376 THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 



how it seemed to them impossible that anybody could not have 

 known. 



Then Captain Lane in a few sentences told me that more than a 

 dozen nations were at war, and all the "great nations" except the 

 United States. Even in the neutral countries many of the indus- 

 tries of peace had been nearly discontinued, making way for those 

 of war, and wealth was being piled up by the sale of weapons and 

 munitions to one or another of the combatants and frequently to 

 both. As for the "Laws of Nations," most of them had been broken 

 and it was understood that those not yet broken would go upon oc- 

 casion. "War psychology" had taken the place of the calmer, more 

 orderly thinking of former years. Even in the neutral countries 

 passions were highly inflamed and in the countries at war elaborate 

 efforts were being made to stir up hatred as a means of securing more 

 united support for war measures. 



The crew of the Polar Bear were mainly sympathizers of the 

 Allied side and they told what had become ordinary stories of 

 German atrocities. They said, too, that the German people were 

 being deceived by their rulers into the support of a war of aggres- 

 sion which they would not tolerate if they knew the facts. But 

 there were four or five German sympathizers who said the stories 

 of German atrocities were "Allied propaganda" and that Germany 

 was fighting a just and a defensive war. Feeling ran high aboard 

 the Bear as everywhere else, but the German sympathizers were in 

 a minority and dared to present their side only by asking me "in 

 fairness" to read some American-German papers they had. 



The Allied sympathizers said the net was already tight about 

 the Central Powers, they were closely blockaded, starvation was al- 

 ready weakening them, and they could not long hold out. The 

 German sympathizers said their armies were victorious on every 

 front, that there was food to last for ten years, that the Allied 

 courage was broken and that German victory would soon come. 



That is the way the news of the Great War came to me, August 

 11, a year and half a month after it started. The Bear had left the 

 last telegraph connections in Alaska some three weeks before, so 

 they brought news of nearly twelve months of fighting. There 

 was hopeless confusion in this news on every point except the black- 

 ness of the cloud that had descended upon the earth. The American 

 newspapers and magazines aboard were equally at variance. There 

 were articles telling of horrible German atrocities and articles say- 

 ing in effect that none had been committed. 



