It is the fashion in some quarters to make out that fathers do not realise
the sacrifice made by their sons, but complacently acquiesce in it while
they sit comfortably at home over the fire. Mr. Punch has not met these
fathers. The fathers--and still more the mothers--that he knows recognise
only too well the unpayable nature of their debt.
They held, against the storms of fate,
In war's tremendous game,
A little land inviolate
Within a world of flame.
They looked on scarred and ruined lands,
On shell-wrecked fields forlorn,
And gave to us, with open hands,
Full fields of yellow corn;
The silence wrought in wood and stone
Whose aisles our fathers trod;
The pines that stand apart, alone,
Like sentinels of God.
With generous hands they paid the price,
Unconscious of the cost,
But we must gauge the sacrifice
By all that they have lost.
The joy of young adventurous ways,
Of keen and undimmed sight,
The eager tramp through sunny days,
The dreamless sleep of night,
The happy hours that come and go,
In youth's untiring quest,
They gave, because they willed it so,
With some light-hearted jest.
No lavish love of future years,
No passionate regret,
No gift of sacrifice or tears
Can ever pay the debt.
Yet if ever you try to express this indebtedness to the wonderful young men
who survive, they turn the whole thing into a jest and tell you, for
example, that only two things really interest them, "Europe and their
stomachs"--nothing in between matters.
[Illustration: PAT (examining fare): "May the divil destroy the Germans!"
SUB: "Well, they don't do you much harm, anyway. You don't get near enough
to 'em."
PAT: "Do they not, thin? Have they not kilt all the half-crown officers and
left nothing but the shillin' ones?"]
Guy Fawkes Day has come and gone without fireworks, pursuant to the Defence
of the Realm Act. Even Parliament omitted to sit. Apropos of Secret
Sessions, Lord Northcliffe has been accused of having had one all to
himself and some five hundred other gentlemen at a club luncheon. The
_Daily Mail_ describes the debate on the subject as a "gross waste of
time," which seems to come perilously near _lèse-majesté!_ But then,
as a writer in the _Evening News_--another Northcliffe paper--safely
observes, "It is the failing of many people to say what they think without
thinking."
_December, 1916_.
Rumania has unhappily given Germany the chance of a cheap and spectacular
triumph--of which, after being badly pounded on the Somme, she was sorely
in need. Here was a comparatively small nation, whom the Germans could
crush under their heel as they had crushed Belgium and Serbia. So in
Rumania they concentrated all the men they could spare from other fronts
and put them under their best generals. Their first plans were thwarted,
but eventually the big guns had their way and Bukarest fell. Then, after
the usual display of bunting and joy-bells in Berlin, was the moment to
make a noble offer of peace. The German peace overtures remind one of Mr.
Punch's correspondents of the American advertisement: "If John Robinson,
with whose wife I eloped six months ago, will take her back, all will be
forgiven."
The shadowy proposals of those who preach humanity while they practise
unrestricted frightfulness have not deceived the Allies. They know, and
have let the enemy know, that they must go on until they have made sure of
an enduring peace by reducing the Central Empires to impotence for evil.
When Mr. Asquith announced in the House on December 4 the King's approval
of Reconstruction, few Members guessed that in twenty-four hours he would
have ceased to be Prime Minister and that Mr. Lloyd George would have begun
Cabinet-making. There has been much talk of intrigue. But John Bull doesn't
care who leads the country so long as he leads it to victory. And as for
Certain People Somewhere in France, we shall probably not be far wrong in
interpreting their view of the present change as follows:
Thank God, we keep no politicians here;
Fighting's our game, not talking; all we ask
Is men and means to face the coming year
And consummate our task.
Give us the strongest leaders you can find,
Tory or Liberal, not a toss care we,
So they are swift to act and know their mind
Too well to wait and see.
[Illustration: THE RETURN OF THE MOCK TURTLE-DOVE
KAISER }
}(breathlessly): "Well?"
BETHMANN-HOLLWEG}