The Hermiston herald., December 24, 1920, Image 12

THE SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS
Today passing in review as we look out through the windows
of our comfortable homes in this great and happy land, are three
and a half millions of helpless children, the innocent victims of
the greatest war that has ever afflicted humanity. It matters
nut. as we gaze in the direction of these children, that our eyes
must stretch across three thousand miles of ocean, we still can
see them and we still can hear them, if we wish to do so; and
we can not help hearing the tragic appeal in their voices and
seeing their tiny arms stretched out to us, and their searching
eyes looting Into our souls, as they say, "Help us, or we perish.”
And if we fail to listen to this great call of three and a half mil­
lions of God's helpless children; if we close our eyes and ears
to this great demand of duty, we will be just as guilty as the
"slaughter of the innocents” as was Herod, nearly two thousand
years ago.
In these lands, swept by death and filled with tragedies too
deep for tears, a sum of human suffering is being written greater
perhaps than for all ages gone by. The mind grows numb and
the heart sick from a constant recital of tales of sueh tragedy as
it is difficult to believe the twentieth century could hold.
And so when we receive the letter from Mr Hoover telling
us that America must not allow hunger and cold to return to
this mass of 3,500,000 helpless children our soul was stirred and
the het blood surged up in our hearts. We felt it was our impera-
the duty to use all the power God has given us to aid this noble-
hearted American in continuing the work of saving human lives
to which he has devoted unsparingly, and at great personal sacri­
fice, his tremendous energy and administrative genious during the
past six years, without any remuneration to the American dt-
rectors. Now he askes us all to help save the children who are
in Imminent danger of starvation this coming winter.
There they are, in the midst of wrecked homes, and farms,
and factories; in cities crowded with masses of refugees without
sustaining food for children, through the destruction of live
stock; seeds for planting, raw materials, tools and machinery
gone; great areas with everything burned, or looted, or smashed;
vast unemployment for workers; no means of subsistence; a
land of economic ruin, of mutilated life, and lingering death;
und in the midst of it all—the little children.
In long lines they are waiting at the American food-kitchen.
Will the food be there for them? Will they be turned away?
There are no happy, healthy faces in those long lines—not one
You have seen rags and barefooted children, but never so many
little boys and girls literally dressed in tatters. Soon it will be
very cold, and for those bare little feet and legs and arms there
is nothing at home to put on.
Hollow faces and shrunken bodies are so common that their
real condition does not become evident until we inquire more
closely, and then we find that moat of them are from one to five
years back in their growth. Children of eight years old have
not reached the normal size of two and a half. They are just
learning to stand alone. Others almost as old can not yet stand
on their feet Their arms, and legs, and spines, and chest are
twisted and warped. The flesh and skin are shriveled on their
bones. It is surprising that life can still exist there. If they
can have food they will gradually regain their health and strength
but with most of them it is a question of now or never. Starva-
ticn and tuberculosis will not wait.
In Poland alone a million five hundred thousand such children
must be cared for. In Latlva and Esthonia the people are living
mostly on a diet made from potato-flour, oat-flour, and sawdust.
In Czecho-Slovakia, in Hungary, in Austria, and in other coun­
tries of central and southeastern Europe, two millions more are
in dire need of food; and who stops to ask regarding creed, or
race, or nationally when a little child Is starving? Children are
just children the world over, and the great American heart is big
enought to caie for them all.
But the appeal now is not for all. The three and a half mil­
lions of children in immediate danger of starvation, if this organ­
ization fails, who must have food at once, are only a fraction of
the total number. The hungry children of those destitute coun-
tries have been examined by competent physicians, and only
those whose wasted little bodies are reduced to the minimum
weight, and whose endurance of hunger has reached the end
which merges into actual starvation, are admitted to the Ameri-
cm kitchens and given one meal a day. It is hard to turn
away thousands of hungry boys and girls—to hear them ask,
pleadingly. "Do 1 weigh too much?” "Am I not thin enough?”
“Can’t I come any more?” But this restricting of food to the
e. treme cases is compulsory, because there isn’t enough for all.
And these neediest ones cannot reach the kitchens through
the cold winds and the snow barefooted and in the pitiful rags
which form only a partial covering for their bodies. They must
have clothes. Each outfit consists of one pair of warm woolen
stockings, one pair of boots, and a little overcoat. This one
meal a day, and these boots, stockings, and little coats can be
supplied only if we give them. If we do not, the slaughter of the
innocents by cold and starving will be appalling.
The small individual unit of ten dollars will provide the coat
and boots and stockings and one meal a day for one child this
winter. A hundred dollars will save the lives of ten children.
For a thousand dollars you may have the joy of saving a hun-
died little ones. We urge our readers—we urge every one whose
eyes are on these words—to give quickly as many of these units
as possible, to buy for themselves that precious and priceless
thing, the life of a little child—as many of them as they can, and
every one will be a shining star in an eternal crown. It was the
Divine Lover of little children, who came to earth as a little
child, and who reigns now as the King of Glory who said
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, ye
have done it unto me.” He does not forget, nor fail to award.
Let us all see what the fathers heart is like in this great rich
land of America. Let us have again a wondrous revelation of
the heart of American motherhood. Let us have a great out­
pouring of love and helpfulness In the name of him who said,
"Feed my lambs!”