Raemaekers\' Cartoons
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RAEMAEKERS' CARTOONS
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[Illustration:
(Transcriber's note: a signed Portrait of Louis Raemaekers)
Photograph by Miss D. Compton Collier]
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RAEMAEKERS' CARTOONS
WITH ACCOMPANYING NOTES BY
WELL-KNOWN ENGLISH WRITERS
WITH AN APPRECIATION FROM H. H. ASQUITH,
PRIME MINISTER OF ENGLAND
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1916
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Copyright, 1916, by
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
languages, including the Scandinavian.
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LIST OF CARTOONS AND THE DESCRIPTIVE NOTES
PAGE
PORTRAIT OF LOUIS RAEMAEKERS
INTRODUCTION Francis Stopford
AN APPRECIATION FROM THE PRIME MINISTER H. H. Asquith
CHRISTENDOM AFTER TWENTY CENTURIES Francis Stopford 8
A STABLE PEACE Eden Phillpotts 10
THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS E. Charles Vivian 12
BERNHARDIISM Hilaire Belloc 14
FROM LIEGE TO AIX-LA-CHAPELLE Francis Stopford 16
SPOILS FOR THE VICTORS Hilaire Belloc 18
THE VERY STONES CRY OUT Bernard Vaughan, S. J. 20
SATAN'S PARTNER G. K. Chesterton 22
THROWN TO THE SWINE The Dean of St. Paul's 24
THE LAND MINE Herbert Warren 26
"FOR YOUR MOTHERLAND" Eden Phillpotts 28
THE GERMAN LOAN E. Charles Vivian 30
EUROPE, 1916 G. K. Chesterton 32
THE NEXT TO BE KICKED OUT--DUMBA'S MASTER Arthur Pollen 34
THE FRIENDLY VISITOR H. DeVere Stacpoole 36
"TO YOUR HEALTH, CIVILIZATION!" The Dean of St. Paul's 38
FOX TIRPITZ PREACHING TO THE GEESE Herbert Warren 40
THE PRISONERS Eden Phillpotts 42
IT'S UNBELIEVABLE Hilaire Belloc 44
KREUZLAND, KREUZLAND UeBER ALLES The Dean of St. Paul's 38
THE EX-CONVICT Hilaire Belloc 48
MISS CAVELL G. K. Chesterton 50
THE HOSTAGES John Oxenham 52
KING ALBERT'S ANSWER TO THE POPE E. Charles Vivian 54
THE GAS FIEND Eden Phillpotts 56
THE GERMAN TANGO John Buchan 58
THE ZEPPELIN TRIUMPH W. L. Courtney 60
KEEPING OUT THE ENEMY H. DeVere Stacpoole 62
THE GERMAN OFFER Hilaire Belloc 64
THE WOLF TRAP Herbert Warren 66
AHASUERUS II John Buchan 68
OUR CANDID FRIEND The Dean of St. Paul's 70
PEACE AND INTERVENTION Boyd Cable 72
LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD H. DeVere Stacpoole 74
THE SEA MINE Arthur Pollen 76
"SEDUCTION" G. K. Chesterton 78
MURDER ON THE HIGH SEAS Arthur Pollen 80
AD FINEM John Oxenham 82
"U'S" Arthur Pollen 84
MATER DOLOROSA Eden Phillpotts 86
"GOTT STRAFE ITALIEN!" Ralph D. Blumenfeld 88
SERBIA Sir Sidney Lee 90
"JUST A MOMENT--I'M COMING" Boyd Cable 92
THE HOLY WAR Boyd Cable 94
"GOTT MIT UNS" Eden Phillpotts 96
THE WIDOWS OF BELGIUM The Dean of St. Paul's 98
THE HARVEST IS RIPE William Mitchell Ramsay 100
"UNMASKED" Boyd Cable 102
THE GREAT SURPRISE G. K. Chesterton 104
THOU ART THE MAN! John Oxenham 106
SYMPATHY Ralph D. Blumenfeld 108
THE REFUGEES Joseph Thorp 110
"THE JUNKER" Clive Holland 112
"AU MILIEU DE FANTOMES TRISTES ET SANS NOMBRE" Alice Meynell 114
BLUEBEARD'S CHAMBER William Mitchell Ramsay 116
THE RAID Arthur Pollen 118
BETTER A LIVING DOG THAN A DEAD LION Arthur Shadwell 120
"THE BURDEN OF THE INTOLERABLE DAY" William Mitchell Ramsay 122
EAGLE IN HEN-RUN Boyd Cable 124
THE FUTURE Sidney Lee 126
CHRIST OR ODIN? Bernard Vaughan 128
FERDINAND Edmund Gosse 130
JUGGERNAUT John Oxenham 132
MICHAEL AND THE MARKS W. M. J. Williams 134
THEIR BERESINA John Oxenham 136
NEW PEACE OFFERS W. L. Courtney 138
THE SHIELDS OF ROSSELAERE William Mitchell Ramsay 140
THE OBSTINACY OF NICHOLAS Joseph Thorp 142
THE ORDER OF MERIT Ralph D. Blumenfeld 144
THE MARSHES OF PINSK Alice Meynell 146
GOD WITH US John Buchan 148
FERDINAND THE CHAMELEON G. K. Chesterton 150
THE LATIN SISTERS Horace Annesley Vachell 152
MISUNDERSTOOD Joseph Thorp 154
PROSPERITY REIGNS IN FLANDERS Cecil Chesterton 156
THE LAST HOHENZOLLERN E. Charles Vivian 158
PIRACY Arthur Pollen 160
"WEEPING, SHE HATH WEPT" Father Bernard Vaughan 162
MILITARY NECESSITY Eden Phillpotts 164
LIBERTE! LIBERTE, CHERIE! John Oxenham 166
I--"A KNAVISH PIECE OF WORK" George Birdwood 168
II--"SISYPHUS,--HIS STONE" George Birdwood 170
CONCRETE FOUNDATIONS A. Shadwell 172
PALLAS ATHENE Herbert Warner 174
THE WONDERS OF CULTURE Clive Holland 176
FOLK WHO DO NOT UNDERSTAND THEM Bernard Vaughan 178
ON THE WAY TO CALAIS Eden Phillpotts 180
VON BETHMANN-HOLLWEG AND TRUTH Herbert Warren 182
VAN TROMP AND DE RUYTER Arthur Pollen 184
WAR AND CHRIST Cecil Chesterton 186
BARBED WIRE E. Charles Vivian 188
THE HIGHER POLITICS Boyd Cable 190
THE LOAN GAME W. M. J. Williams 192
A WAR OF RAPINE E. Charles Vivian 194
THE DUTCH JUNKERS A. Shadwell 196
THE WAR MAKERS John Oxenham 198
THE CHRISTMAS OF KULTUR A. Shadwell 200
SERBIA Horace Annesley Vachell 202
THE LAST OF THE RACE Arthur Pollen 204
THE CURRICULUM W. M. J. Williams 206
THE DUTCH JOURNALIST TO HIS BELGIAN CONFRERE G. K. Chesterton 208
A BORED CRITIC Eden Phillpotts 210
"THE PEACE WOMAN" Clive Holland 212
THE SELF-SATISFIED BURGHER W. L. Courtney 214
THE DECADENT John Oxenham 216
LIQUID FIRE Clive Holland 218
NISH AND PARIS Sidney Lee 220
GOTT STRAFE ENGLAND! Cecil Chesterton 222
THE PACIFICIST KAISER Sidney Lee 224
DINANT W. R. Inge 226
"HESPERIA" (WOUNDED FIRST) H. DeVere Stacpoole 228
GALLIPOLI G. K. Chesterton 230
THE BEGINNING OF THE EXPIATION G. K. Chesterton 232
THE SHIRKERS Sidney Lee 234
ONE OF THE KAISER'S MANY MISTAKES John Oxenham 236
BELGIUM IN HOLLAND Edmund Gosse 238
SERBIA William Mitchell Ramsay 240
JACKALS IN THE POLITICAL FIELD Herbert Warren 242
A LETTER FROM THE GERMAN TRENCHES Cecil Chesterton 244
HIS MASTER'S VOICE A. Shadwell 246
HUN GENEROSITY Horace Annesley Vachell 248
EASTER, 1915 G. K. Chesterton 250
PAN GERMANICUS AS PEACE MAKER Alfred Stead 252
GOTT MIT UNS Cecil Chesterton 254
OUR LADY OF ANTWERP W. L. Courtney 256
DEPORTATION Cecil Chesterton 258
THE GERMAN BAND John Oxenham 260
ARCADES AMBO Horace Annesley Vachell 262
"IS IT YOU, MOTHER?" Sidney Lee 264
THE FATE OF FLEMISH ART AT THE HANDS OF KULTUR
Arthur Morrison 266
THE GRAVES OF ALL HIS HOPES H. DeVere Stacpoole 268
"MY SIXTH SON IS NOW LYING HERE--WHERE ARE YOURS?"
H. DeVere Stacpoole 270
BUNKERED W. R. Inge 272
GOTT STRAFE VERDUN W. R. Inge 274
THE LAST THROW E. Charles Vivian 276
THE ZEPPELIN BAG Clive Holland 278
"COME IN, MICHAEL, I HAVE HAD A LONG SLEEP" Horace Annesley Vachell 280
FIVE ON A BENCH G. K. Chesterton 282
WHAT ABOUT PEACE, LADS? W. R. Inge 284
THE LIBERATORS Joseph Thorp 286
TOM THUMB AND THE GIANT E. Charles Vivian 288
"WE HAVE FINISHED OFF THE RUSSIANS" E. Charles Vivian 290
MUDDLE THROUGH Clive Holland 292
MY ENEMY IS MY BEST FRIEND William Mitchell Ramsay 294
HOW I DEAL WITH THE SMALL FRY Clive Holland 296
THE TWO EAGLES A. Shadwell 298
LONDON INSIDE THE SAVOY E. Charles Vivian 300
LONDON OUTSIDE THE SAVOY E. Charles Vivian 302
THE INVOCATION A. Shadwell 304
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INTRODUCTION
Louis Raemaekers will stand out for all time as one of the supreme
figures which the Great War has called into being. His genius has been
enlisted in the service of mankind, and his work, being entirely sincere
and untouched by racial or national prejudice, will endure; indeed, it
promises to gain strength as the years advance. When the intense
passions, which have been awakened by this world struggle, have faded
away, civilization will regard the war largely through these wonderful
drawings.
* * * * *
Before the war had been in progress many weeks the cartoons in the
Amsterdam _Telegraaf_ attracted attention in the capitals of Europe,
many leading newspapers reproducing them. The German authorities, quick
to realize their full significance, did all in their power to suppress
them. Through German intrigue Raemaekers has been charged in the Dutch
Courts with endangering the neutrality of Holland--and acquitted. A
price has been set on his head, should he ever venture over the border.
When he crossed to England, his wife received anonymous post-cards,
warning her that his ship would certainly be torpedoed in the North Sea.
The Cologne _Gazette_, in a leading article on Holland, threatens that
country that "after the War Germany will settle accounts with Holland,
and for each calumny, for each cartoon of Raemaekers, she will demand
payment with the interest that is due to her." Not since Saul and the
men of Israel were in the valley of Elah fighting with the Philistines
has so unexpected a champion arisen. With brush and pencil this Dutch
painter will do even as David did with the smooth stone out of the
brook: he will destroy the braggart Goliath, who, strong in his own
might, defies the forces of the living God.
When Mr. Raemaekers came to London in December, he was received by the
Prime Minister, and was entertained at a complimentary luncheon by the
Journalists of the British capital. Similar honour was conferred on him
on his second visit. He was the guest of honour at the Savage Club; the
Royal Society of Miniature Painters elected him an Honorary Member. But
it has been left to France to pay the most fitting recognition to his
genius and to his services in the cause of freedom and truth. The Cross
of the Legion of Honour has been presented to him, and on his visit to
Paris this month a special reception is to be held in his honour at La
Sorbonne, which is the highest purely intellectual reward Europe can
confer on any man.
* * * * *
The great Dutch cartoonist is now in his forty-seventh year. He was born
in Holland, his father, who is dead, having been the editor of a
provincial newspaper. His mother, who is still alive and exceedingly
proud of her son's fame, is a German by birth, but rejoices that she
married a Dutchman. Mr. Raemaekers, who is short, fair, and of a ruddy
countenance, looks at least ten years younger than his age. He took up
painting and drawing when quite young and learnt his art in Holland and
in Brussels. All his life he has lived in his own country, but with
frequent visits to Belgium and Germany, where, through his mother, he
has many relations. Thus he knows by experience the nature of the
peoples whom he depicts.
For many years he was a landscape painter and a portrait painter, and
made money and local reputation. Six or seven years ago he turned his
attention to political work, and became a cartoonist and caricaturist on
the staff of the Amsterdam _Telegraaf_, thus opening the way to a fame
which is not only world-wide but which will endure as long as the memory
of the Great War lasts. His ideas come to him naturally and without
effort. Suggestions do not assist him; they hinder him when he
endeavours to act on them. He is an artist to his finger-tips and throws
the whole force of his being into his work. Some years ago he married a
Dutch lady, who is devoted to music, and they have three children, two
girls and a boy (the youngest); the eldest is now twelve. Very happy in
his home, Mr. Raemaekers has no ambitions outside it, except to go on
with his work. A Teuton paper has declared that Raemaekers' cartoons are
worth at least two Army Corps to the Allies.
The strong religious tendency which so often distinguishes his work
makes one instinctively ask to what Church does the artist belong. He
replies that he belongs to none, but was brought up a Catholic, and his
wife a Protestant, and the differences which in later life severed each
from their early teaching caused them to meet on common ground. But the
intense Christian feeling of these drawings is beyond cavil or dispute:
they again and again bring home to the heart the vital truths of the
Faith with irresistible force, and the artist ever expresses the
Christianity, not perhaps of the theologian, but of the honest and
kindly man of the world.
Praise has been bestowed upon his work by several German
papers--qualified praise. The _Leipziger Volkszeitung_ has declared that
Raemaekers' cartoons show unimpeachable art and great power of
execution, but that they all lack one thing. They have no wit, no
spirit. Which is true--in a sense. They do lack wit--German wit; they do
lack spirit--German spirit. And what German wit and German spirit may be
one can comprehend by a study of Raemaekers' cartoons.
* * * * *
It has been well said that no man living amidst these surging seas of
blood and tears has come nearer to the role of Peacemaker than
Raemaekers. The Peace which he works for is not a matter of arrangement
between diplomatists and politicians: it is the peace which the
intelligence and the soul of the Western world shall insist on in the
years to be. God grant it be not long delayed, but it can only come when
the enemy is entirely overthrown and the victory is overwhelming and
complete.
Empire House, FRANCIS STOPFORD,
Kingsway, London. Editor, _Land and Water_.
February, 1916.
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AN APPRECIATION FROM THE PRIME MINISTER
Downing Street,
Whitehall, S. W.
Mr. Raemaekers' powerful work gives form and colour to the menace which
the Allies are averting from the liberty, the civilization, and the
humanity of the future. He shows us our enemies as they appear to the
unbiassed eyes of a neutral, and wherever his pictures are seen
determination will be strengthened to tolerate no end of the war save
the final overthrow of the Prussian military power.
Signed H. H. ASQUITH.
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CHRISTENDOM AFTER TWENTY CENTURIES
These pictures, with their haunting sense of beauty and their biting
satire, might almost have been drawn by the finger of the Accusing
Angel. As the spectator gazes on them the full weight of the horrible
cruelty and senseless futility of war overwhelms the soul, and, sinking
helplessly beneath it, he feels inclined to assume the same attitude of
despair as is shown in "Christendom After Twenty Centuries."
"War is war," the Germans preached and practised, and no matter how
clement and correct may be the humanity of the Allies, we realize
through these pictures what the human race has to face and endure once
peace be broken. Is "Christendom After Twenty Centuries" to be even as
Christianity was in the first century--an excuse for the perpetration of
mad cruelties by degenerate Caesars or Kaisers (spell it as you will) at
their games? Cannot the higher and finer attributes of mankind be
developed and strengthened without this apparently needless waste of
agony and life? Is human nature only to be redeemed through the Cross,
and must Calvary bear again and again its heavy load of human anguish?
One cannot escape from this inner questioning as one gazes on
Raemaekers' cartoons.
FRANCIS STOPFORD.
[Illustration: CHRISTENDOM AFTER TWENTY CENTURIES]
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A STABLE PEACE
Were I privileged to have a hand at the Peace Conference, my cooperation
would take the part of deeds and I should only ask to hang the walls of
the council chamber with life-size reproductions of Raemaekers in
blood-red frames. For human memory is weak, and as mind of man cannot
grasp the meaning of a million, so may it well fail to keep steadily
before itself the measure of Belgium--the rape and murder, the pillage
and plunder, the pretences under which perished women and priests and
children, the brutal tyranny--the left hand that beckoned in friendly
fashion, the right hand, hidden with the steel.
We can very safely leave France to remember Northern France and Russia
not to forget Poland; but let Belgium and Serbia be at the front of the
British mind and conscience; let her lift her eyes to these scorching
pictures when Germany fights with all her cunning for a peace that shall
leave Prussia scotched, not killed.
Already one reads despondent articles, that the English tradition, to
forgive and forget, is going to wreck the peace; and students of
psychology fear that within us lie ineradicable qualities that will save
the situation for Germany at the end.
To suspect such a national weakness is surely to arm against it and see
that our contribution to the Peace Conference shall not stultify our
contribution to the War.
The Germans have been kite-flying for six months, to see which way the
wind blows; and when the steady hurricane broke the strings and flung
the kites headlong to earth, those who sent them up were sufficiently
proclaimed by their haste to disclaim.
But when the actual conditions are created and the new "Scrap of Paper"
comes to light, since German honour is dead and her oath in her own
sight worthless, let it be worthless in our sight also, and let the
terms of peace preclude her power to perjure herself again. Make her
honest by depriving her of the strength to be dishonest. There is only
one thing on earth the German will ever respect, and that is superior
force. May Berlin, therefore, see an army of occupation; and may "peace"
be a word banished from every Allied tongue until that preliminary
condition of peace is accomplished, and Germany sees other armies than
her own.
Reason has been denied speech in this war; but if she is similarly
banished from the company of the peace-makers, then woe betide the
constitution of the thing they will create, for a "stable peace" must be
the very last desire of those now doomed to defeat.
EDEN PHILLPOTTS.
[Illustration: A STABLE PEACE
THE KAISER: "And remember, if they do not accept, I deny altogether."]
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THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS
Some "neutrals," and even some of the people here in England, still
doubt the reality of the German atrocities in Belgium, but Raemaekers
has seen and spoken with those to whom the scene depicted in this
cartoon is an ugly reality. One who would understand it to the full must
visualize the hands behind the thrusting rifle butts, and the faces
behind the hands, as well as the praying, maddened, despairing, vengeful
women of the picture--and must visualize, too, the men thrust back
another way, to wait _their_ fate at the hands of these apostles of a
civilization of force.
Yet even then full realization is impossible; the man whose pencil has
limned these faces has only caught a far-off echo of the reality, and
thus we who see his picture are yet another stage removed from the full
horror of the scene that he gives us. Not on us, in England, have the
rifle butts fallen; not for us has it chanced that we should be
shepherded "men to the right, women to the left"; not ours the trenched
graves and the extremity of shame. Thus it is not for us to speak, as
the people of Belgium and Northern France will speak, of the limits of
endurance, and of war's last terrors imposed on those whom war should
have passed by and left untouched. We gather, dimly and with but a tithe
of the feeling that experience can impart, that these extremities of
shame and suffering have been imposed on a people that has done no
wrong, and we may gain some slight satisfaction from the thought that to
this nation is apportioned a share in the work of vengeance on the
criminals.