The Bamberg herald. (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, October 18, 1917, Image 10
TOM.
The Letter He Got When He Left His
Mother for "France."
It has been something of a grip to
your mother and me. my dear boy;
these last days. But 1 hope we have
kept our feeling in our pockets. We
have tried to look Right in the face.
We wouldn't have you do otherwise. I
would have hung my head in shame
if my son had not wanted to go when
his country called. God knows I
would go with you. shoulder to shoulder,
if I could.
It's going to be very hard on your
mother. She has been very fine so
far, don't you think? But mothers
have a way that children don't know
about; of lying awake in the darkness
and talking to the God of their boys
at such times. She has. And she
will. She is giving all she has; all
she can give; and she does it, thank
God, with a brave heart. But you are
her all. So it isn't easy; it's no use
to say it is.
But you have a wonderful chance
to repay her. You are going into a
big thing: a big war: a big army:
standing for a big idea. But don't
forget that the biggest thing about a
principle or a battle or an army is
a man! And the biggest thing a war
can do is to bring out that man.
That's really what you and the other
chaps have gone over for: to demonstrate
the right kind of manhood,
for it is that which weighs in a fight
and wins it. The measure of any
successful result is the men who
made that success.
You neither want nor neea maxims.
I think you inherit my distaste of
them. There is only one thing that
counts in this life, and it beats all
the maxims ever penned?that is, for
a man's spirit to be all right. If
that is what it should be all the little
details of his life will fall into their
proper places. I think your spirit is
all right, my boy. It should be, for
it came to you from your mother.
Live that spirit.
And as that spirit came to you
from a woman, do you play the game
and show that you have it to other
women. It is the finest thing you can
do with it, and you can't very well do
less, because it is why your mother
gave it to you: that you should stand
foursquare before men and in this
case, means women. For when you
get "Somewhere in France" you will
meet women: all kinds. Some of one
kind in particular. Many of them
will have their men-folks at the front.
They will be alone?alone for other
men to respect and honor and show
the right consideration.
These women will make much of
you, for an American .in khaki in
France is very welcome, and will be
made .so. But don't let that welcome
for your coming to save their homes
and honor mean an approach or
opening tor you ror anyming uui me
highest consideration. Don't forget
that when you are invited somewhere
to hang up your hat it doesn't mean
to hang up your conduct also. You
will hear that in France they have
"let the bars down." But there is
no such thing anywhere as letting
the bars down to a man's conduct
toward a woman. To be a gentleman
in a French home is no different
from being a gentleman in your
mother's home. Think of every
woman you meet as a member of
your moiher's sex, and treat her
accordingly. Think of every girl you
meet as you would Nell, and treat
her as you hope every chap in the
camp near us will treat her. It is
a tremendously big "bit" that every
chap who goes to France now does,
who upholds his own honor at the
same time that he upholds the honor
of the United States when it comes
to his considerate treatment /of the
women d? France. It will be the
finest tribute ii^_ the world to our
great country if, when our boys leave
France, it can be said of them that
they were Spartans of personal honor.
Nothing?no results in battles?will
count for so much as that one record, i
These French women have suffered
much. Let us, as men of America,
not ask them to suffer more.
When you are called to get into the
game, get into it good and strong.
There's no fun in going through life
spoon-fed: in finding the soft seat.
That makes a man soft, and a soft
man is an abomination before God
and men. Find your place and hold
^ on/1 d A if AnH
it. 1I11U * UUl nui n. auu uv it.
put every tiling you've got into it.
Take hold and carry the biggest load
your shoulders can carry, and then
carry it right. Set the pace for
others: don't let them set it for you.
Then when the hour comes for fun
and recreation have it also "full up:"
only get clean fun. You have the
good manners that - your mother
taught you. Be true to your teacher,
for as a son acts so does he reflect
upon his mother and father. And in
no relation in life can you so truly
know a man as in his play. See how
a man plays and you can tell every
time whether he is a quitfeer or if he
is-a standpatter. It is in his play time
that a man meets with the things that
test him.
I would be mighty wary, in those
\
\
\
play hours, of the wines of France. A
man never needs alcohol in his being,
and he never needs it so little as when
he is up against the "trick" that you
and your fellows are going to "put
over" in France. You will need
every bit of real vitality: of strength:
of clear-eyed vision that you can
muster, and not one of these comes
from alcohol, which, after all has
been said of it for and against, is
the chief mantrap in the world. You
want and have your convivial intervals.
They will be welcome from
the tension of camp and trench life.
"? " ? 1 i ~ ~ nrt r? lici ll o H With
DUl CUUVlVia* Llllic:> uv "UH
out playing mischief with your head
and body.
Let nre say this to you too: attend
service; "If not invariably, then
variably." A lot of the fellows won't,
and you won't have to if you don't
want to. But, take it from an older
man who has been over all the way,
you can't afford not to go. Get the
true understanding of this one fact:
this war will, in its finality, have to
be settled on one basis, and only one:
the spirit of Christ. Why, because
any civilization that is worth the
name is based on that, and only on
that can it survive. Christianity
may seem to have a black eye just
now: it may seem almost not to be
in the world. But that is only in the
seeming, for when the time comes for
men to get together you will see that
peace will come out of that Great
Fountain of sanity, tolerance and
political and social wisdom that is
the Gateway to all kinds of truth
and the only sure basis on which the
world can rest. So keep a bit close
to it in your fighting days, aad learn
to know the Greatest Lessons that
a man can know and by which every
decent man lives and is measured.
So, go to it, my boy! Do your
duty and do it strong. If it be God's
will that you come back to us a silent
tribute to your sense of right, so be
it. We will bear and live it, as thousands
of others will be called upon to
do. But I have a strong feeling that
vou are eoina to come back to us a
bigger, finer man than you are leaving
us today. I cannot help feeling
that this is God's will. And when you
come hack, more than any honor that
may come to you for duty done, I
want to feel that, clean-blooded and
clear-eyed, you can look your mother
straight in the eye and that she will
feel that most glorious and satisfying
of all exaltations that comes to a
mother, that tremendous inner satisfaction,
when her mother-heart says
within her: "Thank God, my boy has
kept the faith." Keep you that faith
with your mother. Nothing can count
so big. 4
Until then, dear boy, remember me
as thinking of you throughout each
of the long days and the nights to
come. DAD.?Ladies' Home Journal.
England's Poor in War.
The effects of war are as fantastic
as those of a bolt of lightning. One
woman's income includes such incongruous
items as lis 6d on account of
her interned husband and 3s 6d from
her son, who is in the army. Kate,
aged forty, profits from the Zeppelins.
Her neighbors are fearful of fetching
their own beer when rumors of "trouble
over 'ead" are around, and, as she
neither drinks nor fears bombs, she
earns many a penny by going for beer
whenever an air raid is expected.
The tendency to thrift engendered
by a regular allowance is checked by
the ever mounting cost of living, so
that what the war gives with one
hand it takes away with the other.
The separation' allowance is not all
roses.
Many women remark that it was
their first chance in life, but add that
the high prices force them to deny
themselves comforts they formerly enjoyed.
"When 'e was at 'ome," one of
them puts it, "and 'ad done a good
week, I could 'ave what I wanted;
when he ain't 'ad no work?well,
when you ain't got nothing, you goes
without; but now?now I 'as to go
careful all the time." On the other
hand, not a few wives have found in
the absence of a compulsorilv wageearning
husband, with a compulsory
separation allowance, an ideal solution
of economic problems.?New
York Evening Post.
The Square Deal.
Every patriotic American and every
loyal member of congress will
welcome the president's order prohibiting
the faintest suspicion of pol
itics to influence the exemption cases
of the national army.
Favor-seeking citizens, it is reported,
already had begun to put
pressure on congressmen. Requests
were being sent to the war department
for special consideration for a
privileged few. The peremptory command
issued by President Wilson will
end this budding evil. General Crowder
sent to all the members of congress
a notice saying that "the president
directs the war department to
decline to discuss cases pending on
appeal or to entertain any communications,
suggestions or additional evidence
or statements concerning
them."
That is the spirit of impersonal
fairness which the American people
appreciate. Because of the general
belief that the national army has
been selected by clean tests of actual
fitness this nation has escaped the
customary wholesale opposition to the
draft. The feeling that the law was
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