E

VERY New Yorker is familiar with the "East Side." It is a term which suggests to many unthinking people a colony of Russian Jews whose chief characteristics are poverty and agitations in favor of strikes among garment workers. The East Side is as truly a quarter of New York as the Quartier-Latin is a distinct quarter of Paris. It has a life and quality of its own. But while the spirit of the Latin Quarter in Paris is that of a gay, effervescent, and irresponsible aestheticism-at least as portrayed in such charming literary pictures as those of Henri Murger-the spirit of the New York East Side is one of serious idealism. This was never more truly illustrated than in the life and recent death of Dr. Paul Kaplan.

Dr. Kaplan was born about seventy years ago in Shavel, Province of Kovana, Russia. He was driven out of Russia and came to the United States when he was about thirty-five years of age. He was one of that band of Jewish dreamers who were in the vanguard of the first Russian Jewish immigration. In 1883 he went to Oregon to establish a new Odessa, a communistic settlement where he and his comrades could live out their dreams of a commonwealth based on the principles of communism. It failed after two years, like the earlier experiment of George William Curtis and Charles A. Dana and their New England colleagues at Brook Farm, or the similar venture of the English social reformer and cotton-spinner Robert Owen in Indiana.

After the failure of his colony Paul Kaplan came back to New York, studied medicine, went to Berlin to complete his studies, returned to New York, and practiced his profession in the heart of the East Side. He was primarily a servant of the cause of humanity and incidentally a physician. Many a poor patient can tell of his ministrations. He came to minister to their bodily needs, and often left with them his last dollar. He was Balzac's Country Doctor transported to the East Side. He was a well-trained and capable physician, and had he devoted himself solely to his profession and taken the emoluments which he could quite properly have taken, he might easily have become a prosperous if not a rich man. Large sums of money passed through his hands for the aid of Jewish immigrants, for he was active as an adviser in the Baron de Hirsch Jewish Colonization work in America. But he died destitute.

Dr. Kaplan was one of the most influential but to the American people one of the least known of the Russian revolutionists in this country-least known because of his modesty. He was the intimate friend of Gershuni, of Madame Breshkovsky, of Nicholas Tschaikowsky, of every Russian revolutionist who entered our gates. He was appointed Secretary of the Russian Revolutionist party by Madame Breshkovsky. The rôle he played in the revolutionary movement was so important that all letters of a conspirative character passed through his hands. They were sent to him by the Central Committee of the party, which had its offices in Paris. This was during the years when the Russian revolutionists were political and social outcasts, and when the seeds of Russian freedom were sown through stony underground passages. This correspondence may be published some day-at present it will all be returned to Petrograd. Should it ever be published, it will give to the world historical sources of the greatest value. When the high soul of Russia was struggling underground, when the flower of Russian manhood was persecuted by the most persistent and ruthless agencies of Russian autocracy, Paul Kaplan was working in America to give his comrades the help they needed. Hundreds of revolutionists owe their first aid in America to this saintly soul. Though he was the son of orthodox and devout Jewish parents, he was a modern of moderns, and would have resented, probably, the designation of saint as a return to mediævalism. But the self-effacement with which he did deeds great and small gave to his life a very real quality of saintliness. He remained to the end a Socialist, though he frequently differed with those rigid spirits in the Socialist movement that saw no good in American social reform. For he recognized the idealistic undercurrents in American movements

and was an interpreter of American idealism to the Russian dreamers, some of whom were intolerant of what they regarded as American plutocracy. He enjoyed the friendship of such personalities as Felix Adler, Lillian Wald, and that group of pioneer American social workers who sowed the seeds of the progressive movement of the last decade.

In the seething life of the East Side Dr. Kaplan was a subtle, permeating influence. He was the counselor in many a factional dispute. Labor leaders, litterateurs, and intellectual leaders turned to him for advice and help.

I remember how every Russian revolutionist came to him. He was loved and honored by the revolutionary leaders of all factions. He was Babushka's and Tschaikowsky's comrade and counselor. When the East Side was aroused by the fiery messages of these fighting leaders of the people, Kaplan was behind the scenes guiding and aiding them.

Unforgetable are the scenes created by Gershuni, the daring revolutionary leader who escaped from Siberian prisons and came to America with his stirring appeal to his people for financial assistance to the revolutionary cause. The response was electrical. Poor women threw their heirlooms on the platform and gave their all for the cause. Kaplan and Gershuni were inseparable. When Paul Milyukov came to America, one of his first inquiries was, "Where can I find Paul Kaplan?"

Not a few National movements have had their birth on the East Side. One of them was the movement to conserve the American right of political asylum. This was occasioned by the demand of the Russian Government to the Government of the United States to return Jan Pouren, a revolutionary Lett, accused by the Romanoff Government of being a common criminal. He was not returned, after two years of stormy agitation and litigation. The American right of political asylum was not violated. The movement which led to this real National achievement began in the home of Paul Kaplan. A few Russian Jews stirred the country and reminded Americans of their precious heritage of political freedom. The quiet, permeating force behind the band was Paul Kaplan.

In the gatherings of earnest, idealistic, and gesticulating Russians one could pick out the little, quiet man, with his penetrating black eyes, his sensitive mouth, his generous and enig matic smile, listening and calming the agitated group by the right word at the right time, and tying up the discussion with a practical programme of decision and action.

With the fall of the Romanoffs the great soul of Russia has been struggling in an international limelight which has awakened mixed emotions. The overturn of the old régime came like a miracle to a world ignorant of the titanic forces which were swaying the giant of the North. Americans who caught occasional glimpses of the moral grandeur of Russian revolutionists were thrilled with joy because the new day had dawned for the Russian people.

Almost with bated breath we watched the first coalition Government under Milyukov. When it went down, we pinned our faith to Kerensky and hailed him as a new savior of the Russian democracy. Then Kerensky descended, and out of the seething caldron of Russian aspiration appeared Trotsky and Lenine an international vagabond, driven from pillar to post for his revolutionary views, and a Russian social philosopher an uncouth combination playing not only with the destiny of the new-born Russian democracy, but rocking the other democ racies that are struggling to be made safe for the world.

So the newspaper-reading American is puzzled. He has an undemocratic habit of thinking in terms of personalities. After he got used to Milyukov, Kerensky appeared; his short acquaintance was soon followed by new names-Trotsky, Lenine; and others will soon follow.

But of the forces of which these names are fleeting expressions, of the movement which is bigger than any man, he has much to learn.

An American journalist who was a pioneer in playing up personalities in American magazines told me, with almost mystic

and invincible. With forces thus organized to support the military establishment America can conquer the alien foe and do her part to rescue and redeem civilization. Without these forces she is helpless. Neutrality on the food question is as impossi

ble as neutrality in the war itself. In the great conflict we shall win or lose according to our solution of the food problem. Let us plant gardens as never before, and grow munitions at home to help win the war.

N December 5 we landed in America after a year's travel through England, France, Italy, and Greece. Everywhere we encountered the diabolically clever propaganda work of Germany, and often wondered how it was that the Governments of those countries were not able to fight this terrible menace more effectively. In France this propaganda everywhere sowed distrust of the English and caused an unbelievable number of intelligent Frenchmen to think that England was really planning to keep French seaports after the war. In Greece it convinced numerous Greeks that France was planning a "French protectorate" over Greece, and it insinuated to the French that by supporting Venizelos they were "playing into the hands of England." In England it preached pacifism, conscientious objections, and war weariness. Its effects in Italy have too recently been shown to need recapitulation.

We were in Salonika when America came into the war. We witnessed the intense joy of Mr. Venizelos and his followers at our entrance and the hopes with which it strengthened all the French and English soldiery. In the months that followed we heard on all sides that America was handling the war situation "with her customory thoroughness." In England the papers were continually holding up the United States as an example to their own Government, saying that America was no sentimentalist, that she understood every phase of the German propaganda, and was effectively nipping it in the bud.

One may imagine my dumfounded disappointment when, on our first Sunday in America, my eyes fell on page 11 of the New York "Times" and I read the following headlines:

BULGARIAN MINISTER SAYS HIS LAND IS NOT OUR foe. IN A REMARKABLE INTERVIEW STEPHEN PANARETOFF TELLS WHY HE THINKS WE SHOULD NOT DECLARE WAR-ADMITS HIS COUNTRY WILL CONTINUE FIGHTING.

I read the accompanying article and re-read it. Every line of the interview is the subtlest form of German propaganda I have yet seen in print. Perhaps it was particularly apparent to me because certain partisans of King Constantine and the Kaiser at Athens had informed me that" M. Panaretoff was a valuable man for Germany." But even had I not known very this fact his own words would have been proof enough. First of all, this Bulgarian tells us that our Congressman, Mr. Miller, "seems to be uninformed on the great subjects that he would discuss in the American Congress."

Shaking the faith of our people in their own representatives is one way in which this Bulgarian serves William of Germany, for Germany plans to weaken our strength as an ally of Eng land and France by bringing about mistrust of our Government in the minds of our people-as she so successfully has done in Russia and in Italy. She means to create Bolsheviki among us, and to finance them, and Mr. Panaretoff is her agent.

Then this representative of a nation whose army in its atrocious conduct is only second to that of Germany proceeds to utter lie upon lie in an effort to create public opinion against heroic Serbia. He says:

So our only enemy in this war, recognized by us in an official declaration of hostilities, is Serbia. If it had not been for Serbia we would have been in the war to-day, not as an ally of Germany and Austria and Turkey, but as an ally of England and France and Italy and America. We stayed out of the war until October of 1915, hoping that the Entente Allies would guarantee us what we asked, which was no more than the restoration of our

own territory. In May of that year-that is 1915-we submitted terms to Great Britain. They were, first, the restitution to us by Serbia of both the contested and the uncontested portions of Macedonia; second, the cession of Kavala, Drama, and Seres; third, restoration by Rumania of New Dobrudja, with the exception of Silistria; and, fourth, the restoration of the Enos-Midia frontier according to the London Treaty of May 30, 1913. In other words, we asked only for what had been taken from us wrongfully, and for the restoration of lands occupied by our own people who wanted to be restored to us.

As our Prime Minister put it at the time, we were ready to fight for either side that would enable us to restore our national unity by recovering Serbian Macedonia. The Entente Allies urged Serbia to agree to what we asked, and the very thing that Serbia had admitted to be right before the second Balkan War. But Serbia refused and blocked the plan, although we had the hearty support of Paul Milukoff, the greatest of the Russian statesmen, who denounced the obstinacy of Serbia.

Is it conceivable that a Bulgarian should be ignorant of the true state of affairs in the Balkans? It is not, and hence every word Mr. Panaretoff uttered in this interview is a misstatement of the truth as black, as treacherous, as pregnant with German propaganda, as if Bernstorff himself had uttered it.

As I said before, my husband and I have been abroad a year studying the Grecian situation under circumstances which gave us every opportunity of getting at the truth. We have seen many official documents, and have verified all important points from ambassadors who were actors in the drama down there and from the Foreign Office in London. And unequivocally I can state that Serbia did not block the way to negotiations with Bulgaria, but consented to give up the territory demanded by rapacious Bulgaria, in an effort to keep the latter country from siding against the Entente.

As for the Greek provinces of Drama-Kavala-Seres, I have in my hands indisputable proof that they were offered to Bulgaria on August 3, 1915, to gain her neutrality.

And this Bulgarian Panaretoff questions the honesty of Mr. Roosevelt because he asserts that the Bulgarian Legation is furthering the interest of Germany. I do not know what proofs Mr. Roosevelt has against the Bulgarian Legation, but I do know that every statement of Mr. Panaretoff's in his interview is proof enough that this Bulgarian Minister is engaged in the most pernicious form of plotting, of which Germany is a pastmaster. Every word of his has an object in view. He seeks to diminish our admiration for our courageous and gallant ally Serbia. He makes insinuations against Italy and Rumania with the object of making the American people-who are not yet well versed in international affairs-believe that some of our allies are as contemptible as Bulgaria herself.

In this way, naturally, the number of malcontents who do not clearly understand why we are in this war will be increased. It will also help to dampen the enthusiasm of our soldiers for some of the nations on whose side we are fighting. And this is only a beginning, a beginning which, as I said before, it is hoped will lead to the creation of a Bolshevik movement in the United States. Are we going to permit this? Are we going to see our newspapers unconsciously lending their columns to this inspired propaganda? Are we going to see such men as Panaretoff acting as accredited agents of Germany to our Government? Or are we going to wake up and justify the great faith in our sagacity, in our forethought, in our astuteness, which our allies across the seas have in us?

W

Day long the valley pants beneath the glare
Of shimmering sun; a smothering wind blows by
Hot from the desert, parching the brown bare
Earth beneath the pitiless summer sky.
High in the canyons of the dust-blown hills
Fires flame and spread, the thick smoke blurs
The air, the streams run dry, no water fills
The creeks below, no live thing stirs.

There is a hush; as from a long, dread dream
The valley wakes, and dusk, soft-fingered, cool,
Steals down the hills; there comes a gleam
Of water, phantom shapes of stream and pool.
Mysterious night, tender and wondrous calm,
Lulls the hot land to sleep; the red fires die;
Stilled are the horrors of the day's alarm;
Night sentinels, the stars, keep watch on high.

BY GEORGE

THEN I was a very small boy, my father used to take me to the zoo. There, with bulging eyes, I stood motionless before the cages of what to me were absolutely unique animals. And always, when I was safely home, exaggerating and enriching natural history for my companions, I was inwardly elated to think that no iron bars shut me in from the glorious world of marbles, haymows, bonfires and the resulting singed eyebrows.

To-day, for the first time, I am learning how those dumb creatures felt if, perchance, any of them were of sensitive dispositions. I have been through the ordeal of Visitors' Day at one of our best training camps. Cut from the outside world by a circular knife of barbed wire, I have watched the uncaged, and have been amused and saddened. Friends and relativestime-honored attendants at every function-swarm down upon us like flies on the butter. That Boy in Uniform is, every one, his own Pied Piper.

It is a variegated crowd that he draws. Mothers are, of course, most prominent and most welcome. With eager and worried faces they wait at the gate, adjusting their hats and furs as if they were to be photographed. At the first sight of the boy the impatience becomes unconfined, while anxiety melts into a smile of sympathy, pride, and love.

"Why haven't you written?" begins the mother, after a glad embrace.

"I've had the grip," the son mutters, averting his look from his mother's eyes.

"There, father, didn't I tell you? They haven't given him any warm underclothes."

Father says something about the boy's getting hardened and beams approval on the six feet of young manhood that has already relieved his mother of bundles, the solid appearance of which screams, "Food!" The grand tour of the camp is now under way. The first thing mother will do when she gets home, regulation or no regulation, will be to parcel-post warm socks and underclothes to the boy.

Parents are the first to arrive. Half an hour or so later less intimate relatives and more intimate friends approach the gate. The American girl now draws near. As He pardon the obsolete capital-comes up the walk to meet her, she stands on the tiptoes of her high-laced shoes and claps her hands in unfeigned joy. Color suffuses her face and mingles naturally with the gay bits of finery of her apparel. Surely, now if ever, she can kiss him, no matter who watches. No one, however, seems to notice save the sentry, who smiles and sighs simultaneously in a decidedly unmilitary manner. I have often been that sentry, but I have never had the heart to eavesdrop. What the girl says is for him. Perhaps some day some one will whisper something to

me and me alone.

Still later in the afternoon come the gentlemen friends of the contents of the uniform. They, at first blush, are sheer curiosity. They gape at the sentry's gun, at his leggings, and even his shoes. Their opening remarks bear a striking similarity. There is an emphatic "Well!" and a sincere "How are you? How do you like it?"

An hour after the gate is open to civilians the process of inspecting the details of camp life is in full sway. Right here one begins to think of the lions and monkeys in the circus parade. He also resolves never again to watch them feed the animals.

M. MURRAY

Hereafter the poor things, so far as he is concerned, may at least eat in peace. You look up from the Sunday letter home and see women's faces at the door. From this smiling cloud comes the deluge.

"You all sleep in here? Mercy, there must be a lot of snoring! Those funny things are hammocks? They look like a piece of salt-water taffy. You keep all your clothes in that one bag? My, I never could find anything. What's this-"

The Sunday letter ceases automatically. Here is a golden opportunity to become an adept in the universal art of questionasking.

The cloudburst develops drum-fire intensity. It requires infinite concentration to pick out the individual inquiry.

"Those are half-hitches'? A ditty box! Isn't that the funniest name? Oh, I love your soap and scrubbing-brush! Did you wash that suit? I think I'll send my laundry to you. Do you think I could climb into a hammock? Fall out in the middle of the night? Goodness, it's miles to the floor!"

Then come the mothers' questions-a gentle, soothing shower of them: "Can you keep your feet warm in a hammock? Is it as comfortable as a bed? Do you get to bed early? Nine o'clock! That's right, you must be all tired out. Couldn't use feet-warmers? Do you get enough to eat? Remember, let me know if you feel the least bit sick, and go straight to the doctor. What do you want me to send you?"

you

You are seized with a violent fit of scribbling, wherein you inform your mother that you sleep like a log and never felt better in your life.

So the long afternoon passes. The unvisited animals become restless. They perform for the spectators. They tie the fanciest of knots, confident the average civilian knows nothing about that science. They unroll and roll clothes, demonstrating what a neat bundle is made by the rotary method of folding. They accept cigars, cigarettes, and confectionery just as the elephant takes his peanuts. Kind-faced elderly ladies, their knitting bags dangling before them, promise sweaters and wristlets with an abandon that makes one fear for fulfillment. Small sisters and brothers don real sailor hats, while shouts of excitement emerge from heads of low visibility. The older youths air their Boy Scout knowledge, semaphoring with the speed of a first-class signal man.

Why, it's as good as a picnic or clambake! Yes, it's fine, so long as the sun is high in the heaven, but now the shadows have suddenly deepened and grown long. The blue, high over the riotous trees on the western hill, has become a dull red. The visitors are now in small groups, talking earnestly and softly to those they have come to see. The visited are thinking of lamp-light and soft chairs, and the visitors of noisy mess-halls and pine benches. There isn't much to be said under such circumstances. But then words, as some one long ago intimated, do not always speak loudly.

One by one, the civilian groups depart. The girls no longer ask questions or radiate enthusiasm. Mothers, looking deep into their boys' eyes, communicate a silent message of confidence in the present and hope for the future. Fathers stand erect and grip tightly the hands held out to them, a man-to-man farewell.

The quick, metallic notes of a bugle sounding "mess gear" send the stragglers scurrying to the gate. Motors rattle, horns wheeze, and all is silent, save for the sound of feet scuffling

into the mess hall.