She

house. She buried him in a grave she dug herself. and her children tended the crops. These were burned shortly after they gathered them. Then her swine were stolen, and her cows and horse driven off. Finally her oldest son, a boy of fourteen, was shot dead at the spring, and her house and barn were burned in broad daylight, and she and her children were left homeless and without food on a desolate mountain-side. Long before this woman had finished her story she rose to her feet, her face was white with intense passion, her eyes blazed with fire, and her gaunt form quivered with excitement as she gesticulated savagely. She said that if she lived and her boys lived, she would have vengeance on the men who had murdered her husband and son, and destroyed her home. As she talked, so talked all. These women were saturating their children's minds with the stories of the wrongs they had endured. I heard them repeat over and over to their children the names of men which they were never to forget, and whom they were to kill when they had sufficient strength to hold a rifle."

Take the word war to pieces and spell it out in the direct deeds which it commits and the indirect deeds which are always the product of its spirit, and it is always essentially the same, with its endless variations of crime and misery. It can never be otherwise.

Prince Bismarck, as nearly all Continental Europeans, holds the United States responsible for the present war with Spain. In a recent table talk at his home at Friedrichsruhe, he is reported to have condemned the war outright as due to American provocation. He thinks the whole course of our country, in the matter, has been insincere; that the result of the war cannot be wholesome either to America or to Europe; that the United States will be forced to adopt an intermeddling policy, leading to unavoidable frictions; that the abandonment of her traditional peace policy will lead necessarily to her becoming a military and naval power. The main regrettable fact about the war he considers to be America's change of front which means retrogression of civilization.

This opinion, even though coming from a European source, is none the less valuable. It is the opinion held by very many of the best of our American people, whose greatest grief is that our country has deliberately thrown away the greatest opportunity that ever came to it, and hence can never be again, in the eyes of the world, what it has been in the past. Not the least of the misfortunes of the war is the loss by us of the high respect and confidence of Europe hitherto shown us. The feeling in Europe against us does not come really from European sympathy with Spain and the condoning of Spanish misrule and cruelty, but from disappointment that our country has seemingly broken down in its leadership in ideas. and methods which were expected by Europeans themselves, tired as most of them are of the great militaristic curse which is upon them, to ultimately bring relief to them from their crushing burdens. Chauvinistic Ameri

cans may affect not to "care a snap" for European opinion, but this fact, instead of relieving the situation, only makes it the more unpromising. Why talk of these things now, we are asked. Why, for the very evident purpose of keeping as many eyes as possible open to the evil plight into which we have fallen, in order that the forces of recovery may be as numerous and vigorous as they can be made, when the days of destruction are past and the moment for them to reassert their sway comes. Something of the nation's former standing may be recovered. How much, will depend upon the post-bellum faithfulness of the tens of thousands of friends of peace whose silence and inactivity before the war left the warmaking elements to push their schemes unmolested.

It is announced that the tribunal which is to adjust the British-Venezuela boundary dispute is to meet in Paris next winter. The case of Venezuela has already been laid before the members of the tribunal and that of Great Britain will be presented in July. The agent of Venezuela before the tribunal will be Dr. Jose Maria de Rojas. He will be assisted in the conduct of Venezuela's case by Ex-President Harrison, as chief counsel, and by ExSecretary of the Navy Tracy and Mr. S. Mallet-Prevost, former Secretary of the Venezuelan Commission, as assistant counsel. The four members of the tribunal provided for by the treaty of Washington in 1897, have chosen the distinguished Russian international jurist, Professor de Maartens, as the fifth member of the court.

Something of the enormous and growing burdens of war preparations upon the peoples of Europe may be vividly realized from what F. Marion Crawford has recently said about taxation in Italy. Mr. Crawford, who was born in Italy and owns property there, says that he himself pays, in national, provincial and commercial taxes, 42 per cent upon the assessed income of a few acres of land. On the assessed rent of his house he pays something over 23 per cent. The tax on incomes in Italy is 13 per cent. There is no limit of estates, real or personal, below which taxation is not applied. In this way he accounts for the enormous immigration from Italy in recent years, which has diminished the farming population and thus crippled agriculture. Immense areas of land have been confiscated by the government for overdue taxes, and under existing circumstances no one would be willing to take these lands even as a gift. Such a condition of things Mr. Crawford considers incipient national bankruptcy.

Loudly as these facts speak, the leaders of no nation pay the least attention to them, so blinded and hardened are they by the war-god. There is no end to the millions that are voted without the least hesitation, when the cry of war necessity is raised. The real interests of the

people, that is, of the country, come in for no consideration at all.

Justin McCarthy, M. P., who is so little of a peace man that he does "not know whether there is a peace society in England at present," has nevertheless, as many of his compatriots in authority have not, some AngloSaxon common-sense left in his head. He is not disposed to regard with favor some of England's colonial military enterprises. In a recent article in the New York Independent he thus speaks of the Nile expedition and the "wiping out" of the Dervish army by Sir Herbert

Kitchener's forces:

"But I do not find myself able to get into any actual raptures over the event. I do not quite know what we are to gain by getting to Khartûm, and I find that most of those who rejoice over the opening of the way there know just as little as I do myself. I do not believe that one Englishman in ten thousand has the faintest idea of what our rulers mean by opening the way to Khartûm. I know that the English public have never been consulted on the subject, and that not one man in ten, even in the House of Commons, has any clear idea as to the real object of our policy in Southern Egypt. Therefore, I find myself a little out of tune with the general rejoicing, and I cannot help thinking of the brave fellows, officers and men, who died to accomplish this triumph, and of their lamenting families at home; and I have not yet had explained to me by any competent authority what are the precise benefits which compensate the nation for this sacrifice of gallant lives. . . . I have often thought of late how much we miss the clear voice and the strong influence of a man like John Bright, who could stand up in the face of a whole impassioned country and condemn a war which was not shown to be just and necessary. any war There is no voice now in England like that of Mr. Bright no voice coming from a really great orator, who ventures to stand up for the gospel of peace. So far as I know, the pulpits of the English State Church have not much concerned themselves of late years about that gospel of peace. Now we get into a war, no one knows why

a war of which all we know is that it certainly is not a war of national defense; and when our brave soldiers win a victory, we are bidden to rejoice; and if any one expresses the slightest doubt as to the occasion for the joy, he is at once set down by the majority of his acquaintances as a Little-Englander, or an Irish Nationalist, or some equally objectionable person. Perhaps the time may come when the memory of Prince Bismarck will be less honored by thoughtful and impartial men for his triumph over Austria and over France than for the noble declaration which he once gave forth, that the Eastern Question was not worth to Prussia the blood of a single Pomerania grenadier."

The trouble in England, as in this country, is not that there is not some great national orator like Bright to lift up his voice against "unjust and unnecessary wars," but that the multitudes of ordinary men who believe that wars are wrong do not lift up their voices in favor of peace. The influence of John Bright for peace is dying out in England because the small orators everywhere in the

The death of William Ewart Gladstone has removed from the world the man who in important respects was the foremost man of his time. His long and eminent service in political life, the strength, purity and simplicity of his character, his oratorical greatness, the breadth of his scholarship, the depth, sincerity and fervor of his Christian life, the nature of the causes which he espoused, all combined to give him a distinction falling to the lot of few men in any age. Mr. Gladstone cannot be said to have been a man of original principles and measures. He was

a conservative opportunist, though his opportunism usually went to the side of right and good, which he advocated with great power and sincerity. During his earlier life, the peace movement, as advocated by Cobden, Bright and Henry Richard, did not appeal to him very strongly. He had much to do, however, with the development of arbitration between Great Britain and the United States, though he always manifested a certain caution about the subject, even in his speech on the Cremer resolution in June, 1893. Since then the subject, which has in recent years so rapidly come to the front, seems to have constantly taken deeper and deeper hold of him, and during his last weeks the wish for the peace of the world was one of those most continually uppermost in his mind. We cannot forbear to mention in this necessarily brief note what seems to us one of the very greatest acts of statesmanship ever done by Mr. Gladstone. This was his stopping the war with the Boers in South Africa, after the defeat of the English forces in battle, purely on the ground that England was in the wrong and ought not to prosecute the war another step. He ventured, in doing this, to brave the dislike of the English public, which was enthusiastic for the war and not likely to take his act kindly after the humiliation of a British defeat. But, to his lasting honor, he did what was right, and it would be greatly to the credit of statesmen and cabinets everywhere if they would follow his example in similar cases. An unrighteous war can never be made righteous by prosecuting it until victory comes, and no nation can save its honor by continuing to do a wicked thing.

We had not been able to get a copy of the resolution in favor of arbitration passed at the Congress of Mothers recently held in Washington, until the moment of going to press. It was with some difficulty that the subject got any consideration. But the friends of peace in the Congress, supported by the president, insisted that the subject, so germane to the work of women, should not be

crowded out, by reason of the crisis through which the nation is passing. The Countess di Brazza, who represented the American Peace Society as a delegate in the Congress, as well as the Peace and Arbitration Committee of the National Council of Women, of which she is Chairman, did splendid service in helping to hold the Congress true to the high cause of peace in its international as well as in its social and domestic aspects. The resolution is as follows:

"Resolved, that the Second Congress of Mothers proclaims its belief in the brotherhood of man, and that it recommends the settlement of all national and international difficulties by mutual agreement or arbitration, as between the brothers of one universal household."

The French Peace Bureau was founded in December, 1896 and entered upon its work at 6 rue Favart, Paris, in January, 1897. The object of the Bureau is to serve as a bond of union between the peace societies in France, between these societies and the International Peace Bureau at Berne, and in general to promote the peace propaganda. The report of the work of the Bureau for the first year is before us. It covers a pamphlet of twenty-four pages. The Bureau has given its chief attention to the promotion of peace ideas through the general press. It republished the "Appeal to Educators of Youth," prepared by the International Peace Bureau, and sent this to eighty French educational periodicals. Some French papers of a general character have put themselves at the service of the Bureau. The Bureau has commenced the collection of a library of peace literature, both for loaning purposes and for reference.

Hon. Henry U. Johnson of Indiana introduced into the House of Representatives on Monday, May 9th, the following joint resolution for the neutralization of the Hawaiian Islands:

"Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

That the President of the United States be, and hereby is, authorized and empowered to appoint three commissioners to meet a like number of commissioners appointed on the part of each of the governments of Great Britain, Germany, Russia, France, Austro-Hungary, Italy, Japan and China, to meet at the city of Washington at as early a date as may be practicable, the said commissioners to formulate and consider, and report to their respective governments a plan for the neutralization and independence of the Sandwich Islands and the prevention in the future of any nation taking possession of said islands, either directly or indirectly.

That the sum of $——be, and the same is hereby, appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for the purpose of defraying the expenses of the said commission."

The plan for the neutralization of Hawaii has been discussed in private circles for some years, but this is the first effort made to secure Congressional action on the

subject. The strong opposition in both branches of Congress to the scheme of annexation is likely to awaken serious attention to the Johnson resolution as outlining the only method of dealing with the Hawaiian problem in a manner to solve it for all time. It is thought by some that the participation of the United States in the neutralization of the Sandwich Islands would lead to our becoming involved in "entangling alliances" with the nations of the old world, but the advocates of neutralization believe that this is the only way to prevent the Hawaiian problem from bringing us into entangling alliances of a very serious nature.

While we object as seriously as the stoutest advocate of the Monroe doctrine can do to the United States involving herself in any sort of military alliance with the nations of Europe, or with any other, for that matter, we believe that every interest of humanity requires that she should coöperate with them along all peaceful lines. If our country should invite all the great powers to join her in taking such a step as this, it is almost certain that a favorable response would be given, and thus a great step in the way of friendly and purely peaceful international The Johnson resocoöperation would have been taken. lution deserves the most careful consideration on the part both of Congress and the people at large.

We take from the Philadelphia Times of May 9th, the following note describing an interesting movement among the children of Philadelphia recently set on foot by the Universal Peace Union of that city:

"Yesterday afternoon a meeting was held in Washington Hall, Fourth and South streets, to inaugurate a movement which, it is believed, will result in a very marked beneficial effect among the youth of the neighborhood. The meeting which was under the auspices of the Universal Peace Union, was called for the purpose of organizing the young people, both boys and girls, into small bands, with the object of instilling into their minds the principles of peace and social order, so as to make of them good and useful citizens.

The president of the Peace Union, Alfred H. Love, presided and explained to the three hundred or more children present the object for which they had come together. The Rev. Amanda Deyo, of Dutchess county, New York, also made an address, after which fully half

of the children enrolled their names as members of the bands. Others who were present and assisted in the work of organization were Dr. Moses Stearn, the originator of the movement; Thomas J. Whitney and Mrs. Whitney, P. B. Hall, Dr. Sarah T. R. Eavenson, Miss Jane Weedon and Miss Frances Gibson Smith.

The children took hold of the idea very enthusiastically, and it is Dr. Stearn's idea to train them into a realizasion of the advantages of arbitration in the settlement of their disputes; and through them to reach their parents. The next meeting will be held at the same place on the second Sunday in June."

In his recent address on the Development of the Re

sources of the Southern States before the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Edward Atkinson spoke thus of war and the militarism of the day:

"In prehistoric times men supplied their wants as the beasts did, by rapine and violence. In these modern days few nations have yet risen above the level of the beasts. Hence war or the preparation for war is the leading occupation of the people of Central Europe. War is hell. Militarism, such as rules all Central Europe, is the development of hell upon earth.

Wars of religion (God save the mark!) are over, but the threat of war, owing to the desire to attain the sole control of trade, still degrades nations that are called Christian. The passive war of the military castes, seeking to maintain privileges which are no longer coupled with duties, is ruining nations. If our standing army and navy were equal in ratio to population to those of France and Germany, it would number over nine hundred thousand men. That is about the number in our railway service. Our power of production is plus the nine hundred thousand men in our railway service. The power of production of France and Germany is minus the nine hundred thousand who are wasting their lives in camp and barrack and bringing the people to inevitable bankruptcy, on the lead of Spain which is bankrupt, while Cuba has been desolated through ignorance or neglect of the simplest principles of commerce. We have been free of militarism, let us keep so; then our national taxes may remain as they now are less than half in money those of the lightest taxed nations in Europe; less than a third in ratio to our greater product."

Brevities.

Any persons having copies of the ADVOCATE OF PEACE for March of this year, and not wishing to preserve them, will confer a great favor by sending them to this office.

The Fourth Annual Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration meets, by invitation of Mr. Albert K. Smiley, at Lake Mohonk, N. Y., on the first, second and third days of June. A large number of persons have accepted invitations to the Conference. A report of the proceedings will be given in the July number of the ADVOCATE OF PEACE.

The Congregational Mission at San Sebastian, Spain, has been removed across the French border to Biarritz, on account of the war.

The United States Sanitary Commission, an organization of private gentlemen, spent during the Civil War, in money and supplies, about twenty-one millions of dollars in the relief of wounded and sick soldiers.

What a fine-looking thing is war! Yes, disguise it as we may, dress and feather it, daub it with gold, huzza it, and sing swaggering songs about it, what is it nine times out of ten but murder in uniform - Cain taking the sergeant's shilling. Douglas Jerrold.

Mr. George T. Angell, President of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, has received a letter from the United States Quartermaster-General, assuring him that animals severely wounded in battle will be promptly and mercifully killed.

During the Franco-Prussian war, thirteen million dollars were contributed to the Red Cross Society for its work, and in the Russo-Turkish war, over seventeen millions. Will some one tell us how many millions, or halfmillions, or quarter millions, have been contributed in a whole century to the still more noble work of preventing war?

The Annual meeting of the London Peace Society was held on Tuesday evening, May 17th. We shall hope to have some account of the meeting for our July number. The war has interfered seriously with ocean travel, as much as fifty per cent. in case of first-class passenger traffic. It is not all a matter of fear of the Spaniards, from whom there is not the least danger as the steamers are all carrying foreign flags. The threatened derangement of the "purse "because of the war is an equally powerful motive for keeping people at home.

The expenditures of the government are now exceeding the receipts by nearly one million per day, and the excess is expected to be greater as the volunteers are brought into service.

Annual Meeting of the American Peace Society.

The Seventieth Annual Business Meeting of the American Peace Society was held in Pilgrim Hall, Congregational House, Boston, Monday, May 9th, at 2.30 P.M. Hon. Robert Treat Paine, President of the Society, was in the chair.

Rev. Charles G. Ames invoked the divine blessing upon the Society and its work, upon the country, and upon

all mankind, that righteousness and peace may come to prevail.

Georgia B. Birdsall was chosen Secretary for the meeting, and the records of the last annual meeting were read and approved.

Secretary Trueblood presented to the meeting, and read parts of, letters received from a number of members expressing regret that they could not be present, and declaring their continued interest in the work of the Society.

On motion, a committee of three was appointed by the chair to bring forward names of officers to serve the Society for the coming year. The committee consisted of Rev. Charles G. Ames, Rev. S. C. Bushnell and Mr. William E. Sheldon.

The General Secretary reported that all of the persons chosen to official positions at the last annual meeting had accepted their appointment.

The reports of the treasurer and the auditor were then read. The treasurer's report showed that the sum of $5946.06 had been received during the year, and $5834.14 expended, leaving a balance of $111.92 in the treasurer's hands, with unpaid bills to the amount $1177.13. Offsetting this the treasurer had in his hands a one thousand dollar railroad bond.

On motion the reports of the treasurer and the auditor were received and placed on file.

Secretary Trueblood explained that the estimated income from all sources for the coming year would fall at least fifteen hundred dollars short of what was needed to carry on the work of the society as extensively as at the present time. Members were invited to make such contributions as they were able to do, to remember the Society in their wills and to induce their friends to do so.

The report of the Committee on nominations was presented by Mr. Bushnell. It was accepted and the persons named were by unanimous vote elected to the several offices. The names of George Foster Peabody of Brooklyn, N. Y., and Mrs. L. M. N. Stevens of Portland, Me., were added to the list of vice-presidents, that of Rev. W. E. Barton, D.D., to the Board of Directors and that of Moorfield Storey, Esq., to the Honorary Counsel. (The full list is found on page 122.)

The annual report of the Board of Directors was then read by Secretary Trueblood. Remarks upon the report and upon the condition of the country at the present time were made by several members.

Mr. L. H. Pillsbury explained how he became interested in the peace cause and the work of the Society years ago. He thought that if peace principles would be right. in the millennium they were right now and ought to be upheld even if one had to stand alone.

N. T. Allen believed that if President McKinley had

been given time he would have brought about a peaceful solution of the whole Cuban trouble. Congress was to be condemned for its haste. Peaceful negotiations are always slow and cannot be hurried.

Mrs. G. A. Gibson spoke of her recently awakened interest in the cause of peace, through listening to an address by Secretary Trueblood, and said that the cause should have her continued support and coöperation.

Rev. C. B. Smith expressed his appreciation of the report and regretted that the funds of the Society were not such as to justify a much larger extension of its work, through lectures in the schools and colleges, etc.

Mr. Paine admirably summed up the nature of the work of the Society, as not so much consisting in efforts by petition and otherwise to prevent war in times of great excitement and passion, as in constant education of the public sentiment and conscience of the nation. along this line was there any real hope of success. report of the Directors is given in full below.)

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The question of resolutions was raised. It was considered best not to attempt to formulate any resolutions at this time, but to let the report of the Directors, broad and comprehensive as it was, speak for the Society.

The meeting, which had been an interesting and enthusiastic one, in spite of the cloud of war under which it met, then adjourned.

Annual Report of the Directors of the American Peace Society.

Mr. President and Members of the American Peace Society:

The Seventieth Annual Report of the Board of Directors of the American Peace Society is here with respectfully submitted.

Since our appointment at the anuual meeting last year we have endeavored as far as possible with the resources at our command to prosecute the work for whose promotion the Society has so long labored.