THE ASTOUNDING STORY OF A "MAINE CLEOPATRA" To the World She Was an Angel ••• To 8 Men She Was a Devill­ Her Father, Husbands, Sons, Lovers'

BEN AMES WILLIAMS' NEW 70G-PAGE, $2.75 Best-Sellina Novel of a "Maine Cleopatra" as evil as she was beautiful!

ENNY HAGER was so fascinating to al! men that when she was only four years Jold she caused dashing, gay-Lothario Lt. Carruthers to elope with her mother! She drove her father, Big Tim Hager, to drown himself in rum, in fear of his own unholy de­ sire for her! But as a child-bride, she brought banker Isaiah Poster a new zest for living-for all his seventy years! To Ephraim Poster, Isaiah's son, she showed her true nature more naked and shameless and merciless than death itself! For why would she taunt Eph to kill his father-then jeer at him for a coward when he accidentally caused the old man's death? Yes, she was more than a match for Ephraim, who had once boasted to his friend John Evered that "he saw a wanton in every pretty woman he met, and usually found it, too!" Eph tried to tell John the truth about Jenny. But the truth was be­ yond belief-and John, too, fell under her witch-like spell. Who wouldn't-after he had spent a bitter winter's night under a Cape Cod haystack with her? (CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE) (CONTINUED FROM OTHER PAGE) BorHTHESEB£ST-SELLERS fREE

Retail price of both In The Strange Woman you'll meet an utter­ bookss S3.'15 in the Publisher's ly amazing, human character at the heart .of 8 Edition rich, gaudy, full-bodied 'novel-and '8 character you'll: long remember. PLUSB~~R~:OO":NZOLA Including IINANAII Complete' Your second FREE volume Edna Ferber,· John Steinbeck, contains, with other Zola mas­ Vicki Baum, Nevil Shute, or terpieces, the·· famous novel Somerset Maugham -- selling which even Parisians bought everywhere for $2, $2.50, secretly, and carried home $3.00. The OTHER is the under their cloaks-the scarlet Collected Works of a great story of the harlot whom Zola writer. tookfrom the streets and made The volumes of Collected into the immortal NANAI Works are uniformly bound in PLUS the finest work of this cloth, stamped to simulate the French realist, all complete, beauty of genuine gold. They translatedfromoriginalFrench. grow into a handsome matched (Since this is a great classic for library. Other great authors your lifetime library you may whose works appear in this prefer. the edition bound in series include: Shakespeare, ~enuine pin seal grain leather. Poe, Oscar Wilde, de Maupas­ Just take your choice.) sant, etc. The Book League is the The Best ofIthe New ONLY book club that sends -And of the Old you the new best~sellers AND I!:ach month ONE of the best of the older master­ the Book League's selec­ piecesl The. TWO books sent tions is a modern best­ you each month are valued at seller by a famous au­ $3 to $4:. But you get BOTH thor like Sinclair Lewis. for only$1.39! 5·DAY TRIAL --NO OBLIGATION Send the coupon without money. Read THE STRANGE WOMAN and BEST KNOWN WORKS ORZQLA for five days. If they do not conviriceyou that thi$IS "America's Biggest Bargain Book Club," return them; pay nothing. Otherwise, keep them as a gift; your subscription will begin with next month's double-selection. And the Book League will protect you for ONE WHOLE YEAR against any rise ;~~;eT~om~~~ll~gOKo~ ~~I $~~6KMt~iG~~nb~ AMERICA, Publishers, Dept. A.M.1, Garden City, N. Y.

BOOK. LEAGUE of AMERICA, Publishers I ------Dept. A.M.1 s Garden City, N.Y. Please send me....,FREE,...-The Strange. Woman (Retail I p. .!Jrice in the publisher's edition, $2.75) and Best Known Works of Zola. Within 5 days I may return them if I care I to, without cost or obligation. Otherwise I will keep them as a gift and continue to receive forthcoming ... monthly double-selections for a year-at only $1.39, plus few cents •I postage, for BOTH books. Mr. I Mrs ·•••••••••••••••.,. Miss (Please print plainly) Address•••••••••••...•••.•.•.....•...•.•••.••••••••• •I

City••••••••••••••••••••••••...•State.•••.•.••••••• 0 • ~ Occupation•••••••• o. o.oo •••1f under 21, age please•• 00 I o HANDSOME· LEATHER BINDING: Check box if I ~~~u:~hp~o~~ara::~~: ~~~te:t:i~h ~~~ere~~~~?:::~f~~ ". only SOc extra monthly. ------(Sliehtly Bir;her in Canada-Address. 10il Bond St•• Toronto)" I THE AMERICAN MERCURY '~~~~~~~~~~~~~n~~ro~~~~ ~ VOt~F TABLE OF CONTENTS NU~:ER ~ .. January, 1943 ~~. Mistakes I Saw in the Pacific " Melvin J. Maas 5 ~ ~ A Voice In America, A Poem Matthew Biller 15 ~ Ruth Mitchell: American Chetnik, Mary Van Rensselaer Thayer 16 +~ ~. The Peoples of North Africa Edward J. Bing 24 ~ ~ STATB OF THB UNION: ~ ~ An Open Letter to Vice-President Wallace ...... •...... Eugene Lyons 31 ~ ~.. Music Between Two Wars Winthrop Sargeant 38 ~ ~ I Adopt an Ancestor, A Fable Sholem Asch 47 ~ ~ German Lies About Versailles George Creel 54 ~ ~ Two Poems•...... •...... KingsleyTufts 63 ~ San Francisco - Boom Town De Luxe Lucius Beebe 66 Enough For All!...... •...... Dorothy Thompson 75 '.. The Scandalous Silver Bloc Elliott V. Bell 80 ~ ~ You Can Pull Out Any Time, A Story Chenoweth Hall 87 ~..dI ~+ Must America Go Hungry? James Staniford 92 .~ THE THEATRE: ~ ~ Yes, We Have Some Bananas•••••••••••.•••••• •George Jean Nathan 102 ~ DOWN TO EARTH: W The Mind ofthe Wild. .•...... •...... ••...... Alan Devoe 109 ~ Woodcut by Frank Utpatel ~~ THB LIBRARY: ~ Literary Signposts ...... •...•.•...... •....•..William Y. Tindall 114 f"~ CHECK LIST ••••••••••.••••..•.••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 120 ~ ~ OPEN FORUM •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• '.' ••••••••••••••••••.• •• 122 W ~ ~::::h;: ~; ~~d' K~k~: S~a;; F~~;d~"E~i~' ~i: E;i~ 'p~~~~: ~~d' Co~~ ~

~~fJ1~~®~~~~fJ1ii®~~~ii;S;~ii fJ1~i~~~ Published monthly by The American Mercury, Inc., Mexico, and all other countries participating in the at 25 cents a copy. Annual subscription, $3.00 in U. S. International Copyright Convention and the Pan­ and possessions, and in the count.ries of the Pan American Copyright Convention. Entered as second­ American Union; $3.50 in Canada. Foreign sub­ class matter atthe post office at Concord, N. H., under scription. $4,00. Publication office, Concord, N. H. the Act of March 3, 1879. Five weeks' advance notice Editorial and General offices. 570 Lexington Avenue, required for change of subscribers' addresses. Indexed New York City. Printed in the United States. Copy­ in The Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature. The right 1942 by The American Mercury, Inc. All rights, American Mercury, Inc., accepts no responsibility for includingtranslation into other languages, reserved by submitted manuscripts. No article may be reprinted the Publisher in the United States, Great Britain, in whole or part without permission. Lawrence E. Spivak, Publisher Eugene Lyons, Editor John Tebbe!, Managing Editor; Mildred Falk, Associate Editor; J. W. Ferman, Business Manager

2 IT MAY he the "holiday season" - but war needs the wires that you used to use for Christmas calls. Long Distance lines are loaded with urgent messages. Extra lines can't be added he­ cause copper and other ma­ terials are needed for the war. So - this Christmas p1eflse don't make any Long Distance calls to war-husy centers unless they're vital. WAR CALLS COME FIRST BELL TELEPHONE SYSTEM

B WILLIAM BRADFORD HUIE THE FIGHT FOR AIRPOWER The titanic struggle against apathy and obstruction­ ists-a book that will excite the nation. $2.50

LEOPOLD SCHWARZSCHILD WORLD INTRANCE "An arresting book ••• World in Trance is one of the . first 'new histories', if not the ve~y first, to interpret the experience of our times in the light of the wisdom which weare now acquirin.9 at· such a sickening cost." -WALLACE R. DEUEL, N. Y. Times. $3.50 L. B. FI SC HER, 381 F0 U RT H A V E., N. Y. VOLUME LVI JANUARY, 1943 NUMBER 229

The American MERCURY

MISTAKES I SAW IN THE PACIFIC A Plea For Unified Command

By REPRESENTATIVE MELVIN J. MAAS

TALKED long and earnestly with and to subsist partly from captured I General MacArthur at his Aus­ Jap supplies. 1talked with many ad­ tralian headquarters; with Lieu­ mirals and generals in the Pacific tenant General George Kenney, and the views expressed in this commander ofthe Army Air Forces article are in essence the views of in the Southwest Pacific; and with most of them. Nearly all urged me Admiral Nimitz at Pearl Harbor. I to do two things when I reached was ashore with the Marines at Washington: Guadalcanal when they were forced I. Fight for the creation of a to·fight around the clock for weeks truly.unified command, and

AN AIRMAN and a colonel in the Marihe Corps Reserve, Representative Maas returned recently from four months ofactive duty in the Pacific. He was at­ tached to the naval command during the early operations at Guadalcanal and later a{:companied our troops during the Port Moresby and Milne Bay bat­ tles. Colonel Maas enlisted as a Marine private in the first World War. He has represented the Fourth Minnesota District for fourteen years, is the ranking minority member of the House Naval Affairs Committee, and he is generally regarded as among the best informed men in Congress on military matters. - THE EDITORS.

5 6 THE AMERICAN MERCURY

2. Tell the facts about our mili­ It is with a keen and uncomforta­ tary situation in the Pacific, so that ble sense of this background that J sufficient emphasis may be placed proceed, nevertheless, to argue for on this arena. more intelligent military organiza­ The two things are closely re­ tion. I do so as a matter of duty as lated. When the American people an American and as a legislator. I understand the seriousness of the feel that it would be fa tal ifwe per­ Pacific picture, they will recognize mitted victories, however impres­ that we cannot afford confusion, sive, to blind us to the need for re­ bad planning or friction over forming and perfecting our military command. machinery. Victories can be won ­ In conveying my findings in the indeed, the war can be won - de­ Pacific, I am handicapped by the spite divided commands and dis­ fact that lcannot reveal as a Con­ jointed planning. But more vic­ gressman all that I know as a Ma­ tories can be scored, their cost in rine officer. I am handicapped life and substance can be lowered, further by the fact that I am a the chance ofstaggering defeats can Republican and hence open to the be reduced, and the final knockout charge of "injecting politics into to the Axis can be hastened if we the war effort" when I criticize cur­ correct mistakes and organize our rent conditions. I tried to avoid fighting forces with a proper re­ this last handicap by deliberately gard for change. holding my main fire until after In short, we must not permit the election. good news to make'us complacent My position as a critic has been and to make our leadership smug. made more difficult by a third fac­ Now that we seem, at last, to be in tor: good news. We have landed a position to undertake offensive brilliantly in'French North Africa. action, it is more vital than ever to We have smashed a great Jap naval eliminate all paralyzing struggles armada in the Solomons. Thus it for command, to end competition can be said that our war machinery between services, and to set up must be functioning properly, and truly unified commands in Wash­ that those who dare to raise ques­ ington and in each of the main the­ tions should be ashamed of them­ atres of action. selves. It is no fun to be the sour Army generals everywhere said note in a nation-wide chorus of to me: "Help us geta supreme com­ jubilation. mander even if he has to be an ad- MISTAKES I SAW IN THE PACIFIC 7 miraL It makes little difference service, I have reported to Wash­ who he is, if only we can have a ington that the officers in the Pa­ final military authority." And cific do not regard the present admirals said to me: "We've got to setup in the capital as a truemili­ have a unified, supreme command. tary supreme command. They ,are We don't care whether he is a gen­ not,content with mere "co-ordina­ eral or an admiral, just so he is a tion" and "co-operation" of sepa­ military man. We can't run this rate and sometimes competing war on compromise forever." services, Because t~e process of When I brought these messages give-and-take, the jockeying for horne, I was told sharply that we leadership, operates! against us. have a unified command "at the Nothing less than integration of the top" and that we have a "supreme whole war effort, they feel, can do commander" in the President. I the job. That is why they want a shall be told that again when these real unified command in Washing­ words appear in print. ton and a real unified command in The fact, however, is that the the whole Pacific. Army and the Navy are run as en­ tirely separate organizations with II separate staffs and at times separate strategic plans; each of them· has its Whatever has been said in Wash­ own conception ofwar-making and ington, I can attest as one who was its own idea ofhow to win the war. on the scene and who later dis­ Our air strength remains divided cussed the facts with all the leaders among three organizations. Our involved that the movement into joint staff in Washington is at ~ot­ the Solomons was not properly tom only a committee. The best it planned; that MacArthur's com­ can hope to do is to reconcile Army plaint about its being a "Navy and Navy viewpoints and to work show" must not be lightly brushed out compromise procedures. It can­ aside; that there was a woeful and not in the nature of the case start expensive lack even of "co-opera­ from scratch -'as the German tion" and "co-ordination," let General Staff does, for instance ­ alone true unity, between the to develop over-all plans and en­ Army and the Navy; and that our force them automatically. fighting men had to make up in As a Marine officer and as an ob­ blood and sweat for errors which server of the other branches of the might have been avoided by uni-: 8 THE A11ERICAN MERCURY fied leadership and a properly co~ had to make use ofcaptured enemy ordinated plan. weapons and ammunition. They Consider this spectacle, for ex~ went through a living hell,week ample. As Navy ships were landing after week, without rest and little Marines in the Solomons, Jap air­ if any sleep. The land fighting was craft from Rabaul and New Guinea done at night, while Jap ships lay attacked continually. Now Rabaul offshore and shelled our positions. and New Guinea are in "Mac~ At dawn, the first wave of enemy Arthur's sector" and those Jap bombers came and the bombing planes should have .been an Army continued most of the day. responsibility. Why did not Mac­ These men had to stand this or­ Arthur's planes attack Rabaul and deal, unrelieved, for weeks pri­ New Guinea in sufllcient force at marily because there had not been the time of the Marine landings in proper planning. I am not blaming the Solomons? Whose timing went any of the commanders in the field. wrong? Who failed to "co~ordi­ They and their men are fighting nate" with whom? brilliantly and with magnificent Because the Jap planes were not courage. But why did not the Navy stopped· at their bases and conse­ ships rush Army forces to the scene quently swarmed over the Marine to relieve and reinforce the Ma~ landings, the Navy ships had to rines? Why were the air forces not dump the Marines and run. Sup~ combined and "co~ordinated?" plies and lives were needlessly lost. Was any time squandered in "ne­ The Marines found themselves gotiations" between separate out~ ashore with few supplies, no rein­ fits, in the absence of a final, un­ forcements and no relief. It was the questioned authority? Why was Army's job to relieve us, because there not, from the beginning, the Navy's supply ofground troops a combined plan of operations is limited. But the Army has no against the Japanese in the entire ships, and besides, the Solomons sector - a plan which took the action was considered a "Navy Army, the Navy, the Marines, the show." several air forces, everything avai1~ I am not repeating hearsay. I was able into consideration, under a there, among the landed Marines. commander with power to use all For a month on Guadalcanal they these factors as needed? were obliged to live on captured I am simply trying to state from Jap food. To hold their own they facts which I have, without going MISTAKES I SAW IN THE PACIFIC 9 into detail, that there was not a negotiate for Army divisions to proper plan. In the light of the relieve and supplement its Marines. Solomons action, I am convinced Air strength is in a hopelessly that those ofus who have the power divided condition. to create a unified command but When a problem of ships and fail to do so will have to accept the divisions and planes arises in the blame for any recurrence of this Pacific, it must be referred to situation. My conviction in this Washington. Here the matter is respect is not shaken by the great referred to a group which remains naval victory in the Solomons sub­ essentially a committee, even sequently. We must not let that though we call it a joint staff. victory veil fundamental facts. For Every member on the committee four months, we have been figh ting but one, the President's man, rep" to hold one important beach-head resen ts~his particular service and a in the Solomons. While we might settlement l normally represents a have been fighting offensively long compromise between conflicting ago, we have been struggling des­ service viewpoints. If there is no perately to hold that beach-head settlement, the problem is dumped and we have lost a good-sized fleet on the lap of the Chief Executive. in the effort. The whole affair is as likely as not The difficulties responsible for to end in a compromise, which is this picture ·are inherent in the scarcely a satisfactory basis for divided setup in Washington and military achievement. in· the Pacific. We have negotiation There is no High Command, in and bargaining where we should the military sense, either for our have clear-cut orders. own forces or for the forces of the The Army has no ships. The United Nations. We are trying to Navy has no troops. There is no win the war by committee and one who has both elements, and negotiation. We will win notwith­ everything else ·necessary for a standing, but that is no excuse for modern offensi've, at his instant dis­ not fighting in the most organized posal.· If the Army plans to move a and effective manner. given number ofdivisions to a new position across water, it must ne­ III gotiate for transports and for supply ships. If the Navy considers Let us look at the results of twelve an offensive operation, it must months of separate planning and 10 THE AMERICAN MERCURY divided authority in the Pacific. In the Macassar Straits and Java Our people must come to a realiza':' Sea engagements, the Allied fleet tion of what we are up against, in was hopelessly outgunned and out­ order that they may not succumb maneuvered by the Japs. In this to soporific optimism under the instance, our naval men antici­ influence of good news. pated this condition but were The Jap attack at Pearl Harbor honor-bound to support the Dutch. put our Pacific Fleet out of effec­ In Coral Sea and off Midway Is­ tive action during the months in land, the Jap fleet for the first time which Japan conquered her new met its master, in the form of empire. Though we have been American air power. Our losses able to put most of the ships back were severe and the victories were into service, the enemy had the purely defensive, in that they edge on us during the months stopped further advances by the when salvage and repair work was enemy. under way. Reckoned in terms of As to the Solomons, I have al­ "'that it will cost us to drive the ready indicated the confusion and Japs from the conquered terri­ lack of co-ordination in the initial tories, Pearl Ha(bor ",ras the great­ stages. The later engagement in est military disaster in our history. which· we lost four heavy cruisers The role played by divided com­ can be.charged to negligence and mand in that tragedy is by this to divided responsibility. Our force time well known. was warned during the afternoon The Doolittle raid on Tokyo that three Jap cruisers' were ap­ confused and misled our people. proaching at a speed of fifteen Americans justly asked, "If we can knots. Our commander did not so easily bomb Japan, without loss believe the three enemy warships of men or planes, why don't we would dare attack our much larger have more such raids?" Only after force, and even if they dared, they long delay did they begin to com­ would not come within range until prehend that the operation was the following morning. But the staged for psychological effect only, Japs increased their speed,executed that it was a "stunt." The planes a daring maneuver, and within carried no demolition bombs­ eight minutes, our four cruisers had only fire bombs - and the price been hit mortally and the attackers paid, especially in planes lost, "vas were gone. exceedingly heavy. Now why do I insist that this MISTAKES I SAW IN THE PACIFIC II tragic mistake be recognized since We must recognize this general it cannot be undone? Because an condition and not permit our heads effort has been made to "alibi" this to be turned by the self-evident disaster. We have been told that it gallantry of our forces and occa­ was necessary to sacrifice these sional victories. Then we will rec­ ships in order to protect our trans,­ ognize, also, that we' still need the ports; that by resisting the Taps, kind of unified planning and au" these ships saved our landing party thority which will enable us to take from attack. None of this is true~ the offensive with the greatest Because the Japs were so heavily chance of success. Not all of our outnumbered, they obviously had failures in the Pacific can be attrib­ no intention of pressing the attack uted to divided authority. But and reaching our transports", They the one certainty is that, to retrieve planned a hit-and-run engagement those failures, we must overcome - and they pulled" it off. I~elieve the fearful handicaps involved in it is safer for us to admit this and be the present military setup. on guard against recurrence than to Japan has already won substan­ pretend that we were not asleep. tially what she was after, ifshe can Thus, after a year offighting, we hold what she now has, She is vul­ must face up to an unpleasant ac­ nerable; she has been ,wounded counting in the Pacific. The re­ badly, The possibilities opened up markable courage of our men at by these factors must be exploited, Guadalcanal has enabled us to which means that'the necessity for maintain a foothold in the Solo­ centralized authority and unequiv­ mons. The latest naval engagement ocal planning is gteater than ever. has been a significant victory in Remember that the new Jap em­ that it cut sharply into the enemy's pire is almost self-contained. It is naval strength. But it was primarily all within protected lines, radiating a defensive victory. 'The Coral Sea from Tokyo through the entire and Midway victories were also ofa empire. -The Nipponese are fever" defensive nature. The brilliant Doo­ ishly converting tin, rubber, oil, little raid was a psychological action, iron and aluminum into weapons. without strategic purpose. Thereal­ If they are permitted,to build up istic fact is that the offensive has war production with their vast new been held consistently by the Japs, labor supply while holding present who have grabbed a fabulous em­ lines, we may never be able to out­ pire and are now consolidating it. prodlice them. 12 THE AMERICAN MERCURY

What I have seen in the Pacific split three ways~ The trouble with convinces me that we must not the planning boards as now con­ regard Japan as a secondary threat stituted - including the joint staff duriJ;lg 1943. By treating the Pacific - is that the various members are as a "holding point," while we there in the first place as represen­ defeat Hitler, we play right into tatives oftheir branches of the serv­ Japan's hands. It would be precisely ice. They are charged with the re­ the respite the Nipponese want, sponsibility of presenting to the since their strategy is simply to joint group the views and conten­ hold what they have conquered. tions and honest strategic obses­ If permitted to do so, Japan will sions of the planning boards of the have won its war. We must reform Army or the Navy. That is why our lines - especially in terms of they add up to a "committee" unified command - for a big rather than a true General Staff or Pacific job. High Command. Only Admiral Leahy, in the present setup, is re­ IV lieved ofdirect responsibility to his service, but that is not sufficient to The first realization that came to convert a committee into a .High me during my service in the Pacific Command. I know full well about was the absolute necessity for per­ the Joint Chiefs of Staff (of our fect timing and teamwork among Army and Navy) and the Com­ all our arms, even in the smallest bined Chiefs ofStaff (of the United operation. There is no place for the Nations) and their "co-ordina­ Army to maneuver independently, tion." The fact remains that there for the Navy to stage any separate is no joint elaboration of a single "shows," or for any of the several plan, but a continuous process of air arms to monopolize any action. reconciling plans made separately, Modern warfare is one operation, with compromise procedures as the demanding one plan, one supreme inevitable consequence. staff, one supreme commander, one A proper planning agency, I integrated effort. believe, would be composed of In Washington" we now have officers who do not owe an account­ two separate ·planning agencies­ ing to any particular branch of the the' Army and the Navy. In the total services, being responsible Pacific, we have two separate plan­ only to the President. An admiral ning agencies, with air strength would not represent the Navy or MISTAKES I SAW IN THE PACIFIC be under compulsion to fight for tional aims in war, but not to take the Navy plan or viewpoint. He personal charge of the military would merelycontribute his special strategy and field tactics in carry­ knowledge in evolving a proper ing out those broad aims. over~al1 plan for victory - and The same system ofunified com­ similarly with ground generals and mand, independent. of the indi­ air generals. vidual services, must be extended At the head of this High Com­ to the.various theatres of conflict. mand, I would place a supreme Thus the operations front in the chief- the one man charged with Pacific would be commanded. by a final decision and the military replica of the supreme staff in commander of all the forces. Per­ Washington. It would have a single sonally, I believe that under mod­ commander for the Pacific, com­ ern conditions this man should be pletely responsible· for the imple­ an airman trained in the other serv­ menting of the grand strategy. It ices, if possible. We have a number would have direct access to all of officers fully capable of exercis­ available forces without negotiat­ ing such responsibility; General ing with the individual services. Kenney, General Harmon, General Whenever it planned to move a ' Andrews, Admiral King, Admiral division to a certain point, the staff Nimitz, Admiral Halsey are.a few would have the authority to assign byway ofindication. This supreme the necessary ships and aircraft. military man, naturally, would be Whenever a naval action required subject to removal by the Presi­ support of ground troops, the sup­ dent; but he would have unabridged port should be assigned. There authority and the advice of an in­ would be no more Navy "shows" dependent group ofs'trategic think­ or Army "shows," because there ers while in command. would be only one.process of plan~ The President, under the Con­ ning. The supreme command stitution, is the Commander-in­ would issue the orders and the Chief of the Army and the Navy, officers of the various units­ but it certainly was not intended whether Navy, Army, Marine, or that a. civilian without military Aviation - would carry out the training should direct the actual tactical operations. military operations of our armed As for our air power, it should by forces. His responsibility is to de­ this time be obvious to everyone termine and define the broad na- that it must all be united and given THE AMERICAN MERCURY

the status of astrategic (as against administrative autonomy as is con­ a merely accessory) weapon. There sistent with unified utilization of is no reason under the sun why the the entire military potential by a Army, Navy and Marine Corps supreme General Staff under a su­ should each have its separate land­ preme military commander. Our based air facilities and· personnel. war schools and colleges would then The aircraft carrier, of course, is an train our officers in the single sci­ intermediary form that must re­ ence ofmaking war with all modern main with the Navy. But all ofour appliances, with provisions for spe­ land-based aviation should be uni­ cialization in handling specific weap­ fied and made an integral part of ons like ground forces, tanks, avia­ the unified war machine, on a par tion, naval forces, and so on. with strategic arms like the Army This may sound complicated and the Navy. because of its simplicity, but I am As soon as we can effect the convinced we must come to it. In change, indeed, I believe we should present-day warfare, the functions do away with the Army, Navy, of the various weapons are so inte­ Marines and Air Force as such, and grated that separation makes no place them all within the frame­ sense. There has been a revolution work ofa single organization of the in war-making and we cannot ex­ American armed forces. Within pect to win without a correspond­ . this framework, the various strate­ ing revolution in the military gic weapons would have as much setup.

"I will not}lee like the Kaiser . ..." A VOICE IN AMERICA

A SOUND is made within America to lift fl. above her wooded Appalachian, to thread her secret web of myriad cities and echo western plains and eastern rivers; a sound to touch Sierra's snow and stir the fruit of Shenandoah and Turlock orchards: a voice whose heart has eaten ashes in the dark because America cries against the crib. A voice tensioned with waiting will arise And rub against this wilderness of lost Americans; and wander through the maze of Tennessee and Kansas, through the streets of Denver and Manhattan; through shafts of ship and factory, through lash of truck and locomotive, through whirr ofpress and whang ofhammer, and burn a promise on the sky with hope and passion • and yearn against this unsure continent, and feed it mother's milk, and haunch above its hapless form till bones contour, and hands get strength, and eyes conceive the eyes and shapes of brothers; and needs and wisdoms work together. To house and shop, to men at rest and men at industry this voice will come, driving before its presence common enemies of all men in this lapd ... oppression, greed, and treachery to innocence and truth ... to die before a common wall- before the face where dignity has been with-held; before the American voice of unimportant people saying: "People are important!" A voice is waking from the cradle of America • sighing •.• yearning .•. straining at the shape ofwords beyond the muttering of growth and hunger ..• rising above the hedge of class and custom . crying: "In the wilderness and mercy ... in the wilderness and justice and the hearts of people is a mighty nation made." -'- MATTHEW BILLER 15 ~ General"Billy" Mitchell's si~ter escaped Hitler'sfiring squad.

RUTH MITCHELL: AMERICANCHETNIK

By MARY VAN RENSSELAER THAYER

HEN the Nazi armies smashed turned into a permanent VlSlt. W through France in the spring King Zog liked her work so much of 1940, Ruth Mitchell was living that he asked her to stay and make in the small Montenegrin town of an illustrated guidebook for the Cetinje. A few months later, this Albanian government. Ruth be­ younger sister of the late General came enamored ofthe Balkan coun­ "Billy" Mitchell was a sworn mem­ tries, lived in a house on the Adri­ ber of Yugoslavia's fighting Chet­ atic and decided to spend the rest niks - a lone American woman of her life in Yugoslavia. In that among a band of guerilla patriots, peninsula of political intrigue, it her life pledged to the cause of was beyond Balkan comprehension Serbian freedom. Ultimately, the that an attractive woman, with a Axis invaders caught up with her, generous income, should live alone and like thousands of her fellow and spend her time in the study of "spies," she was trapped in the jaws native folklore. She was arrested of a Nazi court-martial. Only by countless times,accused in turn of the slimmest miracle is she safely being a British, Greek, Soviet, and back in America today, instead of Yugoslav spy. mouldering in a Balkan grave. Fortunately, Ruth Mitchell had A fateful chain ofevents plunged made many friends. Time and Ruth Mitchell into this fantastic again she was saved from expulsion adventure. She had come to the by Sava Medich, a six-foot-four Balkans several years previously to Montenegrin flying officer. Medich photograph King Zog's wedding had been speaker of the Yugoslav for a London newspaper. The as­ congress before its abolishment by signment had grown out ofan ama­ King Alexander. Though Ruth was teur interest in photography, and not immediately aware of it, was more in the nature of alark Medich was one of a handful of than a professional job. What be­ Montenegrin officers planning the gan as a two-week trip, however, cO'up d'etat to exile Regent Prince 16 RUTH MITCF£ELL: AMERICAN CHETNIK 17 Paul and place young King Peter II and rifles as carefully as the pieces in power. Like all Serbs, Montene­ of a jig-saw puzzle. grins, and South Slavs, he and his Ruth Mitchell was s\vorn in by companions were rabid1y anti­ Kosta Pechanetz, a seasoned leader Nazi, considering any Axis co­ who asked her to be staff liaison operation as a national dishonor. officer. Out of consideration for When France fell, Medich knew Ruth's American citizenship, the thathis country would soon be at complicated Chetnik oath was war. As Ruth spoke French and pared. No allegiance to the Yugo­ German perfectly and enough slav king was asked, but she swore Serbian to travel throughout the to defend Serbian liberty to her country, he felt that she c&uld be death. On the table in front of her useful in many ways, and asked her were the implements of initiation, to h~lp. By this time Ruth had a a dagger and revolver. High in. a house in Belgrade, where she had corner was a skull and crossbones become intensely interested in the which, she learned, were those of a Chetnik organization. Amused at young Chetnik. His mother, un­ her enthusiasm, Medich laughingly kno~ling, came to the office daily to suggested she join. To his amaze­ inquire about her son. ment, she didI Ruth thus became the only for­ The Chetniks are a typically eign, though not the only female, Serbian organization. Guerilla rev­ member of the Chetniks. ·She was olutionaries, they came into being not outstandingly conspicuous, for centuries ago to fight for Serbian a number of Serbian women are freedom. Until the last war ended, also in the organization. Her first they battled relentlessly - first assignment was to communicate against the Turks, then the Aus­ with the British army, then on trians. Now they are figh ting its way to Macedonia. She never again, with old..,time fervor, against started. The Nazis, cutting through the greatest oppressor in their his­ Bulgaria, joined the Italians in tory. The Chetniks have no regular Albania and penned the small Brit­ equipment, and serve withoutpay. ish force in Salonika. On the morn­ They provide their own food, often ing of March 25, 194 I, the Yugo­ their own ammunition. Today am­ slav delegates, headed by Premier munition is a problem for, like Svetkovich, signed the Nazi non­ their guns, most of it has been aggression pact in Berlin. Gestapo captured. They must match bullets men moved into Belgrade's Astoria 18 THE AMERICAN MERCURY Hotel, taking over the post. office she got ready to board a small shi·p and radio. Two days later, how­ which was to sail south secretly be­ ever, the coup d'etat was effected, fore dawn. A few hours ofdaylight and Belgrade went wild. A thou­ remained. To celebrate her im­ sandChetnik comrades, with Ruth pending departure, Ruth took a among them, paraded before the last swim. Still feeling jubilant king, singing the national anthem. upon returning to her pension, she Their jubilation was short-lived. started to dance. Her shadow, cast Without warning, the Nazis bombed by the setting sun, dipped and Belgrade on Palm Sunday, April 6. swayed along the wall of the empty Explosions shattered the windows bar. Suddenly, another shadow ofRuth's house, hundr~ds lay dead joined 'hers. She stared, until the or dying in the streets. A great othershadow touchedhershadowon exodus from Belgrade began. Ruth the shoulder and spoke in German. crammed a few necessities into a She was wearing slacks; her bath­ sleeping bag, strapped it to her ing suit was slung over her shoul­ back and started off afoot. Penni­ der. The German allowed her to less, she made her way to Uzic, change her clothes. The concession where the American consul lent her saved her life, because it enabled some money. Then she struck to­ her to conceal her Chetnik pass ward the coast to get between the and don citizen's attire. Neverthe­ German and Italian armies. Her less, she was taken to a filthy plan was to lie low for a few weeks, prison, where she spent the night then double back to Podgorica herded with drunks and prosti­ with any information she could tutes. In the morning she was gather. It took her ten long days to whisked away to another foul jail reach Dubrovnik, a se~side resort in Sarajevo. Then she was switched she knew well. Here she felt safe. to Belgrade. She was forbidden to The local curio dealers, from whom communicate with anyone. Since she had often made large pur" the Nazis never dared place -her chases, proved useful friends. name on the prison list, Ruth The day after her arrival, the Mitchell simply vanished. Italians moved in, and with them came Dietrich, Nazi Gestapo chief. II It was now or never for Ruth to escape. With a passport obtained 'Apparently in a hopeless trap, from a naive Italian commandant, Ruth Mitchell did not despair. She RUTH MITCHELL: AMERICAN CHETNIK drew on the courage and inventive­ The world was her home. At six­ ness inherited from a fighting teen, she visited her brother Billy family, an inheritance derived from in the Philippines and familiarized men like her elder brother, Gen­ herselfwith many ofthe lonely out­ eral "Billy" Mitchell, who sacri­ posts recently in the headlines. ficed his career for the cause of air Later, she met her first husband in power; and like her grandfather, Sicily, where her parents had leased Alexander Mitchell, a pioneer 'who the Taormina house of Robert established Chicago's first bank and Hichens. The newlyweds moved to then rode northward to Milwaukee England and lived there through on a white horse, his fortune tied 'the first World War. Two children up in a bag of jingling gold coins were born: a son, John, an RAF hung from. the saddle. pilot who was killed a year ago over Ruth's father and mother were Libya, and a daughter. After the cast in the traditional Mitchell war, her life became a succession mold. Her father, John Landrum of adventures - slipping off on Mitchell, had been an outstanding yachts, whisking over the Conti­ liberal senator from Wisconsin nent, dawdling at castles and re­ whose pet projects were the forty­ mote islands. hour week and the anti-injunction In between junkets, Ruth made law. He married a woman six feet two unusual educational experi­ tall who sat so rigidly upright she ments. She transformed the coach never touched the back of her chair, house at Chiddingfold Manor, her and who ran her household with English country place, into a minia­ military precision. Notables flocked ture theatre where some two hun­ to the parties she gave at the fani, dred neighboring children made ily's huge marble residence in Wash­ costumes, painted scenery and ington. Red-haired, freckled Ruth acted in plays which she wrote for consequently grew up on friendly them. Newspapers praised the pro­ terms with such public figures as ductions and the Chiddingfold President McKinley, and enjoyed Players became famous. The second the further advantage of extensive experiment evolved from her love -travel. She learned perfect German of travel. Hoping to share experi­ in four years spent at a school neat ences with her children and their Hannover, became an expert horse­ friends, she started a magazine woman, studied until she was com­ called Friendship, privately printed petent on the .violin and lute. at first and full of travel stories 20 THE AMERICAN MERCURY which she wrote herself. Within preliminary stills. To everyone's three years, this publication had surprise but her own, she proved fifty thousand subscribers and a list to be a camera genius. Portraits of ofnoted contributors. Letters from children, peasants and horses were young readers asking if they could exhibited immediately at Self­ actually take the trips they read ridge'S. De Valera, on one of his about became so numerous that rare London trips, spent many Ruth created a travel bureau, hours looking at the Mitchell "The Young Adventurers," on a photographs. Newspapers and mag­ pattern now followed by the azines sought the Mitchell talents. youth hostels. The footloose young­ The London Illustrated News beat sters were able to ramble over its competitors and sent Ruth to Germany, Belgium and France, Albania to photograph King Zog's spending their nights in old castles wedding. This assignment set the provided by the various govern­ stage for the Chetnik phase of her ments. career, because it sent her off on a Married again, to an English ramble through small Balkan vil­ schoolmaster, Ruth worked stead­ lages, listening to the half-mythical ily without vacation for the next tales of Serbian heroism. four years, enabling more than Thus began the chain of events seven thousand children to take which eventually landed Ruth Young Adventurer trips. It was a Mitchell, Chetnik, in a 'Belgrade rewarding experiment in interna­ prison cell, where she endured a tionaI friendship, she discovered, thirteen-month ordeal of torture. but the bureau came to an end She slept on straw in a prison cell with Hitler's rise to power. The packed with twenty other women, Nazis wanted their children to stay breathing air poisoned by stifling home and make no comparisons heat and sewage odors. with the Fatherland. The Fuhrer To keep her faculties alert, Ruth liquidated the Young Adventurers hid a scrap of pencil and wrote a with flattering promptness. diary on sheets of, toilet paper Ruth sought a new outlet for her which she had saved from her knap­ energies. She determined to make sack sleeping bag. Eventually, she a moving picture of Irish children, stitched the diary into the shoulder and although she knew nothing of padding of her dress and smuggled photography, rented a pre-focused it out. Her fellow prisoners were a Leica and began to take a series of strange assortment~ A plump, el- RUTH MITCHELL: AMERICAN CHETNIK 21

derly Jewess, whose Christian hus­ prison, she asked the accompanying band owned the largest stocking Nazi officer what the great German factory in Yugoslavia, had been Reich gained by torturing one jailed merely because of her race. small, insignificant girl.. "Little A Serbian streetwalker stood of kittens can scratch, too," he re­ nights at the barred cell door, and plied. Glancing at his watch, he kissed the guards so that theyinight added: "But she can't scratch any blow cigarette smoke into her more - Zora was hanged about an . mouth. There was also Flora Sands, hour ago." an old Englishwoman who had served years in the Serbian cavalry. III Before her Serbian husband was

shot, the Nazis allowed the two Ruth was twice court-martialed j crumpled figures to say farewell on within a few weeks ofher imprison­ a corridor bench. And then there ment in Belgrade. The second was the woman who had betrayed farcical trial lasted four days. In a her husband to save her children. small room, she faced her judges ­ Slowly going mad, she sang Serbian three. brutal Germans who seemed, love songs in a beautiful, mellow as she later put it, a caricature VOIce. ofall Nazi officers. She faced them Ruth witnessed the tragic last alone, without legal aid of any days of Zora, a delicate young kind. Stacked on the table was her violinist who had belonged to a dossier, page after page ofit. The Serbian secret societyand had been judges were arrogaI?-tly proud of assigned to toss a bottle ofgasoline this document, and wanted merely into an automobile standing in to corroborate the facts rather than front of Nazi headquarters. Zora elicit new information. They told was caught and tortured, not for her where she had been to school, her offense but because the Nazis where she had traveled, when she wanted her to betray her Jewish was married. "You have a son and lover. Daily beatings failed to move daughter," they.said. "Where are the girl and at last the Germans they?" And scarcely listening to took her home, offering to free her her reply, "in America," they if she would disclose her lover's passed to the next question. Fortu­ hiding place. Zora was back in nately, the Gestapo never sus­ prison within an hour. Soon after, pected that her son was in the when Ruth was en route to another RAF. After many more questions, 22 THE AMERICAN MERCURY the ranking officer said coldly: enabled outside help to reach her. "The evidence is closed I" Though the Nazis did not exe­ Naturally, Ruth had been pre­ cute Ruth, they showed no inclina­ judged. She was to be shot, after tion to free her. She was hurried all. Suddenly an idea flashed into from prison to prison, obviously to her mind: Germany and America prevent her from making friends were not yet at war. Ruth held an and finding out too much. Graz, American passport. The Germans the next stop, was no wartime wanted to keep America neutral at makeshift. It was a real prison,,, any cost. Playing a hunch, she said gray and cold, with the barred win­ calmly in German: "If anything dows high above the floor. Each happens to me, many German prisoner had a narrow cot, two thin women will weepl" Startled, the blankets and a straw pillow. The officers asked her what she meant. cell was cleaned by Polish women Amazed at her own audacity, Ruth prisoners, many of them epileptics, replied that Senator Byrd, one of who were crowded into separate, the leading Americans then making dirty cells. There was almost noth­ every effort to keep the United ing to do, and only after constant States out of war, was her brother.. pleading was she allowed to retain in-law. Naturally, she intimated, it the knitting wool and needles which would be a severe jolt not only to a friend had rescued from her Bel­ Senator Byrd, but to American grade house. Like Penelope, Ruth public opinion, ifshe were harmed. kp.it and ripped out her sweater The officers listened solemnly and seven times. held a hurried consultation. Then From Graz she was shipped to they announced that the evidence Salzburg, filthiest of all jails in her would be reconsidered in Berlin. varied experience. Then came Vi­ Ruth knew she was saved. enna, Munich, and finally the great By the merest coincidence, a Nazi internment camp at Liebe­ Serbian acquaintance caught a nau, near the Swiss frontier. Origi­ glimpse of Ruth as she was being nally an enormous institution for returned from the court-martial. the insane, run by nuns, five. hun­ It so happened that the American dred of its inmates had been killed vice-consul was then on the eve of by the Nazis to make room for a his departure from Belgrade. The thousand English and American Serbian informed the vice-consul war internees. Some of the milder ofRuth's plight and this lucky shot cases, including a number of luna- RUTH MITCHELL: AMERICAN CHETNIK 23 tic children, still roamed the Ruth found additional' proof to grounds. support her expectation ofGerman Through the Swiss Legation, collapse. Outside the prison, new Ruth first heard rumors of release. recruits were training - a sickly She almost regretted leaving, for lot of boys, underfed and pimply. she ~anted to stay and see with her They had portable barricades, they own eyes the internal collapse of crouched with guns~ dodging from Germany which she feels is fast ap­ shelter to shelter. From their offi- proaching. But her family and cers' commands, Ruth was able friends had at last worked the mira­ to surmise that all· this was cle. With seven Americans she left preparation for handling civilian for Berlin. There they were kept mobs. on the stadon platform waiting for The next morning, with only a the Drottningholm passengers to as­ guard between them, Ruth and her semble. As a last torture, the news companions were put on the Lis­ was whispered that Liebenau pris­ bon train. She had been more than oners were not to sail after alL a year in prison, hounded by the That night all eight from Liebenau most fiendish gaolers in history. were escorted to a prison in Luck, Mitchell courage and quick Spandau, a Berlin suburb. Here wit had seen her through.

~James, er • •• one question: How would you live on $25,000 a year?" ~ Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya­ a kaleidoscope ofraces and customs.

THE PEOPLES OF NORTH AFRICA

By EDWARD J. BING

HE American military and dip­ Arabic at all. Furthermore, the Tlomatic coup in North Africa Berbers themselves are not a homo­ brings hundreds of thousands of geneous people. They include dif­ American boys in contactwith mil­ ferent ethnic and lingual groups. lions of the most colorful people on Many of them are white, even earth. It suddenly brings within the blond. These are probably de­ sphere of America's daily interest a scendants of the Germanic Vandals region of scrambled ethnic groups, who overran Spain and North Africa strange ways of life, and overlap­ in the fourth and fifth centuries, ping civilizations. Seldom, indeed, sacked Rome in 455 A.D., and whose has history brought together two ruthless destruction of the treas­ worlds more sharply contrasted ures ofart and literature gave a new than the one represented by the word to our language. The other American soldiers and sailors and important element in the Berbers that of the fanatically orthodox is Hamitic and indigenous to North Mohammedans inhabiting this area. Africa. Most of them have retained Nothing could be more mislead­ their age-old tribal forms and habits. ing than to refer to North Africa as The Berbers are fierce fighters part of the "Arab" ·world. In Mo­ and gun-running has never stopped rocco, westernmost of the five in these regions. Ever since the countries of North Africa, there is French took possession· of Morocco hardly a handful of pure Arabs. The people ofCasablanca and other cities and of the plains have adopted the Arabic language along with the Moslem faith. But ethnically they are Berbers, who call themselves Imaziren. More than half of the country's five million people speak various Berber dialects and no THE PEOPLES OF .NORTH AFRICA and made it a Protectorate in 1912, Typical of the powerful Mo-­ they have had to assert their au'" roccan native chiefs is Mohammed thority by force of arms. Between £1 G1aoui, Pasha of Marrakech, 1918 and 1923, they fought the hereditary feudal lord of the fierce Berber tribes inside Morocco on warrior tribes of the Atlas moun-­ four fronts.. The last independent tains. He is a constant headache· to Berber tribes\ were subdued as re'" the French. A word from him can centlyas 1934. Even today, peace mean a bloody uprising in the re-­ is.a fragile thing in the remote re'" motest regions of the mountains. gions of the Atlas mountains. The The ribbon of the Legion ofHonor, country is dotted with modern big financial subsidies, and other French fortifications and with many means of "pacification" have been ancient, native forts called kasbahs. used by the French to keep El Many of these actually show ele... Glaoui in an amiable mood. ments of Babylonian architecture, Some idea of the power over life which the Mohammedan conquer... and death wielded by such a man ors·. of Morocco transplanted there may be gathered from the tragic byway of southern Arabia. story told me by a French friend These remnants ofa very ancient who was the guest of £1 Glaoui past extend to the social aspects of at the city palace in Marrakech, Moroccan life. While the French where he lives with great pomp. women of the large French popula'" As is customary during a visit to a tions of Rabat and Casablanca vie Mohammedan of the old school, with their Parisian sisters in sport... the guest was served Turkish ing the latest creations· of fashion, coffee. The young colored slave the native women of the country who carried the tray slipped and still wear the large, opaque veil and spilled coffee over my friend. In the wide, shapeless robe of medieval eyes ofthe Pasha, this was a terrible Moslem tradition. Though the late insult to the guest, whose person Marshal Lyautey did much to mod... is sacred to the host. His face flushed ernize the country, the French with suppressed rage, he apologized, authorities still have to shut their then clapped his hands to call a eyes to practices they cannot ap-­ servant. He. whispered something prove in order to humor some dan-­ to the head servantwho had rushed gerously powerful native chief. In into the room. The next day my some of the remote parts of Mo-­ friend heard to his horror that the rocco slavery still flourishes. . young slave had been beheaded! THE AMERICAN MERCURY

II four regiments of men who are asked no questions when they en­ Algeria, east ofMoroccoand largest list and who have helped Republi­ of the North African countries, is can France to score great military far more advanced in westerncivi­ victories. The permanent presence lization. Though the native popula­ of strong units of the Foreign Le­ tion is strictly orthodox Moslem, gion in Algeria is a military neces­ more than a hundred years of sity because, in contrast with the French rule have made their mark northern part of the country, the on every aspect of the country's far south has never been com­ life. The one million Europeans pletely pacified. The Saharan re­ and the five million natives live in gion is dotted with picturesque peace in such flourishing cities· as Iittle forts, inside which a handful Algiers, Oran and Constantine, but of French soldiers is constantly on they live separately. the lookout for hostile natives. In Algiers, which is typical ofthe The Tuareg tribesmen are fa­ major cities, two worlds lie side by mous as fierce fighters and also for side within the city limits. There is some unique customs. Ethnically, the modern European quarter with they are a branch of the Berbers. its beautiful Boulevard de la Re­ They inhabit a territory bound by publique, which skirts the sea front the Hoggar mountains of southern and vies with the avenues of Paris Algeria on the north, by Nigeria to for elegance, and there is also the the south, Timbuctoo in the west, famed Kasbah, the native quarter, and the so-called Fezzan in the east. a maze of narrow, dark, crooked, Both men and women are tall and dirty streets and blind alleys. The strong with fine, intelligent fea­ Kasbah, perched atop a five hun­ tures, a very light complexion, and dred foot hill overlooking the port, dark, wavy hair. The women are is also the haunt of the native and sometimes very beautiful. Their French underworld of Algiers. status of complete equality with The denizens of the labyrinthine the men is a startling reversal of Kasbah seem to be hiding from the Moslem practice. It is the men who present. But in Sidi-Bel-Abbes, south wear veils, not the women. They of Oran, are those who seek to hide don't call themselves "Tuareg", from the past - their own private which is Arabic, but Kel Tagilmus past. It is headquarters of the no­ - "the people of the veil," to de­ torious Foreign Legion, with its note the age-old habit of the Tuareg THE PEOPLES OF NORTH AFRICA 27 warrior to conceal his features be­ tradition is the Ouled Nail tribe. hind a black cloth. This litham helps It is standard practice for their to protect/the camel-riding fighters beautiful girls to go to the cities from the whirling sand of the and take up careers as specialty desert, which may account for its dancers, with prostitution thrown remote origin. But the Tuareg in. The Ouled Nail "entertainer" share with the Bedouins of central accepts only gold and silver coins. Arabia the superstition that human She wears them made up in rows beings are constantly surrounded around her head. After a few years by swarms of evil spirits seeking to she retires to her tribe and hands get in through the mouth and nos­ over the rows ofcoins as a dowry to trils to gain possession oftheir souls. an affectionate bridegroom. This It is to ward off this danger that dowry is, of course, the exact op­ they wear the veils. posite of the usual Moslem practice The Tuareg are one of the few of the "purchase price" paid for a extant examples of the prehistoric wife to one's future father-in-law. institution of the Matriarchate. Among the wealthy Moslems of They trace family descent in the Morocco and Algeria the custom female line; the women own and has become purely symbolic, for administer most·of the property; the bride's father gives her wedding only the women are Iiterate. Their presents equal in value to her "pur­ women, indeed, are. renowned for chase price." artistic taste and innate poetic gifts. They hold frequent poetic can'" III tests at which they improvise po­ etry of real merit, while the men East of Algeria lies Tunisia, strate" listen in awed, respectful silence. gically the most important of the Another ethnic group in Algeria three countries that make up French whose customs are completely at North Africa. Its northern shore variance with orthodox Moslem dominates the Mediterranean, which THE AMERICAN MERCURY narrows h~re to a corridor less than fifty-two years later than France's one hundred miles wide. Here is occupation ofAlgeria. This may be Bizerte, the great French naval in part responsible for the more base. The nearby city of Tunis is primitive conditions that prevail in only ten miles from the ruins of the less frequented parts ofTunisia. Carthage, once mistress of the in­ At Matmata, not far from the land sea. Twice in history, Sicily Libyan border, for instance, about has been invaded and conquered a hundred thousand people lead from this part of the African coast: the lives of full-fledged cave dwell­ by the Carthaginians and by the ers. They live entirely underground, Saracens. Before this war is over, in caves dug out of the soft, firm it is likely to happen for a third soil. The living-rooms always sur­ time. round a larger room which much Like Algeria, Tunisia was once resembles a bear-pit in shape. The part of the notorious Barbary states, excavations which form these liv­ which were the terror of the Medi­ ing-rooms have barrel-vaulted roofs, terranean. For centuries their pi­ shelves for storage jars and raised rate rulers preyed upon commerce, bed-places of clay. Oddly enough, filling their treasuries with loot, bathrooms are a regular feature in and their harems and slave marts this subterranean world. with women seized from Christian Governed in name only by the merchantmen. It was through the Bey of Tunis and in fact by the historic "visit" by an American, French Resident-General, the Tu­ Stephen Decatur, in 1815 that their nisians are generally peaceful. The power was finally broken. The pop­ latent source of fric tion inside the ulation of Tunisia is a mixture of country is the implacable enmity Berber and Arab, but the Berber of the Italian colonists of Tunis language has been entirely replaced towards the French element. Each by the Arabic of the conquerors group numbers about ninety thou­ who overran all North Africa in the sand. After Italy had become a uni­ seventh century. The tomb oftheir fied kingdom in 1870, the Italian leader, Sidi Okba, is one ofTunisia's government intended .to seize Tu­ most sacred monuments and, after nisia, but was "beaten to it" by the Mecca and Medina~ the Moslem French. Mussolini's saber-rattling world's holiest shrine. about Tunisia is merely the Fascist The French Protectorate over echo of an ancient Italian war-cry, Tunisia dates from 1882, which is fated to remain unavailing. THE PEOPLES OF NORTH AFRICA

But this hatred of the French by the southeastern part of Libya, the Italians of Tunisia is nothing fourteen days and nights on camel­ as compared to the implacable ha­ back from the coastal city of Ben­ tred with which the Italians them­ ghazi. The Senussi are born warriors. selves are regarded by the natives They repeatedly rose in bloody re­ of neighboring Libya, ever since volt against their Italian oppressors, Italy conquered· that country in until Marshal Rodolfo Graziani 191 I. The population of Libya, took their capital,' Kufra, some which has much ·pure Arab blood twelve years ago and "pacified" in its veins,. belongs in great part to them, mainly with the help of the the puritan and fanatic·Moslem gallows. confraternity of the Senussi. The Kufra at this writing is in the( Senussi are not an ethnic group but hands of the Fighting French. Be­ a religious sect. They claim about fore Marshal Graziani led his ex­ six million adherents throughout pedition there, few Occidentals North Africa and in certain parts penetrated to that almost inac­ of Arabia, but their traditional cessible Senussi stronghold. The stronghold is the oasis of Kufra, in Grand Sheikh Ahmed, supreme

ttAnd all the portions occupied by the United Nations I give to you, my dear LavaL" THE AMERICAN MERCURY spiritual and temporal leader of the tive of the Senussi outlook than a Senussi confraternity, one of the remark Grand Sheikh Ahmed made most important and influential to me during one of our conversa­ Moslem leaders of the old school tions. "There is one thing I never living anywhere between Morocco allow my servants to do for me," and India, leads a strictly secluded he said, "and that is to clean my life. When I was his guest in 1923, rifle. When I was a boy, my grand­ he told me himself that he had met fa ther often told me that one ofthe only two Occidentals previously, Senussi warrior's foremost duties, both Americans. The first was' a which he should always perform Colonel of the United States Army himself, was to keep his gun clean. who had been sent to the East by I have adhered to this rule ever President Woodrow Wilson in 1919 since." Ahmed added, with em­ to meet and confer with him. The phasis, "Besides, I may soon use my second 'was ,the late Charles R. rifle against the ItaliansI" Both Crane ofChicago, one-time Ameri­ during the present war and later, can Ambassador to China and stu­ the Senussi will be natural allies of dent ofOriental affairs, who toured the United Nations in the endeavor the Moslem East around 1920. to keep the Axis permanently out Nothing could be more illustra... of Africa.

.JJour 0/ :late A NATION is not worthy to be saved if, in the hour ofits fate, it will not gather up all its jewels of manhood and life, and go down into the conflict, however bloody and doubtful, resolved on measureless ruin or complete success. -JAMES A. GARFIELD: Speech in the House oj Representatives, June 25, 1864 ~Hm~H~~Hmm~. ~l THE STATE OFTHE UNION l~ ~;S~~fj~H~i~~~~~};~~~H5d

An Open Letter to Vice-President Wallace

By EUG-nNE LYONS

EAR MR. WALLACE: On Novem­ declared was an "imperialist" war. D ber. 8 you made a speech in Surely it cannot be your policy New York under the auspices of a to let bygones be bygones. in the self~styled Congress of American interests of national unity, since Soviet Friendship. By reason of you have not extended any such your high official position, indeed, public amnesty to the Wheelers, you were the chiefspeaker and gave Lindberghs and Hamilton Fishes. the proceedings a clear official sanc- , The tolerance demonstrated by tion. your participation in the "con­ It can be no secret to you that it gress" seems limited to isolationists was embarrassing for many Ameri­ who changed their minds when cans that their Vice~President Russia was attacked, while those should grace that gathering with who changed their minds when his enthusiastic presence. Among America was attacked, six months the most active sponsors and par­ later, remain unforgiven. We hold ticipants of that "congress," it no brieffor the Wheeler~Lindbergh happens, were dozens of men·and isolationism, which has been vigor­ women who had been violently ously attacked'in these pages. Yet, isolationist until June 1941; who to the average American, it seems had picketed the White House and more natural for Americans to denounced our President as a "war... change their views when America monger"; who had opposed Ameri­ is attacked than to do so when Rus­ can rearmament and fomented sia is attacked. Moreover, even the strikes in war industries; who had bitterest of the non~intervention­ organized and led a so~called ists favored the speedy arming of "American Peace Mobilization" America, whereas your associates pledged to prevent American aid in the November 8 "congress" to the democracies in what they worked against every move in that 31 THE AMERICAN MERCURY direction. Please recall that one II Marcantonio, a high official of the American Peace Mobilization­ But first, to avoid silly misunder­ so many of whose fellow-officials standings on a serious matter, the were your ·colleagues at the New writer wants to make it perfectly York meeting - was the only one clear that he shares your admira­ who voted against military appro­ tion for the Russian people, as well priations in Congress. as your sense of gratitude for the And so, as I said, your mere pres­ sacrifices and sufferings of the Rus­ ence at the gathering was hard for sian people. His admiration is not a Americans to take. But let that vague sentimentality, but the prod­ pass. We humble mortals must as­ uct of six full years of residence sume that there were weighty rea'" among the Russians, from 1928 to sons of state why you and Senator 1934- In fact, his abhorrence of the Claude Pepper (identified in world excesses of the Soviet dictatorship public opinion. as an Administra­ grew in direct proportion to his ad- tion spokesman) and a former o miration and affection for the vic... American Ambassador to Moscow tims, the Russian people. should associate publicly with Cor­ He parts company with you, liss Lamont, Joseph Curran, Reid however, when you consider it Robinson, Max Yergan, Robert K. necessary to express admiration for Speer and men of their political per­ Russian resistance against the Ger­ suasion. Of course, it did not occur man invasion by glorifying the to Soviet officials and democratic Soviet regime. One can readily un­ fellow-travelers in Russia to stage derstand the need for a public offi­ an equivalent "congress" in Mos­ cial to keep silent about the more cowan July Fourth, on the theory unplea~ant aspects ofSoviet history that friendship is a two-way propo­ and methods. What one finds it sition, but presumably that over­ hard to understand is the urge to sight will be remedie.d next July deny or misrepresent those aspects, Fourth. and the attempt to garnish some More serious than your mere of them to look like "progress" and participation - not simply em­ "achievement" - yes, even like barrassing but alarming - were some special kind of "democracy" the things you said under those - in American eyes. auspices and it is that which I m.ake bold to ask why we can­ prompts this open letter. not acclaim the courage and sacri- THE STATE OF THE UNION 33 ficial spirit of the Russian people mediate situation is why it is con­ without shouting hallelujah for sidered quite respectable to criti~ their regime or giving its American cize Roosevelt or Churchill or de agents the right of way in tearing Gaulle - but not Stalin; why it is down our own system of life? Can perfectly all right to call for social we not be as realistic, let us say, as revolution in Britain and the Premier Stalin, who recognizes United States - but not in Russia; British and American contribu~ why Willkie and Stalin and the tions to the fight on Hitler without American press rnay clamor to their looking for far-fetched alibis for hearts' content for the opening of capitalist "excesses" and without new fronts by the democracies giving aid and comfort to, Russian while it is verboten to discuss the partisans of the capi talist-demo~ question of a second front against cratic way of life? Japan via Siberia. In the first World War, France Every self-respecting Russian and England acknowledged the must resent this childish pamper~ gigantic help rendered by the Rus~ ing, this assumption that his coun~ sians and their government in es~ trymen are too thin-skinned, their tablishing a second front against loyalties to the cause of the United Germany and in maintaining it for Nations too brittle, to weather our more than three years with their honest strictures. In short, if your traditional capacity for sacrifice strange laudation of the Soviet and resistance. But I cannot recall political and social systems is in­ that any British or French states~ tended as policy to keep Russia in man felt it incumbent upon him~ line, it is mistaken. The Russians self to glorify the Romanoff dy~ are not half-wits to be taken in by nasty or make excuses for Tsarist fla ttery; they want our tanks not internal policies. Before that, in the our thanks. American Revolution, \ve accepted On the other hand, if you actu~ the help of Louis XVI without ally 11lean your laudation literally trying to justify or copy monarchi~ - if you really favor the 'kind of ' cal absolutism. During the Civil "economic democracy" and "edu~ War, we acknowledged the help of cational democracy" on exhibit in Russia without pretending that its Russia, and seriously seek a "middle monarchy srnelled sweet in our ground" between what you call our nostrils. "Bill of Rights democracy" and One of the mysteries of our,im~ the Soviet brand- then the Amer- 34 THE AMERICAN MERCURY ican people ought to know it. not include China, since Russia re­ More than that, they ought to mains neutral in the Far Eastern know whether you speak only for conflict.) Then he argued soberly yourself or for the American gov­ that these differences did not pre­ ernment. Such views and hopes by clude "joint action on the part the man Constitutionally in line for ofthe coalition against the common the Presidency are an exceedingly enemy." serious matter. You, Mr. Vice-President, were not content with any such com­ III mon-sense approach. Instead, you sought to minimize the differences On the day before you made your between the American and Soviet speech, Joseph Stalin made one in systems, to blow up alleged similar­ Moscow and it is revealing to com~ ities, and to kick certain notorious pare the two. Stalin was factual, but unpleasant Soviet facts out of hard-headed, unromantic. Such de­ view. In your eagerness to put the lusions and Hights of fancy as he best possible face on the Soviet re­ indulged in were deliberate policy, gime, indeed, you went so far as to intended to fool others rather than speak disparagingly of our Ameri­ himself. But your speech, by con­ can brand of democracy. Now trast, was notable for generaliza­ whatever may be wrong with tion and for a kind of desperate America, and no one denies that it's striving to square the international plenty, comparison with Russia is circle. Your delusions ·were self-de­ scarcely the best way to prove that lusions, since there is no question of fact.... your noble intentions and genuine One needs to pause and savor the interest in the welfare of the com­ amazing fact: the second highest mon man. executive officer of the greatest Stalin faced calmly the tough democracy on earth speaks slight­ fact of sharp differences between ingly of political democracy! And the Soviet and democratic ways of does it, lTIOreOVer, in a speech life. "It would be ridiculous," said about a dictatorship! he, "to deny the differences in "Some in the United States," ideologies and social systems of you said, "believe that we have the countries con1posing the An­ overemphasized what might be glo-American-Soviet coalition." called political or Bill of Rights (Please note, in passing, that he did democracy. Carried to its extreme THE STATE OF THE UNION 35 form, it leads to rugged individual­ with its blood ·purges and conceti­ ism, exploitation, impractical em­ tration camps and millions of po­ phasis on state's rights and even to Iitical outcasts, and a democracy anarchy." like ours. That the Vice-President In the context of your speech, should attempt such a feat of po­ there was no room for doubt that litical engineering is a startling fact you counted yourself among the that we dare not overlook. "some" who believe we are over­ doing Bill of Rights d~mocracy. IV Then you pointed, of all things, to the Soviet system, implying that It is hard to believe that you really in it we would find a suggestion for think Russia enjoys "economic the corrective. "Russia," you said, democracy." If you do, you are "perceiving some of the abuses of cruelly misinformed. Whether or excessive political democracy, has riot you are right in thinking that placed strong emphasis on eco­ America is moving away from "ex­ nomic democracy." You admitted cessive political democracy," no that the Russian attitude, "if car­ one in the least cognizant of the ried to an extreme," leads to one­ Soviet facts will agree with you man. tyranny, but immediately that Russia is moving towards such added: democracy. You simply have your "Somewhere there is a practi­ basic facts wrong. cal balance between economic But even if the facts were..right, and political democracy. Russia your whole formulation of the and the United States have been problem is, to say the least, dis­ working toward this practical mid­ turbing. In effect, you have placed dle ground." political and economic democracy All of which is strange sleight­ at opposite poles - you have set of-mind, coming from a highly.. them up arbitrarily as opposites­ placed democratic leader. It slurs and impIy that they can. never be over the essence of the matter, made to coincide. The most you namely, that Russia is an absolute seem to hope for is a "practical dictatorship whereas the United balance" and a "practical middle States is a functioning democracy. ground" between the two. It is ob­ No amount· of juggling of words viously your conviction that we and facts can bridge the gap be­ must strive for a cOlnpromise be­ tween a dictatorial police-state, tween political and economic jus- THE AMERICAN MERCURY tice, rather than an integration of Once the reactionary anti-demo­ the two~ cratic idea that political and eco­ I wonder whether you are con­ nomic democracy are opposites is scious that in such a formulation accepted, it becomes possible to you accept the classic totalitarian speak ·glowingly, as you did, of"ed­ notion that economic security and ucational democracy" in a country political justice are irreconcilable where the newly literate common - that the first can be purchased man is forbidden to read or write or only at a heavy price in the second? think anything not okayed by his Not once but a thousand times the dictators; where "education" and writer has been told by Nazis and arbitrary indoctrination are one by Bolsheviks, in substance, "Sure and the same. It then becomes we have no freedom, but look at possible to grow ecstatic over the our children's homes and swim­ "economic democracy" ofa system ming pools. Sure we have concen­ in which workers are tied to state­ tration camps and terror, but owned benches and peasants to we've abolished unemployment." state-owned land like serfs of old; In other words, a chunk of Bill of in which a branch of the secret Rights for every benefit that al­ police is on the premises in every legedly accrues to the common factory; in which trade unions in man, a concentration camp for our sense of the word are outlawed every quart of milk, a censorship and strikes are punishable by death; for every improvement in literacy in which millions are herded into statistics. forced-labor camps under police Now you and' they may be right; control. history will give us the answer. But If you are correct in your asser­ that makes· it no less alarming to tion that we are moving towards get this kind of social arithmetic the Soviet kind of economic de­ from an official sworn to uphold the mocracy, then it's calamitous news. Bill of Rights in a government If we are moving away from "ex­ predicated on the assumption that cessive" Bill of Rights democracy, political democracy is not incon­ it is your sworn duty under the sistent with economic justice. It's Constitution to do something about the kind of arithmetic one expects that trend. But it may be that you from Berchtesgaden and the Krem­ are mistaken in both respects. It lin, not Capitol Hill and the White may be that our vision of political House. and economic democracy as one THE STATE OF THE UNION 37 and inseparable is closer to the on scattered fronts and the Ameri­ truth than your curious concep­ can people are not making huge tion ofa "middle ground" between sacrifices at home for any "practi­ the two. cal balance" ·between our den1oc­ American boys are not fighting racy and dictatorship ofany brand.

Goering: ttNo German will go hungry this winter. J} ~ The Paris influence was a blight on American musical expression.

MUSIC BETWEEN TWO WARS

By WINTHROP SARGEANT

HEN the historians of Amer­ justified distrust of many things W ican music get around to the Germal1, among them the highly p~riod between 1918 and 194 I, nationalistic, Teutonically meta­ they will probably describe it as physical music of the Wagnerian America's Parisian era. It is true period. Paris seemed to offer the that a number of older academi­ perfect antidote. Her musical tradi­ cians went on holding the fort for tions, though predominantly oper­ Brahms and Wagner, and that a atic, were of the finest. Her tradi­ few isolated Americans were influ­ tional way oflife, unlike Germany's, enced by the involved, quasi­ was cosmopolitan, tolerant, sophis­ musical mathematics of the Aus­ ticated. The composers of her im­ trian Arnold Schonberg. But most mediate past, from Gounod to of the serious music by young Debussy, had been magnificent Americans that attracted attention craftsmen, noted for their clarity in our concert halls was influenced and lack ofemotional bombast. The in one way or another by the war, and its attendant revolutions, peculiar revolutionary moven1ent had made Paris a refuge of bright­ that erupted with Stravinsky's minded exiles from all over the Sacre du Printemps in 1913. And world. Prohibition and an invit­ the headquarters of that revolution, ingly cheap franc came close, for a whose ramifications spread to vir­ time, to making her the cultural tually all the world's musical capi­ and artistic capital of America. tals, was on the Parisian boulevards. Those \vho remember the bustle A generation earlier, Munich, and excitement of Paris during this Leipzig or Vienna would have set period recall certain rather back­ the style. But the first World War ward features of Parisian musical had left German and Austrian mu­ life which were then dismissed as sic a shambles from which it has unimportant. Performances by the never since recovered. It had also numerous Parisian symphony or­ left among intellectuals a deep and chestras were generally haphazard 38 MUSIC BETWEEN TWO WARS 39 and second rate. The once proud, extremes, shading almost imper­ but already neglected anq impover­ ceptibly into one or the other, ished Paris Opera, was presenting worked a busy group of revolu­ some of the most slipshod produc­ tionists dedicated to the propaga­ tions to be found in any of the tion of what has since become world's important musical centers. widely known as "modern music": French musical criticism, following brilliant technicians like Stravinsky the worst tendencies of French and Prokofieff, effusive musical journalism in general, had reached aborigines like Heitor Villa-Lobos, a degree of venality that oscillated witty dilettantes like the late Eric between paid press agentry and Satie, musical dadaists like Darius autright blackmail. But from the Milhaud, Arthur (Pacific 2]I) Hon­ composer's point of view, Paris egger, devotees of the theory of was the center of the world. No­ quarter tones, Schonberg-model where else was such a quantity of atonalists. . music being written and argued Aside from a· much-advertised over. A hundred formulas for new, aversion to Wagner and anything different and better kinds of music that reflected the Romantic ideals were being discussed nightly over of nineteenth century music, it the marble-topped tables of Left was difficult to find, in this scat­ Bank cafes. tered array ofmusical activity, any The "new music" that was caus­ evidence of a common goal .or ing all this discussion was notable purpose. The nearest thing to such primarily for its variety. At orie a goal, seemed to be embodied in end of the musical spectrum, the a philosophy of musical material­ late Maurice Ravel and the Span­ ism which revealed itself in prac­ iard Manuel de Falla were dishing tically all the critical and polemical up folk tunes and archaic idioms in writing of the "modernist" move­ an attractive sauce derived from ment. the great impressionist Debussy. This philosophy was borrowed At the other, the Italian futurist from contemporary scientific think­ Luigi Russolo,· who believed un­ ing. It pictured music, not as the compromisingly that the future of communicative emotional language music lay in discovering the latent it had been for nineteenth-century mysteries of noise, was presenting esthetes, but as a pseudo-science concerts wi th an orchestra ofsirens whose technique was comparable and tom-toms. Between these two to laboratory experiment, and THE AMERICAN MERCURY whose purpose was the discovery of unlimited. The object of the "ex­ novel and unfamiliar sounds. The perimental', composer was as simple raw material with which the com­ as it was attractive: experiment poser worked was, ofcourse, sound. would lead to discovery, discovery Considered purely as a vibratory to progress. Music's future evolu­ phenomenon, musical sound dif­ tion to higher and better things was fered in no demonstrable way assured. from non'-musical sound, or noise. To the musical. materialist, the II distinction between the two seemed purely arbitrary, musical sound Very little was said, during this representing merely that type of period of experiment and "prog­ noise that people had conven­ ress," about the emotional and tionally accepted as fit for musi­ spiritual sides ofmusic. Spirituality cal purposes. There were obviously had become an unfashionable word many kinds of noise not as yet in many fields besides music. Emo­ utilized by musicians. So the musi­ tion was considered to be the cardi­ cal materialist created a picture in nal gaucherie of the nineteenth­ which noise (or, as the modernist century compO$ers, against whom, jargon incorrectly termed it, "dis­ of course, all progressive composers sonance") took the place that na­ were in revolt. Emotion was also ture occupies in the realm of highly unscientific. To the debunk­ science: that of a great, uncharted ing, scientific ear, music was simply penumbra of boundless potential­ a patternoforganized sound which ities which it was the function of conveyed certain sensations to the the composer to discover and util­ listener. Anybody who pretended ize. The merit of a new composi­ that it could express things like tion was to be measured in terms of love, nostalgia, patriotism or reli­ its "originality," i.e., the extent to gious awe was - according to the which it ventured into the hitherto prevailing ideology - obviously uncharted wastes of noise phe­ reading something into it that nomena. Its function was to con­ wasn't there. Bach might have vey, not emotion, but novel aural written fugues for the glory ofGod, sensations. The idea, at the time, or Chopin waltzes for the love of seemed pregnant with enormous women, but their fugues and possibilities, for the realm of noise, waltzes, when you removed the or' "dissonance," was practically imaginary ROlnantic aura that his- MUSIC BETvVEEN TWO WARS

tory and convention attached to pother over "originality" as the them, were really nothing but in­ ecole de Paris. The school was indeed tricate collections ofvaried sounds, "original" in one respect: the tech­ arranged in a manner to give pleas­ nical sauces in which it served up ant sensations to the ear. its music were bright, unhackneyed, So much for the theory. The ingenious and daring. But when music itselftended toward extreme one searched deeper i~ to this mu­ eclecticism. In his search for novel sic, one almost invariably found sound phenomena, the Parisian that the solid meat beneath the composer ransacked the resources sauce was borrowed from some­ of geography and history as well as where else. Even the music of the those of the abstract mathematics late Maurice Ravel, who towers of tone relations. He hunted down high above most of the others of exotic sounds in the music oforien­ the Parisian school, is a case in tal and primitive peoples. He point. A great master of manner, tricked out folk melodies in Pari­ and a subtle orchestral virtuoso, sian dress. He revived queer ar­ Ravel nevertheless scarcely created chaisms from the music of the an idiomatically original theme in seventeenth century and other past his life. In La Valse, he speaks with historical periods. He imitated the the voice of Johann Strauss, in the quaint crudities of hurdy-gurdies Bolero and the Rhapsodie Espagnole andstreet bands, and the blaring of with that of the Spanish folk the Paris music halls. He satirized singer, in the Tombeau de Couperin the music of the Romantic· period with the quaint, exotic mannerisms by imitating it in distorted forms. ofeighteenth... century French salon Some of his music was amusing; music, and so on through prac­ some of it astonished audiences by tically the whole exotic panoply of its sheer eccentricity. But there his output. was about all of ita curious lack of Except for the accident of loca­ emotional substance, and an almost tion, there was very little that was complete absence of that power of French about the Paris school. personal communication which has Ravel (who, I am sure, would not always been identified, with true have relished being considered a creative originality. typical member ofit) was a French­ This last point requires some man. So was the genial and very clarification, for no movement in much over-rated amateur Eric Sa­ musical history ever made such a tie. So, with exception of Arthur THE AMERICAN MERCURY

Honegger, was the very articulate, with which musicians, painters, but not very productive group poets and political revolutionaries known as "The Six," who had lived a life apart from the rest of dedicated themselves during the society, painting, composing, versi­ first World War to the ever-popular fying and agitating almost exclu­ French cause of saving French sively for the benefit of their fellow music from the curse ofWagnerism. intellectuals. The audience for But of "The Six," only two­ which the "modern" composer of Arthur Honegger and Darius Mil­ Paris wrote did not even include haud-survived the 192o'sascom­ the French musical public, which posers of any ponderable stature. still loved its Gounod, Franck and (One-time anti-Wagnerite Honeg­ Bizet, and (obstinately enough) its ger, by the way, has recently been Wagner and Strauss. It was an au­ appearing before enthusiastic au­ dience of Parisian intellectuals like diences in the Third Reich.) The himself. Nor were the leading agita­ most influential figures in the move­ tors of "modern" Parisian musical ment were foreigners who had fashion predominantly musicians. taken up a more or less intermittent The styles of the ecole de Paris were residence in Paris: Russians like set as much by the painter Pablo Stravinsky and Nicholas Nabo­ Picasso, the ballet impresario Serge koff, Poles like Alexander Tans­ Diaghileff and the lace-cuffed lit­ man, Hungarians like Tibor Har­ terateur Jean Cocteau, as by such sanyi, Spaniards like de Falla, musical leaders as Satie and Stra­ Italians like Russolo and Alfredo vinsky. . Casella, the Brazilian Villa-Lobos, In America, the new musical the American George Antheil. fashion of Paris was followed with But though the school itself was breathless interest. Societies pa­ a polyglot gathering, and its music tronized by the smartest intel­ a medley of exotic styles, it was lectuals gave concerts and pub­ typically Parisian in its tolerance, lished magazines devoted to the its lively sensuality, its good­ "new music." The generation that humored cynicism, its fiery opposi­ was nodding sage!y over the writ­ tion to complacent bourgeois taste, ings of Gertrude Stein attended and to anything that smelled, ever these concerts and read these maga­ so faintly, of nineteenth-century zines in the firm conviction that Romanticism. Typically Parisian they were witnessing an important also was the bohemian bonhommie milestone in musical history. Com- MUSIC BETWEEN TWO WA·RS 43 posers who had never made the sian style, in American hands, be­ pilgrimage to Paris began writing came a ready vehicle for a type of their symphonies and concertos music that, superficially, sounded with a Parisian accent. By the very American. Actually, it was no 1930's, the whole tenor of thought more American than Ravel's Impe­ in sophisticated American musical ratrice des Pagodes is Javanese. The circles had come under the domi­ Pariso-American nationalist com­ nance of Parisian fashion. Any poser simply stuck a jazz feather in composer who showed a renegade his Stravinskian hat and called it tendency to follow in the footsteps macaroni. The Americanism of of forthright and original melodists Harris'·When Johnny Comes March­ like Strauss, Elgar, Sibelius or ing Home, for example, is limited to Puccini, was at once dismissed as the crusty old tune that inspired it. impossibly old hat. The Harris part is French dressing. Pariso-American music had some of the virtues, and nearly all the III defects, of its pure Parisian proto­ type. Lacking the true symphonic The school of Paris failed to add tradition (which had always been to the sum total of great, affirma­ somewhat foreign to French musi­ tive musical masterworks because, cal thought), its contribution to the behind its materialism and cynical standard American symphonic diet wit, lay a deep,..rooted attitude of was limited mainly to piquant hors negation. It abhorred the frank d'oeuvres and exotic desserts. Its emotionalism of composers like more ponderable offerings (com­ Brahms, Wagner and Strauss, find­ positions like Roy Harris' Third ing them sentimental, bourgeois Symphony, Aaron Copland's Piano and fat. So it set about making a Concerto and El Salon Mexico) cult of dry intellectuality, sensa­ often had moments of genuine tionalism and anemia. It despised freshness and .wit. But its most the simple melodiousness and clear influential victories were won in workmanship ofold-fashioned lyric the field of theatrical music, in composers like Gounod, Bizet, smart, up-to-date accompaniments Massenet and Puccini. And so it to ballets, modern dance produc­ made eccentricity and 0 bscurity tions, Broadway dramas and Holly­ into standards of excellence. Fear­ wood movies. ing anything that had an obvious Eclectic and adaptable, the Pari- appeal to average, cultivated taste, 44 THE AMERICAN MERCURY it praised and propagandized only Modern wars seem to have a way that music which could be counted of becoming cultural milestones. on to shock or bewilder the average The one now being fought has listener. Because the average lis­ probably closed a period. In the tener dearly loved the great sym­ musical field, history will probably phonic and operatic repertoire that rank that period (1918 to 1941) as had flowered during the eighteenth one of the most unproductive ever and nineteenth centuries, the crit­ recorded: a period in which the ics of the Parisian school suddenly great European musical language decreed that this music was false, ceased to evolve, in which the and that the really interesting' monumental style in symphonic things in music were to be found and operatic music was virtually rather in the desiccated remains of lost. The period rang loud with Elizabethan madrigals, in the beat­ denunciations of the one that pre­ ing of African tom-toms, or in the ceded it. Yet when one weighs, more or less accidental improvisa­ even indulgently, the contribution tions of the folk musician. of the period itself and asks, "Did This is not to say that every com­ this talkative era evolve perhaps poser who fell under the sway of one single figure whose serious the ecole de Paris subscribed con­ musical output has the human sciously and in toto to this perverse appeal, and hence the importance and preposterous point of view. of, say, a Massenet's or a Puc­ But enough of it seeped into the cini's?" the evident answer is a fashions and habits of composers of simple, unqualified "No." the generation to have a very im­ Already, with the Paris that led partant effect on that generation's this musical era lying prostrate and output. Naturally, the point of discredited, and the world sud­ view was, in the long run, fore­ denly compelled to take stock of doomed to failure. For the com­ itself in the sober light of war, the poser who had denied every tech­ period is beginning to look like nical method, every emotional some strange, irresponsible debauch purpose; every standard and every from which the art of music has virtue followed and believed in by just been awakened. To people generations that had preceded him, steeled to the sacrifices of war, fac­ had very little left over to affirm. ing problems like death, disease and He ,vas very close to denying mu­ hung.er, the writings of Gertrude sic itself. Stein and Jean Cocteau are begin- MUSIC BETWEEN TWO WARS 45 ning to look like the irrelevant "going back." The great musical prattle of spoiled children. So·· is language r am referring to is as most of the music that came out of alive as ever. It is not only alive in the Paris of Stein and Cocteau. our concert halls where the works Looking back, one finds oneself of past composers are being played wondering whether, after all, the in unprecedented quantity. It is ecole de Paris ever really took the a part of the vernacular of all of art of music seriously. today's popular and semi-popular What the world of culture will music. It has been forgotten only look like after the present war is by a small coterie of "modernist" over is, of course, anybody's guess. composers, critics and so-called mu­ But the indications are thatit will sicologists, who for thirty years be a far more serious world than have, I think, been working at a that ofthe '20'S and '30's. Whether fussy and unproductive tangent this world will call forth a revived to the evolving tradition of music. ' and invigorated musical art, ca'" Already, among .the younger pable of moving human beings generation of today's composers, deeply, remains to be seen. One there are signs of a change of out­ thing that would contribute to that look, a sobering up, and a gradual revival would be a renewed recog­ tendency to discard the "experi­ nition of the spiritual and human mental," pseudo-scientific ideas of function of music. Another would the now middle-aged "modernists." be the rediscovery, by composers, Curiously, this change seems to of the great, abstract language of have had its first reflections not in music - the' language· of Beetho­ such· age-old centers of musical ven, Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Verdi, cuIture as Germany, Italy and MacDowell and Sibelius - which France, but in Soviet Russia and they have, under' the superficial the United States. The symphonies fads and fashions of "modernism," of Dmitri Shostakovitch are earn­ all· but forgotten. ing a high place in the contempo'" In making a similar diagnosis in rary repertoire, not because their these pages some months ago, I was technique is in any way revolution­ accused on all· sides of preaching ary, but because the best of them reaction, of suggesting that com­ are dramatic, emotional works, with posers go back to a style that an affirmative purpose and a deep was, in effect, dead and buried. The respect for symphonic tradition question is not, ho:wever, one of behind them. Compared with the THE AMERICAN MERCURY more extreme concoctions of the In America, younger composers ecole de Paris they sound almost as like Samuel Barber (thirty-two) old-fashionedly dramatic and senti­ and Gian-Carlo Menotti (thirty­ mental as Sibelius or Tchaikovsky. one) have shown. an unmistakable The still-younger Russian, Tykhon tendency to get back to the sort of Khrennikov, mainly known in our poetic, romantic musical utter­ concert halls by a really beautiful ance that their elders have sneered First Symphony, writes with even at for almost a generation. These greater conservatism, and appar­ are merely straws in the wind. But ently sometimes with even greater it is possible that they point to distinction. the close of a cycle.

~ !flt's not that I'm not confident. .. I just hope we use Rumanians• .••" I ADOPT AN ANCESTOR A Fable

By SHOLEM ASCH Author of The Nazarene, Three Cities, etc.

OT only the heavens declare terror in my blood inherited from N. . the glories of God. His deeds ancestors of long martyrdom. But are also written on the tablets ofthe this Ii ttle New England church earth, in the moyements of the pacifies and soothes my inherited wind through the bare fields, and in fear. Her modest cleanliness of line the colors which twilight paints on has aroused in me a deep reverence the surface. The heavenly song for the early settlers who built her. which moves my heart is the motif On the rough, hand-hewn beams I which sings from the landscape can still smell the sweat of toiling around me. My home is on a Iittle pioneers whose piety built this hill. It is wintertime; two days of House of God. sun .have melted the snow; only There are other places which my patches remain, in the curves and neighborhood has inherited from little valleys of our hill country. the founding fathers. Half-hidden The last sign of the fading day is in a little hillside is the old ceme­ the tall, white spire of the little tery, long neglected by today's colonial church which reflects the townsmen. Most of the tOlnb­ dying sun. stones have been cast down by the Churches for me are forbidden wear of age-long storms, but a few fruit. I cannot be indifferent to still stand bravely against the rage churches, like so many Christian of winter and the carelessness of believers. I have to like them or I generations; they stand as strongly have to dislike them. In my early erect as their bearers must have childhood, the two crosses on the done in their lifetime. Some of towers of the Gothic church in my them have taken refuge under the town, I am sorry to say, had always rnapIes and elms, even becoming frightened me and a'wakened all the embedded in their trunks. 47 'THE AMERICAN MERCURY

Greenmeadow is a new com~ feel in quite the way that I do. I muters' settlement, where the na~ felt a spiritual connection with the tives have been driven from their unknown patriotic hand that had ancestral farms by the golden whips tried to recall a forgotten name to of real estate agencies. Old John indifferent people now enjoying the Peters is almost the only genuine fruits of this dead hero's striving. native left and some of us like to And so I came to old Peters, as any­ consider him the squire and master one else in Greenmeadow would of the village. Everyone looks to. have done, to talk to him of the him for advice and information graveyard and especially of the concerning the locality and its lore. neglected Elias Ferrison. Peters was The musty grocery store which he slow, petulant, but under it pleased. runs, too, seems out of a far~off "American hero or not," he said, past. "why do strangers sneak around I naturally went to him on a ma t~ our graveyard anyhow? I can un'" ter concerning the old graveyard. derstand people coming back to My attention had been caught by look after family stones. But stran... a small,weather-worn American gers! He is a Ferrison and the Ferri~ flag planted under an ancient stone sons should look out for him. By by some thoughtful hand. The in~ the way, maybe you would like to scription on the stone r.ead: "Elias buy the Ferrison barn? Across the Ferrison, born 1755, died 1810, street, see it? The bank wants to aged 55 years." The name and the sell it." date must have been retouched re~ From the rest of his monologue, cently by an unskilled hand and I gathered that the dilapidated made clear with dark paint which barn I had often inspected from the was already. fading. Below this in~ outside was filled with "junk"­ scription, newly engraved, were the discarded family belongings. Then words: "A Minute Man" and "Hero and there I made up my mind to of Valley Forge." investigate, and with this intention Somehow this, forgotten hero, went to the bank. The details ofmy hidden under a weather-beaten discussion there are of no interest. stone, awakened all my passion for Suffice that I obtained access to the the heroes ofthe American Revolu­ old house and left the bank officials tion - the passion which, it seems elated, as if I had found a clew to to n1e, only an immigrant and a some long-lost but very dear rela­ stranger enamored of freedom can tive. By dint of thinking about it, I ADOPT AN ANCESTOR 49 perhaps, I had come to feel close to cal Revolutionary uniform with a the bare name and its vague asso­ cocked hat. ciations. , This was apparently the only record of his appearance; and he II was as much of a symbol as a man - the profile might belong to any At first, the only rewards for my man of his time. No line of charac­ diligent searching in the dust and ter could help me to visualize his debris were a few old boxes con­ personality; it was as n~glected and taining some unimportant books forgotten as the stone on his grave. of a theological nature and long And the memorandum concerning out of date. They had seemingly this man was much the same; the belonged to a Congregational min­ personality had; been ignored, leav­ ister. Among the books were also ing only dryness, laconic and manuscripts ofsermons for all kinds sketchy. ofoccasions. I tasted afew of them It appeared that my hero was - orations delivered around the something ofan enfant terrible. This time of the Civil War and strongly was the reputation that family tra­ anti-slavery in tendency. Then one dition had kept alive for him, and day I came across the treasure. was taken for granted by the minis­ There, .,among the sermons and ter in his uninspired record. 1'his funeral orations, in the same beau­ document was brief. It recorded tiful penmanship, was a memoran­ that Elias \vas born the son of Ben­ dum that dealt with the life and jamin and Sarah Ferrison in 1755, ideas of the minister's forebear, the fifth child of God-fearing par­ Elias Ferrison. The memorandum ents. Elias had a knack for learning had evidently been suggested by which his devout mother tried to documents and letters that had direct toward the ministry. The been at his disposal, but which have village pastor helped him with his long since disappeared. It may also Greek and Latin and prepared hilU have been embellished with anec­ for Yale College. Under Ezra Stiles, dotes handed down through the he studied Hebrew and the vvritten years by word of mouth. Attached lessons seem to have been relics in to this ·memorandum was a silhou­ the family for many years, as the ette of the ancestor-hero made author speaks of having seen them. much later in the Romantic style. ,During the summers, Elias came It showed Elias Ferrison in a typi- home to help his brothers on their 5° THE AMERICAN MERCURY father's farm. There was haying, Yale to continue religious training. tending the cattle and getting in He refused to marry the girl his ofcrops, for in those days it was the poor, widowed mother had selected custom for everyone to join in the for him and he took little interest labor, even the well-to-do Ferrisons. in his father's farm. It was as if the Everything went well with Elias war had "turned" him and made until the battles of Concord and him a misfit in society. In express­ Bunker Hill. There was even a cas" ing his ideas, he continually antag.. ual mention that about this time onized everyone. Soon he was quar.. Elias paid court to a certain Ruth reling with the local pastor. He had Stephens whose father did not ap" become a stranger to his neighbor.. prove of Elias. Later, the heart.. hood and a burden to his family. broken Ruth married one Reuben He did nothing but speak of com" Peters. Her gravestone bears the ing revolution in Europe. evidence that despite a broken In a little while, we learn, he left heart she brought eight children his father's home and crossed the into the world and lived to be ocean, attaching himself to Tom eighty-five. After Concord, Elias, Paine and other American agita­ along with some of his classmates, tors. He fled for his life from Lon­ joined Washington's forces. He don to Paris, where he became in­ seems to have been in numerous volved in the French Revolution. battles and served throughout the With great difficulty, the American entire campaign. He suffered a Minister rescued him from the frozen leg at Valley Forge which Girondists. Finally, he landed in a left him a cripple for the rest ofhis little duchy in Germany where he life. was soon arrested as the supposed The real trouble with Elias started instigator of a revolt against the after the war was over and the ruling house. colonies had become independent. So he was driven from one place He brought home peculiar radical to another by his convictions, all ideas which annoyed not only his the while adding to his reputation contelnporaries butseemed to worry as an American inciter of rebellion. even his ministerial descendant. In the end, he returned home, a The whole life of Elias, the author poor, broken, despairing old man hinted, could be summed· up in the at fifty-two. He had no means ex­ one word "heretic." cept what his brothers chose to give Elias Ferrison never returned to him. Three years later he passed I ADOPT AN ANCESTOR 51 away, and was buried in the little He expressed the view that family plot of the old burying American freedom rests on three ground. Except for his deeds in the pillars -the Old Testament au.. war, he had been naught but a thority of one living God, the love disgrace to his fami!y and friends. and teachings of Jesus, and the humanitarian philosophies of the III Greco-Roman age. Without any one of these moral forces, he ar.. His austere, disapproving relatives gued, humanity would be out of ofthe Civil War days had also gath.. balance and would be ied to secu" ereci some of the curious ideas and larism, giving the power to one heretical beliefs which the old pa­ element ofsociety to rule and per" triot must have written down, prob.. secute the other elements. He feared ably in letters from abroad. There that men might take God, Jesus were also copious notes by Elias and even humanism as their own for. a. book, dealing with·American private possessions, excluding those ideas and the development of our who did not belong to their de­ liberties, that was never started. nomination or social sphere. All these writings were probably Religion is the most intimate well known to the author of the secret between a man. and his God, memorandum, either from surviv" Elias believed. No other human has ing original notes or through hear­ the right to interfere in this secret. say.. In spite of the unsympathetic Government has the obligation to curiosity and bristling· antagonism intervene as little as possihIe in a of the author, I could form a fairly man's life and to buy, at the small.. clear picture of the spiritual·per" est cost in personal Iiberty, the sonality of our hero. greatest amount of happiness and He had a passionate love for hu" security for all. Human minds and man freedom and an awesome re" hearts have been concerned with spect for human rights. Man was happiness from time immemorial. the central idea ofhis thinking. He Humanity has left holy tablets on saw in man a mystical force which which God has written His laws made humanity his religion. He and commandments, even when saw the American Revolution not the hand which He directed was as a war for American independence that of a heathen. alone, but as a war for the freedom Such wery the strange ideas of of all nations. Elias Ferrison. He declared that THE AMERICAN MERCURY

America has become the heir of all ofa later period wished to expunge: the best and noblest that human They forget that besides being the Son souls and human minds have cre~ of God, Jesus was also the Son of Man. ated. Not from one creed, not from And it is as the Son of Man that He stands before our eyes as the Supreme one source, but from all creeds and Example. It is this Son of Man we from all sources she has brought should imitate in our daily IiYes. We into service moral values ofall man~ are human, we cannot imitate Him as the Son of God; it is as the Son of Man kind and made them practical that He is neglected by all. The great­ instruments of behavior, through ness of Jesus is that His conduct is so governmental institutions which clear, human and simple, and His teach­ ings are so understandable and appeal­ regulate and shape a world citizen ing to every soul. Sometimes I wonder in an American form. how the clergy has managed to so con­ This, too, Elias truly believed: fuse it. that America has not been created Here the quotation was inter~ for those alone who by accident rupted by a "SIC" in large letters found themselves on her territory. and "Enough blasphemy!"On an~ She was also founded for all Ameri~ other page of the memorandum cans yet abroad. If a Tory lives in was a note obviously copied from a an American colony, he is tech­ letter: nically an American and morally Came home after a long voyage of try­ an alien. If an alien, living in some ing to introduce our liberties to other oppressed country, thinks Ameri- . nations and here I see how we have can and believes in American ideals, neglected our own. But I know that the energy and time we took to spread he is technically an alien, but mor­ our gospel of freedom to other nations ally an American. "You are a free­ has not been in vain. Some day it will born American if you believe in yield fruit, though the prospect today is so dark. Black forces in all nations American ideas and make them have joined hands to keep the peoples the rule of your life even if your inslavery. Humanity has entrusted her foot has not yet set on American greatest moral values to America and we must guard them with eagerness. soil. .. ." were his words. For should freedom disappear from Here the memorandum showed these shores, where else would it be a long blotted space and in the found? margin the author exclaimed: "Re­ The last note of the clergyman~ fuse to repeat blasphemy in writ~ author's read: ing!" But several lines did remain This is all I could gather from the writ­ to indicate the dangerous senti­ ings and notebooks of Elias Ferrison, ments which the pious clergyman soldier of the Revolution and traveler, I ADOPT AN ANCESTOR 53 \ without doing harm to my own soul by twilight before the fireplace of his repeating of blasphemies common with brother's house, eating his un­ him and among some of the men of his time. These ideas of the returned pa­ earned bread. I pictured him a tall triot caused a great disturbance among person, pale, thin and bony, with his pious brothers. Elias Ferrison lived bright, cold blue eyes shining from with his brother Matthias, the eldest of the family, elder of the church, a a wind-smitten face. He warmed God-fearing and respected man. Elias his stiff, lame leg, aching with became a great burden to this pious rheumatism. man by frequent expression of his ideas and by behavior which annoyed the What was he thinking? What did whole community as well as the brother his dreamy eyes see? Perhaps the who tolerated him with real Christian camp fires ofValley Forge; perhaps charity. But God had pity on Elias and . called him.· to His Throne very soon he heard the roar of· the Parisian after his arrival home. He died a Chris­ multitude, pregnant with revolu­ tia·n, asking for the mercy of God for tion. He was thinking also of me; himself and the blessing of God for the country which he so dearly loved. God yes, of me and .of generations to have mercy on his soul! come-distressedand persecuted at the hands of tyrants- for whom he IV had prepareda refuge. Who, indeed, has need of this refuge more than I Here th~ memorandum ends. Spring -I who am a Jew, born in Poland ,came. Soon the valley· was mantled under the regime of the Tsars - in with verdant·freshness which had triple bondage? I am enjoying the been nourished· through the long blessings which this dead hero has winter under blankets of snow. I bestowed on me. I am enjoying the went to visit my hero in the old fruit which his hand has sowed for cemetery. He had been forgotten me. I dwell in a home which his hy men, but not by God, for the noble spirit toiled in sweat and pain graveyard was covered with a blan­ to prepare for me. He knew of my ket ofmyrtle and wild vines. Every coming in the far future. He saw shrub was in bloom and rippled as the bondage which awaited me; he the wind played on a sea of green. heard the rattle ofthe chains which By the grave of Elias Ferrison I were prepared for me. stood and meditated. Long, long ago, Elias Ferrison I could visualize the crippled adopted me as a son. Today I adopt Elias sitting in the gloom of winter him as an ancestor. ~ The Nazis rose to power on four myths about the peace.

GERMAN LIES ABOUT VERSAILLES

By GEORGE CREEL

OUR lies bulked large in Adolf minion. There was always an an­ FHider's rise to power - four swer to those lies, but· here in the lies that came to be accepted as United States it was drowned out gospel truth not only by the Ger­ by the shrill clamor of pundits, mans but by millions of Americans parlor radicals, "intellectuals" and as well. They were: other ersatz Zolas, leaping at the I. That the armies of the Vater­ chance to prove that they were land had' not been defeated but sufficiently Big and Broad and betrayed, "stabbed in the back" by Bold to put concern for a beaten Parliamentary Cowards, Stock Ex­ enemy above their own country's change Vultures, Jews and Money interests and good name. What Changers. more emotionally exhilarating and 2. That Hindenburg did not where a shorter cut to prominence? surrender unconditionally but Only now that these mouths have ceased hostilities on fixed terms. been shut by new revelations of 3. That Germany was not per­ German character is there any mitted to plead her case at the chance of gaining a fair hearing for Peace Conference, the vengeful the facts in the case. Allies imposing intolerable terms without a hearing. II 4. That an indemnity figure. of forty billion dollars doomed Ger­ Taking up the four lies one by one, many to "shame, s~avery, eternal there is a record proving irrefuta­ impoverization and centuries of bly that Germany was defeated in compulsory labor." every military sense of the word, It is time that these lies be ex­ only an abject capitulation saving ploded, if only to head off a second her armies from slaughter and her installment of sentimental delu­ cities from ravage. The Kaiser and sions after the second defeat of his generals knew that the war was German ambitions for world do- lost at a time when the people 54 GERMAN LIES ABOUT VERSAILLES 55 themselves were still confident of 2I, Pershing and· his men erased success, and continuing to meet the St. Mihiel salient; on Septem­ every demand. ber 22, Allenby battered the Two losing gambles spelled the Turks into submission, and on difference between Ger,man vic­ September 28, the Hindenburg tory and German defeat. The first Line gave way. Realizing the hope­ was when Admiral von Tirpitz lessness of continued resistance, won his argument with the High Hindenburg and Ludendorff sent Command and attemptedto prove imperative word that an armistice that unrestricted V-boat warfare must be asked at once. They would end the struggle before the stated plainly that the German United States could swing into front had crumbled, and that decisive action. The second was Franco-American forces could and Ludendorff's gigantic offensive in would break through to Berlin. the spring of1918. It failed, thrown These dates furnish full answer back at the second battle of to Hitler's "stab in the back" Amiens, leaving his armies without fantasy, for it was not until Octo­ reserves and with a shattered ber 28, 1918, that revolution morale. As he himself has recorded: broke out in Germany - three "August8 was the black hour of the months after Ludendorff had ad.. German Army in the history of the initted the decline of Germany's war. . .• Itput the decline ofour figh ting power, and three weeks fighting power beyond all doubt." after the request for an armistice! Before a crown council held at And it was not until November 7 Spa on August 13 and 14, Luden­ that the Majority Socialists de­ dorff urged peace negotiations manded the Kaiser's abdication, while Germany still held large and not until November 10 that stretches of Allied territory, but the republic was proclaimed. Noth­ the Kaiser shrank from going to ing ever stood more clearly proved the people with a confession of than that it was military defeat, defeat. On August 26, Marshal not internal revolution, that caused Foch began his final drive; on Germany's collapse. September 3, the Bulgarian front collapsed, opening the way ·for a III smash into southern Germany; on September 14, Austro-Hungary No.w for the contention that capit­ flew the white flag; on September ulation was not a surrender, but THE AMERICAN MERCURY simply a cessation of hostilities on ber 8, and after study by the Ger­ certain fixed terms. mans, the armistice was signed on In an exchange ofnotes - Octo­ November II. ber 8, 12 and 14 - President Wil­ Regarding President Wilson's son made it clear that no arrange­ notes, Ludendorff bears this testi­ ment could be accepted that did mony: not provide "absolutely satisfac­ On October 23rd or 24th, Wilson's tory safeguards and guarantees of answer arrived. It was a strong answer the maintenance of the present to. our cowardly note. This time he military supremacy of the armies made it clear that the armistice con~ ditions must be such as to make it im~ of the United States and the Allies p~ssible for Germany to resume hostil~ in the field." He insisted also on It1e~ and to give the powers allied having further guarantees of the agalllst her unlimited power to settle themselves the details of the peace representative character of the accepted by Germany. German government. As a result, Prince Maximilian rushed through Two days later, Ludendorff re­ changes that democratized the signed. On October 24, Hinden­ German Constitution, limiting the burg signed an order "for the prerogatives of the Kaiser and re­ information of all troops" that ducing the power of the military contained these statements: authorities. He (Wilson) will· negotiate with· Ger~ On October 23, the President many for peace only ifshe concedes all the demands of America's allies as to wrote that, in view of Germany's the internal constitutional arrange~ explicit acceptance of his pro­ ments of Germany.••. Wilson's an~ posals, he had communicated the swer is a demand for unconditional surrender. entire correspondence to the Allied Powers with the suggestion that, if A second opportunity to choose they were disposed to effect peace between war or surrender was af­ upon the terms indicated, they forded the Germans by the presen­ would ask their military advisers tation of the armistice terms, for a to draw up an armistice of such more definite· document was never character as to "insure the asso­ framed. It set down provisions that ciated governments the unrestricted were the essence of uncondition~il power to safeguard and enforce the surrender, and at every point details of the peace to which the made clear what the Peace Treaty German government has agreed." itself would contain. The Germans Terms were submitted on Novem- could have denounced the terms as GERMAN LIES ABOUT VERSAILLES 57 being in violation of President The principal German conten­ Wilson's assurance of a "just tions were these: that the peace peace," but they made no such was one of violence, not justice; denunciation. that Germany did not commence the war; and that the Allies had IV stated repeatedly that they were not making _war on the German To charge that the Germans were people; it should be, taken into not heard is anotherincredible dis­ consideration that the people were tortion. now in power, and that the new The .full text· was handed to government should not be held re­ them on. May .7, 1919, with the sponsible for the "faults" of the statement that an answer would be old. To these assertions, crushing required by May 21. Oral discus­ rej oinders were made: sion was barred for the reason that The protest of the German delegation meetings would have degenerated shows that they fail to understand the into wrangles, but written argu­ position in which Germany stands to­ day. They seem to think that Germany ments and. counter-proposals were has only to "make sacrifices in order to invited and the Germans took full obtain peace," as if this were but the advantage of this privilege. On end ofsome mere struggle for territory and power.... For many years the May 10, the Germans discussed at rulers ofGermany, true to the Prussian length the clauses telating to the tradition, strove for a position of -repatriation of prisoners; on May dominance in Europe.... In order to attain their ends they used every -,12, the question of reparations; on channel through which to educate their May 13, the proposed territorial own subjects in the doctrine that might changes; on May 16, the Saar was right. Basin; on May 22, the interna­ Germany's responsibility, however, is tional labor legislation; and on not confined to having planned and May 23, the report of the Ger­ started the war. She is no less responsi­ ble for the savage and inhuman man­ many Economic Commission was ner in which it was conducted. Though published, together with the Allied Germany was herself a guarantor of reply. On May 20, an extension-of Belgium, the rulers' of Germany vio­ lated their solemn promise to respect time was asked and granted, and on the neutrality of this unotfending May 29, the complete German people. ~_ .. They were the first to counter-proposals were handed in use poisonous gas, notwithstanding the appalling suffering it entailed. They and straightway given to the press began the bombing and long-distance for the information of all peoples. shelling oftowns for no military object, THE AMERICAN MERCURY

but solely for the purpose of reducing nard Keynes stated flatly that the morale of their opponents by strik­ ing at their women and children. They forty billion dollars was demanded commenced the submarine campaign, by the Allies, a crushing indemnity with its piratical challenge to interna­ that would have the effect of "de­ tional law.... Justice is what the German delegation asks for, and says grading the lives of millions of that Germany has been promised. But ,human beings, and depriving a it must be justice for all. There must whole nation of happiness." This be justice for the dead and wounded ... for the peoples who now stagger colossal figure was seized upon by under war debts which exceed. $30,­ Hitler and other German agitators 000,000,000 that liberty might be - and accepted with equal eager­ saved .•. and for those millions whose homes and lands and property ness by the Big and Broad and Bold German savagery has spoliated and in England and America. It be­ destroyed. came the keystone in a huge Nazi It is said that the German revolution edifice of lies, and self-deluded ought to make a difference. ... The Americans must share in responsi­ Allied and Associated Powers recog­ bility for its persistence. nize and welcome the change. It repre­ sents great hope for peace and a new The fact is that "poor Ger­ European order in the future, but it many," instead of being impover­ cannot affect the settlement of the war ished by "extortionate and uncon­ itself. The German revolution was stayed until the German armies had scionable demands," actually been defeated in the field and all hope emerged with a handsome profit. of profiting by a war of conquest had Here are the telltale figures: up to vanished. Throughout the war, as be­ fore the war, the German people and 1924, Germany made payments in their representatives supported the cash and kind to the amount of war, voted the credits, subscribed to $1,880,200,000; under the Dawes the war loans, obeyed every order, however savage, of their government. plan, she paid $1,886,860,000, and •.. They cannot now pretend, hav­ under the Young plan, $685,916,­ ing changed their rulers after the war is 000. Against this outgo, Germany lost, that it is justice that they should escape the consequences of their deeds. received $5,158,000,000 in the form of loans, international and v private, between 1924 and 1930, and during the same period, foreign Now for the vexed question of capital invested seven hundred what Germany was called upon to million dollars in German enter­ pay and what it actually paid. prises, eighty million dollars inGer­ In his book, The Economic Con­ man bonds, and five hundred mil­ sequences of the Peace, John·May- lion dollars inGermanreal property. GERMAN LIES ABOUT VERSAILLES 59 A total of$4,462,976,000 paid out billions. President Wilson knew against $6,438,000,000 taken in! that it was not in Germany's power Almost a billion to the good on to raise any such sum, or even the reparation, and her pump primed cost of reconstruction, but he by a billion and atltIuarter of out~ knew equally well that the gov~ side money, "poor Germany" ernments of France, England and plunged into a spending orgy with~ Italy would fall if this were ad­ out p~r~l1el. Among other things, mitted. What he did, therefore, she replenished inventories and her was to agree to a tentative settle­ gold and foreign exchange reserves, ment that would continue the built up her merchant marine, hope of Allied peoples until such earned·a favorable. trade balance of time as the truth could be faced. five hundred million,· tore down As a consequence, these terms tenements· and erected a million were set down in the Peace Treaty: and a half new homes, and filled (1) a payment offive billion dollars the land with costly public build~ by May 1921, against which the ings, parks, swimming pools, ath­ Germans were permitted to list the letic stadiums, convention halls, expenses of the Army of Occupa~ airports, theaters, museums, dining tion, along wi th credits for ships, halls, office buildings, planetariums coal, securities, cattle and other and hotels. Finally, by way of fan~ assets that might be turned over fare, she gave Russia $250,000,000 prior td 1924. There was also pro­ in credits. In plain, while the peo~ vision that a part or a whole of the pIes of ravaged countries toiled sum could be reloaned to Germany and pinched, Germany went on a for the rehabilitation of her eco­ joy ride. nomic life and this was done at an What opened the. way for lies early date; (2) a bond issue of and lying· was the failure .of the ten billion dollars; (3) a second Peace Conference to fix a lump issue of ten billion dollars, "when, sum based on provable damage. but not until," the Commission on This was what Woodrow Wilson Repara tion was sa tisfied tha t Ger~ urged, butunhappily, LloydGeorge many could pay. and Clemenceau had led the Allied 1\ definite settlement on its face nations to expect· colossal in~ - but tucked away inconspicu~ demnities. Some of the estimates of ously was a note to the effect that what .Germany could be made to the action. was advisory only. The pay ~an as high as one hundred power to determine the amount of 60 THE AMERICAN MERCURY the indemnity, definitely and fi­ these tactics and German default in nally, was vested in the Commis­ certain deliveries of timber, the sion on Reparation. On April 17, French occupied the Ruhr in Janu­ 192I, after a wait that permitted ary 1923. In return, the German passions to cool, the Commission government ordered a policy of set aside the Treaty's twenty~five passive resistance, but while still billion dollars, and fixed fifteen pleading poverty had no difficulty billion dollars as the sum thatGer­ in finding seven hundred million many would have to pay, and that dollars to indemnify the whole over a term of years. Fifteen bil­ Ruhr industry- capital, masters lions! A long way indeed from the and men - for enforced idleness. Keynes-Hitler forty billions. Unwilling to use force, the dis­ Instead of being encouraged by a tracted Allies now decided to turn leniency greater than they had the whole business of reparations I dared to hope, the Germans not over to an international commit.. only refused to impose adequate tee ofexperts, and under the chair­ taxes, but entered upon an orgy of manship of General Charles G. inflation. This wiped out the enor­ Dawes, this body presented a plan mous internal debt, and gave huge that went into operation in August paper profits to industry and the 1924. No attempt was made to fix great landholders, but it also im­ the amount of Germany's obliga­ poverished the middle classes and tion, and while $1,5°0,000 was re­ ruined Germany's moral as well as quired in five annual instalments, financial credit. Payments were half in cash and half in kind, these met promptly for 1921, because payments were predicated on ~he made in kind, but early in 1922 generous condition that Germany's came .whining requests for post­ exchange and economic life should ponements and reductions. not be endangered. France agreed The Commission agreed to a to evacuate the Ruhr, and by way large measure of relief, but sternly of giving the plan a flying start, insisted that the Germans stabilize Germany received one loan of two the currency, balance the budget hundred· million dollars, and a sec­ and increase the tax rates. None of ond of $150,000,000 for her rail­ these things was done and Berlin, ways and post office. in November 1922, pleaded for a Now all smiles, the Germans definite moratorium and a revision stabilized the currency, adopted of payments. Exasperated both by budgetary reforms, and began to GERMAN LIES ABOUT VERSAILLES 61 meet payments promptly. As are" Soon, however, even the Dawes sult, S. Parker Gilbert, Agent for plan proved an unsatisfactory stop­ Reparations Payments, reported in gap. Out of a myopic inability to May 1930 that "Germany's credit see things as they were, the Allies has been re-established bothathome came forward with a new one based and abroad, her industries have on "confidence in the good faith been reorganized, and her produc­ and financial integrity of Ger­ tive capacity restored, and the gen­ many." Under the chairmanship of eral standard of living has been Owen D. Young, a second group of greatly improved." What he failed experts took over and on January to mention was that all of it was 20, 1930, announced the "com­ done on borrowed money ~ As Dr. plete and final settlement of the Hjalmar Schacht admitted before reparations problem." The slate swinging over to Hitler: was wiped clean and $7,200,000,000 was set forth as the amount that The decisive historic mistake which must he charged against 'the German would settle Germany's reparation Social Democracy is that it seized the bill in full. Adding the $1,880,200,­ occasion of a lost war, and one on a 000 paid up to 1924, and the $1,'" tremendous scale which necessarily re­ quired the greatest sacrifices of the 886,860,000 paid under the Dawes conquered people, to promise the Plan, a total of $10,967,060,000. A masses of the population greater com~ far cry indeed from the forty bil­ forts than they had enjoyed before the war. lion dollars that had caused such breast-beating on the part of Mr. Why not? Were they not being Keynes and other members of the assured by Adolf Hitler that the Big, Broad and Bold fra ternity in Peace T reaty was a "monstrous in­ England and the United· States! justice" that should be repudiated Moreover, the $7,200,000,000 was in every detail? And was this point staggered over the years until 1988! of view not being sustained by Another international loan of three many leaders of public opinion hundred million dollars started the both in England and the United new plan off wi th a helpful shove. States? The Allies were not only To quote Dr. Schacht again: lending them millions, but gullible The German·Government faced two foreigners were fairly falling over great tasks. In the first place, it was each other to buy German bonds its duty to avail itself once and for all of the fa vorahIe provisions of the and invest in German enterprises Young Plan - and a mere reading of and German real estate. the Young Plan reveals a whole series 'THE AMERICAN MERCURY

of opportunities for an active German portant reductions in taxation that reparation policy ~ and in the second were made in the earlier years, have place, it should have applied the ut­ risen to an estimated total of 10,061,­ most energy to the task of regulating 000,000 reichsmarks in 1929-3°, as its budget and assisting German indus­ compared with 7,757,000,000 reichs­ try by every possible economy in all marks in 1924-25 and 8,961,000,000 public undertakings. It did neither of reichsmarks in 1927-28. These reve­ these things; it did not even take them nues .would have been adequate to in hand. Without waiting to be meet all legitimate requirements of the pressed, it sacrificed some of the most Reich, and even to provide a reason­ valuable provisions of the Young Plan, able margin of safety, if only a firm did nothing to make use of others, and financial policy had been pursued. For permitted German finance and Ger­ the past four years, however, the Gov-, man industry to sink still lower. ernment has always spent more than it These failures were due to Hit· received and at times, especially during 1929-3°, it has made commitments to ler's furious attacks, for he fought spend even more than it could borrow. the Young Plan just as he had Fast and faster the German joy fought the Dawes Plan, deter­ ride rushed to a disastrous finish. mined to precipitate the ruin that By June 1931, conditions had would be his opportunity. Hein­ reached a point where England and rich Bruning, the new Chancellor, France fairly leaped at President strove manfully to reduce expendi­ Hoover's proposal ofa moratorium tures, compel budgetary reforms that would suspend Germany's and end proved abuses, but not payments for the fiscal year be­ only did he have to fight Hitler but ginning in July. Straightway the also the senile Hindenburg. whole land blazed with the signal' In October 1930, a $125,000,000 fires of repqdiation, and by their short term foreign credit was nego­ light, Hitler and his gangsters tiated to cover the budget deficit, climbed to autocratic power. That and in January, a second credit of was the end ofreparation! Four and thirty-five million dollars was ar­ a half billions paid out and six and ranged, but these were drops in the a half billions taken inI bucket. The Federal Reserve Bulle­ tin, less naive than Mr. Gilbert, These facts should be more gen... foresaw the crash, and sounded this erally known and understood. The warning in November 1930: misguided "liberalism" which First and foremost, there has been brought support to German· lies no effective recognition of the prin­ must not be allowed once again, ciple that the Government must live within its income. Revenues have been when Hitler and his minions are ample, and, notwithstanding the im- vanquished, to blind us to· reality. TWO POEMS

By KINq-SLEY TUFTS

I WE ARE THE QUIET PEOPLE, the ones who wait While others hang themselves with too much rope. Ours is the slow tongue of patient hate, Silent in the cheek until some hope Oftruth appears, until some way is found To end deceit. The moth upon the bough, The leaf-like worm, the snake upon the ground Have learned no better way than this till now. The dangerous word,. the ostentatious act Are not for us; ours is the quiet breath, The hue and shade of inconspicuous fact, And the instantaneous flight from threatening death. We are the weak who build brave worlds upon The silent fang, the dust, the hope of dawn.

II A MAN CAN BUILD A WALL against the wind, A roof against the rain, but words are germs Breeding in the blood, feeding upon the. mind In chains of phrases, in colonies of terms. The' public cup is vile with septic names, The printed page infected; man grows weak With pathogenic creeds and verbal shames­ The dearest lips are dangerous when they speak. Words breed the plague, the fever of the brain) Days of suffering and untimely death; Words swell the heart and twist the back in pain: The Four Horsemen ride upon man's breath. Small wonder well men tremble when they hear The eloquence of power - the voice of fear! The DOllAR that

IT'S A SECURITY DOLLAR - buying protection for you and your family in an unsettled world.

IT'S A WAR DOLLAR - helping, through War Bonds and other in­ vestments, to finance war production. works fhree shifts

IT'S AN ANTI-INFLATION DOLLAR - a stabilizing force because it is not competing for consumer goods~

It's Your Life Insurance Dollar!

BUY WAR SAVINGS STAMPS-FROM ANY METROPOLITAN AGENT, OR AT ANY METROPOLITAN OFFICE Metropolitan Life Insurance Company

(A MUTUAL COMPANY) !i".7.'~ Frederick H. Ecker. Chairman ofthe. Board Leroy A. Lincoln. President ,1\ JE 1 Madison Avenue. New York. N. y.l~·

. ~: ~ ~ "Frisco. is again a boom town, a pleasure-seeking town, and, yes, in some respects, a hell-raising town." - Variety, November 4, 1942 •

By LuelUS BEEBE

ITY of fabulous legend, city of Poodle Dog or the Mizners or a C bonanza times and fires, city Palace whose inner court was the ofrailroads and gold and banks and carriage drive. Through lean years, ships and luxury hotels, city of a disastrous strikes, labor agitation hundred banners rippling from sky­ and bankruptcies, the San Fran· scraper roofs, city of vigilantes and cisco wheel has come full circle. Pisco punches, city of incredible The town is in the chips, the fleet is hills and mists and vistas, city of always in; the plush cord is up in the most spacious and gusty saga in the hot spots and you can't fight the American story, a sailor city, a your way to the bar at cocktail rich man's city, a city ofglamor and time at the Top of the Mark, the ghosts of the Barbary Coast, San Fairmont or Timmy Fleuger's Francisco recapitulates today al­ ornate version ofa gin parlor at the most every phase of its fragrant St. Francis. Luncheon again is a past and is the super-de luxe boom great and stately function at the town of a wartime nation. Palace; Slapsy Maxy Rosenbloom The. original overlords of the has an upstairs el dumpo which Central Pacific railroad, the politi­ makes his Hollywood den look cal pirates and plunderers of the like something out ofWatteau.. nineteenth century, the celebrated Even in the leanest years of the cocktail route, the mansions of the shipping and hotel strike, San great nabobs on the hilltops, the Francisco never completely lost its wickedness of Chinatown and the flavor or identity; now it is re-es­ Barbary Coast, much that was tablished, not perhaps to the Bo­ tangible and animate in the San hemian tastes of such notables as Francisco story may be gone, but Major J. Edward Bowes or the late the hilarious mortmain of the past Arnold Genthe, but certainly in is discernible even to gobs in the terms of a luxuriousness and pa­ stews of Market Street who never nache of excitement which makes heard of Crocker or Sutro or the it, along with Boston, Charleston 66 SAN FRANCISCO: BOOM TOWN DE LUXE 67 and New Orleans and New York, conflagration redaction, a mighty a characteristic and individual souvenir of the champagne past community. and the bonanza present. An older Nowhere else are there such im­ Palace had been, in .the days of memorial institutions as cable cars, Huntington, Crocker, Mackay and Sunday expeditions to the Cliff Flood, virtually the seat ofthe gov­ House to see the seals, the view ernment ofCalifornia. Legend sur­ from the Top of the Mark and . rounds its every mention and books from Julius' Castle, the tumults of by the bookshelf yard have been what apparently are a million sail... written about it. Leland Stanford ors in·the· Market Street stewing, was the first guest, to register at the spewing and tattooing parlors after old Palace; Charles Crocker was the dark, the fabled sweep of the Bay first to enter its dining room. King Bridge,the Stingersbuilt by Gus, Kalakaua had died there as Warren the ageless barkeep at the St. G. Harding was to die in a later Francis men's buffet, the ... tiny Palace. Grant and Sherman, Ade'" shrimp, sand dabs and giant crabs' linaPatti, •McKinley and Henry legs that make the town the mecca Ward Beecher were familiars to its for gourmets, the urgency of con­ corridors. Frank Norris and Am.. flagrations in a community acutely brose Bierce and the elder and fire conscious, the sibilant sub.. younger Hearsts knew it well. Its pavement whisper ofendless cables free lunch of game birds and foie for the cable cars, die ceaseless gras was fabled and it was a more pageant of arrival and departure than train-orders-stop on the cock­ for· wars and the far places of the tail route of the nineties. earth. Other communities may Today, the Palace is the strong... have their counterparts and parallel est connecting link between the fascinations, but in their entirety, San Francisco .of spacious times these are the property of San during the last century a~d the Francisco alone. epic San Francisco of today. Its Perhaps ·the most perfumed of food is tops for the Pacific Coast; all San·Francisco legends and one its kitchens reputedly the best or­ that has survived from the age of ganized anywhere west of the the railroad .kings and ,the Com­ Waldorf; the cocktail hour under stock Lode, the·Palace (perish the Maxfield Parrish's Pied Piper, a thought of calling it the Palace dubious triumph ofart but a land­ "Hotel") still stands in its post- mark of note, necessitates the pass- 68 THE AMERICAN MERCURY ing of over-shoulder drinks by the the Municipal Opera; Timothy bucket brigade system from the Fleuger, the ribald architect who bar to thirsty brokers and admirals has just finished installing a four­ in the rear. Midweek lunch in its story subcellar garage under Palm Court, once the carriage en­ Union Square: Harry Ross, the trance .to the premises, is institu­ assistant comptroller of San Fran­ tional and immutable, the counter­ cisco County; George Cameron of part ofMonday lunch in the Mural the Chronicle; Joe Cauthorne, pub­ Room at the St. Francis. Its menu lisher of the local Scripps-Howard teems with dishes of the Palace News; Joseph Dyer, Jr., the Mu­ tradition: Consomme Patti, cre­ nicipal Art Commissioner; some­ ated many years ago by Chef Er­ times Mayor Rossi and invariably nest Arbogast in' honor of the a platoon or two of ensigns and singer, roulade of sand dabs, foie junior loueys from the Navy and, gras and marrow broiled on toast, on weekends, shoals .of enlisted petit coeur flottant ,a fa creme aux men from the training school at fraises. The transition from cham- Treasure Island. A feature of lunch pagne days to the age of sidecars at the Palace is, too, the "Cabinet the Palace has taken in its stride. Table" in the Palm Court, regu­ Its several restaurants are jammed larly seating such notables as John at meal times (it set an all-time rec­ Francis Neylan, Chester Rowell, ord recently by serving luncheon Clarence Linder, publisher of the for 4,200 persons in a single day) San Francisco Examiner, Justices and in the men's bar, the Happy Douglas Edmonds and John Valley and adjacent sluicing prem­ Shenck, and Chief Justice Phil ises,' .the business of hoisting them Gibson. is nearly a twenty-four-hour pro­ Practically coeval with the Pal­ cedure. Its tremendous corridors ace is the Fairmont Hotel on the and public rooms are celebrated for impressive top ofNob Hill, flanked the flowers and, indeed, whole on one fa~ade by the Mark Hopkins shrubs and trees brought to town and facing the Pacific Union Club daily from the hotel's own green­ whose stately premises were once houses at South San Francisco. the Flood mansion. The Fairmont The men's bar of the Palace at was built by Senator Fair out ofthe lunch is a fine thing to behold, profits from the Comstock in 19°3, peopled as it is with the mighty and was scheduled to open, with and witty ofthe town: Paul Posz of vast civic and social ceremony, in SAN FRANCISCO: BOOM TOWN DE LUXE 69

June 1906. In April of that year, nance of the best and more costly however, San Francisco suffered resorts by enlisted men of the vari.. the most epic ofits many conflagra" ous services and the something less tions, and along with everything than awe which attends the per" else on Nob Hill, the Fairmont sons of commissioned officers. No went up in a cloud of the most ex'" amount of gold braid, oak leaves pensive smoke. The basic architec.. and· spread eagles can impress a ture of the premises survived and San Francisco waiter captain; sea" it opened its doors a year later to men and Army privates in general become one of the classic hotels de have a sort ofsocial 'priority almost luxe of our continent. everywhere. It is a common and The Fairmont is nothing to trifle heartening sight to see apprentice with. Its approach is guarded by seamen, pharmacist's mates and carriage starters in crimson tail.. torpedomen bowed to their tables coats and white plug hats; its cor'" while recent ensigns and self-impor" ridors are the cloistered equivalent tant majors and their wives wait of the landing ramps of a military outside .the crimson cord for in.. airfield; its marble pillars, gilded ferior service and slightly watered colonnades, Chinoiseries and ornate drinks. In almost all the bars of the furniture the archetypal symbols town, the custom obtains of slip" ofsolid affluence and respectability. ping free hookers, dividends and The Cirque Room is, perhaps, 'the over-size portions at reduced rates most agreeably conservative hoist.. to enlisted men. San Francisco has ing parlor in town and the senior always been a sailor's town and an" barkeep, JackWalker, is reputed to other war doesn't change it any. make the most energetic cocktails, In a more leisured generation, bar none, on Nob Hill. The' clien.. the cocktail route in San Francisco tele IS varied and stretches between was a world-famed institution and Barbara Hutton and Cary Grant embraced in its economy all the and the more affluent gentlemen bars of downtown Montgomery,. gobs ofthe Navy and CoastGuard. Market and Kearney Streets and scores of adjacent premises in II stews, mews and alleyways. Accord.. ing to Evelyn Wells in her Cham­ An aspect of San Francisco public pagne Days of Old San Francisco, life which is less familiar in other the cocktail route started from the cities is the almost complete domi" Reception Saloon in Sutter Street THE AMERICAN MERCURY and terminated inany ofa number way, the Prado in the Plaza Hotel of celebrated oases in upper Mar­ in Union Square, Ray Barrow's, 41 ket. High spots in the accepted Powell Street, the Clift Hotel's course of progress were Pop Sulli­ Redwood Bar and the Persian van's Hoffman Cafe, The Palace, Room at the Sir Francis Drake. Haquettes Palace of Art on Post The gaudy night life for which near Kearney, the Occidental in San Francisco has been'notable Montgomery, the Bank Exchange ever since Mr. Sutter discovered with its marble floors and fine gold up the Sacramento River con­ paintings, the Baldwin, the Peer­ tinues unabated in its modern re­ less and· the'Grand Hotel, Dunne daction, financed largely by the Brothers, Flood and O'brien's, military and the Navy and flower­ celebrated for its corned beef and ing handsomely from the precincts cabbage, and the Cobweb Palace. of Market Street to "The Beach" The cocktail route still exists in and the loud but· essentially inno­ the San Francisco'of the moment, cent resorts of the International but only the Palace survives in the' Settlement. Mostly the dives of full glory of the Nineties. Unlike this particular district are rigor­ New Yorkers, San Franciscans ad­ ously policed by the municipality mire to stroll from saloon to saloon, and shore and Army gendarmes; absorbing no more than six or eight their viciousness is confined to beer liquid arrangements in each and drinking, shooting at targets, sing­ visiting their favorite haunts with ing Victorian ballads at Bill's Gay more or less clock-like regularity. Nineties and being photographed New Yorkers, of course, prefer to in prop hats by tintype cameramen sit themselves down in one haunt who never heard ofArnold Genthe. and stay sat. Notable among the There are more oblique amuse­ refuges of contemporary times are ments for the ultra-sophisticated, the two bars at the St. Francis, the but they are well screened from the men's buffet presided over by Gus public gaze and the heavy hand of Boell, and the shiny patent leather authority clamps a padlock on and composition glass devising of them now and then. Fun, generally architect Timmy Fleuger known speaking, is robust, naive and very as the "coffin bar" to irreverent costly. patrons. The Top of the Mark at Nick at the Palace men's bar can the Mark Hopkins, the Cirque charge $2.50 for a couple of mixed ROOln at the Fairmont across the' drinks without batting an eye, but SAN FRANCISCO: BOOM TOWN DE LUXE 71 he has been known to be generous is sufficient for the other require­ with enlisted. men and is one of the ments of the house, and the view town's highly esteemed citizens. from its panoramic windows is Two bits for a shine is the standard breathtaking. The circular bar is price and. motor livery is expensive jammed three deep with the armed beyond the imaginings ofanybody services after sundown, while older who is not a Spreckels or a Crocker. officers and their ladies prefer win-· Food, however, is moderately dow tables overlooking the harbor priced even in the poshest places or Mission District or "TheBeach." and dinner at Omar Khayyam's, Further exploration of the white the Mark or Maiden Lane Solari's light scene would lead the pious comes to no more than similar pilgrim to the Bal Tabarin, to the establishments elsewhere in the Fiesta, where.the Tropical Punch world. is all that its name implies in the Omar Khayyam's is a restaurant way of a torrid sock, a snack at deserving of more than passing Julius'Castle, to Slapsy Maxy's in notice, not so much for its food as O'Farrell, Mori's, Jack's, John's for the· personality "of its presiding Rendezvous, the Copacabana, and chef and .genius, George Mardi­ the Club 400 where, at the moment kian, who has accomplished for of writing, Gladys Bentley is the himself and his house one .of the starred attraction. No survey, how­ more startling jobs of promotion ever cursory, of the Golden Gate and publicization of the American scene would be complete without restaurantworld. So vast has been mention of two restaurants, more the success of the establishment or less out of San Francisco's city that it is practically impossible to center: the Cliff House, overlook- secure a table without reservations . ing the Pacific beyond the Sutro and long ranks ·of the patient wait Baths, and Trader Vic's· across the night after night on the staircase bridge in Oakland. There have for places. been numerous versions of the The show place of Nob Hill is, Cliff House, two of them having of course, the.· Top of the Mark, a been destroyed by fire and one by tavern of Mr. Fleuger's designing, a mysterious internal explosion. wonderfully located on the roof of It still· retains much of its glamor the Mark Hopkins HoteL Two el­ as a week-end roadhouse, when· the evators are required to hoist its weather is fair. Vic's trading post, patrons skyward, while a single lift saloon and restaurant in Oakland THE AMERICAN MERCURY

boasts ninety varieties of tall rum ances, as the citizenry, hypnotized drinks alone on its incredible bill by melodramatic villainy, often of potations, while other goods in assembled to shower the leading trade available are all sorts of heavy with cobblestones. In those souvenirs ofthe Pacific islands and days, Melba, Fritzi Scheff,Nor­ ships' stores. Vic himself, a ribald dica, Edouard de Reszke, Homer, fellow who wears a camellia over Scotti, .Emma Eames, Sembrich one ear, is something right out of and Caruso were the city's favorites. Conrad. Today, the Municipal Opera is populated by Lily Pons, Jean III Tennyson, Jan Peerce, Richard Bonelli, Ezio Pinza, John Brown­ A city that takes its arts seriously, lee and Josephine Antoine; the San Francisco is able to boast that town and the military turn out in its most recent opera season was the clusters of diamonds and horse most successful in its. history, de­ blankets of sables every bit as im­ spite wartime conditions. Its hand­ pressive as the Metropolitan on a some and stately Municipal Opera more Cartier-Revillon Freres eve­ House, under the general adminis­ ning. As a matter offact, the archi­ tration of Gaetano .Merola, is sold tectural economy of the Memorial out nightly, carrying on a tradition Opera lends itself far more than ofthe city that stems from the gold the Met to spectacular parading, rush days of '49. with its broad staircases, endless An older San Francisco heard marble gangways and vast white its opera at Marasco's Grand and gold lobby. There are bars for Opera House on Mission near everyone, one of them devoted to Third where, according to tradi­ champagne exclusively, and every­ tion, every night .when opera one from Dorothy Spreckels' Du­ wasn't being sung, Walter Morosco puy McCarthy to Mme. Margaret would sit in the last row, weeping Chung, the energetic and public­ copiously over the florid griefs of spirited over-lady of Chinatown, his own productions of Bertha, the and Charles Myron Clegg, Jr., se­ Sewing Machine Girland The Prodi­ lected last year by the late Mauri gal Daughter. According to ,Miss Paul as the best-dressed sailor in' Wells' chronicle of the time, it was New York's Easter Parade can , customary for the police to guard be seen parading at the inter­ the stage entry after such perform- missions· of The Bartered Bride, SAN FRANCISCO: BOOMTOWN DE LUXE 73

Fledermausor Masked Ball. Later in lievable shortage of imported wine the season, the Municipal·· bill in~ in a town once famed for its cellars. eludes a stand by the Russian Ballet All the irregularities and nuisances Theater and a concert calendarem~ incidental to Federal control of bracing Stokowski, Marian Ander~ everything are manifest and abun~ son, Jan Peerce and Rise Stevens, dant, but San Francisco rises above the Don Cossacks, Richard Crooks, them and probably will continue Jascha . Heifetz, Mischa Elman, to do so for the duration. Once John Charles Thomas, Nelson Eddy termed a town "where hospitality and Artur Rubinstein. is a ~vice," public entertaining in To argue that the San Francisco restaurants and night clubs is prac'" scene is the archetype of luxurious tically unabated even though the perfection would be erroneous as hostess may have to rush drinks such an unqualified estimate would from the bar herself. be of any boom town. It suffers Boom town and bonanza, San many ofthe inconveniences of be" Francisco retains so much of the ing a bonanza town and at the same feeling and spirit ofits other palmy time a community hedged, hin... days, when "seeing the elephant" dered and harassed by the circum.. was a favorite local phrase fordoing stance of war. Hotel space is at a the rounds of the more elaborate fabulous premium and weary and joy~boy bars, schnitzel chateaux, unsuccessful searchers foraccommo'" bagnios and deadfalls, that Senator dations snooze gently throughout William Sharon or Jack London or the night unmolested in the lob~ any other old~timer, if he were to bies of the smartest caravanserais. return to earth blindfolded, would Always short of transportation, it still recognize the city from its im­ is a city where twenty times the memorial street sounds alone. The number of taxis now in service thunder of the four tracks ofstreet wouldn't begin to fill the demand cars in Market, ~he incessant up~ and a hack once captured is usually roar of fire companies en route to retained by the lucky finder at conflagration or false alarm, the meter rates no matter.how long his clang of the cable car bells, distinc~ stops may be. Competent waiters tive and unique in all the world, the are almost non~extant and elderly fog horns in the harbor on misty captains serve in a variety of ca~ nights, the roars of ship~bound paeities ranging from wine steward sailors heading vaguely for the to bus. ·There is an almost unbe~ Ferry House at dawn, the bed~ 74 THE AMERICAN MERCURY lamite cries of news vendors with America's most eXCiting city. If the morning editions out at seven ever they should be stilled, some­ the previous evening, the chimes of thing of the wonder of the nation's the churches, all have about them life of gusto and hurrah would be the wistful and ageless quality of gone forever.

BLACK LYRIC

By ROLFE HUMPHRIES

T QVE that gives or takes L Regardless ofthe mind Cherishes the darkness: Though the sleeper wakes Still the eyes are blind, Blind, and also needless.

Beauty in the act, Terror in the cry, Summon dark beyond This in which we lie.

Where the red and black Fuse in utter night, And the other four Join the sense of sight: If the awful door Close or open, heedless. ENOUGH FORALLf

By DOROTHY THOMPSON

·OST of you here have been in too~ of intellectual as well as spirit­ M advance of the thought of ual revulsion. your country on the issue of·war. All thoughtful people realized You knew tp.at matters· having that the perennial causes of war, . been allowed to run as long as they which have been held to lie in the had, and in the direction that they economic sphere, were rapidly be­ had, only one outcome could be ing removed by the alchemists of expected, namely the present total modern science. Through countless and world-wide conflict in arms. All ages, it had been a fact of human sought to avoid being embroiled in life that to them that had was given this struggle and all failed. and that from them that had not The means adopted to avoid was taken away even what they participationin the conflict varied. had. It was a fact that at no time But behind all of them was a during those ages had the discov­ popular sense of the evil in war, a ered land and resources of the earth troubled conscience, and a sense, been sufficient adequately to nour­ ish the whole population living upon it. Because men were always This is the text of an address hungry and other men had bread, made on November 19 at a the hungry killed them and took public dinner, in New York, away their good lands. Because markjng the first anniversary of men had the ingenuity to build Freedom House. The AMERICAN industries, and other men with less MERCURy editors are pleased ingenuity had the aluminum and to publish tt because Miss manganese, antimony and rubber, Thompson's eloquent message oil and coal and tin necessary to the seems to them significant in con­ creation and maintenance of those nection with ;J.merican thinking indu,stries, the ingenious organized on the world after the victory. against the naive and robbed them oftheir resources. 75 THE AMERICAN MERCURY

Over war hung the justification that war was a therapeutic against of The Progress of Civilization. mass starvation. Even so humane and disinterested a spirit as Wynwood Reede could, II in the last century, in his book The Tragedy of Man, find justification Our century, with all its trouhIes for the despoiling of one people by and maladjustments, had glimpsed another on the ground that, on a vision ofa totally different world. balance, the interests ofcivilization In industries, laboratories and uni­ as a whole had been served. versities, a new learning had grown Our country, wrested from its Up out of research into the nature original Indian .inhahitants .by of matter. It was discovered that sword and fire, could support, ac­ what previous physicists had re­ cording to the outlook of the eight­ garded as little gobs of static stuff, eenth century, only a limited namely matter, was not static at all number of white settlers, to be but was energy in constant mo­ counted by the millions and not tion. Chemists were discovering the tens ofmillions. The brutalities that the elements and energies in committed in Asiatic colonies, in this seemingly static and frozen the same century, by Europeans of rnatter could be broken down and all nationalities were all inspired by reassembled. a doctrine of Lebensraum. The re-­ The Kingdom of Man, the ma­ searches of. men like Darwin into terial kingdom, lay no longer in anthropology resulted in the theory the earth alone, hut in the seas and that man had evolved upon this in the air. Man could harness .the planet through struggle and that inexhaustible lightning and tides the Survival of the Fittest was a to turn his wheels; he could draw law of nature and hence justifi.. from the air nitrates to feed his able in the eyes of God. Malthus soil; he. could turn grain into plas" preached that the rapid growth of tics, acetylene gas into wood, wood population to be observed in the into silk, vegetable matter into a rising industrial era would eventu" substitute for mineral matter and ally overcrowd the planet. Since vice versa. In the recent ,vords of there would never he enough for Dr. M. A. Stine, vice-president of all, it was argued that one race or du Pont, new continents of matter people' would constantly be ex~ were being discovered daily and terminating another, and even hourly. These continents did not ENOUGH FOR ALL! 77 lie. overseas, in lands inhabited by last survive and be humane at the other peoples, nor over the borders same timel of neighboring nations. They lay There was truly a war still to be close at hand in the ingenuity of fought in the society of mankind, man himself. butit was a bloodless war in the Thus, for the first time in man's mind and heart. It was a war against long and tragic history on· this outlived theories of economics and earth, he had ceased to be the slave international telations. I t was a war of matter. Thus, for the first time against ignorance and intellectual in man's painful journey upward timidity. It was a struggle to call out of the slime through trillions man into his inheritance. From the of years, he was, if he wished to intellectual mountain tops of the take possession of it, master of un­ world, voices were crying to man: limited possibilities of abundance. "Wake up and stand upl The For the first time, Cain had no day of slavery is oved· Through reason to slay Abel. For the first countless generations men have time, there was enough for all upon built civilizations on the enslave­ this planet. ment of their fellows and have In a groping and inarticulate known no other way. But behold, way, the apprehension of this had mankind has new slaves, .slaves of spread to the masses of people of metal and electricity and steam.. the earth. A message was flickering They are here in billions. They on the winds, whether they blew have no hearts to hea t, no minds over the steppes ofCentral Asia, or to trouble, no egos to long for ex­ the uttermost islands ofthe seas, or pression, no blood to spill. They over the oldest centers of the most will work for you without ever a highly developed civilizations. The revolt. When they die, you can message was: There is enough for throw them into a cauldron and all! revive them to work again. They Since time immemorial, the con­ will pull the strongest rocks out of science ofman has cried out against the ground, fell the highest forests, spilling his brother's blood. Yet add and subtract, multiply and his conscience had been at war divide for you. They will carry with the material realities of his your words to the uttermost parts life. Now, at long last, the dreams ofthe earth with the speed of light; of the prophets ofold were capable they will carry you over the tops of of realization. Man could at long the world more swift!y thana bird THE AMERICAN MERCURY can fly; they will propel you under Today we have organized the the sea. There is a new heaven and whole world to blow each other·to a new earth, for the old earth has bits because mankind cannot be­ passed away and there shall be no lieve the good news. Instead of re­ more seal" ceiving the good news with thanks'" giving, some men listened with III greedy eyes, thinking: "All this new wealth - how can we get If man on this globe had ever fully more of it than anyone else? How realized just once, clearly and with can we use it further to enslave our vision, the fact of his liberation; if fellows?" he had realized to the fullest that They set about turning this new the prayer he has prayed for two wealth into the most prodigious thousand years: "Give us this day aggressive weapons the world has our daily bread" is fulfilled, if only ever seen. Instead of proclaiming he wants ·it to bet and fulfilled the liberation of mant they through his own creativenesst the heralded his· new enslavement. attribute he shares with God - if They claimed for themselves a all men realized thist would they monopoly of this illimitable and not dash into the streets as the universal power. They declared Russians used to do on Easter Day themselves masters of the new and kiss everyone they met, and prosperity - masters in Europe sing with joy? Would man not set and masters in Asia. about to fulfill the rest of the Yet this new prosperity was prayer: "Thy kingdom come on created by no· nation ofmen. Ithas earth as it is in Heaven"? Would been created by the hut?J.an intel­ man not wrestle with the last un­ lect and every race on this planet conquered territory, his own mind has contributed to it: the Hindu, and soul? Would he not say to the Sir C. V. Raman, with his re­ Black Man: "Let me share with searches into the nature of light; you from an inexhaustible foun­ the Negro, Dr. Carver; the great tain"? Would he not call the Yel... Germans, Frenchmen, English­ low Man "brother"? Would he not men, Americans, Swiss, Chinese, use his liberation to turn the whole Jews, 1vloslems - each adding his world into an Eden, 'with not an mite of knowledge to the vastac­ ugly building, a shabby· street, a cumulations of knowledge of how hungry child? to conquer matter, disease and ENOUGH FOR ALL I 79 want; how to make man the master might 'upon the frontiers of the of his planet and reach out from it globe, blast open paths into the to other stars. heart of the enemy, the kings of We are now engaged in a. great slavery, may we bring with us, civil war, testing whether the crea­ wherever we break through, no old tions of these minds shall be used treaties, old' compromises, old di­ for new sla~eries among the peoples plomacies, old faces, old concepts, of the earth or whether they shall old formulas - for new wars. By be used for the creation ofa com­ all means let our arms .restore to monwealthof fellowship and pros­ nations of men the constitutions perity for all humankind; testing embodying their politicalliberties. whether man shall have conquered But let them also carry a great matter in order to be conquered by word, thundered above the roar of himself, or whether he shall have our cannons, and addressed to the coriquered matter in order to people of this now so little star: possess himself. and enter into his "Get up from all fours! Stand on full inheritance. your feet I Open your eyes, and A year after we Americans en­ your ears, and your minds! These tered into this war, we have begun planes that drop bombs have made to release inventions, energies, the earth one habitation; these create new forms of human organi­ energies which propel shells will zations, and make such transmuta­ turn wheels; this blood that we tions of elements as were latent in spill will fertilize the earth for a this society. all along.. Everything new flowering. ,.Whether you stand that men are doing for war they in our ranks or against them, to all could have done for peace to make we bring this message : Mankind this earth a paradise. is free I There is enough for As our armies, standing now in alII" ~ Why are we being denied the use 0/thzs strategic metal?

THE SCANDALOUS SILVER BLOC

By ELLIOTT V. BELL

URIED in the ground at West of domestically-produced silver at B P oint is the world's biggest double the market value. It has hoard of an important strategic bought the foreign silver Mexico metal, badly needed by our war in­ and other countries chose to dump dustries. It is needed in the making on us. It has accumulated a great of ships, airplanes, tanks, trucks, store of silver, although there was guns, shells, bombs, torpedoes. no monetary use for it, in the face Yet industry is cut off from that of our enormous reserve of $23,­ supply. In this all-out \var, we fix 000,000,000 of gold. Until the war prices, wages, salaries; we requisi­ came, there appeared no earthly tion property, draft soldiers and prospect that the American people prepare to draft labor. We compel would ever get a return for the holders of copper, aluminum and bounty they had showered on the other metals to sell them at a fair silver interests. Now, suddenly, a price or face seizure. But this one greatly expanded industrial need strategic metal is exempt; this one for silver.has appeared. hoarder is privileged. Quite beyond its normal use for The metal is silver; the hoarder 'making knives and forks and den­ is the United States Government. tal fillings, silver is needed now to We have heard loud, indignant substitute for copper, tin, nickel blasts from Congressmen and gov­ and other scarce ;war metals. For ernment officials against industries nine years silver has been a kept and individuals who are accused of metal, dependent for its sole sup­ holding up the supply of vital ma­ port upon the bounty of an un­ terials for selfish ends. But in all "villing government. Now it has a this, there has been'no word of sil­ chance to lead an honest, useful life ver. in industry and the American peo­ For nine years our government ple have an unique chance to get a has been subsidizing the silver in­ dividend on their investment. But terests. It has bought every ounce in the face of this opportunity and 80 THE SCANDALOUS SILVER BLOC 81 this need, our Treasury. is com­ they required the Treasury to buy pelled to ,sit upon its buried hoard, silve.r both at home and abroad helpless in the face of a set ofab­ until either of two goals was surd laws which compel it end­ reached - either the price ofsilver lessly to keep on buying silver at had advanced to the statutory level artificial prices and forbid it to sell of$1.29 an ounce or' the amount of excep,tat a prohibitively high silver accumulated equalled one­ figure. fourth of the combined stocks of The explanation ofall this is that silver and gold. Today, weare fur- . a compact, powerful bloc of Sena­ ther away from either of these goals tors from our western silver-pro­ than we were when we started. ducing states stands squarely deter­ As a result of these long years of mined to block any effort to'repeal silver buying, our government has or even amend our foolish silver acculnulated more than 113,000 legislation. Such is the power of tons ofsilver. Of this, about 14,000 these selfish men that the govern­ tons is in the form of coin, 52,000 ment itself does not dare to oppose tons consists of silver pledged them directly. It even plays into against outstanding silver certifi­ their hands. cates, and 47,000 tons is unpledged Here are the facts: Back in the "free silver." confusion of the depression years of 1933 and 1934, the political heirs of II William Jennings Bryan succeeded in putting across what Bryan, tJntil the war came, tne arts and in­ nearly forty years before, had dustries which use silver were not failed with all his oratory to ac­ trOllbled by our silver purchase complish. They put the United program. There had been a brief States back on a bimetallic stand­ period shortly after the passage of ard. They passed laws which. did the Silver Purchase Act of 1934 two things: first, they caused the when our Treasury competed government to subsidize the do­ nladly with itself in an effort to mestic silver industry by buying corner the world market in silver. the entire annual output at high It drove the price up from forty­ prices (the present buying rate three to eighty-one cents an ounce. fixed by law is 71.1 I cents an ounce, Then it suddenly woke up to the compared with a recent market fact that it was being played for a price of35 cents an ounce); second, sucker by all the countries of the THE AMERICAN MERCURY world which were feeding out to it industry of war. And yet for their unwanted stocks of silver. It months there has been an acute stopped buying, pulled the plug, shortage. The war industries are and let the world price fall to not getting enough; other indus­ thirty-five cents, where it remained tries and little businesses are being for the next seven years. But at driven out of existence. that level, ample supplies offoreign In the face of this situation, it silver came into the market to meet became obvious long ago that our the needs of industry. silver legislation ought to be re­ When war came it was different. pealed. Instead, the Administra­ Many new uses for silver arose. tion sought by various means to re­ Silver has many ofthe properties of lieve the shortageiof silver without copper and tin, two metals made antagonizing the silver bloc in Con-, scarce by war needs. It is an excel­ gress. Last April, the Treasury lent electrical conductor. It com­ worked out a "lend-lease" plan bines with lead, as tin does, to form with the War Production Board solder, with great economies in the whereby the Treasury's "free sil­ saving of tin. For example, two and ver" would be lent to the Defense one-half to five pounds of silver Plants Corporation for non-con­ can supplant forty to fifty pounds sumptive use in war plants. But of tin in making solder, a valuable this silver could not be used up. It property now that Japan has cut had to be returned to the Treasury us offfrom some ofour chiefsources after the war. As a practical matter, of tin. Today pure silver is being it could not be employed for any­ used to replace copper wire in mak­ thing much beyond displacing cop­ ing electrical appliances and small per in the manufacture ofelectrical motors; it is being used for airplane bus bars. As a result, only a minor bearings and for the wiring connec­ fraction ofthe amount available has tions in planes and other precision ~een employed. Then the Treasury instruments of death. In various seraped around some more and dis­ ways, silver can substitute for tung­ covered that it had five million sten, bismuth, stainless steel and ounces of what was known as "sil­ monel metal. It is, of course, essen­ ver ordinary," metal acquired in tial for photographic film, surgical various ways in the past not subject materials and pharmaceutical prod­ to the restrictions of the Silver ucts. Purchase Act, that it could sell to Silver can· playa big part in the industry. But this was not much THE SCANDALOUS SILVER BLOC more than a gesture. It amounted thirty-five cents an ounce to forty-' only to about one-tenth of I per five cents. Thus, even in the midst cent of all the government's huge of silver shortages, it was arranged holdings. . for the war industries using silver In the meantime, the shortage to pay a little extra for the benefit of silver had grown tighter and of Mexico. But still nothing ,vas tighter. With the growing war done to make available the huge needs, the .War Production Board buried hoard held by the govern­ last July issued a -fuling forbidding ment. the importation offoreign silver ex­ Then there was another inter­ cept by special license so as to re­ esting measure of relief. All during serve available supplies for users the time industry was. being pinched with high priorities. Other users for silver, the domestic produc­ were permitted to consume the tion, amounting to seventy million stocks they had on hand within ounces annually, was going straight certain limits; but from October I, from one hole in the ground to an­ they had to hold their silver for other. Every ounce was being WPB orders. bought by the Treasury at the fixed On top of this, the price was price of 7I. II cents. That began to raised., That was an interesting lit­ look a little queer, so the OPA tle episode too. ,It seems the State made another ruling. It decided Department wanted to do some­ that domestic consumers could buy thing more for Mexico. Some con­ domestically produced silver at the versations were held, the burden of same price paid by the Treasury,. which was that it would be a nice plus freight. Thus, industry was at thing if Mexico could get a higher least permitted to compete with price for her silver so as to stimulate the Treasury for silver, although at production and permit the Mexi­ the penalty of having to pay well can Government to levy an addi­ over twice the recent market price. tional tax thereon. An increase of Still nothing was done about re­ ten cents an. ounce was agreed pealing the absurd silver laws. The • upon, three cents to subsidize the WPB decided that gold mines Mexican producers and seven cents would have to shut down to save to subsidize the Mexican Govern­ machinery and manpower. But did ment. Then the Office of Price anyone suggest closing down the Administration obligingly. raised silver mines? On the contrary, sev­ the ceiling on foreign silver from eral Senators gravely urged that THE AMERICAN MERCURY special priorities should be granted ure and reported favorably upon it to silver producers for machinery in last October. The War Production order to increase production of this Board approved it; the Navy asked strategic metal - so that more of for it. No opposition appeared ex­ it could be buried in the ground at cept from one quarter. Senator West Point! The Treasury long ago McCarran, ofNevada, leader ofthe had gone on record as favoring the Senate silver bloc, announced that, repeal of these obnoxious silver ofcourse, the silver Senators would laws. But now it became strangely oppose the measure "most heart­ silent. Indeed, whenever criticism ily." It is up to the people to watch ofthe silver scandal appeared in the the fate of this legislation. press, the Treasury and the WPB rushed into print with repetitious III "announcements" giving the mis­ leading impression that the govern­ It is in this group ofsilver Senators ment's silver was being fully put to that silver finds the strange vitality use in the war effort. that has kept it a political issue in The explanation for this strange this country nearly half a century behavior came out later when it be­ after Bryan and his"cross of gold" came known that the Treasury, went down to defeat before Mc­ fearful that the powerful Senate sil­ Kinley. It is this group of western ver bloc would hold up its tax pro­ legislators and their political allies gram, had made a tacit truce with who have succeeded in the face of the silverites to layoff the subject. our wartime need ofsilver in deny­ Now, with the tax bill out of the ing to the people of theUnited way, the Treasury has given its ap­ States the use of the great hoard of proval to a mild proposal made by silyer for which they have paid out Senator Theodore F. Green, of millions ofdollars. They come from Rhodelsland, which would author­ the silver-producing States of Ne­ ize the President through the vada, Idaho, Montana, Utah, Ari­ Treasury to sell to industry at the zona, Colorado, New Mexico, Cali­ direction of the War Production fornia and Texas. Only the first six, Board its free silver and would per­ or sometimes the first seven, on mit it to lease-lend the silver this list comprise what is ordinarily pledged against outstanding silver called the silver bloc. But the Sen­ certificates. A Senate subcommit­ ators from these states can always tee held briefhearings on the meas- count on allies from the inRationist THE SCANDALOUS SILVER BLOC farm bloc with which the silver The story goes back to the last bloc interlocks. quarter of the nineteenth century. Plain economics or plain facts At that time, the silver dollar \vas can never satisfactorily explain the dropped from. the list ofour official role ofsilver in American politics. coins simply because for years be­ Silver is one ofour least important fore no silver had been brought to industries. The entire 'output ofthe the mints for coining. It had been United States and its possessions in \vorth more as bullion than as coin. 1933 waS worth less than nine mil­ But at the very moment that the lion dollars. Even last year's ex­ silver dollar was being dropped, panded output at the Treasury's events were shaping that were to inflated buying price was worth bring about a great fall in the price less than fifty million dollars.. The of silver and'to lay the basis for its actual subsidy above the market subsequent political career. In the price to silver producers only came world\vide shift to a gold standard, to half of that. And half of it went the mints of Europe were being to a group of large mining com­ closed to silver coinage. At the panies including Anaconda, Phelps same time, large new discoveries of Dodge, Sunshine, Kennecott and the metal \vere being made in our Federal Mining and Smelting, most West. The price ofsilver felL Since of which are interested in copper the period was also one of world­ rather than silver. wide decline in all commodity Yet the silver Senators who prices, the loud demands of the sil­ guard this Iittle vested interest are ver producers' for renewed govern­ as strong, as agile and as tireless a ment purchase and coinage ofsilver pressure group as ever plagued a were joined by the demands of government. The Roosevelt Ad­ debtors, speculators and farn1ers for ministration did not want our silver "cheap money." There "vas thus legislation to begin with, and has formed in the last years of the last been heartily sick of it for years; century an alliance of silverites, yet it does not dare openly oppose agrarians and assorted inRationists the silverites. Why this is so can which has survived to 'this day. In only be understood in the light of every subsequent depression, these the sectional, prejudices and con­ groups blamed the fall of prices on fused monetary delusions with gold and demanded the free coinage which' silver has come to be sur­ ofsilver asa means ofraising prices. rounded in its past political history. l'hat was the cry raised in the 86 THE AMERICAN MERCURY dark days of our own Great De­ Finally, it was to restore the'value pression. Added to it was a strange of silver in the world markets. In­ mixture of crackpot international stead, theprice ofsilver for the past economic theory which found fer­ seven years ha's been lower than it tile ground in the confusion of the was when the program started. early thirties. The Administration, On every hand, the high preten­ bent upon its own expansionist sions which surrounded this mad policies of devaluing the dollar, program have turned into fiascos. tried to head off the silver forces. It For years now nothing has re­ even exposed the speculative inter­ mained of them. The silver pro­ ests of the silver advocates, includ­ gram has degenerated intoa mean, ing Father Coughlin. But the silver common handout to the silver bloc threatened to hold up all legis­ states and now it has achieved the lation until it had its way, and at ultimate in degradation - itdenies length, Roosevelt capitulated. our war effort access to a huge According to its advocates, our stockpile ofastrategic metal which silver program was to restore silver we have bought and paid for. to monetary usefulness throughout On any ground, the program is the world. Instead, it drove the last now indefensible. The time has remaining silver-staridard country, long since come to wipe the whole China, off silver and onto a paper slate clean of this confused experi­ money standard. It was to raise the ment. Silver can be a useful metal purchasing power of the Far East. in industry instead of being kept a Instead, it precipitated a violent slacker metal, masquerading as'a deflation and banking crisis in basic monetary reserve, and main­ China until that country aban­ tained in useless idleness by govern­ doned silver. It was to put a crimp ment bounty. But that can be ac­ in Japan - just how was never complished only if silver is rescued clear. Instead, it helped Japan fi­ from its professional political friends, nance her rape ofChina by making the silver Senators. Many of them it possible for her to drain off silver have built their whole political ca­ from the conquered provinces and reers on getting the country to do sell it to the United States Treasury something for silver. They are not for dollars with which to buy war going to give that up merely in materials. It was to lift the level of order to let silver do something for commodity prices. Instead, we had the country. Not unless the coun­ to wait for war to turn that trick. try unmistakably demands it. YOU CAN PULL OUT ANY TIME

A Story

By CHENOWETH HALL

ALL around the shining pine The pert waitress came sailing .ll.. counter they stopped their past just then and glanced into the chewing and looked up -"- each little man's plate. "Eat all of your with the sort of friendly loneliness spinach, there," she said with a of those who eat all their meals in wag ofher head before she went on public places. No face was really to the 'next one. The little man strange for they had grown accus­ looked all around and mugged at tomed to sharing conversation with his spinach. He swung his foot back everybody. The stiff new clump of and forth and hummed to attract army shoes came on down toward attention to himself as though he the counter. They all waited to see were the happiest man on earth. where he would sit down before It was because the waitress had they pronged up another forkful. thought enough of him to tell him There was a suspension "and an to eat his spinach. Then he popped expectancy on all of their lonely a big bite of it into his mouth and faces; it was almost like a rubber began slowly to chew it up, his band stretched too tight. eyes all the while photographing The soldier sat down beside the every inch of the soldier sitting little man with the big head, and back-to. looked all around, like the others. It came time for dessert and the But he was looking for something soldier was still sitting there watch­ definite; not just the smile of a ing; just watching the door, nnw stranger.He was restless; searching slumping a Iittle; tired of waiting. for someone definite; waiting for The little man had watched the someone to comc. He gave all of boy's back so intently that now he them at the counter a skimming felt perfectly familiar with him, glance as though they were noth­ and when the waitress brought him ing, and then turned his back on his apple pie with vanilla ice cream them to watch the door. that he had every night, he reached 87 88 TI-IE AMERICAN MERCURY over and brought the soldier boy's waitress came by and raised her cap over close to him. He beat the eyebrows - made. a face in the bill of the cap up and down on the direction of the soldier. "What's counter to attract the fellow's the matter with him?" attention. Thelittle man shrugged his shoul­ The boy wheeled around as ders as though it didn't make any though he expected the one he was difference. Then, after a few min­ waiting for had somehow come utes, he realized he was still stirring round behind him. Helooked really his coffee and he stopped it. angry when he saw it was just a It·was just like the soldier had little man with a brown button-up said - that's all he had to do­ sweater. He sighed quickly though sit there and stir his coffee. He and said, "I thought ..." hadn't noticed it before, but the "Don't be so impatient. She'll boy had made him self-conscious come." The little man said it about it and he wished he would go jovially, digging into his hunk of away and let him sit there and stir pie. "Where you from? Stationed it, and joke with the counter girl here long?" and listen to things people said be­ The boy ignored the questions tween bites until time for the first he asked. "Impatient! That's okay show at the movies. That's all. Just for you to say." He underscored stir his coffee and go to the movies. the You so that the little man had The counter girl looked up at to ask why. him with the same friendly smile The young fellow just looked at and winked to make him feel good. him, drew a sort offace and looked The little man settled into the back to the door again. smile of the counter girl away from The little man wanted to joke the rude back of the soldier boy about it. He didn't know he was a and took out ofhis pocket some old little dog fooling around with a letters and pictures and a crumpled great big one. "Why me -?" the telegram. "Ever see these?" He Iittle man asked to get attention passed two crumply, dog-eared back. snapshots over to the waitress. "Because you got all the time in "Them was in France in the last the world - so sit right there and war. That's me there." He said the stir your coffee." words as though he were saying The little man picked up his them low so the soldier wouldn't spoon and began stirring. The hear him. YOU CAN PULL OUT ANY TIME 89

The waitress looked at them II quickly but intently, as though she were really interested. "That you?" The little man was watching when "Yeh; that's me - eh - right they said their first sigh of hello to there." each other. He watched right into He looked at the pictures again, their faces as he'dwatched into the whistling quietly to himself in a pIates of the people at the counter. tuneless, irritating way, pretending "I'm starved," the, girl finally it to be all to himself. There was a said, looking gratefully at the curious naive exhibitionism in the counter, and the soldier followed Iittle man - tuneless -and irritating her back there, irritably ignoring like his breathy whistling, self­ the little man. conscious and jaunty. You see it The waitress was anxious to bring lots' of times in people who are all everything in a hurry and the boy alone. You feel sorry for them, but smiled when she said, "Oh, she's they annoy you: They wisecrack got here at last, eh? Well, here's a lot and they mope easy. That's your supper - now - everybody the way they are. happy?" The little man looked The soldier stood up, started, to over at them and clicked his tongue look around for another place to against the side of his mouth. sit down. The little man reached "That's the st~ff," he said wisely over and pulled his sleeve. "There to the soldier's young girl, "eat she is, ain't she?" your supper - she'll take good care The soldier looked quickly to­ 0' you," he said, nodding at the ward the door. There she was, sure bright-garbed waitress, "she's been enough. Before he started toward takin' care 0' me a good many her, he looked around and stared years." the presumptuous little man straight The soldier edged himself be­ in the face. The face was half-hurt tween his girl and the man; cut him and half-triumphant. "There she off with his broad back. 1S.. " "You found anything?" the girl I t was almost as though she had asked tenderly between bites. Her brought someone with her - the, fingers had round little nails like a little' man's being at his elbow high school girl's, and she smelled pointing her out. The edge was off of talcum powder. this piercing quick moment of at "The town's prettycrowded, but last. I got a two-room place. We'll have THE AMERICAN MERCURY to share a bath with another cou­ man and he very nearly bounced. ple. T'hey're young, too, so...." "There's a good roomin' house The little man beat on the coun­ there on Union Street- nUlnber ter and the waitress went over to thirty-four. Thought if you wasn't him and took his glass of water much acquainted around ..." so he could take his after-eating "We don't want any rooming pill. house. We want an apartment or The soldier didn't want to say a house of our own." any more now, but the girl pulled "A house! Why God, boy­ his sleeve, excited. "Where is it?" you're stationed out here ain't y'? He laughed. "Now wouldn't you You're apt t' be pullin' out 0' here just know exactly where it was if any day. Then what'd you be doin' I gave you street and number! with a house! Get yourself a nice Where's your things? Left them clean room 'n you can pull out any at the bus station?" time on a day's notice. You don't She nodded and they both gig­ want no house." gled and laughed and then ate The soldier looked around at the solidly. He finished his first, almost girl, to, see if she was .finished with without stopping to breathe. He her fried scallops. No, she wasn't. pushed his plate back to wait for The man saw she wasn't, too. "You her, rolling his spoon backward and kids don't want no house to worry forward on the counter. The girl 'bout." looked up and laughed into his "I happen to want a house," the eyes and went on eating. He was soldier said, standing up, impa­ feeling very thoughtful to himself, tiently waiting for the girl to gulp but whenever she, looked up, he her scallops. She looked up at him threw on a careless grin and tossed with her mouth full. The soldier his head ather. looked ather and at the man, sit­ "You looking for a room?" the ting now over next to her, like man with the big head said to him a conspiracy. He felt irritated with as soon as his head canted in that them both: her mouth full of direction. scallops and his nudging at the "No." The soldier answered elbow. He thought back to the curtly. moment he'd walked spruce and "Why we are too, Harry." The new into the restaurant. He felt girl looked up at him in rebuke for now as though he'd been shaking being so rude. She smiled at the a feather bed - not spruce any YOU CAN PULL OUT ANY TIME

more - all full of lint - all limp. I bet you a dollar he has. I bet you ,"C'mon." He waved his head a dollar he's had something he toward the door. "C'mon, Alice." could pull out of on a minute's The man watched her eating her notice ever since he was a fellow last bites. "You take my advice. like me in them uniforms with Don't get yourself wound up with skinny leggins. But that's not going no house. Get a good clean room to be me. Not sitting at a counter that you can walk out ofon a day's tickled to death because some coun­ notice. You don't wantnothin' t' ter girl tells me to eat my spinach tie you down." and sleeping in a rooming house They both hurried out of the with somebody else's dust in the restaurant. rugs. Nossir, that's not going to "What's the matter, Harry?" be me." "Oh, nothing." The gi~l's practicallittle face was "Well, maybe he's right. You puzzled, but her eyes were wet. know you're apt to be sent away "I know what you mean, ···Harry, any day. And like he says, we and I want it too, but it's not very could get out of a room on a day's practical." notice." He drew her up tight to him. as "A day's notice! That's just what they walked ~long, looking into the th' hell I don't want. Don't you shop windows. He slowed up past understand either? I thought you a big display of kitchen utensils~ did before. I thought that was why "I like riced potatoes. We ought to you came down here. But now a get a ricer." And he stopped to look stranger drinking a cup of coffee at an electric steamer. "We ought at your elbow can change your to have one ofthem. It saves all the mind all around. I don't want vitamins. something I can pull out of in' a "See?" he said, after they'd hurry. I want something that's passed all the windows and were down there like bricks. Something on a quiet street with the lights ,I know's there. I heard him tellin' going out. "You see what I mean?" it. He was in the last war. He takes Her eyes had little wetnesses in pills for something -I don't know them, her face was still a practical what, but I saw him taking them. face, and his hand held her hand Yeh. He's got a room some place. very tightly. MUST AMERICA GO HUNGRY?

By JAMES STANIFORD

HE United States has the great­ These are the salient facts Test food producing plant in the brought out by the study: world. In spite of it, however, I. Americans consider them­ Americans face hunger and all that selves the world's best-fed people, the \vord implies - malnutrition, but the United States entered the bent and ill-formed bodies, in­ ,var with a diet which for the na­ creased susceptibility to various tion as a whole was below accepted types of physical ailments, and a minimum nutritional standards. A lack of stan1ina and staying power. report by the Bureau of Home More than that, we can lose the Economics of the U. S. Depart­ "var because of an inadequate sup­ ment of Agriculture, in 1941, ply of food for ourselves and our stated that scarcely one family in ' heroic comrades-in-arms. Certainly four had a diet that measured up \ve stand a chance of losing the to a satisfactory level. The Bureau peace for the same reason. said this deficiency was reflected in These are startling statements an' "appalling amount of disabil­ and open the ,vriter to charges of ity." The army has found it neces­ alannism. No such charges can pos­ sary to reject a shockingly large sibly come from anyone who kno"vs number of young men because of the low-down facts on the Ameri­ physical defects arising from nutri­ can agricultural picture. The state­ tional deficiencies. Secretary of ments are made in the most sober Agriculture Claude'R. \Vickard, in spirit on the basis ofa careful study his 194 I report to President Roose­ of the present food si tuation and of velt, said that 50 per cent more the attitude of the government and milk, 12 per cent more eggs, 33 per the peopl~ tovvard the whole ques­ cent more tomatoes" citrus fruits, tion. 1'hey are made with the frank and other vitamin C products, and intention of arousing public opin­ 80 per cent more leafy, green and ion and prodding officials to take yellow vegetables would have been immediate preventive steps. needed to provide every American MUST AMERICA GO HUNGRY? 93 with a satisfactory diet. It is impor­ production goes down - and few tant that one keep in mind this in a position to know expect it to picture of the 1941 food supply be­ reach 1942 totals - government cause it offers a standard by which requirements would take more shortages of the war years may be than a fifth. measured. The United States thus enters 2. The supply of food available its second year of the war with a for ·civilians in 1942 - our first declining food supply and an ex­ year of war - was smaller than in panding demand. At the start of 1941, when, as pointed out above, the ,conflict the Department of there was a marked nutritional defi­ Agriculture assured the public· that ciency. This reduction in civilian there would be plenty of food. supplies was due principally to Now it concedes that there are heavy overseas shipments to Great shortages, but insists that no one Britain, Russia, and other fighting need go hungry. It lists present and foes of the Axis powers, and to the prospective shortages as meats, expanding ne~ds of this country's milk, butter, cheese, cooking fats armed forces. Men drawn into the and vegetable oils, canned fruits armed services usually consume and vegetables, fresh vegetables, more food than they do in civilian and, of course, sugar a.nd coffee~ life. The shift of millions to uni­ Eggs may be added to the list be­ form increases over-all food re­ fore next fall. By November 1942, quirements. the supply of butter had fallen to 3. Deplorable as it may be, the the lowest level for that time of civilian supply will be even smaller year since 1932. Stocks probably in 1943 and for two reasons: first, will be exhausted early this year. military and lend-lease require­ The country will then be reduced ments will be larger and, secondly, to current production which, ex­ production in all probability will be cept in the flush spring and summer smaller."" The Department of Agri­ milk producing seasons, is insuffi­ culture reported very recently that cient to meet domestic demands, military and lend-lease buying in let alone lend-lease requirements. 1943 was expected to be 50 percent Because milk production is not greater than last year. It estimated keeping pace with needs, the gov­ government purchases would take ernment is considering plans to re­ a fifth of this country's "current" duce the butterfat content of fluid agricultural production. If 1943 milk distributed among consumers. 94 THE AMERICAN MERCURY It has prohibited the sale of whip­ on navigation and a shift of fisher­ ping cream. The manufacture ofice men to other lines of work. The cream also may be curtailed. Cheese Department says that shipping de­ supplies available to civilians will mands this year to move troops and be reduced considerably because war materials to figh ting fronts will the governn1ent is taking steps to result in a further curtailment of set aside 54 per cent of the produc­ imports of sugar and coffee. Only tion for military and lend-lease in the case of cereals and dry beans needs. are supplies of basic foods ample The 1943 supply of cooking fats for many months to come. and vegetable oils (excluding but... ter) may be short of civilian de­ II mands by as much as five pounds per person, or the equivalent of a This picture of the 1943 food out­ seventh of the per capita consump­ look is, if anything, optimistic. It tion in 194I. This estimate is based is based upon hopes of officials of upon the assumption that produc­ the Department of Agriculture tion of domestic vegetable oil that production can be maintained crops - soybeans and peanuts­ at the 1942 leveL A realistic analy­ can be maintained at the record sis does not support those hopes. 1942 level. The importance of Agriculture is faced with a criti­ ample supplies of fats and oils can­ cal shortage of manpower. It has not be overemphasized. It was a lost about three million workers shortage of these products that since the defense program started cantributed greatly to the break in in 1940. In 1942 alone, it lost more the spirit of the German home than a million to war industries and frant in 1918 and the final collapse military enlistments and an addi­ of the German army shortly there­ tional six hundred thousand to the after. selective service for the army. Fish is a good substitute for These men were among agricul­ meat, but the Department ofAgri­ ture's most skilled workers. culture predicts that· the civilian Places of the lost men are being supply will be smaller in 1943 than filled insofar as it is possible by last year, when the amount avail­ women, older men, and children. able was about 2S per cent less than A recent Agriculture Department in 1941. Factors contributing to survey revealed that nearly 60 per this decline are wartime restrictions cent of the workers were children MUST AMERICA GO HUNGRY? 95 under fourteen years ofage, women, reduced supplies of beef in 1944. and men over fifty-four. Naturally In its November 1942 crop report, such workers cannot produce as the Agriculture Department had much as the young and middle­ this to say about operations in the aged men. The Department fur­ midwestern dairy belt: ther reports a serious shortage of Despite relatively good late fall experienced. year-around hands, pastures and ample supplies of winter qualified to handle farm ·machin­ feed, farmers have been inclined to ery, and seasonal workers with spe- milk fewer cows in their herds. Since the seasonal downturn in July, the per­ . cialized skills. Milkers, tractor centage of cows being milked has been drivers, sheep herders, shearers, declining faster than normal; and in the and cow hands ·have become very past two months the drop has .been especially sharp. It appears that good scarce. beef prices and shortages of adequate Surveys show that the migration help are encouraging farmers to let from farms· has been the greatest calves suck and to dry up cows more quickly than usual. from areas of high levels of crop and· livestock production and in This decline in the labor supply which young people have had su­ has greatly increased the demand perior educational opportunities. for farm machinery. Yet fewer ma­ These young people were quick to chines will be available. The War seize better paying jobs in war in­ Production Board will allow imple­ dustries. This loss ofskilled workers ment makers to manufacture only is being reflected in curtailed farm­ 20 per cent as much machinery as ing operations all over the country. they turned out in 1940 and less In the middle-western livestock than a third of the 1942 supply. region, large numbers ofdairy cows This drastic reduction, against are being sold for slaughter because which Secretary Wickard fought, farmers are short of capable help. has made rationing necessary. Only Likewise, beefcattle feeders are not the most pressing demands can be fattening as many head as they filled. could if they had more help. In the Then there is the weather. Agri­ southwestern plains and Rocky culture has not had a bad year Mountain range land areas, farmers since the severe drought of 1936. are reducing· beef cattle breeding By the law of averages a poor year operations because of labor short­ is not unlikely. The abnormally ages. fine weather of 1942 contributed to This curtailment will be felt in crop yields averaging 13 per cent THE AMERICAN MERCURY above previous records and 36 per dangerous state? Here's the answer: cent above the favorable 1923-32 Officials in high and controlling period. If 1942 had been no better positions in the government at than average,the country would Washington have failed to under­ ,at this mament be confronted by stand the yalue offood as a. weapon critical shortages of livestock feed, of war. As a consequence they did vegetable oil crops, milk, potatoes, not give it a proper place in the and vegetables. war production program. From Ame.t;ican agriculture farms on President Roosevelt down, they rubber. More than a million trucks had become so used to thinking in are now being used in food and terms of farm surpluses that they crop production. Farm trucks are could not, it seems, conceive ofpos­ gener~lly older than commercial sible shortages. Much of this Ad­ vehicles and will be in greater need ministration's first two terms was of parts, repairs, 'and tires. Yet devoted to problems dealing with these will be difficult to obtain. so-called surpluses. There were, of The Agriculture Department re­ course, no food surpluses. Instead, ported recently that it expected a there was underconsumption. Mil­ considerable pro~ortion of farm lions went hungry because they did trucks to cease operation alto­ not have sufficient buying power. gether by the end of 1943. This Crops accumulated because people would come at the very time that who needed them could not buy the nation's railroads were bur- _ them. dened vvith industrial production Because the nation has never had and troops. The production and a serious food shortage an attitude marketing of farm products would of complacency prevailed and still suffer. prevails both in official circles and Taking all these factors into con­ among the people. sideration there is not much room The government, in its war plan­ for hope that 1943 production will ning, has all but ignored agricul­ match last year's. Ifit doesn't there ture. It has forced farmers to com­ will be hunger in 1944. pete in a short labor market against the army and industries loaded III with fat, cost-plus war contracts. The farmer could not and cannot Why has the nation's food situa­ compete. In the matterof dealing tion been allowed to sink to this out strategic rnaterials agriculture MUST AMERICA GO HUNGRY? 97 has been treated as a stepchild. It carried on with the traditional needs twice as much farm machin­ concept derived from previous ery as the government has allowed wars -- wars fought without to­ for 1943. It is not being allotted day's mechanized equipment­ sufficient tires· and repairs to keep that the civilian population should its trucks in operation. Food proc­ merely be protected from starva­ essors have been denied needed tion and that an army marches on equipment, particularly for turn­ its stomach. This idea is held by ing out dehydrated fruits and vege­ many officials in the military and tables and for drying milk. Little industry-dominated war produc~ effort has been made to put into tion command in Washington. human food consumption channels Secretary Wickard, about the millions of pounds of skim milk only top-ranking official to under­ that farmers feed to livestock every stand the value offood in the pres­ week because they have no avail­ ent struggle, has remonstrated. But able market. he has had Iittle success in making The government's policy makers others understand.· For one thing, have utterly failed to grasp the role he .has not had the ear of the of food in modern, all-out war. President. For another, he arrived Modern waF strategy,with its at his understanding rather late. As emphasis on the large-scale use of late as a year ago, in a report to the highly-mechanized weapons, re­ President, he said rationing and quires the utmost efficiency and substitution were unlikely, that physical and mental alertness, of scarcity was avoidable if the coun­ the armed forces and ofthe workers try utilized effectively its scientific on the home front. A warring na­ knowbdge and its facilities for pro­ tion's food problem is therefore not duction. "T1lere must be no hun­ the maintenance of a bare sub­ ger, obviov<;, or hidden," he said, sistenceJevel, but a diet safeguard­ "ifthe Amel n people are to have ing the striking power of the army the mettle reiuired to make de­ and the efficiency of the working mocracy live." population. Unfortunately, having evoked Germany lost the first World Mr. Roosevelt's displeasure by a War because those in charge offood stand he took on farm price control production planning and of food legislation when it was before Con­ distribution did not understand the gress last spring, Mr. Wickard is value of food as a weapon. They reluctant now to speak out. THE AMERICAN MERCURY

Administration action in making office- that he plans. to impose· ceil.;. farmers the goat in its fight for ings on prices of their livestock. It price controllegislation had an un­ is not that they oppose ceilings. It favorable effect upon agricultural is the uncertainty as to his plans.to output. Producers felt that they which they object. They are afraid had been called upon to make un­ he will set ceilings at levels which equal sacrifices compared to those would make future operations un­ asked of labor and industry. Farm­ profitable. This uncertainty is ers got no forty-hour week, or time causing many farmers to go slow on and one-half for overtime. Many their operations. They feel that in worked as much as eighty hours a a time like this, when they "are week. They saw their hir~d ·help asked to put all their time and drained away by the army and war energy on production, they should industries until they had to sell not have to worry about and their cattle and machinery and let gamble on future prices. Certainly their land lie idle. Yet they heard war plants are not being asked to themselves called profiteers. Dis­ take similar chances. They know in gusted, many joined their departed advance what prices they are going workers and went to work in war to get. They know also that there plants. will be price adjustments for any increases in production costs. IV Mr. Henderson's price policies affecting beef, coupled with unwise Policies of Price Administrator army buying operations, have Leon Henderson have, in many caused thousands of head of beef cases, tended to·discourage farm cattle to be slaughtered at light production. Farmers are convinced weights when they could have been that he is looking out for the inter­ fattened to provide five hundred est of consumers without sufficient pounds or more of meat per head. consideration for the producers. The loss in the potential supply of As an example of the effect ofhis meat has been millions of pounds. operations on production one has There will be further losses unless only to point to the very important some action is taken to correct the meat animal industry. At this situation. The government's price wri ting hog and beef cattle farmers ceilings on beef and the army's de­ are in a dither, and with just cause, mand for lean cattle has placed it over reports from Henderson's in about the same price brackets as MUST AMERICA GO ·HUNGRY? 99 fattened cattle. But production of is the season of·the year when fattened cattle is a fairly expensive farmers· make plans for the coming process. It requires special feeding, crop..Those plans 'will be made on usually .given by farmers in the the basis of the manpower, farm .midwestern corn belt. to lean cat­ machinery, and other productive tle which come off western ranges. facili ties and price policies in exist­ The corn belt farmer can engage ence at the time the plans are in this operation with hope ofmak­ drawn. By spring it will be too late. ing a profit only if fattened cattle Food production is a long-term bring a fair margin over the price process. One cannot turn on the he must pay for the lean cattle. spigot and expect an immediate When the margin does not exist, stream of supplies. the lean cattle go to slaughter lighter than they otherwise would. v Taking all these things into con~ sideration, one cannot but agree What should q be done? First, the with some straightforward remarks government must recognize agri­ made very recently by Albert S. culture as an activity .just as essen­ Goss, master of the National tial as munitions making. There is Grange, in a speech before the an­ Iittle hope, however, for a program nual convention of this farm or­ to implement that recognition as ganization. He warned that there long as the present governmental was grave danger of building an setup prevails. Too many cooks army larger than agriculture's re­ have their say about policies affect­ duced productive power could sup­ ing food production. Besides the ply adequately. ."Altogether it Agriculture Department, there is would appear," he said, "that ifwe the War Production Board, the had deliberately gone about it to War Manpower Commission, the destroy farm production,we could War and Navy Departments, not have done much worse than the BoardofEconomic Warfare, the ·we have done in developing our Office of Price Administration, the policies on manpower and' price Office of Defense Transportation, controL" and the Office ofWar Information. The time has come when the No three see alike. Because ofcon­ public should demand that appro­ fusion arising from this multiple priate action be taken to correct authority, the President is likely to the. precarious food situation. This appoint a food administrator to 100 THE·AMERICAN MERCURY take over food problems before their time and energy. Many of these words are in print. But an ad~ these families could produce much ministrator would not be able to more if they had additional ma­ improve the situation unless food chinery, or dairy cows, or poultry. production is given its proper rec~ Others need larger tracts. Some ognition in the allotment of man­ need better land., These families power, machinery, and transporta­ could be helped by means ofloans. tion facilities. The Agriculture Department has' The President should appoint, as the authority to make such loans, he did when the rubber problem but it does not have sufficient became so confused, a committee money to help very many. of unbiased and well~informed The food program should spell civilians to make a study of food out farm price ceilings so that needs and recommend a food pro­ farmers may know in advance of duction, distribution, and con­ production that there will be no sumption program. :Recommenda.. action to force down prices. Like~ tions would, of course, take into wise, the program should set defi­ account manpower and material nite minimum prices so that farm­ needs of the armed forces and war ers may be spared worry over industries as well as the needs of possible losses. Ifit is proper to pro­ agriculture. At the present time tect the consumer against excessive food policies are being determined food prices, it is proper and right by two biased parties - the mili.. that the farmer be protected tary and the war industry. As against excessively low prices. The a consequence' agriculture's man" food program should provide for power and material needs are being immediate rationing of all scarce judged and determined by agricul­ foods to prevent further hoarding. ture's competitors for those things. In order to assure agriculture suffi­ A proper food program would do cient manpower, the government much more than is being done now should require local draft boards to to help the nation's two million defer farm workers. Recommenda~ low~income and under~productive tions to this effect have been made, farm families increase their output but many boards, faced with the of food. These families live on necessity of meeting quotas, have marginal land or on farms that are ignored them. Future deferments too small to enable their operators would not, of course, plug existing to make full and efficient use of labor gaps. Steps should be taken MUST AMERICA GO HUNGRY? 101 to start a movement of non-draft.. be done. It is imperative that food able workers from cities to farms. production be maintained at as Better farm wages might help. It high a level as possible, for the might require higher farm prices to future of civilization is bound up bring about a boost in farm wages. in the success of our efforts to pro" Or labor subsidies might do the duce more of the vital foods­ job. rich, nourishing food that will keep These are just a few suggestions. up the strength and insure the Some of them are likely to be put efficiency of democracy's fighting into effect soon. Other things could men 'and civilians.

f'I'You remember Mr. Galbraith from the apart­ ment downstairs, dear. He was here during the Liberty Loan drive." Yes.. We Have Some Bananas

nother Casualty. - Tottering to see it with their eyes closed. A. and bleeding, drama criticism It isn't, true enough, that all emerges as yet another victim of these plays of war are invariably the war. While it can still get on its praised as masterpieces. A number legs in -the presence of a farce, a are not. But even where criticism vaudeville show, a musical comedy manages heroically to retain a little or even, in certain instances, some ofits old poise, its grievous injuries play that has no concern with im­ are still discernible. In evidence mediate events, it falls· flat on its whereof, I set down literally six face when asked to contemplate sample comments on the plays in any exhibit that deals with the cur" paint culled from the present New rent world struggle. The veteran of York practitioners of the craft of a thousand peaces has cracked with Aristotle: the boom of the first gun. . I. No one whose heart is burdened by The noble old fellow's wounds the human misery of a cruel war can were first observable some three face Mr. Anderson's play with equa~ years ago and now cover his entire nimity. After the war it may be possi­ ble to have a detached point of view body. And they drip anew and about The Eve ofSt. Mark. There is, in mOTtally on the occasion of almost short, some ham in it. But as things any play that has to do with us or stand in the world today no one is pre­ pared to cavil at (such) minor details. our allies in arms. Patriotism then 2. It is easy to forgive the grave faults triumphs over the once analytical of Mr. Williams' The Morning Star in old fox and, try as he will, he can view of the bravery of our English come out only a bad second. For brothers which it so sympathetically pictures. The mind may say no, but one critic who can't see just how a the heart proclaims a loud yes. mediocre play·is arbitrarily can'" 3. The matchless heroism of our Brit~ verted into a good one simply be... ish allies makes Lesley Storm's Heart of cause its theme is soothing to the . a City what it is: a play deserving of the plaudits of criticism. Who would national or allied sensibilities there dwell on dramatic defects when moved are a dozen who seem to be able by such a theme?

102 THE THEATRE 1°3 4. The nobility of Mr. Steinbeck's gone off precipitantly since the drama, The Moon Is Down, comes from the fact that he demonstrates, days of his Paris Bound, Holiday however now and again faultily in a and somewhat later The Animal dramaturgical sense, thatthe Nazis are Kingdom. And Behrman, the most in the end doomed. adroit of the lot, has not done any­ 5. In Watch On the Rht"n~, Miss Hell· man evokes the high admiration of thing that has come anywhere near critieism with her sympathetic delin· his Rain from Heaven, produced in eation of the anti-Nazi. underground 1934. His present The Pirate, which movement in Germany. Her theme is hard to resist. scarcely comes under the nobby 6. Mr. Sherwood's There Shall Be No heading of polite comedy, is good Night preaches the folly of unprepared· Lunt and Fontanne and hence very ness. What more, in these days, can good box-office, but no credit to one demand ofa play? his old standing. There are scores of other such As for the others, Rachel examples of what once was dra­ Crothers, never of much conse­ matic criticism. The craft seems to quence, has since not touched even be in sore need of.the ministrations her Let Us Be Gay and AsHusbands of the Red Cross. Go, done in '1929 and 1931 re­ ** * spectively.A. E.Thomas, after No Decline of Polite Comedy.- More Ladiesin 1934,· has critically Such recent productions as the disappeared. Paul Osborn. did a John Van Druten-Lloyd Morris nice job in The Vinegar Tree and a indifferent The Damask Cheek and fairish one in Oliver, Oliver a dec­ the Philip Barry wholly vapid ade or more ago and has latterly Without Love again bring home the gone off in other dramatic direc­ fact that in late years American tions with minor accomplishment. light comedy has declined from its Arthur Richman, who began prom­ high even more than B. & O. com'" isingly, has done little worthy of mon, H. G. Wells and the Blue.. note since The AwfulTruth in 1922. point oyster. Van Druten (he has Vineent Lawrence, with all indica­ lived over here for years, has taken tions of a fine talent, wrote two or out citizenship papers, and so may three intelligently amusing polite be regarded as an American), while comedies, went to Hollywood and, still· indicating skill has notnego.. like so many others, died there. tiated anything in seasons to equal After her The Marriage Game, his' early Young Woodley and produced many years ago, Anne There's Always Juliet. Barry has Crawford Flexner faded into Doth- 1°4 THE AMERICAN MERCURY ingness. Lynn Starling, who began Many Husbands, Love In a Cottage with Meet the Wife, subsequently and Caesar's Wije, Arnold Ben­ confected several lesser comedies nett's The Title, Kummer's Be and then wentdown the Hollywood Calm, Camilla, Cyril Harcourt's A chute. Donald Ogden Stewart, au­ Pair .of Petticoats, and Gladys thor .of the entertaining Rebound Unger's Our Mr. Hepplewhite. So in 1929, ditto. ' war and the upset state of a world Aside from some of these obvi­ don't seem to be exactly the ous cases and regarding only the answer. better writers who have persisted A second commonly heard argu­ in the polite comedy field, what ment is that our America is not, may be the reasons for the collapse, and never was, possessed of the either complete or comparative? right social background and tone The first that comes to mind is the for the comedy ofmanners. That it war and the upset state of the may not have been in the past is world, allegedly hardly conducive more than possible, although out of to the writing ofsuch comedy. But it even then emerged such com­ recollection proves the reason' hol­ mendable exhibits as Langdon low. During the last world war Mitchell's The New York Idea, there came from both America and Clyde Fitch's The Truth, and vari­ England a plenitude of sufficiently ous others. But that it has in later deft light comedies, including years been at least the equal of among others Alfred Sutro's The England in that respect should be Clever Ones and The Two Virtues, more or less evident. This largely Monckton Boffe's Things We'd and paradoxically has been brought Like to Know, the Smith-Mapes about by the English themselv~s, The Boomerang, the Ditrichstein­ who for the past twenty years have Hatton· The Great Lover, W.'· S. flooded the American metropolitan Maugham's Caroline and Our social scene and become, to a con­ Betters, Clare Kummer's Good siderable extent, part and parcel of Gracious, Annabelle and A Success- it, often - if rumor be true­ ful Calamity, and the Harwood­ chiefly parcel. Thus, more and Jesse Billeted. Also Haddon Cham­ more, what with economic condi­ bers' The Saving Grace, William tions in England what they have Hurlbut's Romance and Arabella, been, with manifold British.. Jesse Lynch Williams' Why Marry?, American intermarriages, and with Milne's Belinda, Maugham's Too similar phenomena of time,. New THE THEATRE 1°5 York gradually grew to be the ilnagination into woefully weak capital of gay society where things comedy. Fantasy consists· in some­ came to such a pass that one could thing more than a mere initial ex­ no longer familiarly throw a cham­ travagant conceit. It is the quasi­ pagne bottle across the room with­ realistic conversion of such a con­ out hitting at least a couple of ceit into wonder and charm and Lords, three Dukes and several loveliness and ache and laughter Ladies, not to mention divers and commiseration through the French and Italian counts, Ruma­ wonder and charm and loveliness nian princesses, Russian grand­ and ache and laughter and com­ dukes, .and maybe a Greek or miserationof a literate and whim­ Spanish royalty or two. And the sical mind. scene, accordingly, became so much *** meat for comedy of the Maugham Theft Note. - There hasn't been Our· Betters, Lonsdale The Last of a good revue tide hereabout since Mrs. Cheney and even general Ed Wynn offered us Boys andGirls Haddon Chambers-Hubert Henry Together. Such recent ones as Davies species. So that doesn't Laugh, Town, Laugh, Keep 'em seem to be exactly the answer Laughing, Of V We Sing,' and either. Priorities of1943 are enough to dis­ Then what is the answer? I an­ courage even the most avid seeker swer the question simply and con­ after amusement. Since invention fidently. I don't know. seems to be lacking, I suggest that *** producers cabbage a likely one used Fantasy. - Fantasy may be su- some twenty-seven years ago by perficially described as being weak the Messrs. Stuart and Cliff for a serious drama filtered through a revue produced in England. As no poetic imagination into beauty. one remembers it, the producers The definition, however, does not can pass it·off as original. The title: fit the Ketti Frings-Robert Ayre It'll Tickle. Mr. Sycamore by a long shot. In *** this case,' all we get is a fantastic Alt Wien.- It is hardly news in idea, to wit, a postman who takes a this day that whether it be called cue from the Philemon.and Baricis Die Fledermaus, The Bat, One legend and turns himself into a tree Wonderful Night, The Merry Count­ in order to get away from crowding ess, Night Birds,. Champagne Sec, humanity, filtered through a prosy Rosalinda or whatever else, the 106 THE AMERICAN MERCURY libretto of the operetta afflicts take over with the ballet that Strauss' grand score with the pox. brilliantly concludes the second It was, in point of fact, hardly act. news when it was first uncovered This Mr. Brentano appears to be and duly gagged at 'way back in infected with some peculiar ideas, 1874. Ifthe tale ofthe philandering one of which he shares with most husband who goes to a ball and directors of· the musical stage. I there encounters his wife in a two~ allude to drunks. Whereas on the inch .mask and, not recognizing dramatic stage a gentleman in his her, makes loving overtures to her, cups is generally presented as bear~ to say nothing of embarrassed ob~ ing some slight resemblance to a ligatos to her maid who is also pres~ gentleman in his cups, on the musi~ ent under false colors - if the tale cal he is invariably pictured as an was stuporous nigh seventy years unrecognizable cross between an ago, its deficiency in enormous dy~ adagio dancer and a case of Parkin~ namic power may be understood son's disease, with overtones of the in the present era. Worse, when late William Jennings Bryan on one the libretto, as in the current Rosa ... of his good days. A portion of the linda production, is treated to act... second act, laid in Prince Orlof~ ing that seems persistently to be sky's ballroom, anda larger portion beset by the conviction that high of the third, laid in the warden's Alt Wien spirits are best to be office at the jail on the following interpreted by comportment in,;. morning, consequently offer the distinguishable from a number of appearance less of ladies and gen~ chamois frisking with an equal tlemen of old Vienna who have number. of kangaroos, that defi~ looked upon the champagne when ciency becomes doubly apparent. it was amber than of a crowd of There are times during the eve~ current 52nd Street boulevardiers ning, indeed, when one can't be full of wood alcohol. sure that what one is watching There is also the matter of legs. isn't a mixed troupe of high divers Whoever selected many of the and flying trapeze artists. ladies, the dancers foremost among The stage is unfortunately also them, must have a mother who gravelled in other directions and is in childbirth was not scared by a only in the Strauss spirit when grand piano. director Felix Brentano steps aside But if the physical stage on the and permits George Balanchine to whole suggests considerably less the THE THEATRE 1°7 romantic Vienna of yesterday than Her Own. There is, in all truth, a Broadway night club of today, more of this so-called imagination the Strauss score led by Erich in a rubbishy play like Davis' rein­ Korngold and amplified by the in­ carnation nonesuch, The Ladder, terpolation from other Strauss than in an upright play like Ibsen's sources of Wiener Wald, Wein, A Doll's House. As for originality, Weib undGesang, etc. - and in the there is surely far more in a mys­ main ably sung - makes more tery and detective play like The Bat than sufficient amends. But I can than in a considerably greater con­ only pray that the next time the tribution to dramatic art like eminently worthy sponsors of the Sudermann's thematically and basi­ New Opera Company produce the cally stale Honor. operetta they will have the or­ Imagination, it seems, is too chestra play.it and the singers sing often critically identified with a it with the curtain down. Or at fancy .High t into space, however least not raise it until the second meaningless, whereas the greater act waltz ballet and then again imagination frequently exercises promptly drop it. itself with its feet firmly planted on .* ** the ground, as witness, in the first Critical Redefinition. - Two instance, Albert Bein's mediocre terms commonly employed by Heavenly Express and, in the second, journalistic drama criticism call for Hauptmann's The Weavers. Origi­ clarification, to wit, imagination nality, it also seems, is too often and originality. Both are indiscrimi­ identified less with treatment than nately held to be synonymous with with first ·use of theme and a virtue, yet close scrutiny proves second-rate play like Yeats' Deirdre that often they are not. Some of consequently accorded the com­ the best plays are lacking in such pliment and a first-rate subsequent ."imagination," as some ofthe worst one like Synge's Deirdre ofthe Sor­ are full. of it. And so, too, in the rows arbitrarily deprived of it. • case of such "originality." There is That Thornton Wilder's newest no more imagination, in the ac" offering, The Skin of Our Teeth, cepted critical use of the word, in has both imagination and original­ some such relativefy worthy play ity in the above accepted sense is as, say, Brieux's The Red Robe than freely to be granted. Its scheme of in some such unworthy one as, for showing mankind's struggle for example, Brieux's The Woman on certainty and security down the 108 THE AMERICAN MERCURY ages through anachronisms visited effect, it is emphatically not the upon the present is both novel and kind ofplay that results from im­ fanciful. But, though it has scenes agination and originality in the ofhumor and pathos that get their higher and purer sense.

WIND INFERTILE

By GEORGE ABBE

IND that burns and beats and burrows, W Underneath thy burning side Curls the yarrow's white in furrows, Nestles light in golden tide.

In thy passion cries the cedar, Twists the empty stream with pain; Meadow blower, pollen breeder, Softener of soil with rain.

Crouched behind the hounds of thunder, Bursting over, clouds aswarm, Flail and whip and limbs that blunder, Levelling the earth to storm,

Past the thinnest red of dying, Past the last translucent water, Comes from darkened west thy sighing­ Empty still of son or daughter,

Barren giver ofall motion, Turner of the leaves to light, Still more lonely than the ocean, Rest thy fruitless heat in night. The Mind of the Wild

DECURRENTLY, in the woods dividual. There has been concern .1'-. chronicles and sky chronicles to show something of how instinct and water chronicles that occupy works: howaninstinctive act is com­ this section of THE AMERICAN pounded of reflexes and tropisms, MERCURY, .there has been concern and how thus the flight of the to show that the characteristic be­ hawk-moth to the white blossom havior patterns of pre-human and of the phlox is no more a conscious sub-human lives are determined action than the phlox blossom's and fixed by instinct, and are not own phototropic striving toward resultant from private processes of the sun, and how even the be­ mentation and decision in the in- haviors of far higher animals than

RAccoon Trapped Prank UljJatel 1°9 110 THE AMERICAN MERCURY hawk-moths may be products of in a moment of prankish·· fancy impulsions quite as unreasoned and might, that this year it will fly imperative. north. The gray squirrel, burying hick­ Thus far, the interpretation of ory nuts in October, has not taken animal behavior patterns as in­ forethought; he has but responded, stinctive, involuntary, neuro­ almost as will-Iessly as a plant to chemical, can scarcely draw dis­ rain, to the stimulus of a certain puteo It is as plain to the down­ temperature and a certain hickory to-earth eye 6f a naturalist that smell. He has done the thing that animals' central life rituals are en­ all squirrels do; to do it is inalien­ forced and organic, as it is plain to able from his squirrelhood; even in the up-to-heaven eye of a theolog­ the earthless cage in the laboratory ical philosopher that the beasts of he must make the useless. motions the field are forwarded through of burying his trove. The chick of their intricate destinies by no mere the wild game-bird must crouch private decidings, but by a much when it hears the hawk; the ce­ older and deeper and stranger lore cropia caterpillar must spin its silk which Thomas Aquinas admirably cocoon upon a walnut twig in sea­ called "animal prudence." A squir­ son; the spawning salmon must rel is made wise not by thinking. A swim upstream as surely and as woodchuck prospers by no cere­ subrationally as the water of the bration. The animals, in their stream must flow downhill. The flockings and matings, in their feed­ raccoon washing freshly caught ings and wakings and sleepings,· in mussels before eating them ..• all the major patterns oftheir lives, the killdeer feigning a broken wing are not individually wise, but are and drawing attention from the simply caught up, unresistingly as pebbly nest .•• the opossum pre­ diatoms or clouds or floating pine tending death .•. the delicate seeds, in the general wisdom which tree root groping its dark down­ anciently infects the world. A sci­ ward way around an impeding entist may accurately say, if the stone - all are similarly driven idiom please him, that God marks and compelled. When the great the fall of the sparrow. He must bird flocks fly southward in the certainly say that the sparrow's fall autumn of the year, there is no - and its nest-building and its single individual amongst all those mating and its migrating and its myriads that can decide, as a man particular choppy air-gait -are DOWN TO EARTH III not ofits own deciding or devising. coon, caught by the leg in a steel So far, there can be small dis­ trapin thewinter woods, gnaws off pute. A Lloyd Morgan, talking of the imprisoned leg and frees itself? chemotropisms and scioptic reac­ Conceding that the beaver is in­ tions, and a Bishop Berkeley, talk­ stinctively a tree-gnawer and in­ ing of the indwelling of God, need stinctivelya dam-builder, can it be not quarrel. The fixed behavior... insisted that there is no calculation patterns ofan animal, however, ar~ involved, no thoughtful reckoning only a part ofits life. The time and evidenced, when a beaver selects direction of its migrating may be a birch of precisely the correct fixed for it. The texture ofthe nest, height, gnaws it at precisely the and the way of assembling it, may right point, and so fells it that it be Qutside its decision. Perhaps it lies exactly athwart the chosen site has no choosing as to what it shall of a dam? eat, or when it shall copulate, or These are kinds ofquestions that whether it can swim. But outside present themselves insistently to this skeletal pattern of its life, ar'" every woods watcher. They are ranged for it willy-nilly by its in­ three questions, specifically, that heritance of protoplasm or the have lately been raised by corre­ rulership of Providence, there is spondents.Let it be granted (say the vast area of its changing and these three different writers, in flexible daily life: the problems it similar substance) that animals' must meet, the adaptations it must species· behaviors are innate and make to altering circumstances, the unrational, as the articles in Down means it must use toward ends. to Earth have always represented. Shall it be said that in all this, But the countless behaviors that too, the animal is without inteHi... evidently lie outside the fixed gence? Is it "instinct" - that pat... instinct-pa1tterns? The apparent tern of hereditary reflexes and un~ reckonings and j udgings and fore- \ learned drives - when an oriole, sights with which animals meet building its nest on the swaying their new daily problems - what pendent twig-tip ofa willow, builds guides an animal in these? Does a deeper structure than it would science deny, in these perform­ build on the firmer and more wind­ ances, the activity of conscious resistant twig of a hickory? Is thought, and if it does, how does nothing more than preconscious it read the happenings? These are reflexiveness at work when a rae" questions of which a clarification is 112 THE AMERICAN MERCURY essential to understanding present­ awarenesses, hereditary drives day biology's viewpoint. which direct the greater part ofour activity as relentlessly (and as hid­ II denly from our conscious knowing) as our secret chemistry directs The researches of psychology in pulse and respiration and peristal­ recent decades have established, sis. The conscious mind, the dim upon the solid bases of laboratory Iittle glimmering unknown to ani­ and clinical experiment, two tre­ mals, is very slight and recent. mendous and complementary facts. Beneath it is the enormous Older The first is that animals are almost Mind: the instinctive mind, the wholly without any of the powers chemical mind, the body mind, of reflective and speculative and urging and informing us without deductive thinking which humanly our realization, as it urges and in­ we mean when we speak of "con­ forms a lusting hawk or wolf. scious intelligence." A million mice For the total group of chemis­ have run·a million mazes, endless tries and memories and reflexes raccoons have been observed in which constitute this sub-aware endless puzzle boxes, numberless factor in our life, science has no crows have been studied under name, for science is rightly con­ conditions oflaboratory control, to cerned to break it up into its com­ make the truth indisputably clear: ponents and analyze it. But for Animals have percepts. They do convenience, to give it distinction not have concepts. from the·realm of consciousness, it The second result of modern may usefully be given an entity psychological research has been to name; and there is perhaps no establish how huge a part is played better term than a very old phrase in our own human life by factors of the Indians. They summed up \ below the level ofconscious aware­ all the old body wisdoms, the blood ness and conscious thought. Our cunnings, the subconscious drives psychic life has the structure of an and promptings, in a single designa­ iceberg. The area of consciousness tion: "deep-knowing." - the "top-head" - is indeed but Does science think that" deep­ an uppermost tip beneath which knowing" is sufficient explanation lies the vast submerged body of for the behaviors of animals? It subconscious impulsions, instillets, does. Science looks at the trapped reflexes, tropisms, pre-mental raccoon, the ingenious oriole, and DOWN TO EARTH 113 sees no conscious intelligence at happening and be moved to ex­ work. The raccoon is impeded, and claim, "What vast intelligence the struggles to be free; he bites and man-creature must have, to be lashes at random; presently, when able to make this leap! What a his leg is. numbed, he chews pain­ knowledge of mathematics and lessly at this focus ofattention.' He physics he must· have, to enable acts wisely, yes; but it is not a wis­ him to calculate so nicely the nec­ dom of his own. It· is the organic essary trajectory and the exactly wisdom of reflex. It is the wisdom correct degree of muscle-tensing of a cell, the wisdom of a growing needed·to carry him where he wants seed. ·It is deep-knowing, not top­ to land, and to do all this intricate head knowing. Likewise, the oriole calculating in a twinkling." has "not any need of thinking to It would he an understandahIe make its apparently precautionary interpretation and clearly it would insurance against the wind. There be a wholly false one. Man does, is an instinct in its blood to build a indeed, have a mind that can cal­ pensile nest, and when the site is culate and deduce and reckon. But whipped and buffeted by breezes he does not use it when he is leap­ while the oriole is at work, the in­ ing a crevasse. He simply responds, stinct is perhaps stimulated more as a total organism, toa total situa­ vigorously than when the site is tion. He does not think; he acts. _calm. Result: a larger nest, more And the roots of his action are in deeply pensile. Sufficient cause: a "life's primordial tissue," the tissue deep-knowing, far down below the from which conscious thinking is a level·of conscious forethought. farthermost and very recent out­ Even in the engineering of the growth. A beaver, felling a birch, beaver, science sees nothing not does not need to have mastered explicable in terms of spontaneous tangents, or to hold in his furry impulse, race wisdom, and the re­ skull an intricate table of beaver sponses of sub-mind. It cites a hu­ logarithms. For it is not upon con­ man analogy: a man pursued by scious thinking that a heaver draws. danger, coming in his flight to a He draws on deep-knowing and it crevasse, leaping the gulf and flee­ moves him as planets are also in­ ing on. A mind as remote from nerly moved, and sassafras leaves man's as our human mind is remote "are impelled to gr~w green, and from a beaver's, might observe this songbirds are made to sing. Literary Signposts

ALFRED KAZIN'S On Native crudity or a too violent realism and .L1. Grounds 1 is a shrewd and often on the other in frivolity or retreat. brilliant survey of American prose Mr. Kazin's theme is important, from Howells to the WPA guide but the conflict between artist and books. To Mr. Kazin, the present society which he treats as peculiar crisis seems an occasion to take to America is no less peculiar to stock of ourselves and of our im­ Europe, hence not peculiar at all. mediate past. Autopsy would not For the past one hundred years as be the word for the operation he the prosperous prospered, artists performs on the body of literature ofEngland and the Continent have and society; for al though he smells felt as unhappy, lost, and alone as out decadents and literary zom­ Thomas Wolfe. Shelley comes to bies, he is far from finding America mind, together with Rimbaud, decadent or dead. The violence of Rilke, Yeats and Lawrence. They Thomas Wolfe's 0 lost! seems a differ from Wolfe in that they have guarantee of salvation. Mr. Kazin managed to put their unhappiness nurses hope. to be tter use. Bis theme is the long estrange­ Inspired by a desire to show the ment of the American writer from relations between society and art, American society. With the growth Mr. Kazin wades through the of capitalism after the Civil War, years, telling the 1920'S as he gets the artist found himself increas­ to them that they were not so orig­ ingly isolated and confused. Grop­ inal as they once supposed, but ing, nostalgic and angry, he at­ part of along-continued move­ tempted to make adjustments, but ment toward realism, freedom, and his enmity to an uncongenial so-· eccentricity. Irreverent toward the ciety, which belied the promise of irreverent, kindly toward the pure the frantier and of New England in heart, he rescues Howells from as well, resulted on the one hand in Mencken, Norris and Edith Whar­

1 $3.75- Reynal and Hitchcock_ ton from neglect. Their faults are II4 THE LIBRARY

excused by circumstances. Too ing his impressions in astonishing short a period had elapsed, says metaphors. He sees Cabell's writ- Mr..Kazin, "between Sitting Bull . ing, for instance, as "the Florida­ and Henry James." He is sympa­ boom Gothic of America's coming­ thetic and acute in dealing with of-age,"and he notes "the smooth, Hemingway, Lewis, Dos Passos, luscious purr of Archibald Mac­ Fitzgerald and other lost or clear­ Leish's poems, where the words lie eyed souls, but he is so severe with clustered like grapes on the vine." Cabell that the effect is that of Happily detached by youth from beating a dead horse. Though I the time of which he writes, he enjoy this sport, what I enjoyed writes of our time as Mr. Eliot more was Mr. Kazin's'treatmentof writes of the seventeenth' century. the Stalinist critics and the South­ They may not have all the evi­ ern esthetes of the 1930's, especial­ dence; but their intuitions are ly the latter. The section on John delicate and their images provoca­ Crowe Ransom~ Allen Tate, and tive. Where a scholar, lost in de­ other occupants of ivory towers tails, might fail to see the whole, is the severest of the book. Mr. Mr. Kazin triumphantly succeeds. Kazin prudently polishes critics off He has a first-rate critical mind. He except, of course, for his friends has tried to do a five-year job in and Edmund Wilson, to whose two. But if we waited until we school he seems to adhere. knew completely what we were Simpler'now in manner than he talking about, few books would get used to be, Mr. Kazin approaches written and no reviews. a stylistic condition between that of T. S. Eliot and that of Clifton II Fadiman, but he still shares the upholsterer's delight in three sen­ Criticism is full of health but the tences where one would do. He can condition of the novel seems des­ still allude, without shame, to perateo Last year, as I recall, the doubtful matters like the' 'phases" Pulitzer Prize was not awarded offaces; and he is capable ofsaying, because no novel was found worthy. with an air of making sense, that This year the crop seems almost "Steinbeck's world is a kind of equally insignificant. The novel primitivism." But he has the re­ amu:es through arrangements of viewer's ability to rip the heart out reality. Though reality may be ofa book and the knack ofpreserv- found in the past and in human 116 THE AMERICAN MERCURY character at any period, the pres­ Most of the novels of this season ent (and I. am not forgetting Mar­ seem to deal wi th .the American garet Mitchel! or Walter Scott) Revolution, with the Civil War, or has been the field of the better with cloaks, swords, crinolines and novelists. When out of touch with bustles before or slightly after these the present, the novel is apt to be'" conflicts. Interesting as these times come a kind of opiate. and accessories may be, they are a We·are accustomed to good poor substitute for human beings. novels. The 1920'S, the golden age And an almost exclusive interest in of the contemporary novel, gave us such matters is a sign of social or Sinclair Lewis, Huxley, Heming­ literary sickness. Ifdope is what we way at his best, Virginia Woolf, need, we can find a superior variety Lawrence, and Joyce. The 1930's in· thrillers and detective stories, gave us Thomas Wolfe, Farrell, which have the added virtue of Evelyn Waugh, Steinbeck, Angela dealing with our own times. I, who Thirkell, and Elizabeth Bowen, was suckled on Hemingway and whom I consider the best living weaned on Joyce and who remain novelist. And in this period, we dis­ old-fashioned enough to want my covered and imported .Proust, novels up-to-date, turn for my Gide, Mann, and Kafka. The dope and pleasure to spy stories 1920's, of course, could cantem" like those of Helen MacInnes, de­ pIate a world which was not yet too tective stories like those ofMichael oppressive. In the 1930's, the de-­ Innes, and ghost stories like that of pression attenuated the ardor for Dorothy Macardle. Here at least present reality and this war seems are living Nazis, authentic ghosts, to have finished the job. Some of and corpses which are lively in the realists sensibly expired as if comparison with their indifferently they knew their time was up. resurrected ancestors. Some, like Huxley, got religion These bitter and possibly unfair and retired from the world or, like reflections were occasioned by my Mann, sought refuge in the past. hunt through the "serious" fiction Leaving their proper field to of the fall season in the hope of critics, journalists, and poets, most balancing my diet of criticism and of the remaining novelists have poetry. I emerged from fictionized accompanied Mann and Ant~lony history, surprised, with Eudora Adverse to pleasanter regions. The Welty's Robber Bridegroom.2 AI- novel has gone ,vith the wind. 2 $2.00. Doubleday, Doran. THE LIBRARY 117 though it deals with the past, this an alligator with a persimmon novel is less history than legend or tree, found too late that it was too myth and consequently shares a late in the year to· prop open the kind of permanence with Grimm's jaws of an alligator with that kind fairy tales and The Flying York­ of tree. shireman, both of which it re­ This is all very gentle and charm- sembles. Eudora Welty, ffitlch - ing. No living character intrudes; talked about at the moment in but fairy tales depend less upon literary circles, is an excellent story character than upon atmosphere teller. This fall· she won and de­ and style. Miss Welty has both. served the O. Henry Prize for short She commands a childlike, metic­ stories. The Robber Bridegroom, her ulous, yet earthy prose which first novel, is a fantastic tale of would be appropriate for the aa­ bandits, Indians, wicked step­ ventures of Finn MacCooi. Al­ mothers, maidens, and pioneers, though her story is as American as who are innocently and remotely Paul Bunyan, it reminds me of preoccupied with one another on Ireland because, perhaps, the Irish the bank of the Mississippi at some also sought out or invented a timeless time long ago. Rosamond, legendary past and went to the a virgin, picking herbs in the pot­ rhythms of, simple people in the herb patch by the edge of the effort to renew themselves. Now indigo field encounters a robber that Dreiser and Faulkner no who .steals her dress and shift. longer please and renewal is what When asked if she prefers death to the novel needs, legend and sim­ nakedness, she replies: "Why, sir, plicity may do the trick for us as life is sweet, and before I would die they did for the Irish. Aside from on the point of your sword, I this promise of renewal, Eudora would go home naked any day." Welty deserves gratitude for hav­ Before she marries the robber and ing written a tolerable book in a he becomes a respectable merchant bad season. in New Orleans, ·Rosamond en­ counters hags, imitation Paul Bun­ III yans, half-wits, and ineffectual Indians who wander through the Stephen Spender belongs to that dream-like forests. And there is set of .British poets of whom the "anonymous mail rider" who, Richard Aldington remarked: having propped open the jaws of "England use~ to be a nest ofsing- 118 THE AMERICAN MERCURY ing birds. Now it isa bed of pan­ modern writer a spider spinning sies." Though a little too rearly to from his own bowels. hail Spender and other poets of the As for the war poems, they are 1930's as major poets, the British personal, indirect, and small. can hardly be blamed. A promising Spender quietly and ironically generation had been lost in the presents what he has experienced: war. And Spender, as Ruins and lying in bed while bombs drop or Visions, 3 his latest volume, shows, hearing of the death of a friend. In is good. In 1933, when he first his preface he justifies his limitation: appeared, Spender had found his I think that there is a certain pressure excitement in the collapse of of external events on poets today, making them tend to write about what middle-class economy and, filled is outside their own limited experience. with leftist optimism, had taken The violence of the times we are living his images from the wreckage of in, the necessity of sweeping and the depression. I was somewhat general and immediate action, tend to dwarf the experience of the individual, repelled at first by his solemnity and to make his immediate environ­ and looseness. The new Spender is m(§mt and occupations perhaps some­ thing that he is even ashamed of. For tighter and more final. this reason I have deliberately turned In these poems, written .from back to a kind ofwriting which is more 1934 to 1942 , sour rhymes and personal. ••• dissonance, which set the teeth Spender might have written this delicately on edge, and disturbing with Mark Van Doren's latest images of cancer and of "the rot­ poetry in mind. The winner of the ting feet of factories" correspond Pulitzer Prize, fresh from triumphs to Spender's present feeling of in­ in narrative verse, has also felt the stability in a "falling, falling impact of the war. Wanting even world." His earlier hope of social partial experience of it, he tried reform now gone, his visions imaginatively to embrace it all. among ruins concern little but This effort drove him, in search of deatho Some of the later poems appropriate expression, from his suggest that the disorder of the familiar Connecticut manner to world around him and certain something far more violent. The domestic difficulties besides have most remarkable poem of Our driven the poet in upon himself. Lady Peace 4 is "The Lacing," an Jonathan Swift knew what he was eiaborate discord of sense and talking about when he called the metaphor which suggests in its

8 $2.00. Random Hous~. , $.50. New Directiotll. THE LIBRARY 119

enormity the strain these times im­ immaculate messages from keen, pose upon a sensitive mind. The clean senses. In "Extracts from ogre of war, says Mr. Van Doren, Addresses to the Academy of Fine is lacing the world into a formida­ Ideas," for example, and in several ble pair of stays. But there is hope other poems Stevens gives the im­ even before something snaps; for pression of systematic thinking. as her equator is more and more But, as in a dream or in a book by narrowly constricted, the world Mortimer Adler, it is never alto­

may find poise as well as shapeliness gether clear what I the thinking is within pressure. The war has made about. Concealing his thought, if Mr. Van Doren expert beyond any, in indirection, nonsense, and experience. No poet of our time exquisite goofiness, Stevens con­ has gone further in search of a veys the sensation of thinking, figure. which for most of us is all that Wallace Stevens, the poetical in­ thinking comes to anyvvay. surance man of Hartford, Con­ But this much is clear: never necticut, is the most interesting satisfied with the real, he translates and perhaps the best poet now it into the rococo. As an antidote writing in America. Certainly he is to the bestial, he sees nature in the best. craftsman. ·Parts of a terms of art. " Messieurs," he ex­ World 5 resumes the sharp, capri­ claims. "It is an artificial world." cious translation of reality which And to prove it, he presents the he commenced in Harmonium simple, naked apricot, in terms of (1923) and continued in The Man Bach, as the "well-tempered apri­ with the Blue Guitar (1937). As al- cot." He makes the world more "ways, he is nonchalant, precise, elegant by straining it through the precious, and, it must be ad­ parts of a superior world. Though mitted, "not a little decadent. His the elegance which he undeniably kind of poetry could come only achieves may seem to have no re­ toward the end of a poetic tradi­ lation to the world about us, it is tion. its oppositeo It·is his comment on Sometimes his poems are no inelegance. The world which drove more than delightful fooling. Usu" Spende~ to contemplation of his ally they seem to· say more than tripes and Van Doren to extrava­ they say. Even when they appear gance raised Stevens to a refine­ to be philosophical, his. poems are ment never encountered in Hart­

5 $2.00. Knopf. ford. He is like Lady Lowzen who, I20 THE AMERICAN MERCURY in his poem, "skims the real for its but an independent weapon, operating in its unreal": own sphere - fighting for the command of the skies even as navies fight for command of In Hydaspia by Howzen the seas. Considerably on the technical side Lived a lady, Lady Lowzen, for the average reader, it is essential reading For whom what is was other things.. for military specialists and even for "armchair strategists." And he resembles another of his unnatural heroines, a certain Mrs. FOR PERMANENT VICTORY, by Mel~ vin M. Johnson, Jr. and Charles T. Haven. Alfred Uraguay, who once whis­ $2.50. Morrow. The authors argue that pered in the donkey's ear, "I fear "America has never been ready for any war; that elegance must struggle like the and, as a result, has always suffered seriously." They plead for "a permanent doctrine of en­ rest." forcement" which should be made a "partof No less conscious of the war than our moral, spiritual, and physical constitu~ Spender, Wallace Stevens refines tion.••• There can be no justice without law; there can be no law which is not by it by the Stevens process. Poetry, common consent; there can be no justice, no he says in a note, is imagination in law and no order without the power of en~ eternal struggle with fact. Though forcement." war drives us to fact, a poet must UNLOCKING ADVENTURE, by Charles manage to return to what he wants Courtney. $2.50' Whittlesey House. The truly fascinating autobiography of a man who has fact to be. Having done so, Stevens made a world~wide reputation as a locksmith. stands alone, a dandy to the last, He has opened locks for poor women and for adjusting ruffle and cravat in a such eminent personages as the late Sir Basil Zaharoff, the munitions king, and he has also vacant lot. made and opened locks for the Army, the Navy and the F.B.I. He tells his story simply, though with pardonable pride, and his book ~~~ilm@~~il~~ is full ofstrange information, such as that the average haul of a burglar is $43.22. ~ CHECK LIST HOW TO WIN THE PEACE, by ·C. J. Hambro. $3.00. Lippincott. The former presi~ ~~~~~~i~ dent of the League of Nations Assembly and of the Norwegian Parliament thinks there NON-FICTION should be a long cooling~off period between COMMAND OF THE AIR, by Giulio victory and final peace after the Axis is de~ Douhet. Translated by Dino Ferrari. $4.00. feated in battle, that some international fed~ Coward~McCann. Douhet is to air power eration of states plus an international court what Mahan is to sea power. It is a commen­ with the power of enforcement should be es­ tary on arrested development in military tablished, and that, perhaps most important thinking that we have waited until the end of of all, "adequate education" should be pro­ 1942 for a definitive American edition of this vided everywhere with the view of spreading work. As far back as 1909, the Italian theorist the democratic idea. He writes out of a great of aerial strategy emphasized that aviation experience in government and vast learning was not merely an accessory of surface forces in history, politics, literature and psychology. THE CHECK LIST 121

ON GROWTH AND FORM, by Sir D'Arcy would like to read rather than what actually Wentworth Thompson. $12.50. Macmillan. happened - in its entirety. A new, and considerably enlarged edition of the standard work on biology by the eminent QUEEN OF THE FLAT-TOPS, by Stanley Cambridge University scientist, originally Johnston. $3.00. Dutton.' Mr. Johnston was published in 1917 and long out of print. In a the only newspaper man aboard the aircraft thousand-odd, richly illustrated pages, this carrier Lexington when she was sunk in the important and strikingly original book clearly Coral Sea battle. He gives the history of the and simply links the organic and the inorganic ship and sketches of its personnel, and then worlds in a cosmos wherein the same rules of describes in detail her last struggle. Probably mathematics underlie all forms. It demon~ no other book like 'this has ever before ap­ strates that every cell of human, animal, or peared in any language, certainly not in plant organ or tissue, as well as every form of English. It is magnificently written - clear, inanimate matter, is a "diagram of forces," warm and almost'indescribably exciting. revealing its mysteries in simple and familiar physical laws and mathematical equations. MEMBERS OF THE FAMILY, by Fred­ Written by a profound thinker who says in eric F. Van de Water. $2.50. John Day. his introduction that "one does not come by Charming, philosophical essays about the studying living things for a lifetime to suppose animals on Iv!r. Van de Water's Vermont that physics and chemistry can account for farm - four dogs, two horses, a cow and them all. Physical science and philosophy several dozens of. birds. Of especial value to stand side byside, and one upholds the other," metropolitan people who dream of owning a it is a brilliant demonstration of the ancient farm. Greek saying: "The Deity always appli~s geometry." - EDWARD J. BING. THE BRITISH'"COLONIAL EMPIRE, by W. E. Simnett. $3.00. Norton. A compact, DUST TRACKS ON A ROAD, by Zora readable, popular handbook on the history, Neale Hurston. $3.00. Lippincott. The rich­ successes and disappointments of British co­ ness of Miss Hurston's life and her splendid lonial policy. Mr. Simnett is a Britisher, now vitality are accurately conveyed in this auto­ representing his government in the United biography. A Negro girl who grew to be a States, but he seems to be fairly objective in noted' anthropologist and a first-rate story his exposition, and on occasion, in fact, is teller in the bargain, she has somethi,ng to sharp in his criticisms. write about and does so with remarkable in­ sight, humor and gusto. The book's spirit of SHELLS AND SHOOTING, by Willy Ley. broad understanding makes it a hopeful $2.00. Viking Press. The science and military document as well. editor of the New York PM has here written a little encyclopedia on the arms of war from PREACHER'S KID, by Ladd Haystead. the beginning down to the present day. Mr. $2.00. Putnam. A somewhat fictionized auto­ Ley has a gift for making complicated techni­ biography by a man who was brought up in a cal matters comprehensible to the layman, Presbyterian parsonage in the Pacific N orth~ and his own clear illustrations add greatly to west before World War 1. There are the usual the value of his exposition. stories offights with the Irish Catholic kids, ofa father who "wasalways sort of far away THE MAN OF THE HOUR, by Winifred and didn't talk so anyone could understand," Kirkland.$I.75. Macmillan. A somewhat of a major puppy love affair, and so on. Per­ fictionized life of Jesus, with special emphasis haps the reason why this book doesn't impress upon His friendships. Very easy reading, and is that the author tells what he thinks people always in good taste. ~{~~)k;IfID~~~~fID~~ ~I THE OPEN FORUM I~ ~~~lfj~~f~t1J~~t1J~~'[jt1J~~ MYTHS ABOUT ACCESS TO RAW MATERIALS

SIR: In the mounting discussion of the post­ magic-working power ofGerman propaganda. war world, a formula enjoying ever greater There has been no such lack of "free access popularity seems to be "Free access for aU na­ to raw materials" in our time. Every individ­ tions to the raw materials of the world." It is a. ual or nation was able to buy any raw ma­ perfect example of how impressive entirely terials in any country - indeed, a lot more meaningless slogans can be. than they wanted or could use. The producers The tacit premise is that the alleged lack of and exporters did not discriminate; their gov­ "free access" has been a cause of trouble and ernments made no restrictions. While sobbing helped produce this war. This simply is not about lack of raw materials, Germany itself true. The whole assumption is just a reflection increased her imports of such products to of Hitlerite and pre-Hitler German laments. peaks never before attained. In fact, some of The lack of "free access" was a German inven­ the very people now campaigning for "free tion. Its purpose was not to obtain more raw access" not so long ago complained about too materials but to achieve domination over some much "free access." They pointed out, for in­ colonies supposedly producing such materials. stance, and quite rightly, that Japan ought not That so many democratic statesmen and writ­ to have free access to iron or oil. ers have taken over the laments attests the The truth is that the condition which sup-

122 THE OPEN FORUM 123 posedly will transformthe world prevailed be..; A SOLDIER ON .. SEX fore the war - and did not prevent 'that war! True, some nations were too poor to buymuch SIR: Because I ama soldier, what I have to raw material. But that is an economic prob~ say here is strictly nom-de-plume. lern ofa quite different order. While that eco.. I have read with interest "Sex in Boom nomic limitation applied to secondary coun~' Towns" by Irwin Ross. It seems to me to suf· tries, it decidedly did not affect big nations fer, like all the recent discussions ofsex in rela· like Germany, where the war originated. Thus tion to the army and everything else, from we see that, from the angle of causing war or following the conventional social-worker line. securing peace, the whole question is irrele~ Do you welfarers wish to eliminate prostitu­ vant. It is at best a question of equality of tion or sexual intercourse? Permit the social opportunity among nations; and that, after ostrich to pull his head out of the sand long all, would have to begin with free access to in~ enough to set us straight on that point. dustrial tools rather than raw stuffs, since only Your article said that 7S percent of vene­ industrialized nations have any interest in the real diseases in boom towns were contracted raw materials. ' from women who charged for their services. The main point is that it is a matter ofade.; Yet I have been told that in some cities the quate purchasing power rather than restricted doctors have· more venereal patients among non-professionals. Of course, you would not access. Why confuse the two things? The problem is to raise the purchasing power of dare to publish such statistics ifyou had them, some poor nations ~ for instance, by remov.. because that isn't the social-worker line. ing tariffs which prevent them from selling But aside from that, if you succeed in their goods. But let us not speak of locked squelching prostitution, what then? Does any one in his senses really believe that millions ~f warehouses when we mean empty pockets. No amount of "free access" will lead to an eco~ men will take a vow ofabstinence, and stick to nomic·equilibrium. . it, for the duration? What's the point ofall the The vague slogan, however, helps to conceal holier-than-thou preaching, and all the police action, when there seems to be no substitute some troubling realities. If you ponder the for matter, you will discover that raw materials sex? are located, in the main, not in colonial areas B.S.S. Atlanta, like Malaya and Burma, but in such well· defined states as the United States, Russia, Georgia. Sweden, England, Germany, etc. To substi,,; YOUNGSTERS AND OLDSTERS tute the new kind of"free access" for the old AS SOLDIERS would require the pooling and denationalizing of the output ofsuch countries, as well as SIR: I have seen action twice as a soldier: ~t subjecting them to super-management. Who ages seventeen and forty-two. When I hear is prepared to accept this,without any useful Americans debating the draft of youngsters purpose? It would be quixotic and vain. So it and the proper age limits for oldsters, I feel seems best to stop mouthing the meaningless that I can possibly contribute conclusions slogan. There was no closed door against pur~ based on experience. chasers of any materials in any areas before I was freshly out of college when World the war. Its distribution depended on factors War I broke over Europe. It was possible, at quite other than the right of access. that time, in Austria, for young men with cer­ The tendency to accept many of the much tain academic qualifications to· enroll in the repeated claims of German propaganda at Reserve Officers' School after a briefperiod of face value is dangerous. army apprenticeship. I remember that the LEOPOLD SCHWARZSCHILD boys who joined me in that first enlistment New York City. looked upon this school as a kind of post~ 124 THE AMERICAN MERCURY graduate course, a continuation of the class~ older comrades, the men between thirty-five room routine which, through four years, had and fifty, however, suffered. Many of them become a matter offamiliar habit. We studied succumbed to disease, to illness, the nervous tactics instead of history, artillery instead of shock of gun-fire close at hand, the intense mathematics. But the transition was for us a cold, the myriad vexations of trench life. At simple and natural process. We were young, that time, it seemed strange to me. adaptable, and had not yet accustomed our­ Twenty-five years later, returning to the selves to the individuality of success in busi­ battlefields - this time in Finland -I un­ ness or professional careers. There were no derstood their distress. I was no longer the problems of financial dependence or emo­ easily-assimilated soldier of World War 1. I tional liabilities to tear our thoughts and had to train my spirit, my senses, my body, hopes and yearnings away from the disci~ my entire mentality, to the unfamiliar tasks of plines of war. And we were physically tough, war. In Officers' school, where I was required with the resilience of youth. The terrors of to brush up briefly on earlier courses, memory combat, the hardships of trench life, the rigors had to be re-geared to action. And always, in ofclimate, were only aspects ofa great adven~ the back of my mind, were worries stirred: ture into which we were ready to launch our~ Was the family well? Who was replacing me in selves with gusto. the job I had left? IfI came back, tired and ill, But the older men found the going hard. would I have the stamina to take up again Many of them had been out of the classroom where I had left off? Briefly, I was no longer for ten, fifteen, twenty years. They had lived young. the· comfortable life of established citizens in That first time, going to war as a boy of assorted fields. They had wives, children, seventeen, it hadn't occurred to me to wonder homes, debts, a thousand pulls in the direction about the future. All during those four years, ofthe old life. Theirmemories were not as keen while I was becoming acquainted with death as they once had been. Their constitutions, and mutilation and horrible psychical disloc~­ softened by ease, were unfitted for the rugged tions in the thousands of men around me, routines of army life. Their personalities, never once did I acknowledge the fear that I geared to individuality, were resistant to the might die. I can remember making exciting pressures of army regimentation. At gradua~ furlough plans in the midst of rolling fire and tion time, a number of these candidates, one a bayonet battle. Most of the youngsters had wel1~known lawyer, another a writer of repu­ that kind ofoptimism and it kept us immune tation, were unable to pass the examination, to mental strain. Personally, I cannot recall a though we seventeen and eighteen-year-olds single boy who succumbed to madness on the graduated easily. battlefield, but I remember several such epi­ At the front, too, the contrasts were strik­ sodes among the older soldiers. When I re­ ing. I remember how my own body reacted to turned as a middle-aged man to fight in World the first experience of field existence, the War II, the fear of death was part of my atti­ sleeping on the bare ground with a stone tude to war itself. And, beyond that, was an­ under my head, the exposure to wind and other, more profound awareness - ofthe pain weather, the proximity to all the elemental ofhumanity's larger suffering, and the knowl­ and dangerous aspects of the fighting man's edge that all the world was in peril of its experience. Like other boys ofmy generation, life. I had been accustomed to indoor life, for the It seems to me altogether clear, therefore, most part, and should, by all the laws oflogic, that war is a young man's job. The United Na­ h~ve suffered severely from this sudden transi­ tions cannot afford to leave their best soldiers tion. Yet my body never once went on strike. behind the lines. I had the resistance native to youth, the mus~ MAJOR ERWIN LESSNER cular resilience, the adventurous spirit. My New York City. HOLEM ASCH is one ofthe greatest living Yiddish writers. He had won pre­ Seminence as a novelist and ,dramatist among his own people before the English-reading public became aware of his talent through such works as The Nazarene, Three Cities, and What I Believe. Born in Kutno, Poland, sixty-two years ago, Mr. Asch came to the United States in 1914. He is now a naturalized citizen. He is hard at work ona Biblical novel based on the lives of Peter and Paul. ••. LUCHJS BEEBE has chronicled the doings of pub-crawling New Yorkers since 1933, when his syndicated column "This New YorkH first ap­ peared in the New York Herald Tribune. A lounging encyclopedia of good living, he is an authority on clothes, wine, food, belles lettres and --'- amazingly - railroading.... ELLIOTT V. BELL is a veteran newspaperman who is now an editorial writer for the New York Times. ... DR. EDWARD J. BING was for ,many years chief of the .European service of the United Press. Journalist, soldier, philosopher, he fought with theTurkish Army in World War I and spent many years in North Africa and the Near East.... GEORGE CREEL was Chairman of the Committee on Public Information in the first World War, a position equivalent to the one held today by Elmer Davis. He is a journalist by profession, having edited the Denver Post and other newspapers before 1917, andafter the war, returned to his writing. He is the author ofa long array of political and historical works. Recently, he moved to Washington .in con­ nection with a series of articles for magazines.••.. CHENOWETH HALL, born in Indiana in 1908,ls now writing fiction in Maine. She is a graduate of the University ofWiscorisin, has played in string quartets, and for five yean, wrote copy for an advertising agency.••. JAMES STANIFORD is the pen-name of a Washington correspondent.... MARY VAN RENSSELAER THAYER is a globe­ trotter,\ reporter and socialite. Her globe-trotting included three trips to Rus­ sia, fourteen summers in the Balkans'and three journeys to South America. In nine years of newspapering, she covered the Hauptmann trial, the Corona':' tion, the Duke ofWindsor's wedding and other top assignments. For a period, ~he worked as society editor of the New York World-Telegram. Her new book, The Life ofMme. Wellington Koo, will be published in February.••• WILLIAM Y. TINDALL directs graduate work in the English Department at Columbia University. He is the author of D. H. Lawrence and Susan His COUl, which appeared recently.

" 11Ieir SuUerin,s

Will Not Have Been in Vain I'

hyTilelEADER ofFREE ITAl~ CARLO $FORZA (Former Italian Foreiqn Minister)

What kindofpost-war world are wefight­ should forget that in ·the coming world ing to create? Pan American haspresented even the Ocean will be no more than a big answers to this question ~:l such leaders of river. The era ofisolation is gone forever. thought as Dr.John ,Dewey andthe Arch­ War always means suffering. But our bishop ofCanterbury. Here Carlo Sforza, sufferings in this "toughest of all wars" ~ells you what he sees-for the future. will not have been in vain since we are beginning to learn:- DECLARED, in a recent speech at • Montevideo, that the first duty, of (a) INDIVIDUALLY: that Liberty is a right I a which must be, won anew by the common free Italy will be "ardent support ofan or­ people in each generation; ganized world with no morepl{tce fir the (b) NATIONALLY: that the previous complete anarchical independence of'the nationalistic independence of Nations must cease. They States/· I was, not surprised when this must submit to a superior international law. statement met, with cheers from Italians We must, resolve that frontiers will no who had assembled to meet me from all longer mean what they meant up until parts ofLatin America. 1939. I foresee a Peace Conference at Whatis true for Italy, which has bitterly which we might agree to draw in frontiers learned the folly of aggre~sive wars, is very lightly-with a pencil and ~ot in equally true for America. No American indelible ink.

IlE day that Victory is earned by the United flight equipment, in providing widespread distri­ T, Nations, air transport travel costs will, we bution of the world's culture, science and goods. believe, be brought within the reach of common Today, of course, everything that we can offer men everywhere. --over 165 million miles ofover-ocean flight ex­ Pan American looks forward to playing its part perience, trained personnel and service to 60 for­ in the world ofthe future" through technological eign lands-is at work for the government and research as well as with trained personnel and military services of the United States.

PAN AMERICAN WORLD AIRWAYS SYSTEM

PAN .AMERICAN €'lIPPERS

,ii

127 ~~Gm~~~.~~~~~~ The LITERARY BAZAAR FIRST EDITIONS :: RARE BOOKS AUTOGRAPHS .. LITERARY SERVICES PROFESSIONAL SERVICES LAURENCE ROBERTS, LITERARY AGENT Stories, Novels, Books Sold. Our clients on Best Seller At The Roosevelt everything that Lists and in national periodicals. Fiction, non"fiction writers advised, promoted. Unknown authors assisted. makes New York ·so interesting Highly recommended aid for revision and publication. Information on request. 49 West 42d St., New York. is right at your elbow. Step off your train at Grand Central, fol­ OUT..OP..PRINT :~g~~d~~i~~;~~~~~~g~~ low the private passageway direct histories, magazine back numbers, etc. All subjects, all languages. Send us your list of wants - no obligation. to the Roosevelt, enjoy cheerful We report promptly. Lowest prices. (We Also Buy Old Books and Magazines.) A ME RI C AN LIB RAR Y SERV ICE rooms ••• delicious food ••. and 117 W. 48th Street Dept. M New Yorlll a restful atmosphere. Attractive WE SPECIALIZE and are successful in findinil promptly the "Out-of-Print" or "Hard-to.Find" book. rooms with hath from $4.50. which you particularly desire. Please write us stating "Wants." No obligation. A 25% reduction in room rates to THE SEVEN BOOK-HUNTERS Station 0 Box 22 New York Citl ServiceMen RARE COINS COIN COLLECTORS - Read "The Numismatist.' Published monthly. News, illustrated feature articles 01 GUY coins and medals. Sample copy 2Sc. American Numismatic LOMBARDO Association, 99 Livingston St., Brooklyn, N. Y. and his Orchestra GENERAL in the ROOSEVELT BOOKS. 32-page GRILL AT HEIST.. catalogue free. Truth Seeker Co., 38 Park Row, New York, N. Y. Nightly except HOTEL Sundays ROOSEVELT WAR BONDS pay you~ MADISON AVE. AT 45th ST., NEW YORK 2.9 percent interest.' BfRNAM G. HINES, Manaping Director ,\ o·n:'-yout_~oney!' IFYOUR~ ARRIVES LATE please remember that transportation and deliveries are rather uncertain in wartime•• The Mercury leaves the plant in what would ordinarily be plenty of time to reach you on or before publication date. But conditions beyond our control BUY WAR BONDS may delay its delivery. NUID ROM OTHU IIDB IF YOU WERE A MEMBER OF THE BooK-OF-THE-MONTH CLUB lND BOUGHT THE SELECTIONS SHOWN ON THE REVERSE SIDE (Q~~~~gftAue,~~~

A FREE COPY ••• TO NEW MEMBERS oj anyone oj the book.dividends pictured above! B~in your subscription with one of the all other important coming books. If you decide you selections pictured on other side. As a want the book-of-the-month, you let it come. If not (on new member, the Club will send you, a blank always provided) you can specify some other free, anyone of the recent book­ book you want. or simply say: "Send me nothing." Last year over $5,000,000 worth of free books (retail dividends shown above and listed below. value) were given to the Club's members-given, not sold! hat a Subscription Involves. Over 500,000 fam. Your obligation is simple. You pay no yearly fee. You Illes now belong to the Book-of-the-Month Club. They merely agree to buy no fewer than four books-of-the' do so in order to keep themselves from missing the new month in any twelve-month period. You pay for the ks they are really interested in. . books as you receive them - the regular retail price As a member, you receive an advance publication (frequently less) plus a small charge to cover postage report about the judges' choice-and also reports about and other mailing expenses. (Slightlyhigher in Canada.)

T OF 100K·DIVIDtNDS DISTRIBUTED fREE ------BOOK·OF-THE·MONTH CLUB, 385 Madison Ave., New York, N. Y. TO MEMBERS. A TREASURY OF GILBERT Please enroll me as a member. I am to receive a free copy of any .. SULLIVAN one of your recent book-dividends shown above, and for every two dited by Deems Taylor ($5) WAR AND PEACE books-of-the-month I purchase from the Club I am to receive. free, by Leo T olSlaY ($3) the current book-dividend then being distributed. I agree to purchase SUBTREASURY OF AMERI_ at least four books-of-the-month each year from the Club. CAN HUMOR Edi,e" by . B. and K. S. l-Vhite ($3) A TREASURY OF TH E WORLD'S GREAT LETTERS Name ...... •• jud by},~. f.incolnSGhuSler Please Print Plainly ($3.75) SELECTED WORKS OF. STEPHEN VINCENT BENET Address . ($5) From Amer. Mercury A131 nns IS MY BEST Edited by Whit B"T~tl ($3.50) LEAVES OF GRASS City State ...... • by Wal' Whi'man ($5) SHORT STORIES FROM THE NEW YORKER ($3) Begin Mv Suhscription With . A CONRAD ARGOSY (choose ODe of the selections on other side) by Joseph Conrad ($5) THE READERS DIGEST READER ($3) Send Me As A Free Book . REMEMBRANCE OF (choose one of the book-dividende mown above) THINGS PAST by ...Warcel Proust ($5) Bookl .bipPed to Canadian memben, DUTY PAID. tbrouch Book-of·lbe-MoD~ht.:lub (Canada). LiJ:a,.ited.