HONORS TO THE AMERICAN NAVY 



85 



as it covers the surface of the earth, don't 

 you think it may have a little place in 

 geography ? 



When Florence Nightingale wandered 

 at night through those terrible wards of 

 the great hospital at Scutari, the suffer- 

 ing men blessed her as she passed and 

 called her "The lady of the lamp," but 

 neither she nor they realized that she 

 carried the light of a broader humanity, 

 so soon to dawn upon the world. In 

 1864 this broader humanity took shape in 

 the Treaty of Geneva, providing in time 

 •of war for the protection of hospital for- 

 mations, with their personnel. Since 

 then the Hague Convention has extended 

 to naval warfare the provisions of this 

 Treaty. Out of compliment to Switzer- 

 land, its flag was reversed, and the red 

 cross on a white ground became this sym- 

 bol of humanity. 



Under this banner have grown the 

 .great Red Cross societies of the world — 

 great in all the important countries save 

 our own. The Japanese, for example, 

 "have 1,400,000 members; we, about 

 15,000. Millions of dollars fill their 

 treasury and make them ever ready to 

 cope with sudden disasters or with war, 

 while we, practical people as we gener- 

 ally are, make the great mistake of be- 

 lieving that when war or great calamities 

 Defall us, all that is necessary is to open 

 our generous American pockets and pour 

 out the gold, regardless of the inefficiency 

 of suddenly created bodies, the pitiful 

 waste arising from ignorance and inex- 

 perience and the confusion and over- 

 lapping of the work of many committees. 



Are we proud of our record in the war 

 with Spain? On the one side, yes; on 

 the other side, no. Had we the Red 

 'Cross Society we should have had, would 

 so many of our brave boys have sacri- 

 ficed their lives because of our neglect 

 and lack of preparation, rather than from 

 the enemies' bullets? We may look 

 -down upon Russia and Japan as not so 

 far advanced as we in the march of hu- 

 man progress, but their record during 

 the late terrible war (four years ago) 

 puts us to blush. They gave up their 

 Hives to the shot and shell of the enemy, 



and not because of their own country 

 people's neglect. 



War may come ; calamities will come, 

 and the American Red Cross is striving 

 to fit itself for the work our people will 

 then call upon it to perform. It has 

 created an Emergency Relief Board to 

 study the methods and measures best 

 fitted after great disasters. It has cre- 

 ated a War Relief Board, whose duty it 

 is to study war relief measures, what ves- 

 sels are suitable and attainable for hos- 

 pital ships, how hospital trains with oper- 

 ating cars may be acquired, and how to 

 provide the necessary personnel of doc- 

 tors, trained nurses, and hospital order- 

 lies. It has provided for an Interna- 

 tional Relief Board, so that when great 

 disasters occur among our sister nation^ 

 we may be able to give help to them. 

 Tonight I will not dwell on what it has 

 done after great disasters, beyond saying 

 that since its reorganization in 1905, it 

 has assisted in relief work after eighteen 

 national and international disasters. 



By unanimous resolution in 1907, at 

 the International Conference in London, 

 the Red Cross Societies agreed to assist 

 in the campaign against that most fear- 

 ful pestilence, so often called "the great 

 white plague." Today, like David of 

 old, our Red Cross army, with only a 

 little penny Christmas stamp, is going 

 forth to join the fight against this devas- 

 tating Goliath. Little that Christmas 

 stamp may be, but twenty-five millions 

 of them are flying through the mails, or 

 waiting for the Christmas parcels, and at 

 the same time calling out that glad mes- 

 sage of good will to men to thousands of 

 the poor victims who suffer from this fell 

 disease. 



In the greatest of all our national dis- 

 asters, caused by the fire and earthquake 

 in San Francisco, too much praise can- 

 not be given to the work of the Army 

 and Navy, the latter not only saving its 

 all-important water front to the "City of 

 the Golden Gate," but the officers in 

 every way gave assistance to the unfor- 

 tunate victims. Wherever now relief 

 work calls the Red Cross into relation 

 with the officers of our Army and Navy, 



