There were also in our number some young doctors and nurses who were returning from the hospitals in France for a little needed rest. They were of those young Americans who are giving themselves so generously for the cause, eager, courageous, sympathetic. They seemed to me to have gotten most from the war of all us Americans, much more than the munitions men who were making money so fast. In Belgium, in Serbia, behind the French lines, in the great hospital at Neuilly, they had got comprehension and all the priceless rewards of pure giving. They had seen horror, suffering, and waste indescribable; but they had seen heroism and devotion and chivalry. And with them should be joined all the tender-hearted and generous Americans at home who have aided their efforts, who are working with the energy of the American character "for the cause." Alas, already the word was coming of a relaxation in the generosities, the devotions, the enthusiasms of these Americans. Other interests were coming into our rapid activities to distract us from last year's sympathies....
So as we rolled on through the soft summer night while the passengers discussed the latest Russian reverse of which news had been received by wireless, I kept asking myself,--"What does it really mean to us? To vast, rich, young America?" Surely not merely more money, more power, even a loftier inspiration for the few who have given themselves generously in sympathy and aid. After all, these were but incidental. The threat we were beginning to feel to our own security, this campaign for "preparedness," did not seem of prime, moving importance. Probably in our bewildered state of mind we should wrangle politically about the matter of how much defense we needed, then drop some more hundreds of millions into the bottomless pit of governmental extravagance and waste. We had already spent enough to equip another Germany! When peace was finally made in Europe, we would forget our fears; our Congressmen and their parasites would fatten on the new appropriations, which would be as actually futile as all their predecessors had been. No; these were hardly the significant aspects of the war to us as a people.
No more was that acrobatic exhibition of diplomatic tight-rope walking we had witnessed from Washington. Mere "words, words, words, professor!" Our dialectic President had thus far failed to establish any one of his contentions, either with Germany or Great Britain, nor did it seem likely that he ever could. While he was still modifying that awkward phrase, "strict accountability," Germany obviously would murder whomsoever it suited her purpose to murder, and England would hold up any ship that attempted to trade with Germany. All those neutral rights for which Washington was paying big cable tolls had not been advanced an atom. The time had gone by when our strong voice could compel respect from the barbarian, could hearten the soul of other weaker neutrals. Europe had taken our exact measure. We should have saved some dignity had we not murmured more than a formal protest....