Chapter 4

I know it isn't. And the more's the pity. Another thing where you went all wrong. Why not have let Asquith clear up the Irish muddle? Why truckle to a handful of disloyal North of Ireland traitors? If the Government had court martialed the ring-leaders, tried the rest for treason and put the Irish Government in Dublin, why, man, three-quarters of the male population of the South of Ireland would be in the trenches now.

DARTREY

Don't let us get into that. I was one of the officers who mutinied. I would rather resign my commission than shoot down loyal subjects.

GILRUTH

(Hotly) Loyal? Loyal! When they refused to carry out their Government's orders? When they deny justice to a long suffering people? Loyal! Don't prostitute the word.

DARTREY

(Angrily) I don't want to---

GILRUTH

(Going on vehemently) It's just that kind of pig-headed ignorance that has kept the two countries from understanding each other. Why shouldn't Ireland govern herself. South Africa does. Australia does. And when you're in trouble they leap to your flag. Yet there is a country a few miles from you that sends the best of her people to your professions and they invariably get to the top of them. Irishmen have commanded your armies and Ireland has given you admirals for your fleet and at least one of us has been your Lord Chief Justice. Yet, by God, they can't be trusted to govern themselves. I tell you the English treatment of Ireland makes her a laughing-stock of the world.

DARTREY

(Opens the door, then turns and looks straight at Gilruth) My head bothers me. Will you kindly---

GILRUTH

(All contrition) I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to blaze out. Do forgive me like a good fellow. It's an old sore of mine and sometimes it makes me wince. It did just now. Don't be mad with me.

(The sound of a boy's voice calling newspapers is heard faintly in the distance; then the hoarse tones of a man shouting indistinctly; then a chorus of men and boys comes nearer and nearer calling of some calamity. Dartrey hurries out through the outer door. Gilruth stands ashamed. He does not want to leave his friend in bad blood. He would like to put things right before going. He waits for Dartrey to come back.

In a few minutes Dartrey walks through the outer doorway and into the room. He is very white, very agitated and his face is set and determined. He is reading a special edition of an evening paper with great "scare" head lines.

The sound of the voices crying the news in the street grows fainter and fainter.

Dartrey stops in front of Gilruth and tries to speak; nothing coherent comes from his lips. He thrusts the paper into Gilruth's hands and watches his face as he reads.

Gilruth reads it once slowly, then rapidly. He stands immovable staring at the news-sheet. It slips from his fingers and he cowers down, stooping at the shoulders, glaring at the floor.)

DARTRY

(Almost frenzied) Now will your country come in? Now will they fight for civilization? A hundred of her men, women and children done to death. Is that war? Or is it murder? Already men are reading in New York and Washington of the sinking of that ship and the murder of their people. What are they going to do? What are YOU going to do?

GILRUTH

(Creeps unsteadily to the door; standing himself with a hand on the lock; his back is to the room. He speaks in a strange, far-off, quavering voice)

She was on the LUSITANIA! Mona. She was on it. Mona was on it.

(Creeps out through the street door and disappears)

(Dartrey looks after him)

(The curtain falls and rises again in a few moments. Several days have elapsed. Dartrey, in full uniform, is busily packing his regimental kit. The bandage has been removed from his head. The telephone bell rings. Dartrey answers it)

DARTREY

Yes. Yes. Who is it? Oh! Do. Yes. No. Not at all. Come up. All right.

(Replaces the receiver and continues packing)

(In a few moments the door-bell rings. Dartrey opens the outer door and brings Gilruth into the room. He is in deep mourning; is very white and broken. He seems grievously ill. Dartrey looks at him commiseratingly. He is sensitive about speaking)

GILRUTH

(Faintly) Put up with me for a bit? Will you?

(Dartrey just puts his hand on the man's shoulder)

(Gilruth sinks wearily and lifelessly into a chair)

She is buried.

DARTREY

What?

GILRUTH

(Nods) She is buried. In Kensal Green. Half an hour ago.

DARTREY

(In a whisper) They found her?

GILRUTH

(Nods again) Picked up by some fishermen.

DARTREY

Queenstown?

GILRUTH

A few miles outside. I went there that night and stayed there until--until she--they found her.

(Covers his face. Dartrey puts his arm around him and presses his shoulder)

I wandered round there for days. Wasn't so bad while it was light. People to talk to. All of us on the same errand. Searching. Searching. Hoping--some of them. I didn't. I knew from the first. I KNEW. It was horrible at night alone. I had to try and sleep sometimes. They'd wake me when the bodies were brought in. Hers came toward dawn one morning. Three little babies, all twined in each others arms, lying next to her. Three little babies. Cruel that. Wasn't it?

(Waits as he thinks; then he goes on dully; evenly, with no emotion)

Fancy! She'd been out in the water for days and nights. All alone. Tossed about. Days and nights. She! who'd never hurt a soul. Couldn't. She was always laughing and happy. Drifting about. All alone. Quite peaceful she looked. Except--except--

(Covers his eyes and groans. In a little while he looks up at Dartrey and touches his left eye)

This. Gone. Gulls.

(Dartrey draws his breath in sharply and turns a little away)

In a few hours the cuts opened. The salt-water had kept them closed.

DARTREY

Cuts?

GILRUTH

(Nods) Her head. And her face. Cuts. Blood after all that time.

(He clenches and unclenches his hands nervously and furiously. He gets up slowly, walks over to the fireplace, shivers, then braces himself trying to shake off the horror of his thoughts. Then he begins to speak brokenly and tremblingly endeavoring to moisten his lips with a dry tongue)

Never saw anything to equal the kindness of those poor peasants. They gave the clothes from their bodies; the blankets from their beds. And took nothing. Not a thing. "We're all in this," they said. "We're doing our best. It's little enough." That's what they sayd. Pretty find the Irish of Queenstown. Eh?

(Dartrey nods. He does not trust himself to speak)

A monument. That's what the Irish peasants of Queenstown should have. A monument. Never slept, some of them. Wrapped the soaking woman in their shawls--and the little children. Took off their wet things and gave them dry, warm ones. Fed them with broths they cooked themselves. Spent their poor savings on brandy for them. Stripped the clothes off their own backs for them to travel in when they were well enough to go. And wouldn't take a thing. Great people the Irish of Queenstown. Nothing much the matter with them. A monument. That's what they should have. And poetry.

(Thinks for a while, then goes on)

Laid out the bodies too; just as reverently as if they were their own people. They laid her out. And prayed over her. And watched with me over her until she was put into the--. Such a tiny shell it was, too. She had no father or mother or brother or sisters. I was all she had. That's why I buried her here. Kensal Green. She'll rest easy there.

(He walks about distractedly. Suddenly he stops and with his hands extended upwards as if in prayer, he cries)

Out of my depths I cry to Thee. I call on you to curse them. Curse the Prussian brutes made in Your likeness, but with hearts as the lowest of beasts. Curse them. May their hopes wither. May everything they set their hearts on rot. Send them pestilence, disease and every foul torture they have visited on Your people. Send the Angel of Death to rid the earth of them. May their souls burn in hell for all eternity.

(Quickly to Dartrey)

and if there is a god they will. But is there a good God that such things can be and yet no sign from Him? Listen. I didn't believe in war. I reasoned against it. I shouted for Peace. And thousands of cravens like me. I thought God was using this universal slaughter for a purpose. When His end was accomplished He would cry to the warring peoples "Stop!" It was His will, I thought, that out of much evil might come permanent good. That was my faith. It has gone. How can there be a good God to look down on His people tortured and maimed and butchered? The women whose lives were devoted to Him, defiled. His temples looted, filled with the filth of the soldiery, and then destroyed. And yet no sign. Oh, no. My faith is gone. Now I want to murder and torture and massacre the foul brutes.... I'm going out, Dartrey. In any way. Just a private. I'll dig, carry my load, eat their rations. Vermin: mud: ache in the cold and scorch in the heat. I will welcome it. Anything to stop the gnawing here, and the throbbing here.

(Beating at his head and heart)

Anything to find vent for my hatred.

(Moving restlessly about)

I'm going through Ireland first. Every town and village. It's our work now. It's Irishmen's work. All the Catholics will be in now. No more "conscientious-objecting." They can't. It's a war on women and little children. All right. No Irish-Catholic will rest easy; eat, sleep and go his days round after this. The call has gone out. America too. She'll come in. You watch. She can't stay out. She's founded on Liberty. She'll fight for it. You see. It's clean against unclean. Red blood against black filth. Carrion. Beasts. Swine.

(Drops into a chair mumbling incoherently. Takes a long breath; looks at Dartrey)

I'm selling out everything back home.

DARTREY

Why?

GILRUTH

I'm not going back. I'm bringing everything over here. England, France, Russia, Belgium, Serbia--they can have it. All of it. They've suffered. Only now do I know how much. Only now.

(Fiercely) I want to tear them--tear them as they've torn me. As they mangled her.

(Grits his teeth and claws with his fingers) Tear them--that's what I want to do. May I live to do it. May the war never end until every dirty Prussian is rotting in his grave. Then a quick end for me, too. I've nothing now. Nothing.

(Gets up again wearily and dejectedly; all the blazing passion burnt out momentarily)

This was to have been my wedding-day; our wedding-day. Now she's lying there, done to death by Huns. A few days ago all youth and freshness and courage and love. Lying disfigured in her little coffin. I know what you meant now by wanting to go back for a third time. I couldn't understand it the other day. It seemed that every one should hate war. But you've seen them. You know them. And you want to destroy them. That's it. Destroy.... The call is all over the world by now. Civilization will be in arms.... To hell with your Pacifists. It's another name for cowards. They'd lose those nearest them: the honor of their women; the liberty of their people--and never strike a blow. To hell with them. It's where they should be. I was one of them. No more. Wherever I meet them I'll spit in their faces. They disgrace the women they were born of; the country they claim.... To hell with them.

DARTREY

(Tries to soothe him) You must try and get some grip on yourself.

GILRUTH

(His fingers ceaselessly locking and unlocking) I'll be all right. It's a relief to talk to you. (Sees the preparations for Dartrey's departure) Are you off?

DARTREY

Yes. To-night.

GILRUTH

I envy you now. I wish I were going. But I will soon. Ireland first. I must have my say there. What will the "Sinn Feiners" say to the LUSITANIA murder? I want to meet some of them. What are our wrongs of generations to this horror? All humanity is at stake here. I'll talk to them. I must. They'll have to do something now or go down branded through the generations as Pro-German. Can a man have a worse epitaph? No decent Irishman will bear that; every loyal Irishman must loathe them.... I'll talk to them--soul to soul.... Sorry, Dartrey. You have your own sorrow.... Good of you to put up with me. Now I'll go....

(Goes to the door, stops, takes out wallet)

Just one thing. If it won't bother you.

(Tapping some papers)

I've mentioned you here.... If I don't come through--see to a few things for me. Will you? They're not much. Will you?

DARTREY

Of course I will.

GILRUTH

(Simply) Thank you. You've always been decent to me.... Dartrey. To-day! You would have been my best man--and she's--

DARTREY

(Shaking him by the shoulders) Come, my man. Pull up.

GILRUTH

I will. I'll be all right. In a little while I'll be along out there. I hope I server under you. (Grips his hand) Good-by.

DARTREY

Keep in touch with me.

GILRUTH

All right.

(Passes out, opens and closes the outer door behind him and disappears in the street. Dartrey resumes his preparations)

The End of the Play

[signed]J. Hartley Manners

To France

For the third time in history it has fallen to the lot of France to stem the Barbarian tide. Once before upon the Marne, Aetius with a Gallic Army stopped the Hun under Attila. Three hundred years later Charles Martel at Tours saved Europe from becoming Saracen, just as in September, 1914, more than eleven centuries later, General Joffre with the citizen soldiery of France upon that same Marne saved Europe from the heel of the Prussianized Teuton, the reign of brute force and the religion of the Moloch State. These were among the world's "check battles." Yet the flood of barbarism was only checked at the Marne, not broken; again the flood arose and pressed on to be stopped once more at Verdun--the Gateway of France--in the greatest of human conflicts yet seen.

America was a spectator, but not an indifferent one. Once again mere momentary material interest counseled abstention; precedent was invoked to justify isolation and indifference. The timid, the ignorant, the disloyal, those to whom physical life was more precious than the dictates of conscience, counseled "peace and prosperity." Many began to wonder if America had a soul and was indeed worth saving as the policy of "Terrorism" on land followed that of "Terrorism" on the high seas seemed to leave us indifferent. Yet the same spirit, as of yore, dominated the nation. The people of America at last understood that it was not any particular rule of law, but the existence of law itself, divine and human, that was involved in the Fate of France.

The task confronting this nation is a stupendous one. Let there be no illusion. The war may well be long and painful, beyond expression, but the past few weeks have taught us that the nation will bear the strain with that same courage and enduring perseverance as in the past, following the example of the Fathers and inspired by the traditions of the American Revolution, this people will stand like a stone wall with our splendid Ally of old and of to-day--France--and from Great Britain from whence came our institutions, to end forever the Hohenzollern system of blood and iron so that a better future may come to Europe and America, one in which peace may be builded upon a guaranty of justice and law--a world order in which fundamental moral postulates and human rights may never again be set at defiance at the behest of mere material force, however scientifically organized.

To France has fallen the honor of checking, to Britain the burden of containing by sea and land, to America now comes the duty of finally overthrowing that common enemy of democratic institutions and ordered liberty, the foe whose morality knows no truth, whose philosophy admits no check upon the "will to power."

In France the traveler passing along the roads to the northeast leading to Lorraine may see at every cross-road a great index finger pointing to the single word VERDUN. To many thousands, nay, hundreds of thousands of men passing over these roads in the five fateful months of critical battle, these six letters spelled mutilation and death, yet the word was an inspiration to heroism in every home of France, and from every corner of the land men followed that great index finger pointing, as it did indeed, to the modern Calvary.

To-day at every cross-road must we here in America set up a great index hand with the words "TO FRANCE." To France, land of suffering humanity, in whose devastated fields again must be saved the same principles for which Americans fought at Bunker Hill, at Saratoga, at Yorktown, at Gettysburg and in the Wilderness; to France, where the fate of the world is still pending; to France, which has again checked the Huns of the modern world as it did those of the ancient; to France, the manhood of this nation must now be directed, to save the heritage of the American Revolution and the Civil War, to preserve the dearest conquests of the Christian civilization; to France will our men go by the thousands, hundreds of thousands, if need be by the million, to prove that the soul of America is more completely intent upon battling for the right than ever before, intent that slavery in another but far subtler and more dangerous form may not prevail upon the earth.

It was Washington who gave as the watchword of the day in those soul-trying hours that preceded the birth of our nation the immortal and prophetic phrase, "America and France--United Forever."

[signed]Frederick Coudert THE END.

Ce Que Disent Nos Morts

Il n'est pas besoin de rappeler le souvenir de ceux qui nous furent chers et ne sont plus, à notre peuple qui passe, non sans raison, pour célébrer avec ferveur le culte des morts. N'est-ce pas en France, au dix-neuvième siècle, qu'est née cette philosophie qui met au rang des premiers devoirs de l'homme la reconnaissance envers les générations qui nous ont précédés dans la tombe, en nous laissant le fruit de leurs pensées et de leurs travaux? Certes la religion des ancêtres est de tous les temps et de tous les climats; elle est même chez certains peuples orientaux la religion unique; mais en quel pas les liens entre les morts et les vivants sont-ils plus forts qu'en France, les deuils plus solennels à la fois et plus intimes? Chez nous, d'ordinaire, les defunts aimés et vénérés ne quittent pas tout entiers le foyer où ils vécu; ils y respirent dans le coeur de ceux qui demeurent; ils y sont imités, consultés, écoutés.

Je me rappelle trop confusément pour en faire usage ici une scène très belle d'une vieille chanson de geste, GIRART DE ROUSILLON, je crois, où l'on voit une fille de roi contempler, la nuit, après une bataille, la plaine où gisent les guerriers innombrables tomber pour sa querelle. "Elle eut voulu, dit le poète, les embrasser tous." Et, du fond de mes très lointains souvenirs, cette royale fille m'apparait comme une image de notre France pleurant aujourd'hui la fleur de sa race abondamment moissonnée.

Aussi n'est-ce pas pour exhorter mes concitoyens à commemorer en ce jour nos morts selon un usage immémorial, que j'écris ces lignes, mais pour honorer avec notre peuple tout entier ceux qui lui ont sacrifié leur vie at pour mediter la leçon qu'ils nous donnent du fond de leur demeures profondes.

Et tout d'abord, à la mémoire des notres, associons pieusement la mémoire des braves qui ont versé leur sang sous tous les étendards de l'Alliance, depuis les canaux de l'Yser jusqu'aux rives de la Vistule, depuis les montagnes du Frioul jusqu'aux défiles de la Morava, et sur les vastes mers.

Puis, offrons les fleurs les plus nobles palmes aux innocentes victimes d'une atroce cruauté, aux femmes, aux enfants martyrs, à cette jeune infirmière anglaise, coupable seulement de générosité et dont l'assassinat a soulevé d'indignation tout l'univers.

Et nos morts, nos morts bien aimés! Que la patrie reconnaissante ouvre assez grand son coeur pour les contenir tous, les plus humbles comme les plus illustrés, les héros tombés avec gloire à qui l'on prepare des monuments de marbre et de bronze et qui vivront dans l'histoire, et les simples qui rendirent leur dernier souffle en pensant au champ paternel.

Que tous ceux dont le sang coula pour la patrie soient bénis! Ils n'ont pas fait en vain le sacrifice de leur vie. Glorieusement frappés en Artois, en Champagne, en Argonne, ils ont arrêté l'envahisseur qui n'a pu faire un pas de plus en avant sur la terre sacrée qui les recouvre. Quelques-uns les pleurent, tous les admirent, plus d'un les envie. Ecoutons les. Tendons l'oreille: ils parlent. Penchons-nous sur cette terre bouleversée par la mitraille où beaucoup d'entre eux dorment dans leurs vêtements ensanglantés. Agenouillons-nous dans le cimetière, au bords des tombes fleuries de ceux qui sont revenus dans le doux pays, et là, entendons le souffle imperceptible et puissant qu'ils mêlent, la nuit, au murmure du vent et au bruissement des feuilles qui tombent. Efforçons-nous de comprendre leur parole sainte. Ils disent:

FRERES, vivez, combattez, achevez notre ouvrage. Apportez la victoire et la paix à nos ombres consolées. Chassez l'étranger qui a deja reculé devant nous, et ramenez vos charrues dans les champs qui nous avons imbibés de notre sang.

Ainsi parlent nos morts. Et ils disent encore:

FRANÇAIS, aimez-vous les uns les autres d'un amour fraternal et, pour prevaloir contre l'ennemi, mettez en commun vos biens et vos pensées. Que parmi vous les plus grands et les plus forts soient les serviteurs des faibles. Ne marchandez pas plus vos richesses que votre sang à la patrie. Soyez tous égaux par la bonne volonté. Vous le devez à vos morts.

VOUS nous devez d'assurer, à notre exemple, par le sacrifice de vous-mêmes, le triomphe de la plus sainte des causes. Frères, pour payer votre dette envers nous, il vous faut vaincre, et il vous faut faire plus encore: il vois faut mériter de vaincre.

Nos morts nous ordonnent de vivre et de combattre en citoyens d'un peuple libre, de marcher résolument dans l'ouragan de fer vers la paix qui se levera comme une belle aurore sur l'Europe affranchie des menaces de ses tyrans, et verra renaître, faibles et timides encore, la JUSTICE et L'HUMANITE étouffées par le crime de l'Allemagne.

Voila ce qu'inspirent nos morts à un Français que le détachement des vanités et le progrès de l'age rapprochent d'eux.

[signed]Anatole France

What our Dead Say to Us

There is no need to recall to the minds of our people those who were dear to us and have passed hence, for they are celebrating--and with good cause--the anniversaries of their deaths. Was it not in France, in the 19th century, that there was born that philosophy which placed in the rank of the foremost duties of mankind gratitude towards those generations who have preceded us to the grave, and have left us the fruits of their thoughts and of their labors? Indeed, ancestral worship prevails in all climes and at all periods; in fact, with certain Oriental nations it is the only religion. But in what country is the link between the dead and the living so strong as it is in France--the rites at the same time so solemn and so intimate? With us, as a rule, our dead, beloved and venerated, never entirely depart from the homes in which they have dwelt, but take up their abode in the hearts of the living who imitate them, consult them, pay heed to them.