truths. It is an exposition of the fact, well confirmed in late years, that modern warfare is in great measure a commercial matter, fostered by those who are in the war business, makers of the munitions of

war.

The Krupp works and their young mistress, Fräulein Bertha Krupp, thinly disguised for the purposes of the drama, are the scene and the chief figure in the play, with a homely American ambassador another character of whom we may all be proud.

Of course, there are always some play manufacturers who design their wares according to the season and without serious intentions. From these there have come an occasional vaudeville skit of the type where the young officer stripped of his insignia is about to be shot for treason, when through the intercession of the heroine he is saved and they later escape by aeroplane. But the popular imagination, even of war time, is not credulous enough to respond to such exaggerations. Of better stuff than this, though still calculated for the crowds

who want big scenes, picture and melodrama is "Under Fire," by Roi Cooper Megrue, recently produced with success, and containing much of truth in its atmosphere, even though glamor and "glory' still mix in with grief and destruction.

Of all the purpose plays which so far have been written with war for theme, perhaps the one that has made the widest appeal is "War Brides." Though only a sketch, it is so poignant in its bitter arraignment of the quickly contracted marriages merely to insure another generation (regardless of the probably fatherless babes and the miserable, rebellious mothers) as to leave a personal resentment in the hearts of every man and woman in the audience. This one act play by Marion Craig Wentworth was inspired by a current item in the press: "The war brides were cheered with enthusiasm and the churches were crowded when the large wedding parties spoke the ceremony in concert."

With a great emotional actress like Mme. Nazimova in the role of Hedwig, the latter becomes the mouthpiece for the entire audi

ence when, for instance, she replies to the war-drunk lieutenant's reproach:

Hoffman-When we are gone-the best of us-what will the country do if it has no children?

Hedwig-Why didn't you think of that before you started this wicked war?

Hoffman-I tell you its a glory to be a war bride. There!

Hedwig (with a shrug)-A breeding machine! (They all draw back.) Why not call it what it is? Speak the naked truth for once.

Or again when later in the action Hedwig is bidding farewell to her husband's brother, about to leave for the front, by whom she sends her last message to her Franz. In this speech we are made to feel that suddenly interrupted spirit of internationalism which has been one of the most tragic elements of the present war. Hedwig says:

Tell him how happy he made me and how I loved him. He didn't believe in this war any more than I and yet he had to go. He dreaded lest he meet his friends on the other side. You remember those two young men from across the border? They worked all one winter side by side in the factory with Franz. They went home to join their regiments when the war was let loose on us. He never could stand it. Franz couldn't, if he were ordered to drive his bayonets into them (gets up, full of emotion that is past expression). Oh, it is too monstrous! And for what!-for what!

The drama, however, which is the very epitome of war's deepest woe and which has withstood the test of ages as shown by its successful revival again this year, is that great tragedy of the Greek poet, Euripides, "The Trojan Women." This was the play chosen by Granville Barker and his company with which to dedicate the new stadium of the College of the City of New York and which Maurice Browne, of the Chicago Little Theater, has taken from coast to coast the past winter.

Almost at the very beginning the theme is voiced in Poseidon's speech:

How, are ye blind?

Ye treaders down of cities, ye that cast
Temples to desolation, and lay waste
Tombs, the untrodden sanctuaries where lie
The ancient dead; yourselves so soon to die!
And in Cassandra's speech a little later:
Would ye be wise, ye cities, fly from war!

Hecuba's suffering is not for any material loss but because of the wanton destruction of the very life forces which to Euripides was the grim tragedy of war. She tastes "the last dead deep of misery." Yet with the larger vision of the poet whose creation she is, hers is a resigned but steady gaze. But if we are moved by the sorrow of those thus fortified what, indeed, must be our sympathy for the poor benumbed creatures who are incapable of any spiritual rift in the cloud and who are struggling blindly in the physical blackness of it all?

The drama of the present world war has not yet been written. Nor will it be until long after the artillery is muffled and the arms reversed. Those written now, during the heat of passion, can only represent the sentiment and judgment of each particular dramatist-with imagination afire but lighted by the red hot glow of a national patriotism.

Yet in spite of all this, the fact remains that the war drama of to-day is one not of emotion, but of reason. Not exploiting kings and kaisers nor yet feverishly exciting a romantic and melodramatic love of one's own country, alone, but pleading for broader humanitarianism; looking beyond the excitement of actual conflict and considering its effect on the general morale; groping for the good of the many and with genuine sympathy for the conflicting emotions of the individuals involved, a drama, not of the merchants or the field marshals or the monarchs, but of the people who pay.

BESIDES the friends of his home circle

and those of the city where he dwelt, who knew him with intimacy and appreciation, two other great bodies of loyal though less intimate friends grieve over the death of John M. Hall. It is for these latter that the present writer attempts to express some of the loss that will be widely felt, and to acknowledge the debt they owe to this man of unique qualities.

These two groups are, first, the thousands whose summer activities for a generation have made Bay View the place that it is. and, second, those other thousands who for years have shared the work of the Bay View Reading Club. Of course, in great numbers these are the same, and those who enjoyed both points of contact are thereby doubly fortunate, and at the same time doubly grieved.

So thoroughly identified was Mr. Hall with Bay View the Place, and Bay View the Idea, and Bay View the Reading Circle, that it is hard to think of him at a time when this association did not exist. But there was a time when the preparation and

the efficiency of his young manhood were leading him directly to the larger work of his life. A graduate from Albion College in 1876 at the age of 25, he then studied law, and was admitted to practice. He had gained some success in his profession, and was living in Flint, Mich., when his interest turned toward what definitely became his life work.

Circumstances led him into acquaintance with the work of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, then at the height of its strength and popularity, and he undertook the work of organizing clubs to use that course of study. About the same time Bay View was growing into importance, first as the seat of a great annual campmeeting, next as a cottage resort of charm and beauty, and finally as the location of a notable Assembly and Summer School.

Every such institution needs a man, a personality, who may typify the work, who will saturate himself with it, submerge himself in it, give his heart and mind and strength to it. Money is needed, an ideal is essential, loyal followers and faithful,

wise trustees are a factor, but most of all there must be a man. Then under his labors, with the passing of years, the institution will become bigger than the man. bigger than any man. His reward is in the service he renders, the growth he sees. A generation arises that knows the magnitude of the institution, and only those who were a part of the growing years may remember the tasks that were overcome and the man who was most potent in overcoming.

John M. Hall was the Man of Bay View. Casting about for someone to undertake the details of superintendence, the trustees made inquiry in various ways, and the Rev. Dr. Seth Reed, of Flint, came forward with an inspired suggestion. He had the very man in his own church. So it came that

more than thirty years ago this association was formed, to grow into a volume of service that only the gift of prophecy could have foretold.

It is impossible to say at what time or in what way the vision of Bay View as the institution it might be, developed in Mr. Hall's concept. Surely it could not have been the matter of an instant, but rather a growth in that sense as truly as it has been a growth in actuality. But the years have brought to realization such great things as might well seem an extravagance of vision if they had been predicted at the beginning.

Says a recent writer in the Michigan Christian Advocate: "Mr. Hall developed a positive genius for planning and carrying