to-day (June 13) is, "Will she sign the Peace Treaty?"

"Yes," say most people, "she will sign, even though knowing that she cannot execute because she can no longer resist her conquerors by force of arms.' No," say others, "she will not sign, and for this reason: What the Germans want above all else is protection to person and property. Suppose the German Commissioners sign. The Ebert Government will fall the next day. No government, certainly no Ebert, could stand up against that. What comes in? Perhaps a Haase Government--the Independent Socialists replacing the Majority Socialists. Now, you may be for Haase and not for Ebert, bút

you must admit that if the majority of Socialists do not protect persons and property better than at present the Minority Socialists could protect not at all. No matter how much new freedom and independence the Haase people might introduce, Germany would drift from bad to worse. There would be anarchy-just what most Germans want to avoid.

"But suppose Germany does not sign. One of two things would occur. Either Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau would place in the hands of the Ententists a decree dividing the German National Assembly and containing the resignation of President Ebert and of all the Ministers and requesting the Ententists to exercise all the sovereign rights of the German state and all the governmental powers; or the non-signature would enormously strengthen the present Government, present Government, which already gives a certain protection, and of course the Entente Allies would have to extend throughout Germany the protecting Governments which have worked so well in the occupied zones along the Rhine the people would thus have a double have a double security of law and order."

We outsiders would then have the demonstration of a Society of Nations at work for the ultimate redemption of a morally bankrupt Power.

We could presumably expect a more immediate result, however, in so far as the Treaty is concerned, through its early

signing by the various governing forces in Germany. The slight amendments as to frontiers and finance so far admitted to that Treaty proves the desire of those constituting the Society of Nations to act fairly. These amendments are not an admission of weakness, but of strength.

These are the critical days for the Society of Nations. These are the days when it must meet the special conditions arising in America, England, France, Italy, Rumania, Japan, China, in the newly made nations and in Germany. They are testing the Society's backbone. Has it a real backbone? Has it a real fiber? It has.

At the same time, to demonstrate this to the world it must be permeated by a greater atmosphere of understanding, of less political time-serving, less listening for the next election. There must be, in short, less indecision, more force.

Taken as a whole, however, the Society of Nations is not losing, but gaining, ground.

Paris, June 13, 1919.

WE

E were going up the Champs Elysées with Doctor Vgathering from the walls pierced by shell, the pavement plowed by grapeshot, the history of the besieged Paris, when just before reaching the Place de l'Etoile, the doctor stopped and pointed out to me one of those large corner houses so pompously grouped around the Arc de Triomphe.

"Do you see," said he, "those four closed windows on the balcony up there? In the beginning of August, that terrible month of August of '70, so laden with storm and disaster, I was summoned there to attend a case of apoplexy. The sufferer was Colonel Jouve, an old Cuirassier of the First Empire, full of enthusiasm for glory and patriotism, who, at the commencement of the war, had taken an apartment with a balcony in the Champs Elysées-for what do you think? To assist at the triumphal entry of our troops! Poor old man! The news of Wissembourg arrived as he was rising from table. On reading the name of Napoleon at the foot of that bulletin of defeat he fell senseless.

"I found the old Cuirassier stretched upon the floor, his face bleeding and inert as from the blov of a club. Standing, he would have been very tall; lying, he looked immense; with fine features, beautiful teeth, and white curling hair, carrying his eighty years as though they had been sixty. Beside him knelt his granddaughter in tears. She resembled him.

1 From "Tales from Many Sources," by permission of Dodd, Mead & Co.

Seeing them side by side, they reminded me of two Greek medallions stamped with the same impress, only the one was antique, earth-stained, its outlines somewhat worn; the other beautiful and clear, in all the luster of freshness.

"The child's sorrow touched me. Daughter and granddaughter of soldiers -for her father was on MacMahon's staff-the sight of this old man stretched before her evoked in her mind another vision no less terrible. I did my best to reassure her, though in reality I had but little hope. We had to contend with hæmoptysis, from which at eighty there is small chance of recovery.

"For three days the patient remained in the same condition of immobility and stupor. Meanwhile came the news of Reichshofen you remember how strangely? Till the evening we all believed in a great victory-twenty thousand Prussians killed, the Crown Prince prisoner.

"I cannot tell by what miracle, by what magnetic current, an echo of this national joy can have reached our poor invalid, hitherto deaf to all around him; but that evening, on approaching the bed, I found a new man. His eye was almost clear, his speech less difficult, and he had the strength to smile and to stam

"When I went out his granddaughter was waiting for me, pale and sobbing. "But he is saved,' said I, taking her hands.

"The poor child had hardly courage to answer me. The truth as to Reichshofen had just been announced, MacMahon a fugitive, the whole army crushed. We looked at each other in consternation, she anxious at the thought of her father, I trembling for the grandfather. Certainly he would not bear this new shock. And yet what could we do? Let him enjoy the illusion which had revived him? But then we should have to deceive him.

"Well, then, I will deceive him,' said the brave girl, and hastily wiping away her tears she re-entered her grandfather's room with a beaming face.

"It was a hard task she had set herself. For the first few days it was comparatively easy, as the old man's head was weak, and he was as credulous as a child. But with returning health came clearer ideas. It was necessary to keep him au courant with the movements of the army and to invent military bulletins. It was pitiful to see that beautiful girl bending night and day over her map of Germany, marking it with little flags, forcing herself to combine the whole of a glorious campaign-Bazaine on the road to Berlin, Frossard in Bavaria, MacMahon on the Baltic. In all this she asked my counsel, and I helped her as far as I could, but it was the grandfather who did the most for us in this imaginary invasion. He had conquered Germany so often during the

First Empire. He knew all the moves beforehand. Now they should go there. This is what they will do,' and his anticipations were always realized, not a little to his pride. Unfortunately, we might take towns and gain battles, but we never went fast enough for the Colonel. He was insatiable. Every day I was greeted with a fresh feat of arms.

"Doctor, we have taken Mayence,' said the young girl, coming to meet me with a heartrending smile, and through the door I heard a joyous voice crying:

"We are getting on, we are getting on. In a week we shall enter Berlin.'

"At that moment the Prussians were but a week from Paris. At first we thought it might be better to move to the provinces, but once out of doors, the state of the country would have told him all, and I thought him still too weak, too enervated, to know the truth. It was therefore decided that they should stay where they were.

"On the first day of the investment I went to see my patient-much agitated, I remember, and with that pang in my heart which we all felt at knowing that the gates of Paris were shut, that the war was under our walls, that our suburbs had become our frontiers.

"I found the old man jubilant and proud.

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66

Well,' said he,' the siege has begun.' I looked at him, stupefied. "How, Colonel, do you know?' "His granddaughter turned to me, 'Oh, yes, Doctor, it is great news. The siege of Berlin has commenced.'

She said this composedly, while drawing out her needle. How could he suspect anything? He could not hear the cannon nor see that unhappy Paris, so sullen and disorderly. All that he saw from his bed was calculated to keep up his delusion. Outside was the Arc de Triomphe, and in the room quite a collection of souvenirs of the First Empire. Portraits of marshals, engravings of battles, the King of Rome in his baby robes; the stiff consoles, ornamented with trophies in brass, were covered with Imperial relics, medals, bronzes; a stone from St. Helena under a glass shade; miniatures all representing the same becurled lady, in ball-dress, in a yellow gown with leg-of-mutton sleeves and light eyes, and all-the consoles, the King of Rome, the medals, the yellow ladies with short waists and sashes under their arms-in that style of awkward stiffness which was the grace of 1806. Good Colonel! it was this atmosphere of victory and conquest, rather than all we could say, which made him believe so naïvely in the siege of Berlin.

"From that day our military operations became much simpler. Taking Berlin was merely a matter of patience. Every now and then, when the old man was tired of waiting, a letter from his son was read to him an imaginary letter, of course, as nothing could enter Paris, and as, since Sedan, MacMahon's aide-de-camp had been sent to a German fortress. Can you not imagine the despair of the poor girl,

without tidings of her father, knowing him to be a prisoner, deprived of all comforts. perhaps ill, and yet obliged to make him speak in cheerful letters, somewhat short, as from a soldier in the field, always advancing in a conquered country. Sometimes, when the invalid was weaker than usual, weeks passed without fresh news. But was he anxious and unable to sleep, suddenly a letter arrived from Germany which she read gayly at his bedside, struggling hard with her tears. The Colonel listened religiously, smiling with an air of superiority, approving, criticis ing, explaining; but it was in the answers to his son that he was at his best. 'Never forget that you are a Frenchman,' he wrote; be generous to those poor people. Do not make the invasion too hard for them.' His advice was never ending; edifying sermons about respect of property, the politeness due to ladies -in short, quite a code of military honor for the use of conquerors. With all this he put in some general reflections on politics and the conditions of the peace to be imposed on the vanquished. With regard to the latter, I must say he was not exacting:

"The war indemnity and nothing else. It is no good to take provinces. else. It is no good to take provinces. Can one turn Germany into France?"

"He dictated this with so firm a voice, and one felt so much sincerity in his words, so much patriotic faith, that it was impossible to listen to him unmoved.

"Meanwhile the siege went on-not the siege of Berlin, alas! We were at the worst period of cold, of bombardment, of epidemic, of famine. But, thanks to our care and the indefatigable tenderness which surrounded him, the old man's serenity was never for a moment disturbed. Up to the end I was able to procure white bread and fresh meat for him, but for him only. You could not imagine anything more touching than those breakfasts of the grandfather, so innocently egotistic, sitting up in bed, fresh and smiling, the napkin tied under his chin, at his side his granddaughter, pale from her privations, guiding his hands, making him drink, helping him to eat all these good, forbidden things. Then, revived by the repast, in the comfort of his warm room, with the wintry wind shut out and the snow eddying about the window, the old Cuirassier would recall his Northern campaigns and would relate to us that disastrous retreat in Russia where there was nothing to eat but frozen biscuit and horseflesh.

"Can you understand that, little one? We ate horseflesh.'

“I should think she did understand it. For two months she had tasted nothing else. As convalescence approached our task increased daily in difficulty. The numbness of the Colonel's senses, as well as of his limbs, which had hitherto helped us so much, was beginning to pass away. Once or twice already those terrible volleys at the Porte Maillot had made him start and prick up his ears like a warhorse; we were obliged to invent a recent victory of Bazaine's before Berlin and

salvoes fired from the Invalides in honor of it. Another day (the Thursday of Buzenval, I think it was) his bed had been pushed to the window, whence he saw some of the National Guard massed upon the Avenue de la Grande Armée.

"What soldiers are those?' he asked, and we heard him grumbling beneath his teeth:

666

66

Badly drilled, badly drilled.'

Nothing came of this, but we understood that henceforth greater precautions were necessary. Unfortunately, we were not careful enough.

"One evening I was met by the child in much trouble.

"It is to-morrow they make their entry,' she said.

"Could the grandfather's door have been open? In thinking of it since, I remember that all that evening his face wore an extraordinary expression. Probably he had overheard us; only we spoke of the Prussians and he thought of the French, of the triumphal entry he had so long expected, MacMahon descending the Avenue amid flowers and flourish of trumpets, his own son riding beside the marshal, and he himself on his balcony, in full uniform as at Lützen, saluting the ragged colors and the eagles blackened by powder.

"Poor Colonel Jouve! He no doubt imagined that we wished to prevent his assisting at the defile of our troops, lest the emotion should prove too much for him, and therefore took care to say nothing to us; but the next day, just at the time the Prussian battalions cautiously entered the long road leading from the Porte Maillot to the Tuileries, the window up there was softly opened and the Colonel appeared on the balcony with his helmet, his sword, all his long-unused, but glorious apparel of Milhaud's Cuirassiers.

"I often ask myself what supreme effort of will, what sudden impulse of fading vitality, had placed him thus erect in harness.

"All we know is that he was there, standing at the railing, wondering to find the wide avenue so silent, the shutters all closed, Paris like a great lazaret, flags everywhere, but such strange ones, white with red crosses, and no one to meet our soldiers.

"For a moment he may have thought himself mistaken.

"But no! there, behind the Arc de Triomphe, there was a confused sound, a black line advancing in the growing daylight-then, little by little, the spikes of the helmets glisten, the little drums of Jena begin to beat, and under the Arc de l'Etoile, accompanied by the heavy tramp of the troops, by the clatter of sabers, bursts forth Schubert's 'Triumphal March.'

66 In the dead silence of the streets was heard a cry, a terrible cry:

666

To arms!-to arms!-the Prussians.' And the four Uhlans of the advance guard might have seen up there, on the balcony, a tall old man stagger, wave his arms, and fall. This time Colonel Jouve was dead."

[Those who are using the weekly outline should not attempt to cover the whole of an outline in any one lesson or study. Assign for one lesson selected questions, one or two propositions for discussion, and only such words as are found in the material assigned. Or distribute selected questions among different members of the class or group and have them report their findings to all when assembled. Then have all discuss the questions together.]

I-INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Topic: Versailles and After; Protests;
Ratify the Treaty.
Reference: Pages 389, 390; 393, 394.
Questions:

1. The Germans have signed the Treaty of Peace. What does The Outlook mean in saying: "The United States to-day is still at war with Germany. Not merely technically at war"? 2. What reasons does The Outlook advance for believing that "if this peace is to be a peace of justice, it must be a peace of vigilance"? 3. Give the German people and nation five reasons why they "fail to command the world's respect.' 4. Make a list of the protests against the Treaty of Versailles mentioned by The Outlook. Why these protests? Can you add any further protests? 5. Discuss whether China did right in refusing to sign the Treaty. 6. Give as many reasons as you can why the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles is more significant than the ratification of any other treaty in American history. 7. What, according to The Outlook, will the ratification of this Treaty by all the Allied nations mean? Does it seem to you that it will mean all these things? Reasons. 8. Tell what you think of The Outlook's belief as to the result if we fail to accept the treaty and do not enter the League of Nations. 9. Discuss: The Treaty is by no means perfect, but it is a big advance over the diplomatic method of 1914. 10. Give arguments for and against this proposition: America can in the future "render the greatest service to the world if it is allowed to express its opinion as an independent and impartial state as each crisis in civilization arises."

II-NATIONAL AFFAIRS

Topic: Industrial Democracy on Trial.
Reference: Editorial, pages 394-396.
Questions:

1. From this editorial and other sources, state and explain several reasons for industrial unrest. 2. Explain somewhat at length what industrial democracy is. 3. What reasons are there for believing that it is on trial? 4. Give several reasons for believing, now that the war is over, that the first problem which must be solved is industrial reconstruction. 5. How does Mr. John Leitch believe organized industries can be made democratic? 6. Make clear what The Outlook means by saying that indus

trial democracy is much more than profitsharing. 7. Labor has been and now generally is excluded from representation in the control of industry. Discuss the results of this. Do you think that labor should be represented in the ownership and management of all businesses? Reasons. 8. Among the schemes advocated for the improvement of social and industrial conditions are communism, Socialism, anarchism, the single tax, and constructive liberalism. Explain briefly the meaning of each and tell your own opinion of these schemes. 9. Discuss whether poverty and pauperism could be banished from the United States in twentyfive years. 10. You would do well to own "Industry and Humanity," by W. L. Mackenzie King (Houghton Mifflin), and "Principles of Political Economy," by T. N. Carver (Ginn). Read also a suggestive book, "Proposed Roads to Freedom," by B. Russell (Henry Holt).

III-LOCAL AFFAIRS

Topic: North Dakota's Rash Adventure. Reference: Editorial, pages 396, 397. Questions:

1. What is North Dakota's adventure? The Outlook considers it rash. Do you? Reasons. 2. Furnish proofs for The Outlook's statement: America" is built in such a way as to make experiments comparatively safe and simple." Illustrate by giving not less than one experiment from each of the following phases of public life: social, educational, religious, industrial, and political. 3. Why has North Dakota undertaken this experiment? Explain. 4. What are some of the things that, in your opinion, are against true Americanism? Illustrate your answer. 5. What is State paternalism? Discuss whether we have enough of it in the United States.

IV-PROPOSITIONS FOR DISCUSSION (These propositions are suggested directly or indirectly by the subject-matter of The Outlook, but not discussed in it.)

1. The Irish question is purely a domestic affair. 2. All true Americans will heartily welcome the return of President Wilson.

V-VOCABULARY BUILDING

(All of the following words and expressions are found in The Outlook for July 9, 1919. Both before and after looking them up in the dictionary or elsewhere, give their meaning in your own words. The figures in parentheses refer to pages on which the words may be found.)

Technically, treaty, league, alarmists (389); ratify, negotiate (393); impracticable (394); referendum, eminent domain (396); tinctured, leeches, reactionary (397).

"A GENTLE CYNIC" Under this title, chosen by Professor Jastrow, of the University of Pennsylvania, for his new theory and new metrical version of the Book of Ecclesiastes, "The Preacher," The Outlook reviewed it in its issue of June 18. As stated then, he regards it as a genial satire by an unknown Hebrew "Omar Khayyám," to which some orthodox critic, or critics, have added comments, amendments, and replies.

It should not be forgotten that in 1905 a more serious and more definite view of that puzzling book was presented by an equally eminent Semitic scholar, Professor Haupt, of Johns Hopkins University. He attributes the genuine portions of it to a Sadducean physician at Jerusalem in the second century B.C. The Epicurean view of life which he inculcated under the pseudonym of King Solomon naturally. roused the ire of orthodox critics. The Pharisees, unable to suppress the book, injected into it the neutralizing comments and replies which resulted in its admission, A.D. 90, into the Jewish canon of Holy Scripture. In that dark time for Judaism it may have seemed to those rabbis what Luther in his stormy career declared it— "a book of consolation."

Professor Haupt's metrical version of it, with an Introduction and notes, makes a handsome quarto of forty-seven pages, from the Johns Hopkins Press, price-marked fifty cents. His translation of the passage, "Cast thy bread upon the waters," etc. (xi. 1, 2), is eminently Sadducean and worldly-wise:

"Send thy breadcorn across the water,

Though it take many days-thou wilt re-
gain it ;

But apportion it 'twixt seven or eight [ships];
For what may happen, thou knowest not.'
J. M. W.

CONFIDENCE RESTORED The article by F. M. Davenport in The Outlook of June 4 will restore confidence in The Outlook among some of its readers. The friends of the progress of social well-being are not sufficiently numerous in the party of Mr. Davenport and Colonel Roosevelt to keep other friends of social progress assured; the position won by Senators Penrose and Warren and by Congressman Mann in the organization of this Congress is not reassuring; and for that reason the words of Mr. Davenport are timely. Too many periodicals of the class of The Outlook appear to be committed irrevocably to the opposition to Mr. Wilson and have sought to undermine him in the public confidence till protests from their readers forced a change of tone. This article should serve as a warning that there is a section of the Republican following which will not go to all lengths in its distrust of the Democrats as a party without financial convictions and with a "pandering tendency." Does not Mr. Davenport's cross-section of Albany Republican politics show in the Republican party a "pandering tendency"? It is well that The Outlook still stands as the spokesman of the Rooseveltian conscience and warns certain interests that if the poor are not to rob the rich the Republican party will not be permitted to hold the poor while some of the rich rob them.

JOHN MCCARTHY, Pastor Eastwood Memorial Methodist Church.

Caruthersville, Missouri.

T

HERE is not much chance of a fire in a hospital," said the doctor.

"Unless somebody overturns an alcohol stove or unless there is defective wiring-or something happens in the heating plant-or unless-well, I guess I'm getting myself in trouble here," he ended ruefully.

Many other good and useful citizens would say just what this doctor said. You never can know and appreciate fire dangers till you stop and think how many, many causes there are, and how worthless ordinary methods of prevention have proved themselves.

Hospitals for the insane with splendid equipment for helping or curing the mentally unfit; hospitals where little crippled children grow strong and learn once more to play; hospitals where the blind are taught trades so they can go back to a happy and natural life; hospitals

where wounded heroes are made whole again; all with the finest of modern appliances, light, air, sunshine, heroic doctors and nurses-but no fire-fighting apparatus. worth mentioning.

Constant exposure to the worst kind of death in institutions dedicated to humanity, the world over! Investigate your own Hospital. Find out for yourself what will mean safety for the patients.

Don't put on your nurses, those fine women already giving their lives to the service of others, the cruel burden of responsibility in case of fire.

See that your hospital is equipped with Grinnell Automatic Sprinkler System. Like a hundred firemen scattered throughout the building, always on the job! When the fire starts, the water starts-no chance for the fire to spread.

Read-"Fire Tragedies

and Their Remedy"

Parents, trustees, or officials will find in Fire Tragedies and Their Remedy" the unvarnished truth and a path of imperative social service. Write for it today. Address General Fire Extinguisher Company, 289 West Exchange Street, Providence, R. I.