Yet even with all those memories of tragic
scenes which in this book are but lightly sketched, I hoped that the
peace we should impose would not be one of vengeance, by which the
innocent would pay for the sins of the guilty, the children for their
fathers' lust, the women for their war lords, the soldiers who hated
war for those who drove them to the shambles; but that this peace
should in justice and mercy lead the working-people of Europe out of
the misery in which all were plunged, and by a policy no higher than
common sense, but as high as that, establish a new phase of
civilization in which military force would be reduced to the limits of
safety for European peoples eager to end the folly of war and get back
to work.
I hoped too much. There was no such peace.
PART EIGHT
For What Men Died
I
In this book I have written in a blunt way some episodes of the war as
I observed them, and gained first-hand knowledge of them in their
daily traffic. I have not painted the picture blacker than it was, nor
selected gruesome morsels and joined them together to make a jig-saw
puzzle for ghoulish delight.
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