From Homeric warfare to subterranean conflict of modern trenches is a far cry, and Ares, God of Battles, may well yawn at the entertainment with which the Demon of War is providing him. But the spectator of this grim "revue" lacks something of the patience of its creator, and our Mephistopheles, marking the god's protest, will doubtless hurry the scene and diversify it with new devilries to restore his interest. Indeed, that has happened since Raemaekers made his picture.
The etiquette of butchery has become more complicated since Troy fell, yet it has been so far preserved till now that the fiend measures Ares with his eyes and speculates as to how far the martial god may be expected to tolerate his novel engines. Will asphyxiating gas, and destruction of non-combatants and neutrals on land and sea, trouble him? Or will he demand the rules of the game, and decline to applaud this satire on civilization, although mounted and produced regardless of cost and reckoning?
As the devil's own entertainment consists in watching the effects of his masterpiece on this warlike spectator, so it may be that those who "staged" the greatest war in mankind's history derive some bitter instruction from its reception by mankind. They know now that it is condemned by every civilized nation on earth; and before these lines are published their uncivilized catspaws will have ample reason to condemn it also. Neutrals there must be, but impartials none.
The sense and spirit of the thinking world now go so far with human reason that they demand a condition of freedom for all men and nations, be they weak or powerful. That ideal inspires the majority of human kind, and it follows that the evolution of morals sets strongly on the side of the Allies.
"War," says Bernhardi, "gives a biologically just decision, since its decisions rest on the very nature of things." So be it.
[Illustration: "I say, do suggest something new. This is becoming too boring."]
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In this humorous yet pathetic cartoon--humorous because of its truth to the type, and pathetic because of the futility of the effort depicted--with unfailing skill the artist shows the folly of the cry "Peace! Peace!" when there is none. In the forefront is a type of woman publicist who can never be happy unless the limelight secured by vocal effort and the advocacy of a "crazy" cause is focussed upon her. She calls "Peace!" that the world may hear, not attend. Behind her stands that other type of detached "peace woman," who has, judging from her placid yet grieved expression, apparently scarcely realized that the War is too serious and has its genesis in causes too deep-rooted to be quelled by her or her kind. One can imagine her saying: "A war! How terrible! It must be stopped."