THE PLAUSIBLE HUN

Evening Star, Issue 16996, 19 March 1919, Page 8

THE PLAUSIBLE HUN

A. PARTING WORD TO BRITISH PRISONERS. Lance-corporal L. E. Brown, who has just been repatriated to England from a prison camp in South Prussia, writes to his mother (Mrs Brown, 129 Maclaggan street, Dunedin) stating that on the eve ol leaving German soil British prisoners Tver© Sanded a leaflet -containing a far© - well message, a copy of which he forwards. This says : “ Gentlemen,—The war is over! A little while—and vou will see your native land again, your homes, your loved ones, your friends. You will once more take tip vour accustomed work. “The fortune of war brought you as prisoners into our hands. You were freed, even against your will, from the fighting, from danger, from death. But the joys of peace could not be yours, for there was no peace. Now peace is coming, and peace means liberty. When yon aro already reunited to your families, thousands of our countrymen will still be pining in far-off prison camps with hearts as hungry for home as yours. “ You have suffered in confinement —as who would not? It was the fate of every prisoner in every prison camp in the world to eat his heart out with longing, to chafe against loss of liberty, to suffer from home-sickness, brooding, discouragement, blank despair. The days, the weeks, the wea.rv years erect by, and there was no end In "sight. There were many discomforts. irritations, misunderstandings. “ Your situation has been a difficult one. Our own has been desperate. Our country blockaded, out civil population and army suffering from want of proper sufficient food and materials, the enormous demands made upon our harassed land from every side—these and many other afflictions made it impossible to do all that we should have liked to do. Under the cir cumstances w© did out best to lessen the hardships of your lot. to ensure your comfort, to provide you with pastime, employment , mental and bodily recreation. It is not likely that you will ever know how difficult our circumstances have been. “We know that errors have been committed. and that there have been for which the fanner system was to blame. There have been wrongs and evils on both sides. We hope tint you will always think of that —and be ju=t. “You entered the eld empire of Germany; vou leave the new republic—t he newest and, as we hone to make it. trr freest land in the world. We are sorry that you. saw so little of what we were proud of in the former Germany our arts, our sciences, our mod-d cities, or.r theatres, our schorls, industries, our sm-i d institutions, as well as the beauties of our scenery and the real son! of our people, akin in so mn-nv things to your yawn. “ But these things will remain part of the New Germany. Once the barriers rf artificial hatred " and misunderstanding have fallen we hope that you will learn to know, in happier times, these grander features of the land, whose unwilling guests von have been. A barbed wire enclosure" is not the proper point of view from which to survey or judge a. great nation. “ The war has blinded all nations. But if a true and just peace will result in opening the eyes of the peoples to the fact that their interests are common, that no difference in flags. Governments, speech, or nationality, can alter the grett truth of th© fraternity of all men. this war will not have been lought in yam. If the peoples at last realise that it- is not each other who are thrir enemies, but the ruthless forces of Imperialism and Capitalism, of Militarism of all sorts, of jingo journalism that sows _ falsehood, hatred, and suspicion, then this war will not have been fought in vain._ Then peace will not be established in vain. “ We hope that every one of yon will go homo carrying a message of good-will, of conciliation, of enlightenment. Let, nil men in our new epoch go forth ns_ missionaries of the new evar.geh as interpreters between nation and nation. . “The valiant dead who once fought against each other have long_been sleeping as comrades side bv side in the same earth. May the living who once format against each other labor as comrades side bv side upon this self-same earth. _ ‘“That ie the message with which w© bid vou farewell.” . „ , The irony of the thing _is that all the men who received this precious valedictory had been ill-fed and denied pastimes in their sojourn, on. German soil.