Volume 153 — MORE TALK WITH GERMAN PEACEMONGERS.
Reading edition
(Including an incidental reference to Mr. H.G. WELLS.)
[The writer has received a pontifical brochure by Mr. WELLS, reprinted from The Daily News, sold by the International Free Trade League and entitled "A Reasonable Man's Peace", in which the following passage occurs:—"The conditions of peace can now be stated in general terms that are as acceptable to a reasonable man in Berlin as they are to a reasonable man in Paris or London or Petrograd.... Why, then, does the waste and killing go on? Why is not the Peace Conference sitting now? Manifestly because a small minority of people in positions of peculiar advantage, in positions of trust and authority, prevent or delay its assembling."]
When with another winter's horror nearing Once more you send along the old, old dove And frame with bloody lips that hide their leering A canticle of love; It has no doubt a most seductive cadence, But we who look for argument by fact We miss conciliation's artful aidance, We note a want of tact. Your words are redolent of pious unction; Your deeds, your infamies, by sea and shore, Go gaily on without the least compunction Just as they went before. We are not caught with olive-buds for baiting; Something is needed just a shade less crude, Something, for instance, faintly indicating The penitential mood. While still the stain is on your hands extended We'll hold no commerce with your frigid spells, Even though such a move were recommended By Mr. H.G. WELLS. Rather, without a break, like Mr. Britling (Though the brave wooden sword his author drew Seems to have undergone a certain whittling), We mean to "see it through." O.S.