Humanitarian Pacificists are much impressed by Germany's piteous lamentations over the brutality of the blockade. In these appeals to America optimists detect signs of cracking. Cooler observers explain them as evidence of her policy of shamming dead. English mothers who have lost their only sons cannot be expected to show sympathy for an Emperor who combines the professions of a Jekyll with the ferocity of a Hyde. Yet few of them would rewrite the record of these short lives; their pride is greater than their pain. While the daily toll of life is heavy, War, shorn of its pomp and pageantry, drags wearily in the trenches. The Lovelace of to-day is a troglodyte, biding his time patiently, but often a prey to _ennui_. This is how he writes to Lucasta to correct the portrait painted by her fancy: Above, the sky is very grey, the world is very damp. His light the sun denies by day, the moon by night her lamp; Across the landscape, soaked and sad, the dull guns answer back, And through the twilight's futile hush spasmodic rifles crack. The papers haven't come to-day to show how England feels; The hours go lame and languidly between our Spartan meals; We've written letters till we're tired, with not a thing to tell Except that nothing's doing, weather beastly, writer well. So when you feel for us out here--as well I know you will-- Then sympathise with thousands for their country sitting still; Don't picture battle-pieces by the lurid Press adored, But miles and miles of Britishers, in burrows, badly bored. [Illustration: FOR NEUTRALS "Why do we torpedo passenger ships? Because we are being starved by the infamous English." FOR NATIVES "Who says we are in distress? Look what our splendid organisation is doing."] Small wonder that Lovelace in the trenches envies the Flying Man: He rides aloof on god-like wings, Taking no thought of wire or mud, Saps, smells, or bugs--the mundane things That sour our lives and have our blood. The roads we trudged with feet of lead, The shadows of his pinions skim; The river where we piled our dead Is but a silver thread to him. Lovelace in the air might tell another story; but both are at one with their prototype in the spirit which made him say: "I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honour more," though neither of them would say it. In this context one may add that the Flying Men are not alone in exciting envy. Bread is the staff of life, and in the view of certain officers in the trenches the life of the Staff is one long loaf. The discussion on the withdrawal of Members' salaries has died down. The incident is now buried, and here is its epitaph: Some three-score years or so ago six hundred gallant men Made a charge that cost old England dear; they lost four hundred then: To-day six hundred make a charge that costs the country dear, But now they take four hundred each--four hundred pounds a year.