MY SECOND WAR-TIME VISIT TO BERLIN
_December 22._
I am just back from my second war-time trip to Berlin. It is about ten
weeks since I was last in the German capital, and during the interval a
big change has come over the city.
Less cheering, less flag-waving, less enthusiasm; the Berliners still
tell you that everything is going on all right, the papers are still
very optimistic, the short official bulletins keep very dark any bad
news and magnify what is good, but the atmosphere is different and one
feels the change in almost everything.
I arrived in Berlin on the day the German Pacific Squadron was sunk by
British ships. Since the sinking of the _Emden_ nobody in Germany dared
hope for any better destiny for the other ships on the high seas. They
realised that all they could expect was to cause as large a loss of
life as possible on the English vessels before going to their fate.
The news of the affair off the Falkland Islands greatly impressed
Berlin.
It had not been expected that the British naval authorities would act
so quickly and at one blow demolish a force whose destructiveness had
given the people to hope that a longer life was in store for it.
A remarkable thing is that, though Berlin got to know of the
destruction of the four ships only through English sources, the Berlin
papers printed it before it was published in London.
The _Lokal-Anzeiger_ gave the news in a few lines as sent by a
special correspondent in London. It was only last Tuesday, when I
saw the English papers in Switzerland, that I realised that the
_Lokal-Anzeiger_ had been able to print the news in Berlin before the
Press Bureau had given it out in London.
In this case the fact has no importance, but does it not show that
Germany has still a wonderful information service and telegraph wire or
wireless communication with London?
Since last Sunday it was known in Berlin that some sort of raid was
to be attempted on the eastern shores of Britain, and that this first
appearance of the German fleet would be followed by numerous other
visits in different parts of the English, Scotch, and Irish coasts.
Then one fine day Germany might attempt to disembark a few thousand
men, who, of course, would be killed or taken prisoners, but it is
thought in Berlin that such a landing will stop England sending troops
to the Continent and probably force her to recall some of the troops
she has already sent there.
My informant said that the Germans would probably make their first
appearance on the British coast very soon and that afterwards a
regular programme of raids, both by sea and by air, was to be carried
out.
I am sorry I was not in Berlin when the news of the bombardment of
Scarborough was served out to the good Berlin people. The papers will
no doubt have magnified its effects to cheer up the population, which
seems to need it badly.
Most people there seem very keen on bringing the war to English
territory, and if this was not done before it was only because it
was feared that such a raid would act as a tonic on recruiting, or
even give the last blow to England's traditional form of voluntary
recruiting.
Now, however, the desire to attack British shores has become more
and more pronounced, as the continuously increasing figures of Lord
Kitchener's Army, regularly sent to Germany by her informers, have
dispelled the illusion that the mass of British people were indifferent
to the war.
Though ignorant people seemed to believe in a probable German invasion
of one or another part of England, in military circles in Germany it
is realised that it is absolutely impossible, and the raids which will
take place on the British coast are only meant to plunge the population
into panic and to force the British Government to keep troops in
England instead of sending them to the Continent.
The feelings of the capital are very complex; disillusion caused by
the campaign in France lasting so long without any apparent progress,
sorrow for the enormous number of lives lost, hate for every nation on
earth save Turkey, and especially for Great Britain.
At first everybody was absolutely certain that the German Army would
take all things by storm, that its superiority was sufficient to smash
any resistance in a few weeks. Now, however, the Berlin people are
beginning to realise that they have been deceived in this respect.
I don't mean to say that Berlin's people, at least the people in the
street, realise that things are going badly nor that they are giving
up hope--that would not be true. They still believe in a final victory
for Germany, but they don't seem to be as certain as they were before.
They are getting rather tired of the length of the war.
I can confirm everything that has been written about the hate of
England. England is called the "jealous, cowardly country," and all
sorts of insulting names, unjustified either by historical or political
precedents. What is absolutely certain is that Russia and France are
not hated half as much as the English are.
Curiously enough, this hate, which is very moderate in the military
class, and not too strong among commercial and industrial people, who
have always considered Great Britain as one of their best customers
and who are longing to start trading with her again when the war is
over, reaches the highest possible degree of violence amongst the upper
classes, the sedentary men of the laboratories, the "Professoren,"
pride and, in former times, amusement of Germany herself.
"We have been very humane up to now; we have not killed half the men we
could; we have not destroyed half the towns it would have been easy for
us to destroy," said to me a quiet-looking little man with gold-rimmed
spectacles and a white beard, who has for years occupied a high
position at the foreign office, "but if we ever manage to reach England
in force we shall respect nothing. We shall fully justify that name of
Hun which British papers seem so fond of giving us."
This official, who belongs to a class of people who should really know
how things are, is so blinded by hate for England that he cannot even
detect the monstrosity of this statement.
I always thought the spy mania in England exaggerated, but now I am
absolutely persuaded that even those Englishmen who recognise this
peril do not realise the lengths to which it goes.
They have been suspecting waiters and servants, while the spies are in
high social positions; they have contented themselves with searching
the houses of German barbers and grocers whilst neglecting the heads
who collect and forward to Berlin the information gathered by more
humble satellites.
It is very sad to have to say such things, but I think the most
dangerous spies still in England are not Germans, whether naturalised
or not, but are people belonging to neutral countries--even to
countries actually fighting Germany--and subjects of Great Britain
herself.
I would not have written this if I was not sure of it; the diplomat
from whom I got the information assured me that there are some English
and French of both sexes who come regularly to Berlin or to frontier
towns through neutral countries and have conversations with officials
and then return.
The restrictions as to luggage and passports, both in France and in
England, are not half as severe as they should be; they are even
slacker than at the beginning of the war. I know personally of a number
of stolen American passports under the shelter of which German spies
are now travelling, and an Italian Consul with whom I happened to
travel a few days ago said he had discovered two fellows with false
Italian passports almost perfectly imitated.
In Berlin I heard people, well-informed people, saying that in every
English town of importance, on every spot of strategical value on the
British coast, Germany has got _a few friends_ keeping their eyes open
and ready to receive an eventual German raid and to lend their friends
as strong a hand as possible.
* * *
The first morning I woke up in Berlin I could not help feeling a
bit nervous. The small hotel I had chosen in the Tiergarten was a
few minutes away from the Kaiserhof theatre of my rather unpleasant
adventures during my first war-time visit to Berlin.
I knew that some quotations from my newspaper articles had appeared in
the German papers, and I was certain that the police, who, in Berlin,
are wonderfully well organised, had managed to identify the man who
had written them with the man who had awakened their vigilance a week
before the articles appeared.
It was true that this time I had entered Germany through Switzerland,
and that they would never think that a British newspaper correspondent
would take the trouble to go all that way round. I could not help
realising, however, how awkward my position would be if I were to meet
face to face in a Berlin street one of the men who had arrested me two
months before.
The little dreary devil who hides himself at the bottom of every human
being's mind impelled me to go straight down the Leipziger-place to
Wilhelmstrasse, and from there to the Linden, the very parts of Berlin
where danger for me was greatest.
I was impressed by one great change at once; two months ago the streets
were full of soldiers idling about amongst the slow-moving crowd. Now I
had to walk half-an-hour before I met a single military uniform, and
that was worn by a wounded soldier. Evidently the contingent of troops
which had been kept waiting in Berlin had been poured on to the Russian
frontier.
As a protest against French and English fashions, the German
dressmakers are trying to make German ladies adopt all-German fashions;
the shop windows are full of dummies dressed in impossible clothes of
stiff, cheap-looking materials. The ladies' hats are in the flat, round
shape of the Bavarian peasant woman.
Some of the shops show what they call evening gowns, and touch the
extreme of bad taste with curious creations of a half-religious,
half-pantomime-like character. But I have never seen anyone wearing
these horrors.
Horse vehicles were much scarcer. When the war broke out Germany
thought she could get any amount of horses out of Norway, Sweden,
Denmark, and Holland, but these nations could only send a few
thousand animals, and Germany was in a terrible plight, as she needed
immediately about twenty thousand. Then she tried to get horses from
Austria and Hungary, but owing to the food and the bad quality of the
water the greater part of these animals fell sick or died. Lastly,
Germany had to take for military purposes all the horses she could find
in Germany and Belgium--even those which had formerly been judged unfit
for military service.
Taxi-cabs have reappeared in fairly large numbers.
The shortage of petrol, arising from the Russian occupation of Galicia,
has been a very severe blow for Germany, especially when one considers
that the enormous special reservoirs constructed in all the German
ports for the storage of large quantities of the precious liquid were
expecting large supplies when the war broke out--supplies which were
never delivered.
All the petrol left in the country was seized by the Government for
the use of military motor-cars, aeroplanes, and Zeppelins. Lately the
rather serious situation was cleverly dealt with by extracting from
coal in a new, cheap and quick way a liquid called benzol, which is a
fairly good substitute for petrol, but which smells horribly when used
and requires a lot of work to keep the engines clean.
The coal from which benzol has been extracted is converted into coke,
and now German railways, works, and private householders are using
solely this kind of fuel. The supply of coal is not plentiful, but up
to now sufficient, thanks to the strict economy observed by the German
people.
Berlin street illumination has been very much reduced on this account,
while in some other German towns it has been completely suppressed.
The number of temporary hospitals has increased enormously. I counted
more than thirty houses in Unter den Linden alone over which the Red
Cross flag flew. These house hospitals depend partly on the large
hospitals for support, and are partly kept up by private charity.
As most of the trained nurses are at the front, there is generally only
an old nurse as matron, and under her command a number of ladies do all
the work without the help of servants. The large hospitals have no more
room for new beds. Doctors are very scarce, and those left seem to be
working very hard.
Owing to the German habit of keeping ambulances right in the firing
line the losses amongst doctors have been enormous, and fresh ones are
continually required for active service.
I had occasion to talk to a doctor who was just back from the front for
the purpose of organising a new Red Cross column for work in Poland.
"We try to operate as little as possible," he said. "During the last
two months we have not made a single amputation, as we believe that it
is a crime to take even a finger from a man if it is not absolutely
indispensable to do so.
"The wounded are in enormous numbers, most of them suffering from
wounds caused by their being struck by shrapnel or scraps of shell. It
is almost impossible to deal with such cases immediately, and we send
them back, after temporarily bandaging them, to Germany. During the
last fights on the Yser and near Ypres even the rifle wounds were often
infected.
"The wounded had to lie for hours, and often for days, in the trenches
or on the battlefield before they could be removed.
"The downpour of shrapnel bullets from the artillery gave us no time
to take the wounded to the nearest Red Cross department. In such
conditions cases of lock-jaw are fairly common, but luckily up to the
time I left the front there were no cases of infectious disease."
"It has been said there have been some cases of cholera in your army?"
"Yes, we had a few cases, not amongst German troops, but amongst the
Austrians who are fighting with us in Belgium. We have organised a few
large special hospitals for such diseases, as we expect that we shall
have more infectious cases when the winter is over."
"Do you have many English, French, and Russian wounded in your
hospitals?"
"Not many. We don't keep them in the same hospitals with our
own soldiers. Generally we send them down straight away to the
concentration camps, where there are always infirmaries, and in these
they are cured."
I don't know if the impression of dullness I got from this visit to
Berlin is due solely to what I have seen and heard or whether it is
partly due to the weather. During the five days I was there it rained
without interruption. The town was completely washed by heavy showers,
which hardly ever stopped.
In such weather the only thing to do was to sit and talk. In the
numerous cafés women and old men were constantly talking and reading
newspapers and letters from the front to each other and discussing the
next German move. Apparently the wish of the whole of Germany is now
the capture of Warsaw; they give to the Russian theatre of operations
an importance which was formerly reserved for the western theatre. They
consider the war in Flanders as a sort of siege war, refuse to believe
in an offensive movement of the Allies there, and want to go for Russia
before it is too late.
Berlin seems to need a sort of formula, something to shout out, an
immediate object to achieve; but the newspapers engaged in supplying a
popular cry seem to be rather unhappy in their choice. At the beginning
of the war the cry was "To Paris"; later on "To Calais" seemed to
satisfy German public opinions; now everybody shouts "To Warsaw."
The fact that the two former wishes were not fulfilled does not seem to
matter much. Not only that, but every good man in the street will tell
you that the march to Paris and the march on Calais are only postponed.
The almost unlimited confidence of German people in their army has
certainly been shaken during the last few months, and though nobody
will frankly admit that things are going badly, I have observed a
difference between the way they used to talk and the way they talk now.
I do not want to be misunderstood; if a Berliner is asked directly, "Do
you think you are going to win?" the answer will come pat, "Yes, we
are certain of it." But if you go on talking you will detect from the
way in which the man tries to avoid certain subjects, and how he sighs
when some others--namely, the Navy and the Crown Prince--come into the
discussion, that the beautiful assurance of former days is gone, and
that some small cracks in the war organisation begin to be evident
even to his eyes. He begins to doubt the prestige of the German army,
the destiny of the German race, and the perfection of the military
organisation of his country. It is not a question of colour, but of
shade, and it is evident that something has changed.
As for the officers, the men of the upper classes, and the people who
have realised since the beginning of the war how hard was the task
Germany had undertaken, they go ahead in their military, diplomatic,
or simply private work, not daring to look too far. They prefer to die,
to disappear before the downfall of their country. It is impossible not
to admire them. Most of the officers of Bavarian or Silesian descent
are fighting for those who have formerly been their oppressors, and
for the supremacy of that Prussia which has killed the independence of
their country.
Yet they are sacrificing themselves in a war about the final result of
which very few entertain illusions.
The officers and non-commissioned officers who were injured at the
beginning of the campaign, and who are so mutilated that they would
be of no use at the front, are drilling the new recruits, or making
themselves as useful as they can. But practically none have left the
army or even taken a temporary leave.
A friend of mine whom I visited in hospital ten weeks ago has now
had his foot amputated. But his spirit is not crushed, and he is now
drilling recruits at a fortress near Stettin.
Everybody feels Germany cannot waste a single man. Most young men who
had been refused for physical imperfections in former years have now
been accepted. The fact that most classes of the Landsturm have not
been called up yet does not mean that there is no need for them, but
only that they are composed of men who, on account of their age and
lack of experience and fitness would be of no practical efficiency on
the battlefield.
I saw in Berlin some sturdy, strong-looking chaps who looked quite fit
to bear arms still in mufti and attending to their usual professions. I
asked an officer the reason of this astonishing fact.
"Don't you believe it," he answered me smiling; "such fellows follow
an employment which must be covered even in wartime, namely, a job
in one of the war-office departments, or else they are not as fit as
they look and for some reason or other would be of no use to the army.
Besides that, all fit men are as keen on serving in the army as we are
in taking them up."
To one who knows how reserved and silent German people generally are,
at least with foreigners, about their Government, their diplomacy, and
especially about the sacred person of their Emperor, the free way in
which they discuss them now is really astounding.
"Our army has been a success," said the same officer to me when asked
what he thought of the conduct of the war, "but our diplomacy has
proved _un ratage complet_; everything has been arranged clumsily
before the war broke out, and managed still more clumsily since then.
Our diplomats seem busy making mistake after mistake; we have lost the
sympathies of all countries on earth, even of those who were formerly
our friends. If we are to have peace on favourable conditions, our arms
must win it on the battlefield, because our diplomacy will not be able
to. After Algeciras our diplomacy seems to have lost completely even
the bluff qualities which marked her last success."
The Kaiser now begins to be discussed, and I heard more than once this
definition of His Imperial Majesty: "A man good enough in peace-time,
but hardly capable of bearing the responsibilities or of carrying out
alone and successfully the task he has lately undertaken."
The English cartoonists show us every German soldier weighed down by a
large iron cross hanging from his neck; in real life the thing is just
as bad as in caricature. One often sees groups of fifteen or twenty men
every one of whom shows the large square piece of blackened tin hanging
from the third button-hole of his grey-green uniform. It is as though
the iron cross, instead of being a decoration, was an indispensable
accessory of the uniform.
I have seen two battalions of the new recruits coming back from drill
to their barracks on the Spree; some of the soldiers did not look
more than sixteen, they were headed by a very old captain of the
Landsturm and accompanied by a few officers--all old men (I have seen
a lieutenant who was probably sixty-five).
Those who were not aged were suffering from recent wounds. A lieutenant
who had evidently been struck by a bullet in the knee, limped painfully
at their side, leaning on a stick, his right sleeve hanging empty from
his shoulder. He was the only one in the column who smiled cheerfully,
and the crowd in the streets looked at him with admiration, while some
old men raised their hats.
A curious crowd indeed, this of Berlin. Women and children composed a
very large part of it, and the number of people in mourning was really
astonishing, far more than I saw in Paris or Vienna. Some people were
wearing a white and red armlet or a band crosswise with the number of
the regiment to which the man who died used to belong. An old lady was
wearing the band with the number of a regiment repeated three times on
it. She had lost three sons who were all in the same regiment.
The proprietress of the hotel at which I was staying had lost a son in
France and another was lying wounded in a hospital in Belgium.
"The one who died," she said, "had been in England for over four years,
and was here taking a holiday when the war broke out. He always used to
say that he liked England better than his own country, and yet he had
to go. He was killed by an English bullet."
Her story was interrupted by an unrestrained sob, and she went on:
"The one in Belgium is very, very bad, and they say that (even should
he live) he will be blind for life. I have got two more sons fighting
down there. God knows if they will ever come back," concluded the poor
woman, crying hopelessly.
The mothers, whether they be English or German, whether they sit in a
factory or work in a mill, are always the first to bear the privations
of war. Yet in Germany they are bearing these privations nobly indeed.
The courage of their women is an example to the world.
* * *
The few police agents still to be seen in the streets of Berlin are
standing outside military and public buildings. They are old men
already out of service, called back as substitutes for the policemen,
who were all converted into soldiers and sent to the front. Naturally
the police service, which was one of the best in the world, has lost
most of its efficiency--luckily for me perhaps!
In the Tiergarten large posters hang on the trees, saying that owing to
the mobilisation of the police force for active service, the lovers of
romantic walks at night (one of Berlin's favourite pastimes) will have
to look after themselves, and that the corporation has not enough men
to carry on a service of police after midnight.
The first effect of this is the enormous number of beggars in Berlin
streets--women and children, and old and crippled men--standing at
the street corners, or sitting in long rows on the outer steps of
churches, and telling long tales of husbands, fathers, sons at the war,
of miseries of every kind. Even about this, the Berlin Corporation,
always fond of giving tips to the public, has issued another
proclamation, which reads:--
Don't give anything to people in the streets asking for help.
Nobody starves in Berlin. There are free distributions of bread,
soup, and potatoes in all quarters of the town. The money you can
spare for charity should be sent to the Relief Committee; this
will ensure that such institutions are kept going. The beggars are
only trying to make money out of your sympathy, and their tales of
misfortune, in most cases, are absolutely false.
Unemployment seems to have increased enormously, especially for women,
owing to the fact that most manufacturers have closed down their works,
either for lack of raw material or for lack of demand. In some other
industries where women cannot take the place of men workers are badly
needed. I have been told that unemployment is even greater in the
northern towns. The toy-making and fancy goods industries are almost
entirely stopped, as the stores are full of goods prepared for the
usual exportation, which is, this year, entirely paralysed.
Paper, wool, metal, and wooden industries no longer receive their usual
supplies of raw material; and though articles manufactured of these are
badly needed, the works have had to close.
Metals have increased enormously in price, and all the reserves of
so-called noble metals, and also of nickel, etc., were requisitioned by
the military authorities. Such metals are indispensable in the making
of new guns, and also for repairing the old ones put out of action by
long usage. Lead is also very much dearer than usual, and everybody
is instructed to take down old gas and water pipes and to bring them
to special depôts, at which the metal is bought by weight at standard
prices, to be forwarded to military works, where it is converted into
bullets.
As for copper, a few old mines which had been given up forty years
since because they did not pay when the metal could be imported freely,
have been reopened with success and give employment to some of the
out-of-work folk.
Bread, except in the Zucker-Baeckereien, which are not forced to sell
at standard prices, is getting very scarce, and all bakers study every
possible way to make it as heavy and as economic as possible.
Wheat and other cereals, all equally scarce, have been seized by the
Government, which lets the different bakers have so much a week and
gives instructions about bread substitutes and the methods of making
them as healthful and nourishing as possible. The Government also
recommends the baker to make his wares as little appetising as possible
so that people should not eat too much out of _Feinsmecherei_--gluttony.
The last quality, if not the other two, is certainly prominent in the
German bread I have seen.
Though bread is not the most important part of the daily food of the
German population, and though in many provinces potatoes have almost
completely taken its place, yet the problem is very serious, and
Germany tries to face it in all possible ways. Large quantities of
wheat have been imported from Roumania, and potatoes, dried peas, etc.,
from Switzerland.
Through Holland, Germany still gets a certain amount of fruit, beef,
and cheese. Special stores have been arranged for the preservation in
good condition of perishable goods for a fairly long time.
Good Munich beer is now a luxury obtainable only in a few high-class
establishments. The materials, which usually come from Russia, are
naturally all stopped; moreover, the strong young fellows who generally
work in the large breweries are now at the front. It would not be
surprising in a few months to see Germany reduced to drinking aerated
waters.
Upon reflection I think I must be wrong, however, for there is now in
Germany plenty of champagne--champagne of German make, which is sold at
very low prices, and excellent French champagne of the best brand, sold
a lot cheaper than it was ever possible to buy it, even in France.
A large shop in Unter den Linden displayed a window full of "Mumm,"
"Clicquot," "Pommery," and practically all other first-class champagnes
at five marks (five shillings) a bottle. In the middle of the window
was a large poster saying that here was a unique opportunity, and that
every Berliner must have on his Christmas dinner table a bottle of good
French champagne to drink the health of the Kaiser. This is probably
the first effect of the wholesale sack of Rheims. To obtain such a
noble result even the shelling of the cathedral was not too much.
I was struck by the enormous number of children in the street. The
first time I observed this I thought that I was near a school and that
the children were just coming out; later on I saw that it was the same
everywhere. I very often saw a lady with ten or twelve children, as
though she were taking a whole school for a walk.
The explanation is that children from the towns and villages near the
Russian frontier have been sent to Berlin; a great number have arrived
also from Galicia. The schools are all closed, and the children thus
left free all day long.
* * *
I have said that the Berliners have been taken by a sort of mania which
makes them detest everybody on earth who has not the great fortune to
be born a German subject. I was not quite right.
If, besides the enemy she is fighting, Germany loathes Italy for
having deserted her and also for having taken Valona (the Albanian
port which Germany meant to offer Italy as a bribe for neutrality),
America for supporting Belgium and sending ammunition to the Entente,
Austria for not doing well enough, etc., she has still a place in her
well-protected heart for one tender love. The lucky country which
occupies this position is Turkey. Everyone in Berlin talks of the Turks
as the best soldiers in the world (always excepting the Germans, of
course). Enver Pasha is considered one of the best servants of the
Kaiser.
Turkey has taken the place of Italy in the defunct Triple Alliance.
In the streets of Berlin I saw quite a number of fez, only a few of
them worn by Turks. The others were worn by children or by the plump
beauties of the German capital, amongst whom the fez is perhaps even
more popular than is the "Tipperary" cap over here.
Everybody seems to have great hopes in Turkish co-operation. There is
a little disappointment over Egypt, Algeria, and Tunis, because they
have not awakened yet; but it is hoped that they will do so in a few
weeks. I don't believe that military circles are as optimistic as are
the general public about Turkish help.
An officer told me that the action of the fleets in the Black Sea had
to be postponed owing to damage to two of the units of the Turco-German
Fleet. The transport of Turkish troops from Asia Minor to Egypt had
been promised in an endeavour to make a Pan-Islamic war, but it
would be very difficult to carry out such a scheme. He said it was
not unlikely that a certain contingent of Turkish troops, especially
cavalry, would be brought to Germany next spring.
Curiously enough, this love for Turkey is not extended to Austria,
which country, after all, has already made the biggest sacrifices in
this war.
I saw many wounded Austrian officers in Berlin. Apparently more
Austrian troops will arrive shortly in Germany. It seems that more
cavalry is urgently needed for the operations in the East.
One evening I was sitting in my stall at the Lessing Theater, where a
boring "1870" drama had been revived; in front of me were two Austrian
officers, while at my side some German people were discussing the war.
They were speaking loudly about the battle in Galicia, and passed many
untactful remarks, evidently meant to be heard by the Austrians. They
carried this to such a length that the two officers left their seats
and walked out.
Listening to other people's conversations is certainly the best way of
getting unsophisticated impressions of what they think, as when they
know they are talking to a foreigner their Chauvinism makes them speak
in a more optimistic way.
"We cannot keep on for ever racing our troops from west to east; if
we do not obtain a success now in Flanders, I don't know what will
happen afterwards when England sends her new troops," said one of the
theatre-goers.
"Don't be frightened," said another, "she will want to keep too many
soldiers at home to defend her own coasts. I think the danger is now
on the eastern side, and that we had better go ahead there as far as
possible; who knows if we leave the Russians alone, how many men they
will concentrate there?"
"Well, I only hope it will soon be over, otherwise we shall all be
ruined," said an old man, evidently belonging to the shopkeeper class.
"It will all be over in a year."
"In six months."
"You are wrong, it will be over in four months. The war cannot last
more than that; the Tribunal of Brunswick having to call a witness in
a case, and the witness being at the front, decided that the witness
being detained by an engagement of uncertain duration, the cause should
be called again in four months. Evidently the war cannot last longer
than that."
Everybody laughed at this typically German joke, but I am afraid the
Brunswick magistrate will have to adjourn the case for many a four
months, even if the Court has not to renounce the witness completely.
The night life of Berlin, which had struck me so much ten weeks ago,
may be considered now as dead. The cabarets are closed, not by the
police, but from the lack of male customers. Of the theatres only the
Lessing, the Schiller, and the Neues Schauspielhaus are still open;
the music-halls have reduced their prices and are arranging special
patriotic shows to attract the public, but their efforts do not seem to
have succeeded, and almost every week some of them close to reopen no
more.
The great amusement of Berlin is the cinema, where really wonderful
pictures are shown. Most of the pictures are faked; but they are so
cleverly done that the public does not doubt for a second that it
is seeing real battles, and tries to pick out relatives amongst the
soldiers in the pictures represented as fighting at the front.
There are wonderful dramas full of English and French spies, traitors,
and rascals, and of German heroes--all very much appreciated.
The show is generally closed by slides showing, under the title "What
We Have Achieved," photos of Brussels occupied by the Germans, of the
ruins of French and Belgian towns, of destroyed bridges and shelled
cathedrals. The audience cheer loudly at each picture.
* * *
"Ist Gott neutral?" I read this astonishing question printed in red
letters half a foot high on numerous posters stuck on the walls all
over Berlin just as if it was the most ordinary question, such as "Is
Holland neutral?"
At first I took it for one of those complicated swear-words one so
often hears in Southern Italy. I looked naturally for the answer.
The answer was given by P. Samuel at the Circus, the very theatre at
which Max Reinhardt produced his cumbersome "Miracle."
P. Samuel was a name perfectly unknown to me, but I learned that its
owner is a preacher of large fame in Berlin. I decided to go to his
lecture.
The enormous hall was filled by over 5,000 people. Evidently, thought
I, P. Samuel is a celebrity. In a powerful, low-pitched voice he
started to speak amidst perfect silence. I listened.
God is not neutral! He is with the Germans. That is why He has placed
them in the middle of Europe. After this war they will be for ever
the first nation of the earth. But they must go back to Christ; the
bankruptcy of materialism is complete. How could a materialist explain
a phenomenon like the present war? The name of Idealist which has
covered the whole nation from the beginning of this war has been
superb; but an Idealism without religion must lead to final disaster.
The victory of our arms is certain. Since Frederick the Great Germany
has attributed to God the habit of being on the strongest side; now
we can say that He is behind our guns. But even if they are not the
strongest, God is with us all the same. He gave us our genius, our
culture, our art, our music; He gave us the mission to make us teach it
to the whole world.
The victory is certain, but we must afterwards be worthy of it.
At this moment it was that I really saw a new Berlin, a Berlin
unsuspected, a Berlin I did not know, a Berlin which is really a
creation of the war.
Five thousand people had come to this theatre to hear that God is not
neutral. After the preacher had finished the people sang:--
A safe stronghold our God is still,
A trusty shield and weapon;
He'll help us clear from all the ill
That hath us now o'ertaken.
The ancient prince of Hell
Hath risen with purpose fell;
Strong mail of craft and power
He weareth in this hour;
On earth is not his fellow.
After that a sudden extraordinary and fascinating thing happened. The
preacher, with his strong, calm voice invited the audience to pray with
him; Pater noster.... The men stood, the women knelt down with the
children, struck by a sort of mystic terror.
"Vater unser der du bist im Himmel...."
Five thousand people of all classes, of all social conditions, everyone
with a father or a brother or a husband to pray for, recited the
Paternoster in the theatre.
They recited it in a low voice, like the murmur of a quiet river.
Then there was a short silence followed by the benediction, recited by
the black-bearded monk, and the crowd walked out quietly.
I walked out with the others, and I found myself a little distance
from one of the smartest concert-halls in Berlin, in which a certain
Professor Blüthner was to deliver a lecture, the title of which had
attracted my attention when I had seen it announced in the morning
newspapers; it was, "Us, Italy, and England."
As I was just in time I stepped in.
The audience was very select, the five marks admission being devoted to
the fund for soldiers fighting at the front. Most of what is left of
Berlin society was there.
With polished words the lecturer served out to his hearers the
most astonishing theory: England took part in the struggle, not in
defence of Belgian neutrality, but in fear of Italy becoming a great
Mediterranean Power.
How? The explanation, according to the lecturer, was simple.
The Anglo-French Naval Convention imposed on France the necessity of
keeping her fleet in the Mediterranean. If England had kept neutral
she would have allowed France to bring her fleet out to protect her
defenceless coast; but in that case Italy would have been master of the
situation in the Mediterranean.
That is why England preferred to declare war. Clever and simple, this
explanation, is it not? What will Italy do?
Mr. Blüthner knows quite well.
Italy, he is quite certain, will decide to join Germany before long.
Is she not the motherland of Machiavelli, and Machiavelli, we all
know, was decidedly against any form of neutrality. Neutrals, said the
lecturer, will be hated by the beaten nations at the end of the war
and despised by the victors.
Therefore Italy will join the German side, and the old ideal of the
German Empire (as wrote Bernhardi) will again come to life in a
federation of Germany, Austria, and Italy.
I wonder if, in a few months' time, this delightful Mr. Blüthner will
be of the same opinion?