AMERICAN IN WAR HUMOR.

Hokitika Guardian, 30 July 1918, Page 3

AMERICAN IN WAR HUMOR.

CUTTINGS FROM THE PAPERS

Tho “Erie Dispatch,” commenting on the advance in Palestine, optimistically observed that ‘‘the British will soon fix it so that a man can go from Jerusalem to Jericho without falling among thieves.” This is levity, of course, but good levity, with the essential grain of truth. A touch of gentle sarcasm is added by the Pliiladelpia “North American” on the same subject when it says: .“The fact that British bulldog tenacity won Jerusalem after 700 years makes •Germany’s peace feelers seem a trifle premature.” As might be espeeted, tho Bolshevik regime in Russia was a win for the American humorists. The New York “Morning Telegraph,” apropos of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, remarked: “So far as treaties are concerned, one signed bv Trotsky is just as .good as one of the Kaiser’s.” The same paper, taking note of Siberia’s break from the ! tottering Empire, observed that “Si-1 beria might get good and even for gen- J orations of oppression by exiling politi- | enl prisoners to Petrograd.” The “Boston Herald,” analysing the Bolshevik, came to the conclusion that “the original Maximalist was little Oliver Twist.” Hie Philadelphia “Inquirer,” disgusted at the prolongation of Russia’s state of, chaos, declared with plaintive levity that “the next time it is announced that Russia has staged a bloodless revolution we’re going"to wait for the official report before tendering congratulations.” “The three R’s as taught in Russia, ’ said the Aitehison “Globe,” “are riot, retreat, and revolt.” The Chicago “Tribune,” after it critical inspection of Trotsky’S photograph remarked: “His picture indicates that if Herr Trotsky had not been called by destiny to he foreign Minister at Petrograd, he would have done very well on the road in flowers and feathers, or cloaks and suits.” The war cablegrams of tho old trench days, when villages were taken house by house, piecemeal, enabled the Noa York “Telegraph” to publish, with the comment, the following: “Describing the British capture of Poelcappelle, the war correspondent cables: “A German detachment clung tenaciously to a brewery in the eastern suburbs,, and fought until the end.” Some time ago a new artillery express ion “drum-fire,” began to appear in the dispatches from tho West. For a while people did not quite know what it meant. But'the “Nashville Southern Lumberman” quaintly helped ; “As .we understand it, the object of the British “drumfire” is to make the Germans heat it.” . Speaking of the blundering scheming of German diplomacy, the “Kansas City Star” remarked that, “despite the scarcity of foodstuffs in German', Teuton diplomats continue to spill the beans.” When the first of the Americans went • into the firing line, a; cablegram from a German source announced three weeks’ furlough was to he granted to the German soldier who brought in the first Yankee prisoner. The Mason Citv “Globe Gazette” added; “He will need it.” ~ “Times certainly change,’ said the “Chicago Herald” on the sam«> subject. “A German commander now offers a reward for an American soldier, dead oV

»livo. and only a fow months ago von tornstorff was offering .'IO,OOO dollars if wo wouldn’t send any 1” At the time of the Lnxbnrg diplomatic scandal at Buenos Ayres, when Sweden was protesting her innocence In the matter of convoying secret messages for Germany under cover of her own diolomatic service, the Boston '‘Transcript” asked, facetitiously: “What did Sweden think was being sent to Berlin in her diplomatic code the baseball scores?” And the Wall Street “Journal.” referring to Sweden’s demand for an expedition from Germany, said: “If explanations are all that’ Sweden wants from she lias gone to the world’s experts.’ Thel New York “Evening Sun” suggested that the Swedish Government should “get its grub from the people it saws wood for!” The German Crown Prince, of course, comes in for not a fow digs. One paper suggests that ho is another. argument. 'against the cigarette, while the Washington “Post.” is more free with its punch savs: “It is said to he the death penalty in Germany to impersonate an Armv officer, but so far the Crown Prince hi>s escaped!”