To the Editor of the "Norra-Ciins Dairy News."
Sir,—In your Notes and Comments of Jast Friday you make use of these words:—"Take, as ° an instance the man who has been through the war and is here in our midst. What are his political sentiments when he feels his old wounds aching, when prickly heat twitches the scars on his limbs, when. -ete? Whatever his political affiliations, is he likely to seek allies among former enemies?"
"Certainly not" is your' implied inference; and although you carefully refrain from approving this state of perpetual animosity, and term it merely "a very profound factor in a country's policy" yet it is obvious, especially in view of the openly antagonistic attitude you adopt towards "A German" (whose statements I have no wish to defend: I refer simply to your intolerant and biassed attitude), that. you deem such unrelenting hostility worthy of nothing but commendation.
Now, Sir, whither does this lead? This fostering of national hate and distrust can tend, in the long run, to nothing but more war—war, stretching down the ages ahead of us, each successive phase more ghastly than the one preceding, finally culminating in............ what? Is this dismal prospect the only possible one in store for the human race? Must all that is " splendid and noble in Man be devoted only to his own destruction?
Every sane person admits that the appeal to force is illogical—that the fact of A punching B's head does not prove A a champion of truth and right and B a monster of iniquity; yet when we come to deal with nations this is completely overlooked and, in spite of all pretty sentiments, Might is Right. We have progressed since the days when Big Feet smashed Crook Neck's skull for stealing a marrow bone, and since the more recent times when bloodthirsty feuds were carried on between families for many generations over the disputed ownership of a strip of pasture such questions are now settled equitably by the process of litigation. Is it, then, fatuous optimism to hope that this system of rationality may be enlarged until nations settle their trade, tariff, territorial and what-not differences at the bar of Reason and Justice, instead of rushing to arms?
All of which, you probably think, is a vast mountain to make out of an inoffensive little molehill; and you would be the last to admit anything inflammatory in the words I have quoted. Be that as it may, I have noticed in your paper a steady current of serious ''patrioteering,'? which can tend anily in the direction I have indicated. After all, doesn't the role of ''innocent lamb" played opposite Germany's "ravening wolf" savour somewhat of the ridiculous?
Please don't misunderstand me, however; I no more suggest conscious propaganda than I suspect our statesmen of conscious deceit
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.