freedom in which every man is an active unit in the system of his own Government, while our defeat would stand for a victory to a priviliged class, the thrusting down of the civilian by the arrogance and intolerance of militarism, and the subjection of all that is human and progressive to all that is cruel, narrow, and reactionary.  This is the stake for which we play, and the world will lose or gain as well as we.  You may well come, you democratic oversea men of our blood, to rally round us now, for all that you cherish, all that is bred in your very bones, is that for which we fight.  And you, lovers of freedom in every land, we claim at least your prayers and your wishes, for if our sword be broken you will be the poorer.  But fear not, for our sword will not be broken, nor shall it ever drop from our hands until this matter is forever set in order.  If every ally we have upon earth were to go down in blood and ruin, still would we fight through to the appointed end.  Defeat shall not daunt us.  Inconclusive victory shall not turn us from our purpose.  The grind of poverty and the weariness of hopes deferred shall not blunt the edge of our resolve.  With God’s help we shall go to the end, and when that goal is reached it is our prayer that a new era shall come as our reward, an era in which, by common action of State with State, mutual hatreds and strivings shall be appeased, land shall no longer be estranged from land, and huge armies and fleets will be nightmares of the past.  Thus, as ever, the throes of evil may give birth to good.  Till then our task stands clear before us—­a task that will ask for all we have in strength and resolution.  Have you who read this played your part to the highest?  If not, do it now, or stand forever shamed.

Conan Doyle on British Militarism

Early last year, in the course of some comments which I made upon the slighting remarks about our army by Gen. von Bernhardi, I observed:  “It may be noted that Gen. von Bernhardi has a poor opinion of our troops.  This need not trouble us.  We are what we are, and words will not alter it.  From very early days our soldiers have left their mark upon Continental warfare, and we have no reason to think that we have declined from the manhood of our forefathers.”  Since then he has returned to the attack.

With that curious power of coming after deep study to the absolutely diametrically wrong conclusion which the German expert, political or military, appears to possess, he says in his “War of Today”:  “The English Army, trained more for purposes of show than for modern war,” adding in the same sentence a sneer at our “inferior colonial levies.”

He will have an opportunity of reconsidering his views presently upon the fighting value of our oversea troops, and surely, so far as our own are concerned, he must already be making some interesting notes for his next edition, or, rather, for the learned volume upon “Germany and the Last War,” which will, no doubt, come from his pen.  He is a man to whom we might well raise a statue, for I am convinced that his frank confession of German policy has been worth at least an army corps to this country.  We may address to him John Davidson’s lines to his enemy: