Feb. 9.
AN American recently made the statement, or rather complaint, that Britain had conducted her share of the war in the dark, that nobody knew how much she had done towards victory. A common complaint this, the attitude being thoroughly well illustrated by a war correspondent—also an American—in the early days of the war when he wrote that in the minds of the authorities all that even the British public required to know could be comprised the recruiting poster, ''Your King and Country need you." In peace we are not one whit better: we do all manner of things, and then conceal them carefully in blue and white books—official publications which will be invaluable to posterity but which are rather appalling for the living generation to tackle. Yet in those blue and white books are to be found a record of achievement which makes us proud to be Britons—when we learn their contents. From one of these books a summary of British relief work has been extracted, and we can feel that our nation at least has done a wonderful work in trying to alleviate distress in the ruined countries of Europe. Sir William Goode, who has written the account, paints a picture of the most harassing description, in which one point stands out in appalling prominence. We achieved the triumph of modern civilization over militarism in defeating Germany: to-day we have to fight for civilization itself in the same countries over which the armies campaigned. Unless help can be brought to these people their civilization will collapse, and it is the work of averting that, catastrophe on which Great Britain, with her resources already overtaxed, has been engaged.
The condition of the countries who acknowledged defeat in 1918
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.