It has been said that the soldier is the real pacifiss knows all that there is to kn about war—he knows it in all its terror and horror. His ideas on the subject are apt to be clearer and more definite than those of others who merely watch from a distance and are not acquainted with the reality. And especially is he concerned with the business of making an end of the conflict when once the issue has been; decided.
You go to war, and you Then, in the view of the soldier, the war should be over. That it should be allowed to drag on and on is to him the intolerable thing. And he is apt to be impatient of the people who contemplate with seeming indifference the prolongation of any struggle beyond the point of decision. Such were the views expressed to me (writes a representative of the Observer)" by General Sir Hubert Gough, who has seen more than most people of the troubled areas of Europe since the Armistice.
"People seem to have forgotten that we really did win the war," he said. "We fought, and won, and that should be the end of it: Now that it is over we ought to settle down to be friends again.
"TE two men have a row and get to fighting, they go on till one of them is beaten, and then it is all over. When you have knocked a man down you don't start kicking him. That is not our English way of doing things.
"T suppose I fought the Germans as hard as anybody. I had seen, too, that the war was coming. Years ago I knew that it was bound to come, and I did my best to get ready for it. But it is over now, and T cannot tell you how strongly I feel that it is our business nom to settle down and be friends again. We want to make an end of all the bad blood, all the bitter, revengeful feelings.
"Hirrinc a Maw Wuex He 1s Down."
"There is the Peace Treaty, for instance, I am afraid people in England have not begun yet to realize what. thoroughly un: English thing that is. It really does consist of hitting a man when he is down and hitting him in a pretty murderous fashion. It is no excuse to say that if Germany had won her terms to us would have been far harder. Germany did not win, and what she might have done has nothing to do with it-"T believe the Treaty will he revised, but I wish I could hope that it will be revised soon. That is an aim that we ought to set before ourselves, for until it is
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.