THE INVISIBLE BROTHERHOOD
A special guard was sent from Vehnemoor to bring us back, and we had
to leave our comfortable quarters at Meppen and go back with him.
The guard took a stout rope and tied us together, my right wrist to
Edwards's left, and when we were securely roped up, he tried to
enlighten us further by dancing around us, shouting and brandishing
his gun, occasionally putting it against our heads and pretending he
was about to draw the trigger. This was his way of explaining that he
would shoot us if we didn't behave ourselves.
We tried to look back at him with easy indifference, and when he saw
that he had not succeeded in frightening us, he soon ceased to try.
However, from the wicked looks he gave us, we could see that he would
be glad to shoot us--if he had a reasonable excuse.
At the station in Meppen, where he took us fully an hour before train
time, as we stood in the waiting-room with the guard beside us, the
people came and looked curiously at us. The groups grew larger and
larger, until we were the centre of quite a circle. We did not enjoy
the notoriety very much, but the guard enjoyed it immensely, for was
he not the keeper of two hardened and desperate men?
We noticed that the majority of the women were dressed in black. Some
of them were poor, sad, spiritless-looking creatures who would make
any person sorry for them; and others I saw whose faces were as hard
as the men's. The majority of them, however, seemed to be quite
indifferent; they showed neither hostility nor friendliness to us.
We changed cars at Leer, where on the platform a drunken German
soldier lurched against us, and, seeing us tied together, offered to
lend us his knife to cut the cord, but the guard quickly frustrated
his kind intention.
At Oldenburg we were herded through the crowded station and taken out
on the road for Vehnemoor, the guard marching solemnly behind us. He
knew we had no firearms, and we were tied together, but when Ted put
his free hand in his pocket to find some chocolate, as we walked
along, the guard screamed at him in fear. He seemed to be afraid we
would in some way outwit him.
But he was quite safe from us; not that we were afraid of either him
or his gun, for I think I could have swung suddenly around on him and
got his gun away from him, while Edwards cut our cords with the knife
which was in my little package. I think he knew that we could do
this, and that is why he was so frightened.
But there was one big reason which caused us to walk quietly and
peaceably forward to take our punishment, and that was the river Ems,
with its cruel sweep of icy water and its guarded bridges. We knew it
was impossible to cross it at this season of the year, so the guard
was safe. We would not resist him, but already we were planning our
next escape when the flood had subsided and the summer had come to
warm the water.
He had a malicious spirit, this guard, and when we came to Vehnemoor
and were put in our cells, he wanted our overcoats taken from us,
although the cells were as cold as outside. The Sergeant of the guard
objected to this, and said we were not being punished, but only held
here, and therefore we should not be deprived of our coats. Several
times that night, when we stamped up and down to keep from freezing,
I thought of the guard and his desire that our coats should be taken
from us, and I wondered what sort of training or education could
produce as mean a spirit as that! Surely, I thought, he must have
been cruelly treated, to be so hard of heart--or probably he knew
that the way of promotion in the German army is to show no softness
of spirit.
But the morning came at last, and we were taken before the
Commandant, and wondered what he would have to say to us. We were
pretty sure that we had not "retained his friendship."
He did not say much to us when we were ushered into his little
office and stood before his desk. He spoke, as before, through an
interpreter. He looked thin and worried, and, as usual, the questions
were put to us--"Why did we want to leave?" "What reason had we? Was
it the food, or was it because we had to work?"
[Illustration: Friedrichsfeld Prison-Camp in Winter]
We said it was not for either of these; we wanted to regain our
freedom; we were free men, and did not want to be held in an enemy
country; besides, we were needed!
We could see the Commandant had no interest in our patriotic
emotions. He merely wanted to wash his hands of us, and when we said
it was not on account of the poor food, or having to work, I think he
breathed easier. Would we sign a paper--he asked us then--to show
this? And we said we would. So the paper was produced and we signed
it, after the interpreter had read and explained it to us.
In the cells the food was just the same as we had had before, in the
regular prison-camp. They seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of
that soup. We wondered if there was a flowing well of it somewhere in
the bog. The food was no worse, but sometimes the guards forgot us.
The whole camp seemed to be running at loose ends, and sometimes the
guards did not come near us for half a day, but we were not so badly
off as they thought, for we got in things from our friends.
On the first morning, when we were taken to the lavatory, we saw some
of the boys. They were very sorry to know we had been caught, and
told us Bromley had been sent to Oldenburg a few days before, for his
punishment. They also told us that the night we escaped, no alarm had
been given, although the guards may have noticed the hanging wires.
Several of the boys had had the notion to go when they saw the wires
down, but they were afraid of being caught. The general opinion was
that the guards knew we had gone, but did not give the alarm until
morning, because they had no desire to cross the bog at night.
Our method of getting stuff to the cell was simple. I wore my own
overcoat to the lavatory, and hung it up inside. When I went to get
it, I found another coat was hanging beside it, which I put on and
wore back to the cell. In the pocket of the "other coat" I found
things--bread, cheese, sardines, biscuits, and books. The next day I
wore the other coat, and got my own, and found its pockets equally
well supplied. It was a fellow called Iguellden, whose coat I had
on alternate days. He watched for me, and timed his visit to the
lavatory to suit me. Of course, the other boys helped him with the
contributions. Edwards was equally well supplied. In the prison-camp
the word "friend" has an active and positive quality in it which it
sometimes lacks in normal times.
On the second night in the cell I suffered from the cold, for it was
a very frosty night, and as the cells were not heated at all, they
were quite as cold as outside.
I was stamping up and down, with my overcoat buttoned up to the neck
and my hands in my pockets, trying to keep warm, when the new guard
came on at seven o'clock. He shouted something at me, which I did not
understand, but I kept on walking. Then he pounded on the wall with
the butt of his rifle, crying, "Schlafen! schlafen!"
To which I replied, "Nix schlafen!" (I can't sleep!)
I then heard the key turn in the door, and I did not know what might
be coming.
When he came in, he blew his breath in the frosty air, and asked,
"Kalt?"
I did not think he needed to take my evidence--it certainly was
"kalt."
Then he muttered something which I did not understand, and went out,
returning about twenty minutes later with a blanket which he had
taken from one of the empty beds in the _Revier_. I knew he was
running a grave risk in doing this, for it is a serious offense for
a guard to show kindness to a prisoner, and I thanked him warmly. He
told me he would have to take it away again in the morning when he
came on guard again, and I knew he did not want any of the other
guards to see it. My word of thanks he cut short by saying, "Bitte!
bitte! Ich thue es gerne" (I do it gladly); and his manner indicated
that his only regret was that he could not do more.
I thought about him that night when I sat with the blanket wrapped
around me, and I wondered about this German soldier. He evidently
belonged to the same class as the first German soldier I had met
after I was captured, who tried to bandage my shoulder when the
shells were falling around us; to the same class as good old Sank
at Giessen, who, though he could speak no English, made us feel his
kindness in a hundred ways; to the same class as the German soldier
who lifted me down from the train when on my way to Roulers. This
man was one of them, and I began to be conscious of that invisible
brotherhood which is stronger and more enduring than any tie of
nationality, for it wipes out the differences of creed or race
or geographical boundary, and supersedes them all, for it is a
brotherhood of spirit, and bears no relation to these things.
To those who belong to it I am akin, no matter where they were born
or what the color of their uniform!
Then I remembered how bitterly we resented the action of a British
Sergeant Major at Giessen, who had been appointed by the German
officer in charge to see after a working party of our boys. Working
parties were not popular--we had no desire to help the enemy--and one
little chap, the Highland bugler from Montreal, refused to go out.
The German officer was disposed to look lightly on the boy's offense,
saying he would come all right, but the British Sergeant Major
insisted that the lad be punished--and he was.
I thought of these things that night in the cell, and as I slept,
propped up in the corner, I dreamed of that glad day when the
invisible brotherhood will bind together all the world, and men will
no more go out to kill and wound and maim their fellow-men, but their
strength will be measured against sin and ignorance, disease and
poverty, and against these only will they fight, and not against each
other.
When I awakened in the morning, stiff and cramped and shivering, my
dream seemed dim and vague and far away--but it had not entirely
faded.
That day the guard who brought me soup was a new one whom I had not
seen before, and he told me he was one of the twenty-five new men who
had been sent down the night we escaped. I was anxious to ask him
many things, but I knew he dared not tell me. However, he came in and
sat down beside me, and the soup that he brought was steaming hot,
and he had taken it from the bottom of the pot, where there were
actual traces of meat and plenty of vegetables. Instead of the usual
bowlful, he had brought me a full quart, and from the recesses of his
coat he produced half a loaf of white bread--"Swiss bread" we called
it--and it was a great treat for me. I found out afterwards that Ted
had received the other half. The guard told me to keep hidden what I
did not eat then, so I knew he was breaking the rules in giving it
to me.
He sat with his gun between his knees, muzzle upwards, and while I
ate the soup he talked to me, asking me where I came from, and what
I had been doing before the war.
When I told him I had been a carpenter, he said he was a
bridge-builder of Trieste, and he said, "I wish I was back at it;
it is more to my liking to build things than to destroy them."
I said I liked my old job better than this one, too, whereupon he
broke out impatiently, "We're fools to fight each other. What spite
have you and I at each other?"
I told him we had no quarrel with the German people, but we knew the
military despotism of Germany had to be literally smashed to pieces
before there could be any peace, and, naturally enough, the German
people had to suffer for having allowed such a tyrant to exist in
their country. We were all suffering in the process, I said.
"It's money," he said, after a pause. "It is the money interests that
work against human interests every time, and all the time. The big
ones have their iron heel on our necks. They lash us with the whip
of starvation. They have controlled our education, our preachers,
government, and everything, and the reason they brought on the war is
that they were afraid of us--we were getting too strong. In the last
election we had nearly a majority, and the capitalists saw we were
going to get the upper hand, so to set back the world, they brought
on the war--to kill us off. At first we refused to fight--some of
us--but they played up the hatred of England which they have bred
in us; and they stampeded many of our people on the love of the
Fatherland. Our ranks broke; our leaders were put in jail and some
were shot; it's hard to go back on your country, too.
"But I don't believe in nationalities any more; nationalities are a
curse, and as long as we have them, the ruling class will play us
off, one against the other, to gain their own ends. There is only one
race--the human race--and only two divisions of it; there are those
who represent money rights and special privileges, and those who
stand for human rights. The more you think of it, the more you will
see the whole fabric of society resolving itself into these two
classes. The whole military system is built on the sacrifice of human
rights."
I looked at him in astonishment.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"I am just a bridge-builder," he answered, "but I'm a follower of
Liebknecht... We can't do much until the Prussian system is defeated.
There are just a few of us here--the guard who got you the blanket
is one of us. We do what we can for the prisoners; sometimes we are
caught and strafed.... There is no place for kindness in our army,"
he added sadly.
"I must go now," he said; "I heard one of the guards say we were
going to be moved on to another camp. I may not see you again, but
I'll speak to a guard I know, who will try to get the good soup for
you. The Sergeant of the guard is all right, but some of them are
devils; they are looking for promotion, and know the way to get it is
to excel in cruelty. We shall not meet, but remember, we shall win!
Germany's military power will be defeated. Russia's military power
is crumbling now, the military power of the world is going down to
defeat, but the people of all nations are going to win!"
We stood up and shook hands, and he went out, locking me in the cell
as before.
I have thought long and often of the bridge-builder of Trieste and
his vision of the victory which is coming to the world, and I, too,
can see that it is coming, not by explosions and bombardments, with
the shrieks of the wounded and the groans of the dying--not that way
will it come--but when these have passed there shall be heard a
still, small voice which will be the voice of God, and its words
shall be--
"Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!"