Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, 8 June 1916, Page 17

Current Topics

Verdun .-,-•. .;.."•• .-' -v :- " ;.'- For the first time, so far as we know, details relative to the Jack Johnson, the famous 42-centimetre (16.5 inch) howitzer of the Germans, have just been given by the New York World. They are as follow : Weight of gun ... .........97 4-5 tons Weight of platform 41J tons Length of barrel 16ft sin Weight of shell , .' 8851 b Length of shell 4ft 2in Number of parts in gun 172 Railway cars to transport it ...12 Depth of foundation ; 26ft Casualties at Liege from first shot 1700 Casualties from second shot 2300 Namur and Maubeuge held out 2 shots Fort Speer, Huy, held out 1 shot Putting up gun takes 25-26 hours Adjustment of range 6 hours Gun fired from 300 yards All windows broken within radius 0f... miles Each shot costs £524 To serve gun it takes 200 men. The gun crew proper wear protectors over their mouths, eyes, and ears, and lie on their stomachs to keep from being injured by the shock of the discharge. The entire gun emplacement is mined, and the engineer in charge is sworn to blow up the gun if it is in any danger of capture. . * " These facts, though not strictly relevant to the subject of Verdun, are not without a bearing on the course of events at that tremendous storm-centre. The assault on Verdun commenced as far back as February 21, and the German General Staff had some reason to anticipate an easy and early decision. They thought of Liege and Namur and Antwerp, of all that their big guns had accomplished in the early stages of the war, and they believed they had only to accumulate enough men and enough guns to force a passage to Verdun as they had previously hacked their way to similar strongholds on both the western and the eastern fronts. They began the attack with twenty-three divisions of infantry, and with a force of guns hitherto without precedent in the history of war. Yet Verdun still holds out. The explanation is not far to seek. General Sarrail, to whom had been entrusted the task of re-arranging the defences of ' The Road to Paris,' remembered Liege and Namur just as keenly and vividly as did the German General Staff; and it is because that General learned the lessons taught at Liege, Namur, Antwerp, and Maubeuge, that General Petain is able to hold Verdun to-day. It was the fate of Liege and Namur that showed General Sarrail, as it has shown all the world, that the day of fixed fortresses had gone, and that led him to dismantle the forts, to distribute the guns for mobile defence, and to push out his lines of defence far around Verdun. And so it- comes that wave after wave of German' attack has surged against it, in vain, and that whereas other great fortresses capitulated after only . a few hours bombardment, Verdun, after three months of the most terrific assaults -known to history, still stands. And there is as -yet no visible sign of the end. German Submarine Talk It is impossible to form a reliable opinion as to the truth or otherwise of the rumors about the intended inauguration of a German submarine service across the Atlantic, but there has been so much talk of .late of German submarine extention that it is reasonable to j conclude that there is something behind it ; all. About a fortnight ago the following cable was published in our dailies: 'The New York American; says that a shipmaster who was recently in Hamburg, states that a regular ? trans- Atlantic submarine service will shortly be commenced. : The first boat will reach: New York

on July 7. The submarines '..will make the trip in 12 days via the North of Scotland. They will be armed for defence only, and will carry mails and parcels, and a few passengers. The Germans expect to have five boats ready in August, each 450 feet in length, with a crew of 60 men and a speed of 18 knots.' On Friday last the following further message appeared : ' The correspondent of the Daily Mail at The Hague believes that the rumor of a submarine service between Germany and New York has some foundation. The first experimental giant submarine, he says, is now at Stettin. It is 450 feet long, and is able to remain at sea for 20 days without touching port.' * These statements, coupled with communications contained in the special correspondence of GermanAmerican papers, make it fairly certain that for some months past there has been a greatly increased activity in submarine construction in Germany, the rate of construction, it is asserted, being no less than three submarines weekly. Under date Berlin, March 1, an American, who is said to be in the confidence of the German Admiralty, writes to American papers: ' Germany's present restraint in submarine policy is in startling contrast to the increase in German submarine power which has taken place in the last few months. The German Admiralty estimates that if present diplomatic considerations with regard to America were put aside Germany is now in a position to destroy one million tons of English shipping a month.' When asked upon what facts the German Admiralty bases this estimate, which goes far beyond what were previously considered to be the limits of submarine power for destruction, he said he had seen with his own eyes, not a month ago, twenty-two U-Boats of the latest model at a single wharf at a certain German port. That there were so many at one place was simply due to the fact that, as they were finished, they had been left there awaiting crews. The activity at Kiel,* Bremen, Hamburg, Stettin, and Danzig is said to be colossal. This has reached such a point that from the construction docks of Germany, taken together, there are now being turned out an average of three new submarines a week. When asked how it is possible to 'man such a number of submarines, the speaker said that owing to the German system of education any recruit, even from the inland, can be within six months converted into a submarine officer. Submarines are not manned by sailors, but by experts and specialists in machinery, who, at the Government naval station at Eckenforde and other minor stations, have received special instruction in torpedo technique, and a general naval education at Murwik and Flensburg. The destructive force of Germany's submarines is to-day, according to the German Admiralty, seven times as great as at the beginning of the war. * Assuming that there is an element of truth in these cables and statements, it is natural to ask, what is the purpose of it all It is difficult to believe that, all this preparation means nothing more than the establishment of a submarine service with New York. On this point the American correspondent has something very definite to say. . He declares that the great desire on the part of all Germany to prevent a breach with the United States is the one real obstacle to the success of the aggressive naval party in Germany, but that if a breach should come about, the policy they advocate will at once be carried out. And this policy is thus stated: A complete blockade of all England will at once be declared. All ships, of whatever nationality, going to or from England, will be sunk. The German Admiralty now stands ready to put this policy into effect at a moment's notice. It is convinced that it will actually be able to cut England off from the outside world much more completely than Germany is to-day cut off. A few English ships would still be able to run the submarine blockade. But for all practical purposes England would be isolated. We give these statements merely for what they are x worth, and a very liberal allowance has to be/made for the usual German tall

■ talk. . It is long ago since the coast of Britain was declared to be under blockade, but British oversea commerce still goes on almost as if Germany did not exist. It is quite possible that Germany may attempt some further move of the kind indicated, but such an eventuality need cause no greater anxiety or disquiet than previous threats have done. An Anglican View of Wittenberg Wittenberg, a town of Saxony, some sixty miles south-west of Berlin, had acquired a certain historical interest as having been the birth-place of the Reformation and as containing the church on whose door Luther nailed his once famous but now more or less forgotten theses. It has lately achieved fame of a still more equivocal kind. It is the site of one of the German prison camps, and in connection therewith our cables a few weeks ago gave particulars of such revolting depravity on the part of the German officials as has never before been recorded in the history of an ostensibly civilised nation. The camp was ten and a-half acres in extent, and held 16,000 prisoners. ' Owing to poor feeding, overcrowding, and insufficient clothing—the prisoners' overcoats having been taken away by the Germans— broke out in the winter. ' It is impossible to allege,' says the Press Bureau report on the subject, ' that there was a general shortage of medical requisites in Germany. The English doctors saw abundant supplies in Wittenberg town, yet the plaguestricken camp was starved for months of the barest necessities of existencesimples and drugs— surgical dressings were not even provided. Above all, the British suffered from being the victims of special hostility at the camps. The Germans' behaviour was outrageous.' 'The prisoners,' continues the report, ' had not vitality sufficient to resist disease. They became very verminous. One cupful of soft soap had to last 120 men for many weeks. The epidemic first broke out in December, 1914, and the German staff and guards fled. The conditions, four weeks from February 11, were still full of horror. There were no mattresses in the improvised hospital, and the men dreaded to go there. Fifty secret cases were discovered in one compound containing 1000 men. Infected mattresses had to be employed even in the hospital. The patients had to be carried on tables, at which the prisoners were afterwards fed and the tables could not be washed owing to the absence of soap. The Germans refused to allow the typhus patients to be separated from others. Men lay delirious in clothes on the bare floor so closely packed that the doctors moved about them with difficulty. There were a thousand cases on March 7, and fifty fresh cases daily. There was practically no hospital clothing, and only one small disinfector. Men had to wear their outer garments while the inner ones were being disinfected, and vice versa, because there were insufficient blankets to keep them warm. The washing of patients was out of the question, until much later, when soap came from England. The dead were buried within the camp cemetery, which was so small that coffins were piled up. The hardest trial of all was to hear the townspeople outside the entanglements jeering at and insulting the dead.' * Punch, in the current week's cartoon, endeavors charitably to let the by-gone Wittenberg down lightly, and depicts Martin Luther as repudiating present-day Germany and all its ways. It represents the spirit of Luther as saying to the spirit of Shakespeare: ' " I see my countrymen claim you as one of them. You may thank God that you're not that. They have made my Wittenberg—ay, and all Germany—to stink in my nostrils."' But the Anglican Church Times will not hear of any such glossing over of history, and roundly declares that the Germany of to-day is practically the lineal descendant of Wittenberg and Luther v ' Witten- • berg,' writes, ' so a morning contemporary has informed us, "once had an honorable place in history as the home of the Reformation " ; and we are asked' to regard Che latest incident for which it will be memor-

able as another illustration of corruptio optimi- pessima. We are inclined, however, think that this is no case of a fall from a great height of goodness to a depth of wickedness. Dr. Martin Luther was the spiritual progenitor of Oberstabsarzt Dr. Aschenbach and that other criminal, Herr Kommandant General von Dassel; and it is a case of "like father, like son." The disregard of solemn treaties as mere "scraps of paper" has its analogue in Luther's broken vows; the ruins of Louvain and "Reims and Ypres are of a piece with the havoc he made of the Catholic Church and Creed; the gross living of so many Germans of to-day is the reflection of his table talk.' It is certain that ample evidence can be found, from the writings of Luther himself, to sustain the Anglican paper's judgment as to the effects of the so-called Reformation. Luther stands forth as himself the surest and strongest witness against Lutheranism and against his ' reformed ' Germany. . It was Luther who, after his religion had begun to take effect, spoke of the Teutons as brutes arid pigs. It was Luther who called the German Nation a bestial race, a sow, a debauched people who, since the preaching of the pure Gospel had become seven times worse than they were under the Papacy. Here are his own words: ' Avarice, usury, debauchery, drunkenness, blasphemy, lying and cheating are far more prevalent now than they were under the Papacy. This state of morals brings general discredit upon the Gospel and its preachers as the'people say "if this doctrine were true, the persons professing it would be more pious." ' (Works of Luther, Erlangen edition, Vol. "i, p. 192.) * If we succeed in expelling one devil,' Luther wrote in .1532, 'he immediately is replaced by seven others who are much worse. We can then expect that, after having driven away the monks, we shall see arise a race seven times worse than the former.' (Erlangen xxxvi., 411.) Luther is found constantly repeating that the German people are seven times worse ever since they embraced the Reformation. * There is not one of our preachers,' he wrote in 1525, ' who is not seven times worse than he was before he joined us, despoiling others, their property, lying, deceiving, indulging in gluttony and drunkenness and giving himself up to all kinds of vices, just as if he had not received the holy word.' (Erlangen xxviii., 420.) ' They (the preachers) undertake to give the flesh unbridled license by freeing it from every kind of law, authority and restraint. . .Their conduct is seven times worse under the reign of liberty than it was formerly under Papal tyranny.' (Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatiuns, 1535.) ' Since the, tyranny of the Pope, has ceased to exist amongst us, there is no one who does not despise pure and salutary doctrine. We are no longer dealing with men but with veritable brutes and'with a bestial race.' (Cited by Dollinger in his masterly work Die lie formation, 1., 313). They have now another God to whom they render worship. It is the coin of the realm. They live for money which is their heaven. . . . They believe like pigs and they cram their maws with victuals just like pigs.' (Dollinger, I. 240). ' Scarcely had we begun preaching our gospel when frightful revolts broke out all over the land and schisms and sects rent the Church. On all sides uprightness, morality, and good, order were involved in one common ruin. . . , Unbridled license, all sorts of vices and every form of moral degradation are now more in evidence in all ranks of society than they ever were under popery. Formerly there was at least some regard for duty, especially among the common people; whilst now they recognise no restraints and live like wild, untamed horses unhampered by any sense of shame and at the mercy of the most degrading passions.' * As to Luther's personal habits and example we content ourselves with a comparatively mild quotation from his writings: 'lf God can pardon me for having tortured and crucified myself for twenty years by saying Mass, He certainly will pardon me for sometimes taking a considerable quantity of wine in His honor i Let God permit it and the world may say whatever it pleases about it!' (Dollinger, 111., 232.) On July 2 he

Wrote to, his wife, Catherine de Bora, an ex-nun: 'I write to inform you that I am in very good health. I devour my food like a Bohemian, and I drink like a Teuton, for which God be praised. Amen.' (Luther's -Letters, de Wette edition V., 487.) In'a letter dated March 18, 1535, he bemoans that he has no longer the physical strength to keep his head clear in a beerdrinking bout with jolly company as in student days: 'And yet,' he adds with a profound sigh, 'the beer was good, the young lady was beautiful, and the company consisted of young persons ' (Luther's Letters, Ender's edition XXXIX., 353). This letter is signed 'Doctor plenus' (A well filled Doctor). Who does not recognise in all this a more than distinct family likeness to a type of German with which the war has made us painfully familiar? In Mesopotamia Mesopotamia, which bulks so largely in our later war cables, is a land redolent of the/earliest memories, the cradle of the human race, and the theatre of God's active, visible dealings with man. It was man's first dwelling-place after the flood. From the time God blessed Noah after the deluge there is no record that the Divine Voice was heard by man till He appeared to Abraham when he dwelt in Mesopotamia. Four hundred years after the covenant with Noah and his seed the word of the Lord came unto the son of Thare, descendant of Sem: ' Get thee out of thy -country and from thy kindred and from, thy father's house into a land that I will show thee; and I will make of thee a great nation and I will bless thee . . . and in thee shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.' And Abraham departed as the Lord had spoken to him. Here was the plain of Shinar, where the *Babel tower and kingdom were. The upper Tigris valley was separated from the Mesopotamia plain by a mountain range. The vast plain is intersected by the Sinjar running East and West, and mounds mark city sites on every side. Innumerable lines of embankment indicate a network of ancient canals which by irrigation diffused fertility where now are morasses or barrenness. Orfa, Abram's native city, and Haran, his resting place between Chaldaea and Palestine, are in Padan Aram, the northern portion of the country. Bethuel, Rebekah, and Laban lived in Padan Aram; and Balaam's abode was Pethor of Mesopotamia among the mountains of the East? The Mesopotamians aided the Ammonites with chariots against David. Men of Mesopotamia were among those who, on the Day of Pentecost, heard in their own tongue the wonderful works of God. Although the Garden of Eden was located in Mesopotamia, the country is, apart from the horrors of war, very little like a paradise now. It is a sandy waste, producing very little vegetation, supporting a few goats, sheep, and camels, and practically uninhabited except by roving tribes of half-savage Kurds. It is believed, . however, that Mesopotamia can be reclaimed, and William Willcocks, who built the great dam at Assuan in Egypt, has prepared a plan for the irrigation of this historic province. . As we have mentioned, hundreds of miles of the ancient canals can be easily identified, and it is said that the old canals can be restored at half the cost of constructing new ones. The greater part of the valleys of the Euphrates and the Tigris and of the area between these rivers is as rich as the valley of the Nile. In Willcocks' report he says: ' Of all the regions of the earth none is more favored by Nature for the production of cereals than the valley of the Tigris. Cotton, sugar-cane, Indian corn, and all the summer cereals, leguminous plants, Egyptian clover, opium, and tobacco will find themselves at home as they do in Egypt.' More than thousand years ago Herodotus wrote of Mesopotamia ' This is, of all lands with which we are acquainted, by far the best for the growth of corn.' - : So much for Mesopotamia in general. Coming to particular localities, we now learn that the site of ancient Nineveh (or Ninive), so full of Biblical and

historic interest, is likely to be the scene of critical operations in the campaign. A cable in Friday’s papers informs us that * A considerable force of Turks on a ten-mile front attacked a Russian column advancing on Nineveh. The attackers ' were routed with heavy losses. Bagdad has been placed in a strong state of defence by the best German methods, but probably the fate of the town will be decided at Nineveh, the loss of which means the isolation of Bagdad.’ Nineveh was once the famed metropolis of the great Assyrian empire, the residence of a long line of illustrious princes, and the largest and most populous city in the world. From the Scripture point of view it is chiefly interesting as having been the scene of the mission Jonas (or Jonah), and the subject of a remarkable prediction by the prophet IjTahum which was literally- fulfilled. We learn from the book of Genesis that Assur, one of the sons of Sem, ‘ went forth’ from the land of. Shinar, and built Nineveh; but we hear nothing more of it in the sacred writings till Jonas, its inspired missionary, describes it as ‘ an exceeding great city of three days’ journey ’ round (i.e., 60 miles, at 20 a day), with 120,000 children ‘ who knew not their right hand from their left,’ which would make a population in \ all of 600,000 or even a million. The prophet Nahum describes it as a city with many strongholds and many gates with bars, her merchants as multiplied above the stars of heaven, her inhabitants and princes numerous as the locusts. The city was utterly destroyed for its sins, as prophesied by Nahum. The destruction was accomplished about the year 606 B.C. by the combined armies of Cyaxares, king of Persia and Media, and Nabopolassar, who was either king of Babylon or, as Layard thinks, the Assyrian governor of the city. Diodorus says there was a prophecy that Nineveh should not fall till the river became its enemy. The immediate cause of capture was the city wall’s destruction by a sudden rise in the river. So Nahum (i. 8, it. 6, 8) foretold ‘ with a flood that passeth by he will make an utter end of the place thereof ’ ; ‘ the gates of the river are (shall be) opened, and the temple is (shall be) thrown down to the ground/ viz., by the inundation; ‘and as for Ninive, her waters are like a great pool, but the men flee away.’ There was a floodgate at the N.W. angle of the city, which was swept away; and the water pouring into the city ‘ threw down ’ the temple foundation platform "of sun-dried bricks. Nineveh then totally disappears from history ; it never rose again. Opposite to its site, on the west bank of the Tigris, is the modern city of Mosul, containing a mixed population of various Eastern peoples, amounting: to 40,000.