d
like to be in it!" Unfortunately "father's" predilection to fight is
not wholly confined to the Irish!

But although men like to fight, war is not inevitable. War is not of
God's making. War is a crime committed by men and, therefore, when
enough people say it shall not be, it cannot be. This will not happen
until women are allowed to say what they think of war. Up to the
present time women have had nothing to say about war, except pay the
price of war--this privilege has been theirs always.

History, romance, legend and tradition having been written by men, have
shown the masculine aspect of war and have surrounded it with a false
glory and have sought to throw the veil of glamour over its hideous
face. Our histories have followed the wars. Invasions, conquests,
battles, sieges make up the subject-matter of our histories.

Some glorious soul, looking out upon his neighbors, saw some country
that he thought he could use and so he levied a heavy tax on the
people, and with the money fitted out a splendid army. Men were called
from their honest work to go out and fight other honest men who had
never done them any harm; harvest fields were trampled by their horses'
feet, villages burned, women and children fled in terror, and perished
of starvation, streets ran blood and the Glorious Soul came home
victorious with captives chained to his chariot wheel. When he drove
through the streets of his own home town, all the people cheered, that
is, all who had not been killed, of course.

What the people thought of all this, the historians do not say. The
people were not asked or expected to think. Thinking was the most
unpopular thing they could do. There were dark damp dungeons where
hungry rats prowled ceaselessly; there were headsmen's axes and other
things prepared for people who were disposed to think and specially
designed to allay restlessness among the people.

The "people" were dealt with in one short paragraph at the end of the
chapter: "The People were very poor" (you wouldn't think they would
need to say that, and certainly there was no need to rub it in), and
they "ate black bread," and they were "very ignorant and
superstitious." Superstitious? Well, I should say they would
be--small wonder if they did see black cats and have rabbits cross
their paths, and hear death warnings, for there was always going to be
a death in the family, and they were always about to lose money! The
People were a gre