LIFE IN BERLIN.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 68, 20 March 1915, Page 14

LIFE IN BERLIN.

" ■ ... A - NEUTRAL VISITOR'S . I IMPRESSIONS, '/ ■ . ..." GERMANY WILL BE BEATEN. [The London "Times" has received the following article from a well known South American writer, who has just returned from a visit to Berlin. It was written primarily for the South" American Press, in which.it.will.ahso-appear, but has a general interest as the latest impression of affairs in the German capital and the views of a competent and neutral observer on the outcome of the war.] Life in Berlin is not very agreeable, ohiefly on account of the absence of news and the great difficulty .which exists of communicating with the rest of the world. The foreign element has almost disappeared from Berlin hotels. The 1 traffic of motor-cars in the streets has diminished, and the aristocratic Uhter .[ den Linden is little frequented; the avenues of the Tiergarten' are similarly ; abandoned. At every turn one runs against people' in mourning or else soldiers who are wounded, isolated or in groups of eight or ten accompanied by Red Cross nurses, who take them for w-alks .in the parks, etc. People in the city meanwhile frequent the cafes, theatres, etc., more pr less as usual, but "the dancing saloons have been closed, dancing being prohibited. Anything French is taboo, and really Berlin; deprived of the '•chic Parisien" and j the "English correct cut" is not a$ enchanting spectacle. Nowadays the foreigner-in Berlin hardly experiences a sense. of absolute security, to talk a foreign tongue is to attract immediate attention. : GERMANY BEING BLED TO DEATH. But if superficially life in Berlin goes on as usual one should not look only as far as this to judge of the effect of the war on Berlin; to do sjo .would'be to judge of a corpse by. its apparent tranquillity without taking into account the decomposition taking place below the surface. In the origin and source of all her power, her industries, her enormous foreign trade. Germany is being clowly bled to death! Banking.' transactions with the outside. world are paralysed, and. it is only on talking with bus,_3ss men that one can realise what' Germany is losing, or judge of the enormous labour which the British Navy has accomplished for the benefit' of the Allied cause. Germany is beginning to run short of many much-needed articles; among them copper, rubber, nitrate, etc.: for which high prices are offered; all motor tyres, for example, are now commandeered for Government use. BRITISH HATED. BUT' FEARED. All this explains the great and ever; growing hatred for perfidious Albion: which has reached such a pitch that the hatred against France tends to diminish and one now hears occasionally friendly aillusions to a time in the not far distant future'whe;h France will : form a quadruple alliance with Germany,' Austria, and Turkey.- Xeyertaele3a. ; .'the hatred for things EngliatK'. tend as far as the pound sterling,, sovereigns being in much demand at Marks 21.50, with a rising tendency. ..-.•', : . But with all the hatred there is no one in Germany:.that payable: and even,- 7 lierdie with which the 'French and'" jEngltsh' 'h-ave' fought; and the •'contemptible little English Army" has been converted into a I black nightmare to torment-the dreams 'of the Kaiser und.Jiis staff..' Every re. ; turned soldier,, be he -, officer; or, man. I brings with him unbounded admiration for the elan of the Frcnch'-ahd'the'coof-ness and iron .resistance of the British | A German officer confessed to mc that to capture a French or English .'trench, was most difficult. The construction'of these trenches is such' that they offer practically no mark for" the great-Ger-man guns; often, said this officer, "we i would reach the .firrt'line- of trenches only to find the enemy had retired to a second' line, from which he poured % withering fire upon our men. who" buffered a splendid target; if England' ]A the start of hostilities hailbr-cn iible'to put a million men in-the .field we'should before this have been' lighting on Gcr- { man soil." ! INVASION OF ENGLAND. % \'[ \ One sees little by'little the wane of their belief in the infallibility of their] army. To-day all their fury is directed across the North Sea, towards the. country they are sure of invading. I have' listened to-many plans for this inyasion, but none, worthy of serious .repetition. No, unless the waters of the '.Channel behave like those of .'the Red ■Sea,.'E.ngr land is as safe from German menaces' as-. she is from the dog that, bays the moon. It's a long way to Tipperary, but longer still to London! •'!.•"' It is not from one of the papers which translate the publications of. the German. War Bulletin, nor from ; the newspapers themselves, that one can glean, the -true march of-the war. The Tieriin.-'-public: is deprived of all news of' German defeats, except such as it is impossible '.to hide, but the greater part of'the.-adversities —the iailures arid the ■ hoTrible' sufferings of the kept -from the pubIk. ... ; * '. ■ ■"■■ ;'/'•, '".,".,•'•'••..;•:": THE 'END OF KAISERDOM: * During my stay in Germany I lisd many o.pportunities "of seeing' soldiers .*n the "march, and, to note the difference between them and the.'Allied; troops ;-"tbe German soldier lacks"' the ardent- spirit whicii inflames the' English or*. French troops, who go : to. war cheerfully .'in defence of all they hold most dear;'but in the German soldier is the frigid and calculating soul of the Germanic racje, and it pushes this mass.'of men towards something which, they have been taught to believe since infancy .as a" biological necessity, fatal and inevitable.' " Soon, no doubt, they-,will''.have occasion to convince themselves of the error ' of their unhealthy "doctrines. T return convinced that in spite of all her efforts., •rreat though these be beyond all pondefation. Germany will be beaten, and if the war goes to a finish the military power of Kaiserdom will be buried for the -remainder of the century.