The "Land & Water" edition of Raemaekers' cartoons, volume 1Raemaekers, Louis
History
The "Land & Water" edition of Raemaekers' cartoons, volume 1
Raemaekers, Louis
World War, 1914-1918 -- Caricatures and cartoons
One old woman walks quietly with bowed head submissive. In the front
walks a priest, his hand raised in the gesture of blessing his flock.
The heroism of the Catholic priesthood both in France and in Belgium
forms one of the most honourable features of the Great War, and stands
in striking contrast with the calculating diplomatic policy of the
Papacy. There is always the same tendency in the “chief priests” of
every race and period to be tempted to sacrifice moral considerations
to expediency, and to prefer the empty fabric of an imposing Church
establishment to the people who make the Church. But the clergy
of Belgium are there to prove what the Church can do for mankind.
This cartoon would be incomplete and would deserve condemnation as
inartistic if it were not redeemed by the priest and the old woman.
WILLIAM MITCHELL RAMSAY
[Illustration: THE SHIELDS OF ROSSELAERE
At Rosselaere the German troops forced the Belgian townsfolk to march
in front of them.]
The Obstinacy of Nicholas
The venerable quip that what is firmness in ourselves is obstinacy
in our opponents is illustrated with a ludicrous explicitness in the
whole tenor of German official utterance since the failure of the
great drives. The obtuseness of the Allies is so abysmal (it is again
and again complained in the Reichstag and through Wolff) that they
are unable to see that Germany is the permanently triumphant victor.
Whereas for Germany, whose cause even the neutrals judge to be lost,
to hold out at the cost of untold blood and treasure is merely the
manifestation of heaven-conferred German steadfastness. The Army into
whose obstinate corporate head it is hardest to drive the idea of
German military all-powerfulness is the Russian, of which retreating
units, actually armed with staves against a superbly equipped (but
innocent and wantonly attacked) foe, were so stupid as to forget how to
be broken and demoralised.
And this long, imperturbable, _verdamte_ Nicholas, who was declared
on the highest German authority (and what higher?) to be annihilated
twice, having turned a smashing tactical defeat into strategical
victory, bobs up serenely in another and most inconvenient place.
Absurd; particularly when “what I tell you three times is true.”...
Neonapoleon didn’t remember Moscow. But he will.
JOSEPH THORP
[Illustration: “Why, I’ve killed you twice, and you dare to come back
again.”]
Bundles of Four
This cartoon is horribly suggestive of Hun utilitarian methods! I
am told by an eminent chemist that six pounds of glycerine can be
extracted from the corpse of a fairly well nourished Hun, and I can
well believe that such an opportunity for replenishing the diminishing
stocks of a much needed commodity is not neglected by the Great General
Staff.
_Bundles of Four!_
And why not, from the Hun point of view?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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