American divisions, steeled now to this ruthless fighting against a
hidden enemy, took machine guns only to find that there were machine
guns behind them; they took woods, ravines, and crests only to find
that there were more woods, ravines, and crests yet to be conquered.
They made vital gains and fought off fierce counterattacks to hold
them. And the Germans brought in still more divisions and still more
artillery and machine guns in their desperate determination which they
set against that unremitting offensive spirit and unyielding will of
the Americans. Under cold rain and mist in the soaked earth the
grinding continued.

After the 77th Division had come out victorious from its long fight in
the Argonne Forest, McCrea's 78th "Lightning" National Army Division
had relieved it in that inconceivably hard and thankless task of
cleaning up the town of Grand Pré and the positions north of the gap
of Grand Pré. Day after day it kept on attacking even when there was a
lull in other parts of the line. When Wright's 89th Division came into
the line we had in these men of the Middle West, well drilled and in
fine fettle, another new force in the battle which was to bring honor
to the National Army and the nation. The 89th and the 90th and 5th
Divisions and other divisions improved their opportunities in the
final week of October, 1918, by taking positions which were valuable
for the general attack, now in preparation, which was to take place on
November 1, 1918.

With ample artillery and fresh reserves at our command we were
determined to gain the summit of the whaleback in a final drive. This
was the third phase of the battle, the second having been the long
merciless hammering throughout the month of October, 1918, in which
the endurance, the nerves and the aggressive spirit of American
soldiers were tested as they never were before. Every day we were
becoming more skillful in combat and our traffic arrangements were
improving in their organization. The line from left to right on the
morning of November 1, 1918, was: the 78th, 77th, 80th, 2d, 89th,
90th, and 5th Divisions. Our infantry, protected by the best artillery
service which it had ever had, with the exception of some delay at
certain points, irresistible in its sweep everywhere, gained its
objectives, mastering the heights for which it had fought for six
weeks. On November 2, 1918, the German communiqué made its confession
to the German people that the American army had broken the German
line.

The battle now became one of skillful maneuvers and rapid pursuit down
the apron of lesser heights and slopes toward the Meuse. Behind the
1st Corps in reserve was the 42d Division; behind the 5th Corps in the
center the 1st; and behind the 3d Corps on the right the 32d. These
three veteran divisions, after their rest from the fearful fighting of
the second phase of the battle, now had the opportunity finally, as
the movement spread, to join in the glorious final phase which saw
that army of regulars, guardsmen, and draftmen, the strongest force
America had ever had under arms, as citizens victorious in the cause
of democracy.

On November 11, 1918, when the armistice was signed, the 5th and 90th
Divisions of the 3d Corps had swung well across the Meuse, taking the
heights on the other side. The 89th and 2d Divisions were also across,
while the 42d Division had reached the suburbs of Sedan, and the 77th
Division was on the left bank. Kuhn's 79th Division from Camp Meade,
which had relieved the worn and gallant 29th Division, which had done
such lion's work across the Meuse, moving in unison with the
operations beginning November 1, 1918, had conquered the heights which
had poured their fire down into the trough where the Third Corps had
fought. The 26th Division, which had stubbornly kept in line despite
its losses and the misery of its position, was able to appreciate, as
only such veterans could, the privilege of operating on the 79th's
right, in mastering the positions on its front which had so long
defied it. These two divisions were both attacking on the morning of
the 11th. Before nightfall they had gained the last of the hills
separating them from the plain of the Woevre. Thus the rapid daily
advances of the American forces toward and across the Meuse, in their
capture of the positions upon which the Germans depended for their
winter defense line, had been not the least of the arguments which
Marshal Foch was offering the Germans for signing the armistice.

We had only two divisions in reserve when hostilities finished. If we
had come late into the war, once our legions were prepared, we had
not been hesitant in giving them for service. All the resources of our
army from the base ports to the front line had been stretched to their
limit. Our hospitals were full and our surgeons exhausted. We had
broken up freshly arriving divisions when the Service of Supply
demanded more labor in order that the demands of the front should be
filled at this juncture When the hope had risen in every heart that by
a supreme effort we might bring the orgy of the great war to a close.
We had fought for six weeks in chill winter rains and in face of fire
and of hardships; and in the test of nerves, courage, and devotion we
had come out triumphant. And through it all there had been no finer
heroism than that of the trained army nurses who kept cheerful when
staggering with fatigue in caring for the wounded in our hospitals. Be
it aviator or motor truck driver, soldier in the fox hole or stevedore
on the docks, all had given their strength and zeal in keeping with
the spirit of their errand in France. There remained the task of the
organization of the 3d Army, under General Dickman from the veteran
divisions, which had the fortune to be in the front line on November
11, 1918, to march through Luxemburg and across the German frontier to
the Rhine, where they did their duty as policemen during the peace
negotiations; and the further task of reversing the great machinery of
the army, in sending the soldiers home in good health after their
wonderful experience and splendid service.

PART VII-THE PEACE CONFERENCE AT PARIS

CHAPTER XIX

FIRST SESSION OF PEACE CONGRESS--CLEMENCEAU, PERMANENT
CHAIRMAN--PRESIDENT WILSON'S ADDRESS--THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS COVENANT
COMPLETED

The Peace Congress held its first session at 3 o'clock in the
afternoon on January 18, 1919, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Paris. The scene of this historic event upon which the interest of the
world centered was the former Salle d'Horloge, renamed for the
occasion Salle de la Paix, one of the most magnificent reception rooms
in all Europe.

The French Government had made careful preparation of the chamber for
every need of the assembly, and in a manner worthy of such a
gathering.

For the opening session seventy-two seats were provided, the Japanese,
the British and Colonial delegates, and the fifth British delegate
were on the outer side of the great horseshoe. To the right of the
table of honor a seat was reserved for the fifth American delegate.

The delegates representing Italy, Belgium, Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, Peru,
Portugal, Serbia, Czecho-Slovakia, and Uruguay were seated in the
order named.

At the left wing of the table sat the delegates of Siam, Rumania,
Poland, Liberia, Hedjaz, Ecuador, China, and Bolivia.

A striking object among the decorations of the splendid chamber was a
heroic marble statue of Peace holding aloft the torch of Civilization
which stood behind the chair of Premier Clemenceau.

A council table of horseshoe form, covered with green baize, stood
directly before the statue. Nine seats of honor had been prepared at
the upper end of the table for the presiding officer, the vice
presidents and the premiers. On each side of the wings of the great
horseshoe there were fifteen seats, making sixty in all, in addition
to the nine seats of honor at the head of the table.

The seats, upholstered in leather of a vivid crimson, served to
emphasize and throw into relief the figures of the representatives in
somewhat somber attire. The walls of the chamber were decorated in
white and gold and from the ceiling, whose borders were frescoed with
dancing Cupids in pastel shades, hung four great crystal chandeliers.
An abundance of light from five large windows overlooking the Seine
made it possible for the delegates to read and write in any part of
the hall. From the council room there opened another sumptuous
apartment overlooking the gardens where the delegates could retire for
consultations. Adjoining was a superbly furnished dining room, where
meals could be served when protracted meetings were held.

Long before the Peace Congress began its session the Quai d'Orsay was
thronged with people, their eyes fixed on the windows of the Salle de
la Paix. The Palais Bourbon and the Foreign Office were protected by a
line of troops, and a special guard of honor was drawn up near the
entrance to the Foreign Office, the delegates passing through a double
file of soldiers. Each arrival was the signal for a fanfare of
trumpets and full military honors from the troops on guard. President
Wilson's appearance a few minutes before the time fixed for the
opening of the session was the occasion for a remarkable demonstration
of good will on the part of the crowd. The President joined M. Pichon,
the French foreign minister, in the anteroom and was conducted to the
council chamber. At the table of honor Mr. Wilson was joined by
Secretary Lansing, Mr. White, and General Bliss, and exchanged
greeting with other delegates.

President Poincaré entered the chamber at 3 o'clock, and the entire
assembly stood up as he delivered his address, which was in French.
After he had concluded, an interpreter read the speech in English.

In the course of his remarks, which were delivered with calm
earnestness, M. Poincaré, after greeting the delegates in the name of
the French Republic, reviewed the course of the war, placing on
Germany the guilt of premeditation in plunging the world into
frightful disaster for the purpose of spoils and conquest. He praised
the Allies for the mighty efforts they had made to crush the German
menace, and dwelt on America's unselfishness in entering the world war
in defense of free ideals.

In conclusion he spoke warmly in favor of the League of Nations, which
would be a supreme guaranty against any fresh assault upon the rights
of peoples. M. Poincaré then declared the congress open and retired.

Georges Clemenceau, the French premier, was elected permanent chairman
of the conference. Speeches by President Wilson, Premier Lloyd-George,
and Baron Sonnino expressed the desire of the representatives of the
different nations to reach a friendly understanding with respect to
the problems that were to be decided at the conference.

President Wilson, in proposing Premier Clemenceau for the permanent
chairmanship, said:

"It gives me great pleasure to propose as permanent chairman of the
conference Mr. Clemenceau, the president of the council.

"I would do this as a matter of custom. I would do this as a tribute
to the French Republic. But I wish to do it as something more than
that. I wish to do it as the tribute to the man.

"France deserves the precedence, not only because we are meeting at
her capital, and because she has undergone some of the most tragical
suffering of the war, but also because her capital, her ancient and
beautiful capital, has so often been the center of conferences of
this sort, on which the fortunes of large parts of the world turned.

"It is a very delightful thought that the history of the world, which
has so often been centered here, will now be crowned by the
achievements of this conference--because there is a sense in which
this is the supreme conference of the history of mankind.

"More nations are represented here than were ever represented in such
a conference before. The fortunes of all peoples are involved. A great
war is ended which seemed about to bring a universal cataclysm. The
danger is past. A victory has been won for mankind, and it is
delightful that we should be able to record these results in this
place.

"But it is more delightful to honor France, because we can honor her
in the person of so distinguished a servant. We have all felt in our
participation in the struggles of this war the fine steadfastness
which characterized the leadership of the French in the hands of Mr.
Clemenceau. We have learned to admire him, and those of us who have
been associated with him have acquired a genuine affection for him.

"Moreover, those of us who have been in these recent days in constant
consultation with him know how warmly his purpose is set toward the
goal of achievement to which all our faces are turned. He feels as we
feel, as I have no doubt everyone in this room feels, that we are
trusted to do a great thing, to do it in the highest spirit of
friendship and accommodation, and to do it as promptly as possible in
order that the hearts of men may have fear lifted from them, and that
they may return to those purposes of life which will bring them
happiness and contentment and prosperity.

"Knowing his brotherhood of heart in these great matters, it affords
me a personal pleasure to propose that Mr. Clemenceau shall be the
permanent chairman of this conference."

In accepting the presidency of the congress M. Clemenceau expressed
his gratification for the honor paid him and outlined the principal
questions which the conference must decide. The three principal
subjects of these were, he said, responsibility of the authors of the
war, responsibility for the crimes committed during the war, and
international labor legislation. The League of Nations would lead the
program at the next full session.

Mr. Lloyd-George, who seconded Mr. Wilson's motion, and Baron Sonnino,
the Italian foreign minister, paid tribute to M. Clemenceau's courage,
energy, and inspiration which had helped the Allies to bring the war
to a triumphant conclusion.

At this session the regulations governing the conference proceedings
were adopted. The following were the regulations regarding the
composition of the congress:

The belligerent Powers with general interests--the United States of
America, the British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan--shall take part
in all meetings and commissions.

The belligerent Powers with particular interests--Belgium, Brazil, the
British Dominions, and India, China, Cuba, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti,
Hedjaz, Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua, Panama, Poland, Portugal,
Rumania, Serbia, Siam and the Czecho-Slovak Republic--shall take part
in these sittings at which questions concerning them are discussed.

The Powers in a state of diplomatic rupture with the enemy
powers--Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and Uruguay--shall take part; in the
sittings at which questions concerning them are discussed.

The neutral Powers, and states in process of formation, may be heard
either orally or in writing, when summoned by the Powers with general
interests at sittings devoted especially to the examination of
questions directly concerning them, but only so far as these questions
are concerned.

The representation of the different Powers was fixed as follows:

Five for the United States of America, the British Empire, France,
Italy, and Japan; three for Belgium, Brazil, and Serbia; two for
China, Greece, the king of the Hedjaz, Poland, Portugal, Rumania,
Siam, and the Czecho-Slovak Republic; one for Cuba, Guatemala, Haiti,
Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua, and Panama; one for Bolivia, Ecuador,
Peru, and Uruguay.

The British Dominions and India were to be represented as follows:

Two delegates each for Australia, Canada, South Africa, and India,
including the native states; one delegate for New Zealand.

Although the number of delegates must not exceed the above figures,
each delegate had the right to avail himself of the panel system, by
which the representatives of the Dominions, New Zealand, and India
might be included in the representation of the British Empire.

Montenegro would be represented by one delegate as soon as the
political situation of the country was cleared up. The conference
would fix the representation of Russia at the moment when the matters
concerning Russia were examined.

It was further decided that the secretariat should be appointed from
outside the plenipotentiaries, composed of one representative of the
United States of America, one of the British Empire, one of France,
one of Italy, and one of Japan.

It was decided that the publicity of the proceedings should be assured
by official communiques prepared by the secretariat and made public.
In case of a disagreement as to the drafting of these communiques the
matter should be referred to the principal plenipotentiaries or their
representatives.

A provision was made that all questions to be decided upon should be
subject to two readings. The program regarding resolutions which was
agreed upon was, in brief, that a committee should be formed for
drafting the resolutions adopted, composed of five members not forming
part of the plenipotentiary delegates, and composed of one
representative of the United States of America, one of the British
Empire, one of France, one of Italy, and one of Japan. This committee
should concern itself only with questions that have been decided. Its
sole duty should be to draw up the text of the decision adopted and to
present it for the approval of the conference.

The supreme council, consisting of two ranking delegates from each of
the five chief Powers, held its first session on January 20, 1919,
when the Russian situation was considered and was further discussed on
the following day. At the session of the council of January 22, 1919,
the decision was announced by which all Russian factions were invited
to a conference at Princes' Island, Sea of Marmora. (The proposed
conference was subsequently abandoned, as certain Russian factions
refused to negotiate with representatives of the Soviet Government of
Lenine and Trotzky.)

At the meeting of the supreme council on January 23, 1919, an order of
business was announced for a plenary meeting of the conference on
January 25, 1919, when the following questions were considered for
this purpose.

First.--International legislation on labor.

Second.--Responsibility and punishments in connection with the war.

Third.--Reparation for war damage.

Four.--International régime of ports, waterways, and railways.

On January 24, 1919, the supreme council met for the first time as the
supreme war council. Besides President Wilson and the premiers and
foreign ministers of the Allied Powers, there were present also
Marshal Foch, Field Marshal Haig, General Pershing, General Diaz, and
the generals of the Versailles war council, including Generals Wilson,
Bliss, Bolling, and Robilant.

The council conferred with Marshal Foch and other military authorities
as to the strength of the forces to be allowed to the various Allied
Powers on the western front during the period of the armistice.

The President of the United States and the prime ministers and foreign
ministers of the Allied and Associated Governments addressed a
communication to the world in which reference was made regarding the
use of armed force in many parts of Europe and the East to gain
possession of territory "the rightful claim to which the Peace
Conference is to be asked to determine." Those employing armed force
for such purposes were warned that they were prejudicing their claims
by so doing, and that "if they expect justice, they must refrain from
force and place their claims in unclouded good faith in the hands of
the Conference of Peace."

On the same day the mission of the Allies and Associated Great Powers
to Poland was discussed. It was agreed that M. Pichon, the French
foreign minister, should prepare the instructions to the mission, and
that one press representative for each of the five great Powers should
be allowed to accompany the mission. The question of territorial
adjustment concerning the German colonies was then discussed by Sir
Robert Borden, prime minister of Canada; Mr. Hughes, prime minister of
Australia; General Smuts, representing General Botha, the prime
minister of South Africa, and Mr. Massey, prime minister of New
Zealand.

At the second plenary session of the Peace Conference on January 25,
1919, with M. Clemenceau in the chair, the plan for a League of
Nations was unanimously adopted. The resolution on the creation of a
committee on the League of Nations was as follows:

It is essential to the maintenance of the world settlement which the
associated nations are now met to establish that a League of Nations
be created to promote international obligations and to provide
safeguards against war.

This league should be created as an integral part of the general
treaty of peace, and should be open to every civilized nation which
can be relied on to promote its objects.

The members of the league should periodically meet in international
conference, and should have a permanent organization and secretaries
to carry on the business of the league in the intervals between the
conference.

The conference therefore appoints a committee, representative of the
Associated Governments, to work out the constitution and the functions
of the league, and the draft of resolutions in regard to breaches of
the laws of war for presentation to the Peace Congress.

That a commission, composed of two representatives apiece from the
five great Powers and five representatives to be elected by the other
Power's, be appointed to inquire upon the following:

First.--The responsibility of the authors of the war.

Second.--The facts as to the breaches of the laws and customs of war
committed by the forces of the German Empire and their allies on land,
on sea, and in the air during the present war.

Third.--The degree of responsibility for these offenses attaching to
particular members of the enemy's forces, including members of the
General Staffs and other individuals however highly placed.

Fourth.--The constitution and procedure of a tribunal appropriate to
the trial of these offenses.

After the reading of the resolutions by M. Clemenceau President Wilson
addressed the assembly. He said that they had met together for two
purposes: to make the present settlements rendered necessary by the
war and to secure the lasting peace of the world not only by the
present settlements, but by the arrangements which they should make
for its maintenance.

The League of Nations Mr. Wilson believed to be necessary for both of
these purposes. Some complicated questions could not be worked out to
an ultimate issue at the time, but would need subsequent
consideration, they were not susceptible of confident judgments at
present. It would be necessary to set up some machinery to render the
work of the conference complete.

"We have assembled here for the purpose of doing very much more than
making the present settlements that are necessary.... We are not the
representative of governments, but representatives of the peoples. It
will not suffice to satisfy governmental circles anywhere. It is
necessary that we should satisfy the opinion of mankind.

"The burdens of the war have fallen in an unusual degree upon the
whole population of the countries involved." Here, Mr. Wilson spoke of
the burden thrown upon the older men, women, and children, upon the
homes of the civilized world.

These people looked to this assembly to make a peace which would make
them secure. "It is a solemn obligation on our part, therefore, to
make permanent arrangements that justice shall be rendered and peace
maintained.... Central settlements may be temporary, but the actions
of the nations in the interest of peace and justice must be permanent.
We can set up permanent processes. We may not be able to set up a
permanent decision."

In a sense, said President Wilson, the United States was less
interested in this subject than the other nations here assembled. Her
great territory and extensive sea borders made her less likely to
suffer from enemy attacks than other nations. The deep ardor of the
United States for the society of nations did not spring from
apprehension, but out of the ideals begotten of the war.

"In coming into this war the United States never for a moment thought
that she was intervening in the politics of Europe, or the politics of
Asia, or the politics of any part of the world. Her thought was that
all the world had now become conscious that there was a single cause
of justice and liberty for men of every kind and place.

"Therefore the United States would feel that its part in this war
should be played in vain if there ensued upon it abortive European
settlements. It would feel that it could not take part in guaranteeing
those European settlements unless that guaranty involved the
continuous superintendence of the peace of the world by the associated
nations of the world."

To make the League of Nations a vital thing, said Mr. Wilson, it must
continue to function, there must be no intermission of its
watchfulness and of its labor; it should be the eye of the nations to
keep watch upon the common interest.

The select classes of mankind, said President Wilson, were no longer
governors of mankind. The fortunes of mankind were now in the hands of
the plain people of the whole world. "Satisfy them and you have
justified their confidence not only, but have established peace. Fail
to satisfy them and no arrangement that you can make will either set
up or steady the peace of the world." In the United States the great
project of a League of Nations was regarded as the keynote of the
whole. "If we returned to the United States without having made every
effort in our power to realize this program, we should return to meet
the merited scorn of our fellow citizens.... We have no choice but to
observe their mandate. But it is with the greatest pleasure and
enthusiasm that we accept that mandate. And because this is the
keynote of the whole fabric, we have pledged our every purpose to it,
as we have to every item of the fabric. We would not dare abate a
single item of the program which constitutes our instructions; we
would not dare to compromise upon any matter as the champions of this
thing--the peace of the world, this attitude of justice, this
principle, that we are the masters of no peoples, but are here to see
that every people in the world shall choose its own masters and govern
its own destinies, not as we wish, but as they wish.

"We are here to see, in short, that the very foundations of this war
are swept away. Those foundations were the private choice of a small
coterie of civil rulers, of military staffs. Those foundations were
the aggression of great Powers upon the small. Those foundations were
the holding together of empires of unwilling subjects by the duress of
arms. Those foundations were the power of small bodies of men to wield
their will and use mankind as pawns in the game. And nothing less than
the emancipation of the world from these things will accomplish
peace...."

Mr. Lloyd-George, the British premier, and Signor Orlando, premier of
Italy, followed President Wilson, and made eloquent speeches in
support of the resolution. After Leon Bourgeois, a French delegate,
and representatives of China, Poland, and Belgium had expressed their
adherence to the plan for a League of Nations the resolution was
unanimously adopted.

It was decided at the conference to appoint a commission in regard to
reparation for war damage to consist of representatives from Belgium,
Greece, Poland, Rumania, and Serbia who would report on the amount of
reparation which the enemy countries ought to pay, on what they are
capable of paying, and on the method, form, and time within which
payment should be made.

A resolution in regard to international legislation on industrial and
labor questions was also passed. This provided for the appointment of
two representatives apiece from the five great Powers and five
representatives to be elected by the other Powers represented at the
Peace Conference to inquire into the conditions of employment from the
international aspect and to recommend the form of a permanent agency,
to continue such inquiry in cooperation with and under the direction
of the League of Nations. The conference also adopted a resolution to
appoint a commission to inquire and report upon the international
régime of ports, waterways, and railways.

The supreme council at its session on January 27, 1919, prepared a
program of work and the constitution of new committees for economic
and financial questions and those relating to private and maritime
laws. The question of the former German colonies was discussed on the
following day. At the two sessions of the supreme council on January
29, 1919, reports were heard from delegates on the Polish situation
and Polish claims, and the Czecho-Slovak delegates gave their views.

The question of Kiauchau and the Pacific Islands created sharp
differences between the delegates of China and Japan. China finally
agreed that Kiauchau should be left to the disposal of Japan, to be
restored to China on condition that it was opened as a commercial
port.

At the meeting of the supreme council on January 30, 1919, the
question of the German colonies in the Pacific and in Africa and the
occupied territory in Turkey was discussed. Provisional arrangements
were made to incorporate in the constitution of the League of Nation a
plan for administering the German colonies by which the league should
assign them to various powers for administration. This was opposed by
the representative of Australia, who insisted on the annexation of New
Guinea to Australia.

President Wilson was firmly opposed to a division of Germany's
colonial possessions among the Powers which then held them. He
believed that to divide the colonies among the Entente nations would
be in direct contravention of the "Fourteen Points" which had been
accepted as a basis of peace, and would violate the principles of the
League of Nations.

The famous "Fourteen Points," it will be remembered, were formulated
by President Wilson, and in January, 1918, were offered to the
belligerent nations as the foundation for peace negotiations:

I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there
shall be no private international understandings of any kind, but
diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial
waters, alike in peace and in war, except as seas may be closed in
whole, or in part by international action for the enforcement of
international covenants.

III. The removal as far as possible of all economic barriers and the
establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations
consenting to the peace and associated for its maintenance.

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will
be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

V. A free, open-minded, and also impartial adjustment of all colonial
claims, based upon the strict observance of principles that in
determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the
populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims
of the government whose title is to be determined.

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such settlement of all
questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest
cooperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an
unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the desired determination
of her own political development and national policy, and assure her
of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under the
institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance
also of every kind that she may need and herself desire. The treatment
accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to some will be
the acid test of their good will, of the comprehension of her needs as
distinguished from their own interests and of their intelligent and
unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and
restored without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys
in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve
to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they
themselves have set and determined for the government of their
relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole
structure and validity of international law is forever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions
restored, and the wrongs done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the
matter of Alsace and Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the
world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace
may once more be made secure in the interest of all.

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along
clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among nations we wish
to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest
opportunity for autonomous development.

XI. Russia, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied
territories restored, Serbia accorded free and secure access to the
sea, and the relations of the several Balkan states to one another
determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of
allegiance and nationality; and international guarantees of the
political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the
several Balkan states should be entered into.

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be
assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nations which are now
under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and
an absolutely unmolested opportunity for autonomous development, and
the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the
ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected which should
include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations,
which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose
political and economic independence and territorial integrity should
be guaranteed by international covenants.

XIV. A genuine association of nations must be formed under specific
covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political
independence and territorial integrity of great and small states
alike.

At the session of the supreme council on February 1, 1919, a decision
was reached concerning the German colonies and the conditions were
later confirmed by the covenant of the League of Nations.

President Wilson presided at the opening meeting of the League of
Nations Commission on February 3, 1919, held at the residence of
Colonel Edward House in Paris. The United States was represented by
Mr. Wilson, Colonel House, and Mr. Miller, technical expert. Lord
Robert Cecil and General Christian Smuts represented Great Britain;
for France, Leon Bourgeois and Ferdinand Larnaude; for Italy Premier
Orlando, and for Japan Baron Chinda; also delegates from Belgium,
Serbia, Brazil, Portugal, and China.

The discussion in which Mr. Wilson took a leading part was not general
but specific, as the printed text of the agreed plan for the formation
of the League of Nations was before the meeting.

On the same date important committees on reparation, ports, waterways
and railways held their first formal meetings. The French and British
presented a program recognizing the right of nations to control
international waterways and international railways, which was accepted
by the commission.

The commission of the Allied Nations held daily sessions beginning
February 4, 1919, and made continued progress. The delegates were
unanimous in believing that a League of Nations was desirable, but
some doubted its immediate efficiency and favored maintaining the old
order of balance of power until the new plan had demonstrated its
capacity and workability, to meet the needs of nations loving peace.
Much time was spent in winning over these dissenters, and it was only
accomplished after long and patient endeavors.

The final session of the League of Nations Commission was held on
February 13, 1919, when a French delegate offered a clause for an
interallied military force to compel peace, and the Japanese presented
an amendment providing that racial discrimination should not be
tolerated. Both proposals were defeated.

At this meeting the constitution of the League of Nations as finally
drafted was unanimously adopted by the committee and President Wilson
was designated to present the completed plan to the plenary council at
their next session.

CHAPTER XX

THE COVENANT AND DRAFT OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE LEAGUE OF
NATIONS--PRESIDENT WILSON'S SPEECH IN SUPPORT; HE RETURNS TO
AMERICA--THE UNITED STATES SENATE CRITICISES LEAGUE DOCUMENT

On February 14, 1919, President Wilson read the draft of the
constitution of the League of Nations before the plenary council of
the Peace Conference and afterward delivered an earnest and spirited
address in support of the plan. Lord Robert Cecil, head of the British
delegation, expressed his approval of the League and constitution in
an eloquent speech, and the Italian Premier Signor Orlando, described
his satisfaction at having collaborated in one of the greatest
documents in all history.

Leon Bourgeois, for France, said that the French delegation reserved
the right to present their views on certain details of the plan which
made no distinction between great and small States. France and
Belgium, said M. Bourgeois, were especially exposed to danger, and
required additional guarantees. He urged a system of permanent
inspection of existing armaments and forces as a means to avoid the
renewal of wars.

The text of the document read by President Wilson at the plenary
session, opening with a preamble, is here given in full.

"In order to promote international cooperation and to secure
international peace and security by the acceptance of obligations not
to resort to war, by the prescription of open, just, and honorable
relations between nations, by the firm establishment of the
understandings of international law as the actual rule of conduct
among governments, and by the maintenance of justice and a scrupulous
respect for all treaty obligations in the dealings of organized
peoples with one another, the Powers signatory to this covenant adopt
this constitution of the League of Nations."

Of the twenty-six articles which comprise the constitution of the
League of Nations some were afterward amended, and such changes will
be noted later in their place.

The first seven articles of the constitution which are the least
important to the general reader may be thus summarized:

The action of the high contracting parties under the terms of the
covenant shall be effected through the meeting of a body of delegates
representing them, and the meetings of an executive council, and of a
permanent international secretariat to be established at the seat of
the League. Each of the high contracting parties shall have one vote,
but not more than three representatives.

The executive council shall consist of representatives of the United
States of America, British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan, and
representatives of four other states members of the League. Meetings
shall be held as occasion requires and at least once a year. Any Power
shall be invited to attend a meeting of the council when matters
concerning its interests are to be discussed. The first meeting of the
body of delegates shall be summoned by the President of the United
States.

Admission to the League of states not signatories to the covenant
requires the assent of not less than two-thirds of the states
represented in the body of delegates. Only full self-governing
countries or dominions shall be admitted.

Article VIII. Provides that the executive council shall determine for
the consideration of the several governments what military equipment
and armament is fair in proportion to the scale of forces, laid down
in the program of disarmament. The high contracting parties agree to
examine the manufacture by private enterprise of war material and
direct the executive council to advise how to prevent the evil effects
attendant on such manufacture, respecting the need of those countries
that cannot manufacture munitions and war implements necessary for
their safety.

Article IX. Permanent commission shall be constituted to advise the
council on the execution of the provisions of articles I and VIII and
on military and, naval questions generally.

Article X. This and the two following, as among the most important
articles in the constitution, and which became the subject of heated
controversy, must be given in full:

"The high contracting parties shall undertake to respect and preserve
against external aggression the territorial integrity and existing
political independence of all the states members of the League. In
case of any such aggression, or in case of any threat of danger of
such aggression, the executive council shall advise upon the means by
which the obligation shall be fulfilled."

Article XI. States that any war, or threat of war, is a matter of
concern to the League, and the high contracting parties reserve the
right to take such action as will conserve the peace of nations.

Article XII. States in effect that if disputes arise that cannot be
adjusted by the ordinary processes of diplomacy no resort to war will
be made until the questions involved are submitted for arbitration of
the executive council. Until three months after the award by the
arbitrators war will not even then be resorted to against a member of
the League which complies with the award of the arbitrators, or the
recommendation of the executive council.

Article XIII. The high contracting parties agree that disputes or
difficulties arising between them which cannot be settled by diplomacy
they will submit the whole matter to arbitration. They agree to carry
out in good faith any award that may be rendered.

Article XIV. Provides for the establishment of an international court
of justice to hear and determine any matters suitable for submission
to it for arbitration.

Article XV. Disputes between members of the League not submitted to
arbitration shall be referred to the executive council. If the dispute
has not been settled, a report by the council shall be published and
recommendation made by the council for the settlement of the
difficulty. If the report is unanimously agreed to by the council
other than the parties to the dispute, the high contracting parties
agree that they will not go to war with any party which complies with
the recommendations.

Article XVI. "Should any of the high contracting parties break or
disregard its covenants under Article XII, it shall thereby ipso facto
be deemed to have committed an act of war against all the other
members of the League, which hereby immediately undertakes to subject
it to the severance of all intercourse between their nationals, trade
or financial relations, the prohibition of all intercourse between
their nationals and the nationals of the covenant-breaking state, and
the prevention of all financial, commercial, or personal intercourse
between the nationals of the convenant-breaking state and the
nationals of any other state, whether a member of the League or not.

"It shall be the duty of the executive committee council in such a
case to recommend what effective military or naval force the members
of the League shall severally contribute to the armed forces to be
used to protect the covenant of the League." This article further
states that the high contracting parties agree to mutually support
each other financially and economically, and in resisting any special
measures aimed at one of their number by the convenant-breaking state.

Article XVII. Considers disputes between one state member of the
League and another state which is not a member of the League, or
between states not members of the League. In such event the high
contracting parties invite the state, or states, not members of the
League to become members and accept the obligations of the League
membership for the dispute in such conditions as the executive council
shall deem just. The executive council will immediately inquire into
the merits of the dispute and recommend such action as may be deemed
just and equitable. Any Power refusing to accept the obligations of
membership in the League for the purposes of the League would
constitute a breach of Article XII. The provisions of Article XVI
shall be applicable too against a state taking such action.

Article XVIII. In this article the League is empowered with general
supervision of the trade in arms and ammunition with countries where
control of the traffic is necessary.

Article XIX. Deals with the question of colonies and territories which
through the war have ceased to be under the old sovereignty.
"Inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves ... there
should be applied the principle that the well-being and development of
such peoples form a sacred trust of civilization, and that securities
for the performance of this trust should be embodied in the
constitution of the League." The tutelage of such peoples, it was
advised, should be intrusted to the advanced nations, and should be
exercised by them as mandatories on behalf of the League. Communities
that have reached a stage of development as in Turkey could be
provisionally recognized as independent nations, subject to
administrative advice and assistance by mandatory power until they
were strong enough to stand alone.

Article XX. In this the League promises to endeavor to secure and
maintain fair conditions of labor for men, women, and children in all
countries where their commercial and industrial relations extend, and
agree to establish a permanent bureau of labor.

Article XXI. Provision through the instrumentality of the League to
secure and maintain freedom of transit and equitable treatment for the
commerce of all states members of the League. Special arrangements
with regard to the necessities of the regions devastated during the
war.

Article XXII. The high contracting parties agree to place under
control of the League all international bureaus already established if
the parties to such treaties consent. All such international bureaus
in the future shall be placed under the League.

Article XXIII. Every treaty or international engagement entered into
by any member of the League shall be registered with the secretary
general and published by him. No treaty or international engagement
shall be binding until so registered.

Article XXIV. The body of delegates shall have the right to advise the
reconsideration by states members of the League of treaties which have
become inapplicable, and of international conditions of which the
continuance may endanger world peace.

Article XXV. The high contracting parties agree to abrogate all
obligations inconsistent with the terms of the covenant, and will not
hereafter enter into any engagements inconsistent with those terms.
Powers signatory hereto, or subsequently admitted to the League, who
have undertaken any obligations inconsistent with the terms of this
convenant shall take steps to secure release from such obligations.

Article XXVI is concerned with amendments to the covenant. These are
to take effect when ratified by the states whose representatives
compose the executive council, and by three-fourths of the states
whose representatives compose the body of delegates.

At the conclusion of his reading of the draft of the constitution of
the League, President Wilson said in part:

"It is not a vehicle of power, but a vehicle in which power may be
varied at the discretion of those who exercise it, and in accordance
with the changing circumstances of the time. And yet, while it is
elastic, while it is general in its terms, it is definite in the one
thing that we were called upon to make definite. It is a definite
guaranty of peace. It is a definite guaranty by word against
aggression. It is a definite guaranty against the things which have
just come near bringing the whole structure of civilization into ruin.

"Its purposes do not for a moment lie vague. Its purposes are declared
and its powers are unmistakable. It is not in contemplation that this
should be merely a league to secure the peace of the world. It is a
league which can be used for cooperation in any international matter.
That is the significance of the provision introduced concerning labor.
There are many ameliorations of labor conditions which can be effected
by conference and discussion. I anticipate that there will be a very
great usefulness in the bureau of labor which it is contemplated shall
be set up by the League. Men, women, and children who work have been
in the background through long ages, and sometimes seemed to be
forgotten.... Now these people will be drawn into the field of
international consultation and help and will be the wards of the
combined governments of the world.

"As you will notice there is an imperative article concerning the
publicity of all international agreements. Henceforth no member of the
League can claim any agreement valid which it has not registered with
the secretary general.... And the duty is laid upon the secretary
general to publish every document of that sort, at the earliest
possible time....

"Then there is a feature about this covenant which to my mind is one
of the greatest and most satisfactory advances that have been made. We
are done with annexations of helpless peoples, meant in some instances
by some Powers to be used merely for exploitation. We recognize in the
most solemn manner that the helpless and undeveloped peoples of the
world ... put an obligation upon us to look after their interests
primarily before we use them for our interests and that in all cases
of this sort hereafter it shall be the duty of the League to see that
the nations who are assigned as the tutors and advisers and directors
of these peoples shall look to their interests and their development
before they look to the interests and desires of the mandatory nation
itself....

"It has been one of the many distressing revelations of recent years
that the great Power which has just been happily defeated put
intolerable burdens and injustice upon the helpless peoples of some of
the colonies which it annexed to itself, that its interest was rather
their extermination than their development, that the desire was to
possess their land for European purposes and not to enjoy their
confidence in order that mankind might be lifted in these places to
the next higher level.

"Now the world, expressing its conscience in law, says there is an
end of that, that our consciences shall be settled to this thing.
States will be picked out which have shown that they can exercise a
conscience in this matter and under their tutelage the helpless
peoples of the world will come into a new light and into a new hope.

"So I think that I can say of this document that it is at one and the
same time a practical document, a human document. There is a pulse of
sympathy in it. There is a compulsion of conscience throughout it. It
is practical, and yet it is intended to purify, to rectify, to
elevate.

"It was in one sense, said Mr. Wilson, a belated document, for he
believed the conscience of the world had long been prepared to express
itself in some such way.

"We are not just now discovering our sympathy for these peoples and
our interest in them. We are simply expressing it, for it has long
been felt and in the administration of the affairs of more than one of
the great states represented here--so far as I know all of the great
states that are represented here--that humane impulse has already
expressed itself in their dealings with their colonies whose peoples
were yet at a low stage of civilization.

... "Many terrible things have come out of this war, gentlemen, but
some very beautiful things have come out of it. Wrong has been
defeated, but the rest of the world has been more conscious than it
ever was before of the majority of right. People that were suspicious
of each other can now live as friends and comrades in a single family,
and desire to do so. The miasma of distrust, of intrigue is cleared
away. Men are looking eye to eye and saying: 'We are brothers, and
have a common purpose. We did not realize it before, but now we do
realize it, and this is our covenant of friendship.'"

After notifying by cable the Congressional Committee on Foreign
Affairs at Washington, that he would return to America and confer with
them at the White House, President Wilson sailed from Brest for home
on February 15, 1919. Greeted at Boston by a great multitude of
enthusiastic citizens, he delivered an address in the afternoon to
7,000 people assembled in Mechanic Hall on the subject of the League
of Nations. Traversing much of the ground he had covered in his speech
on the draft of the League in Paris, Mr. Wilson said he had been
impressed with the wonderful fact during his work at the Peace
Conference that there was no nation in Europe that suspected the
motives of the United States....

"Before this war, Europe did not believe in us as she does now. She
did not believe in us during the first three years of the war. She
seems to have believed that we were holding off because we thought we
could make more by staying out than by going in. And, all of a sudden,
in a short eighteen months, the whole verdict is reversed.... They saw
what we did--that, without making a single claim, we put all our men
and all our means at the disposal of those who were fighting for their
homes, in the first instance, but for a cause, the cause of human
rights and justice, and that we went in, not to support their national
claims, but to support the great cause which they held in common. And
when they saw that not only America held ideas, but acted ideals, they
were converted to America and became firm partisans of those
ideals....

"And now do you realize that this confidence which we have established
throughout the world imposes a burden upon us, if you choose to call
it a burden? It is one of those burdens which any nation should be
proud to carry."

President Wilson said that all the peoples of Europe were buoyed up
with a new hope, that they believed a new age was dawning, when
nations would understand each other and support each other in every
just cause and unite every moral and physical strength to see that
right should prevail. "If America were at this juncture to fail the
world, what would become of it?" He dwelt on the despair and
bitterness that would follow if America failed to justify the world's
hope; on the return to the old bad conditions that had prevailed
before the war when all European nations were hostile camps.

Yet the most satisfactory treaty of peace, said Mr. Wilson, would have
little value unless it were backed by the united nations to defend
it, with great forces combined to make it good, and the assurance
given to oppressed peoples of the world that they should be safe.
America would not disappoint the hopes of the world, and would make
men free. "If we did not do that, the fame of America would be gone
and all her power would be dissipated. She then would have to keep her
power for those narrow, selfish, provincial purposes which seem so
dear to some minds that have no sweep beyond the nearest horizon." He
spoke of the claims of Poland, and the wrongs of Armenia, and of the
aspirations of the Czecho-Slovaks and Jugoslavs, and how certain
powers would pounce upon them if there were not the guarantees of the
world behind their liberty.

President Wilson said he had returned to report progress which would
not stop short of the goal. The people were in the saddle and they
would see to it that if their own present governments did not do their
will some other governments shall. "And the secret is out and the
present governments know it."

Before President Wilson returned to America the League of Nations
covenant had already been discussed in the United States Senate. The
Republican members in particular were vehement and even bitter in
denouncing the project as set forth in the original draft. Senator
Poindexter declared in the course of a three-hour speech that the
charter of the League meant surrender of American sovereignty to
European nations. Article X bound the United States as one of the
contracting parties, he said, to preserve against aggressions the
territory and political independence in all states members of the
League. This, argued the Senator, would compel the United States to
tax its people and sacrifice its soldiers to make war on behalf of a
foreign country. In mixing in the affairs of small European nations,
these small nations would intrude into the affairs of the United
States. To place into the hands of the council of the League of
Nations--all but one foreigners with different ideals and
interests--such control over the sovereign action of the American
people for which so many heroes had labored "would be as though it
were a pitiful murder of the very souls of our fathers in their own
house, builded by their hands...."

Senator Borah, Republican, attacked the League as a radical departure
from the policy laid down in Washington's Farewell Address and the
Monroe Doctrine. Article X, which provided for the preservation of the
territorial integrity of the nations of the League, the Senator said,
would first obligate America to protect the territorial integrity of
Great Britain. If the British Empire was threatened in any part, not
the United States Congress, or the people, or the Government would
determine what should be done, but the executive council, of which the
American people had one member, would determine what should be done.
The British Empire, united in interest with Italy and Japan, would
outvote America in the League. The whole project, he believed, would
sterilize the principle of nationalism and abrogate the American
Constitution.

The League found a sturdy and eloquent champion in Senator Hitchcock,
Democrat, of Nebraska, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. In
the course of a speech delivered on February 27, 1919, Senator
Hitchcock expressed his belief that the League was a positive guaranty
against future world wars. The attitude Japan might take regarding her
nationals was not a cause for worry. Japan had already recognized the
exclusion laws of the United States. There was no question about
Mexico, which could not give guaranties of international obligations
and therefore would not be admitted to the League.

Senator Hitchcock declared that those who opposed the League were
thinking in the terms of the past. The fear expressed that the League
would open the way to European despotism was without foundation, for
the spirit of despotism had vanished. Democracy was the mastering
spirit in all the nine nations represented in the executive council,
yes, even in Japan. Such a league, he argued, with its provision of
arbitration and delay for calm consideration, would make war
improbable. The restrictions on armaments would save the great nations
billions and eliminate oppressive tax burdens.

One of the principal arguments against the League was that in joining
it America would have to renounce the Monroe Doctrine and relinquish
the right to attack any nation that attempted to establish itself in
the Western Hemisphere. Senator Hitchcock argued that the League of
Nations included the very purposes of the Monroe Doctrine in that it
prevented the aggression of nations upon each other. An unfriendly
act, or attack, upon any American republic, or upon the United States,
would at once be the subject of inquiry and action by the League of
Nations. America also would no longer be compelled to defend alone the
Western Hemisphere, but would be backed by the sympathy and help of
the League of Nations.

"We have been told that this is one of those entangling alliances
against which Washington warned us. I deny it. In Washington's day the
world was full of alliances, the nations of the world were seeking to
maintain, through the theories of the balance of power, their rival
interest. Alliances were for the very purpose of waging war, whereas
the League of Nations is a great covenant among the democracies of the
world for the purposes of preserving peace."

Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, Republican leader in the Senate,
expressed the definite opposition of his party to the League as
proposed in a speech before the Senate on February 28, 1919.

Senator Knox, Republican, of Pennsylvania, ex-Secretary of State and a
member of the Foreign Relations Committee, speaking on March 1, 1919,
before the Senate, expressed himself in favor of a modified League
that would preserve our sovereignty. The chief points in his argument
may be summarized.

The Central Powers must not be left out of the League, or it would
force them for mutual protection to form a second League of Nations,
which the neutral states would almost certainly join. The result would
be two great camps, each preparing for a new and greater
life-and-death struggle.

Even the term League of Nations was a misnomer, for according to the
proposed plan the nations of the world were divided into three
classes.

First.--Signatories to the covenant confined perhaps to the five great
Entente Powers--British Empire, France, Italy, Japan, and United
States.

Second.--States not signatory, but named in the protocol, including
possibly such Entente Powers, if any, as were not signatories, as well
as other states neutral in the war.

Third.--Those states which are neither signatories nor protocol states
which must furnish guaranties as to their intention to be bound by
their international obligations, to be admitted to the League.

Thus the League of Nations, said Senator Knox, in the sense of all the
nations was not created by the document, nor were the states members
of the League treated as equals. He pointed out the difficulties in
withdrawing from the League. "Once in this union we remain there no
matter how onerous its gigantic burdens may become."

The climax to the senatorial discussion came when Senator Lodge
circulated a proposal to reject the League of Nations constitution as
then drafted. Thirty-nine members of the next Senate, said Senator
Lodge, approved of the proposal, and read out their names. The
thirty-nine members of the next Senate, if they stood fast for
rejecting the League's constitution, would represent more than
one-third of the body which must ratify any treaty by a two-thirds
vote before it became effective.

Immediately after Congress adjourned on March 4, 1919, President
Wilson left Washington for New York, where he delivered an address on
the League in the evening of that date at the Metropolitan Opera
House.

President Wilson in his address covered much the same ground he had
traversed in his Boston speech, and paid his respects to the critics
of the covenant in somewhat scathing terms. He was amazed that there
should be in some quarters such ignorance of the state of the world.
"These gentlemen do not know what the mind of men is just now.
Everybody else does. I do not know where they have been closeted. I do
not know by what influences they have been blinded; but I do know that
they have been separated from the general currents of the thought of
mankind.... I have heard no counsel of generosity in their criticism.
I have heard no constructive suggestions. I have heard nothing except
'will it not be dangerous to us to help the world?' It will be fatal
to us not to help it."

After concluding his address President Wilson and party boarded the
_George Washington_ and sailed again for France.

The attacks on the League of Nations in the United States affected the
attitude of the French press and of the delegates in Paris, who had
been critical of the project. But as soon as it became apparent that
the Wilson program was in danger of defeat at home the press rallied
to its support and the delegates, fearing failure of the whole
project, became advocates of the covenant as it stood. Only Germany
denounced it as unjust to the German people. Italy gave unqualified
support, and England's attitude, as expressed through Mr. Balfour, was
that an immense responsibility rested on the American people. "They
have come into the war. Their action has had profound importance.
Their service to mankind in this crisis will make a great page in
their history. But that service is only half accomplished if they do
not take a share in the even more responsible labors of peace."

The effect of the assaults upon the League was to speed up the
preliminary work on the Peace Treaty.

CHAPTER XXI

REVISED COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS--THE TREATY OF PEACE

On April 28, 1919, the revised covenant of the League of Nations was
adopted by the plenary session of the Peace Conference without
divisions and without amendment. Sir Eric Drummond of Great Britain
was nominated the first secretary general of the League.

The covenant as drafted may be briefly summed up.

"The original members of the League of Nations shall be those of the
signatories which are named in the annex to this covenant, and also
such of those other states named in the annex as shall accede without
reservation to this covenant."

(In the annex to the covenant the original members of the League of
Nations signatory to the treaty of peace are given as follows: the
United States of America, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, British Empire,
Canada, Australia, South Africa, New South Wales, India, China, Cuba,
Czecho-Slovakia, Ecuador, France, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Hedjaz,
Honduras, Italy, Japan, Liberia, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Poland,
Portugal, Rumania, Serbia, Siam, and Uruguay. States invited to accede
to the covenant: Argentine Republic, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica,
Denmark, Netherlands, Norway, Paraguay, Persia, Salvador, Spain,
Sweden, Switzerland, and Venezuela.) It is interesting to note that
Mexico was not included among the states invited to join the League.

Article I, as revised, provides that "Any self-governing state,
dominion, or colony, not named in the annex may become a member of the
League if its admission is agreed to by two-thirds of the assembly,
provided it shall give effective guaranties of its sincere intention
to observe its international obligations and shall accept such
regulations as may be prescribed by the League in regard to its
military and naval forces and armaments.

"Any member of the League may, after two years' notice of its
intention, withdraw from the League, provided that all its
international obligations and all its obligations under this covenant
shall have been fulfilled at the time of its withdrawal."

Article IV, as revised, reads: "The council shall consist of
representatives of the United States of America, of the British
Empire, of France, of Italy, and of Japan, together with four other
members of the League. These four members of the League shall be
selected by the assembly from time to time in its discretion. Until
the appointment of the representatives of the four members of the
League first selected by the assembly, representatives of (blank)
shall be members of the council."

Two new paragraphs in this article provide specifically for one vote
for each member of the League in the council, which was understood
before, and providing also for one representative of each member of
the League.

[Illustration: The signers of the treaty for the United States:
President Woodrow Wilson, Robert Lansing, Henry White, Edward M.
House, Tasker H. Bliss; for the British Empire: David Lloyd-George,
Andrew Bonar Law, Viscount Milner, Arthur James Balfour, George N.
Barnes.]

[Illustration: Signature of Ch. J. Doherty and A. L. Sifton, Canada;
W. N. Hughes and Joseph Cook, Australia; Louis Botha and J. C. Smuts,
South Africa; W. F. Massey, New Zealand; Ed. S. Montagu and Sir Ganga
Singh, India; for France: Georges Clemenceau, S. Pichon, L. L. Klotz,
A. Tardieu, Jules Cambon.]

[Illustration: Signatures of delegates from Peru, Portugal, Rumania,
Jugoslavia, Siam, Czecho-Slovakia, Uruguay. Pages preceding were
delegates from Italy, Japan, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador,
Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Hedjaz, Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua,
Panama.]

[Illustration: Signatures and seals of the German delegates, Dr.
Hermann Muller and Dr. Bell.

Names of delegates, not previously given, who signed on behalf of the
Allied and Associated Powers, are: ITALY, Baron Sonnino, Marquis
Imperiali, S. Crespi; BELGIUM, Paul Hymans, Van den Heuvel, E.
Vandervelde; BOLIVIA, Ismael Montes; BRAZIL, P. Calogeras, Rodrigo
Octavio; CUBA, Antonio Sanchez de Bustamente; ECUADOR, Enrique Dorn y
de Alsua; GREECE, E. Venizelos, N. Politis; GUATEMALA, Joaquin Mendez;
HAITI, Terulien Guilbaud; HEDJAZ, Rustem Haidar, Abdul Hadi Anuni;
HONDURAS, Policarpo Bonilla; LIBERIA, C. D. B. King; NICARAGUA,
Salvador Chamorro; PANAMA, Antonio Burgos; PERU, Candamo; POLAND,
Paderewski, Dmowski; PORTUGAL, Costa, Soares; RUMANIA, Bratiano,
Coanda; JUGOSLAVIA, Pachitch, Trumbitch, Vesnitch; SIAM, Prince
Charoon, Prince Traislos Probandhu; CZECHO-SLOVAKIA, Kramarez, Benes;
URUGUAY, Buero.]

A new paragraph in Article V expressly incorporates the provision as
to the unanimity of voting, which was at first taken for granted. The
second paragraph of Article VI has added to it that a majority of the
assembly must approve the appointment of the secretary general.

In Article VII Geneva is named as the seat of the League, as before,
but the council are given power to establish it elsewhere if
subsequently desired.

A new paragraph in Article VII establishes equality of employment of
men and women by the League.

An added paragraph in Article XIII gives instances of disputes which
are generally suitable to arbitration, such disputes as to the
interpretation of a treaty, as to any question of international law,
as to the existence of any fact, which if established would constitute
a breach of any international obligation, or as to the extent and
nature of the reparation to be made for any such breach.

A new paragraph added to Article XV is an amendment regarding domestic
jurisdiction, that where the council finds that a question arising out
of an international dispute affects matters which are clearly under
the domestic jurisdiction of one or other of the parties, it is to
report to that effect and make no recommendation.

A new paragraph in Article XVI provides for expulsion from the League
when a member violates any covenant "by a vote of the council
concurred in by the representatives of all the other members of the
League represented thereon."

Article XXI was not in the first draft of the League covenant and
reads: "Nothing in this covenant shall be deemed to affect the
validity of international engagements, such as treaties of
arbitration, or regional understandings, such as the Monroe Doctrine,
for securing the maintenance of peace."

This amendment recognizing the validity of the Monroe Doctrine meets
the "inequality of voting power" criticism, and its inclusion in the
covenant was regarded as a personal triumph for President Wilson.

Article XXII provides that all agreements shall be unanimous and that
a nation must decide whether it is to be a mandatory for any other
nation.

Article XXIII contains a new clause providing for just treatment of
the aborigines, a clause looking toward prevention of the white slave
traffic and opium traffic, and a clause looking toward progress in
international prevention of disease.

Article XXV specifically mentions the Red Cross as one of the
international organizations which are to connect their work with the
work of the League.

Article XXVI permits the amendment of the covenant by a majority of
the states composing the assembly, instead of three-fourths of the
states, though it does not change the requirement in that matter with
regard to the vote of the council. A new paragraph was added to this
Article at the request of the Brazilian delegates in order to avoid
constitutional difficulties. It permits any member of the League to
dissent from an amendment, the effect of such dissent being withdrawal
from the League.

On May 7, 1919 (the anniversary of the sinking of the _Lusitania_),
the Treaty of Peace between the Allied and Associated Powers on the
one hand and Germany on the other was delivered to the German
plenipotentiaries at Versailles. Fifteen days were allowed for reply.

The treaty represents the work of more than a thousand experts who
were continuously engaged on the task for three and a half months. It
is the longest treaty ever drawn, totaling about 80,000 words. The
treaty does not deal with questions affecting Austria, Bulgaria, and
Turkey except to the extent of binding Germany to accept any agreement
reached with her old allies.

The covenant of the League of Nations is contained in the first
section of the treaty and in addition to its general duties others are
specified.

The League may question Germany at any time for a violation of the
neutralized zone east of the Rhine as a threat against the world's
peace. A high commissioner of Danzig will be appointed to guarantee
the independence of the free city, and arrange treaties between
Danzig, Germany, and Poland. It will appoint three out of five members
of the Sarre commission, oversee its régime and carry out the
plebiscite. The mandatory system will be applied to the former German
colonies and the League will act as a final court in the matter of the
plebiscites of the Belgian-German frontier and Kiel Canal disputes.

SECTION II.

BOUNDARIES OF GERMANY.

Germany cedes to France Alsace-Lorraine, 5,600 square miles to the
southwest, and to Belgium two small districts between Luxemburg and
Holland, totaling 382 square miles. To Poland she cedes the
southeastern point of Silesia beyond and including Oppeln, most of
Posen and West Prussia, 27,686 square miles. East Prussia is thus
isolated from the main body by a portion of Poland. Germany loses
dominion over the northeastern tip of East Prussia, forty square miles
north of the River Memel and the internationalized areas around
Danzig, 729 square miles, and the basin of the Sarre, 738 square
miles, between the western border of the Rhenish Palatinate of Bavaria
and the southeast corner of Luxemburg. The Danzig area consists of a V
between the Nogat and Vistula Rivers, made a W by the addition of a
similar V on the west including the city of Danzig. The southeastern
third of East Prussia and the area between East Prussia and the
Vistula north of latitude 53 degrees 3 minutes is to have its
nationality determined by popular vote, 5,785 square miles, and the
same with Schleswig, 2,787 square miles.

SECTION III.

BELGIUM.

Germany is to consent to the abrogation of the treaties of 1839 which
established Belgium as a neutral state, and she agrees to any
convention the Allied and Associated Powers may determine to replace
them.

She is to recognize Belgium's sovereignty over the contested territory
of Moresnet and part of Prussian Moresnet, and renounce in Belgium's
favor all rights over the circles of Eupen and Malmedy, whose
inhabitants may within six months protest the change, in whole or
part, the League of Nations to decide.

Germany renounces her various treaties and conventions with the Grand
Duchy of Luxemburg, all rights of exploitation of railroads, and
adheres to the abrogation of its neutrality, accepting in advance any
international agreement arrived at by the Powers.

Germany will not maintain fortifications, or armed forces, within
fifty kilometers east of the Rhine, hold maneuvers, or maintain works
to facilitate mobilization. In case of violation "she shall be
regarded as committing a hostile act against the powers who sign the
present treaty and as intending to disturb the peace of the world."

ALSACE-LORRAINE.

Alsace-Lorraine are restored to France with their frontiers as before
1871. Citizenship is regulated by detailed provisions distinguishing
those who are immediately restored to French citizenship, those who
have to make applications therefor, and those for whom naturalization
is open after three years. All public and private property of former
German sovereigns passes to France without payment or credit.
Ownership over railways and rights over tramway concessions and the
Rhine bridges pass to France.

For five years manufactured products of Alsace-Lorraine will be
admitted free of duty to Germany to a total amount not exceeding in
any year the average of the three years preceding the war. Textile
materials may be imported from Germany into Alsace-Lorraine and
reexported free of duty. For seven years, perhaps ten, the ports of
Kehl and Strassburg shall be administered by a French administrator
appointed by the Central Rhine Commission. Property rights will be
safeguarded in both ports and equality of treatment in traffic
assured nationals, vessels, and goods of all countries.

Contracts between Alsace-Lorraine and Germany are maintained, but
France has the right to annul them on grounds of public interest.
Judgments of courts hold in certain classes of cases, others require
first a judicial exequatur. War-time political condemnations are null
and void and the obligation to repay war fines is established, as in
other parts of Allied territory.

THE SARRE.

To compensate France for the destruction of her coal mines in the
north, Germany cedes to France full ownership of the coal mines in the
Sarre basin, their value to be estimated by the Reparation Commission
and credited against that account. France replaces the present owners,
whom Germany undertakes to indemnify. France will continue to supply
coal for present needs and contribute in just proportion to local
taxes. The basin extends from the frontier of Lorraine as reannexed to
France as far as St. Wendel, including on the west the Sarre valley as
far as Saarholzbach and on the east the town of Homburg.

To secure the rights and welfare of the population and guarantee to
France entire freedom in working the mines the League of Nations will
appoint a commission of five to govern the territory, one French, one
a native of Sarre, and three representing different countries other
than France and Germany. Existing German legislation will remain the
basis of the law, but the commission may make modifications after
consulting a local representative assembly which it will organize. It
will have taxing power for local purposes only. The assembly must
approve new taxes. The wishes of local labor organizations will be
considered in labor legislation and the labor program of the League.
French and other labor may be utilized freely; the former are at
liberty to belong to French unions. Pensions and social insurance will
be maintained by Germany and the Sarre Commission.

There will be no military service; a local gendarmerie will preserve
order. The people will preserve their local assemblies, religious
assemblies, schools, etc., but may only vote for local assemblies.
They will keep their present nationality except as they wish to change
it, and their property will be respected if they wish to leave the
territory. As a part of the French customs system there will be no
export tax on coal and metal products going to Germany, nor on German
products entering the basin and for five years no import duties on
products going and coming. For local consumption French money may
circulate without any restrictions.

After fifteen years a plebiscite will be held to discover if the
people wish a continuance of the régime under the League of Nations,
union with France, or union with Germany. The right to vote will
belong to all inhabitants over twenty, resident therein at the
signature. The League will take into account the opinions expressed
and decide the ultimate sovereignty. In any portion restored to
Germany the German Government must buy out French mines at their
appraised value, which if not paid for in six months pass finally to
France. In case that Germany should buy the mines, the League will
decide how much coal shall be annually sold to France.

SECTION IV.

"Germany recognizes the total independence of German-Austria in the
boundaries traced." She recognizes the independence of the
Czecho-Slovak state, including the autonomous territory of the
Ruthenians south of the Carpathians, accepting the frontiers as will
be determined, which in the case of the German frontier follows the
frontier of Bohemia in 1914.

POLAND.

Germany cedes to Poland the greater part of upper Silesia, Posen, and
the province of West Prussia on the left bank of the Vistula. A Field
Boundary Commission of seven, five representing Allied and Associated
Powers and one each representing Poland and Germany, shall be
constituted to delimit this boundary. Special provisions to protect
racial, linguistic or religious minorities and secure equitable
treatment of commerce for other nations will be laid down in a
subsequent treaty.

The southern and eastern frontiers of East Prussia as touching Poland
shall be fixed by plebiscites, the first in the regency of Allenstein
between the southern frontier of East Prussia and the northern
frontier, or Regierungsbezirk Allenstein, from where it meets the
boundary between East and West Prussia, to its junction with the
boundary between the circles of Oletsko and Angerburg, thence the
northern boundary of Oletsko to its junction with the present
frontier. The second plebiscite will be held in the area comprising
the circles of Stuhm and Rosenberg and the parts of the circles of
Marienburg and Marienwerder east of the Vistula.

In each case German troops and authorities will move out within
fifteen days of the peace and an international commission of five
members appointed by the Allied and Associated Powers will arrange for
a free, fair, and secret vote.

Regulations will be drawn up by the Allied and Associated Powers
assuring East Prussia full and equitable use and access of the
Vistula. A subsequent convention will fix terms between Poland,
Germany, and Danzig, to assure railway communication across German
territory on the right bank of the Vistula between Poland and Danzig,
while Poland shall grant free passage from East Prussia to Germany.
The northeastern corner of East Prussia about Memel is to be ceded by
Germany to the Associated Powers, the former agreeing to accept the
settlements made, in particular as regards nationality.

DANZIG.

Danzig and the territory near it is constituted a free city under
guaranty of the League of Nations. A high commission appointed by the
League and the president of Danzig shall draw up a constitution in
agreement with the representatives of the city, dealing with all
differences between the city and Poland. The boundaries of the city
shall be delimited by a commission appointed within six months of the
peace of representatives chosen by the Allied and Associated Powers
and one each for Germany and Poland. A convention, the terms to be
fixed by the Powers, will include Danzig in the Polish customs
frontiers through a free area in the port; insure Poland free use of
the city's waterways, docks, the control of the Vistula and the whole
railway system within the city, and telegraphic and telephonic
communication between Poland and Danzig; provides against
discrimination against Poles in the city, and places its foreign
relations and the diplomatic protection of its citizens abroad in
charge of Poland.

DENMARK.

The frontier between Germany and Denmark, will be fixed by the
self-determination of the population. Ten days from the peace German
troops and authorities shall evacuate the region north of the line
running from the mouth of the Schlei, south of Kappel, Schleswig, and
Friedrichstadt along the Eider to the North Sea south of Tönning; the
Workmen's and Soldiers' Councils shall be dissolved and the territory
administered by an international commission of five, of whom Norway
and Sweden shall be invited to name two.

This commission shall insure a free and secret vote, and draw a new
frontier on the basis of the plebiscite, Germany renouncing all
sovereignty over territories north of this line in favor of the
Associated Governments, who will hand them over to Denmark. All
military works on islands of Helgoland and Dune will be destroyed by
German labor under supervision of the Allies.

RUSSIA.

Germany agrees to respect the independence of all territories which
were part of the Russian Empire. Accepts abrogation of Brest-Litovsk
and other treaties, and recognizes all treaties of the powers with
states part of former Empire. The Allied and Associated Powers reserve
the right of Russia to obtain restitution and reparation on the
principles of present treaty.

SECTION V.

Outside Europe, Germany renounces all rights as to her own and her
allies' territories to all the Allied and Associated Powers and will
accept whatever measures are taken by the five powers.

GERMAN COLONIES.

Germany renounces in favor of the Allied and Associated Power her
overseas possessions. All property of the German Empire, or state,
passes to the government exercising authority in the territory.
Provision will be made for the repatriation of German nationals and of
German subjects holding property. Germany undertakes to pay damages to
French nationals in the Cameroons who suffered from acts of German
civil and military authorities between January, 1900, to August 1,
1914.

CHINA AND SIAM.

Germany renounces in favor of China all privileges and indemnities
resulting from the Boxer rebellion of 1901, and all public property
except diplomatic and consular establishments in the German
concessions of Tientsin and Hankow, and in other Chinese territory
except Kiauchau, and agrees to return to China all astronomical
instruments seized in 1900 and 1901. Germany accepts the abrogation of
concessions at Hankow and Tientsin, China agreeing to open them to
international use. Germany renounces all claims against China, or any
allied or associated government, for the internment or repatriation of
her citizens in China, and for seizure or liquidation of German
interests. She renounces in favor of Great Britain her state property
in the British concession at Canton, and of France and China.

Germany recognizes that all agreements with Siam ceased July 22, 1917.
All German property but consular and diplomatic premises pass to Siam.
Germany waives all claims against Siam for seizure of German property
during the war.

LIBERIA.

Germany renounces all rights under international arrangements of 1911
and 1912, regarding Liberia. All commercial treaties and agreements
between herself and Liberia are abrogated and she recognizes
Liberia's right to determine the status and condition of the
reestablishment of Germans in Liberia.

MOROCCO.

Germany renounces all her rights, titles, etc., under the act of
Algeciras and French-German conventions of 1909 and 1911, and all
arrangements with the Sherifian Empire. She undertakes not to
interfere in any negotiations as to Morocco between France and other
powers, accepts the French protectorate and renounces the
capitulations. The Sherifian Government shall have complete liberty of
action over German nationals. All German property may be sold and the
proceeds deducted from the reparation account.

EGYPT.

Germany recognizes the British Protectorate over Egypt and renounces
the capitulations and all treaties, etc., concluded by her with Egypt.
She undertakes not to intervene in any negotiations between Great
Britain and other powers. She consents to the transfer to Great
Britain of the powers given to the late Sultan of Turkey for securing
the free navigation of the Suez Canal. German nationals will be dealt
with as in Morocco. Anglo-Egyptian goods entering Germany shall enjoy
the same treatment as British goods.

Germany accepts all arrangements which the Allied and Associated
Powers make with Turkey and Bulgaria.

SHANTUNG.

Germany cedes to Japan all rights, etc., notably as to Kiauchau and
the railroads, mines, and cables acquired by her treaty with China of
1907 and agreements as to Shantung. All German rights to the railroad
from Tsingtau to Tsinan-fu, including mining rights, pass equally to
Japan, and the cables from Tsingtau to Shanghai and Che-foo free of
all charges.

SECTION VI.

THE GERMAN ARMY, ARMAMENTS, ETC.

The German army must be demobilized within two months of the peace.
Its strength may not exceed 100,000 including 4,000 officers, to be
devoted exclusively to maintaining internal order and control of
frontiers. The great German General Staff is abolished. The army
administrative service is reduced to one-tenth of the total in 1913
budget.

Customs officers, coast guards, etc., may not exceed the number in
1913. Local police may be increased with growth in population only,
and none of these may be assembled for military training.

Within three months of the peace all establishments manufacturing arms
and munitions of war except those specifically excepted must be closed
and their personnel dismissed. The amount of armament and munitions
allowed Germany is laid down in detail tables, all in excess to be
surrendered or rendered useless. The manufacture or importations of
asphyxiating, poisonous, or other gases is forbidden, as well as
importations of arms, munitions, and war material. Germany may not
manufacture such material for foreign governments.

Conscription is abolished. The enlisted personnel is to be maintained
by voluntary enlistments for a term of twelve consecutive years.
Officers remaining in the service must agree to serve to the age of
forty-five. Newly appointed officers agree to serve for twenty-five
years.

No military schools but those indispensable shall exist in Germany two
months after the peace. No associations, such as societies of
discharged soldiers, shooting or touring clubs, etc., may occupy
themselves with military matters. All measures of mobilization are
forbidden.

All fortified works in German territory within a zone of fifty
kilometers east of the Rhine shall be dismantled within three months.
Construction of new fortifications is forbidden. Fortified works on
southern and eastern front may remain. Interallied commissions will
see to the execution of the provisions for which a time limit is set,
the maximum named being three months. Germany must afford them every
facility to go to any part of Germany, pay their expenses, and cost of
labor and material necessary in destruction or surrender of army
equipment.

THE GERMAN NAVY.

The German navy must be demobilized within two months of the peace.
She will be allowed six small battleships, six light cruisers, twelve
destroyers, twelve torpedo boats and no submarines, either military or
commercial, with a personnel of 15,000 men, including officers, and no
reserve force of any character. Conscription is abolished, only
voluntary service being permitted, with a minimum period of
twenty-five years' service for officers and twelve for men. No member
of the German mercantile marine will be permitted any naval training.

All German vessels of war in foreign ports and the German high-sea
fleet interned at Scapa Flow will be surrendered, the final
disposition to be decided upon by the Allied and Associated Powers.
Germany must surrender forty-two modern destroyers, fifty modern
torpedo boats, and all submarines with their salvage vessels. War
vessels under construction must be broken up, other war vessels may be
placed in reserve, or used in commerce. Ships cannot be replaced
except those lost, until at the end of twenty years for battleships,
and fifteen years for destroyers. The largest armored ship permitted
Germany will be 10,000 tons. All German fortifications in the Baltic
defending the passages through the belts must be demolished. For three
months after the peace German wireless stations at Nauen, Hanover, and
Berlin will be permitted to send commercial messages only under
supervision of the Associated and Allied Powers, and no more may be
built.

CABLES--AIR FORCES.

Germany renounces all title to specified cables, the value of such as
were privately owned being credited to her against reparation
indebtedness. The armed forces of Germany must not include air forces
for more than 100 unarmed seaplanes. No dirigibles shall be kept. All
the air personnel must be demobilized within two months except for
1,000 men retained until October 1, 1919. No aviation grounds or
dirigible sheds are allowed within 150 kilometers of the Rhine, or the
eastern or southern frontiers. Existing installations will be
destroyed. Manufacture of aircraft is forbidden for six months. All
military and naval aeronautical material must be surrendered within
three months, except the 100 planes specified.

PRISONERS.

Repatriation of German prisoners and interned civilians will be
carried out without delay at Germany's expense by a mixed commission
of Allies and Germans. The Allies have the right to hold German
officers until Germany has surrendered persons guilty of offenses
against the laws and customs of war. Repatriation is conditional on
the immediate release of any Allied subjects still in Germany. Germany
is to restore all property belonging to Allied prisoners.

GRAVES.

Both parties will respect and maintain the graves of soldiers and
sailors buried on their territory and assist commissions charged with
identifying, registering, etc., erecting monuments over the graves,
and to afford each other facilities for repatriating the remains of
their soldiers.

SECTION VII

RESPONSIBILITIES.

"The Allied and Associated Powers publicly arraign William II of
Hohenzollern, formerly German Emperor, not for the offenses against
any criminal law, but for the supreme offense against international
morality and the sanctity of treaties."

Holland will be requested to surrender the ex-emperor, and a tribunal
will be set up composed of one judge from each of the five great
powers, with full guarantees of the right of the defense. It will fix
the penalty which should be imposed.

Persons accused of acts violating the laws and customs of war will be
tried and punished by military tribunals. If the charges affect the
nationals of only one state, they will be tried before a tribunal of
that state; if they affect the nationals of several states, they will
be tried by joint tribunals of the several states concerned. Germany
shall surrender all persons so accused and all documents and
information necessary to insure full knowledge of the incriminating
acts, the discovery of the offenders, etc.

SECTION VIII.

REPARATION AND RESTITUTION.

The Allied and Associated Governments affirm and Germany accepts the
responsibility of herself and her allies for causing all the loss and
damage to which the Allied and Associated Governments have been
subjected as a consequence of the war imposed upon them by the
aggression of Germany and her allies. The total obligation of Germany
to pay is to be determined and notified to her not later than May 1,
1921, by an Interallied reparations commission. At the same time a
schedule of payments to discharge the obligation within thirty years
shall be presented.... She further agrees to restore to the Allies
cash and certain articles which can be identified.

Germany shall pay within two years one thousand million pounds
sterling in either gold, goods, ships, etc.; this sum being included
in the first thousand million bond issue referred to later. Expenses
such as those of the army of occupation and payments for foodstuffs,
raw materials, etc., may be deducted at the Allies' discretion.

Germany further binds herself to pay all sums borrowed by Belgium from
her allies as a result of Germany's violation of the treaty of 1839,
up to November 11, 1918, and will at once issue and hand over to the
Reparations Commission 5 per cent gold bonds falling due in 1926.

Germany is required to make compensation for all damages caused to
civilians, such as injury caused by acts of war, exposure at sea,
maltreatment of prisoners; damages to the Allied peoples represented
by pensions and separation allowances, to property; damages to
civilians forced to labor; damages in the form of fines or levies
imposed by the enemy.

The sums for reparation which Germany is required to pay shall become
a charge upon her revenues prior to that for the service or discharge
of any domestic loan.

In case of voluntary default by Germany the Allied and Associated
Powers shall take measures which Germany agrees not to regard as acts
of war, and may include economic and financial prohibition and
reprisals.

The Reparations Commission shall consist of one representative of the
United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Belgium, a
representative of Serbia or Japan taking the place of the Belgian
representative when the interests of either country are particularly
affected, with all other Allied Powers entitled, when their claims are
under consideration, to the right of representation without voting
power. The commission shall permit Germany to give evidence regarding
her capacity to pay and assure her opportunity to be heard. Permanent
headquarters will be established at Paris, which will become the
exclusive agency of the Allies for reparations. Majority vote will
prevail, except that unanimity is required on questions involving the
sovereignty of the Allies, the cancellation of all, or part of
Germany's indebtedness, the time and manner of selling, negotiating,
etc., bonds issued by Germany.

The commission may require Germany to give issues of bonds from time
to time to cover claims not otherwise satisfied. Bond issues are
required presently of Germany in acknowledgment of its debt as
follows: 20,000,000,000 marks gold payable not later than May 1, 1921,
without interest; 40,000,000,000 marks gold bonds bearing interest at
5 per cent under terms fixed by the commission. Interest on Germany's
debt will be 5 per cent., unless otherwise determined by the
commission. Payments not made in gold may be accepted in the form of
properties, commodities, businesses, rights, concessions, etc.

The German Government recognizes the right of the Allies to the
replacement ton for ton and class for class of all merchant ships and
fishing boats lost or damaged owing to the war, and cedes to the
Allies all German merchant ships of 1,600 tons gross, and upward;
one-half of her ships between 1,600 and 1,000 tons gross, and
one-quarter of her steam trawlers and other fishing boats, to be
delivered within two months to the Reparations Commission. Germany
further agrees to build as reparation merchant ships to the amount not
exceeding 200,000 tons gross annually during the next five years. All
ships used for inland navigation taken by Germany from the Allies are
to be restored within two months; the amount of loss not covered by
such restitution to be made up from Germany's river fleet up to 20 per
cent thereof.

To effect payment by deliveries in kind, Germany is required for a
period of years varying in each case to deliver coal, coal-tar
products in specific amounts to the Reparations Commission. The
conditions of delivery will be modified so as not to interfere with
Germany's industrial requirements.

DEVASTATED AREAS.

Germany undertakes to devote her economic resources directly to the
physical restoration of the invaded areas, replacing destroyed
articles by the delivery of animals, machinery, etc., existing in
Germany and to manufacture materials needed for reconstruction.

Germany is to deliver to France annually for ten years coal equivalent
to the prewar output of Nord and Pas de Calais mines, and the annual
production during above ten-year period. Germany further gives options
over ten years for delivery of 7,000,000 tons of coal per year to
France, in addition to the above, of 8,000,000 tons to Belgium, and of
an amount rising from 4,500,000 in 1919 to 1920 to 8,500,000 in 1923
to 1924 to Italy, at prices fixed as prescribed in the treaty.
Provision is also made for delivery to France of benzol, coal-tar and
ammonia.

Germany is to restore within six months the Koran of the Caliph Othman
to the King of the Hedjaz, the skull of the Sultan Okwawa to Great
Britain, and to the French Government papers and flags taken in 1870.
For destroying the Louvain library Germany is to hand over
manuscripts, rare books, etc., to the equivalent of those destroyed.

Germany is also to hand over to Belgium the wings of the altar piece
of "The Adoration of the Lamb" by the Van Eyck's, now in Berlin, and
the wings of the altar piece "The Last Supper," now in Berlin and
Munich.

FINANCE.

Powers to which German territory is ceded will assume a portion of the
German prewar debt, the amount to be fixed by the Reparations
Commission, except Alsace-Lorraine and Poland. If the value of the
German public property in ceded territory exceeds the amount of debt
assumed, the states to which the property is ceded will give credit on
reparation for the excess, excepting Alsace-Lorraine. Mandatory powers
will not assume any German debts, or give any credit for German
Government property. Germany renounces all right of representation on,
or control of, state banks, commissions, or like organizations.

Germany is required to pay the total cost of the armies of occupation
as long as they are maintained in German territory, this cost to be a
first charge on her resources. The cost of reparations is the next
charge, after making such provisions for payment for imports as the
Allies may deem necessary.

Germany is to deliver to the Allied and Associated Powers all sums
deposited in Germany by Turkey, and Austria-Hungary, in connection
with the financial support extended to them during the war, and to
transfer to the Allies all claims against Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria,
or Turkey in connection with agreements made during the war. Germany
confirms the renunciation of the treaties of Bucharest and
Brest-Litovsk.

Germany will expropriate any rights or interests of her nationals in
public utilities in ceded territories, or those administered by
mandatories, and in Turkey, China, Russia, Austria-Hungary and
Bulgaria, and transfer them to the Reparations Commission which will
credit her with their value.

SECTION IX.

OPIUM.

The contracting powers agree, whether or not they have signed and
ratified the opium convention of January 23, 1912, or signed the
special protocol opened at the Hague in accordance with the
resolutions by the third Opium conference in 1914, to bring the said
convention into force by enacting within twelve months of the peace
the necessary legislation.

RELIGIOUS MISSIONS.

The Allied and Associated Powers agree that the properties of
religious missions in territories belonging to or ceded to them shall
continue in their work under the control of the powers, Germany
renouncing all claims in their behalf.

SECTION X.

ECONOMIC QUESTIONS.

For six months Germany shall impose no tariff duties higher than the
lowest in force in 1914. For wines, oils, vegetable oils, artificial
silk, and washed and scoured wool, the restriction obtains for two and
a half years more. For five years, unless extended by the League,
Germany must give favored-nation clauses treatment to Allied and
Associated Powers. She shall impose no customs tariff for five years
on goods originating in Alsace-Lorraine and for three years on goods
originating in former German territory ceded to Poland, with the right
of observation of a similar exception for Luxemburg.

SHIPPING.

Ships of the Allied and Associated Powers shall for five years and
thereafter under condition of reciprocity, unless the League
otherwise decides, enjoy the same rights in German ports as German
vessels, and have most-favored-nation treatment in fishing, coast
trade, and towage, even in territorial waters. Ships of a country
having no seacoast may be registered at some place within its
territory.

UNFAIR COMPETITION.

Germany undertakes to give the trade of the Allied and Associated
Powers safeguards against unfair competition, suppressing the use of
false wrappings and markings and on condition of reciprocity to
respect the laws and judicial decisions of Allied and Associated
States in respect of regional appellations of wines and spirits.

TREATMENT OF NATIONALS.

Germany shall impose no exceptional taxes or restrictions upon the
nationals of Allied and Associated States for a period of five years,
and unless the League acts, for an additional five years German
nationality shall not continue to attach to a person who has become a
national of an Allied or Associated State.

MULTILATERAL CONVENTIONS.

Some forty multilateral conventions are renewed between Germany and
the Allied and Associated Powers, but special conditions are attached
to Germany's readmission to several. As to postal and telegraphic
conventions Germany must not refuse to make reciprocal agreements with
new states.

She must agree, as respects the radiotelegraphic convention, to
provisional rules to be communicated to her. In the North Sea
fisheries, and North Sea liquor traffic, convention rights of police
and inspection over associated fishing boats shall be exercised for at
least five years only by vessels of these powers. As to the
international railway union, Germany shall adhere to the new
convention when formulated. China, as to the Chinese customs tariff
arrangement of 1905 regarding Whangpoo and the Boxer indemnity of
1901; France, Portugal, and Rumania as to the Hague Convention of
1903, relating to civil procedure; and Great Britain and the United
States as to Article III of the Samoa Treaty of 1899, are relieved of
all obligations toward Germany.

BILATERAL TREATIES.

Each Allied and Associated State may renew any treaty with Germany, in
so far as is consistent with the Peace Treaty, by giving notice within
six months. Treaties entered into by Germany since August 1, 1914,
with other enemy states, and before or since that date with Rumania,
Russia, and parts of Russia, are abrogated, and concessions granted
under pressure by Russia to German subjects are annulled. The Allied
and Associated States are to enjoy most-favored-nation treatment under
treaties entered into by Germany before August 1, 1914, and during the
war.

PREWAR DEBTS.

Clearing houses will be established, one in Germany, and one in each
Allied and Associated State for the payment of prewar debts and those
from contracts suspended during the war. For adjustment of proceeds of
liquidation of enemy property and settlement of other obligations each
state participating assumes responsibility for debts owing its
nationals, to nationals of enemy states, except in case of prewar
insolvency of the debtor. Proceeds of sale of enemy properties in each
participating state may be used to pay the debts owed the nationals of
that state. Disputes to be settled by the courts of the debtor
country.

ENEMY PROPERTY.

Germany shall restore or pay for all enemy property seized or damaged
by her, the amount to be fixed by a mixed tribunal. German property
within Allied or Associated States may be liquidated as compensation
for property of their nationals not paid for by Germany, who will
compensate her nationals for such losses.

Prewar contracts between Allied and Associated States--excepting the
United States, Japan, and Brazil,--and German nationals are canceled
except for debts for accounts already performed.

For the transfer of property, leases of land, mortgages, etc.,
arbitral tribunals of three members, one from Germany, and one each
chosen by Associated States, shall have jurisdiction over all
disputes.

INSURANCE.

Fire insurance contracts are not dissolved by the war even if premiums
have not been paid, but lapse at the date of the first premium falling
due three months after the peace. Life insurance contracts may be
restored by payment of accumulated premiums and interest. Marine
insurance contracts are dissolved by the outbreak of war except where
the risk insured against had already been incurred. Reinsurance
contracts are abrogated unless invasion has made it impossible for the
reinsured to find another reinsurer. Any Associated or Allied Power
may cancel all contracts running between its nationals and a German
life insurance company, the latter being obligated to hand over the
proportion of the assets attributable to such policies.

INDUSTRIAL PROPERTY.

Rights to industrial, literary, and artistic property are
reestablished. Special war measures of the powers are ratified, and
the right reserved to impose conditions on the use of German patents
and copyrights in the public interest. Except as between the United
States and Germany prewar licenses and rights to sue for infringements
committed during the war are canceled.

SECTION XI.

AERIAL NAVIGATION.

Aircraft of Allied and Associated Powers shall have full liberty of
passage, etc., and equal treatment with German planes in German
territory and with most-favored-nation planes as to commercial
traffic. Germany agrees to accept Allied certificates of
airworthiness, competency, etc., and to apply the convention relative
to aerial navigation concluded between the powers to her own aircraft
over her own territory.

SECTION XII.

TRANSIT, PORTS, WATERWAYS.

Germany shall grant freedom of transit through her territories by mail
or water to persons, goods, from or to any of the Allied and
Associated Powers without customs or restrictions. The powers shall
have equal rights with her own nationals in her ports and waterways.

Free zones existing in German ports on August 1, 1914, must be
maintained with due facilities as to warehouses, etc., without charge
except for use and administration.

The Elbe from the junction of the Ultava, the Ultava from Prague, the
Oder from Oppa, the Niemen from Grodno, and the Danube from Ulm are
declared international together with their connections, and will be
placed under international commissions.

The Rhine is placed under a central commission to meet at Strassburg,
within six months of the peace. Germany must give France all rights to
take water to feed canals between the two extreme points of her
frontiers. She must also hand over all drafts and designs for this
part of the river.

Belgium is permitted to build a Rhine-Meuse canal, Germany to
construct the part within her territory. The Central Rhine Commission
may extend its jurisdiction over the lower Moselle, upper Rhine and
lateral canals. Germany must cede to the Allied and Associated
Governments certain vessels and facilities on all these rivers as
specified by an arbiter named by the United States.

In addition to most-favored-nation treatment on her railways, Germany
agrees to cooperate in through-ticket services between Allied,
Associated, and other states, to allow the construction of
improvements and to conform her rolling stock to enable its
incorporation in trains of the Allied and Associated Powers.

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA.

To assure Czecho-Slovakia access to the sea toward the Adriatic she
may run her own through trains to Fiume and Trieste. Germany will
lease her spaces in Hamburg and Stettin, the detail to be worked out
by a commission.

THE KIEL CANAL.

The Kiel Canal shall be free and open to all ships of all nations at
peace with Germany; subjects, goods, ships to be treated on terms of
absolute equality, and no taxes may be imposed but those necessary for
upkeep and improvement.

SECTION XIII.

INTERNATIONAL LABOR ORGANIZATION.

Members of the League of Nations agree to establish a permanent
organization to promote international adjustment of labor conditions
to consist of an annual conference and a labor office, the former
composed of four representatives of each state, two from the
government and one each from employers and employed.

The international labor office will be established at Geneva as a part
of the League. It is to collect and distribute information on labor
throughout the world, publish a periodical, and prepare agenda for the
conference. The first conference will take place in October, 1919, at
Washington to discuss the eight-hour day, prevention of unemployment,
child labor, and similar questions.

Nine principles of labor conditions are recognized in the treaty. They
include the principle that labor should not be regarded as a mere
commodity; the right of association of employers and employees; a wage
adequate to maintain a reasonable standard of life; the eight-hour
day, or forty-eight hour week; a weekly rest of twenty-four hours,
including Sunday; abolition of child labor, education, and proper
physical development of children, equal pay for equal work for men and
women; equitable treatment of all workers lawfully resident therein,
including foreigners; a system of inspection in which women shall take
part.

SECTION XIV.

GUARANTIES.

As a guaranty for the execution of the treaty, German territory to the
west of the Rhine with the bridgeheads will be occupied by Allied and
Associated troops for fifteen years. If Germany faithfully carries out
conditions, certain districts, including the Cologne bridgehead, will
be evacuated in five years, certain other districts and territories
nearest the Belgian frontier after ten years, and remainder after
fifteen years.

If Germany fails to observe her obligations during occupation, or
after fifteen years, the whole or part of the areas will be
immediately reoccupied. If before the expiration of the fifteen years
Germany complies with all her treaty undertakings, the occupying
forces will be withdrawn immediately.

All German troops at present in territories east of the new frontier
shall return as soon as the Allies deem wise.

SECTION XV.

MISCELLANEOUS.

Germany agrees to recognize the full validity of the treaties of peace
and additional conventions to be concluded by the Allied and
Associated Powers with the powers allied with Germany, to agree to the
decisions to be taken as to the territories of Austria-Hungary,
Bulgaria, and Turkey, and to recognize the new states in the frontiers
to be fixed for them. Germany agrees not to put forward any pecuniary
claims against Allied or Associated Powers signing the present treaty
based on events previous to the coming into force of the treaty.

THE STORY OF CANADA IN THE GREAT WAR

EDITED AND COMPILED

BY

LIEUTENANT COLONEL JOHN A. COOPER

Late Commander of the 198th Battalion, Canadian Buffs

INTRODUCTION

By LIEUTENANT COLONEL JOHN A. COOPER

Late Commander of the 198th Battalion, Canadian Buffs

When the dark cloud broke on August 4, 1914, Canada was not wholly
unprepared. While not a militaristic people, Canadians had always
recognized that it was the duty of every able-bodied citizen to be
prepared to defend his country in case of need. That principle had
underlain the military policy of the nineteenth century both before
and after Confederation. Every citizen of fighting age was
theoretically a soldier, more or less prepared to take his share in
national defense.

To this was added, in later years, a feeling that some day Canadians
might be called upon to take a part in the defense of the British
Empire should it become engaged in a supreme struggle. This feeling
developed during the South African War when Canada took over the last
garrison duties from the Imperial forces as well as the naval stations
at Halifax and Esquimalt. The obligation of contributing men to
Imperial defense was admitted and discussed at the various Imperial
Conferences between 1900 and 1914. Assisted by British experts,
certain military and naval preparations had been made with the
intention of meeting any national emergency and any imperial necessity
which might arise.

While these grave obligations may have rested lightly on the majority
of the people engaged in agriculture, commerce, and railway building,
the country was not mentally unprepared for the great call of August,
1914. This explains in part why the recruiting of her early battalions
and the prompt dispatch of her first contingent of 33,000 men was so
enthusiastically accomplished. Division followed division until in
about fifteen months Canada had a fighting army corps in France. This
accomplishment surprised herself not more than it surprised the Allies
and the enemy. Canada's enlistment during the five years of activity
totaled one-thirteenth of her population. Over four hundred thousand
men, out of a population of about eight millions, actually crossed the
ocean. Four divisions fought as such in France. Railway troops worked
with every British Army, and forestry battalions did almost all the
work of that nature required to supply the needs of both French and
British forces on the western front. The casualties among Canadian
troops were quite equal to those sustained by the more numerous armies
of the United States, because of the greater duration of Canadian
service.

Such success as the Canadians had in fighting was due largely to
inheritance and environment. Many of those who fought were of British
birth or were English, Scotch, Irish, or Welsh once or twice removed.
The military instincts of the British and French races had been
preserved to a remarkable degree in the Dominion. Added to this was
the energy, adaptability, and initiative developed in a people living
in small communities scattered through the vast open spaces of a
country almost equal in area to the whole of Europe. The pluck of the
pioneer, the tenacity of the settler, the self-reliance of the rider
of the plains, the initiative of the woodsman, the skill of the
shantyman and the prospector--all these combined to give the Canadian
army a quality second to none among those engaged in the Great World
War.

Remarkable also was the development of officer ability. The Canadian
army, after the first two years, was officered entirely by Canadians.
The business man, with his experience in organization and executive,
became a military administrator in a wonderfully short space of time.
The corps commander had never been in any military school except the
Canadian militia. Of the seven or eight men who served as divisional
commanders, not more than three could qualify as professional soldiers
before the war. Of the brigadiers and battalion commanders probably 90
per cent had never attended a military school for more than a month.
Canada's army was a citizen army, commanded and administered by men
without business training. Such professional soldiers as Canada had
before the war became administrators rather than leaders in battle.
The war developed so much that was new in tactics and technique that
the militia officer had almost an equal chance with the so-called
military expert.

If the individual soldier ranked high in initiative and valor, he also
must be credited with a loyalty to discipline and to his national
traditions. He quickly acquired steadiness and obedience to his
officers. He respected himself and his superiors. While never servile
nor obsequious, he rendered such service as made the fighting units
effective because of their cohesion and compactness. That was
remarkably exhibited in the first great engagement in which Canadians
took part, the Second Battle of Ypres. It was equally in evidence at
Amiens, Arras, Cambrai, and Mons during the final period of the war.
The Canadian never forgot he was a Canadian. He had such a sublime
faith in himself and in his army as a whole, that his ambition was
only fully realized when he was asked to do more than was usually
asked of a soldier in this titanic struggle. He never despised the
enemy, but he never lost the feeling that he was physically and
mentally the enemy's superior. Excepting, perhaps, the Guards
Division, the Fifty-first Division, and the Australians, the Canadian
army yielded the palm to no portion of the British fighting forces.

Finally, Canadian success in the field of war was but a reflection of
the determination of those who remained at home and who with wonderful
fortitude, self-sacrifice, and determination backed the army to the
limit. There were few tears and less mawkishness when the battalions
moved out from their home towns on the long trail. The sentiment of
the time was stern because of the prevailing spirit of duty and
responsibility. But no nation has paid more honor to those who served
nor has done more toward reestablishing the warrior in citizen life
than have the Canadian people. If the pay of the soldier was good and
the allowance to his dependents adequate, the effort and money
expended on his reestablishment have been most generous. In raising
Red Cross gratuities and other patriotic funds, the motto of Canadians
was "Give till it hurts." In the production of food and of war
material, the nation accomplished the seemingly impossible. In
subscriptions to the national loans, patriotism reached heights
undreamed of by bankers and financial experts. Nearly seventy million
shells, made and exported by a country that never before made an
explosive instrument of this kind; the purchase of over two thousand
million dollars worth of Dominion Government bonds by a people who had
never bought a million of such in their history--these are the
tangible results by which one may measure the depth of Canadian
loyalty and determination.

When the war broke out, the Hon. (afterward Sir) Sam Hughes was
Minister of Militia and Defense. He possessed militia experience
extending over many years and had seen active service in South Africa.
The possibility of war in Europe in which the Empire troops would be
engaged had long been in his mind, and he had studied in advance the
possibilities of such a situation. Consequently when the first
contingent was authorized he proceeded to discharge both the civil
duties of Minister of Militia and the military duties of Chief of
Staff. He it was who recruited, organized, administered, and commanded
this first Canadian army. He was the driving power which brought
success in the speedy dispatch of the first contingent and the raising
and the training of subsequent divisions.

This very success in the end brought a change. General Hughes
centralized too much power in himself to please all those with whom he
was associated. The purchasing of supplies for the army was taken from
his department and put in charge of a purchasing board. A Shell
Committee was formed at his suggestion and this later grew into the
Imperial Munitions Board. The administration of the troops in England
was gradually organized and eventually placed under General (afterward
Sir Richard) Turner at Argyll House, London. The control of the army
in the field passed as a matter of course to the British authorities,
who were responsible for food, clothing, transport, and
administration from the moment the troops crossed the Channel.

Sir Sam Hughes resigned his post as Minister of Militia in the autumn
of 1916. He was succeeded by Sir Edward Kemp, who later went to
England as Minister of the Overseas Forces of Canada. His place in
Canada was taken by General The Hon. S. C. Mewburn, who remained
Minister for some time after the war closed.

In the field the first commanding officer of the little Canadian army
was General Alderson, an English officer of experience. He was in
charge when the First Division made its unique reputation at the
Second Battle of Ypres. Later on General Byng, a younger English
officer, was selected to command the corps, which he did with complete
success. In process of time a Canadian was selected in the person of
General (afterward Sir) Arthur W. Currie. He took over in 1917 and
commanded with general satisfaction for the remainder of the war. On
his return to Canada he was made Inspector General, the highest purely
military office in the Canadian army next to that of the Governor
General who is Commander in Chief.

After the Fifth Division was filled up, the unsystematic practice of
sending reenforcements overseas by battalions and batteries was
discontinued. In January, 1917, a new method of furnishing drafts was
outlined. This necessitated the reorganizing of the whole army on a
territorial basis. There was created in each military district in
Canada a home battalion, with corresponding battalions in England and
in France. The scheme was as follows:

M. D. No. 1--Western Ontario Regiment (one depot battalion in Canada,
two reserve battalions in England, and 1st, 18th, 160th, 161st, and 2d
Pioneers in the field).

M. D. No. 2--1st Central Ontario Regiment (3d, 4th, 5th, 15th, 20th,
75th, 123d, 124th, 134th, 198th, and 208th Bus.).--2d Central Ontario
Regiment (4th C. M. R., 54th, 58th, 102d, 116th, 119th, 125th, and
164th).

M. D. No. 3--Eastern Ontario Regiment (P. P. C. L. I., 2d, 21st, 38th,
156th).

M. D. No. 4--1st Quebec Regiment (5th C. M. R., 13th, 14th, 24th, 42d,
87th).

M. D. No. 5--2d Quebec Regiment (22d and 159th).

M. D. No. 6--Nova Scotia Regiment (R. C. R., 25th, 85th, 185th).

M. D. No. 7--New Brunswick Regiment (26th, 100th).

M. D. No. 10--Manitoba Regiment (8th, 16th, 27th, 43d, 52d, 78th, and
107th Regt).

M. D. No. 11--British Columbia Regiment (2d C. M. R., 7th, 29th, 47th,
and 72d).

M. D. No. 12--Saskatchewan Regiment (3d C. M. R., 5th, 28th. and
46th).

M. D. No. 13--Alberta Regiment (10th, 31st, 49th, and 50th).

The idea behind this scheme was to effect a closer connection between
the military patriotism and pride of the home distinct with the
battalions serving overseas. The hope was distinctly expressed that
"the Canadian militia should inherit the honors and distinctions won
in battle by the Canadian Expeditionary Force."

There is no question that this measure was founded in wisdom and that
it worked tolerably well. It was not always possible to maintain it
exactly, since the smaller provinces had too many battalions for their
resources in men. Consequently Ontario, which produced most men
proportionately, was called upon to reenforce units credited to other
provinces. For example, the 2d C. M. R. ceased to be a British
Columbian unit early in 1918, although its commanding officer was a
British Columbian who continued to give British Columbia officers the
preference. This, however, was quite on a par with the selection of
generals in France; for, when the war closed, Ontario which
contributed half the men in the ranks, did not have a single brigadier
or divisional commander on active duty.

It is also interesting to note that the hope of the originators of the
scheme with regard to the old militia inheriting the "Honors and
distinctions" of the C. E. F. has been negatived by the action of the
militia authorities of 1919 in disbanding all militia units which
existed previous to the war. This action seems to have been based on
a mistaken conception of the important part played by the Canadian
militia from 1860 to 1914.

[Illustration: General Sir Arthur William Currie, who commanded the
Canadian Army Corps in France from 1917 to 1919. He was later made
Canadian Inspector General and Principal of McGill University.]

Early in 1918 came one of the greatest discussions of policy that ever
engaged the Canadian army leaders. The British had decided to reduce
their brigades from four battalions to three to conform to the German