Слике страница
PDF
ePub

ister, Count Czernin, replied. These two men assumed different rôles. It is altogether probable that their respective rôles were assigned to them. To Hertling was allotted the task of speaking for the Junkers, the reactionaries, the whole military hierarchy of the Central Powers. To Czernin, on the other hand, was allotted the task of speaking for the more liberal elements in both Germany and Austria. Thus everybody in Pan-Germany might be supposed to be satisfied. Šo Hertling thundered and Czernin cooed. We can imagine the pride with which the conservative read the Hertling speech and the new confidence that it gave him in the might of the German arms. On the other hand, we can imagine the thrill that came over the half-hoping, half-despairing liberal as he read Czernin's speech, with its suggestion of promise to long-subjugated peoples. Thus Pan-Germany thought to keep up the courage of its fighters while at the same time it allayed within its own borders the ferment of liberalism and enticing with fair words the pacifists and liberals in Allied and neutral countries.

This is a dangerous game to play; it is like playing with explosives. Germany can be handled with comparative safety by its rulers, for the people of Germany have become used to handling. But Austria-Hungary is different. Here is a so-called Dual Empire that is not dual really, but multiple. It is composed of a group of nationalities that are ready to fly apart. The ruling classes in Austria-Hungary have acquired skill in keeping these elements together.

If we read President Wilson's address of January 11 aright, he saw the possibilities in that game and chose to make use of them.

So the President proceeded to show how hopeless the militaristic and Junker doctrine of Hertling was. He set the German Chancellor aside as hopelessly incapable, at least at present, of even understanding what men of to-day demand. But to Czernin, who had been striking this attitude of liberalism, the President offered, with every appearance of good faith, words of welcome. Here is a man that can understand the language of the twentieth century, so the President seemed to say. He has traveled a long way toward the position of the true liberal. If he will only come further, just these four steps (and the President enumerated them), he will be on ground where we can actually discuss with him the terms of peace.

Where does such a speech as that leave Czernin?

He cannot go further without mortally offending all the Junkers, the conservatives, the Hindenburgs, and the rest of the Potsdam gang on whom Pan-Germany depends. And yet he cannot turn back and eat his words without proving to every liberal within the Empire and to every pacifist outside that he has been indulging in mockery and false pretense.

an entirely different form. It may result not in the dispersion of the different elements but in a new arrangement of them in the form of a free, or semi-free, confederation. The effect of this would be to permit the various nationalities within the Empire to become autonomous. The Slavs and the Rumans, and even the Italians, might gain a freedom that they have never known under Hungarian and Austrian rule. It is conceivable, if German victory is conceivable, that the change in Austria-Hungary may be directed and determined by Germany.

This would not be important if it were a mere matter of bringing confusion upon a certain Bohemian nobleman. But it is something a great deal more than that. It is a signal of warning to the liberals of Austria-Hungary and its component peoples. It is virtually saying to them: "Now is your chance to turn the trick."

It is evident that Austria-Hungary is destined for a radical change as a consequence of this war. What the nature of that change may be will depend upon circumstances and upon the leaders of Austria-Hungary themselves.

But whatever form that change may take, it is bound to come. Austria-Hungary as we used to know it we shall never see again.

President Wilson's reply to Czernin is in effect, and we are inclined to think it was in purpose, a notification to the liberals of the various nationalities in Austria-Hungary that they still have a chance for determining their own destiny instead of having it determined for them. It was a notice to the present rulers of Austria-Hungary that if they are ready to accede to the demands of the Empire's subject peoples they might have something to say as to what the new form of the Empire should be. It was a notice to the leaders of the Liberal party that here is an opportunity for them to step forward and to make the people of Austria-Hungary believe that the things which Czer nin had said with his tongue in his cheek they were ready to promise on their honor and in good faith and put into effect. It was a notice to the peoples of Austria-Hungary, so far as they could be made to listen or to understand, that if they were ready to throw off German domination and to choose from among their own people leaders willing and able to carry out a programme of freedom for the peoples of the whole Empire they might save themselves not only further bloody sacrifice in the present war, but future suffering in the convulsions of a possible revolution.

If that change comes as the result of a smash from the Allies, the elements of the Empire may disintegrate. They may fly to their affinities. The Jugo-Slavs of Bosnia and Herzegovina would then join the Serbians and the Montenegrins to make a greater Serbia; the Poles of Galicia, their brothers of Russia and Prussia, to make a new Poland; the Transylvanian Rumans, their brothers of Rumania; the Germans of Austria, their uncongenial fellow-Teutons under the thumb of Berlin; the Czecho-Slovaks would unite to make an independent Bohemia ; and the Magyars would be left to rule themselves, something they have perhaps forgotten how to do in their effort to rule others. This would be a revolution administered from the outside.

If the change in Austria-Hungary comes from the inside, it may come as an explosion caused by spontaneous combustion. The disintegration might be quite as complete and might result in much the same new adjustments as those which might come from the outside smash.

If the change comes from the inside, however, it may assume

To such an appeal the present rulers of Austria-Hungary are not likely to listen. Lloyd George, in discerning no differ ence in substance between Hertling and Czernin, between the German and the Austrian reply, was right, and it is not likely that the President disagrees with him. But the President's experiment was worth trying, not for any hope of action from the present rulers of Austria-Hungary, but for the chance that the Liberals of Austria-Hungary may really see for what the Allies are fighting.

There can be no peace without victory; and over such a foe as the Potsdam gang there can be no victory that is not a mili tary victory. If the President succeeds in detaching from the support of the Potsdam gang the liberals of Austria-Hungary. the coming of that military victory will be hastened.

INFORMATION ABOUT THE FRENCH

We have received from a lady living in one of the most progressive, prosperous, and well-informed cities of New York State-a university town-the following interesting and sug gestive letter:

Has it occurred to you that, in spite of the fact that we are allies of the French and that there is a general acceptance of the fact of their bravery as a nation and people, yet many good Americans harbor a certain prejudice against the French as individuals, as a social entity, associate with them vice and fashions, absinthe drinking, grisettes, and Latin Quarters? Would not a series of articles and stories bringing out the domestic side of the people as it really has existed and as it exists now-the modesty and purity of the girls, the devotion of fathers and husbands, the helpfulness and cleverness of the women as they normally have been-would not such articles help to a better appreciation of the French people?

high

When the war was only six weeks old, in 1914, the minister of a large church here in in a sermon ridiculed the degenerate French nation. Of course he had been imbibing at a German fountain of truth. In our high schools, at least at school, the French Department is still under the German Department, with a strong pro-German, an American of German ances try, at its head. It will take some effort on the part of parents and taxpayers to change to a French head, although there is a stampede of pupils from the German classes into the French.

Now if in a patriotic, devoted city such as ours such prejudice exists, why not elsewhere? This feeling towards the French

reminds me faintly of the feeling of the abolitionists for the slaves and that of many Northern people to-day for the Negro: "Let him be free and have civil rights, but, for Heaven's sake, keep him down South!"

In response to this letter we make one or two practical suggestions to our correspondent. First, establish a Groupe of the Alliance Française, if one does not already exist in your community. The Alliance Française is an American association whose purpose is to do exactly what you want to have done in your community. Through lectures and literature it extends a knowledge among Americans of the French character, the French people, and the fine and noble achievements of the French in literature, science, and art. Full information about the Alliance Française may be obtained by writing to its secretary, Professor Louis Delamarre, 200 Fifth Avenue, New York. Second, ask all your friends who really want to know the truth, but who fail to understand the French people because they are not in the possession of the facts, if they have read any of the following books: First," Round My House," by Philip Gilbert Hamerton. Hamerton was an English artist and art oritic of a very fine nature, who married a Frenchwoman and lived much of his time in the French countryside. "Round My House" is a delightful interpretation and portrayal of French family life outside of Paris. It is most agreeable reading and full of anecdotes and touches of humor. Second, "French Traits," by W. C. Brownell. Mr. Brownell is perhaps the foremost living American critic of literature, customs, and manners. He had a New England education and lives in New York, but is a master of French literature. His book was published twenty years ago, after he had lived in France for some time, but it is as true to-day as it was at the time it was published. It is full of keen insight and brilliant wit, and it is brief. Third, "The France of To-Day," by Professor Barrett Wendell, of Harvard University. Mr. Wendell was a lecturer at the Sorbonne in Paris and other French universities in 1904-5. The purpose of his book is to give the American reader some understanding of the substantial and estimable qualities of the French nature. The American who will read these three volumes will have a very different idea of France, the French family, and the French individual from that which is current in the ordinary Broadway play and the yellow-backed novel.

FOUR LENTEN LESSONS

I-A TOWER OF STRENGTH

There is no authentic picture of Jesus, but the New Testament contains a portrait that indicates the impression which the physical personality of Jesus left upon his contemporaries. It is as follows:

And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; and in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; and his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars; and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword; and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.

This is not a portrait. But this specter of a dream would never have suggested to the dreamer Jesus of Nazareth if Jesus of Nazareth had been the effeminate being which ecclesiastical art has delighted to depict. The personality of Jesus was a virile personality. He was a terror to his enemies and a strong tower to his friends.

It requires courage to attack a vested wrong, hoary with tradition, intrenched behind ample capital and buttressed by the Church. Such a vested wrong had taken possession of the outer court of the Temple. That court had been converted into a market-place where profiteers were robbing the common people. The worshiper was compelled to buy here his doves and sheep for the sacrifice; here to exchange his foreign money for Hebrew money. For the priests would accept only what this market furnished. The first act of Christ's public ministry was to assail,

single-handed, this corrupt monopoly, drive out the traders, set free the doves, and overthrow the tables of the money-changers. It requires greater courage to face, single-handed, popular prejudice, and by fearless condemnation to convert unthinking applause into unthinking execration. This was the second act of Christ's public ministry. From Jerusalem he went to Nazareth, the home of his boyhood. His fame as a defender of the rights of the common people had preceded him. The congregation assembled in the synagogue at first admired the grace of their fellow-townsman. But he turned their admiration into execration. For he told them that they were not God's favored people; that their own Scripture showed that God cared for the heathen no less than for the Jew. Imagine the reception which an audience of Negro-haters would give to the reformer who told them that no white race had ever made so great progress in so short a time as the Negro race has made in the last fifty years; or an audience of Bolsheviki that class legislation by a proletariat is no better than class legislation by the capitalists. The admiring congregation were converted into an angry mob, and only a marvelous personality, such as has sometimes sufficed to awe a mob, saved Jesus from death.

It requires a more difficult courage to withstand the entreaties of a devoted friend than the hostility of an angry enemy. On one occasion Jesus was denouncing the false leaders in the Church of his time. To the hatred of greed and the hatred of race prejudice he was adding the hatred of ecclesiastical pride. No wonder his mother thought that the son whom she had always reverenced but had never been able to understand was crazed by his enthusiasm. She sought to draw him from his perilous ministry to the safety of his home. Thy mother and thy brethren," said his puzzled and indignant hearers, "wait without for thee." "My mother and my brethren!" he replied; "who are my mother and my brethren? They who do the will of my Father in heaven." And he went on with his teaching.

66

To be understood, appreciated, admired even by a few, is a great reinforcement to faltering courage. Jesus had not this reinforcement. The leaders of his day both hated and despised him. There is no hatred quite so bitter as the hatred of a corrupt conscience. And the hatred of the Church leaders was quite conscientious. The common people had admired him, but could not comprehend him. Even to his intimate disciples he was an enigma. In his last interview with them they said to one another, "A little while, and ye shall not see me and again, a little while, and ye shall see me.... What is this that he saith? 'A little while.' We cannot tell what he saith." The loneliness of Jesus is the most pathetic fact in his splendid but isolated life. The expression of his loneliness is the most pathetic word in his luminous life of sorrow. "Ye shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.'

[ocr errors]

History affords no picture of a more heroic figure than that of Jesus of Nazareth, who had the courage of a soldier attacking intrenched and hallowed injustice, of a reformer assailing as bitter a form of race and religious prejudice as the world has ever seen, of a prophet whom entreaties of love could not divert from his purpose, of an enthusiast who, left to face the great crisis of his life alone, faced it in loneliness unafraid.

FEBRUARY THAW

The Happy Eremite listened to the dripping of the water from the eaves, and the sound was music to his ears. He had been pursued for months, day and night, by the terror of frozen pipes; in the grayness of six in the morning and the starlit blackness of ten o'clock at night he had ascended the two flights of slippery stairs that led to the top of his water-tower, exposed to all the winds that blew ; again and again at the risk of his neck he had climbed the perpendicular ladder up the side of the tank (recalling each time the cheerful remark of the friendly plumber, "That ladder's only held up there by them two nails toed in to the side of the tank. I've always made up my mind that if it should give way, I'd either -"); with the icy blast cutting his cheeks he had again and again flashed his pocket electric lamp into the tank with one hand and lunged with a

poker at the frozen crust with the other, holding on with one elbow; at all hours he had carried oil-heaters to points of danger; he had stoked the furnace and burned up his earthly substance in the coils of electric stoves; he had labored over the radiator of his automobile as a doctor over a drowned man; he had exulted as from a full heart over the squib in somebody's funny column that now at last we knew what the weather-man meant when he spoke of the "mean" temperature; he had shivered and chattered and ached and grumbled and cursed and begged his Irish cook to intercede with the saints—

And now the water was dripping from the eaves.

He pushed out the casement window to hear it more certainly, and to have the further satisfaction of feeling that he was comfortable with the window open in the room he had been miserably uncomfortable in with an overcoat on his back and all manner of stoves round about.

The water dripped. He remembered that when it did that it arrived sooner or later, by one channel or another, in the cellar, and stayed there, for the cellar drain was not all it should be (the architect having been an artist). But he disregarded that anromantic detail. The eaves were dripping.

There was a foot of snow on the ground. The trees were utterly bare, with no faint hint of new green. On the young oak tree by the driveway last year's leaves clattered mournfully. But at the other end of the lot, where the potatoes had been and where now the winter rye lay under the snow, there was a smoky mist of steam.

And drop, drip, drip, drop, the eaves were dripping.

The Happy Eremite was a disciplinarian. He did not like the cold, but he was sure it was good for his soul. He was quite

positive that climbing to the top of the tower in biting wind was excellent for his soul, because it took an effort of will to overcome a perfectly definite fear that the ladder would go in the way the friendly plumber dreaded. He knew also that it was good for his soul to tend to the furnace so many times a day. for he was not naturally methodic, and the knowledge that to make a new fire is thirty times worse than to keep an old one going left him reasonably faithful. It was good for his soul, likewise, to freeze, to suffer the buffeting of the elements, to plod through snow-drifts, to give up for a day or a week the luxury of twenty miles an hour in a closed car for the slower locomo tion that Jack, the farm horse, offered.

He believed all that. He accepted the discipline. In a sense he rejoiced in it. And yet the music of the water dripping from the eaves !

It was Chesterton who admitted years ago that he was con stantly tossed to and fro between astonishment at the incredible wickedness of mankind and amazement at its incredible sublim ity. Surely in winter mankind is at its best, for then the most indulgent suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous weather with a stoical and humorous resignation which is unnoticed and uncelebrated only because it is so common.

The Happy Eremite himself felt unusually virtuous. He was certain that his soul had improved very much during the past three weeks. He was not at all sure that the improvement was not all that the most exacting Deity could ask for one season's endeavor. He was satisfied to remain without further improve ment for the present.

Wherefore he closed his eyes and smiled, and listened to the water dripping from the eaves.

"AFTER THE WAR" RECONSTRUCTION IN GREAT BRITAIN

A

-SOME RADICAL PROPOSALS

FAR-REACHING programme for reconstructive legislation in Great Britain after the war has been recommended by a sub-committee of the British Labor party. It is printed as a supplement to the "New Republic" of February 16, and is worthy of careful study by American publicists, legislators, business men, and workers. Its main points are as follows:

The war signalizes the "culmination and collapse of a distinctive industrial civilization," based on the individualist based on the individualist system of capitalist production.

A new social order is presently to be built up on "a deliber ately planned co-operation in production and distribution for the benefit of all who participate by hand or by brain on a systematic approach towards a healthy equality of material

circumstances.'

[ocr errors]

The democratic control of society in all its activities is, according to this proposed platform, to be based on

1. Universal Enforcement of the National Minimum. 2. Democratic Control of Industry.

3. Revolution in National Finance.

[ocr errors]

4. The Surplus Wealth for the Common Good. The "national minimum" signifies that thirty shillings ($7.50) per week is to be the lowest wage for the least skilled adult workers, on the principle that every member of the community must have the requisites of "healthy life and worthy citizenship. The "democratic control of industry" signifies that there must be no reconstruction of the "disorganization, waste, and inefficiency involved in a crowd of separate private employers," but "a genuinely scientific reorganization of the nation's industry," based on democracy in industry as well as in government." It calls for the immediate nationalization of railways and mines, and for the production of electrical power on a vast scale for common use; for the nationalization of life insurance for all classes, and for the continuation of Government control of all industries which have been taken over during the war. The Government is called upon to formulate a deliberate national organization for coping with the immense dislocation of industry which will occur with the freeing of eight millions of work

66

ers now either with the colors or engaged in munition produc tion.

66

The "revolution in national finance" that is called for prescribes Assessment by families instead of individuals; a graduated income tax rising to sixteen or even nineteen shillings in the pound on the highest income of the millionaires;" the national exchequer to be "normally the heir to all private riches in excess of a quite moderate amount;" a special capital levy to pay off the debt incurred by the war.

The "surplus for the common good," which has heretofore been absorbed by individuals and "devoted very largely to senseless luxury," is to be devoted to the permanent welfare of the community, by providing new capital for public welfare projects; for the care of the sick and the aged; and for a democratic system of education and recreation. "It is in the proposal for the appropriation of every surplus for the common good that the Labor party most distinctly marks itself off from the older political parties.'

66

In conclusion, this Labor pronunciamento calls for the annual assembly of an Imperial Council to discuss matters of common interest to all British dependencies, but only to make recom mendations for action by the "autonomous local legislatures." It desires to put an end to all economic "leagues against leagues." It stands for the establishment, as a part of the treaty of peace with which the war will end, of a super-national authority, with an international high court to try all justiciable issues between nations; an international legislature to enact such common laws as can be mutually agreed on, and an inter national council of mediation.... We would have all the nations of the world solemnly undertake and promise to make common cause against any one of them that broke away from this fundamental agreement.'

[ocr errors]

This platform is significant as being proposed for adoption by one of the most powerful parties in Great Britain. Its radi calism far outruns American progressivism, but it calls for serious consideration as a proposed solution of problems are certain to confront America as well as England after the great battle for democracy is fought and won.

that

[graphic][graphic][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

This article, describing the war action of Bohemians in America and elsewhere, parallels the description of the American-Polish Legion recently published in The Outlook. Most of these Bohemian soldiers are technically Austrian subjects, and they therefore face a double danger in fighting Austria. The author is of Bohemian ancestry and is a graduate of an American college.-THE EDITORS.

66

"N

TO lapse of time, no defeat of hopes, seems sufficient to reconcile the Czechs of Bohemia to incorporation with Austria," wrote President Wilson, several years ago. The Czechoslovaks are a nation of ten million people, living in the very heart of Europe, occupying a compact territory extending over Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, and Slovakia (North Hungary). For purposes of mutual defense Bohemia once concluded a voluntary alliance with Austria, but has since learned by sad experience that Austria as an ally is more to be feared than Austria as an enemy. To recount all of the sufferings of this liberty-loving nation would require volumes, not merely a few short paragraphs. It is sufficient to say that they were subjected to every sort of oppression possible in order to denationalize them and transform them into Germans or Magyars. Consequently, it is not a matter of surprise that at the very outbreak of the present war the Czechoslovak nation declared its opposition to the aims of the Central Powers and publicly proclaimed its adherence to the cause of the Allies.

Very soon after the outbreak of the war the Allied public was informed that numerous Czechoslovak regiments in the Austro-Hungarian army had voluntarily surrendered in Russia, Serbia, and later in Rumania and Italy. These wholesale surrenders were part of a preconceived plan on the part of the Czechoslovaks to paralyze Austro-Hungarian military efforts as far as possible.

Simultaneously, acting on direct authority from the people at home, Professor T. G. Masaryk and Dr. Edward Benes, both former members of the Austrian Reichsrath, and Dr. M. R. Stefanik, a noted scientist who is extremely well known in France, organized the Czechoslovak National Council at Paris for the purpose of advancing the movement for Czechoslovak independence. This Council is now the recognized head of the Czechoslovak movement.

The task which was facing the Czechoslovak National Council at its organization was enormous. It was necessary to create a compact organization among the Czechoslovaks all over the world in order to make their combined action effective. After months of labor this was finally accomplished.

The main task of the Council consisted in assisting the Allies to the fullest extent of their ability. At first the Czechoslovaks living in Russia, England, France, and Canada were urged to join the Allied ranks. Several thousand were thus enrolled, and have distinguished themselves at Artois, Champagne, Dobrudja, and in the Balkans. Later those Czechoslovaks who voluntarily surrendered were organized, and then, when the necessary permission was secured, invited to volunteer their services and join the Czechoslovak army which was to be formed in Russia. Captain Firlinger, who has just reached New York from Russia, reports that there are over sixty thousand Czechoslovaks

now in Russia who are ready at a moment's notice to proceed against their former oppressors. As a matter of fact, the ex ploits of the Czechoslovak Brigade, which so nobly distinguished itself at Tarnapol last June, are now well known all over the world. In one of the communications issued by General Brusiloff at the time, he speaks of them as follows: "The Czecho slovaks, perfidiously abandoned by our infantry at Tarnapol, fought in such a way that the world ought to fall on its knees before them." The motto of these troops is, "Victory or death." It is a firm rule which every man obligates himself to observe, that they should never surrender to the enemy, but rather fight to the bitter end.

A similar autonomous Czechoslovak national army is at the present time being organized in France. A recent decree of the President of the Republic of France regulating the formation of this army reads as follows: "The Czechoslovaks, organizing an autonomous army and recognizing in all military respects the superior authority of the French High Command, are waging war under their own standards against the Central Powers." They are waging war under their own standard! What this means to them only one who has had a taste of Hapsburg oppression can understand.

Their army may not be large, but the spirit which prevails is a sufficient proof of the indomitable courage of this oppressed nation, which hopes to emerge from this war as a free and united people.

It is extremely inspiring to see a few of these volunteers who are flocking to the Czechoslovak standard from all over the world. Some of them are from Canada, some come from Russia, while many of them are periodically arriving from America. It has been my good fortune to speak with many of these men. Just the other day a man came all the way from Texas in order to depart for France. When informed that, owing to certain physical disabilities, he could not be accepted, the man burst into tears, saying, "I must go. I care not whether I accomplish much. I only want to go to die in the trenches, so that when my nation is free and my children grow up to appreciate the value of freedom they too can say that their father was one of those who laid down his life in order that their nation may not be engulfed in the Pan-German sea that has almost completely surrounded it already." In one of their recent maneuvers grandfather and grandson marched together to meet the hated Teuton foe.

The advent of this autonomous Czechoslovak national army should be hailed as the accession of a new ally to the cause of humanity and civilization. All that these volunteers ask is the privilege of fighting side by side with the Allies in order to cooperate in the gigantic task of liberating the whole of democracy from the Teutonic menace

·A

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE

BOUT a year ago the casual visitor from the States, if he glanced at the local dailies of Porto Rico, marveled greatly at the constant appearance of "Bill Jones in the headlines, and he wondered who that much-discussed person might be. Curiously inquiring, he would be informed that the name was the Spanish version of the Jones Bill, which, enacted by Congress, became law on March 2, 1917, making the island an organized Territory of the United States and conferring upon the Porto Ricans who for nineteen years had had the anomalous status of American subjects but not citizens the long-desired boon of citizenship. The event was celebrated with much enthusiasm, and included a great and beautiful procession of public school children of San Juan, followed by the dedication of a conspicuous public square in the Condado district as the Plaza Segundo de Marzo (Plaza Second of March).

This beautiful tropical island-the second of Spain's American colonies, and one of the oldest New World seats of Western civilization-has a population numbering about a population numbering about 1,300,000 persons (much larger than that of many a State of the Union), and occupies an area equal to only seven-tenths of that of the State of Connecticut.

One extraordinary outcome of this change to a Territorial status has been the adoption of the prohibition of alcoholic intoxicants inside of five months, making the Porto Ricans the first Latin population in the world to take such a step. The Jones Act provides that upon petition of twenty per cent of the voters the option as to prohibition may be decided at any general election held within five years; otherwise prohibition would take effect automatically a year from the passage of the bill. At first it was doubted if that many signatures could be obtained. But the interests opposed to prohibition succeeded in getting them. At the first general election, held last July, the vote in favor of prohibition was about two to one.

This outcome was the more extraordinary since alcohol is comparatively little abused in Porto Rico. Light wines are in daily use by most of the well-to-do Porto Rican families, but drunkenness is regarded as a deep disgrace. When a man is seen drunk in public, he is almost certain not to be a Porto Rican. A young American of irreproachable character, recently arrived in the island, was strolling about the crowded streets of San Juan on Christmas Eve. Being slightly lame, he walked somewhat unsteadily. A Porto Rican gentleman, mistaking the cause of his gait, said in a low voice as he passed, and in excellent English: "You ought to be ashamed of yourself!"

The prohibition propaganda was entirely native, American residents taking no part. Immediately upon the passage of the Jones Bill an enthusiastic eampaign for prohibition was started; practically every prominent physician came out for it, and large meetings were held all over the island, often in the public plazas. Like all Latins, the Porto Ricans are intensely emotional, and are deeply moved by sentimental appeals. The ruling sentiment appeared to be that alcoholic drink was essentially an evil; hence, even though not greatly abused locally, it should nevertheless be done away with.

While we Americans have made mistakes in the course of our administration of Porto Rican affairs, altogether our record is something to be proud of. Our greatest boons have been the public school system, sanitation, and good roads, together with the assurance of what nearly every self-governing Latin-American country lacks-universal tranquillity and good order. When we took over the island, there were a few inferior private schools only; public schools were unknown. Illiteracy was everywhere the rule. Now the public school system is universal, and is correspondingly valued. Little rural schools dot the wayside throughout the island. In the towns the graded schools are invariably the finest buildings, more conspicuous than the churches, handsome fireproof edifices, usually of reinforced concrete, architecturally tasteful, and in equipment well up to date. In Ponce a handsome group of school-houses stands in spacious grounds: the McKinley graded school, the Roosevelt

manual-training school, and the high school. The American flag floats over every school-house, large and small. The system runs from the rural schools, the graded schools in the towns, the continuation schools in the larger towns, and the high schools in the cities and certain other municipalities, up to the normal school and the university. The system is highly centralized. The Commissioner of Education, like the Governor, is a Presidential appointee, and is correspondingly removed from influences that make for inefficiency and graft. Grafting. when attempted by certain local school boards, has been effec tively thwarted by the central authority, which controls the fixing of salaries and approval of appointments, the curriculum, and matters of school-house design and construction.

The schools are gradually making the population bilingual; in a generation the process should approach completion. But, although it is the official language, English can never replace Spanish in domestic and colloquial usage, any more than it can replace French as the idiom of Quebec. French still remains the common speech of a large part of Louisiana; German as a native idiom still lingers in Pennsylvania. But Mr. Miller, the excellent School Commissioner, tells me that in the less than twenty years of American rule in Porto Rico a greater advance has been made in the use and knowledge of English than in the State of New Mexico, which for nearly three-quarters of a cen tury has been part of the United States.

All teachers in Porto Rico must know English. It is taught in all grades; in the upper grades it is the medium for all instruction. As to Spanish, thanks to the public schools, it is now spoken and written better than when the island was a possession of Spain.

Manual training and domestic science are public school features all over the island. Admirable progress has been made in both respects. Instruction in domestic science has borne fruit in greatly improved cooking methods and in household economy, including hygiene. It teaches the utilization of native prod ucts for instance, green mangoes as a substitute for apples in cooking. It is said that our American pie has become a household institution in something like ten thousand families.

Domestic science in the schools is a growing factor in the food conservation propaganda now in active progress. The na ture of the work is essentially different in Porto Rico. It antedates by some months the campaign in the States. When war was first threatened, there was uneasiness as to the food supply of an island so largely dependent upon outside sources. So the great aim is to make the island self-sustaining. The advice of Dr. May, Director of the Federal Agricultural Experiment Station, that beans and other staples be extensively planted, bore good fruit. Beans had been mostly imported, but were so universally planted in the past year as to yield a surplus after meeting all local needs. There has also been a large crop of corn. At the present rate of increase, it is believed that in vari ous essentials Porto Rico may, by another year, have a surplus for export. Already there is an abundance; the prices of many staples are lower than in the States.

The Food Conservation Commission locally constituted has greater powers than the Federal department. It can fix retail prices, and has made the observation of wheatless days and meatless days mandatory, under penalty. I understand that the public in general observes these requirements scrupulously; in

the

average family no one would touch so much as even a cracker on a wheatless day. The local Commission is to be credited with one great business stroke. Rice is in enormous demand here; every native family must have its daily rice-and-beans. But little rice is grown on the island. So the Commission purchased a large cargo of it in Saigon, Cochin China. But when the ship, coming by way of the Suez Canal, reached Italy, the Italian Gov. ernment was so anxious to acquire the cargo, and offered so much for it, that it was sold at a profit of half a million dollars, reducing by one-half the necessity for the bond issue of a million that had been authorized for the work of the Commission.

San Juan, Porto Rico.

S. B.

« ПретходнаНастави »