1941-02-28 — Page 39

THE CHINA MAIL, FEBRUARY 28, 1941.

CHINA MAIL

"WINDSOR HOUSE

THE ANSWERS

The American news- papers have presented aj demand by Senators Nye and Wheeler for a state- ment of peace aims as a tactical move against the Lease and Lend Bill.

It is assumed that the Senators do not expect that all nations now at war will provide either a full statement of their reasons for going to war or a blueprint of the kind of peace they hope to see. There is value in a sincere effort to define as clearly as possible future peace purposes-if it be first re- cognised that peace must be won.

Most Americans we be- lieve would

agree with

this statement of the situation:

The only reason why peace cannot be made to-morrow is that the German Government have as yet given no evidence whatever of their readiness to repair the dam- age they have wrought upon their

of weaker neighbours, or

their the capacity to convince

world that any pledge they may sub- scribe to is worth as much as the paper on which it may be writ- ten.

If the isolationist Sena- tors really want a state- ment of British war aims in fairly definite terms they could find it in the same speech, by the mem- ber of the British War Cabinet who has just ar- rived as Ambassador to the United States:

Zater

MAL

SMITH YATES LOOKS.. AT POVERTY

·++C.4.

MALNUTRITION

DEATHS

TUBERCULOSIS - BERI-BEK! - PELLAGRA

IN 1940

5451 9239 442

VESTED

INTERES

STS

THE GRASS

Ktep off

HE Well...

WHO MENTIONED VULTURES ?

Rash Conclusion

Page T

Victuals In Our Time

It is perhaps natural that peo- ple with nothing to do but wait for the next meal should accept the aesthetic philosophy of the stout gentleman in the lounge who was heard to describe the sound of the dinner-bell as the sweetest music in the whole world. Idle- ness is a great begetter of glut- tony, as one notices on sea voy-

By Ivor Brown

ages, where in good weather pundering the shape of edible things to come is a common form of preoccupation, naughtily stimulated in happier time by the lavishness of shipping companies,

The menus of luxury inners are really a Communist paniphlet.

The whole thing is fantastic. People who would be perfectly happy with the simplest suppër at home must apparently have an eight-course dinner

served with fanfares, Bunkeys, and carnival procedure when they are in mid-

vetan.

One business of civilisation is surely to put food in is place. Our earliest ancestors, the food- gathering me, har to think a great deal about ways and means of getting nourishment, Their problem was acquisition. They had to live for food in order to live by it, just as many animals and birds have to work all day for their food supuly.

Once food-growing had been invented as the supplement to food-gathering the problem was the leisure thus eased;

gaineri might be misused in the arts of war, but it could be turned also to the arts of peace,

The Nile Valley started build- ing, sculpture, and many decora- tive splendours when it solved the food problem. Because there was corn in Egypt there could also be civilisation.

Nowadays, in peace-time, sup- ply of victuals is no trouble. Fair Distribution is the problem that has so far baffled the meagre in- genuity and organising talent of concinic man. We should be able, in decent conditions, to think just sufficiently about food and suffer no further worry. How much s On this thera that sufficiency? will never be agreement. Man generally both Indulges and artities the flesh, the duality of Virginia that Mr.

our nature running as often to Balderston was a British agent! the extremes of Stoic doctrine us Senator Clark does all he can to the gentler Epicurean creed. largely attributed to their efforts. to help Germany by attempting For any part, I believe that Ches- Their work has not by any means to withhold essential supplies lerton uselully summed up the

There is a tendency in England] great-great-grandson of the wo-

Mr. Clark, of Missouri, full of to feel that the sympathy of the man who made the first Ameri-sweet accord, replied that he had whole of the United States is with can flag. has done work for the no formation as to that, but that us in our struggle, that with the White Committee that should he was entirely prepared to be- exception of a negligible minority make his name, with that of lieve the statement of the senator that great country is with us up, Sherwood, ever remembered by from to the edge of war. This is as; us. anyone listening in to Mr. Alistair Cooke's recent broadcast would realise-a very rash assumption.

It is difficult enough for

us

The fifty destroyers cun be

same level and the

Isolationists, of

West

We must insist upon the res- toration of liberty to small nations that Germany has cruelly depriv ed of it, and, profiting I hope by experience of the past, we shall du our utmost to secure Europe from

Wo! a repetition of this disaster. seek nothing for ourselves. We

us been without difficulties and even trom Britain. He cannot and does matter when he said that the logic have said publicly that if We'

the immediacy dangers. Mr. Balderston at one not pretend to believe that the of the fast is the feast, and vice could once again feel security here, living in

versa. It is reasonable to slake nowa- time had to have a bodyguard, † United States is in danger of at- that a German Government would; which life holds for

whom tack by Great Britain. He is within reason all normal desire, respect its undertakings and hon- days, to keep at the

How much more there are many still in the Senate, just one of those neutrals, of and the ascetic's glory in a total estly cooperate in trying to of keenness.

must this be the case with people

retusal is no more in nature than build. instead of destroy, Europ

is the unceasing and calculating ean peace on terms of live-and-who are only with us emotionally

sensuality of the glutton. sympathetically, and who let-live for all nations, we would and

have around them the daily proof vindictive peace or not seek ንነ one that would deny to Germany that life is good and sweet

rightful place

the easy, that nature's abundance ainong

yet theirs, that their country is When Senator Wheeler, inviolate? recently outlined some- what similar terms, the Berlin press rejected them.

her nations.

and

is

1

By F. Tennyson Jesse

whom France, Holland, Belgium, and Norway have provided

SU in- many, to whom neutrality, stead of being sometimes admir- able but always, by its nature, negative, becomes an active vir- tue.

the

A large part of the art of liv- ing is the avoidance of obɛessions, and it is a dreadful thing to be obsessed about food To go beyond a sensible interest in the niceties Thus the "smear campaign" of the palate to a continual fuss- We are fortunate that so many

went on in the Senate. Mr. John ing about the next meal is usual- of the intellectual leaders of the

Balderston having been accused of ly to become a misery to oneself being a propagahda

others. agent, sen- and a dreadful bore to United States either work for the William Allen White Committee |

ator after senator arose not to What tedium equals that created or are moved by it. William Al-]

attack William Allen White per- by the constant chattering of the and of the prattler len White is, as most Englishmen have not hesitated to try to bes-sonally, for he is too revered and gourmet know and as all should know, one mirch the reputation of certain elderly a figure in national politics about vintages? Possibly only that The fundamental dif- of the most important pro-British members of the committee, not to attack, but members of his inflicted on us by the person who in war-time is always thinking of John Balderston. group.

about ficulty is that the Nazi re- Americans. He organised what is ably that

rationing and discussing now known as the White Com- What is known as a "smear cam- As a matter of fact the famous the state of the larder. The war gime can offer

no real mittee to Defend America by Aid-paign" has been extremely active. "Seven-point Programme" sub- has given us, along with the the Allies. William Allen MT. Clark, of Missouri, on mitted to Mr. Allen White by his bomb-bores, the bacon-and-but- basis of security for the ing nations of Europe-or for what that the United States September 26, 1940, declared that committee had obtained data for ter bores too. The stomach is a

firm belief that the United

“a man by the name of Balders-six of its seven points through good thing in its place, but its those further afield.

first line of defence is Britain, and ton, long a resident of Great Brit-American and not British sources. place is certainly not "on hence that Britain is fighting for; ain, putting out a William Allen The "seven points" urged the brain." The reason that na-

the United States.

White news service release

delivery to Britain of a score of tions chiefly interested in In New York Robert Sherwood, was trying to arouse public senti- motor torpedo-boats, flying-boats Navy's heavy bombers), a firm peace support, in the famous playwright, that tall ment to bombard the President, (the

flame of a man, has been fighting bombard public officials, so as to "fying fortresses"the great confreres imagine that anything degree, Britain's for us with his pen as ardently as override any technical objections long-range bombers; tanks, some

the given to the British now will ever

stand

United be used by the British against the against Nazi he fought, though a Yankee, in a of the General Staff of the Navy use of airfields

and the General Staff of the States for training of pilots; 250,- Americans? It is true that the -anarchy is presented in

Army" to send to Great Britain 000 more Lee-Enfield rifles until Germans might capture some of another speech by Vis-

weapons that "might be needed something better could be got hold these secret weapons, but that is by the United States." Mr. Clark, of, and seventh (and the one a risk that has to be taken if count Halifax:

of Missouri, was then joined by which agitated the senators most) Hitler is to be fought at all,

England must not underrate There are things to-day within

Mr. Holt, of West Virginia, who the famous secret bomb sight. our body politic which we need

remarked that Mr. Balderston was All these requests, which were the power of the "Copperheads." to fight not less intensely, if with

"brought back" to the States to not put forth, by the way, by Mr. They can at least hold up the en- and other weapons, than we fight the When we think and speak of create war propaganda, and that White, were not even put forward gine just when its smooth enemy without. But the broad peace, what do we really mean? it was a known fact that John to him without the certain know- quick working is essential. But record of the British race stands We naturally tend to think of it) Balderston was not interested in ledge that each one of them had we must remember also that our

been the subject to be judged on facts that are in- as something negative-not war-preserving the United States but already

of friends of the White Committee contestable. It is the fact that and for that reason to be some- was directly under the British negotiation and in the belief that are still fighting for us through during the nineteenth century, thing worthy of all we can do for Ministry of Information.

all or most of the requests would "smear campaigns," innuendocs, when the power of this country its preservation. But just as I Mr. Holt, in short, accused Mr.be granted either in whole or in and lies and realise, that the de- was unchallenged, there was no can imagine individuals confront- Balderston of a crime against the part. The belief was American lay is no fault of theirs. nation in Europe that felt for thated by a situation which Christian Federal Statutes.

and not British belief, and was As to the "Copperheads" them- reason insecure, or that did not men and women would feel was John Balderston has never in held by a great group of people selves, we can wish them recognise, our power to be an worse than death, so I can imag- his life been directly or indirect in the United States, all of them worse than that in their old age Instrument of peace.

ind circumstances for a nation or ly under or connected with the American patriots.

they may be forced to read, with Cutting even more in- for human civilisation in which British Ministry of Information Is it possible, one asks oneself, | shame what has been recorded. for cisively into the thinking damit from war could be too or any other foreign Government that even these "Copperheads" ever upon the records of the San-

such as Senator Clark and his ate.

Canadian regiment in the last war. John Balderston, the writer,

behind peace talk is an- other statement by Lord Halifax:

dearly purchased. :

NAF) LO 1,

agency.

1.MO

in the

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