With reference to the right to involve the United States in a controversy over the obligation of certain Southern States to pay bonds issued during reconstruction, which have been repudiated, it is sufficient to say that the pending treaties affect only cases hereafter arising, and the cases of the Southern bonds all arose years ago.

After a time, if our treaties stand the test of experience and prove useful, it is probable that all the greatest Powers on earth will come under obligation to arbitrate their differences with other nations.  Naturally, the smaller nations will do likewise, and then universal arbitration will be more of an actuality than an altruistic dream.

The evil of war, and what follows in its train, I need not dwell upon.  We could not have a higher object than the adoption of any proper and honorable means which would lessen the chance of armed conflicts.  Men endure great physical hardships in camp and on the battle-field.  In our Civil War the death-roll in the Union Army alone reached the appalling aggregate of 359,000.  But the suffering and perils of the men in the field, distressing as they are to contemplate, are slight in comparison with the woes and anguish of the women who are left behind.  The hope that husband, brother, father, son may be spared the tragic end which all soldiers risk, when they respond to their country’s call, buoys them up in their privations and heart-breaking loneliness.  But theirs is the deepest pain, for the most poignant suffering is mental rather than physical.  No pension compensates for the loss of husband, son, or father.  The glory of death in battle does not feed the orphaned children, nor does the pomp and circumstance of war clothe them.  The voice of the women of America should speak for peace.

TRAGEDY OF THE “TITANIC”

THE SPEED CRAZE AND ITS OUTCOME A.D. 1912

WILLIAM INGLIS

No other disaster at sea has ever resulted in such loss of human life as did the sinking of the Titanic on the night of April 15, 1912.  Moreover, no other disaster has ever included among its victims so many people of high position and repute and real value to the world.  The Titanic was on her first voyage, and this voyage had served to draw together many notables.  She was advertised as the largest steamer in the world and as the safest; she was called “unsinkable.”  The ocean thus struck its blow at no mean victim, but at the ship supposedly the queen of all ships.

Through the might of the great tragedy, man was taught two lessons.  One was against boastfulness.  He has not yet conquered nature; his “unsinkable” masterpiece was torn apart like cardboard and plunged to the bottom.  The other and more solemn teaching was against the speed mania, which seems more and more to have possessed mankind.  His autos, his railroads, even his fragile flying-machines, have been keyed up for record speed.  The Titanic was racing for a record when she perished.