Out To Win | Page 7

under-estimating their capacity to respond to an ideal. It was an ideal that led the Pilgrim Fathers westward; after more than two hundred years it is an ideal which pilots their sons home again, racing through danger zones in their steel-built greyhounds that they may lay down their lives in France.
In view of the monumental stupidity of her diplomacy Germany has found it necessary to invent explanations. The form these have taken as regards America has been the attributing of fresh low motives. Her object at first was to prove to the world at large how very little difference America's participation in hostilities would make. When America tacitly negatived this theory by the energy with which she raised billions and mobilised her industries, Hun propagandists, by an ingenious casuistry, spread abroad the opinion that these mighty preparations were a colossal bluff which would redound to Germany's advantage. They said that President Wilson had bided his time so that his country might strut as a belligerent for only the last six months, and so obtain a voice in the peace negotiations. He did not intend that America should fight, and was only getting his armies ready that they might enforce peace when the Allies were exhausted and already counting on Americans manning their trenches. Inasmuch as his country would neither have sacrificed nor died, he would be willing to give Germany better terms; therefore America's apparent joining of the Allies was a camouflage which would turn out an advantage to Germany. This lie, with variations, has spread beyond the Rhine and gained currency in certain of the neutral nations.
Four days after President Wilson's declaration of war the Canadians captured Vimy Ridge. As the Hun prisoners came running like scared rabbits through the shell-fire, we used to question them as to conditions on their side of the line. Almost the first question that was asked was, "What do you think about the United States?" By far the most frequent reply was, "We have submarines; the United States will make no difference." The answer was so often in the same formula that it was evident the men had been schooled in the opinion. It was only the rare man of education who said, "It is bad--very bad; the worst mistake we have made."
We, in the front-line, were very far from appreciating America's decision at its full value. For a year we had had the upper-hand of the Hun. To use the language of the trenches, we knew that we could go across No Man's Land and "beat him up" any time we liked. To tell the truth, many of us felt a little jealous that when, after two years of punishment, we had at last become top-dog, we should be called upon to share the glory of victory with soldiers of the eleventh hour. We believed that we were entirely capable of finishing the job without further aid. My own feeling, as an Englishman living in New York, was merely one of relief--that now, when war was ended, I should be able to return to friends of whom I need not be ashamed. To what extent America's earnestness has changed that sentiment is shown by the expressed desire of every Canadian, that if Americans are anywhere on the Western Front, they ought to be next to us in the line. "They are of our blood," we say; "they will carry on our record." Only those who have had the honour to serve with the Canadian Corps and know its dogged adhesion to heroic traditions, can estimate the value of this compliment.
I should say that in the eyes of the combatant, after President Wilson, Mr. Ford has done more than any other one man to interpret the spirit of his nation; our altered attitude towards him typifies our altered attitude towards America. Mr. Ford, the impassioned pacifist, sailing to Europe in his ark of peace, staggered our amazement. Mr. Ford, still the impassioned pacifist, whose aeroplane engines will help to bomb the Hun's conscience into wakefulness, staggers our amazement but commands our admiration. We do not attempt to understand or reconcile his two extremes of conduct, but as fighters we appreciate the courage of soul that made him "about turn" to search for his ideal in a painful direction when the old friendly direction had failed. Here again it is significant that both with regard to individuals and nations, Germany's sternest foes are war-haters--war-haters to such an extent that their principles at times have almost shipwrecked their careers. In England our example is Lloyd George. Throughout the Anglo-Saxon world the slumbering spirit of Cromwell's Ironsides has sprung to life, reminding the British Empire and the United States of their common ancestry. After a hundred and forty years of drifting apart, we stand side by