The Message Part 30

RUDYARD KIPLING.

The learned German, Professor Elberfeld, has told the world, in sentences of portentous length and complication, that "the petty trader's instincts which form the most typical characteristic of the British race" came notably to the fore in our treatment of the German prisoners of war who were held under military surveillance in the British ports which they had garrisoned.

The learned professor notes with bitter contempt that no wines, spirits, cigars, or "other customary delicacies" were supplied to our prisoners, and that the German officers received very little more than the rations served to their men. The professor makes no mention of one or two other pertinent facts in this connection; as, for example, that none of these "customary delicacies" were supplied to the British troops. We may endure his reproaches with the more fort.i.tude, I think, when we remember that the German Government absolutely ignored our invitation to send weekly s.h.i.+pments of supplies under a white flag for the towns they had garrisoned on British soil.

It is known that the officers in command of the German forces in England had previously maintained a very lavish and luxurious scale of living; in the same way that, since the invasion of England, extravagance was said to have reached unparallelled heights in Germany itself. But the British Government which had reached depletion of our own supplies, by a.s.sisting our prisoners to maintain a luxurious scale of living while held as hostages, would certainly have forfeited the confidence of the public, and justly so. Upon the whole, it is safe to say that German sneers at British parsimony and Puritanism may fairly be accepted as tribute, and, as such, need in no sense be resented.

As soon as we received Germany's cynical reply to Britain's demand for a complete withdrawal of all the invasion claims, it became evident that the war was to be a prolonged and bitter one, and that no further purpose could be served by the original British plan of campaign, which, as its object had been the freeing of our own soil, had been based on the a.s.sumption that the defeat and capture of the invader's forces would be sufficient. Troops had to be despatched at once to South Africa, where German overlords.h.i.+p had aroused the combined opposition of the Boers and the British. This opposition burst at once into open hostility immediately the news of England's declaration of war reached South Africa. While the Boers and the British, united in a common cause, were carrying war into German Southwest Africa, troops from German East Africa were said to have landed in Delagoa Bay, and to be advancing southward.

In all this, the British cause was well served by Germany's initial blunder; by the huge mistake which cost her four-fifths of her naval strength at a blow. This mistake in Germany's policy was distinctly traceable to one cause: the national arrogance which, since the invasion, had approached near to madness; which had now led Germany into contemptuously underrating the striking power still remaining in the British Navy. It was true that, prior to the invasion, our Navy had been consistently starved and impoverished by "The Destroyers." It was that, of course, which had first earned them their t.i.tle. But Germany herself, when she struck her great blow at England, hardly wounded the British Navy at all. Her cunning had drawn our s.h.i.+ps into a Mediterranean impa.s.se when they were sadly needed upon our coasts, and her strategy had actually destroyed one British line of battle-s.h.i.+p, one cruiser, and two gunboats. But that was the whole extent of the naval damage inflicted by her at the time of the invasion. But the lesson she gave at the same time was of incalculable value to us. The s.h.i.+ps she destroyed had been manned by practically untrained, short-handed crews, hurriedly rushed out of Portsmouth barracks. Yet German arrogance positively inspired Berlin with the impression that the Navies of the two countries had tried conclusions, and that our fleet had been proved practically ineffective.

Prior to the invasion our Navy had indeed reached a low ebb. Living always in barracks, under the pernicious system gradually forced upon the country by "The Destroyers" in the name of economy, our bluejackets had fallen steadily from their one high standard of discipline and efficiency into an incompetent, sullen, half-mutinous state, due solely to the criminal parsimony and destructive neglect of an Administration which aimed at "peace at any price," and adopted, of all means, the measures most calculated to provoke foreign attack. But, since the invasion, an indescribable spirit of emulation, a veritable fury of endeavour, had welded the British fleet into a formidable state of efficiency.

First "The Destroyers," actuated by a combination of panic and remorse, and then the first Free Government, representing the convinced feeling of the public, had lavished liberality upon the Navy since the invasion.

Increased pay, newly awakened patriotism, the general change in the spirit of the age, all had combined to fill the Admiralty recruiting offices with applicants. Almost all our s.h.i.+ps had been kept practically continuously at sea. "The Destroyers'" murderous policy in naval matters had been completely reversed, and our fleet was served by a great flotilla of magnificently armed leviathans of the Mercantile Marine, including two of the fastest steams.h.i.+ps in the world, all subsidized by Government.

We know now that exact official records of these facts were filed in the Intelligence Department at Berlin. But German arrogance prohibited their right comprehension, and Britain's declaration of war was instantly followed by an Imperial order which, in effect, divided the available strength of the German Navy into eight fleets, and despatched these to eight of the nine British ports garrisoned by German troops, with orders of almost childish simplicity. These ports were to be taken, and British insurrection crushed, ash.o.r.e and afloat.

If the German Navy had been free of its Imperial Commander-in-Chief, and of the insensate arrogance of his entourage, it could have struck a terrible blow at the British Empire, while almost the whole fighting strength of our Navy was concentrated upon the defence of England. As it was, this fine opportunity was flung aside, and with it the greater part of Germany's fleet. Divided into eight small squadrons, their s.h.i.+ps were at the mercy of our concentrated striking force. Our men fell upon them with a Berserker fury born of humiliation silently endured, and followed by eight or nine months of the finest sort of sea-training which could possibly be devised.

The few crippled s.h.i.+ps of the German fleet which survived those terrible North Sea and Channel engagements must have borne with them into their home waters a bitter lesson to the ruler whom they left, so far as effective striking power was concerned, without a Navy.

Here, again, critics have said that our tactics showed an extravagant disregard of cost, both as to men and material. But here also the hostile critics overlook various vital considerations. The destruction of Germany's sea-striking power at this juncture was worth literally anything that Britain could give; not perhaps in England's immediate interest, but in the interests of the Empire, without which England would occupy but a very insignificant place among the powers of civilization.

Then, too, the moral of our bluejackets has to be considered. Since the invasion and the sinking of the _Dreadnought_, ours had become a Navy of Berserkers. The Duty teaching, coming after the invasion, made running fire of our men's blood. They fought their s.h.i.+ps as Nelson's men fought theirs, and with the same invincible success. It was said the _Terrible's_ men positively courted the penalty of mutiny in time of war by refusing to turn in, in watches, after forty-two hours of continuous fighting. There remained work to be done, and the "Terribles" refused to leave it undone.

The commander who had lessened the weight of the blow struck by Britain's Navy, in the interests of prudence or economy, would have shown himself blind to the significance of the new spirit with which England's awakening had endowed her sons; the stern spirit of the twentieth-century faith which gave us for watchword, "For G.o.d, our Race, and Duty!"

With the major portion of our Navy still in fighting trim, and twenty-five-knot liners speeding southward laden with British troops, it speedily became evident that Germany's chance of landing further troops in South Africa was hardly worth serious consideration, now that her naval power was gone. On the other hand, it was known that the enemy had already ma.s.sed great bodies of troops in East and Southwest Africa, and it became the immediate business of the British Admiralty to see that German oversea communications should be cut off.

Further, we had to face ominous news of German preparations for aggression in the Pacific and in the near East, with persistent rumours of a hurriedly aggressive alliance with Russia for action in the Far East. The att.i.tude of Berlin itself was amazingly cynical, as it had been from the very time of the unprovoked invasion of our sh.o.r.es. In effect, the Kaiser said:

"You hold a German Army as prisoners of war, and you have destroyed my Navy; but you dare not invade my territory, and I defy you to hit upon any other means of enforcing your demands. You can do nothing further."

The British demands, made directly the German troops in England were in our hands, were, briefly, for the complete withdrawal of the whole of claims enforced by Germany at the time of the invasion.

That, then, was the position when I returned to our London headquarters from a journey I had undertaken for my chief in connection with the work of drafting large numbers of _Citizens_ back from the camps into private life. Various questions had to be placed in writing before every _Citizen_ as to his att.i.tude in the matter of possible future calls made upon his services. I had only heard of seven cases of men physically fit failing to express perfect readiness to respond to any future call for active service at home or abroad, in case of British need. Here was a s.h.i.+eld of which I knew both sides well. The thing impressed me more than I can tell, or most folk would understand nowadays. I knew so well how the G.o.d of business (which served to cover all individual pursuit of money or pleasure) would have been invoked to prove the utter impracticability of this--one short year before. I looked back toward my Fleet Street days, and I thanked G.o.d for the awakening of England, which had included my own awakening.

My return to London was a matter of considerable personal interest to me, for Constance Grey was there, having been recalled by John Crondall from her active superintendence of nursing at Portsmouth.

XVI

HANDS ACROSS THE SEA

There is a Pride whose Father is Understanding, whose Mother is Humility, whose Business is the Recognition and Discharge of Duty.

That is the true Pride.--MERROW'S _Essays of the Time_.

I was impatient to reach London, but I should have been far more impatient if I had known that Constance Grey stood waiting to meet me on the arrival platform at Waterloo.

"They told me your train at the office," she said, as I took one of her hands in both of mine, "and I could not resist coming to give you the news. Don't say you have had it!"

"No," I told her. "My best news is that Constance has come to meet me, and that I am alive to appreciate the fact very keenly. Another trifling item is that, so far as I can tell, practically every member of _The Citizens_ would respond to-morrow to a call for active service in Timbuctoo--if the call came. I tell you, Constance, this is not reform, it's revolution that has swept over England. We call our members.h.i.+p three and a half millions; it's fifty millions, really. They're all _Citizens_, every mother's son of them; and every daughter, too."

We were in a cab now.

"But what about my news?" said Constance.

"Yes, tell me, do. And isn't it magnificent about the Navy? How about those 'Terrible' fellows? Constance, do you realize how all this must strike a man who was scribbling and fiddling about disarmament a year ago? And do you realize who gave that man decent sanity?"

"Hus.h.!.+ It wasn't a person, it was a force; it was the revolution that brought the change."

"Ah, well, G.o.d bless you, Constance! I wish you'd give me the news."

"I will, directly you give me a chance to get in a word. Well, John is at Westminster, in consultation with the Foreign Office people, and nothing definite has been done yet; but the great point is, to my thinking, that the offer should ever have been made."

"Why, Constance, whatever has bewitched you? I never knew you to begin at the end of a thing before."

And indeed it was unlike Constance Grey. She was in high spirits, and somehow this little touch of illogical weakness in her struck me as being very charming. She laughed, and said it was due to my persistent interruptions. And then she gave me the news.

"America has offered to join hands with us."

"Never!"

"Yes. The most generous sort of defensive alliance, practically without conditions, and--'as long as Great Britain's present need endures.'

Isn't it splendid? John Crondall regards it as the biggest thing that has happened; but he is all against accepting the offer."

There had been vague rumours at the time of the invasion, and again, of a more pointed sort, when Britain declared war. But every one had said that the pro-German party and the ultra-American party were far too strong in the United States to permit of anything beyond expressions of good-will. But now, as I gathered from the copy of the _Evening Standard_ which Constance gave me:

"The heart of the American people has been deeply stirred by two considerations: Germany's unwarrantable insolence and arrogance, and Britain's magnificent display of patriotism, ash.o.r.e and afloat, in fighting for her independence. The patriotic struggle for independence--that is what has moved the American people to forgetfulness of all jealousies and rivalries. The rather indiscreet efforts of the German sections of the American public have undoubtedly hastened this offer, and made it more generous and unqualified. The suggestion that any foreign people could hector them out of generosity to the nation from whose loins they sprang, finally decided the American public; and it is fair to say that the President's offer of alliance is an offer from the American people to the British people."

"But how about the Monroe Doctrine?" I said to Constance, after running through the two-column telegram from Was.h.i.+ngton, of which this pa.s.sage formed part.

"I don't know about that; but you see, d.i.c.k, this thing clearly comes from the American people, not her politicians and diplomatists only.

That is what gives it its tremendous importance, I think."

"Yes; to be sure. And why does John Crondall want the offer declined?"

"Oh, he hadn't time to explain to me; but he said something about its being necessary for the new Britain to prove herself, first; our own unity and strength. 'We must prove our own Imperial British alliance first,' he said."

"I see; yes, I think I see that. But it is great news, as you say--great news."

How much John Crondall's view had to do with the Government's decision will never be known, but we know that England's deeply grateful Message pointed out that, in the opinion of his Majesty's Imperial Government, the most desirable basis for an alliance between two great nations was one of equality and mutual respect. While in the present case there could be nothing lacking in the affection and esteem in which Great Britain held the United States, yet the equality could hardly be held proven while the former Power was still at war with a nation which had invaded its territory. The Message expressed very feelingly the deep sense of grateful appreciation which animated his Majesty's Imperial Government and the British people, which would render unforgettable in this country the generous magnanimity of the American nation. And, finally, the Message expressed the hope, which was certainly felt by the entire public, that those happier circ.u.mstances which should equalize the footing of the two nations in the matter of an alliance would speedily come about.

To my thinking, our official records contain no doc.u.ment more moving or more worthy of a great nation than that Message, which, as has so frequently been pointed out, was in actual truth a Message from the people of one nation to the people of another nation--from the heart of one country to the heart of another country. The Message of thanks, no less than the generous offer itself, was an a.s.sertion of blood-kins.h.i.+p, an appeal to first principles, a revelation of the underlying racial and traditional tie which binds two great peoples together through and beneath the whole stiff robe of artificial differences which separated them upon the surface and in the world's eyes.