Arm-Chair Patriotism.

(We invite all men in the University to submit communications on subjects of timely interest, but assume no responsibility for sentiments expressed under this head.)

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

In the current issue of the Advocate there appears an editorial dealing with the men who, to quote the author's words, think to serve humanity by doing hospital and ambulance work in England and France." The writer of the editorial then goes on to criticise these men who are pusillanimous enough to prefer to risk their lives in the relief of suffering rather than serve gloriously in their respective college regiments, even as he. The editorial is written throughout in a highly moral tone of admonition, of gentle rebuke, but it is nothing less than a serious attack on the ambulance drivers who have failed so lamentably to grasp what the writer calls nobly "the one loyalty" and "the greater cause." Perhaps I had better give his own words.

"Those men in college and out of college. . . . are guilty of a misconception of their duty. They are ignoring the fact that our nation has been called up on to express itself in action. If they were merely disloyal to their nation in being loyal to the whole of humanity, they would be justified. (?) But . . . they are failing to serve to their utmost ability that greater cause which they have undertaken to uphold. They are failing both the nation and the race. Let them stop to take thought, lest unwittingly they be doubly disloyal."

And now, if you will allow me the space, I will put side by side with the above, a matter-of-fact newspaper account of the death of an ambuance driver, H. G. Suckley '10, in the American Ambulance Service. "Shortly after the beginning of the war he volunteered in the Ambulance and served in the Vosges Mountains through the winter of 1915. For bravery in action during the intense attack by the Germans, lasting over a month, he was awarded the Croix de Guerre and promoted to sous-lieutenant. In this capacity he served at Malzeville, Verdun and Port-a-Mousson, distinguishing himself at all times by his executive ability and coolness under shell-fire. Last September, he returned to this country for the purpose of recruiting a new section of the Ambulance, which he subsequently did, getting 20 ambulances from the New York Stock Exchange. On his return to France he was immediately detailed to the Service in Salonika. . . . It was while on duty there that he met his death."

I should like to ask, forgetting for a moment the false rhetoric and almost inconceivable bad taste of the latter, which of the two displayed more activity, ardor and self-sacrifice and supported with greater ability the greater cause--the subject of the above account or the writer of the editorial? While the latter, safe at home, was mouthing rhetorical rubbish about "the one loyalty" and the "greater cause," the men whom he attacked were saving lives at the constant risk of their own, to be reminded that "they were guilty of a misconception of duty"; that they are verging on "a double disloyalty"; and that, when all is said, "they are failing both the nation and the race." It has come to this then, that the vulgar fanaticism of that editor, and those like him, can turn on the finest expression of American activity the war has produced; that a wretched conceited little scribbler, sitting in his sanctum, can offer impertinent advice and a gratuitous insult to his own classmates who are working and dying while he is editing whimpering little verses. Truly, those who believe in universal training, and even in the participation of America in the war, may say: "We have no need of such aid or of such defenders." C. V. WRIGHT ocC.