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FREE VOICES FROM AMERICA
65

excellent book reviews and several columns of theatrical criticism deal with questions of the hour. Among the works referred to, I may mention two of great originality: a book filled with bold paradox by Thorstein Veblen, entitled Peace? An Inquiry into the Nature of Peace; a Russian play in four acts by Artsibashev, War, depicting the cycle of the war in a family and the wastage of souls which it involves.

Finally we have vigorous drawings, the work of satirists of the pencil. R. Kempf, Boardman Robinson, and George Bellows, enliven the magazine with their pungent visions and their cutting words. Kempf shows us War crushing in his embrace France, England, and Germany, crying out: "Come on in, America, the blood's fine!" The four linked figures are dancing on a sea of blood in which corpses are floating.—A few pages further on, Boardman Robinson shows Liberty in the background weeping. In front stands Uncle Sam, wearing handcuffs (censorship) and leg-irons, the cannon-ball of conscription drags at the chain. He is described as being "All ready to fight for Liberty."—George Bellows' design depicts a chained Christ in prison. He is "incarcerated for the use of language calculated to dissuade citizens from entering the United States armies."—Finally, upon a heap of dead, the two sole survivors are seen savagely cutting one another to pieces. They are Turkey and Japan. The legend runs: "1920: still fighting for civilisation." This design is by H. R. Chamberlain.

Thus fight, across the seas, a few independent spirits. Freedom, clearness, courage, and humour, are rare virtues. Still more rarely do we find them united, in days of folly and enslavement. In the American opposition, these virtues take the palm.

I do not pretend that the opposition is impartial. It, likewise, is influenced by passion, so that it fails to recognise the moral forces animating the other side. The