decisive factor in the victory, or Germany will not be fairly beaten,
and we shall be only rescued _proteges_ of Russia instead of the
saviours of Western Europe. We must have the best army in Europe; and we
shall not get it under existing arrangements. We are passing out of the
first phase of the war fever, in which men flock to the colours by
instinct, by romantic desire for adventure, by the determination not, as
Wagner put it, "to let their lives be governed by fear of the end," by
simple destitution through unemployment, by rancour and pugnacity
excited by the inventions of the Press, by a sense of duty inculcated in
platform orations which would not stand half an hour's discussion, by
the incitements and taunts of elderly non-combatants and maidens with a
taste for mischief, and by the verses of poets jumping at the cheapest
chance in their underpaid profession. The difficulty begins when all the
men susceptible to these inducements are enlisted, and we have to draw
on the solid, sceptical, sensible residuum who know the value of their
lives and services and liberties, and will not give them except on
substantial and honourable conditions. These Ironsides know that it is
one thing to fight for your country, and quite another to let your wife
and children starve to save our rich idlers from a rise in the supertax.
They also know that it is one thing to wipe out the Prussian drill
sergeant and snob officer as the enemies of manhood and honour, and
another to let that sacred mission be made an excuse for subjecting us
to exactly the same tyranny in England. They have not forgotten the "On
the knee" episode, nor the floggings in our military prisons, nor the
scandalous imprisonment of Tom Mann, nor the warnings as to military law
and barrack life contained even in Robert Blatchford's testimony that
the army made a man of him.


*What the Labour Party Owes to the Army.*