Zeppelins are a sad disappointment; but if any address on the War is
being delivered to-night by a German professor, there can be no doubt
that it deals with submarines, and treats them as the saviours of the
Fatherland. Well, I know very little about submarines, but I notice that
they have not had much success against ships of war. We are so
easy-going that we expected to carry on our commerce in war very much as
we did in peace. We have to change all that, and it will cost us not a
little inconvenience, or even great hardships. But I cannot believe that
a scheme of privy attacks on the traders of all nations, devised as a
last resort, in lieu of naval victory, can be successful when it is no
longer a surprise. And when I read history, I am strengthened in my
belief that morality is all-important. I do not find that any war
between great nations was ever won by a machine. The Trojan horse will
be trotted out against me, but that was a municipal affair. Wars are won
by the temper of a people. Serbia is not yet defeated. It is a frenzied
and desperate quest that the Germans undertook when they began to seek
for some mechanical trick or dodge, some monstrous engine, which should
enable the less resolved and more excited people to defeat the more
resolved and less excited.
Pages:
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104