THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



347 



mental building and loan associations, to 

 which the peoples to be relieved should 

 contribute their fair proportion in labor 

 and materials. Such relief would encour- 

 age, not pauperize, and, given without 

 hope of financial or commercial gain, 

 would strike a new note in the world's 

 history. 



We must hold firm to our ideals. We 

 have a present and a future obligation; 



we must pay the full price ungrudgingly, 

 both in fighting and rebuilding. We must 

 demonstrate to the world the principles 

 of true democracy, and thus hasten the 

 dawn of a more perfect day. Then, in- 

 deed, may the hatred and bitterness of 

 this war give way rapidly before the light 

 of human kindness, and "Peace on earth, 

 good will to men" become a living reality 

 in a world where justice will reign. 



AN APPEAL TO MEMBERS OF THE NATIONAL 

 GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY 



To the Members of the 



National Geographic Society: 



You and the members of your house- 

 hold constitute three million thoughtful, 

 intelligent, patriotic Americans. Tens of 

 thousands of you have already made su- 

 preme sacrifices for the cause of freedom. 

 Some of you have given your sons, your 

 brothers, your husbands, to our country 

 in its hour of greatest need. Others of 

 you have given of your wealth, your 

 plenty, your competency. Still others of 

 you have given your time and your 

 energy to Red Cross work, Liberty Loan 

 campaigns, and other activities which 

 have profited by your service and by your 

 enthusiasm. 



To those of you who already have 

 given much there will come a special joy 

 in the realization that there is a new op- 

 portunity for helping by personal depri- 

 vation; to those few who have not yet 

 enlisted in the service of their country 

 there should come a sense of relief and 

 satisfaction that the opportunity is at 

 hand to prove to one's self that his soul 

 is not dead to the appeal which lies in the 

 thought that "this is my own, my native 

 land." 



The opportunity which now presents 

 itself to each member of the National 

 Geographic Society is the opportunity of 

 pledging himself and his household to eat 

 neither wheat bread, zvheat cereals, nor 

 pastry made of zvheat flour until the new 

 zvheat crop is harvested. 



You have read the preceding article by 

 Frederic C. Walcott, of the United States 



Food Administration — a simple, concise, 

 unexaggerated statement showing that 

 famine and starvation lie ahead of our 

 Allies in Europe unless America is will- 

 ing to practice the virtue of abstinence 

 from that food product which is vital to 

 the life and health of the millions across 

 the seas who for nearly four years have 

 suffered the horrors and the devastations 

 of war at first hand. 



America normally consumes 42,000,000 

 bushels of wheat each month. In order 

 to supply the Allies with the absolute 

 essentials of life, the American consump- 

 tion must be reduced to 20,000,000 bush- 

 els a month until the next harvest. 



It is not enough that you, members of 

 the National Geographic Society, agree 

 to use only half the wheat which you 

 would normally consume. There are 

 thousands, millions, of Americans who 

 are careless, thoughtless, wasteful. They 

 will not and cannot be made to practice 

 such economy. 



The obligation, therefore, rests upon 

 you, who realize the situation, you, who 

 have fortitude of purpose and the love of 

 humanity in your heart, to do more than 

 curtail your wheat consumption. It is 

 not merely your duty, but your oppor- 

 tunity, to pledge yourself to total absti- 

 nence from wheat bread, wheat cereals, 

 and wheat pastries until such time as the 

 critical situation is relieved. 



Such abstinence does not entail priva- 

 tion, bodily suffering, or decreased physi- 

 cal efficiency. Happily, there has been a 

 bountiful corn crop. We in the United 



