, but the best roads is on the Italian side. In place of the usual Drum-Head, they hez a little table. The jedge advocate he tells em, in Italian, I'm a Welsh renegade that's been a hangin round Munich fur ten year. I shows the key, and tells 'em it belongs to the oats-bin at Borgo di Val Sugana. (They's five Borgos in Italy and one inHungairy.) I made a closin' pathetic spiel in Himerican, begs 'em to telly- graft my friend Francesco, Marchese di Miran- dola (the Mar-Casey). But when they found Schwester's picture, that settled it. In some ten minutes a guard tells me I'm to be shot at midnight or right soon after that hour. It was a disap'intment to me. I'd expected to be received with open arms when I got back to Italy. My Italian words fail me in critical DEATH OR I.IBERTY 53 junctures, in crises, so to speak. ^'Oli, might my grave at home, in Carthage be ! " Thus Monica, and died in Italy. In '67 a new girl come to Springfield from Cincinnati. Hoke Tucker and me was inter- doosed to her at a picnic on White river. Hoke axes me, "Kin ye swim? " Fool-like, I says I kin, the girl smiles, and I feels like a hero. Next day Hoke says: "Let's go swimmin." He strikes out plumb acrost the river, but gits cramps and goes down. I starts to rescue him, but git ox-cited, the current takes me down- river, and I goes down twiset. I thinks a hull cyclopedy in a sho't time. I recalls thinkn cam-like: "Hoke's drowaded, and it'll be awful long befo' they come to look for us good swimmers. Jest then I comes up for the last go-down. I see a tree branch at a bend, and grabs it (Ve kaint drownd a boy, ez is horned to be shot — fur a spy.) I feels much the same tonight — so much I want to write I kaint fiu^ a place to begin. I writ a list of folks ez owes me, addressed to the Mar-Casey, long o' this. Don't waste money 54 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN on a tombstone. I pcrfer to be _ commemorated [makes me think of CamembertJ by my literary work alone. Not marble nor the gilded monuments Of princes shall outlive this powTul rime. And when I die, I'll leave to you My little stock and farm — My house, my barn, my little all- And all the little chickens in the garden." P. S.—Hoke he got out, too. I feel hungry. Free in Italy It wor jest six minutes past ten by the wrist- clock a Ikdy at Udine guv me fur Christmas when I hears a key turnin gentle in the do\ I rises perlite to see if it's time to go and git shot. Instid of the fierce-mustached guard, the lovely face of a most beautiful lady, with great, deep, dark blue eyes, pertrudes jest inside, and a shapely white hand beckons warninly. I has a hunch she is the wife of the common Dante. ** Tachaty ! *' miisical and low. , *'Non parlate forty. [Be quiet.] ' She slips a box of chocolate chips into my hand, and points down a dark and shaded lane, 'most kivvered with vines and blooms, through the grounds in rear of the palazzo. I turns to say **Thankye mum,'' but she puts a finger acrost her Cupid's bDw of a mouth, ez a sign to say it not, douses her lantern and disap- pears. About ten rod down the lane or path I see the moonlight strike a distandt mouutirig, «o I curls up under a tangle of vines and briers. Half hour later the' was a 'sturbance in the castle or barracks: purty soon a blood- 56 BLUE EYK TO BERLIN hound ccme past down the path, follered by three men. I used to expect a bloodhound is the fiercest, most dangersome dog they is; but couldn't, when I come to look and think one over, reconcile his big, dark, mild, liquid eye (and droopin ears) with my preconceptions. A deerhonnd looks six times ez fierce, and he is that fierce, too. And yet a bloodhound kin beat all follerin and findin ye, if he isn't in at the death, but jest stalls around and weeps, while the deerhound chaws ye up. From 1864 to 1876, Uncle Tom's Cabin was a legitimate drama; from '77 to '99 they kep' multiplyin the Topsies and bloodhounds until the U. T. C. companies all went broke, and the price of bloodhounds come down agin to some- thing like the ante bellum price. It's the b-l-u-d in bloodhound that skeers. This bloodhound didn't stop or notice me except to wag his tail as he went past, so I know he's a friend of mine, l, At my trial he was the only person in the room that looked at me friendly. He leads em off to'rds Austry. 'Bout 2 a. m , all quiet, the moon hid behind a mounting, and I lit out, keepin in the shad- der all I kin, and usin short-cuts past danger p'ints and thro the bresh. The blue sky of Italy was turnin to azure when my skeert eye see a auto, comin rapid. I dodged into the bresh. I felt awful shamed to* be hidin that-a-way like a thief. The keer FREE IN ITALY 57 stopt almost opposit the rock I laid behind. A big young man in a drab-green overcoat hollers loud and cheerful: " It is I — Francesco — the Mar-Casey.'' T come out sneakin-like, and we whirls oflF to Colico on the lake of Como, some fifteen mile, in twenty minutes. Sence I rid in the airyplane I don't mind, and it beats walkin all to smash. I wor 'most three hours comin ten mile and a half. At Colico he throws the reins to the shover, tells him to phone my escape to Sondrio, then take the auto to Milan. Francesco and I ketch the early steamboat fur Lecoo, *'jest fur the boat-ride," says he. He p'ints out Bellagio, at the p'int of the pen- insula that splits the lake in two. At Lecco, a town busy makin things, we take the train fur Monza and Milan. Milano has over half a million folks, twiset as many as Genoa. Naples hez mo' folks, but Milan has the mostest money. That 9-mile- long tunnel thro the Alps [St. Gotthard] did n't hurt her biznes none: it guv her a pull at Zurich and Luzerne an' round theh that stood the Allies sence in good stead, and holp a lot to make Zurich much the biggest SweitzerCity and let the Toy Makers git out theh painted Elephants and Tigers and Mountain Sheep to 58 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN make the Yankee children's Chrismas day. It was a right slim Christmas fur Toys last year [191 5]. I 'How that's ez how Italy declared War agin Austry and not Germany. The 12^-mile Simplon Tunnel is also a fine thing fur Milan. It taps the valley of the Rhone, and lets the metropolis of Lombardy into a big trade with France and Switzerland. They tell me that most kinds of freight that used to go via the St. Gotthard go now by the Simplon, which is 40 per cent longer but much lower and easier to git to. Them Alpine valleys all pours things into Milan's lap like spouts from a granary or from a threshing machine. Edward Everett, in his funeareal oration for Dan'l Webster, said: ''"Your long rows of quarried granite may crumble to the dust. The corn fields of yon- der villages (p'intin off to'rds Concord and Lexington and the Green Mountains and No'th Lancaster, vvheh they raise cows and stor3^ books and 'mighty little co'n) jest ripenin to the sickle — may. like the plains of stricken Lombardy, be trodden into bloody sands by the maddening wheels of artillery. It was given to but a limited number to listen to the living voice of Dan'l Webster, and they will never isten to it again; but the wise teachings, the FREE IN ITALY 59 grave admonitions and patriotic exhortations that fell from his tongue will be garnered and treasuied up in the memory of millions." Them plains of Lombardy aint stricken much, this war. The Austrins kaint git past the last line of mountings. That 12^-mile Simplon tunnel railway kin haul longer trains owin to lower grades, not hevvin to climb so high up the mounting to git into the tunnel. LaScala, the famous oppery house of Milan, is the largest theatre in Italy, barrin one in Naples. It aint open much late years, xcept when a Himerican prima donna subsidizes La Scala to git to show how fine she kin sing. Byzantinism Abating "Francesco,'^ I says,"I learnt a new word sence I come to Europe." I'd suppose you'd learn several." I mean a English word— Byzantinist." "What is a Byzantinist ? " **A Byzantinist is a Chermin with on-due or exaggerated respeck fur authority, or fur pot- entates or things established, and reverence, I guess, for 'ficials and sich-like. *'rd never guess that in the world, or how to connect such a cult with Constantinople's predecessor, Byzantium." *'By the time Byzantium had come to be the Capital of the degenerated Roman empire, the Roman soldiery and civics [cives] had lost the rugged independence of early times and come to be classified by posterity as chicken-hearted sycophants, or so they would be, later on. The bold peasantry that had once peopled the Alban BYZANTINISM ABATED 61 hilltops had no word or name for Byzantinist or pussy-footer. An ancient name for a modern species of servility, Mr. McCann, but why exclusively German? *' Some German scholar-radical detected the likeness and applied the name to what he deemed an evil. When a German scholar coins a word it is apt to be a long one — he builds it on top or jines it onto the end of an old-estab- lished word already in good standing. Greeley or Webster would of teached Americans a mo' condensed, a short word. To make a short story long, I should define, translate Byzantinism as the antipode of Lazy Majesty (lese majeste). Befo' this war Lazy Majesty was a crime in the Chermin Empire; few of the many cases were prosecuted, how- ever. Prosecution didn't pay, and the trial us- usually netted a considerable loss of dignity to the Kaiser and the Government. In war such laws are usual mo' strictly enforced, but the Kaiser has been very indulgent to that crowd. Mebby he needed the help of every one of 'em. "I think it mo' likely he regarded as unsafe to stir up the animals much." A lady at Meran lent me a paper that says a society has been organized at Darmstadt or at some town up that wa}^ to suppress or least- ways mitigate Byzantinism. They 'How it's got clean out of bounds in Doychland. A movement like that shows that even the Kaiser recognizes that one may have too much 62 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN of a good thiug. *'They don't cal'late to do much till after the war — jest git cf&rers elected, and on-finished business done, and mebby a barmycide banquet at Darmstatt or sumwers. The Markis interdoosed me to a Censor at Milan, and asked wot is a Byzantinist. The Censor didd't know, and put it up to me. I splained, and added: "I allers been a Byzantin- ist and didn't know it. Ef I do repperzent the ablest periodical in the world, I never let on. Some cor'spoudents takes too much space fur their liitle troubles with authorities and ficials, but I never says nawthin — leastways till I gits out of their reach. '' You didu't 'splain ^yzantinism at Meran ? *' I hadn't took time to think about it — too much society. '*Of course Italy isn't like our ke^ntry. I never heered tell of boodlers in Italy. It's dif- ficult to evince genuine on-due respeck fur a boodler. The Censor strokes bis moustache, musing. *' One beauty of the Irishmau," I says, is he will often do mo' fur glory than fur boodle, in a crisis affordin any show fur promotion. This is Decoration Day [1916] but it aint strictly enforced in Italy. Any'ow I aint been decorated yit, but the Mar-Casey 'Hows I'll git a order of the first-class fur rescuin Col. Count — —who fell wounded under a hail of Austrian HEROISM OF McCANN 63 bullets, cat-ridges and shells that swept the on-protected, narrer canyon: They was a open patch of about two city blocks the Italians hed to cross, without no kivver, and you bet they took it on the run, haids down like men facin a Ozark sleet storm. 'Bout fifty of the batalyen was left on the ground on that little patch. It was the 19th c f May, and the OstQjrins had druv us fur a couple days percedin. By special favor, owin to my Byzantinism, I wor settin behind a rock, on the near side of the little vale, takin in the scenery, dodgin the splinters from rocks and Osterrin shells, an' peepin out at the forward-flyin brave. I'd lost my writin material, so didnt't write nawthin down, an *hev to trust to memory. Off over my left shoulder the breeze ruffled old Mount Adamello's snowy mane, and the [xi,637] mountain hisself seems to look me in the eye and inquire: *'Who will resk his life to rescue a shot and sufferin brother Human beiu? I thinks mebby ez how God saved me in the airyplane and in Sondrio's dungeon, maybe he'll puH me out now. Anyhow, I'm g[oin on sixty-se\en." I waits ^second till it lets up a little, then scoot, like we used to light out from the barn to the house in a Mizzoorry storm of thunder, lightnin — and water. Ws'd run in the load or part load of hay, rocin'with the on- coniin storm loadin' till the last second. By a straggle we get the big barn doors shet inspite 64 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN of the tornado-breeze. Then the rain comes '4n sheets.^' Nothin' to read and no umbrell in the barn, no coat and no dry shirt till Sun- day. We toss up a pitchfork-handle to see who dives under the rain fur readin-matter. I finds the Colonel, slings him on my shoulder, and gits him somehow behind the rock. He is now recoverin' satisfactory. He oifered me his best horse, but I declined, bein' ez how I'm an airyplanist. I was shot in my wrist-clock, skinnin my arm up quite a bit. The Colonel got ancther bullet in his projectin laig, but didn't seem to mind. The fight was at the upper end of the Val Sarca, which some call four valleys. AUe Sarche is the main p'int or metropolis of the first valley or j'int (first from its mouth); Ste- nico of the second, which runs northwest, then north; the last j'int, which runs west, is called Val di Genova, and is narrow, wild and purty, but badly shot up now. The Osterrins has been givin us Hail Columby fur some time, but we 've retook all the ground they gained. Adamello (11,635) is on our left, Pressenella 11,686 on our right (north); Val Genova in be- tween-^forty mile on a bee-line from Trent, but most a million miles follerin the roads and cart-tracks. Round hyeh is Upper Judycaria (Giudicaria): Lower Judycaria is down by Sten- ico. We come in via Riva, at the head of Lake Garda. Another Riva (comparative unimport- ant) is at the head of Lake Como. A Chatelaine of Udlne When I see that some one had pied or dis- trybuted a page of my foryicomin book, I was skeert. Kin it be possible that some Eu-rope- ian Anarchist groop hez took offense and sent a Censor to Himerica? I^ra 'stonished so many folks is livin in Eu- rope, special befo' they took to killin' ^era ofiF this time. Now take Doychland and Italy — - YouM be s'prised at the amount of folks, and the biof sheer of land that aint arrowble. Some parts of Germany is mo' mountainious than the Ozark kentry. Both peoples takes to big famblys. It stands to reason they got to emi- grate or manufacture. And they got to sell part of theh factry product abroad. Wheat and cattle got to have room. Ye kaint make two blades of grass grow wheh they's only space for one. That's ez how the mountainious pro- vinz of Germany and Ostry is thicker-settled than the wheat-growin plains of Hungairy 66 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN and Proosliy. Fur instance, the Toymakers of Germany, Ostry and Switzerland lives almost unanimous in mountain-deestricks. They*s right s^niart of mountings most round this part hyeh of the Isonzo valley, most all the way to Goritzy. The Isonzo valley is comparative- narrow in spots— I mean in places — and from a militia standpoint the Osterins deserves credit fur the way they hez placed theh artillery. It*s been mo* than a year sence the Italians hez bin middlin close to Goritzy. It may be quite a spell yet befo' they git in. [Gorizia surren- dered in August, 1916, lollowing.J I *llow mebby theyM got in quicker if the kentry was leveler. It w^as one of the warm latest days of May when I come to the tunnel adj'inir cUe Isonzo, six or seven mile from Goritzy. They couldnt dig this one from both ends, ez how the Ostrin shells come too all-fired exact and regler. The daylight of early morn was jest peepin' in the fur end of our tunnel thro a slit in the false, imitation mountain-side the Italians hed riggd up, the common-Dante pulled a string and the Italian big guns on top of our high hill and down stream begun shoot in at the Osterrin batteries acrost the river at the rate of Ten Thousand Dollars a minute, and we ran out thejHnted, armored kivvered bridge, poutooned to the last ounce, we hed in the tunnel. The sky was that soft, fresh, morning azure one sees so seldom away from Italy^ California and Medicine Hat, Sixteen or seventeen airyplanes CHATELAINE OF UDINE 67 and two Zepliiis bej^un droppin bums. Every- body seemed to be gittin busy. The safest place from airyplanes is inside a tunnel. Shell after shell dented the bridge^ bum after bum spluttered and 'sploded. Quite a few Italians fell. On the furder side, the soldiers of Franz Josef fit with on-common^bravery, but the bridg went majestically, sinuously on, like a Twister Cyclone, or a British Tank, or Juggernaut, only not so fast as the first, or so lumbering as the second, or so religious as the third. Moses git- tin acrost the Red sea wan't in it, or Napoleon on the bridge at Lodi. "Mr. McCann," says the General, " would ye like to go to the front end and hitch her to the bank ? " Our smoke-screen or barrage had settled by now already and blotted out the fair light of a sunny first of June. The sun had not yet riz when T had took a peep through a slit in our canvas make-believe mountain, but the tip-tops of the hills and mountains east and north stood out marvelous-ruddy and clear in the advancin dawn, but by now all was changed almost in the twinklin of an eye, or in the lapse of a few moments, and the valley looked like a London pertickler, the river itself was obscured. I furgits I'm nootral, and makes a noose in the cable and throws it. After that I has a dim memory of bein trampled over by a rushin 68 . BUTE EYE TO BERLIN host. I come to proper in a 'field hospital. Nawthin but concussion — a bum 'sploded cloast to me. CHATELAINE OF UDINE Udine, June 3, 1916. The common-Dante advises me to take a sho^t lay-off which I don't need; concussion aint no kind of a injury. But I didn't mind stoppin a day OT two at Udine, bein as how comin down from the Trenteeno I hadn't no time to even call on the lady who guv me her wrist-watch in memory of her husband, who was great fur his liking fur Himericans. He made quite a bit of money in New York some years sence. She aint a truly Contessa or countess, but looks a lot like one, and her Departed left her better fixed financially than most of the bona fidy countesses. I doctored up her driving horse— the only one she had left. She told me today she'd 'bout as leave send her sorella (sister) to the War, but she guv four horses to the Army. I consoled her, p'intin out ez horses hez to die sometime ; and her argyment that horses hadn't nawthin to do with startin the War, and twuz a shame fur them to suffer so, applied jest the same to all the men but a few. Her CHATELAINE OF IJDINE 69 husband was one of the first Italians killed in this War. She cried fur him, too. The perfeshinal veterinarians was all in the Army, all-fired bus}^, and a friend of her hus- band asked me to look at her horse. I took quite a bit of pains with him, and won't tell my suspicions — twon't do no good, and he got well. I refused money, and she guv me a watch of her own, not one of her husband's, which shows she hez good taste and knows wot's wot. She's bin adoin headquarters work seuce with the horse, off and on, mostl}^ on. She received me in the libr'y, at her charmin villa in the soobnrbs (I furgit the Italian fur sooburbs) on a quiet, shaded strada or street — one of but a few sich in Udine now She 'pol- ogized ez how la sala (the parlor) and most of the balance of the house was full of workers or War fixins: this room she kep' jest as il marito left it — it was his si an pin-ground when he was home. She turned and looked out a winder fur a little spell, and a tear sneaked on-bidden from her eye. She brightened up quick, and asked me about New York. I 'llowed that wot I didn't know about New York wood most fill a Onabridged; but let her know that Oakland and Frisky is buildin' ships as fast as they kin to replace them as is gittin drownded. She was quite a picture, as she stood there, in the high lights of early afternoon, the sun- 70 BLUE EYE TO BERtlN shine filtered and softened thro the chestnut trees — all in black without a relieving note save the rich coloring of her cheek, and the fairness of her brow and hand. Raven hair, great dark eyes, and dark but scaVely middlin* heavy eyebrows. She's about five foot tall and medium plump, spite of all her troubles — she said the only thing she likes about livin on rashins it kep' her weight down. She speaks United States good, but chucked in a Italian word, now or then, to tease. Her husband was sixteen years older, with dark blue eyes, she said. I had to tell her that her pretty wrist watch had been sackerficed in the cause of It- alia irridenta. She didn't look sorry. I said I had cal'lated on takin' it home to Peggy. I 'llowed Pd take the lifeless remains to her, any- how, en souvenir. "She'll prize it all the more fur showin her father is a hero," says meh lady, and smiles. *^Ii was a good little time-keeper," I says. She guv me her hand in goodbye at the do\ "I hope you'll come to see me again." *'If the Mar-Casey has leisure, we both may.'* In and Out- of Aslago . Count Cadorna is yankin the troops o£f the Isotizo and piling em into the Sette Communi and round theh, south of the Val Sug^na, to meet the great Austrian offensive. Considerin the mountain country surroundin it in all di- rections ,the Sette Communi is comparative- level and so is fit over often. They aint no disguisin the fact our folks has been druv quite a ways, owin mostly to mo* pow'ful artillery — and mo' of it. The Ostrins advanced upon a line thirty miles long, reaching from Rovereto on the Adige, northeastward to the cheemas [cimas] or precipices that p'int oflf the south boundary of Val Sugana. Them 7,000-foot cheemas is most as. fierce as the 10,000-foot mountings. Two or three sharp, jagged curves in the line. On this line the Osterrins had gethered up 350,000 men and 2400 cannon, a lot of them cannon were big guns, too: they made the biggest showin of artillery sence cre- ation, outside of France ait this present time. They was two big naval guns set up on the Cost' Alta, near the left of the thirty-mile 72 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN line, that throwed shells into Asiago, eleven miles southeast, and hit the spot 'most every time, or danged close to it. I leave for Asiago tomorrow. As I said on page II, it is the chief town of the Sette Com- muni, a high table-land extending from within a few miles of Trent southeast .almost to the city of Vicenza. The Tredici (Thirteen) Com- muni, southwest of the Seven, similarly reach almost to Verona. The Sette comprise seven towns and villages— Asiago, Rottero, Roanna, Gallio^ Foza, Enego, San Giacomo di Cusiana, and the half-brofher communities of Campese, Campoloug Otiero, Val Stagna, Val Rovina, Vallonaera, Crosera. Asiago lies from six to ten miles back from the Brenta. Most tourists used to go in from Valstagna, on west bank of the Brenta, a two hours walk of five or six miles through the beautiul Val Frenzela. Valstagna is nearly due cast of Asiago. The former has a beautiful site on Brenta's right bank. As a a traveler comes dow»- the left bank from the narrow gorge of the Brenta, he crosses upon a wooden bridge at Valstagna, From here on is a road on each side of the river, to Bassano. Enego is on the Brenta about ten miles N.E. of Asiago. Enego is the next largest town of the seven. McCrackan reached the Sette Comrnuni by walking from Levico to Asiago in eight or nine IN AND OUT OF ASIAGO 73 hours, making a hot and toilsome (midsummer) climb of the Duodici range. The Undici and Duodici ranges is jest south of Val Sugana, paralleling it. Levico is at the western end of Sugana Valley, a few mile northeast from Trent. His route lay thro' the narrow defile of the Val' d'Assa. He described the Sette as '*a vast table-land of grass," 3,000 feet above the sea, a table-land among the Mountains, like some vast clearing in the forest." McC's notion of vastuess wan't acquired in Argentine or Canada, Montaina or Texas. I guess it's not mo' than ten mile acrost each way on the average. But among so many perpendicular farms [credit Bill Nye] it looks big. They's so few good places to fight that the Sette now gits mo' than its sheer. Asiago stands out on the perary mo' exposed than Cortina, which is fifty-five miles northeast by airplane, and a lot farther any other way, fur instance dodgin the high mountings or foUerin the road. I fears they won't be much left of the town at the tail end of this war. This high petairy is the only good place in these parts to practice highpow' artillery. The people of the Sette is most interestin. Up to recent its folks was considered a kind of Chermins livin under the red, white and green flag. Long ago these folks spoke onl^^ a kind of Chermin resemblin Swabian, and alleged scholars of the Sixteenth century identified them as descendants of the Cimbri, perhaps of 74 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN the few survivors of the|bloody defeat inflicted on the Cimbri by Caius Marius in the year lOO B. C. Up to 1797 the Seven were a small re- public under the protection of Venice. Then Napoleon gave it to one of his Italian creations but in 1815 it went back to Ostry again, and in 1859 she lost it again to Italy. Of late years, a majority of the people speak Italian only — a lot of the old settlers have only a lingo about as much like Chermin as story-book dialect is like truly Tennessee. Besides these, quite a few up-to-the-present folks speaks Italian and this kind of Chermin, too, Baedeker says "in all probability^' these folk are "relics'' of the Allemanni who flocked to followed Theodoric the Great, the Ostrogoth, in 496, after the battle of Tolbiac. Theodoric, you know, invaded Italy from Hungairy in 493. Asiago is yet, or was, the most important town of the Seven. A dummy (steam tram) road runs southwest seven or eight mile to the town of Arsiero, near the foot of Mt. Cengio, around which mountain they's been some hot fightin lately. From Arsiero the tramway mo- sies along the mountains' aidge S xS.E. to the junction Y at Schio. One fork of the Y runs N.W. to Torres, the other to Arsiero, which is a inland port for the Sette, with a population of Bbout 2500. From Schio the line runs south- east, then south, to join at Vicenza the main line from Brescia and Verona to Udine. The dummy from Asiago was used mostly to IN AND OUT OF ASIAGO 75 haul out the broad-brimmed straw hats, butter, cheese and milk that are the most volnmirous products and exports of the Seven. The butter is perduced most in summer, tlie broad-brim hats in winter. I arrove (June 6) nine days too late to save Asiago It's quite vulnerble, so to speak. But I see some rattlin-good fightin two or three mile south of town. Its high perairy is a fine place to show off artillery fire or sich like. The Sette is a open perairy or table land several mile acrost, with a fringe of woods or forest round the aidges and hills and mountings at the back all around, with a few narrow, scroogy ways out, like the Val d'Assa north, Val Fren- zela east and Val d'Astico (through which the Arsiero-Schio line runs) at the southwest. Ye kin see a shell comin quite a ways, but they're harder to dodge than you'd think fur. When that smokeless powder was first diskiv- vered, I 'llovved it 'd be a great thing, but the enemy beats that easy by raisin a smudge, or a smoke-barrage. Of course any kind of a bar- rier is a barrage. Usual It is an artilleyfire so hot that troops kin be lined up and m'neuvered behind it. Even in old times, ez fur back as Gettysburg, or even Napoleon I., 'twas quite common to preface a charge with the artillery — all of it. The object mostly was to silence the enemy artillery so they couldn't mow down 76 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN our men so soon and fast. It was Napoleon's accustomed formula (He was trained for the artillery) and next he would send in to win the day *'the bravest of the brave," Ney or Murat: "Where the broken line, enlarging, Fell or fled across the plain, There be sure was Murat charging— There he ne'er will charge again. This war I cal'late is the first time they have used gun-fire for barrage or concealment: they found it paid to shoot so fast the enemy would have to keep his head kivvered up out of sight and dassn't dare to look or peep or even lift his face out one tiny bit. Folks of the Sette is ac-colorcd to smoke. Fur ages their houses hez hed no chimblys — a hole in one side and a sooty outside wall, soovy- nears of the hated and burdenin chimbly-tax ! Britain had a window and chimbly-tax fur a long spell, but Free Himerica never ! Never before did we come to believe that we could afford to use so much ammunition. TheAsiago-MonteCengio dummy line exports broad'brimmed hats and dairy products. It is not operatin' now. Asiago, like Cortina, is fine to see the mountings from, but teetotally com- manded from too many of them. The Italians got out of Asiago May 28 ; the shells and bums was comin' too thick. They 'llowed the Osterrins wouldn't spile the town IN AND OUT OF ASIAGO 77 ef they'd move od. But Ostry got too sassy to oncet, and we tinned on 'em two mile out. June 6 the Ostrins made a Pickett's charge aginst the barrages, etc., on the slopes of Mt. Lemerle, jest south of Asiago, It suggested a steeper Gettysburg. By the 8th they gained the summit. But the Italians, unable to hold the summit, still clung to and held the south- west corner of the mountain, and they never gave it up. The highest position aint allers the strongest. That was high-water mark fur Austry at the southeast of the Seven. At Mt. Ciove and Pria Fora, a few mile farther west, they got a litUe deeper into Italy. June i8, the anniversary of Waterloo, the enemy made its last attack-attempt on Lemerle [London Times history says: *'June 15th the Austrian commander, after the capture of Mt. Lemerle, addressed his troops: **Only three more mountains, and we will be on the open road to Milan. But Lemerle was the last^one he got— and not quite all of Lemerle. Such was the endin of a most determined, desprit and devoted campaign. The massed Austrian onset was on-common heavy. Some of the first fierce battles were fought at Zugna Torta, two mile south of Roveredo and about seventeen south of Trent. From theh heavier enemy masses pushed the Italians acrost the Posina valley to Monte Pasubio, ten mile from Roveredo southeast by airyplane. Then the 7% BLUE EYE TO BERLIN enemy zig-zagged northeast along the mountin range almost to the pecipices bounding the Val Sugana, then swung southeasterly toward Asiago. The enemy from that side and from Asiago attacted Mt. Cengio near Arsiero the day before I come: when I got to the mounting, all the Italians had been druv off except one Sardinian brigade thet hung onto the south slope of Cengio after the rezidoo had hiked acrost the Val Cannel-yeea [Canaglia]. I sizes up the Sardinians^ looks over the field and exclaims: *^ Remember Chickamoggy ! ^* And the Sardinians set the firm lines of theh months and hung on like Grim Death. That night we got out much the same as Thomas did, *'in good order." The brigade lost half its men. One batch held the south- west corner of the mounting, above Schiri. I 'How some Military Critics got on-popular with the Army by gittin too bad skeert at the Ostrin advance. I cal'late they fo'ced Cadorna's hand so he bed to let up on the Isouzo. Some Allies is like your whist pardner— adanged site mo* anxious about yo' play than to keep out of raakin errors thehselves. Yeste'day I entered Asiago in triumph— on foot — theawithdrawin Ostrlnsfi^htin from street to street. She is shot up baa and ketched fire in places. The enem^' btldAsiagoa month. McCann on Furlough Genoa, July 4, 1916. When I see the Mar-Casey di Mirandola at headquarters in the Sette Communi, he'd re- ceived recent a letter from Sallie Yates ez how Bill Yates 'Hows to leave Au^. 5 on a Trip to Arkinsaw, and hopes I git home in time to go 'long. Francesco and me talked it over, and decided I could depart at this time without serious injury to the Army and the Campaign — Looks like as if the conquest of the Trent- ino would all have to be done all over again. We aint quite so neerd to Trent as when I first come last Autum. But I sticks to my first prophesyin. When the Chermins was a- sweepin thro Belgium, and on down as fur as the Marne, I says to a then unknown spy: ^'That's a wonderful Army, but it kaint win in the end.'* As Byron and Dickens says, the deep and dark blue ocean rolls 'round all the world, and 80 .BLUE EYE TO BERLIN command of the sea is party probble to to be the last word in a fight to a finish. "I kaint git ont ! " was the cry of the Starlin" — also of the neutral. Now look at Goritzy. It's only twenty-two mile (by rail) from Udine, but weVe been mo' than a year on the way. We haven't traveled much by rail, however. 'Taint the distance so much as the folks, etc , you meet on root. But Goritzy is doomed. That last a. m. Francesco hands me a sweepin letter to the police, etc., countersigned by the Commander-in-chief hisself Then he sets down and composys the follerin, which he hands over with a grin: Excelleniia the Dook of Mirandola: Revered ancestor — You will greatly oblige me if you will kindly refrain from making any strange eccos or noises roundabout the Castle endurin the visit of my friend, McCann. He is pow'ful skeert of ghostez. —Francesco di Mirandola. If ever you go to Modena, Stop at a palace near the Reggio gate, Dwelt in of old by one of the Donati, And look a while upon a picture there. 'Tis of a lady in her earliest youth Her name Ginevra. A banker, retired, writ that Mebby that's McCANN ON FURLOUGH 81 why I kin recall that much. We used to read about Ginevra at school, one of the sorr'fulest tales ever wrote, probly true, of a mischivous but rich and lovely lady who hid in a chist in the garret on her wedding day, to tease the bridegroom and the guests. On-known to her it had a spring-lock, and they all couldn't find her. Bankers aie often good writers, but it is mainly in hand-writin, not poetry. I allers did admire bankers, special the accommodatin kind, usual on-pretentious, too. [McCann quotes Rogers brokenly. S^mUel Rogers, retired banker and author, gave so many good dinners that the Jiterati;, the people who ate 'em, spoke patronizingly^ of his verse. His sarcasms alienated the critics he fed at his table. "Description is my forte": so Byron wrote. In description and narrative, in words and measures fastidiously chosen, Rogers also surpassed many an impecunious versifier.] I come straight thro' Genoa, but got off the keers at Modena, which is quite a city, but is beginning to show its age: not so lively nor so modern as Udine. Northeast by rail some twenty miles is Mir- andola. (Uncle Blair has no accent-marked a^s ore's or other letters in his type, so he v/rit two po- ems to show folks how to^pernounce Miraudola 8? BLUE EYE TO BERLIN —at first he s'posed it was like as follers: A fellow who knew every learning bit of school or schola Was Pico della (tum-tum) Mirandola. But that isn*t kerect. It rhymes this way: Of all the castled ruins I have saw The shabbiest housed old Duke Mirandola. Mirandola is wheh Francesco's fambly come from. Uncle Blair looked up its poppylation to 'splain one of my letters. In haste, he got the township or commune, which includes the town, instid of the town, then stuck on 3,000 mo' to 'How fur wot it's probly growed sence the census, which was too much, and his total was fur too high. Still,its beauty of situation appeals to a almos'-come-to-be connoisseur like me. [Population Asiago 2349, commune 6128; *.' Arsiero 3500, commune 482 i.j The castle ot Mirandola has been short a truly livin Dook fur a long spell: the Sixteenth cen- tury put them ont of business, was a hard year fur them. Some of them knew so danged much mo' than the Pope that he put them on the List Expurgatorius, ez how they made His Holiness feel on-easy, like the Kronprinz when Hindenburg comes down the line on pay-raid. And yet they was too poetical fur the Presby- terians, and too full of the gray old Greek and McCANN ON FURLOUGH 83 Roman myths to soot the Lutherans— sort of Swinburne-Rosetti Blessed-Damozels. Twa'nt no wonder they fell between two armies. Our Francesco aint a bit like that. He knows sev- verl languages, but never rubs em in. Probly he^s read about his ancestors. Emprer of Os- try abolished the last Duke of Mirandola 1710 Pico della di Mirandola was the Holy Prodigy, Admirable Crichton - Macaulay Best Speller and Catechism Champion of the 15th century. At the age of only 23, he issued, at Rome^ a challenge to the scholastic world of Europe and undiscovered U.S.A. to meet him in a championship discussion of ^*Everything that Can be Known'^ (and Some Things Besides) Voltaire remarked almost 300 years afterward. He submitted no less that 900 separate theses for discussion, but I bet he left out the airy- plane. At the last moment the Pope prohibited the bout. There are beautiful verses about him in French by Gerard de Nerval, done into En- glirh by Andrew Lang. He lacked the Sense of Humor, though hardly any other mental attribnte. The mild climate of Italy got away with Pico at the early age of thirty-one in 1494 Genoa has about half as many folks as Milan —and yet it is Italy's greatest seaport, surpass- ing Naples in net proceeds. When I was a lad I s 'posed big cities tapered off gradual. I was surprised awful when for the first time I was on a train that emerged from thick-settled Chicago Si BIvUE EYE TO BERLIN and in five minutes was loozin itself on the bori- zonless perairy. One might expect they wonld build both cities where Geneva is, but Milan kep' on growin. Two great tunnels thro the Alps are hpudy by, and brakemen got into the habit, as the train slowed up in the poorer dis- tricts of Milan, of throwin off a piece or hunk of coab for some poor fambly. By and by the poor fambly'd start a factry, and manufacturin in transit, and terminal rates, was established. Besides, the hills of Genoa is middlin steep. The Genoese have allers been sui generis, so to speak, different to them of any other city, doin' bizness off its own bat, like the free cities of old times, Hamburg and the like. Milan was long an Austrian possession, and kept the money at home, as fur as possible, a habit that lasted after she jined united Italy. Also Genoa stuck to her old sea-farin ways. The Army is abatin some this cosmopolitanism. I writ once of the number of Borgos in Ital}^ I see two mo' in Genoa— Borgo Pi la and Borgo Insciati. The last-named seems to be in socie- ty. One might say this kind of borgo is a soob-urb or Borough like The Bronx or Man- hattan or Queens. Genoa faces mostly south, which keeps it nice and warm at this time of year. On such warm, moonlit nights Columbus, clothed only with his enthusiasm, Columbus used to lie in McCANN ON FURLOUGH 85 bed with his head part-way out the window, in one of the many high-up houses, and fancy he could see off southwest Far as the Pillars which Alcides reared at the Straits of Gibraltar, and figger wot was acrost the Atlantic beyondr. One of the finest buildins is Palazzo Doria, like as not named in honor of the fambly of Francesco Doria, the young man who w^as to marry Ginevra. Weary of his life, Francesco flew to Venice, Flung it away in battle with the Turk Near-by in city blocks, but the other end of the scale, is the massive Albergo di Poveri. Genoa has a great art collection, but Peggy isn't in our party, and steam is up for U.S.A. Where'er I roam, whatever wars to see, My heart, untraveled, fondly turns to thee. I was a guest of a widowed cousin of the Mar *- Casey, thirty-one "year old, chick [chic] and fascinatin'. Although she is a native Genoese, her hair is the neerdest flaxen I have seen in Italy, or sun-kissed lemon color you might call it, with big, light-blue eyes. She is exceeding well "posted," as Bill Yates M say, in what the 86 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Foe used to call World-Polit-tic. I jedge her her to be also a connoisseur of art and antique literature and archaeology. She keeps (basks in the approval of) a stately English butler. He told me she had wrote a book, **Genoa of the Antediluvians,'* that had been crowned by the French Academy. I thought the Forty Immortal had quit the practice. She flitted past the pictures with me today; says she likes ALL Americans, but I hope not. A Sea 'Scape Abont 4:30 my chaperon druv me to U. S. A. consulate, where I shook her. The vice consul greeted me with mo' enthusiasm than I calcu- lated. ''Jest the man I want to see. Won't you come into the parlor and set down fur a few minutes?" He hands me a New York paper that tells about a hull fambly bein killed in an autpmobeel, and that reminds me I has a new perfeshin to learn next summer, shuvverin. A English Major coaies in and says his sister is sailin by the night boat for Northampton, Mass., to visit friend. She has no companions but a little Swiss maid, and the only English- speakin passenger is me. I 'Hows ez how I'ze learnt to be a avvytor a spy and a sojer, but sailorin is my weak soot. '^She's going to America to recooperate;had a job pulling me out, but don't let her talk of me — the little Genevese kin teach you bothFrench and you can tell Alice about America. *'I aint been to many young-lady places. I S8 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN never summered at Lenox. '^She^s partial to the wild and woolly — in fic- tion- — deeds of dairin, you know.'^ He interdoosed me to Alice on the boat^ — a tall, fair, well muscled girl, mebby a few months older or younger than Peggy, with light blue, blazzy eyes. The Major had got shot thro the Inngs (or lights, we used to -call 'em) and she'd worked hard resuscitatin him. I guessed Alice's figger was fine, but 'twas only a guess, owin' to her long, loose-fittin, purplish-brown overcoat, and she had good pearls in her ears, and di'mons in the comb that held up her back hair at dinner It was her pull, I 'How, that got me a seat at 4;he Captain's table, where I made a onmistaka- ble hit. His voice minded me of old Henry Clay Banabee, tho I cal'late he'd swallered mo' weather and less bronchial medicine. Every danged one of the Captain's Table spoke En- glish for perlite to Alice. Alice asked the Captain ez how about the submarine danger, and he passed it up to me fur fun, bein ez how I had never see a subma- rine. Then I told 'em about a farmer's horses that 'd start to run every time they heered the keers whistle. One time his wife got spilt out and hurt and he traded off the team for a pair that had been brought up in a roundhouse. It was about a month later, at a grade crossin, the keers whistled, the horses never lifts an ear, too tame to run, the en-jine hits the wagon, killin' the hull fambly, includin a year-old baby. Ba- McCANN ON FURLOUGH 89 bies usual gits away on-hurt. After dinner we lounges on deck. Marie (I wonder if they're all named Marie) is half as tall as Alice. The moon is in her first quarter, already beginnin to think of retirin fur the night. On our port quarter, dim and far, are the lights of Corsica. I observe how the pale fuzzy moonlight matches Alice^s cheek, like ice cream melting in cream, and approve the slender aristocrat nose, tilted the tiniest trifle, reassuringly low at the bridge. Hours pass idly. I tells of The Betrothed, Salzburg, Schwester, Innsbruck, Meran, New York and Boston, After a hot day» the cool, fragrant air, laden with the odors of Riviera roses and the gardens bordering the sea, is delicious. In a scant half hour, the moon will disappear. Twice hasAlice spoken of retiring, and lingered. In the same instant, Alice clutched me arm, and I hears a ^splosion on the side of the boat away from the settin moon. In a second the crew got busy, the waiters passin out life-belts, a mate on the bridge, the Captain bossin the deck. In less 'n six minutes everybody is in the boats. Ours was the only one that upset in launchin, and we all got spilt into the Mediterranean. I hears Alice's voice close to my ear,"Swim clear if ye kin !'* She wor a travlin as easy as Hero's Lcander or Annette Kellerman, one hand aholt of the little mountain-maid's back-strap, pro- pellin' with the other. The mate comes over- board with a life-buoy and tells me to take holt. 90 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN I thinks: *'If Hoke Tucker could see me now !" Jee ! Two minutes later I hears Alice agin : *' The Captain's on the bridge ! " I looks, the ship's stern was in the air, the foc'sle under water. The Captain, one foot braced aslant, was sizing up the lifeboats.* "'Down she goes by the head," says the mate ~r-and in a swirl and with a hiss and roar of steam, the big ship plunged headfu'st to Davy Jones's drydock. It growed darker, the moon's last feeble rays was fadin; U 6i was already amongst us, not takin nobody on board. All to oncet I feels a lassso under my arms, and I was yanked aboard the submarine, whose deck was all above water and the crew on deck. The man at the other end of the lass-so was the common-Dante, from St Looey, Seattle, Mt. Blanc, Salzburg, and all over, now commander-in-chief of U-6i. I fiir- gits discipline, and my wetness, and blurts out, astonished-like: **Wheh did you learn submareenin and navi^ gatin?'' Then I thinks, *'No trip with Bill Yates, but back to Ostry fur me !" However, he don't let on I was a 'scaped prizner, on the contrairy he pertends he last see me in St. Lopey— and I see the p'int fur a wonder. He IThis incident was, first put in type June 9, 1917, published June 14 in Tht Jury. June 15 the author saw first, iuN Y. Times of loth June the extremely similar sinking of ^the French SS. Sontay. McCANN ON FURLOUGH 91 never told me he'd cowboyed two year in Montaina. Soon after sun-up a Spanish steamer come along, out of MarrsaiP. Common-Dante huv her to, sends ns all aboard, and orders us into Port Mahon, and come part- way with us, "ez a guaranty of good faith." In 1865, the home-come soldiers guv a play at Fort Madison. Uncle Blair's big (small but growed-up) brother was a Major General (in the play) bein ez how he wan't tall enough fur a private. All a Major General in a play has to do is to wear a slouch hat and shoulder-- straps, and be keerful to not git a-straddle of his sword. They don't dast make Generals talk much.Uncle Blair w^as only 4 years old (goin-on 5) a infant prodigy for memoriziubut not wuth the powder to blow him up with fur speakin pieces; and so they put Blair on fur a recita- tion entr'acte like Jessie Bartiett Davis used to sing ^^Promise Me" in Robbin' Hood. Blair was a teetotal failure, skeert wor^e than any of the other actors had been at Perairy Grove: he started off Old Ironsides at anchor lay In the harbor of Mahon ■ '^ And broke down as often as a second-hand motor keen • When We entered the harbor of Port Mahon 92 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN (one of the finest in Europe but not the busiest owin to lack of tributary kentry) Alice looked twiset as healththy as she did at Genoa. Port MahoUj island of Minorca, is a city of about twenty thousand folks. Precedin the Frinch and Indian war of 1756-63 she was a Britisli possession. In 1756 the Spaniards at- tackled and besieged her. Admiral Byng was sent to relieve Minorca. He looked the Span- ish fleet over keerful, and went away. London papers made a awful holler, was full of ironical rhymes. Oh, that in the rolling ocean I had cast them with disdain^ And obeyed my heart's warm motion To have quelled the pride of Spain. —Quoted by Schmucker. Wben Admiral Byng got back to London he was tried and took out and shot^ When folks took time to cool off, they llowed Byng had been sackerficed to popular clamor, and was only guilty of a error of jedgment, speshil as Spain guv back Minorca at the peace. Spain, with France and Himerica for allies, re-took Minorca in 1782. And yet, ever sence, when a British Admiral makes a error of jedgment, it's been in the direction of fightin. I said Mahon has one of the finest Harbor* McCANN ON FURLOUGH 93 in Europe, three miles deep. It would be a great seaport if it had the country back of it, but the land is owned by a few men, who rent it to peasants who don^t perdoose much. The name Mahon, I ^llow is a soov-near of the Irish conquest of Spain, which was kerried forward like the Irish conquest of Aimerica as took place 1850-85. In Spain, as in Himerica, the Irish took to politics right soon. Famous Gen. 0*Donnell,was right bower for two Queens — for Isabella II. and her mother and Regent- predecessor, Queen Christina. He was practic ally Dictator for quite a spell. He was a de-- scendant of a Limerick exile of 1691. Most of them exiles went with Sarsfield to France, but The (1691) O'Dontiell believed that the French ate frogs' (legs), and as late as 1685 O'Donnell's grandfather was still wearing a souvenir of the Invincible Armada, a beautiful eipbroidered jacket that had been washed ashore (a grandee in it) a hundred years be- fore. Gen. O'Donnell couldn't say a word of Irish, and knowed only nine English words— ^*I am happy to meet you '' and three En- glish cusswords. He was a corker, and sure inherited thelrish versatility, bein ez how he wor a statesman and soldier. Mahon was oc* cupied by the English so long that the jargon is still spoke. **Damn'' and "Bloody" . are the English words I heered oftenest resound around the docks. Isabella made Gen. O'Donnell a Dook, Dook of Tetuan, and he holp her to lose her moral 94 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN reputation, It was partly lost before. After lier exile in 1869, be lived as one of ber entourage in Paris, and ber busband, an on-popular .little Prince (wbile sbe was Queen folks called bim • Tbe King, once in a wbile, for fun,) elsewbere. Spaniards are purty pertickler, and tbe scandal irritated *em; but no one blames a man, least- ways a Irisbman, in tbe case of a Queen, more especial a regnant Queen. One nigbt at tbe Britisb consul's we played ole.fasbioned wbist, without no Bridge, with Alice and tbe consul agin me and tbe most beautiful lady in Spain: grace in ber every motion, tbrills in tbe touch of ber band; gay, and brimming with laughter, tben archly sad; a face and form that would delight and despair Valasquez. Her breath is like a early morning zephyr from dewy roses in mid-summer. Her whist When sbe rests soft, dark ey€s on you, it means: *^Have you the biggest trump?'' Her husband Is suspected of being in tbe pay of H. B. M., and is absent in Spain -T-or Afriky. I showed the ladies the new creases in my pants. ■ A wireless to the British consul gave Alice carty blanch^ and tbe common-Dante guv me a requets or order on tbe German consul for a suit of clothes; bnt the consul advised me to get it in Barcelona, wheh stocks are bigger; McCANN ON FURLOUGH 95 ez how a wealthy gentleman wired he was a- comin to- take me and Alice to the big city to catch a boat to America. He arrove Friday, The consults own tailor ironed out my suit, while I wore his pyjamas. I didn^t lose my money like some of the passengers. We arrove in Barcelona yesterday. It is oue of the finest cities I ever see, but they tell me they's lots of annerkis. A cylopedy says the harbor (not crowded nowadays) is three times bigger^n both of Marsail's but not so big as Genoa's. Tt kivvers 346 acres— big enough fpr two farms if the water was drained off and t\\Q salt evaporated. Barcelona is Spain's big^gest shippin' p'int, doin $150,000,000 trade with 0!ver-seas, sellin a half more 'n she buys. She hez about 600,000 people— half outside the city limits. Barcelona reckons the rezidoo of Spain Mossbacked, Spain gits back by sayin: "You're too big and on-rooly now/' And keepin 'er split up; Barcelona has her Piedmont^ too, roostin' high^ with millionaires fur night watchmen; several Berkeleys, wheh retired sea lords and literati live, one big 'varsity, aud three Emery 57illes, . ' to show Tne -very place where wicked people go. :Spain has one largos city, Madrid, 440 miles 96 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN by rail, 310 by airy plane. Barcelona has one of the finest climates of the world, mean (not ornery) temperature 61, and is about due east of Yreka; Evanston, Wyoming; Lincoln, New- brasky; DesMoines, Iowa; Chicago, Illinois; Cleveland, Ohio, and New "Vork, N. Y. Some of these places have a climate mo' severe, even if Barcelona does git a touch of the mistral off the Pyrenees oncet in a while in winter. The Rambla, a fine street, runs fur three- quarters of a mile from the noble statue and monument of Columbus, with a double row of shade trees. Barcelona is another Crescent City, and fronts its bay in a grand semi-circle. When the Earl of Peterborough was Lord Monmouth, he had a personal moral and im- moral record bad enough to beat him even for Chief of P'leece. It a lady of any rank wot- ever took his eye, at Court, in London or the Provinz, he'd set out same evening and kidnap her hisself. He gambled, too, and most every- thing. He didn't change his name to beat his record, but his uncle, the Earl, died and left him a lot of money. Marlborough wan't jeal- ous after Blenheim, and sent Peterborough to conquer Spain fur Charles of Austria against Philp of France, the first Bourbon King of Spain, ez how the old fambly of Philip Second and Charles Fifth and Isabella of Castile had run out. That's wot the war was about. Montjuich was an impregnable fortress jejst • McCANN ON FURLOUGH 97 west of Barcelona,' and set on a hill. The hill is still there, to corobberate histry, bein ez how Henry Ford is quoted as savin that histry is all bunk. The Prince of Hesse, who was along with a batch of Hessians, had made a sneerin remark about the English, probly to the effect that they perfer to hire their fightin' done. So Peterborough goes to him and Hows he intends to make a night attack on Montjuich whether he jines in or not. Put up to him that^a-way, the Prince goes along and gits killed. At the head of only 1,500 British and Irish, My Lord Peterborough stormed the fort; oncet, when he was off linin up the Dutch and Chermins, the so fur victorious English got in a panic, and was gittin licked. Peterborough he comes back like Sheridan and swept everything, fort and hill and all. Montjuich fallen, Barcelona had to s'render. Folks in England made mo^ fuss over Peter- borough's victry than over Blenheim, or most as much — it was so spectacular— if Parliament didn't vote him no great fortune like it done Marlborough, ez how Parliament knowed that Marlborough would save his money keerful and improve his land, while Peterborough 'd spend right off the reel.- Besides too many M. P.'s had it in for Peterboroughpersonally. The hoi polloi of London— the City masses — ^whose wives had never met His Lordship, went wild at the great news. Blenheim was fit 1704, Montjuich 1705. 98 . BLUE EYE TO BERLIN I wish I could write up an attack like that in this war. But they won't usual let me git within forty rod of the firin line, I bet if My Lord Peterborough had been in Sir Dooglas Haig's or Admiral Beatty's place that inside of a week his enemies *d had him jest where they wanted him—inside a loonatic asylum. Keepin' track of so many men and guns, of friend and foe, by telephone, telegraph or horse and cart, would of razzled him. Sir Dooglas or Admiral Beatty, special the latter, would of gone like our Admiral Sampson if ary one of them had been built Physical like him. Jedgiu from Beatty^s face and figger, I Mlow a bulldog 'd be as easy to kill with worry. Kipling^s man who went crazy watchin* the currents and tryin* to keep *em from runnin crooked, wouldn't do for Commander-in Chief these timeSc Fact is, this is a wrist«watch war. I kaint sense wot they 'd of done without the needed indeed ondispensable wrist=clocko The lines is so long everything hed to be done like as if the officers was railroad conductors, on time,, and theh watches hed to jibe and be kep kerect and no delays tolerated. In our on-civil and precedin wars, often, orders woul go out the night before for all divisions to attack at sun- up. One division wouldn't be ready till after eleven, hed forgot its artillery or something, or McCANN ON FURLOUGH W they was mud in the powder or a cow on the track. Sometimes it was towVds evening be- fore an attack was delivered. They aint much of that sort of thing in this war. "Time is the essence of this order " is printed at the top of every order-blank. What most diskerridges the folks at home, and special the book agents is they aint no chanst fur hero-worship. We hear of a Lieu- tenant General bein' permoted to Field Mar- shal but don^t hear wot he done. Did he say: Charge, Chester, charge ! Strike, till the last armed foe expires ! A little more grape, Capt. Bragg ! Up, Guards, and at them ! McPherson and revenge ! No, not in a telephone-telegraph war ! The Marshal gets his remarks printed, and a million copies distributed to the Army, and seventy thousand or so for Paris. True, Grant set in his tent and writ: No terms but unconditional surrender — — I propose to fight it out on this line- And so did they propose who fit before Verdun Barcelona was part of the Cat=a-lan kingdom up to 1 137, when their suvrin got married to the Princess of Aragon and took Catalonia along for dowry— I mean alimony. The French had her (Catalonia) a while, but 100 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Spain got her again in 1652. The Catalan is a sonorous speech like Spanish, with streaks of old French, "sweet beyond compare/' from over the long-ago green Pyrenees. The owner of our yatchit interdoosed me to his clever and beautiful daughter Pepita. I was ramblin with her today on the Rambla to give the old grandee leisure and an undisturbed si- esta. Pepita has the step of a thoroughbred, the footfall of a fairy treading on daisies and clover, the eye of a wild gazelle, and a voice low and rich, like Peggy's mother; twenty, and wears good clothes. It was Sunday afternoon, and the showin' of clothes and folks was over- powerin. Spain is the most nootral of nootrals, which makes it a hot question. The King is person- ally popular, is surer to hold bis job than most Kings 'd be in his place. Pepita showed me a *Tunch'' in which the editor thanks the King for wot he personally done in a pathetic case of a English prisoner in Germany. Barcelona was named in honor of Halilcar Barca? You remember Hamilcar? He was a Phoenician, but some of his folks settled later in Carthage. I asked my beautiful guide if "La Boca de Pepita'' was wrote about her? ^*Do I seem as old as that ? " Farewell, Europe Cadiz, Surrounded by the Sea, July 9,1916. Some one long ago pointed out that the Spanish runs more to consonants than other so-called Latin or Romance languages. This tends to make folks mo' taciturn and reserved, ez how it takes mo' effort to pernounce consonants. Spaniards writes fewer books, too, 'most all of them decent; npt much obscene literature in Spain. Chary of speech leads to chary of writin. - Carthage hed a lot to do with settlin Spain- Early Carthaginians was probly a rugged folk* Hasdrubal (All pegples, from Phoenicians to English, has had trouble with. the Letter H], Hannibal's little brother, founded Carthagena in 228 or 221 B. C. The bay minded him of his ole home town, so he named the place Nevv Carthage. Rome, N. V., wan't named by Ital- ians, but by a man who hed jest read Plutarch. Said man must of been quite a potentate or 102 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN a big land-owner. He named a bunch of near together towns in Central New York as Toilers: Pompey, Cato, Cicero, Syracuse, Rome, etc. Pompty, Cato and Cicero kilt theh towns 'most dead, but Rome and Syracuse growed purty good. [Seems to me Brutus has a town theh named for him; and Cassius, too.] Carthage, 111., is some punkins of a city, and Athens and Rome, Georgia, are beautiful places. They's another Cartagena in South America (Colombia). The h is silent. The word cart- age is the outrageous charge they used to col- lect for haulin things up from the wharf or warf at Carthage about 303 B. C. Carthagena, Spain, has growed to 41,000 in a 144 years; has a fine harbor and fairly fine climate, and is Spain's leadin' naval station. Spanish-American war guv its business a black eye. but gittin rid of Cuby was money in the pockets of the rezido of Spain. We made only a party call, leavin in two hours fur Cadiz, and passin' ole Gib without stoppin; visitors are. non grata now. Cadiz growed to 64,000 in 3,017 years. You know Spaniards are sposed not to hurry, The Romans called her Gades and she always had a rep. for gayety; the first gadders blonged theh. She is built on a low, small, almost island with no room for-platted additions; no chance for its benevolent promoter to show you a new, McCANN ON FURLOUGH lOl nicer place to live, So town lots is worth jest about as much as in King David of Israel the Psalmist's time. Phoencians was the first bold sailors of this world, but submarines and Mariner's Compass hadn't come to yet. They hung around the Mediterraneon fur quite a spell before anybody whistled up courage enough to go out past the Pillars of Hercules, a heathen alias (otherwise) for Gibraltar straits, and see wot the dreaded, fabled Atlantic was like; but one day a daring bunch in a boat sneaked ont past the Pillars of H and turned to the right dead agin the English rules. Right soon they come to a p!int or promontory high and skeery, A sailor sejested the subway to Hades was jest around the p'int; so they run the boat ashore an' sent a sailor over the hill to see. He got through an' set on a rock waitin, but a sea serpent met the boatload, and swallered boat and alL The lone scout on the rock waited a couple days^ then started back thro' the woods, but was never heern tell of. A year later a second lot or bunch come out, lookin fur the first; They come to the same p'int, sent a man over the same hill, waited one day, then went round and waited quite a spell but didn t go into the forest to look for their sailor-scout, for fear of bears, so he probly got lost. The others went on and founded the city of Cadiz about iioo B. C. (before the first Christmas.) Cadiz is 350 years older 'n Rome, but Rome 104 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN growed fur a spell, and seems now to be in her second childhood, growin' some mo. Cadiz has a good Atlantic trade, seein ez how she is the neerdest Eu-rope-yen port to Southern U. S. A. and Central and South America, Many of the ships for Barcelona, Trieste and Genoa call at Cadiz, and their officers, some of them, some- times, call on her beautiful ladies. The warm, moist air gives them complexions enchanting^ captivating-fair, rosier, than the Carthageniau. Parque Genova and Avenue de Apodaca are attractive, Calle de Tetuan the best street. As per fore-goin, Cadiz has little room to grow side- ways, and the houses is tall, and nearly all are painted white, which gives to Cadiz from the sea an aspect unique : a snow-drop in turquoise or emerald setting. A Himerican promoter, probly a Chermin spy, has been shini^' round Alice. As we docked at a U. S. A. port, Alice^s girl friend cried: "How wise, and clever ,to come in a nootrat ship !** "'Twan't our faultV says Alice. **WeVe out fur adventures, but didn^t see even the Blue Canaries 1 ^^ [O^Donnell Duke of Tetuan died, say several books, 1867. Isabella was exiled 1868, which vindicates O^Donnell as to 1868-9. Espartero was a considerably greater national figure.] Beginning a New Age The Great War of 1914-19 will long baffle or confound writers who essay description graphic and picturesqve of the brilliant battles fought and so often won by the German armies, who entered upon the war more near perfectly led, trained and equipped than any before, ever, if each great military success brought them only nearer to total surrender, A dozen such victories led to ruin I Where is the Victor Hugo who can hold his gait describing a Waterloo that lasted from February to July ? •They fought from morn till noon, From noon till dewy eve: a summer's day [Here follows a Chronology] 1914 THE WAR AT A GLANCE June 28 Murder of Archduke Franz at Sarajevo July 28 Austro-Hungary declares war on Servia 1914 THE WAR AT A GLANCE Aug. I Germany declares War against Russia 2 Germausdemandtransit acrossBelgium 3 Germany declares , War upon France 4 PresidentWilson proclaims U.S. neutral 4 to 26 . Germans overrun Belgium 4 Great Britain declares war on Germany 12 ** '' " Austria 18 Russia all mobilized^ invades E.Prussia 23 Franco-British retreat from Mons, etc. 31 Halt of Allies on the Seine and Marne Ciar re-names St. Petersburg Petrograd Sept* 3 French Government moves to Bordeaux 5 Allies agree not to make separate peace 6-10 Battle of the Marne, Germans retire 7 Germans take Maubeuge II Australian expedition takesNewGuinea 16 Russians driven from E.Prussia 27 Botha invades Southwest Africa Oct. 9 Germans occupy Antwerp . 13 Belgian Gov't moved to Havre, France i6-"a8— Battle of the Yser; Germans halted 17 to Nov, 17— Battle ot Ypres 2i-28~Germans driven back in Poland Nov. I German naval victory off Chili 5 Great Britain declares war on Turkey 7 Tsingtsau surrenders to the Japaoe^^e 10-13 Austria invadesServia; British take Basra,P'"rsianGulf;PanauiaZone proc. neutral Nov.16,1914 Cruiser Emdeu captured Cocoslsld Dec. 2 Belgrade captured: recaptui^d Dec. 14 8 Bnti«?h naval victory off Falkland Isles 17 Egypt proclaimed a British protectorate 24 First German air raid on England 1915 THE WAR AT A GLANCE 107 Jan. 7 France forbids sale of absinthe in War Jan. 5 Am. ship W.P.Frye sunk byEitel Frdch Ffb. 4 Germans proclaim war zone abt Britain Marchio British capture Neuve Chapelle March 17 Russians take Przemysl Apr.i7=-May 17 Germans use gas, 2d bat.Ypres Apr. 23 Germans warn vs. travel inBritish ships Apr.26 Allies land on Gallipoli Peninsula Apr.30 Germans invadeRussianBaltic provnces May 7 Lusitania sunk;ii54 lost, 114 American May lO.German message sympathy for lost Am's May23 Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary June 8 WmJ. Bryan, Secretary of State,resigns June 22 Austro-Germans re-capture Lemberg July 12 to SeptoiS Germans take Russ. Poland Aug. 20 Italy declares war on Turkey Sept. 18 Germans capture Wilna (Russia) Oct. 14 Britain declares war on Bulgaria Oct. 6 Austro-Germans overrun Servia Nov.— Russians advance on Teheran Dec, 10 Boy-Ed andVonPapen recalled fromU. Si Dec, 1 5 SirDouglasHaig succeedsSirJohnFrench Dec. 19. British evac. AnzaCjSulva bay(Gallipol) 1916 THE WAR AT A GLANCE Jan. 8 British complete evacuatidn of Gallipoli Jan. 13 Cettinje, Montenegro, falls to Austrians Feb.i6 Germans acknTg liability for Lusitauia Feb.2i-July— Battle of Verdun Feb. 24 Wilson refuses to warn Americans not to travel on armed merchant ships Mar. 8 Germans declare war on Portugal Mar.19 Russians enter Ispahan Apr.17 Russians capture Trebizond 24 Insurrection in Ireland Apr.26 Townsend surrenders to Turks at Kut May i6-June 3— Austrian attack in Trentino 31 Naval battle of Jutland June 5 Lord Kitchener drowned ^ 17 Russians take Czernowitz July I to Nov. Battle of the Somme Aug. 6 Italian offensive. Gorizia falls Aug. 9 2 7 Italy declares war on Germany Roumania joins Allies; Bucharest fallsDec.6 Sept. 7 Senate ratifies buy of Danish Virgin isls. Dec. 6 Fall of Asquith; Lloyd-George Premier 12 German Peace offer: Allies decline, 30th demand ^'restoration, reparation, indemnities" Dec. 18 Wilson peace note; 26th German reply 1917 THE WAR AT A GLANCE 109 Feb. 3 Wilson dismissesBernstorf, severs rePtns 12 Will not treat till U-boats are withdrawn 24 Kut re-taken by Gen. Maude Mar 4 British take over entire Somme front of 100 mi., Fr. 173: Belg. 25 mi. Mar. 1 1 Bagdad falls to Gen. Maude 15 Czar abdicates; revolution in Russia Apr. 6 U.S. declares war on Germany. May 17 Kerensky minister of war 18 Wilson signs selective draft act June 10 Italian Trentino offensive I King Constantine of Greece abdicates 26 First American troops reach France 29 Greece joins Allies and enters war July 4 Bethmann-Hollweg resigns Aug. 10 Food Control enacted Sept. 3 Germans capture Riga 15 Russian Republic Oct. 26 Brazil declares war on Germany Oct.24-Dec. Great Austrian drive in Italy Nov. 1 3 Clemenceau succeeds Premier Painleve Nov.22 to Dec. 13^ — Battle of Cambrai Nov. 29 Col. House attends ist inter-allied Conf. Dec. 6 Destroyer Jacob Jones torpedoed Dec. 7 UriitedStates declares war onAustria^-H. Dec. 9 Allenby captures Jerusalem Dec. 14 Cuba declares war on Austria Dec. 18 Sixteen Gothas raid London Dec. 24 Germans break Italian line near Asiago Dec. 26 ViceAdmiralWemyss istLordAdmiralty Dec. 3 1 LordRhondda rations sugarjj^ft) a week 1918 THE WAR AT A GLANCE Jao. 7 Mutiay at Kiel, 38 killed Earl Readiug ambassador to U S 14 Murder of Lenine attempted 26 Ostend bombarded 29 Sir E. Carson resigns from BrtshCabinet Italians break German line near Asiago Air raid over London kills 47,injures"ioo 30 ** '' Paris " 36 *' 190 Feb. 3 Gen, March, Chief of General Staff U S Feb. 4 Trial begun of Bolo Pasha Feb. 1 2 Eighth session Long(est) Parliament Feb. 14 Bolo sentenced to death; executed Apr 16 Lord Northcliffe Director of Propaganda 18 Bolshiviki capture Kiev 23 English occupy Jericho Roumania makes peaee with Germany Mar»2, Germans enter Kiefif (Kiev) 10 Russian Capital Moscow, vice Petrograd 13 Germans enter Odessa 18 Britain and US seizeDutch ships in ports 21 Teutons capture Pultowa (Poltova) Mar, 21 '^Fat Bertha" bombards Paris (61 mi.) 28 Turk army destroyd;Britsh crossjordan ^o Foch Commander-in Chief of Allies 31 Nation! Debt of Britain $29,500,000,000 Apr 4 U S troops occupy Meuse hghtSjVerdun 13 House of Commons passes man-power bill 23 'ReichtofeB,Teutonair-king,buried Londn May 4 Sir John French Lord Lieut, of Ireland 13 Karl a dVVilhelm form 25-year alliance Kaiser proclaims Lithuania independent 19 Major Raoul Lufbery shot down 20 Twenty planes raid London; 44 killed 1918 THE WAR AT A GLANCE 111 May 30 Germans take Soissons,35,ooo prisoners June 3 Fr.&Americans force foe re-cross Marne 19 Teuton attack on Rheims repulsed July 15 Hayti declares war; Q„ Roosevelt killed 12 Russian Czar murdered 19 Americans&Froforce foe back to theAisne Honduras declares war, 18 Hoover: U. S.sent Europe $1,400,000,000 food in yr; Aug, 29,Brtisli takeBapaume 21 Cliateau-Thierry occ.by Fr. & Americans gain 197 towns, 1000 sq.mi.,lineshort*nd 33 mi a6 Lloyd-George istrikers must work or fight Aug. 19 D'Annunziodrps 14 bombs onPolaarsenal 23 Foch created Marshal of France Sept. 16 Czechoslovaks appeal for allied help 23 English, Caledonians andlrish enterAcre 30 Max of Baden Chancellor, vice Hertling Oct. I Allcnby captures Damascus, capital of Syria, 300,000; Servians re-enter Nish - 5 Teutons leave LilkjSet fire to Douai Ferdinand abd, Bulgaria, Boris abd.Nov.i 8 Caledoniansjlrish. English occupyBeirut 13 French take Laon. 18 Guatemala con6scatesGermn light-plant 16 Albrt enters Oster.d; Nov.g Kaiser quits Max Dictator few days; EbertChancellor Nov, 1 1 Armistice signed; 12th Kaiser Karl abd, Dec.13 President Wilson arrives in France Dec. 26 Wilsou guestKingGeorg[eJan.6**T.R"dies 28 Lloyd-George lias 519 in iiewParliamenl,alloppel88 1919 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Feb »i'i9 KurtEisner,Premier,killed at Munich May igCongress in spl session to receiveTreaty June 28 Germans sign Treaty at Versailles Aug.16,'19 KingGeorge signsAct approvgTreaty At the Corner-Stone of Bunker Hill Mon^ ument in 1825 Daniel Webster said: ^We live in a most extraordinary Age.'* No man has ever since so characterized A. D„ 1825! It seems to us later Americans rather the central j^ear of interregnum between the introduction of the steamboat and the introduc- tion of the locomotive; between the first Amer- ican Protective Tariff and the first compromise with threatened Secession: between the reaper and mower and the invention of Electric Teleg- raphy. The extraordinary age that produced DauielWebster had not yet produced either the Locomotive or Telegraph, The first days of a more extraordinary age were coincident with the months of 1916 from which the policy of Mr. Lloyd-George began to control the British Empire: for a few weeks in the Asquith Cabinet, then under himself as Prime Minister— a policy that forced all of the principal nations save Spain and the Dutch and Scandinavian nations to become allies, and up- BEGINNING A NEW AGE 113 set the world-old customs of commerce and war and discredited many modern inventions: smoke screens or barrages nullified smokeless powder; in two years commodities, priced in gold, rose farther than they had previously risen in price in any one entire century. Wilhelm II, his Generals and Arniies, at the commencement of the war, were found be in a state of preparedness superior to any contem- porary, and possibly without a lival in the whole historic past. A British writer of humor made the pat and timely cavil that Germany's entire military system was in such a condition of perfection that its nomenclature even could not be improved in a single polysyllable. The very name of every military, war-like article, iota, item or appurtenance was infallibly and accurately descriptive. No better name could be found had one searched all summer, nor any coined, which obviated delays more numerous than one might suspect; and so it came about that even finical word-smiths found nothing to do but march and fight. The German army, as we have seen, was ready. :. The navy was not. Soon after the accession of William II, in 1888, he began to formulate a system of over- seas corn mercial expansion and colonies. His Chancellor Prince Bismarck, though hostile to every, forru of Anglomania, in which hostility 114 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN he had been supported hitherto by the young Kaiser, now opposed the Kaiser' naval and ex» pansion prog^ram as likely to embroil Germany with Great Britain^ Bismarck retired, and the Kaiser pushed vigorously forward his plans for a great navy. During the twenty-odd ensuing years, the overseas trade of Germany made surprisingly great advances. In the South Pacific and in South America the time could be foreseen when Germans would control the market; and«a large part of the staple fabrics, especially the cheaper metal ware, sold in even Britain, and in the -United States, bore the soon-familiar graven legend, "Made in Germany/* During three or four years next preceding 1914, although Germany^s mercantile fleet con- tinued to grow rapidly, the interest of the German nation in her war navy seemed to slacken. Here lay the fatal weakness. In 1914 its war fleet ranked next below that of the United States, far behind Britain's. When the. American fleet in 1917 was united with the al- lied seatigers of Britain, France and Italy, the out=starving of Germany became a not far-dis- tant certainty, in spite of all the victories of her, land Army. An American naval Captain (raised later to Rear Admiral) Alfred T. Mahan, was the first author to set forth clearly the "Influence of BEGINNING A NEW AGE 115 Sea Power upon History." The war of 1914-19 confirmed in every item his deductions from the history of former wars. The ships and sailors of the Allies did not do much fighting in comparison with their armies, but the pre- ponderant strength they represented chiefly sufficed, with their own vigilance, to make pos sible the achievements of soldiers and states- men, of munition-makers and workers^ Admiral Mahan died a few months after the war^s commencement, Dec. i, 1914, at the age of 74. Astonished no doubt by the swift and seemingly irresistible advance of the Germans in August to within fifty miles of Paris, there is no reason to doubt that he died serene and confident of the truth of his ov^n precepts and deductions from history, which proved that in the final event victory for Germany was not in the range of possibility: During forty years of peace, German militar- ists had studied war, and several inventions or improvements evidenced their originality and thoroughness. Long-range small arms and smokeless powder had been the pretext for creeping-u.p movements at night, which had brought the trenches of either army into close proximity to the tnemy, so that grenades and other missiles were thrown by hand into the hostile trenches, and soldiers were drilled in this hand-throwing, which seemed likely to re- sult in a permanent stall, which was broken up or obviated by the device credited to a German 116 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN General, von Hutier. A brief but violent bom= bardment preceded the attack by a strong force wliicli emerged suddenly and rapidly, ^n solid formation, from a thick smoke-barrage. This device drove the British back behind the Somme in 1918, and caused the Caporetto disaster to Gen^^^Cpunt Cadorna's army in October, 1917, >^'hich, exposing "Venice, occasioned retirement of that GeneraL Gen. Diaz succeeded him. -In. April, J[9i5, Germans began using poison igas at the second battle of Ypres. This use of gas, >yas bitterly denounced by the British; but,: before the end of the war, the British used gas nii-^re sucx:essfully than the Germans* Submarine or under-sea boats were used in this war, first, most destructively by Germans. l^^evertheless, before the war ended Britain had larger and finer submarines than lany of the enemy's. One of these war-time creations, not quite completed at the Armistice, carried a 300 ton gUU, ,' '. : ■ ' On the side of the Allies, the French armies and the British navy were alone in any sense prepared to resist the German attack. On the land Britain's soldiers were thrown against the perfectly-trained and supplied enemy minus the indispensable adequate supply of .ainmunition^ **A heavier gunfire is the best forlificaitjous" The British people could not beai^f the .J;l^ugh' BEGINNING A NEW AGE 117 that Britain's soldiers should be exposed for lack of ammunition helpless before the best- equipped army that ever took the field. Never did the latent heroism of the British nation come to the front more brilliantly, to shine re« fulgent. Men, women and children of every rank set themselves to work in ammunition factories. The United States was called on for thousands of tons, and in 1917 and 1918 Britain alone was able to supply herself, When» after fifty-two years of unbroken peace (the war of 1898 requiring no great ex» ertion) the United States sent a great array to Europe, and a powerful fleet, both wer^ found to be well-equipped in every detail, modern and efficiently supplied. There was some early criticism of the army crdnance, but none of the navy's. The Army needs, were of course, multiplied many times by the War. [At Caporetto Austn>Germans broke Italy's lines, drove her army many mileSj took Udine.] BOOK 11 OUR INNINGS Western Army KNTOMOLOGY OF CAMOUFLAGE Paris, Sept, 3, 1917. PVance is mos' normal oncet mo'; leastways, she seems to be, this fur from the region of shot'tO'pieces villager and keutry ripped up by shell-holes and trenches, they are even resumin the aunty^bellum custom of exchangin minis- tries oncet in so often, or twicet^ rather. M» Ribot, who wears whiskers all over his face, was replaced as premier by M. Painleve, a much younger man, who wears only a mous- tache. So fur as I kin learn, they wan't naw- thin agin M, Ribot barrin the situation that the mo' younger men, who boss this war, are agin whiskers, bein ez how they seem to transform a comparative youthful statesman into a back- number prcmatoorly old. Ribot is not a back number, but one of the greatest French era- 120 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN tors, a able and patriotic statesman, and has an army of friends yetj if his whiskers haven't. The new premier is M. Panlevay (Painleve), which is French fur a kind of bread we don't often git. Next Paris had a street-car strike. And now the ladies from Cuby, Argentine, England and U.S.A. is flockin to Paris to buy dresses, millionary, lingerie, jest ez in the brav' days of old, ef not so m,any. A millionaire lady from New York, attended only by a maid and show-fear, smiled pleasant at me on the rue de la Paix. She is a member of the well-known ■ .. fambly, and had'nt nawthin on but gray. [British Americans in Paris spells it grey,] She looked like Martha (Dandridge Custis) Washington or a student at BrynMawr in grey, and as nice as she could be. It hez been known for aeons that women hez mo' passive courage than men. Ef she hez the price, and kin find a ship, all the under-sea boats afloat kaint keep her 'way from Paris. I shouldnt wonder if some of 'em hoofed it in from Bordeaux ! Ez I was sayin, but forgot to say, the couleur de style fur next year is black trimmed with white. Grey aint so fashionable, and is the one other color permitted. If them dark-eyed ladies from Cuby and elsewhere don't look fetchin in ENTOMOLOGY OF CAMOUFLAGE 121 black trimmed with white, I aint no jedge. I see khaki is confined to folks ez hez relations in the army neerder than second cousins. Paris, too, is -reaching out for the argent [money] of visitin Hiruericans in her same old cheerful, debonair way Strictly and literally, argent means silver, but in truly French life is made to kivver also gold, which in some parts of Paris is much preferred. Our five and ten dollar gold pieces is greatly admired ; they even 'How that the tam,e Rozyvelt eagle looks hand- some and intelligent, and it beats all how rapid Parisians learns the value of our coin. It takes us a heap longer to get onto commodity prices here: some things sells shockin low, others viva voce, which is the opposite. [In 1892, two John A. Taylors helped to get Lewis county, Wash., her sheer in politics. John A. Taylor, Mayor of Centralia, was a Democrat. John A. Taylor, of Adna, was a Republican stand-by, and was cheerman of the county convention, which voted to omit calling the roll of precincts on a certain question. The Cheerman rose: "Gentlemen of the Convention: On this question, the vote will be vice versa ! "] When Peggy and Sallie was in Paris in '13, 1 enj'yed one evening ^t the Cabaret of the Six Hundred and Four Murders on Montmartre. 122 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN One evening recent I went to the same quiet ramshackle place not fur from the Boulevar' de Clichy, which is the Brodwy of Moufmartre. Its name has been changed to Maison de St. Josephus, in deference to liimerican and Brit- ish prejudice, and probly in honor of Secretly Dan'ls, to fool the Marines, but it was the same inside, barrin a few fresher-faced ladies. In '13 black and white was rulin mode in women hab- bytoos ef not yet in clothes — black ey«s and hair, and faces mos' pow'ful white. This trip I was settin nice and quiet at a little table. In all Paris ye kaint buy whisky or vermouth or absinth after nine thirty, nawthin but light wines, champagne and sich. At the neerdest table set a little beauty, with a form like Psy- che's, eye like Venus^s, and a voice like the Goddess of Music's— I disremember her name jest at this juncture. With her was a habbytoo of about eighty year but built powerful He was in black and white, too— dark black soot, dull black face an' hands, bris'lin white haV, and white shirt-front He 'minded me some of Alexandre Dumas (the Biggest) and some of Honore de Balzac, All to oncet the little lady she took a XXXX wallet-flap bond envelope from her corsage, or vest-pockit, gazes at a pliotygraft, and kisses it with abandon, passion. Her escort he draws a big hunting knife, and grabs her by the hair. She gives me one terri- fied iraplorin look: When in doubt, spring to the rescue. I sprang, interposin my horse-shoein arm to stop the blow, at the same time quailin ENTOMOLOGY OF CAMOUFLAGE .123 him with my hazel eye. The lady clang to my left arm in terror, the horchestra struck up a merry valse; and she steered me out on the floor, missin every mother's son of a table, and me goin' on 69 ! When she pushed me into my cheer she says: *'Ze champagne, it is five dollars, now." *^Jewhillikins 1 four years ago it v^as only $4, **It is ze high cost of livin. I will tell you a sekert: It was a Frame-np. He taught me the frame-up." Then she showed me the photy- graft, portrait of a wealthy Himerican writer, on the staff of — — 's, with his autograft, brazen as brass. ^ "The on-velope won't wear out soon,." I says, dry-like. *Xe soldat American, I adore him." "Them's regulars: jest wait till ye see oui drafted men. I know one that's worth a mill- ion dollars, and ye wouldn't think he had a thousand, the way he behaves: he's so modest. In 'Te^fgy McCann ' I informed Peggy, as we wandered in a beautiful cemetery, that the wealthy, livin' and dead, takes to the high ground jest ez they did in the days of Noah." Above aint true consarnin Montmartre, tho of they'd sava their money, they'd be rich in time, those on the boulevar' anyway. Mont- 124 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN martre, I cal'late, is the higliest p'int or hill rather, in Paris, and has the best view of the most interestin part. No rich folks has their homes — are with theirselves— theh as yet. One day, when '88 was fadin into '89, Uncle Blair was on root to Frisky. He see on the train a man that minded him some of Joaquin Miller, and some ways of the Prophet Jonah. He was goin to get off at Weed, where they wan't no fish big enough to swoUer him. His h'ar was long, and curled on his neck, and his whiskers were copious and gray. He set on me a warnin eye, and quoted from the Gospel of and acordin' to St. Luke the Beloved Physician [Not in King Jeem's version]: San Francisco, thou that stonest the prophets And persecutest them that are sent unto thee: How oft would I hev gethered thy children together, Even as a hen hovereth her chickens under her wingSj But ye would not." San Francisco allers did have a gay, don't give a dang way with her Jonahs, like a balky but beautiful and charmin' lady. "YouDg man," says old Dyodgenes,*' ye'll live to see grass growin in the streets of San Francisco." That was some years befo^ au^tomobeels come ENTOMOLOGY OF CAMOUFLAGE 125 into vogue. In less ^n 3 days Uncle did see grass growin' in the streets of The City, on a south **slope," south front, I mean, of NobHill, growin' in between the cobble-stones of Mason, from Sooter, and Post, too, to California. He never see no delivery wagons climb that hill, and he often set and wondered how Flood, Fair, Mackay and O'Brien, Stanford and Hopkins and Crocker, got anything to eat. Some places on the Butte of Montmartre calls to mind a few high-spots of Frisky; but some streets on the Butte I wouldn't climb for forty dollars at or after the witchin' hour of midnight —two or three dogs I don't like the looks of. Diane 'llowed as how les soldats americaines is plumb anxious to speak the French, and learn so rappide. ^'Helas ! it is I who could it teach, did I but know z'americaine, which you, Monsieur, speak so lovely." To my mebby too fastidious ear, the French our men pick up is too colloquial to comport with the dignity of Uncle Samuel. (Sammy is to my notion a mo' stately name than Tommy) The French language is gittin the worst of it in some pertioklers in this war, not doin as well as the army. Take that word camouflage we hear so much. ^Taint in Surenne's big dictionary, leastways it wan't when I left home. Ef a word aint in the dictionary, dig fur its root, and git track of the 126 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN entomology of it. The root is the verb camou- fler, which means to shake a piece of vvhite paper in your face by way of insult, or to dis- tract attention. Sometimes they'd set fire to the paper. In war-time brown paper will do. The word has been so jolted and jiggered by the war so*s to mean any sort of disguise; Big Dictionary Littre, the progress of whose 4-volu me folios was noted by John Bigelow in his diaries, says: **Camouflet rime avec traits, jamais, succes^ paix." It also rime avec Littre. In October, 184— the editor of Grayum's Magazine was settin' in^ his cheer when Edgar Allen Poe come in with a poem that was to have appeared in August, ihat the editor paid $2 fur in July. The editor rose, took the poem, see that the poem contained six words^ barred in the magazine, then crumpled up and shook the poem in Poe^s face. That was camouflage.; Then he opened the door and threw Poe down stairs. Next, he threw the poem, fluttering, down-stairs after him; then he went down his> self, retrieved the poem, put in four or five amendings of his own that made Poe Crazy as a bed-bug, and run it in December. . ■ It was way back in 14, not fur Irom the river Aisne, that a French officer was settin up a battery of 75's, and was pertickler anxious tbe crack'German gunners shouldn't get a bead on him befuV he got his guns in position, so he tells a subordinate to climb a **rise" off to one side and distract the enemy's attention by ENTTOMOLOGY OF CAMOUFLAGE 127 some kind of Camouflage. The officer clumb the cue tall tree on the hill .and begun usin the Chermin signal code, which allers made em hot: Pigs of Chermins, Down mit die Ki- zier, and the like. By and by or purty soon a big shell cut the tree off slick and clean, obout ten foot from the ground. It fell so the leaves and branches hid the guns exactly. The chief congratulated his subordinate, who got only an arm and leg broke (in French) "The tree beat our Camouflage all to the Dickens ! So they called the tree-boughs they used ever after, and every other concealment, from a sprinkle of flour or a load of hay to a hand- painted mountain — Camouflage I Whiskers and Motors Inside the War Zone, Sept. 14, 1917. In my last I jest tetched on the war 'twixt Whiskars and no Whiskers* It's too much like this war itself, most a toss-up. The British and French has been pushin em right along all summer in France and Flanders. Battle on battle, victory on top of victory, altho some call the whole kit, the whole summer series, one battle, has gained sich a few miles, and they's sich a many mo' to go, befo' we gits to Berlin. Howsomever, if we kin jest hold 'em level on the long line, Lloyd George and Hoover will Win the War, and make Grub so skeerce fur the Chermins at home that they'll git diskerridg. At a recent doins I observed that the men in the front row the Whiskers had one major- ity — ^about the same majority net that Sir Doo- glas has over the Chermins. M. Ribot stood nerd the middle, and was the tallest man of the bunch. He's over six foot high, stoops quite a bit, but has a fine face, a regal head. WHISKERS AND MOTORS 129 He was tlie orator at the first celebration (the third anniversary) of the Battle of the Marne. His whiskers kivvers his whole face, and is 'most white. President Poincare has whiskkers, too, but not a full set, jest moustache and g:o-tea, neat- trimmed. He's a small man. Premier Painleve is a middle-size middle-weight, with a heavy, on-yieldin moustache. Slathers of the French private soldiers is at present wearin full-beard whiskers. It's a lot of trouble to keep track of a comb, but if he lose his, some kin git purty good, combin 'em out with theh fingers. Why, when Prince Arthur of Connaught was invited to inspect a batch of French sold- iers (you bet it was a lot of the best) the man at the right end of the first file hed a fine, dark p'inted beard. The Prince, who is most tall as Abr'm Lincoln but right-smart bctter-lookin, don't wear no whiskers; His father the Duke aint so tall, nor quite so libel to let the troops know by his manner if they're lookin' well. The British, fur a fact, don't take to whiskers among theirselves. Most of their officers has a moustache, but they don't lay whiskers up aginst a Frenchman. I wear a perfickly smooth face, so that enemy or ally kin see all the lines and finger-prints of power and determination. I had less trouble with the author'ties than most of the cor'spondents. The trouble with many of them they don't know nawthin of officialism -at home, 130 BI.UE EYE TO BERLIN The insolence of office, and the spurns That conscious merit from the onworthy takes. They've filers hed a cheap man or office boy to deal with Federal officials and sich-like. The time we hed a Democrat Postmaster atBlue Eye, I went to the complaint window to buy 5 cents worth of stamps. The Postmaster was settin in the back office doin' a sum. I waited ten minutes while he never looked up. Then he says: *''Come around tomorrer.' ''But 1 got to go to Bill Jasper's funeral." ''Well; next week, then," and kicked shet the intervenin' do'. The p'int is them officials aint got no compe- tition. The great Chicago war correspondent, Ring W. Lardner,when his train from sumwers on the coast of France come to a good-sizable town, seems like it was Orleans, he see on the station, in bold type, a sign, SORTIE. Ring took it fur the name of the town, and he wrote about it in Collier's. Them bureaucrats' don't keer a dang if you git in or not, so they aint no sign, "Entrance," but a mighty plain one to show you where to get out, or sorlie. My fine record as a pussy footer, in Italy, WHISKERS AND MOTORS 131 helped a lot. The Mar-Casey got me a recom mend from the censor at Udine, who wrote, "Ye kin trust Monsieur McCann. Entre nous, he is a pretty good censor hisself, and stands in, allers". When I left Paris for the front, I went afoot, seein ez how some cor'spondents hez mo' troubl with motors thsin with 'ficials. Pinned on. my coat-bosom was the Tricolour, Old Glory, and. my pass. About nine mile this side of sumwers, I see a cavalcade ahead, and heered a brave Himerican voice : "Whoa, Buck ! Haw, there, Berry ! " He wor standin up in his motor- keer, drivin a yoke oxens. Pie could crack a long whip-lash good. When I ketched up and passed him I smiles patterhizin at his outfit, and he says : "I say, old man, wot's the French fur Buck and Berry ? " •^Try Dan and Gran' (daim et grain)." "I kaint onderstand these French oxens," he adds, "or make them onderstand." His team was wobblin aud takin up a big sheer of the road: When he see a automobeel comin, he got out and pushed his oxens over with his hands. He was cor'spondent fur Ind- ianapolis . The last I heered of him was "Jee, Dan !" some forty rod back. They aint no mountings in this part of the 132 BLUE EYK TO BERLIN French Republic, so they planted a row of pop- lars along the big road, like they used to plant wind-breaks in Newbrasky, to keep the private soldiers' whiskers from blowin' away. I cal'late theyVe been rcntin out condemned cars to correspondents. In the dusk an' drizzle last evening I run onto a broken-down motor that blonged to two corespondents. They'd got somehow two horses and hitched em to it. The horses was stuck fast between two trees on the left-hand side of the big-road. I see they had run right-hand rein of each horse thro the neck yoke ring ! "What in Sam Hill did ye do that fur ? **Thet's to keep em from gittin theh heads up and runnin' away." In parting one thanked me, adding: **I used to know Richard Harding Davis." Besieged is Lost Sortie (a good-sized town on the Railroad — Please thank the man who sent me a Collier's, with Mr. Lardner's mention of this place. Also to the lady who sent one of Ouida'^ novels to the soldier who gave it to me. They come in a box marked **Keep in a Cool Place" Some of the Stories in that box is mo' like to 'splode than any of Ouida's ef they git overhet. They aint much chanst to git over-bet inNorth France this winter, tho it aint a bad winter, compairin with the other three. On the 25th of July, 1870, President Grant was settin out on the piazza of his cottage at Long Branch, in New Jersey, when Phil Sheri- dan come up, saluted, and shook hands. Phil flowed he had some thoughoughts of a v'yage to Europe, ez how he might get some new pints from the Franco-Prussian war jest started. 134 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Grant he said nawth'in, but smoked a couple of minutes longer, then he stepped into his par- lor thro the long, low windows, pulled a cheer up to his writin desk, and writ a letter of inter- duction informin the crowned haids ot Europe that Sheridan was ''one of the bravest and most skillful soldiers developed by the late war in America." Then Grant took his cigar out of his mouth and 'llowed it was a fine day, but like as not pretty warm back in Perry county, O.," where Phil growed up, and was appinted to the Academy from. " The French high command wouldn't let Phil go with them, mebby Napoleon III was skeert Phil might lead his Army into Poatsdam and git to be Philippe the Sixth. When Sheridan got to Berlin in August^ evry danged crowned male head was out-o-town: when Moltky struck his tunin-fork, royal princes had to go, same as bricklayers. But the Queen of Prooshy (later Empress Augusty^ invited iiim to the Palace, and made him tell her a little about Five Forks and Cedar Creek. He couldnt tell her about Sheridan's Ride, as he hadn't yet met Buchanan Read, the author. (He met Read in Rome the follerin winter, and spelled the name Reed in his Memoirs.) When he ketched up to Headquarters, he got solid by askin Bismarck wot clothes he ought to wear. Other visitors asked old Blut und Eisen things he dassent tell, und got snubbed: but, like many another big-bug, Bismarck prided hisself in things he was a amytpor ir;, Avliich shows Phil wan't no BESIEGED IS LOST 135 Jay, but had the salve-for~fair of a highly- improved son of Irish parents. Old Wilhelm I. was chummy with him after bein' crowned Emprer in Looey Fourteen's famous old Palace of Vairsail, but he knowed he'd be solider b}^ not braggiu. They decided upon a Himerican fatigg uniform, leavin off the sword to show he v^an't one of the killers. He looked on at the great battle of Gravelotte (near our root to Co- blenz) where he Probly see mo' actual killing than at Five Forks, havin more time to hisselt: the charge of the French cavalry was magnif- icent to see For one who had no friend, no brother there, Ef it wan't Sheridan's way of usin cavalry; in all his born days he never sent horses up against solid lines of infantry — in 1862 he was a Quartermaster buying horses iir Michigan and knowed how much they cost. Prooshin needle-guns brot down horses a long ways off. Even Hoover couldnt of bulldozed bim to feed a off-duty horse corn. He was reckoned a favorite of Grant, but he had Grant beat, ez bow he lied been a horse-buyer as above, was up north buyin fur the Army when Grant was fightiu at Pittsburg Landin, danged close to the Landin. Sheridan's trooper knowed Little Phil woodnt send him out on a rheumatic horse, but wood buy him a good one. Then ''Get there, my boy, or the firin-squad. Grant rode well and was agood jedgeof horses, but undervalued cavalry. Meade had small use for mounted troops: when 136 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Sheridan come East to command the cavalry, Army of the Potomac, he quarreled with Meade first thing about his cavalry corps. Meade was powerful sore when Lincoln and Stanton was so delighted at nothavin to git out at midnight to man the forts no mo' that they made Sheridan a Major General of regulars ahead of Meade, for his victories in the Valley. Grant didnt recommend it, ez how he didnt want to hurt Meade's feelins; and he wouldnt let Sheridan ride in the Grand Review, ez how he ranked Meade, but hurried him off to Texas, to fight tarantulas and other insex. This fur from a Cyclopedy, I furgit wot hero said, epigrammatically; A besieged army is a lost army. They don't do it no more. Even in our oncivil war, no city stood a siege after Vicksburg. Not one in Europe after Paris in 1870. In this war, the long line sways forward or back, but no army gits surrounded. Sheridan criticised modestly Bazaine for shutting np hisself and 180,000 men in Metz. If Metz was to be held at all, 25,000 could hold Metz jest ez well. It was easy as fallin' off a log to^git recruits fur Grant's army after he got Pemberton penned up. Folks like to poke up and pester caged animiles. Sometimes the best scholar pans out in truly THOMAS AND MASON 137 life pure gold. Lee graduated second in his class. 1 furgit who it was ranked above him. At West Point they used to put the best grad- uates in the Enginers; second, Artillery; 3d, Cavalry; 4th, Infantry Grant, Sheridan, Han- cock, went to the Infantry. The Academy dons sent Sheridan home for a year, and it took him five years to graduate, Hancock had eighty- five demerits his first year,Lee ne'er a one, Geo. H. Thomas had jest got a job as deputy clerk in one of the Dismal Swamp counties of Virgin- ia, not fur from Jerusalem Plank Road and the battlefields of Dinwiddie Court House and Five Forks. ' Like some parts of the county of Lewis in early days, plank roads was the only kind ye could tetch bottom on. Gen. Scott come from close by. Thomas's town was Jerusalem C. H. till the folks got tony and changed the name to Courtland. One day John Y, Mason, M. C. (not the Trent Mason, James M., but the one Charles Sumner made fun of fur gittin Em- press Eugenie's playing=keerds all stained up with tobacco juice— He also was a diplomatist, minister to France, and died 1859— called. He admired Thomas's stalwart frame and offered him the 'pintment to West P'int; Thomas, on his way to West Point to be xamined fur cause stopped in Washington to thank Mason once mo', but Mason cut him short: ''No cadet from my deestrick at West P'int ever graduated. If you don't I don't never Vi^ant to see your face agin." Thomas was pow'ful keerful to graduate 'bov i^^ BtUB mn TO BERLIN the Itiiddle. Me got in the Artillery, but never went to see Mason agin. Long after, at West Point, Prof.Mahan said: *'0f all our GeneralSjThomas most resembled Washington- in cbaracten'* Washington wouldn't a been best scholar. At Blue Eye we hauled our best scholar Vound spellin' down other of the deestrick schools. He got a school hisself, but the big boys put him outdoors, which busted him fur teaching in that kentry, Warren was a fine scholar, brave and skillful *-but one patternizin, sarcastic retort to Sheri- dan about Bobby Lee was the cause of his losin his job at Five Forks, Sheridan was proud and niebby a little tetchy about them good scholars, Meade said sumpin like it to Grant when U, S. G. took holt in '64. War Back Numbers When U. S. A. declared war on Germany, April 6, 1917, the Allied armies of Britain and France had already begun their fourth cam- paign not far from the point on the west front reached by the Germans in 191 4. In three weeks of 191 4, Aug, 4 to a6, th« German invaders, entering via Luxealliour^, had captured every important city of BelgiudI except Antwerp and Ypres. Liege, Brugear, Brussels, Namur, Ostend fell in rapid order, Antwerp fell Oct. 9. Ypres remained iu Belgian and British possession till the war's conclusion. The first battle for its possession lasted thirty one days, from Oct. 17 to Nov. 17, 1914. Tht second battle of Ypres lasted thirty days, from April 17 to May 17, 1915. With Ypres the Al- lies held a little strip, a few square miles, of Belgian territory. Russia, against whom Germany's first decla- ration of war was launched, had a few surprfs- ing initial successes. Aug. 18 she invaded E. Prussia and threatened Koenigsburg, but was 140 BLUE KYE TO BERLIN driven back across the frontier, a month later. Russia celebrated St. Patrick's Day, 1915, by capture of Przemysl, Austrian Galicia, but the Austrians recovered Lemberg and Przemysl in June. Russians captured Ispahan March 19, and Trebizond April 17, 19 16. Aug. 23. 1914, the British and French fell back fromMoDS, Aug-.3i they halted at the Seine und Marne. Sept. 6-10 was fought the first bat- de of the Marne, The day before the battle, the French government removed to Bordeaux, and Oct. 13, four days after the fall of Antwerp the Belgian government moved to Havre. Oct. 16 to 28 was fought the battle of the Yser, and the progress of the Germans towards the En- glish Channel was arrested by'the ancient god Terminus.- ;Qn -Nov. 5 Great Britain declared war on the Ottoman ports, bringing Turke^^ into the war. Dec. 17 Britain frankly assumed a protectorate overEgypt, replacing the old, cumbrous fiction. April 26, 1915, an allied force, for the greater part British and Australasian,landed onGalipoli peninsula, the Northern shore of the Dardan- elles, to attempt the capture of Constantinople. Such was^the bloodiest blunder. A relatively small Turkish force sufficed to hold the narrow approaches and to slaughter the assailers. On Dec. 19 the British began to evacuate the pen- insula. Jan. 8, 19 16, the evacuation was com- pleted. The object was to use Britain's great WAR BACK NUMBER 141 battleships. Even Turkish land fortifications, German-officered, were superior, and infantry assaults proved suicidal. When Gen. Allenby, having conquered Pal- estine, approached through Syria, from the Asia minor side, Constantinople fell, easily, without another struggle or a groan, and the force out- side her northern gate marched in and took possession, much as Gen. Weitzel took hold at Richmond in 1865. The Transcript (Boston, U.S.A.) when some one remarked the slow progress of the British across the Desert of Sinai, cited the fact that Moses, Aaron and the soldiers of Israel took all of forty years to cross the same desert. LieutenantGeneralSir Archibald Murray, on June 18, 1917, found on arriving at the western border of the Promised Land of Canaan, that Gen. Sir Moses Moses was Murray's true ante- type, or prototype, maybe. Said the Angel to Moses: '*Thou shalt not enter in,'- His orders .s*a:id::to Gen. Murray, worn and weary: *'Turn over your command to Lieut, Gen. Sir Edmund H, H. AUenby" (a younger malt.) Allenby wasn't able to get results right this minute. Nearly all his transport, including 30,000 camels, had to go to his eastern army. Near the Dead Sea the Arabian Sherif of Mecea whom the British had foxily made King ofHed- 142 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN jaz, a thorn in the side (and back) of the Turk kept the latter busy. It was Oct. 31 when Al- lenby attacked and captured Beersheba the same day. Gaza, Samson's town, a strong place, fell Nov. 7; Jaffa, Nov. 17. Then he marched on Jerusalem, which ranks next to Mecca and Me- dina among the holy cities of the Turk, and he put up a stiff fight for it at El Mughir. Here Capt. Neil Primrose, son of Marquis of Rose- bery, was killed. Allenby says "The Turk is a fine horseman and a fine shot, especially at longrange," Gen. Falkenhayn came fromAleppo to advise^ but soon went away. Kress von Kressenstein, a Bavarian, commanded Turkish army. Djemel Pasha, commander-in-chief, was at Damascus. Jericho fell Feb. 23^ 1918. Damascus (275,0003 surrendered Oct. i, '18. Allenby entered the city that day, accompanied by his Arab ally, Emir Faisul. Allenby then, withdrew, leaving the citizens in control. , Acre occupied Sept. 23. Beirut occupied Oct. 8, '18, The main reason Gen. Allenby got so xnuch attention is folks knowed better his sphere of inflooence. We all know Bethlehem and Jeri- cho and Beersheba like we do Boston and Con- cord and Lexington and Bunker Hill, and there they will remain forever. He rescued the birthplace of the Infant Samuel, who was in mother' s» Bible Pictures. Ever since she told us about Little. Sam, and good old Eli, we've WAR BACK NUMBER 143 felt sore to know that his grave hed come to be a source of revenoo to onbelievers, Heig and Pershing, Beatty and Sims, may have had mo' fightin to do, but readers of the paypers kin foller with their «yes shut Allenby and his camel-tracks to glory. They kaint do that on the Western Front, nearer home but still on-familiar. Baghdad The capture of Bagdad, tlie city of the Kaiser^s Wilhelm tbe Second's dream^ the lately realized recently attained objective of the Bagdad rail- way went farther to show the impotence of the German state as colonizing, conquering wor|d- nation than any other achievement ofjthe War. It was essentially and exclusively a British and Irish and India campaign: 1915 and '16 showed the characteristic, bulndering nnpreparednesi-— not the first time— of Britain in a great war; 1916 and '17 showed these errors doggedly^ bravely, characteristically repaired. Britain^s triumph, final and complete, came, igiy-iS. Baghdad was, you recall, the seat of the great Haroun al Raschid and lovely Zobeide. Nov. 10-13, 1914, a British expedition sent ont from India, captured Basra city, on a bayou (they might qall it in Lousiana) in the delta of the Tigris and Euphrates, 55 miles inland from the Persian Gulf, a city of 50,000 Gen. Townshend proceeded up the Tigris in 1915. The army was imperfectly supplied, and BAGHDAD * 145 it is alleged that at a critical time of the early summer the medical service broke down com- pletely, causing much unmitigated suffering. The transport and supply service were vastly inadequate. Guns that were captured by Gen. Townsend in '15 were recaptured by the Turks in '16, and again captured by Sir Stanley Maude in '17. On April 26, 1916, Gen. Townshend was compelled to surrender the city of Kut and 9,000 men to the Turks. Aftjr a brilliant strategic campaign, daring in conception and carried through to victory hardily without a skip or flaw, Sir Stanley and his men entered Kut on Feb. 24. 1917. Maude surprised the '^ Turks by operating from the south ride of the Tigris whence he crossed at the Sbumran bend five or six miles upstream from Kut,' Gen. MarshalPs left, forcing passage over the swollen Tigris under heav3^ fire. At Sann yat, down-stream from Kut, Lieut. Gen. Cobbe Feb. 23 attacked to distract the enemy, developing a hard battle, attacking again 24th. Sir Stanley allowed no grass to grow under under his feet but kept the Turks going. March 11 in a dust storm the British drifted into Bagdad, now a city of about 150,000, and took possession. There was no triumphal entry. Sir Stanley Maude had a more than common allotment oi the British genius for dealing with 146 ' BI.UE EYE TO BERLIN oriental peoples and religions. He was popular in Bagdad from the first, and it was in indulg- ing his inclination to gratify the people that he met his untimely, lamented death. London Times history says the only acco-unt of the tragedy is by *'an American writer," a guest of Sir Stanley at the Residency, who accompanied the General to an entertainment given by a Jewish school. The Chief Rabbi of Bagdad, "black-bearded, in a white and gold or bin? received them ; the headmaster ^f the school, "a typical Bagdad Jew, with a French education and old-fashioned French manners, hovered about and showed his pleasure in the occasion.'* At the close a small table was brot, **and placed before the Army Commander and me, on which were two cups, a pot of coffee, a bowl of sugar and a jug of milk. The Ameri- can drank his coffee "black," but, being an outlander, never thought to caution Sir Stanley, who poured into his coffee large quantities of the cold^ raw milk. lu a few days (Nov. 19) the Army Commander was dead of cholera. He was succeeded by Sir W.R. Marshall,- who finished ably the task Sir Stanley Maude had set himself. A remnant of the Turks reached Hamadan, Persia, 300 miles east by north. The Times history says Sir Stanley's death was "a bitter blow to the army, by whom he was idolized. He had com^ to Mesopotamia BAGHDAD 147 when the army was at its lowest ebb, and had bent himself to the work of reorganization thro the succeeding summer, and moved at last only when all was perfectly ready, aud finally by his genius he had changed the whole face of affairs in Mesopotamia. King George sent to the Army a telegram ot sympathy. Nov. 25 a memorial service was held under the new Commander, who had been in Sir Stanley's confidence, had been in the hardest fighting before Kut, He was bitterly bereaved, and sore at the manner of the Army Commander's taking-off. McCann for Qovernor of Palestine Via Grapevine Wire (trellis) from Sumwers December 14 Genial, glad-hand toorist-busters is the only people who kin make the Holy Land pay. Ez soon ez I see that the Rt. Hon. the First Lord of the Treasury David Lloyd George hed assured Lord Rothschild that Palestine would be put under Jewish control, 1 forwards to D- Dowuing street a application for a p'ntment ez Guvner. I garntee a administration thet will knock the spots off the Guvner of Baritaria,the Itte Captain-General Pansy. I cal'late a sober second thought of each of these great men 'will conceiye the advantage of friendly nonpartisan (not neutral) control. I fear the Himerican missionaries will refuse to undertake the conversion of the Guvner and McCANN FOR GOVERNOR 149 staff that might come out from-— Britain. Paul, ye mind, took on Festus and Agrippa, but Cai- aphas and Josephus he passed up, as too well- informed already. My platform will be about as follers: 1. Start to oncct to re-build Solomon's Temple using onl}^ union labor; 2. No restriction on the sidewalk display of goods; 3. Money-changers may use Temple, but only before or after banking hours; 4. Interest charges on commodity or pledge loans to be governed by the law of supply and demand; 5. Statue of Thomas Cook at civic center; 6. Equestrian Gen. Allenby, in Park ben Eli; 7. Painlins of Lord Reading and Mr. Justice Brandeis in the Co't House; 8. Tooris and Gentiles pertected in free and on- restricted expenditure of their money; 9. In short, for one and all, an open Jerusalem, but not a Coney Island or anything cheap. There will be no attempt to divert travel from Mecca, Rome, Salt Lake, or any other Hfoly City. As to my own qualifications: I hev allers got my clothes of Israelites; My great-grandmother was a Catholic; I sympathize with the Zionists; I am willing to j'ine the Armenians; but I 150 BUTE EYE TO BERLIN The Greek Church is stronger in Jerusalem And Methodis' in U. S. A. Perhaps I better jineBabtis But I leave all that to Lloyd-George, said to be a Christian and admitted to 'ave the Say. xAdv] Jerusalem [Adv The Golden Clothing House $io Suits Reduced — Now $37-85 Why pay more? Trade in Jerusalem Uncle Blair's father was a friend of the editor of the Fort Madison Plain Dealer Canother Wilson) who let him write a article for the Plain Dealer oncet in a while. Editor Wilson was thin and slim, and wo' spectacles for both readin' and lookin. Wilson was U.S.A. Consul p.t Jerusalem fur a long spell, and writ »a book about the City of David, sooburbs, back kentry and adjacent — a standard anthority. The Wilson who kept the dry goods store seems like was the Consul's brother. He was rayther stout and prosperous-appearin. At vSpringfield in 1868 they was talk of the Universalis' and Unitariums, and Hebrews, combinin' to fight Satan, bein' ez how neither the Jews nor the Unitariums kin onderstand McCANN FOR GOVERNOR 151 the doctern of the Trinity. And most all the Universalis was Ulowed to be Uuitariums ez regards the Trinity, in addition. [Seems like UniversaH:^' is mo' skeerce now, which shows the world is g:rowiu worser and mo' in need of future punishment. It was a sad day and a crool loss fur Universalism,when Dr. Chapin died, of the Church of the Divine Paternity. Jest the other day I see a letter fromOakland sayin a leadin minister [First Congregational] hed announced a sermon, tentativ-like, it might be about time for a reunion of Catholic and Protestant [on a basis of city and county poli- tics, mebby.] It do seem that now , goin-on two thousand years after the Death on the Cross, speshil as He said "Forgive them!'' right at the time, Jews and Christians may jine hands acrost the Holy Sepulchre, and perceeed to make the low- lyin valley of the Jordan to blossom like the Rose of Sharon, or like a field of fairy Flax, or more beautiful yet, a field of Buckwheat in bloom, all reinforced with fertilizer from (South) Himerica. It is dazzlin and wondrous to see, when the cloud shadows chase each other acrost a field of flowering buckwheat,* but buckwheat and flax is both pow'ful severe on land. And *Pcggy — "Buckwheat cakes in bloom! Fine.'' ISa BLUE EYE TO BERLIN tlie Land of the Moabites to flow with milk at fourteen cents a quart, and honey at ^fifteen cents a pound, like it come in the days of the Army Commander, Joshuway, vice Moses excluded. We git along right nicely with both of the Senators from Massachusetts, also with Editor of Boston Transcript, spite of theh folks hangin Quakers, and all kinds of Noncomformists, a heap more recent, —Ben McCann. The ''bayou" mentioned on p,i44 is the Shat el Arab, into which flow Tigris and Euphrates. The Shat empties into Persian Gulf. *The California retail price prior to 1916. For one day only at 15 cents retail in 1917. Bad News from Italy Von Hutier Charges The victorious progris of our Allies did uot perceed as smooth as I cal'lated it wood. My friend the Mar-Casey writes me for the first in a year. He's sorry, but been so danced busy —savin his own hide and his own liberty I In October and November he and Gen. Cadorna have been shot acrost the Isonzo, the Stabba, the Tagliamento, the Zellina, the Sile, the Me-- duna and the Piave, with great velocity and speed, accompanied by their own noble army, and botly pursued by a pow'ful Austro German and both armies a-straddle of the Brenta in spots. The Mar-Casey says the retreat was the worst so fur: the only thing that saved the Italian army was the coolness and devotion of the men and officers. If Germans hed a chanst fur final victory, the coming man is Gen. von Hutier. I spelt his name Huter in a former letter : have sence 154 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN diskivvered tbat he is of French descent, may be from one of them Huguenots that helped to set Berlin ahead, after Looey Quatorze hed busted Henri Quatre's pledge and exiled 'em. He captured Riga Sept. 5 (19173 and they say his campaign was a top-notcher. Then they sent fur him to come and drive the Mar- Casey. On August 9th, 1916, the latter and Cadorna, after a year's efforts took [Gorizia] and the Italians kep' pushin theh line steady eastward, as well as south towards Trieste. On Oct. 24, ^17, the Foe started his big drive. Caporetto, on the Isonzo, 35 mile north of Gorizia (58 from Treste) was hit hard, and there the crack divisions under von Hutier broke the Italian line. Such a rain of shells Caporetto before had never seen, nor so dark a smoke-barrage, from which emerged, treble quick, the famous "solid formation." The Italian Third Army could not stand against it, and started for Udine, the Italian field headquarter, twenty miles away to the rear. On beyond Udine the Third Army marched all night, twenty miles more, to stand at Tagliamento river. Hence they were forced on, twenty miles farther, acrost the Livenza and Piave. Venice was in danger, and many paintings and statues were sent to Rome. Th^ arinies were in the low lagoon-lands, in water ''up to their necks," for weeks. The campaign ended in the same old place, near the eastern border of Sette Communi, in late December. In November, British, French and American VON HUTIER CHARGES 155 troops came to the assistance of Italy. Gen. Cadorna retired to the Allied War Council at Paris. He was succeeeded by Gen. Diaz, wlio was only 56, aud had entered the war in com- mand of a division. In March, 1918, the Germans tried vonHutier and his system against Sir Douglas Haig and Gen. Petain, commanding the British and French armies iti Franee. Sir Douglas Haig reported to the British army council that he had information or that there were indications of a determined German attack about March 20th, directed either against Calais, to cut off the British communications with England or to interpose between and French armies. The latte proved to be the true objective. Early in December it had been decided that the Allies must confine themselves to the de- fensive until the arrival of the Americans in sufficient numbers to bring the war to decisive swift couelusion. This, stated in the London Times history, suffices to justify the tremendous force organized in America aud dispatched to Europe, Between the first of November and the first of March, the Germans drew 28 divisions from the Eastern front and 6 from the Italian. On March 2 1, the Germans had 192 divisions o» the line facisg Haig and Petain. The German divisions had been reduced from ten to nine 156 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN regimetits each. Haig's divisions had been reduced, each from thirteen to ten battalions. The first attack of the Germans March 21 was between the river Sensee and the Oise, by the 23 divisions under von Huticr, whose left faced the junction of British and French, 23 of 40 divisions on the left of the 54-mile line be- tween the Sensee aud the Oise. The Fifth army, Gen. Gough^ held Haig's right, and the Third trmy^ Sir Julian Byng, Haig's left. The First army was still nearer Belgium, on Byng's left, still farther north. As usuftl, the Germans were bountifully sup- plied with artillery: vou Hutier had 900 A.K.A. or heavy batter- ing guns, to destroy trenches, silence big guns. 1,200 LK.A. or Infantry battering guns, for attacking infantry, 480 heavy guns, and a large number of trench mortars. At the right, next north of Hutier^s twenty. three divisions, were eighteen divisions under von Below. DeMarwitz commanded Hutier's right, von Boehn his left. The attacking force comprised four armies and sixty-four divisions, and fourteen divisions in reserve. Arriving troops were detrained some distance VON HUTIER CHARGES 157 behind the lines, for secresy, and the divisions marched to the front. The bat tie- front of a German division was commonly about 2,000 yards, and several lines deep, in two battalions; ist, a line with light machine guns, each machine man carrying a paiabellum pistol, .28; behind this a line of infantry; then more machine guns; then bat- talion headquarters, with light trench mortars. The orders for March 21 were for a general attack westward toward Boulogne andAbbeville —Von Hutier's 23 divisions attacked: II in front, 8 in support, 4 in reserve; 21 divisions attacked the Fifth army. All ar- rivals were timed for the night of March 20; at dawn was a general attack on 54 miles of* line held by Britisj Fifth and Third army. By noon two breaches in the line of the Fifth Army. At that (south) end the fighting was hard all day. The French Sixth Army, con- tinuing eastward the Fifth army's line, was at- tacked before dawn. French Sixth army was a-ble to send one division (125th) to help Sir H. Gough's Fifth army. Before 5 a. m. gas and high explosive shells rained on the Fifth and Third army from the Scarpe to the Oise. By this time says the his- torian hitherto quoted (Times): poison gas was dispensed only in shells. The bombardment was the most furious tkat Sir Douglas Haig's 158 BLUE EYE TO BKRUK army had ever experienced. Gas clouds such as were used in '15, were subject to winds, and the shells could be thrown much farther. All British communications were severed in a short time by the bombardment. Like the war itself as a whole, every detarl of the attack seems to have been programmed and arranged for beforehand. The preliminary bombardment was to last five hours. The creeping barrage began at the time for the infantry attack, and was started 330 yards in front of the British lines automatically, and was put forward 220 yards every four minutes. Variations and delays were arranged for. Infantry attacks were to be accompanied by low-flying airplanes. On the 21st a thick white fog favored the German attack. They used smoke barrages also, where efficacious. The first successes of the Germans were at the left and extreme right of the British line. The lines were but a ihort distance apart, the fire from the A.K.A. guns had beaten down the British entanglements, *'and it was a short push for the Germans to be in oar weakly- held front line." At 4 p- m. the Germans captured Quessy at British extreme right, but the commander at Tergnier defied them. Villeret-Faucon, Hari- court on the left, Doignies and Louverval, and a few other villages, fell to the Germans. At 4 a. m. of the 22d the Germans attacked VON HUTIER CHARGES 159 again. Again a thick mist favored tbera. As they came on in massed formation, a French officer of the 125th exclaimed: *'What a slaughter, if our artillery had been in line ! " The French Government ordered their First iarmy to be brought up, and placed between thf British Third and Fifth armies. /'According to Sir Douglas Haig's report, to meet the German attack in this battle, the British had only one division to each 6,700 yards of line. The Germans took Levegneur at 10 a. m., and St. Emilie and Villers the same day. At nightfall the Germans captured Pouilly, opening a gap between the British 50th and 6ist Divisions. The Germans poured thro* and penetrated the British third defense line near Vaux and Beauvais. All the men available of the Fifth army had been sent in, and Sir Hubert Gough, on the 23d, was compelled to retire to bridgehead positions on the Somme, a retreat necessitating a night march of 10 or 12 miles. The Germans followied closely, as they had followed up every drawing back during the battle, and there was sharp rear-guard fighting all the way. Peronne bridgehead had to be abandoned.-— On the 23d, near the junction of the Third and 160 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN Fifth army, Germans broke the line, and drove the British west of Peronne. The German Supreme Command that night called the battle *'the greatest defeat in history/' claimed a gain of 700 square miles.*' "The Crown Prince, with the army of von Hueter, has forced a passage of the Somme below Hatn. Bapaume fell in a night battle. The English, French and Americans were thrown back late the evening of the 23d." Germans took Nesle by storm the 23d. The British authority suggests the French assistance should have been interspersed among the British regiments, That,'*anyway, would have slowed down the retreat." At dawn on the 24th, Germans entered Bus, Lechelle, Le Mesnil, Arrouisse, Rancourt and Clery. British had to abandon Bertincourt, in drawing back the Third army to line with the Fifth army, which had been forced back. Von Hutier arrived at the bank of Somme south of Peronne, broke the British line, and crossed at Pargny, Germans pouring through a gap between 8th and 20th divisions. The 8th was forced to fall back, and the 20th had a dif- ficult retreat to Guiscard. British Sixth cavalry division assisted ably. French support was used freely. The 9th French division held a line ten miles long. On north bank of Somme Germans were repulsed. The night of the a4tii and 25th CLOSING MONTHS 161 the fighting was almost continual. Tb« Germans took three towns v/est of the Libremont Canal. Gen. Foch had collected a force of 70,000 in the rear of the Sixth army, barring the road to Paris. The defense westward was weak, and the Germans got within six miles of Amiens. -March 23 Berlin claimed that in the three days they had captured 25,000 prisoners and 400 guns and 300 machine guns. March 25 the Aliies had lost 45,000 men, and 600 guns. March 28th Germans took Montdidier. The same day the Turkish army in Mesopo- tamia was wiped out. On the same date Gen. Foch was made commander in chief of all the Allied armies. Foch was successful from the first: there was never again sucl^ lack of team work among the Allies as bad been apparent during the Drive toward Amiens. On the 29th, its last day, the Germans bul- letin claimed the capture of 70,000 prisoners. On the ist day of April the British held their line at all points. The Drive was ended. Gen. Debeney's First army came by train from Toul in the Argonne, east by south of Verdun, where several American divisions took the place of the first army. The British writer who described the retreat across tho Somme estimated the Americans in 162 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN France at 220,000 men. These were posted mostly east aud south of Rlieims. If the British Army Commander had but out division to 1,% miles of line, where were all the great British leyies of four years ? Scattered in every war-zone ? April ist the French army chiefs estimated the German losses in eleven days at 275,000 to 300,000 men. April I2th Sir Douglas Haig exhorted his British: ''All positions, must be held to th« last man„" Last Weeks On April 3d 40,000 Germans landed in Fin- land, and on the 13th occupied Helsingfors, the capital. April 5th, a year after America declared war, the United States had under arms, fully equipped, 1,500,000 men. On the I2d of April, Baron Reichtofeu, one of the most brilliant young German aviators, with a record of eighty air victories, was killed in England. He was buried in London with full military honors. On the 25th of April, a French division ma- neuvered and fought its way into Hangard. On the T6th of June reports from Italy were to^the effect that tne Italians aided by U, S. A. French and British troops, had regained all of the places captured by the Austro-Germans, except a few points on Piave river. This leaves Udine and places on Tagliamento and Isonxo rivers still in the grip of Austria. On the 25th of April in the Reichtag Gen, 164 BUTE EYE TO BERLIN Ton Risberg reported that on March 24 the total Missing from the German armies was as follows: Total German missing — 664,104 Of these were the following: Prisoners in France — 236,676 Prisoners in JSngland [Scotland] 119,000 Prisoners in Russia and Roumania 157,000 Remainder, probably dead— 161, 428 vSeemingl}/, Italians took no prisoners. No quarter I On the 1 2th of July Nicholas II, abdicated Czar of Russia, was ninrdered by his guards at Ekaterinberg. In July the Germans agreed to an exchange of prisoners with Britain. Commanders of U~ boats (submarines) were not included. In the last German drive, on July l8th, the city of Soissons fell, with 30,000 prisoners. It August, T914, It had been attcked by the Ger- mans, ciud had been actually besieged or on the firing-line ever si'jce. Rheims, more- famous neighbor of Soissons, tlie French were ) uiaiutaiii possession of throughout the war. Soissors was the Enemy's last Cnpture in France, May 30, 1918. (Allie:^ regained Soissons July 1 8.) In this drive GermaLS penetrated to CLOSING MONTHS 165 a few miles nearer Paris tban they had been able to proceed in August, 1914, but few were those nearer miles indeed. The March of- fensive had shown the German army still strong enough to make headway against the British and French. In the June-July cam- paign the Americans were given an important sharefof the fighting, their fif-st serious work in quantity. The German commanders reported that the Americans were not inferior to the more vet- eran allies. At that date were 2,ooo,coo U.S.A. troops equipped and under arms. More than a million American soldiers were now in France and a million nior* would be in Europe as the transports were able to biing them. America had at her command a transportation service gneh as h*d never for capacity been approached — never bi^fore had a third as many men been transported so far at sea. In the nineteen months from the Declaration of War, April 6, 191 7, to the Armistice Nov. iL, 1918, the Army sent to Europe 2,075,834 men and 5,153,000 dead-weight tons of cargo for the Army the Embarkation service. Somewers about one-half the ships used in this service wer€®5Uy>ii€fby the shipowners and Govern- ment of Britain. The Army, until recently proportionately the smallest in the world, was increased to be one 166 BLUB BYB TO BERLIM of the most numerous and best equipped. The number of men in the Army June i, Sept. i and Nov. I, 1918, was as follows: In U.S. and Possessions In Europe Total June I, 1918 1,390,000 722,000 2,112,000 Sept.i , , 1,425,000 1,576,000 3,001,000 Nov, I 1,^72,000 1,993,000 3,665,000 [World Almanac] If need be, our army in Europe could be increased from Two Millions (without making such effort as France and Germany had already made, without taking one man older than 31) to Three Millions, from men fully armed and equipped; organized, ready to embark. A British estimate placed the losses of Sir Douglas Haig's command from March 26 to May, at 250,000. April 1 8th, 15 French planes dropped tons of bombs on the German bivouacs in vicinity of Ham, Guiscard and Noyon. June 9-12 the German drive between Noyon and Montdidier netted 15,000 prisoners and 150 guns. On June 15, Gen, March reported 800,000 U. S. troops in France. On July 16, Herbert Hoover said that U.S.A. CLOSING MONTHS 167 gent $1,400,000,000 of food to the Allies during the year. On the 20th of July the American troops had taken 17,000 prisoners and 560 guns. On June 10 Berlin claimed capture of 75,000 prisGuers np to May 27 in west front. July 24 the total German losses since the beginning of Foch's drive are alleged at 180,000. Aug, 5 American troops land at Archangel. Aug. 28th the Americans and Allies in the last eight weeks captured 102,000 prisoners and 1,300 guns. Aug. 28th French recapture Roye. Ang.31. — British capture Mt. Kemmel. On Sept. 7th t]]e Germans began a general retreat on a. loo-mile line from Arras-Cambrai to Rheims, British advanced nine miles from ihe Somme. Sept. 22 Allenby advanced beyond Nazareth, taking 18,000 prisoners. Oct. I.— Allenby captures Damascus and 7,000 Turkish troop». Since Sept. 20 Allenby marched 150 miles, captured 58,000 prisoners, destroyed three Turkish arnnes; He left the great aid famous city in the keeping of its old officials, whose loyalty to the Sublime Porte had failed sometimes, and marched westward to Beirut, a seaport that is much nearer both Damascus and Bagdad than is Constantinople 168 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN or Smyrna. HenceBeirat's great promise. Gen. Allenby advanced from Damascus Oct. 5, and occupied Beirut three days afterv/ard, taking 15,000 more prisoners, ^'making 71,000, besides 8,000 claimed by tSe Arab army." In October, 1919, commemorating Allenby's return to England, London Punch pictured him in armor, upon a sturdy English mount, as The New Crusader: "Singing from Palestine, Hither I come. Lady love, lady love,welcome me home. Britannia— I do indeed, with all my heart ! "For he {% an English man" made Allenby still more dear to the heart of London. It was on the 30th of Ma}/, Decoration Day in America, that Germans captured Soissons. July 18 the city was retaken by the Allies. On July 19 the Germans recrossed the Marne in retreat towards the Rhine. Oet. 6. Germans retreat on a 38-mile front in Champagne. On the same day, Germany^s new Chancellor, Prince Max of Baden, asked President Wilson to aid in restoring peace. Oct. 10 British take Cambrai, and twe days later Servians recapture Nish. Oct. 16, British cross the Lys headed toward CLOSING MONTHS 169 the Rhine instead of westward as formerly. On Oct. 17 the Allies entered Bruges, Lille and Ostend, and the Germans retresited from the Belgian and French front from the North Sea to the river Sambre. Oct. 22 the British cross the Scheldt north of Tournai. In the four days ending Oct. 25 the Allies took 15,000 prisoners. The German killed and wounded totaled 50,000. Hungary agrees to all peace terms of the Allies including Czecho-Slovak and Jugo-SIo- v:ik independence. Oct. 31. Italians advanced in 54 divisions. Nov.i. Socialist republic was proclaimed in Vienna. Nov. 3 the Italians occupy Trent. King Albert enters Oudcnarde and Ghent. Austria accepts Armistice terms with imme- withdrawal from North Sea-Switzerland line. Half of equipment to be surrendered, Nov. 5. Pershing advances on both banks of the Meuse. Nov. 7 — Americans capture Sedan. Nov. 9. Kaiser William II abdicates and re- tires lo Holland. Herr Ebert becomes German chancellor. 17j blue eye to BERLIN Nov. lo—Kiiig Wiliam II of Wuertemburg abdicates. Vienna andNeustadt airplane hangars burn. Victor Irnmainiel of Italy makes triumphal entry into Trieste. Nov. 1 1. Germans sign Armistice at Scnlis. On the day of the Armistice, the Grand Duke cf Mecklenbugrg Schwerin abdicated, Grand Duke of Oldenburg was dethroned^ Each was ftcompoiient of the passing German Empire.-- On that day also, Field Marshal von Hinden- urg placed himself and the army at the disposal of the new German Republic. King Friedrich- Augustus of Saxony was de- throned that day. On the first day of December th® Americans crossed into (Rhenish) Prussia at Treves. The British advanced toward the Rhine at Cologne. On the 2d of December, King Nicholas of Moulenegro was dethron^^d by the skupbhtina. Nicholas was father of the Queen of Italy, consort of Victor Immanuel II. Dec. 3. Americans under Gen. Pershing took up a line of six miles with Coblantu in center, at the confluence of the Moselle tnd Rhine. Dec. 8 Gen.Petain became Marshal of France. George, Albert, Raymond His Excellene}^, the Presideut of the French Republic, come down ihis-away quite recent to hold a inspection. M. Poincare ou view fr/ilers the mode of Abram Lincoln and wear*; a plug hat (Lincoln called it a stove-pipe — same as top- hat amorg our allies in London. He looks good in it, but better yet in the cap he wears when prowlin round the aidges. Our great Hm-nici- pator never looked nio^ awkVd thsii when he come !n 1862 to visit the Army of the Potomac and they put him on a middlin strong but low- set horse so the President wouldn't '^It hurt if the horse throwei him, so Abram's No. 12 hoofs 'd clear the grcun3 by ten inches. Fact is, ole Abe could slick on a horse as good as most of the cavalry/. The stove-pipe was mos' tremenjis high— the same danged hat he used to k-. rry his law- papers and letters and jack-knife in, out in Springfield. British House of Common;* is the oh'cet livin exampler of legislative Power, the Roman senate havin' gone out of busiijess some time sence. The craze for precedent rajsed a l,<,st of 172 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN imitators.^ Yon all have see how funny was the eftorts of 'sundry Himericans to make our Cab- inet comprise the majority leaders and prize orators, but both our houses persisted in sendin fur cabinet ministers and exaniinin like bank clerks or army contractors. Our Cabinet rep- resents only the President and pays no special attention to Congress. The French hed see thet to make a Cabinet pow'ful they'd hev to cut off tha President as a party. So M. Poincare is non-partisan and has not many active duties: He holds the reins, but holds 'em easy when one Cabinet goes oat till the 'other comes. Other times, he shows hisself to the people, entertams/makes speeches of, occasion and the like, and does as much like a King of England [Scotland and Ireland] as a Frenchman kin. He gits a lot mo' salary than the Premeer, and usual holds ^he job longer. The President is elected fur seven years; but I doubt if the French cabinets sence 1872 have lasted seven mouths on an aver^'ge. M. Cle- men ceau has held now since Nov. 13, '17, To make an active PVench statesman President is right smart like kickin a leader of the House of Ccnimons up into the House of Lords. Fur some time, before he got took as Pre- meer, M. Clemen ceau bad been runnin on his newspaper a sarcastic sub-heading ** The Man Chained." I bet liis L'Homnie Libre is chained tighter now tnan tver before. Why, it 'got So long sence in Britain a leader KING GEORGE, KING ALBERT 173 of the opposition hed to be as keerful most as the Premeer 'bout keepin his mouth shet. The sure way to learn the 'British S3'Stem is to go aver the bumps like the British done long ago and is still doin. Kings George and Albert appeared in uni- form. Albert still works at bein King, least- ways while the War lasts; but George's Hera- pire is too vast; he has to content hisself with a general overseein. George looks to me like he'd make a good commander-Jn-chicf ef he had the chanst. The quiet way he listens when 'is Generals is 'splainin things minds me of Gen. Grant, minus (leastwa3/s in public) Grant's ci~ caf. Perhaps, when they're in the royal tent or wicky-up Beside Meade, Thomas, Hooker, Sherman, Hancock, Burnside, Logan, Rawlins, Grant seemed small. Ore day in peace time Napo- leon reached fur a book on a shelf. One of his Marshals obtained the book and gave it to the Emperor, *'P4rdon, I am taller than your Majesty." Napoleon eyed him stern. "You are longer," True, King George wis trained fpr the Navy. So was Admiral Blake trained iar the Army. GeorgcII fit well, and no Scot dreamt of 174 BLUE EYK TO BERLIBT of fightin Xht English after George II's ad son, Cumberland. Uncle Blair's poem, which I jest sec^ shows the origin of Kings, all fighters to start with: The drudging Tasks by great men shirked Were not escaped without^a fi;2fht Then they, while their companions worked, • Slept safely, soundly, thro the night. Then folks let 'im be King, perferrin to work rayther than fight any more. Albert, to borrow the phrase of a best scllt;r, is^ generally well-liked. To my eye he is very Chermin in appearance ef he was the man who gave the bu^le-call that brought in Britain and U. S. A. and sounded the keynote of the war that upset the Chermin empire, and sent adrift the Hohenzollerns. His folks of course come from Saxe-Coburg- Gotha, which is a good part of Doychland, alias Germany. His grandfather was the first King of Belgium, and his great uncle Albert married Queen Victories. Albert's^ uncle 1^, Leopold II, was the best business man that ever wore a crown at home and a top-hat in Paris. Bdginm was prospris, and done a big biznez fur one of her size, wa'nt taxed so heavy as some fur the Army, and was Dooley envied by her neighbors. When war come it cost like fury, s© prudent Albert KING GEORGE, KING ALBERT 175 worked at bein' king hisself to save the liire of one bar-tender. Albert is the only royal suvrin that rides habitual in the airy plane, and hez the skill to run his own plane. En- durin the war, he done any kind of man's work, from commandiu a brigade to holdin a council of War. He suffered equal privations with his tn«n, and is a truly soldier. If looks were all, King George 'd do fine fwr a President. A: top-hat becomes him great, and fits his figgcr better- 'n Leopold's did his. Historic Belgium This war, somehow, with it smoke barrages: khaki, we kind o' miss the brass buttons, the bright blue uniforms and flashin bay'nets of old times. One hot night in July, '63, old Grandmother Reinhart was dreamin of the time she was a girl in Clarion county. She drempt she was a- makin peach-butter. A noise in the big road woke her up, and she looked out the winder. Fur up the big road, fur ez her old eyes could see, shimmered and shon® the bright muskets of A. P. Hill's corps, goin back to ole Virginny after the shindy at Gettysburg; She looked fur quite a spell. *'I 'How that's the war Isaac was telliu' about yesterday, when he brung in Gov. Curtin's handbill rousin tht men folks to expel the invader." Hill's corps was famous for "bright muskets and ragged uniforms." No mo' bright muskets in this war anymore. HISTORIC BELGIUM 177 Even the bayonets are blued dull. You could git ino' fight! n them days fur a dollar than ye kin this war fur ten dollars. Ef itwan^t fur the on-parallelled high cost of this war, the big raise in the price of smokin' tobacco, flour, and other on dispensable neces- saries, lots of round-hyah folks wouldnt allow it is much of a war. In 187 1 they was a fight at Hornet's Nest spelling school consarnin Lanningham's New Departure. Bill Jasper was a witness. Jedge Purdy questioned Bill: **Did yo' see de fi^ht, Misteh Jaspeh?" *'No. '' Did yo' hear de fight ? '' *^No, suh." " Did yo' smell de fight ? " *'No, suh." '^ Vo' kin step down, Misteh Jaspeh." [Clement L. V&llandigham was one of the ex- treme peace Democrats or Copperheads. When a candidate for Governor of Ohio in 1863 he was one ef a few anested and sent thro the lines. In 1871 he astonished the country by promulgating a **New Departure." Under it the Democrats were urged to accept the results of the war, ihb XIII, XIV and XV Amendments, with Freedom, Equal right?, and the Ballot for the Negro. A few weeks Ister, in hia home city of Dayton he was defending in court a fellow citizen accused of murder. His theory was the corpus delicti or victim accidentally had shot himself He was rehearsing before his colleague 178 BLUE EYB TO BE^LIM endurin tlie noon recess, when the pistol went off and writ *'The End" to his Life. He was toe anxious and literal a illustrator. He wa'nt goin* to give that jury no room for a reasonable doubt. lallers/Uowed hejiued the Copperheads as a Adv.(Patriots was thicker in '63) and I 'How the same of his New Departure of '71. It was a good one and set our Clement in the spot-light once mo' fur a few days. Horace Greeley writ a signed editorial about it. Had Horace left it out, also oue about the KuKlux, and one on the Twelfth of July riots in New York, he'd of run better fur President the next year. Clement was some of a' Humbug. Greeley [P.T. Barnum, Ben, he was] said Himericans like to be humbug-fed. Had Clement lived he might of been Guvner of Ohio yet 1 (That is wot Clement run fur in '63) but A Man I know from Ohio, says it wan't likely. Yc see, 'taint like when Abe Lincoln 'd give War Democrat like Logan a fur-low to make a lot of speeches fer Abe's re-election and raise a new regiment, and whoqp 'er up generally. A stranger 'd p'int: That man with the ebon mane and square shoulders, tawny epidermis, with shoulder-straps, is our highest volunteer non- West P'inter General--t:.ie one who rid his KING GEORGE, KING ALBERT 179 charger down the battle-line befo' Atlanta, past the whole front of the Army of the Tennessee shoutin: '' McPherson and Revenge '* Then they both 'd in-list. The dark, squar' General was John A.Logan. British bninbarded Ostend. Ostend means cast end, blit is truly the west end of Belgium. Mebby its the east end of the Atlantic Ocean. Queen Victoria was a good friend of Leopold I. as a man and Chris-tiau, but not of Leopold II, whom she dtefUJc^d at times improper, flirtin and carry in-on with actresses. She would of liked KiKg Albert, Albert wps named in honor of her own imforgotten Albert. He is strong and healthy, and has no bad habits, that is none yc kin decipher in a King, Belgium, at the resk of .^^a^n'n at the wrong tinje, aint got uo sich recrrd as a historic, icde- perdciit nation like lrek;nd fur icstauce. The Daik and twilight Ages pervided fur Kiiinanity no Woodrow WiJsou: Locne to in?ijt that Bel. giuni should determine her seU. Outsiders did the determinin,m.ostly outside Kings. In short, serice Rcme Declined the ncmins^tion and Fell, Belgium has been iLe fcotball of wairm furrin 180 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN suvrins^ the tradin stock of international con- ferences, From first to last, Belgimn Has had three Kings, compairin with Ireland^s seventy thous- and; but these three all were able men. Fur ages bothBelgium and Holland war' both known as the Low Coontries or Netherlands. Twas Religion that split 'em up the back; folks in Holland ready to tear a hole in the levy, or open the dikes rather, to let the sea in and drownd the Spaniards out. Belgians took a biz- nez rather than religious view, ez how the^ca'd on-fit the land fur oats too all-fired many years. Up in Skagit county, Wash., is places ye kin still discern wot salt water will do- to Oats. So Belgium sides, long years ago, for Spain, and aginst the stubborn Reformed Dutch ancestors oi Stuyvesant Fish and Robert B. Roosevelt. From 1633 Belgium was held by. Spain, and known as The Spanish Netherlands. At the tail-end of Marlbro^s wars, Louis Fourteen after so many lickins still got in Philip of Bourbon, liis candidate for King of Spain, which was wot King William went to war about. But William was dead, the Man in London Street had no mo^ affection fur his memory than has a New York City crowd on the Twelfth of July. So Beljim was handed over to William's ally, Austria, without any determinin. ^ Maria Theresa, lik« Victoria, had a big fambly, but a fine lot of KING GEbRGE, KING ALBERT 181 men to work for her. She sent to Belgium her husband^s brother, Charles of Lorraine, "the Good Governor,^' who held his job fur forty year. He died in 1780, jest ahead of the Em- pris Queen. Like other good Governors, none other kin wield Excalibur. Maria T.made few reforms, but hers went; her son Joe begun a hull batch to once. Joseph failed teetotally, the Belgians revolted, and they was liades in Flan- ders. France, afterjemappes, i792,coramandered the hull kentry and kep^ it till 1814, when it was handed back to Austria, agin without no determinin. Kologne, Knssel, Koblentz all near, is hard on the cap. k box of Cologne Gazette as Berke- ley and Oakland used to be on the p'tit k box. In 18 15, Congress of Vienna figgered it out mo' keerful, and jined together Holland and Belgium with William of Holland King of the United Netherlands. The French revolution of 1830 biled over into Belgium, ketehi»n onpreparcd King William of Orange. A conference in London ap'inted Le- opold of Saxe Coburg, brother of Victoria's mother, first King of the Belgians. The Dutch King balked fur eight year, then ♦yielded. King Wm.IV of Britain agreed to squar' Holland by marryin Victoria to the Dutch King's younger son; Victoria balked and aided by Leopold, de- layed negotiations till she her^^elf was Queen. Whenever she had time she writ Leopold, reit- Ig2 BLUB KYB TO BERLIN aertia, tbankin "him fur pullin off her marriage to Cousis Albert Belgium's neutrality was guaranteed bj treaty, but when bis spies reports them Eastern fortf impregnable, the Kaiser says: *' Necessity is tlie Mother of Invasion. We will go to Paris by way of Brussels, then hire some clever Himerican to justify us to Beljim and Jthe on-civilized world. Coblentz to Weimar Koblentx, occupied by Himericans, is one-Qtli the size of Kocln, or Cologne, occupied by the British, 65,000 to 600,000, due to tbe demaxad for eau-de-Cologne in Himerican towns of l«s« 'n 5,000. I'd rather live in a 65,000 town than in a 600,000 — I like to know and speak to cv- erybody,which I kaint do to 600,000. Greeks and Cherm ns Lookup K rather than put a r^ng-tail on C. K for Greeks and C for Romans, Seein* ez how theyre idem sonans. Coblentz is important bekaze it commands the Mos«lle valley tkat taps France,which it pen- trates a hundred mile.Y© kin go by steamboat 117 mi. to Treves, then walk, or by rail all the way. Koeln was the Roman Colonia, Coblentz the Roman Confluencia. Rhine and Moselle confluence at Coblentz. Cross the Rhine bridge of boat* end climb Karenbreitstein *'Rock o{ honor (fariious) abroad," rising 400 feet ab«ve the rivcT. Betweea iUiIue and Moselle the city 1S4 BLUE EYB TO BERLIN is a rcgler triangle. A statue of Wilhelm I. at its apex iiiEhrer! breitstein's (rown, trans-Rhine. A suburb of Kassel is Wilhelmshohe, wheh Nap. Ill was kep' prizner in '70. It is right pretty, and they guv the Eniperer lot mo' to eat than the prizners gits this war. Thirty-six mile from Cassel, on root to Han- nover, which Chermins spell with two n's, is a fine old varsity city, Goettingen: Whene'er with haggard eyes I view -This dungeon I am rotting in, I think of those companions true Who studied with meat the U- niversity of Gottingeti. George Canning, premier of Britain, writ that. I had a notion the Chermin varsities all was powful old: 83 years ago varsity of Gottingen wan^t half as old as Harvard, 200, Gotti^ngngg. Ever sence I read Goodrich's School History of the battles of Long Island. and Brandy winej Ich bin hoss-style to Chermins from Cassel and That solid formation did us in both battles. If Gen. Washington felt like me he didn't let on. He knowed they come from the finest part of Cherminland, so be located the prizners he got at Trenton on good Pennsvlvany Doych farms. The Fathers of the new Chermin republic emulated him in iixirg iheh Capital in the little pleasant 34,000 city of W eimar. They are mo' comfortable than was John Adams in the newU.S. A. capital: no lights, no sidewalks, ito picture blays, and the cow not coming up nights, not half the lime. — B. McCaim. Leipzig Had Thebes a hundred Gates— As sung by Homer ? I kaint say sure but this I know: Leipzig had 200 printn' offises Or one to every 2,400 folks. Some of 'em were bigger shops than the Blue Eye Banner's.. Per capita, anyway, it was was the great bookprintin town of the world. A book that PaulElder would charge $500 fur, ye could git published in Leipzig for $469 flat. Ye see they hadn't no 8-hour day in Leip- zig, and compositors didn't set type to the air of Deutschland ueber AUcs. They used that to drink beer by, to or mit — on Sundays. One of the bravest of all the braver !£6' BLUE EYE TO BERLIN kuights of the iron cross who fell in the 1914-19 war was Karl Baedeker. The war didn't show it, for Karl was killed in its first battle. All them rcd- kivvered books Himericans used to lug around Europe (Asia and Egypt)come from his store. When Paw would git reckless. Daughter 'd git out the red book and p'int out this: ''Make ^ bargain before you em- ploy anybody in this town.'* And his books said that oftener in Germany than in any other kentry. He hed the sand to staud by his koo- staymers. Folks made fun of his too- ris, but the best Books of Travel got their local color from the red books. At Leipzig 106 years ago this Oct, 16-19, Napoleon felt some iikeWilhlm II of same date 1918- The battle con- tinued four days, the longest on record befo' this war. Ke had 140,000 men, of w^hom 50,000 were killed, wounded or disfiggered useless and helpless or total wrecks— against 300,000 Allies (Russia, Prussia, Austria). Saxony and Bavaria fit under Napoleon, who went right on home with his 90,000. On the Kronberg (eastLeipzig) is the Napoleonstein, the rock on which Na- LEIPZIG 187 poleon stood, with his arms folded and bat on crossways, and watched the de- cisive third day of the battle. The big Battle Monument is handy-by. I jest see Uncle Blair's story-book: one place he says a French soldier gits lo cts a day; he gits only about 5c; at the Month-End he has 37c left. Brit- ish soldier gets 48 cts, 12 cts left. The Himcrican gets a dollar: 10 cts left. •» No deep plots in Uncle's stories and none in Dickens, Balzac, or Thackry. Anna Katherine Green has all four of em beat bad fur exciting plots. Uncle plans to put out an American Comedy, not less than i of evry kind of people: i doctor, i lawyer, i soldier, I Quaker preacher, i fine lad}^, etc. I write Leipzig, not Leipsic, to show I am a Chermin scholar. Uncle Blair studied Chermin a few weeks with a Swiss preacher, who con- fessed he didn't pernounce well — too many French in his can-tone. He said the best Chermin was spoke in Saxe-own (Sachsen, Saxony) and Ber- lin (Preussen). Dresden and Leipzig are in Sachsen. I cal'lated Leipsic im BLUE EYE TO BERLIN and Dresden were not mo' then eleven mile apart. Lfind it's 74 mile by R, R. from Leipzig to Dresden, and only lOi to Berlin. So Berlin cotnes next. —B.McC. Dresden Before I started for Berlin, I looked into an ancient Baedeker and read of Dresden, "the beautiful environs, the magnificent art gallery," and when I saw a ^'considerable English colony resides here, I hadnt the Hart to give Dresden the go-by. For years after, Vd Icelch myself frettin thet lid been wnthin Seventy- five mile of the golden statue of Fame sixteen foot high, and I never see it. This statue is on top of the cupalo of the Exhibition building of the Ac- ademy of Art. The picture collection is great, but it's souie centuries sence Dresden was at the top fur pictur^- pjiinters of her own. The King's palace is fine. It got on fire in 1701, when it was 170 years old and Augustus the Strong was King. Marshal Saxe; who led the Irish and French to victory at Fontenoy, was a natural son ofAugustus. Kings^hav* 190 BLUE BYE TO BERLIN frequently unnatural sons, like Absa- lom. The Marshal had several natural brothers and half-brothers -sisters and half sisters. Augustus was a taller, larger man than Samson, who kerried off the gates of jGaza, and is said to have been stronger. Augustus could of lifted the Gate of Hades off its hinges, but Frederick the Great was able to ''lick" mo' people. How big was Frederic H, Dad, That people called him great ? When I see Dresden is 74 mile from Lcipsic, I cal'lated it must be up high. It is only 370 feet above the level of the ocean by which Garfield said all heights are measured. Leipsic is 15-foot higher ^n Dresden, on the historic Elbe. Leipsic is set out on a big perairy, near 3 comparative on-known rivers: Pleisse,Parhte,Elster. Dresden has about 450,000 population — Leipsic about 500^00. — B. Low or High? At first thought a ciTilian if he h^d the choosing would take the up-hill side in a battle, and push the lower enemy down. Lookout and Missionary Ridge both were wen by the climbing army. To be above is easier on the "wind.^^ On June 6, 1916, Austrians, axter driving the Italians from A*iago, a tacked Mt. Lemerle, three miles south, and on the morning of 8th, they carried the top of the mountain. An Italian brigade, retreating down the mountain, when part-way down, stopt on a bench or ledge on the southwest corner of the mountain and hurg on, and the Austrians were unable to dis- lodge tnem, and after a few days the Austrians went away. Many of the ^^g guiis with which they had swept the top of the mountain, they were not able to bring to bear on the troops part- way down. We Republicans used to denounce 192 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN the ^'Cobden club," years ago, for but- ting intoAmerican political campaigns with ^'British gold." In his lifetime on the other hand, Richard Cobden (who was not a rich man, though the club was) was addicted to praising of things American. At a time when Americans were ashamed of our shirt- sleeve diplomatists, Cobden asserted that ours were superior to those of England and Europe (in a letter to John Bigelow). This he thought, was because our foreign service was drawn from the whole body politic, not from one dog-cared, moth-eaten, blazzy class. [Our adjectives.] The Jury often showed the big rise began Oct.1916. A last months state- ment sets it back to '14. Says high- grade clothing increased 93 per cent, cheap clothing 13 per cent. Must be a typic error; overall that sold for 75c, brings $1.49, $1.50 and $1.75 now. A Giant's Growth Berlin is rno' cosmopolitan than I cxcctcd to find so fur from the front- car of other civilized nations. The nanjc, to bej^ia with, is of Slavic an- cestry. If Louis Quatorze (which is French fur 14) ciidu't teetotly cripple France when he brake HenryOuatre's pledge to the Huguenots, it wan't hi» fault if it did benefit other nations but because France hid a on-common supply of artist-artisans still adherin to the older faith. The Exiled ones were a pow'ful boost fur London, Am- sterdam and Berlin, Last-named was so much snialler, the imported Hugue- nots showed up mo' in the ore bizucz street than in Amsterdam, cvcu. Up to 170 r wot was, ontil Nov. 10, 1918, the Kingdom of Prooshy went b3^ rhe name of the Mark of Branden- burg. In them days Brmudenbug had p lot mo' denizens than Berlin: a mark bejn the domain of a Margrave. This 194 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN margrave called liisself the Elector of Brandenburg ez Iiott he had a vote at the election of one of the make-believe f©rmer-tim€ iigger-head German Emp- erers. His people, bis creditors, and Posterity, called himThe Great Elector, He was ambitious only fur his kentry. They thrice presented him a kingly crown. Which he did thrice refuse. His successor, Frederic IH, was vainer and became Fredk I., King of Prooshy, [At the time America had a Fort Dodge editor (Roberts) for Superin- tendent of the Mint (Mints, as they ought to say, for there were several — at Dahlonega, Carson City, Philadel- phia, New Orleans and SanFrancisco) in fact up to 191 5, a Mark was worth in Berlin some Twenty Cents. Unlike most other it didnt git no higher en- durin the War. The coin, also the on- paper Mark, was named in honor of the Mark of Brandenburg. The greatest thing Fredric William (the Great Elector) like King Albert of Belgium, ever did was to marry a handsome and sensible Bavarian girl: a Princess. She and he liked to coddle the infant Berlin. They never moved A GIANT'S GROWTH 195 to Berlin, but 'd drive tbe forty mile often to buv pretty French tbif^g^s at the sbops. 'The Elector died 1688, tke year of the English RevOiUtion. In his time Berlin gro wed from 3,178 to 20,000. But from 1871 to 1901 Berlin beat all Kumpe: 1740 1840 1871 1875 90,000 331,895 826.000 966,858 180 1 — 172,000 1910—2,071,259 The Great Elector planted the row of lime tree5^(double)fAmous 200 years afterward, ihe Unter dtn Linden. In my mind's «ye I kin see th« old Elector, jest turnin' sixty, diggin' the holes, and the Margravine Doro- thea pattin' with her i^iender, shapely, high bred little hands, the dirt 'round the roots of the Linden. His succesor, King Frederick I., removed the royal residence to Benin — wearin a metal crown at times. Tiie famous park, the Thierga iters, has onl}^ one-sixth the arcs of E'air- mount Park, Philadelph}-, and iibout 4 fourth that of Golden Gate park. It is big enough to hold Berlin's two mil- lions and give ten square feet per person. Folks from abroad enter Berlin jest the same as Napoleon did, or the Great E'itctor liis&tlf for that, thro the garten, thtn enter XJnter den Lin 196 BLUE »YK TO BKRLIK thro the Bmndenburg Gate, a, grand sandstone portal, 305 wide, and 85 foot high. The Quadraga of Victory that surmoumts the Gate was kyart«d off to Paris in 1807, but the Prussians brung it back to Berlin in 18 14. The Gate has five passages, Entrances or Sorties, separated by Doric columns. Here bc|^ins Unter df^n Lind«n and runs E.N.E for about a mile to the gate of the royal palace. Two thirds of the way in is the statue of Frederic the Great. When Napoleon entered Berlin, Oct. 24, 1806, he stopped in front of Frederick the Gr^it's sutue on theLinden and lined up his staff to pay respect to^ld WarriorFritz. All presented the p'ints of their naked swords, advanced to the base of the statue in perfect line, rapidly, then backed away. A bit of stage-play, not badly enacted. Frederick the Great spent little time in Berlin, yet built up the city more thaia any other King. i\s he rode his white horse that day along the Linden, Napoleon's face was strangely sour. The King and lovely Queen Louise had been sent to a safe retreat by Prince Hatzfelt His fambly is roomered to 've invented felt hats I The Prince came humbly and srend'rd Berlin. ^'Go to your estate," ordered A GIANT'S GROWTH 197 Napoleon angrily. In tlie street parade Napoleon set upon his White Horse like a sceptered Misog^^nist. After the parade Napoleon was takin' off his spurs at noontime to wash up for din- ner; he told his Chief of Staff to order a court martial fur that evening, and have Hatzfclt shot. Marshal Lan- frey and others pertested warmly that Hatzfeldt hadn't done nothin but stan' by his suvrin. ^*We got to *kcer 'era right from the start," rej'ined the Emprer. ^'That's wot I told my broth- er, Joseph, as regards Italy." They was a nice fowl for dinner, roasted fine, and orobs of Chicked Gravy, rich and fragrant, fur tlit Em- prer to sop his bread in, and afterward he felt better, or else forgot Hatzfelt, and vvhen they g^t around to Princa H., one of Napoleon's best Generals 'd guv the Prince a true tip, and he'd lii out for som ewers on-known. I find Berlin is built up mo' solid than I cal'lated: The city, thet hed 2,071.000 in 1910, covered 24^^ square miles: Paris covers 36, Oakland 38. "I 'How readin' consarnin Berlin's big sewage farm ruv me the notion Berlin was spread ©ut and scattered- like, but the farm was- located outside the city limits. Fact is, not many years sence, Ber- 198 BLUK ^K¥K TO BERLIN lin was c'-'--^std bv municipal improTe- ment cranks as one t-f two model cit- ies. Glasgow was the other. Each muffeied some kind of frost, I think Glasgie got hers first. Mebby Berlin's rural neighbors disliked her sewage farriis. ^ In 19 10 Greater Berlin, with 1,376 sq. mi., contained 3,974,300 people. I bed the honor to meet & Daylight Saver of Berlin who is also a Hurucr- ist by trade. These la$t ye kin iden- tif}^ by their weary eyes and cxtry serious conversation, never guilty ©f a jest, leastwa3s not of a printable jest. These he composes ^nd practices the sonnd of on the Linden between day- light and sun-up, and in the Tiergar- den to the birds before the human bipeds arriye. *' Now, that the Empire is gespielt oii«5^'' said he, '^we nia}^ have again a Cherniin Literature.^' ''The ill wind blowin good agin fur soroebody. ''Have ye not@d how wea't has been Germany in pure lilerature — by lha.t I mean or in tend Literature discon- nected with nor used as a tool or as a doormat by Commerce, Manufacturing or the World-Polittic— since 187 1? A GIANT'S GROWTH 199 "I reckon physical power and war success tend to exalt Brute Force above Imagination. Think of Schiller or Lessing compelled to yield the side- walk to a captain of I\Iachine Guns, or a Freach spy iai Chermin uniform? Weimar, selected for the capital of the German Republic, more than a hundred years ago was the literary capiti^l of the world, where four world famous poets lived at one and the same time — Goethe, Schiller, Wieland and Herder. All four couldn't make a livin in that one town of 15,000 or so (about 1800. Weimar had 34,581 in 1910) but for the friendship of the Grand Duke Charles Augustus (Karl August in the vernacular) who was a life member of the bunch hisself. It was 1776, first year of Himerican in- dependeuce^ wlien Charles Augustus invited Goethe to live in Weimar, and the great poet novelist accepted, and lived in Weimar for 56 years. He was prime minister part of the time and his three friends held other offi- cial jobs. Maecenas was the friend and. minister for twenty-three years of Au- gustus Emperor of Rome, the friend also of two eminent poets, Horace and Vergil. Goethe was the friend and minister of Charles Augustus of Sax« too BLUE BTE TO T]K^LIN Weimsr. Arniiistiis oTitHved his re- nowned iMssctiias, the most illustrious patron of literature, twenty-two 3'ears. Goethe outlived his patron four yetrs. What a coustitution Goethe had ! Schiller died 1805, Wielaud 1813, Herder 1803, Charles .Augustus 1828, Goethe 1832, age 83. Wielaud late in- herited. Herder, a preacher, lived in a Parsonage, back of hisWcimar church, from 1776 till his death. Theirs was an idyllic time, theirs the Augustan age — the Charles Augustan age, 'of Ghermin literature ! Here and there in Weimar statues of the live, poets and Grand Duke, recall those memorable friends. In 1792 Goethe soldiered in France; Karl August soldiered, too. also built a house for Goethe, in which he lived forty years. In 1885, Goethe's grand- son gave it to the State, the family run out, as do sich a many great. Herein Berlin are statues of Goethe, Sch!ller,Erederick H, Wilhelm I., Mar tinLuther, the Great Elector; Bismarck. ''Soldiers and militarists," continued the Jester^ ''make wep^k liistorians." "Gibbon wan't much of a fightin man »or Hume, Macau lay or Greeley, or The German Struggle? for Liberty Bigelow. "Our only historians since 71 to equal Bigelow are Luedencamp and Tirpitz. Cousins Overseas When Kin^ Edward died in May, 1910, th« article Uncle Blair writ wound up in a quoting out of Whitticr: When nearer strand shall lean to strand Till meet beneath saluting flags The Eagle of our mountain crags. The Lion of our Mother Laud. It was read the first time then the rules was suspended and it passed unanimous at a meetin Near the rude bridge that arched the flood in April, 1875, jest ^ hunderd y«ar after the shootin* between the British regulars and tho Minute Men from Concord. Them lines show that Whittier wes mighty near reconciled by April 19, 1875. Whittier wan't at the doins, hisself, to hear his poem read, or to decipher his handwritin in a pinch if the reader stalled, Whittier was awfle bashful, and w«mld raytlitff 102 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN take a lickin' than appear at any sicli function. One nihgt at the London home of the latter, John Bright bragged np Whittier to George W. Smalley, saying he regarded ''Snow-Bound/' as one of the great poemSj and asked Smalley if he conid repeat it. The Tribune correspondent flushed up, hesitated, and answered '^No—Not all of it." [Fur a factj he couldn's recall a line and a half ot it] Then Bright stood befo' the open ire, spread out his coat-tails, and recited the whole long poem. Yon kin believe it was no waste of time to hear John Bright reproduce poetry. Horace Greeley dedicated his History of the American Civil War To John Bright British Commoner and Christian Statesman Who was the Friend of My Country Because the Friend of Mankind* In 1S34 Daniel Webster said: "Our Fathers raised their flag against a power to which for purposes of foreign con- quest and subjugation, Rome, in the height of her glory, was not to be compared; whose morning drumbeat, following the sun and ac- BRITON AND FRANK 203 companied by the hours, circles the globe with a coutiunous and nubroken strain o^ the mar- tial airs of England^ So you see, us present folks aint the only Himerican people who've forguv Britain. That same year, 1910, UncleBlair printed, in regards to Britain seudin' 250000 meu toSouth Afriky in the Boer war, that no other nation eould transport and supply 250,000 men 6,000 miles from home. That was befo' Oakland and Hog Island hed took to buildin' to send acrost the Briny. Our soldiers that hev see King George are a'most unanimous fur him. His ways suits the average Himerican right well, a sort of man to man style, not coddlin' uor even suave as some. He sent around a handy and handsome little fac simily auto graft libretto or soovneer of wot he would say to each man if they was time. London is learnin to drink coffee at its meals —most Himericans is 'stonished to-fiod London folks that never in all their born days took coffee fur breakfast. Coffee-hous-s of Addison's time served coffee as a luxury, not 'P^^ssity^ at nie:htand theWits drunk it in evening dress, mo' like to hev Beer fur break fas' tjan coffee. Tlip One of the Bunqji least intoxicated would resd Ihe Spectator out loud. The main reason we don' drink mo' Tea i» the Ostracism of 1768 come to be hereditary. 2C4 BLUB KYB TO BEKLIW Dr= Frsnkliti advised Boston to pay for the two sliip'load* of Tea thro wed into Boston Harbor in *73, That was called The Crime of '73. It didn^t make Franklin any mo' popular in his native city. Oxfori Uoiversity gave Gen. Pershing and Herbert Heover the degree of DoCL., same ez it conferred on Haig and Beatty. D. C. L. is a Doctor of Canon Law, in which examinations are easier than in the Civil Law. Pershing is TC-rsed in Cannon law with two n'Sj and Hoo~ v*r in Can law. I hear that Gen. Allenby is to be made a D.CL. of Cambridge, which is roomered to of lieen Allenby's alma mater, if you know wot that means. Sir Owen Seaman, of Punch, went to the same school. The first favorite of King George IH (and his pUtontc but ambitions mother) was MyLord Bute, a Scottish gentleman for whom great Lord Chatham ^as turned out as Premier. England is pretty well grsdironed by rail- ways, yet they are still back ^:ounlies (as one lays in America) a moiety of whose denizens travel not. much, and stiil remember the Hun- dred Years^ War of the Fourteenth and Fif- teenth centuries and somehow are admirers of the French esprit, but not m equal degree with BRITON AND FRANK 205 King Edward and.otlier great Englishmen who have been broadened by travel and associa- tion with the au fait of the belle, brave nation. At the time of the Drive of March, rgiS, the Briiiish were driven west of the Somme. I at that time suspected that, mixed with the un- doubted, undaunted courage of the British soldiery was a certain balkiness that dulled the edge of their attack and became an obstacle to the carrying out of theArmyCommander's well- laid plans. Britain, since 1856, had been en- gaged in several far-flnng little wars. The Boer war, even, was nothing like this. Modern, warfare, as fought in Picardy, was toilsome in excess of its danger. Small wonder if Veteran Atkins was ready to inquire: ** Why didm't 'is Majesty hire Hessiaus for this job ? Lord Bute was a fiue gentktman^ and an able minister; moreover, of limited popularity in .he City of London regiments. In 1919 three Generals were iu command of the British armies in three^ widely separated ^'theatres of action.,^* not comitiogSir Douglas (now Earl) Haig — three of Scottish birth- Sir Archibald James Murray, Sir James Wolfe Murray, and Sir Charles Munro. [ James Wolfe Murray was born in Kent.] When Moses(commanding on the Sinai front) 206 BLUE K¥E TO BERLIN sftys te Joshuway, in trumpet tones: "Speak to the Cliildren of Israel that they go forward! ^'They kaiiit onderstand Scotch, Sir!" Sir James Wolfe Murray, named in honor of a famous ancestor, the eaptor of Quebec, died in October, 19 19. He and Sir Archibald Mur- ray, wb.0 commanded in Egypt^, 1915-17, were Lieiitenaiit Generals. It may be jealous}^ of French or Scotsman detracted somewhat from Haig's effeetivenesSj or a growVWhere are the millon Americans ?'* This last German drive was a forlorn hope to forestall Americpn reinforcements. Haig, in 'iy and eaily '18, was in a situation that recalls Grai^t before Petersburg, Grant had awarded to JhermAu and Sheridan the spectacular work, and Sherman entered Atlanta, Sheridan swept the Vallevv and , Grant fought out h's weary battle slowly. He depended upon memory of Donelson and Vick.-bur^^ to hold the home folks for Grant, and t re the cud came he had needed all. In no less than En, eland ''erscl, Scotland had devoted blood and m^rd- earned pence to tli€ Cause, proportioned to her nuniber, men as freely as General--o S'leh truth was recog- nized in England and thro-igl-o.u tne Enipirc. The honors and re wiuxis given ;oEarl Haig BRITON OR FRANK 207 evoked no carper. The son of Asquith lost had as a counterpart the con of Rosebery who fell befcite Jfru^alem, or Redmond's brother, dead among Irish heroe^;, defender of Calais. Fe.ver leaders were lost than in the U. S. A. Wair for Union, pro rat«, whose combats were portrayed and losses reported mo' fully, Wai Losses were reported to October, 191S: Gr. Brtn— Killed Wounded Men^ — - 620.828 Ij939,47S Officers— 37,876 92,664 658,704 3,032,142 Canada — Men— 60,383 Officers — 1,842 ~Tot*l Casualties 220,182 An earlier report gayi the Canadian casualties up to II days from capture of Mons totakd 2ir- 358— killed, 34,877; died of wounds and diseast 15,457; missing, 8,245; wounded,i52,779. Cologne Gazette' estimated German war dead to Oct. 25, I9i8,at 3,000,000; total casualties 6,- 086,769, of waica the following had: Dead Prussia 1,262,060 Wounded 2,882,171 . Missing 616,139 Bavaria 150,958 363,^23 72,TIS Saxony 108,017 Wurtmbrg 64,507 Navy 25,862 252,027 157.654 25,608 51.7^7 i6.89« 15,679 French casualties include i.4€0,ooo dead. 208 BLUE EYB TO BERLIN A statement issued in October, 1919, gives a British loss in gross tonnage of sea-going Tesiels, from submarines, etc. Tonnage destroyed by Enemy, 9,031,828 Tons Net Loss to Britain 3,443,012 The difference, more than five and a half million tons had been replaeed by "building, buying seizing." In December,i9i8, World almanac stated the public debt of the following nations: Britain $3 3, 000,000,000 France $26,000,000,000 Astralia 1,212,000,000 Italy 10,328,000,000 Canada 1,172,000,000 Russia 35,383,000,000 ^) .Zealand 611,000,000 U.S.A. 19,000,000,000 At about the same date,*a British delegate to Paris peace conf«rence, estimatedthe total public debt of Britain at $34,000,000,000. Great sacrifices in aid of Britain were made by Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and other colonies, and evidenced how successful is the Colonial policy of Britain's later time. After United States entered the war, Canada seemtd to abate, as unnecessary, something of effort. Britain seems to have given United States a fair opening to the world's carryu>g trade, but Americans seem to prefer larger profits off one another. Reciprocating, they say to Britain: "Do your worst in Palestine^ for all me ! ^* Peace On tilt Friday or Saturday night preceding the general election of 1916, Uncle Blair and I w«nt to Oakland Auditoryium to htar Francis J. Heney urge the re-election of President Wil- aon. The great hall, with seats for 11,000, liad been crowded, two weeks earlier, by voter?« in- tent to hear Mr. Charles E. Hughes; that was again replete with people assembled to listen to Woodrow Wilson himself, in September, 1919. It was not opened for Mr, Heney. who had a numerous audience in the smaller hall. On every chair had been depoiited a half dozen pieces of **campaign literature." The title of one and the burden of all was: " He Kept Us Out of War." Likely not one person present had a suspicion that within six months this Peace President wonld be urging upon Congriess a Declaration f War with Germany. This campaign Cry on many votes, notably of women in Suffrage 110 ' BLTTS EYE TO BEPXI-M States. It is believed, however, that Hiighei^ liad be been chosen President, would have been «ven more prompt to join the Allies. Certain scary stories printed in American newspapers, of German plans to invade the Uiited States throngh Mexico, clc, which ap- peared in 1916, were too absurd to merit such publication. Never since its formation had th« ImperialGerman power been sufiiicent to inflict injury on the United States in the latter's home Continent. Germany and the United States, conjoined, mifhthave made a respectable showing against the naval power of Biitain. But there is no likelihood that they united could have won a conclusive Tictory. When, however, the United States joined Britain and France and Italy with forty battleships, 303 chasers, 32 cruisers, 68 submarines, 125 de- stroyers, 1900 ships in all, against 250 at the oursct of the war, and our three millions of soldiers, Germany might with easy grace throw up the sponge in the presence cf force majeur. It wfts possibly the plan of President W'lson and the American leaders to interpose, if at all, with a force so strong as to show Germany the ■ uselessness of further bloodshed. It is- likely the German high command were so convinced' speedily, as was the Kniser. More powerful, koweverj than the army chiefs or the people at THE PEACE 111 home, were the rank and file of the German army. Thcv were in possession of all save a few square miles of Belgium and of an area of Northern Fraace large as several Belgiums^ and had been for almost four years; that Army had not yet been defeated in a single important battle. Mackensen had swept Roumania in a wonderful campaign, and Austrian troops were still inside the old boundaries of Italy. On the surface the Germans were conquering. The relentltss system organized by Mr. Lloyd George, Lord Devon port, Lord Rhondda, and Mr. Hoover, had almost complet<-jy taken th* ground from under all the armies of the so- called Central Powers. To convince these ar- mies and terminate the contest, more than a allow of force was necessary, and thousands of American lives had to be sacrificed. On Nov. 26, 191 8, a statement was issued^'of American losses, as follows: Killed in Action - 2LS363 Died of Wounds 12,101 Died of Disease 16,032 " other causes 1,980 Wounded - 189,155 Miss'g in Action' 14,290 The war of 18 12 had cost United States about thirteen million dellar.Sj amd the Government had infinite diffi- culty raising that much money. The civil war 1861-5 ^^^^ nearly three and a half billion*. W^heu America went hersalf into the war of 1914-19, her 112 BLUB EYE TO BERLIN statesmen had apparently no thought of a possible bottom iu her pocket. ** Git a plenty while you're gittin ! " **A National Debt is a National Bless- ing." ^'It all depends on who gets'the interest." "Give our soldiers the best." Not many years before, Charles A. Dana and the great editors denounced a Sillion-DoUar Congress, the first of whom the appropriations for two years had reached $1,000,000,000, The con- gress elected in 1916 authorized taxa- tion never before approached in Amer- ica, raised by loans more than twenty- five billions, loaned nine billions to theAllies and raised the National total debt from slightly more than a billion in 1916 to thirty billions in 1918. U. S. A. Exports to June 30: To~- 1 915 19 1 4 England $835,5^5^79 $55^,^47,390 Scotland 53,612,156 33,95o,947 UnitedK. 911792,454 - — — — Germany 28,863,354 341,794,276 France 369,397ii7o 159,818,924 Italy 184,819,683 74,233,678 Netherlds 143,067,019 11^,215,673 Austria=H'y 1,240,167 22,718,258 An unprecedented increase in the cost of food and commodities began in the autumn of 1916, due presumably to "Lloyd-George" measures. Flour and many other staples, despite war THE PEACE 813 buying, were cheaper in 1915 than in 1913. Under an agree'neiit with Great Britain, in I918, the United States in 1918 and '19 maintained the price of wheat at $2.26, minimum— the first wheat "corner" that ever won out in America— when Australia wheat sold for a dollar. In 1916, Lloyd -Georgt noted possibly the $300,000,000 1915 in- crease {50 per cent) in our exports to Britain, and soon after asked British holders oCAmerican railway securities to deposit them with Government; this many were at first loth to do, bonds of this class beirg relied on for iucorae; in the end all came in, the interest going still to the owners. These were of vast amount, and fear of them being put in mass on the market caused capital to favor our entry into the war. Under a War Power decision of our Supreme Court, the President took over all the American railways. Our government paid out more than the excess of ex- ports, but most was spent at home; all our war bonds are hcld-^n America. The increase in cost of food was es- timated at 65 per cent, clothing 90. ^ The Federal Reserve banking system in operation before the War, had given a more flexible currency and probably afforded opportunity to iucreajre cost. At no time was there danger of sus^ 214 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN pension of specie pavments, as in the civil war, despite inflation. New York reserve banks Dec.6'i9,had capital$fio- 350,000; profits, $402,527,900; deposits f4,228,o37,ooo;loaDs, $4,963,349,000; U. S. Fed. reserve crculation $2,881, 357,000. Ill-judged,cru'el sinking of Lusitania gave us no fair pre'ext to fight.Britain never asked any other nation to pro- tect passengers under licr flag. She wa,s light in the Trent case. The deck of a British ship is British territory. The powers of the Americau Presi- dent include no fictions. No King or other Executive Vv'ieMs so much actual power. A British Chancellor of Ex- cktcquer represents the House of Commons' majority, not the nominal Executive. If he iubmits a budget of which a Cabinet disapproves, he drops out. If the Hous€ disapproves, the whole Cabinet resign. If we adopt a budget system ,^lhe man at its head must be a member of the lower House of Congress. A President's appointee in such a plaee would be a bureaucrat powerless. As we said of a propo£?;d Tariff Commi'^sion, the Hou*e will not give xip control of revenue. Work of 1883 Tariff Couimissioii ail had to be done over again by Congress. Nor will the Senate ^ive up treaty making. A President alone may carry THE PEACE 215 on a war, but he cannot make a treaty of peace without the Senate. Treaties are the law of the land, enacted by the least numerous, less popular house, a look toward oligarchy, under rule of parties not worth noting. The party whip lashes President and Senator. In the end, public opinion rules. It is hindered more by our Constitution, is in effect more tardily than Britain^s. July lO the President just from Paris presented the Treaty to Ithe Senate. An amendment, restoring Shantung to China was defeated 55 to38;Johnson*s rejectinf the article givingBritain an^ her Colonies 6 votes in the proposed League, failed, 38 to 40; also Gore's requiring a declaration of war to be submitted to popular vote; 67 to 16. Foreign Relations Committee had the previous day adopted a Preamble and Ten Reservations to amend theTreaty Nov. 13 Senate passed reserve of Art. X, objected to as apt to entangle us. 2. United .States declines to assume under Art.X or any other article, any obligation to preserve tlit territorial integrity or independence of any other country, or to interfere in controver- sies between nations, whether members of the League or not. * * Adopted 46 to 33. 3. Reserves freedom of actioti upon .10 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN home, and boundary qiiestions;59 to 36. Reserve complete jurisdiction of the Monroe doctrine to tj. S. 55 to 33. Vv^ithholdin^ assent to clause under whichjapan keeps Shantung: 53 to 41. Am. appointees to staff of League to be approved by Senate. 53 to 40. German trade of U.S. to be regulated by Cong ress^notHeparaiionsCom. 54-40 Armaments limitation not to apply to U.S. threatened with invasion. 56 t039 Congress to appropriate U. S. share of League expenses. 56 to 39. Reserves freedom of intercourse with nationals of covenant-breaking State* not living in their own country. 53-41. No article shall contravene rights ®f American citizens. 51 to 41. Nov. 26, Treaty, with reservations^ failed in the Senate, 41 to 5i. Pream- ble (by Senate) required acceptance by three of four chief treating powers.* Appropriations for year ending Juna 30/20, $5, 629486, 439.42. Estimates for '21, $4, 186,196,358. But a deficit for *20 of $2,890,000,000 will make the reve- nue required' for '20-21 seven billions. Lloyd-George, dissolving the Long Parliament in the psychic moment of victory, got 331 majority. Coalitions are always weak. Like Missouri mules they have no pride of ancestry(a great point with old Tory), no ^'principles.'^ THE PEACE 217 Essentia] ccinponeiits are likely to fly the track in perilous crises. M'nisters find post bellum troubles worst. Riots and Chartism deglamortd Waterloo. Liberals accidentally got the worst of it; they had a fine majority 1905-14; in old days 1 cries rather favored Ger- many, Liberals Russia. Exportito 1917 iQis UnitedKingd'mj2.047,545,843 > 1,994, 894, 260 Prance 1.011528.095 890.481,515 Italy 360,529,625 477,530.202 Russia 423,2«4.663 116.705.346 Exports from U. S. 1918 1917 Brefidstuffs J633,309,485 ^588,683.454 Meat & Dairy Prd 679.848,942 403,192,279 Cotton 665.021,655 548.074,690 ^^^^ 75.306,692 72,476.204 2*^* 105,881,233 88.844,401 Wheat 80 802,842 298,178.795 ^^^^r 244.861,440 93,198.174 Beef, canned 30.051,507 16,946,630 ^ i^i-esh 67.386,359 26, ^77,271 Total exp.ft imp. 8,874,000,000 8,949.000,000 The excess of exports over imports, the balance of trade that enabled us to maintain specie payments as against 1S62-78, was $3,63 1,000,000 in ^17, and $2,982,000,000 in 1918. 9 In passin, I note the Conferens. put Voelsnear-Innsbruck and Vocls-ncar- 318 BLUE EYK TO BERLIN Botzen in separate nations. This will please the P( stoffice heads. In several Capitals is a feelin weVe not done our sheer, et we hev paid out mo' in two years thau some in five. I am willin, now that Roosevelt's gone, to raise a army of old franc tiieurs, a Flyin Colyum of Maine to Californy veterans, to settle now and then the hash of Fich of the New Republics as gits obstreperous, and niebby organiz a few new ones here and there. I am skeert of U.S.A. as sich ondertakin the job, as some allied big bugfs ask. I see in a pay- purr thet purrs fur pay per'aps, our Aviater service asked fifteen bilivons of next year's budget— a error on purpose to injure the serv- ice. 1 favor raisin the service to the highest p'nt of the Zenith; but insist that in-futur«N. y, to S. F. races be run ir? relays Too many avvytors got iilJed that last trip that the Sky Pilot May card from Syracuse won Long' before a vy» tin was drem]>t of they called the preachers Sky Pilots. Crossin' the Atlantic is a strange, hard, onfamiliar stnnt, but croFsiji the Mississippi valley is worser. Oceans is. known to be climate equalizers, but a avvytor in one day is probble to have eighteen sorts ot climate in Oio alone. Several coiuptters reported a stratum of rough air aboveChicago so pungent they near fainted and fell out. If tkey THE PEACE 2i<^ 'd put aC jicago man in atCrestline lie M flown over the Peraity Meiropolis and not knowed they was a stock y'ds less than a thousand miles off. Near the Continental watershed, ou the fur west rim of the big, oii-sartin pork-producer Valley, is where most g( t killed, over ground so level ez to make even the preacher believe he was sailin down the Mohawk, Fact is, the ground under the plane has a sworn elevation of mo' than ten thousand foot. Right soon a hill about 400 foot high confronts him. When he tries to riz over it he finds the dauged plane has alredy riz to its limit, and kaint go no higher. Next thing we know he's at the pearly Gates, bonin'Sant Peter to pass him in on 13 em rule. Why, knowin' railroadin' good as \ve do now, after eighty-odd year, the Super, when he puts on a new Flyer dfesn't pick out an engineer that has never been over the Division, but one rather who kin tell by the feel of any bridge 'bout when the road will go into the hands of a Receiver if the Government don't commandeer it. I used to know an engineer on the Katy who could tell within five second of the time by the weather cock on PikeAnderson's barn. He kerried a 120 BLUE EYB TO BERLIN good watch to comply with the rules, but the boys said he never looked at it when on duty. I got into a j*int debate with a En- glish D. S. O. whether people of a monarchy or republic has most so- called Byzantinism or respect for au- thority. I p'inted out to him that his ken try raised most of its troops by volunteerin, but we hadn't time, and drafted. Folks as didn't spose U.S.A., *d ever fight again, found on notice of few days they'd have to go to Europe to war, not knowin or keerin' wot was it about. If a draft had come at first and that sudden, in England I None our men made trouble. Some cussed under their but went like men. Widely imformed as I am, when-in 'i6 I see a paper in Greece urge U.S.A. to intervene, I says: "Does thatLevauter pyrite fancy U.S will ever butt in on Europe, speshil on sich a nasty fight?' Inside a year we were in on hoth feet Wot made Lardner's**hit the spot" was a King is mo' anxious to pleast the people than a republic's burocrat, who is one of the people hisself, and don't keer if ye kaint find the way in but he wants you to know the way out A Briton wood of wrote the Spectator: *W'y aint they no sign "Entrance" as THE PEACE 221 well as "Sortie" on that ticket-office?^' A absolute monarch everybody kicks. I mean to buy some lots in Beirut, then build a Short Line to Bagdad via Damascus, beat Constantnople all to pieces on through business. They's a small desert between Damascus and Bagdad that won't originate much bizness till we get water o^ it, mebby from **the Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus." Damascus is a big shipper. Damascus, O., is a smalt place, but Damascus Staiiott almost a mile northeast, is smaller. Damascus refused a bonus to the P.F.W.&C. in (about) 1855 so they built the road a mile off, to do the town up. [Company claimed Damascus was too near Heav- en. ] When the Pennsylvany took over the line, the big company stood by th* old. Blair lived for seven years four mile south of Damascii5, but was never in Damascus in hisjlifeu In a maga- «ine article in 1918 I said: "Ouce a year. Uncle Blait passed thro' Damascus Station on root to N. Benton, Mahoning county, via Berlin (Center.); he was in Damascus but oust in his lie. His uncle had took Blair to Hicksite Quaker yearly meeting at Sa- lem, and tnot it only fair to give the ©rthodox (Wilbur) yearly meeting at m BLUE EYE TO BERLIM Damascus a chance at the Prodigy.?* I find the meeting house is forty rod east of town. A mile north of "^Blair the road plunges down to the Maho. ning, then right up agin in two hills so steep it minds you of them iieerd the upper O'io. No one 'd drive a ker- ridge that road. One day two cousins visited Blair and he walked wi'tti them that far homeward. They advised hini not to go down the hill; the other time he and some boys went down one hillj but the up-hill looked too steep, so they walked down the Mahoning past Gal- braith's dam and saw-mill. In 1910 I writ that whenVVilhelm II come on in '88 folks looked fur him to be '^the deesturber of Europe,'* but he'd done gone and been twenty year without a war or even a battle. The ex-Kizer read Plutarch at a too, early age. The Happy Warrior is old Franz Joseph. He did mo' to start the War, but died Dec.'i6, in full tide of victrY, after a reign of 69 years of trouble fur his wife and relations and a purty good time fur hisself. It was storniiu' revolution when he come on in '48, but he won out; lucky. Stems like Vienna is woise off than Berlin, Congress of Vienna (1815) '11 sneak out: of history comparative ^unimport-^ ^nt. Contrast cynic Metternich, coum THE PEACE 223 tin onh^ Kings, and Wilson, lookin^ put for every two-spot. British hev been run u in a car- ferry to France fur nionths, bigger 'n them at Kalama or Benicia, but papers jest recei.t printed its picture. A fine job, haulin ^mniynition ihat-away, airy- planes droppin bums. A tunnel to Ca- lais 'd been built ni?ny year sence but fur Britains trust in Hearts of Oak. A Corptals gard M hold the other end of the tunnel agin most of Europe, with Britain ccmuiandin the sea, releasin half the Grand Fleet for attack. Blair calls my eye to anachronism — I made Napoleon quote Cincinnatus of theWest some nineteen year before Byron wrote ii: that's like me — like Napoleon, too. The old lady formerly called State Rights may justly paraphrase King Pyrrhus (of Fiume): One more Democratic victory and I am Ruined If I aint Ruined already. On the Day of Judgment the Distriet Attorney, Simon Peter, may examine not under four Democratic Presidents: ''Thomas Jeffeiscn, \ou said that government is best that govrns least? How about the War Power? You insisted the Constitution must be strictly construed? *'I did. ^^4 BLUE EYE TO BERLIN **Yet 50U stretched it awful to let in a territory of imperial destiny Andrew Jackson, you threatened to hang S.Carolina State Rights leaders. Grover Cleveland, I have here a let- ter from Gov.Altgeld, denouncing you for trampling on the rights of hisStatc. **Keep it— I don*t want it. A middle-«izesoldier in light blue p- p-pants, dark-blue dress coat, shoulder straps, took the stand: *• What's your name, my boy? "McKinley. **Your (so called)Christian name? ^William. Rank and regiment? Major, Twenty-third Ohio. A handsome youth in kaki c«mes up. Saint Peter — Wot Regiment? "i59ih, A.E.F. Tkc old lady bust into sobs. OWood- row, the worst biff of all comes from thee. Poor boy has no home State I The boy, with dignity^I went from California; I fought for America. TeUgram.MarchesediMirandola to Sallie Yates: Married,Christmas,i9i9,Charlotte Au- gust aHartman and ChevalierMcCann. I asked Ben: Aint you skeert to marry with I foot in the grave?'* "In Sondrio i thot I had both feet in thegiaveand my haid' most ready tobekivvered up. Deacidified using the Bookkeeper proces Neutralizing agent: iVIagnesium Oxide Treatment Date: y .y oftf)! PreservationTechnologies A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESEHVATIO 111 Thomson Park Drive Cranberry Township, PA 16066