Читать книгу Boche and Bolshevik. Experiences of an Englishman in the German Army and in Russian Prisons онлайн

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But though I never took any trouble to conceal my English sympathies—in fact, they were notorious—I had nothing to complain of except from this woman. It is with especial pleasure that I record that my relations with my students were never so cordial as in this last Semester. My correspondence was censored from early days, and the essays my students sent me all went through the Censor’s hands. This caused some hindrance to the work, but they simply thought it a good joke that the Censor should have to read their essays. (Letters addressed to me were always censored; letters addressed to my wife never were. It is a curious example of the limitations of official intelligence.) My colleagues and other friends, when they discussed the war with me, were quite fair, and seemed only interested in discovering the English point of view. Some of my acquaintances were good enough to inform me, with all the exactness and conscientiousness of German pedantry, what they thought of England, and then to add they did not want that to interfere with our relations. If I laughed at their clumsiness, I valued their good will. The professors of English throughout Germany were the bitterest. They did not help their countrymen to understand England at all. One man told me he was going to learn to speak English with an American accent and insist on his students doing the same. Another spent his time translating a Dutch book, proving that Germany was superior in material resources to the whole of the British Empire.