BOOKS OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3197, 22 September 1917, Page 11

BOOKS OF THE DAY

R Wal" Book, In "A Regimental Surgeon in War and Prison" (John .Murray; per Whitcombo and Tombs), CVptnin Robert V. Dolbey, I'.R.C.S., 1t.A.J1.C., tells of liia expoi;icnces as a regimental medical officer 111 the retreat from lions, tho advancc at (ho Marne and tho Aisnc, and. the fighting in and near I/a Bassee, and of his sojourn in four prisoners' camps in Crermany at Crefeld, Minden, ' Sennolager, and Gueterstoh. He was. released and returned to England on July 1915. Captain Dolboy gives an interesting description of tho fighting in tho oarlv months of tho war, and confirms cvferytliiiis that has been written as to the 1 desperately .obscene and filthy way in which tho Huns defiled the homes of the unfortunate French. civilians whoso houses .they had occupied. It is, however, in his account of his experiences in tho German prison camps'that the author is most interesting. Captain Dolbey quotes numerous ex- . amples of the studied brutality of.tlj# Germans, both officers and men.' Nft doubt a good deal of this brutality win? due to what seems to have been the fls«j 'policy of the Hun Government to paint the English as little better than savagM. At tho Cologne station the author was lodged temporarily in the off-duty room of the station guard. He says: .. The atmosphere was hostile, but I sat on a chair and took up a German illustrated paper. At this, with the bollovr of an outraged bull, the under-ofliccr loap9 up, seized the chair from , under ue, toro the paper from my hand, niid thqn, taking- . from his pocket, an English sddier's knifo, proceeded to give an illustration of ft" uses to which the various j-arts wisra put. "This," pointing to the Vis knifeblade, . "is to cut the throats of tho wounded -sons of' the ■ Fatherland, and that," exhibiting the spike, "for the English doctors to gougo out the eyes cl tho wounded defenders of; (heir country." [ should have heard moro .of these interesting explanations had nut my escort\ come for me and marched me out. It .should never be forgotten- in the years to oomo, when the sloppy sentimentalists in England begin .to find excuses for the enemy, that all this, tjlk of- dum-dum bullets, tho use of various 'implements in Tommy's knife, of the barbarities to German -wounded, were the official propaganda of the German Government. Our prisoners at Hons. were taunted with thees stories, so. the Germans must have been well prepared to expect these brutalities from the English. At Crefeld the-.author saw von Bissinsr, then-commanding the Seventh-Army at Minister, but who later on was to earn a prominent place in the world's record <>', infamy as Governor of Belgium and murderer of poor Nurse Cavell. Von Bisjjne waxed wrath when he 6aw one EngUsa officer wearing only a blanket.' 1 "What," he yelled, "is the meaning of, this? I have seen the t'renoh officers and they are smart, soldierly people. Th» Ilussians and. .Belgians also havo X sfuti, and t-hey are as otllcers should be, buv you—you are a lot of tramps." He paused, and looking at our Adjuvant, why saluted, in OBtler fashion, by touching ma disreputable cap,'"Who aro-you, What ar-a you. doing in tfyoso clothes? "I was woiinded at L© Cateau, and stripped of- everything but my shirt And trousers by German soldiers," was tho yery calm reply.- "And this officer there, what is he doing in a blanket?" pointing toward* the fellow who was in' the rear rank. "I *as recently wounded, and the German soldiers robbed me of everything I have not had time to get a .'iiiw I kit. , Then the great m Bi6sing departed. In appearance he was a shprt man, with a: very lined face and big bags under hin eyes; he looked as'if he was no stranger to every bind of debauchery, and nad the marks of vicious living plainly written . on his face. Wherever-he went the author found - the German officer to be a' thorough cad. : The ordinary everyday' characteristics of tha English gentloman are completely ( missing-, in the German officer. ■ rlie camp officers always discriminate against ; the British prisoners "in the matter of , food, in the question of clothing, in thn ( method and maimer of punishment. The ordinary miseries of camp life were . supplemented by special, acts of brutal . tyranny and deliberate meanness against the British. The silly and mischievous i people in England—and they have, alafi, their prototypes here in Nevr Zealand— who prate about "international brotherhood, and the necessity for "forgetting and forgiving " after the war should read this book. ' Captain Dolbey notes the fact that th® men who behaved most cruelly and harshly to the British prisoners were

,men who • had lived, before the war, in England from flf teen to twenty years, had married English women, and had families,' then and now at _ liberty in England, and enjoying the free Mβ <>i the country their men were, betraying. They knew all Tommy's y-ays and hie language, and they used the knowledge gained in England to bring thoEe Englishmen to punishment. . . ■ One mean hound in particular, the uuder-commandant 01 one of the camps, and later in charge of Stohuller damp, was known to have: an rtaelish wife and six children '" , England; yet in this camp there were always many of our men tied to the stake all through the -winter. . ( Captain Dolbey's 'account of , the terrible sufferings of the British prisoners during the awful winter of 1911-1915, of the utter neglect of the German, authorities to provide' proper housing accommodation, of the inadequate clothing, and of the brutal way in which those who dared to complain were treated confirms what has been said on this subject by previous writers. His booJc id a valuable contribution to the history of the war, and specially useful in exposure of the studied infamy of tho German authorities in encouraging if not actually ordering, both Hie military and civil population to heap every possible indignity and cruelty "pou Hi*'| British prisoners. (N.Z.. price (is.) Nelson's History of the War. The sixteenth volume of that 'invaluable work, "Nelson's History of the War," by John Buchan (T. Nelson and Sons, per Whitcoiube and Tombs) is entirely devoted to the great Battle of the Spmine last year, a battle which raffed for five months and. resulted in gains of epochal importance by the British. As in previous volumes, 111 , . Buchan gives a clear, straightforward record of tho events.described, , the necessary and welcome details never clogging or clouding the iunin narrative, hut rather increasing the vividity of th© impression, it makes on the reader's mind. Mv. Buchan (low not often indulge in metaphor, but in the following passage he appears to me to hit off tho general position ort the Western front with aptness:— A strategical problem is not, as a_rule, capa.blo of being presented in a amnio metaphor, but wo may ai.y that, to tho view of the Allied strategy, tho hueo German salient in the West was like ail elastic band drawn very tight, '.swh part of such a band has lost, elasticity,and may be severed by .friction which would do little harm to the band if less toiitly stretched, That reprcßcnted one element in tho situation. Another aspect might bo suggested by tho metaphor of a scadyko of atone in a- flat country, where a.Il "tone must be imported. The waters crumble tho wall in one sectu.u. and ill freo reserves of stone arc used .to strenethen that part. :- BUI tho crumbling coos on. and Iβ fill the breach stones are brought from other seetione of the dyke. Some day there may come en hour when the sea will wash through the pld breach, and a great length of tho weakened dyko will follow in the cataclysm. The enormous extent of the German defensive wb.ll, for oven the most deluded Hun must admit there is now no question of a Gorman offensive in Prance, and tho marvellous lngenu ~ and industry which have gone to 1.-..■■ construction of supporting and slrengUenin" buttresses is well illustrated in some of the maps and diagrams with which tho volume is so liberally supplied. It would seem almost impossinle to break through such a complicated network of trendies, to , reduce such a number of strongly fortified positions. But, as we all know, Haig and his men have accomplished tho apparently impossible at more than one point, and a comparison of such, a map as that whicii faces

page 18 of Mr. Buohau's took with a. similar map showing the position as it is to-day would prove how substantial have been the British gaiue. For the maps and diagrams alone this History is well worth buying. (N.Z. prico is. 3d.)