WORSE THINGS THAN WAR.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 109, 1 October 1914, Page 6

WORSE THINGS THAN WAR.

A BISHOP'S PROTEST. lAt an Anglican Synod last week, Dr. Long, Bishop of Batimrst, made reference to the war: '"I believe," lie said, "tlicro are many tilings worse than war, and in certain circumstances peace be worse than war. I think that slavery and cowardice aro worse than war. Let us by all means hate war, but let us hate dishonour and unrighteousness even worse than war.

"1 was told by one member of this synod who says it is all nonsense to light at all—that we might just as well be rmed by the Kaiser as by the King, and that this would be much'better than making a lot of German widows. 1 believe that I am a very peaceful person myself, but .1 have, a hatred of mere sentimentality, and a love for clear thinking. Some of the kind of persons referred to hold up their hands in horror about war. Well, so do we all. V/e hato and abhor the cruel insanity of it all. At the same time, there are many who are serfs of an enfeebled imagination who shudder at war because it brings suffering before thern in ; l „ way they cannot realise. What- is the use of saying to those people, even on the lines of common sense, that there is at least as great a wastage of life going on continuously in the overcrowded and sweated towns of the Old World? If you were to tell them that the average life of female factory workers in Belfast had dropped to thirty-cigfat years, that infant mortality in Bolton had gone up 10 per cent., that the death rate of Stepney liad risen 0 per cent., that 17 per cent, of the population of south I.ondon is living below the poverty line, their answer would probably he: 'ls that really soV'_ But it would not Bhake or appnl their imagination, because their indignation is too enfeebled to realise what the suffering means. These things, we put up with from day to day, and still manago to enjoy the cream on our morning porridge; but when war comes,' we are prepared to shriek at once, almost to faint at the sight of blood, as i; life itself was the one and only good, and death the one and only horror tilie World had for us.

"-For myself, if I were a sweated, tweed-capped, under-sized factory hand in 'Manchester, I would be g-tad'of one hour of glorious life on the fHd-; of France, even if it meant tlmt I ha J to die of a German bullet a few years 'jcforc I died of consumption in home-gar-ret of the slums."

BLIOIIT « :;u AJ3AOE. DREADFUL ByCTLX SCENES. VASTS ESS of OPERATIONS. A vivid desti'j/t:;;!! of the havoc wrought in A-sat.- i., e of battles between the J«ri-iicii i&. Hermans, by John H. Cox, In . lorrespondent of the New York, Tr.i/un,: ami London Standard, under dut,. 01 August 21, appeared in the former ipo-per on .iiiigust 13 iast. The eor.caj.oJ.ienl; v.'-roto as follows:

'1 have just returned fro:n an iiit%noetlan of scenes oi th;i recent lighting between the French and tit-ramns in the soirthern districts of Alsace. Despatches from Paris and) Berlin describe the engagements between the frontier and Mulhausen as 'insigni.!leanl encounters between advance guards.' If this be true in the military seirce, and if preliminaries of war produce the terrible effects I have witnessed, the disastrous results -of the war itnelf will e.seeed the 'possibilities of h'mnii . i-'elicnse'-n

"As a Swiss subject, I was equii - ! with identification .pa-pew. I •.•.-as necoinpanicd by four ieilow <oiint.r-.-mcn, all on b'e-"!c-s. At the very outset the snectaclc of peasants, m->n an 1 women, uiK'otiteernedi'y at work in the .fields gathering the harvest stiuc'k me .is Blran/r? "ml urnnt.ura]. The men were either old or well advanced in middle age. Everywhere women and girl# of all ages and mere lads weru working.

BRUTAL Mt-lUi'-R OF A PRIEST. "The ifirst siign of war was the demolished villa of a Koman Catholic priest at a village in the vicinity of Ilansibach. This priest had lived there for many yearn, engaged in religious work and literary pursuits. AfUr the outbreak of war the German authorities jumped to the conclusion that lie was an agent of -the French secret service, and that lie had been in the habit of sending rigularly to Belfort information concerning the German military moven.-cjits and German measures of defence, very often by means of carrier nigcons. "The Alsatians -declare thesoi accusations to have been utterly unjust, -but last -week a military party raided a priest's house, dragged him from his study, and placed him against his own garden wall and shot him summarily a.s a tr.rt.or and spy. The house 'was searched from top to -bottom, and aiu-mcirouß hooks and papers were removed. after which the whole building was com-oletelv destroyed by dynamite. The -priest himself was buried without a coffin at t-ho end of his little garden plot, and some villagers placed a rough cross on thci mound which marked the place of interment.

TERRIBLE SIGNS OF DEVASTATION' "In tho next largo village we are told it had Ibeen successfully occupied by French and German troops, and had been the scene of still' infantry lighting. Hore we found groups of elderly men and burying tho bodies of men and horses. Pestilence was feared. Further on were a number of Gorman soldiers beating about on both sides of the r0a...; searching for dtad and wounded. It was said t'hat many wounded soldiers had crawled in among tho corn to escane bein" trodden on iby troops marching alonp the road, and alio to gnin relief from thu blazing sun. ,r ou tho outskirts of another large villago we were shown a garden .bounded by a thick hedge, behind which a comipany of French infantry 'h-ul taken their £taud against the advancing German troops. Anion™ the crushed, downtrodden flowers there •were still lying fragments of French lioldiexs' equipments, including two French caps, stained, and three torn. French tunics were likewise dyed red. The walls of a cottagu bore marks of rifle bullets and the roof was partly burnt'd. "Parsing through villages we saw on all sides teW'Sdo signs o£ the devastation of war—houses burned, uncut corn trodden down and rendered useless, gardens .tramped under foot —uvcrywhero rust and distress.

EVIDENCES OF JJUMAN SLAU OUTER "At ft small village locally known as 'Napoleon's Island,' we t'ounX the railway station demolished and a lino of trucks the .French had used as a barricade. These truJks were almost shot to pieces, ami bore many evidences of human slaughter. Outsido the station! thy roof of tile small restaurant i'ud been shot away. The windows were smashed and mush furniture destroyed. Nevertheless, the. proprietor re-arranged the damaged premises a« well as possible, and was serving customers as if uothing kadi happened. 1 ''.lust outside tliia village there was a large common grave, iu' whioh French and. German soldiers were buried together in their iniiformfli. A laraa inoun;l marked tlris site. Here ajyiin the villagers had placed roughly-hewn crosses.

PEASANTS GRAPHIC NAJSttATIVE. ''Not far from Iluriingrn we met an intelligent Alsatian peasant, who remembered the war of IS7O, and ihad witnessed seme of the engagements during tilie last few days. Jiere is an account of -what ho said: 'The bravery of 'both sides was amazing. The effects of the artillery lire were terrific. As the shells burst, where you formerly saw a body of soldiers, you saw a heap of corpue-i or a number of figures writing would scatter for tho moment, but on the ground. Those who were unhurt would ([uic.kly regain their coimposure «nd take up their positions in the fighting line as if, nothing had happened. The effects of the other weapons were as bad. It seemed remarkable that the Rold'iers could wee the destruction worked all around them and yet control theii' nerves sufficiently to continue fighting. X remember battles in 1870, five or six of which 1 fought in myself, Ibut Uiey bear no comparison with the 'battles of 11114. The war of 4-1 years a,«o was child's play compared with the war at the iprcsent time.' "'