all this continent under the protection of the Monroe Doctrine and forbids the hoisting of a foreign flag. Almost all the rest of the undeveloped world which is counted a white man's country is part of the Empire of Great Britain.
Where and how shall the immensely virile and fertile Germanic race find a new home and a new empire over seas? Or will it, with the greatest army in the world at its command and a tremendous war fleet in the making, sit tight within its narrow boundaries at home until famine and pestilence sap its vitality and reduce its numbers? It may do that, it may allow millions of its sons to renounce their allegiance to the fatherland, or it may—the last terrible alternative is the one of which the world stands in dread.
(3426)
See Armies of the World; Militarism;
Navies of the World.
WAR, THE HORRORS OF
After his splendid victory of Austerlitz
was won and the iron crown of empire securely
fixt on his brow, Napoleon, standing
on the high ground, saw a portion of the defeated
Russian army making a slow, painful
retreat over a frozen lake. They were at his
mercy. He rode up to a battery and said,
"Men, you are losing time! fire on those
masses; they must be swallowed up! fire on
that ice!" Shells were thrown, the bridge of
ice was broken, and amid awful shrieks hundreds
upon hundreds of miserable wretches
were buried in the frozen waters.
The crime of war is its wanton
waste of human life. And so are the
social wrongs that decimate our world.
And so is evil in every form. (Text.)
(3427)
WARFARE, ANTIQUATED
The ordinary spear was eighteen feet long,
or three times the height of the man, and
from one inch to an inch and a half in
thickness. The iron jaws of the head were
two feet and a half in length.
With such spears the Massachusetts militia was trained for more than forty years, or until the outbreak of Philip's war. I do not know how long they may have been used in Virginia. Poking Indians armed with muskets out of a swamp with a spear might do for imaginary warfare—but when it came to real fighting it was very ugly business. The desperate character of the conflicts with Philip and the necessity for the exclusive use of gunpowder became apparent, and the edict went forth that the militia, who were trained to the use of the spear, should take up the musket. With this edict the spear disappeared in this country forever. It went out in England about the same time. Thus do we learn the progress of the human mind in arts of destruction.—Edward Eggleston.
(3428)
WARMTH, LOST
A story is told of a certain pastor who
mourned over a backslider in his congregation,
once a regular attendant at the prayer
service, but who had drifted away, and who
for many months had not been seen in the
"upper room." Finally, unable to stand it
longer, at the close of one of the meetings,
in which the voice formerly accustomed to
lead in prayer was sorely missed, the minister
went straight to the man's home and
found him sitting before the open fire. The
absentee, somewhat startled by the intrusion,
hastily placed another chair for his visitor
and then waited for the expected words of
rebuke. Had the rebuke been spoken, no
one knows what the reply might have been or
what mistaken yet lasting anger might have
been kindled. But not a word did the minister
say. Taking his seat before the fire, he
silently took the tongs and lifting a glowing
coal from the midst of its fellows, laid it by
itself upon the hearthstone. Remaining painfully
silent, he watched the blaze die out and
the last warm flush of life fade away. Then
it was the truant who opened his lips to say:
"You need not say a single word, sir; I'll
be there next Wednesday night." (Text.)
(3429)
Warmth of Christian Love—See Doubts, Dissolving.
WARNING
A wasteful loss of fish life occurs by the
sacrifice of millions of little fishes that are
left to gasp out their lives on the meadows
and grain-fields all over the great State of
Montana owing to the irrigation ditches. To
prevent this waste a paddle-wheel is installed
at the head of a ditch to frighten back and
prevent the fish from entering the intake. A
law requiring this to be done is now in force
in that State.
How many silly souls are warned
away from danger-points in life by
wise devices both divine and human!
(3430)
