I have been at home for more than a year now, and cannot return to the front. Apparently the British Government have given their word to the neutral countries that prisoners who escape from Germany, and are assisted by the neutral countries, will not be allowed to return to the fighting line. So even if my shoulder were well again, I could not go back to fight.
Ted and I parted in London, for I came back to Canada before he did. He has since rejoined his family in Toronto. I have heard from a number of the boys in Germany. Bromley tried to escape again, but was captured, and is now at a camp called Soltau. John Keith and Croak also tried, but failed. Little Joe, the Italian boy who enlisted with me at Trail, has been since exchanged—insane! Percy Weller, Sergeant Reid, and Hill, brother of the British Reservist who gave us our first training, have all been exchanged.
I am sorry that I cannot go back. Not that I like fighting—for I do not; but because I believe every man who is physically fit should have a hand in this great clean-up—every man is needed! From what I have seen of the German people, I believe they will resist stubbornly, and a war of exhaustion will be a long affair with a people so well trained and organized. The military class know well that if they are forced to make terms unfavorable to Germany, their power will be gone forever, and they would rather go down to defeat before the Allied nations than be overthrown by their own people. There is no doubt that the war was precipitated by the military class in Germany because the people were growing too powerful. So they might as well fight on, with a chance of victory, as to conclude an unsatisfactory peace and face a revolution.
The German people have to be taught one thing before their real education can begin. They have to be made to see—and the Allied armies are making it plainer every day—that war is unprofitable; that their army, great though it is, may meet a greater; that heavy losses may come to their own country. They need to be reminded that he that liveth by the sword may die by the sword!
The average German thinks that only through superior military strength can any good thing come to a nation. All their lives they have been taught that, and their hatred of England has been largely a result of their fear of England's superior strength. They cannot understand that England and the other Allies have no desire to dominate German affairs. They do not believe that there is an ethical side to this war. The Germans are pitifully dense to ethical values. They are not idealists or sentimentalists, and their imagination is not easily kindled.
Added to this, they have separated themselves from religion. Less than two per cent of the men attend church, and if the extracts we read from the sermons preached in their churches is a fair sample of the teaching given there, the ninety-eight who stay at home are better off than the two who go!
Post-card Sent by Private Bromley from the Prison-camp of Soltau, Germany, in July, 1918. The Crosses Mark The Graves Of Prisoners Who Have Died at This CampPost-Card sent by Private Bromley from the Prison-Camp of Soltau, Germany, in July, 1918. The crosses mark the graves of prisoners who have died at this camp
Post-card Sent by Private Bromley from the Prison-camp of Soltau, Germany, in July, 1918. The Crosses Mark The Graves Of Prisoners Who Have Died at This CampPost-Card sent by Private Bromley from the Prison-Camp of Soltau, Germany, in July, 1918. The crosses mark the graves of prisoners who have died at this camp
All these things have helped to produce a type of mind that is not moved by argument or entreaty, a national character that has shown itself capable of deeds of grave dishonesty and of revolting cruelty; which cannot be forgotten—or allowed to go unpunished!
But if their faith in the power of force can be broken—and it may be broken very soon—the end of the war will come suddenly.
The people at home are interested and speculative as to the returned soldiers' point of view. Personally, I believe that as the soldiers went away with diversity of opinions, so will they come home, though in a less degree. There will be a tendency to fusion in some respects. One will be in the matter of coöperation; the civilian's ideas are generally those of the individual—he brags about his rights and resents any restriction of them. He is strong on grand old traditions, and rejoices in any special privileges which have come to him.
The soldier learns to share his comforts with the man next him; in the army each man depends on the other—and cannot do without him: there is no competition there, but only coöperation. If loss comes to one man, or misfortune, it affects the others. If one man is poorly trained, or uncontrolled, or foolish, all suffer. If a badly trained bomber loses his head, pulls the pin of his bomb, and lets it drop instead of throwing it, the whole platoon is endangered. In this way the soldier unconsciously absorbs some of the principles of, and can understand the reason for, discipline, and acquires a wholesome respect for the man who knows his job.
He sees the reason for stringent orders in regard to health and sanitation. He does not like to get into a dirty bath himself, and so he leaves it clean for the next man. In other words, the soldier, consciously or unconsciously, has learned that he is a part of a great mass of people, and that his own safety, both commercially and socially, depends on the proper disciplining of the whole people.
The returned soldier will take kindly to projects which tend to a better equalization of duties, responsibilities, and pleasures. He will be a great stickler for this; if he has to work, every one else must work too. He will be hard against special privileges. He will be strong in his insistence that our natural resources be nationalized. He will go after all lines of industry now in the hands of large corporations, and insist on national supervision if not actual ownership.
In religion, he will not care anything about form. Denominationalism will bore him, but the vital element of religion, brotherly love and helping the other fellow, will attract him, wherever he finds it. He knows that religion—he believes in it.
The political parties will never be able to catch him with their worn-out phrases. Politicians had better begin to remodel their speeches. The iniquities of the other party will not do. There must be a breaking-out of new roads—old things have passed away!
The returned man will claim, above all things, honest dealing, and for this reason the tricky politicians who "put it over" in the pre-war days will not have so easy a time. "Guff" will not be well received. The leaders on the battle-field have been men who could look death in the face without flinching, so the political leaders at home must be men of heroism, who will travel the path of righteousness even though they see it leads by the way of the Cross!
There is a hard road ahead of us, a hard, steep road of sacrifice, and in it we must as a nation travel, although our feet are heavy and our eyes are dim. The war must be won; human liberty is worth the price—whatever the price may be!
We do not travel as those who have no hope, for we know, though we cannot see it, that at the top of the mountain the sun is shining on a cleaner, fairer, better world.
THE END
THE END