WILHELM: "Hang it! I _must_ go _somewhere_! I promised my people
I would."]
We have begun to think in millions. The war is costing a million a day. The
Chancellor of the Exchequer has launched a war loan of 230 millions and
doubled our income tax. The Prime Minister asks for an addition of a
million men to the Regular Army. But the country has not yet fully awakened
to the realities of war. Football clubs are concerned with the "jostling of
the ordinary patrons" by men in uniform. "Business as usual" is interpreted
as "pleasure as usual" in some quarters. Rumour is busy with stories of
mysterious prisoners in the Tower, with tales of huge guns which are to
shell us from Calais when the Germans get there; with reports (from neutral
sources) of the speedy advent of scores of Zeppelins and hundreds of
aeroplanes over London. But though
Old England's dark o' nights and short
Of 'buses: still she's much the sort
Of place we always used to know.
[Illustration: T.B.D.
OFFICER'S STEWARD: "Will you take your bath, sir, before or after
haction?"]
It is otherwise with Belgium, with its shattered homes and wrecked towns.
The great Russian legend is still going strong, in spite of the statements
of the Under-Secretary for War, and, after all, why should the Germans do
all the story telling? By the way, a "German Truth Society" has been
founded. It is pleasant to know that it is realised over there at last that
there is a difference between Truth and German Truth. The British Navy, we
learn from the _Kölnische Zeitung_, "is in hiding." But our fragrant
contemporary need not worry. In due course the Germans shall have the
hiding.
In some ways the unchanged spirit of our people is rather disconcerting.
One of Mr. Punch's young men, happening to meet a music-hall acquaintance,
asked him how he thought the war was going, and met with the answer: "Oh, I
think the managers will have to give in." And the proposal to change the
name of Berlin Road at Lewisham has been rejected by the residents.
_December, 1914_.
In less than six weeks Coronel has been avenged at the battle of the
Falkland Islands:
Hardened steel are our ships;
Gallant tars are our men;
We never are wordy
(STURDEE, boys, STURDEE!),
But quietly conquer again and again.
Here at least we can salute the vanquished. Admiral von Spee, who went down
with his doomed squadron, was a gallant and chivalrous antagonist, like
Captain Müller, of the _Emden_. Germany's retort, eight days later, by
bombarding Scarborough and Whitby, reveals the normal Hun:
Come where you will--the seas are wide;
And choose your Day--they're all alike;
You'll find us ready when we ride
In calm or storm and wait to strike;
But--if of shame your shameless Huns
Can yet retrieve some casual traces--
Please fight our men and ships and guns,
Not womenfolk and watering places.
Austria's "punitive expedition" has ended in disaster for the Austrians.
They entered Belgrade on the 2nd, and were driven out twelve days later by
the Serbs. King George has paid his first visit to the front, and made
General Foch a G.C.B. We know that the General is a great authority on
strategy, and that his name, correctly pronounced, rhymes with Boche, as
hero with Nero. He is evidently a man likely to be heard of again. Another
hitherto unfamiliar name that has cropped up is that of Herr Lissauer, who,
for writing a "Hymn of Hate" against England, has been decorated by the
Kaiser. This shows true magnanimity on the part of the Kaiser, in his
capacity of King of Prussia, since the "Hymn of Hate" turns out to be a
close adaptation of a poem composed by a Saxon patriot, in which Prussia,
not England, was held up to execration.
Kitchener's great improvisation is already bearing fruit, and the New
Armies are flocking to the support of the old. Indian troops are fighting
gallantly in three continents. King Albert "the unconquerable," in the
narrow strip of his country that still belongs to him, waits in unshaken
faith for the coming of the dawn. And as Christmas draws on the thoughts of
officers and men in the waterlogged trenches turn fondly homeward to
mothers, wives and sweethearts:
Cheer up! I'm calling far away;
And wireless you can hear.
Cheer up! You know you'd have me stay
And keep on trying day by day;
We're winning, never fear.
Christmas at least brings the children's truce, and that is something to be
thankful for, but it is not the Christmas that we knew and long for: