CHAPTER XVIII—THE PROBLEM OF DANTZIG

Dantzig's problem is similar to the problems of the whole of Central Europe; it arises out of the arbitrary creation of new frontiers. To sit in Paris with a blue pencil and scrawl¹ lines on a map was a simple task; to have to dwell within those lines, despite their violation² of economic laws, and make a livelihood³, has proved less easy. It is one thing to declare Dantzig a free-port; it is another to persuade her neighbours to use her. It is possible that in making Dantzig free, the Peace Conference has only made her free to starve.

Here is the situation. Dantzig, as she is today, consists of seven hundred and fifty square miles of territory, and a population of 350,000 souls. Her former industries were shipping⁴, ship-building and the manufacture of armaments. For the latter purposes, while the war was on, the Germans imported thousands of workmen, many of whom still remain. The manufacture of armaments is now forbidden. There is no demand for ship-building. Ocean-going traffic is at a halt; the nations in whose interests the free-port was constituted are either bankrupt or anxious to develop their own harbours. Poland, who was expected to be her largest employer, is too busy with the Bolshevists to be a producer; hence she has nothing to ship. When she does begin to produce, it is on the boards that she may avoid Dantzig. She acquired a distaste for free-ports last summer when the Dantzig longshoremen refused to unload her munitions⁵. She is already flirting⁶ with two alternatives. Germany is coaxing⁷ her to adopt Stettin as her outlet⁸; she herself is inclined to build docks of her own on the seaboard of the Polish Corridor.

Meanwhile Dantzig is idle. She has no industries to keep her going. Her agriculture is too limited to support her population. Her neighbours cannot send her food-stuffs; their own needs are too pressing. If times were normal, Poland might be willing to feed her; but Poland herself is only being kept alive by the relief brought in from America. When the free-port was created, a clause was inserted in the Peace Treaty, obliging Poland to act as Dantzig's larder⁹. One of the demands was that Poland should provide the free-port with five hundred tons of flour weekly at a stipulated¹⁰ price. The price named was so insufficient¹¹ that the flour sent to Dantzig costs Poland twice as much, not reckoning the unloading, as the price which Dantzig pays for it. All of it has to be imported from America.

In 1914 the daily consumption of milk in Dantzig was 50,000 litres, most of which was Polish. Today the maximum she is able to obtain is 10,000 litres and the minimum 4,000. As a consequence babies are the sufferers. I visited ward¹² after ward filled with tiny mites¹³ made hideous¹⁴ with rickets¹⁵. The hospital was so overcrowded and diminished in its resources that it possessed¹⁶ no change of linen¹⁷. While the rags are washed the little patients go naked. What this means in the sanitary¹⁸ conditions of a babies' hospital can be best imagined. You may see children of six months who have not gained beyond their birth-weight.

In Vienna, where similar conditions prevail, I saw a four year old child who weighed only nineteen pounds.

It is the children, always the children who are the victims, no matter in which country you investigate. When we fought, we believed that it was we who paid the price; but the bill of pain which we settled in the trenches¹⁹ is as nothing to the account which is being rendered to the younger generation. Of the Dantzig children below the age of fifteen who have been medically examined, more than half are under-nourished and of this half only a third are being cared for by the joint²⁰ efforts of the American Children's Relief and the Society of Friends. Here are the exact figures. One quarter of the children examined is normal. One quarter is badly under-nourished. And one half is sufficiently²¹ below the standard to warrant extra feeding. An important fact of the situation is that the majority of the starving children belong to the middle-classes. During the war and until recently the workmen have received special rations²² to induce them to labour. In addition to this their wages have followed the rise in costs, whereas the salaries of clerks, officials and professional people have been comparatively stationary²³. The middle-classes are not unionized so they cannot attract attention to their grievances²⁴ by strikers' methods.

Dantzig's future is distinctly gloomy. Germany has her own Baltic ports to encourage. Poland is her sole hope of prosperity and Poland is in bitter want herself. Moreover, if Poland recovers, which may take years, she may prefer to construct her own harbour—that is to say, if she does not yield to the inducements held out by Stettin.

The muddle²⁵ is economic and racial. But such a statement leads to no solution. The fact remains²⁶ that before she was commanded to be nobody's property her harbours were thriving. Today, as far as one can see, all that her freedom means is that her harbours are free to stand empty and her children are at liberty to die of hunger. No doubt the gentleman in Paris with the blue pencil had the handsomest of intentions, but he collided head-on with economic forces which it was his business to have apprehended²⁷. Whoever he was, he has made good his escape, while the children, as usual, pay the penalty.

1 scrawl   

vt.潦草地书写；n.潦草的笔记，涂写

参考例句：

• His signature was an illegible scrawl.他的签名潦草难以辨认。
• Your beautiful handwriting puts my untidy scrawl to shame.你漂亮的字体把我的潦草字迹比得见不得人。

2 violation   

n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯

参考例句：

• He roared that was a violation of the rules.他大声说，那是违反规则的。
• He was fined 200 dollars for violation of traffic regulation.他因违反交通规则被罚款200美元。

3 livelihood   

n.生计，谋生之道

参考例句：

• Appropriate arrangements will be made for their work and livelihood.他们的工作和生活会得到妥善安排。
• My father gained a bare livelihood of family by his own hands.父亲靠自己的双手勉强维持家计。

4 shipping   

n.船运（发货，运输，乘船）

参考例句：

• We struck a bargain with an American shipping firm.我们和一家美国船运公司谈成了一笔生意。
• There's a shipping charge of ￡5 added to the price.价格之外另加五英镑运输费。

5 munitions   

n.军火，弹药；v.供应…军需品

参考例句：

• The army used precision-guided munitions to blow up enemy targets.军队用精确瞄准的枪炮炸掉敌方目标。
• He rose [made a career for himself] by dealing in munitions.他是靠贩卖军火发迹的。

6 flirting   

v.调情，打情骂俏( flirt的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Don't take her too seriously; she's only flirting with you. 别把她太当真，她只不过是在和你调情罢了。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• 'she's always flirting with that new fellow Tseng!" “她还同新来厂里那个姓曾的吊膀子！ 来自子夜部分

7 coaxing   

v.哄，用好话劝说( coax的现在分词 )；巧言骗取；哄劝，劝诱；“锻炼”效应

参考例句：

• No amount of coaxing will make me change my mind. 任你费尽口舌也不会说服我改变主意。
• It took a lot of coaxing before he agreed. 劝说了很久他才同意。 来自辞典例句

8 outlet   

n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄

参考例句：

• The outlet of a water pipe was blocked.水管的出水口堵住了。
• Running is a good outlet for his energy.跑步是他发泄过剩精力的好方法。

9 larder   

n.食物贮藏室，食品橱

参考例句：

• Please put the food into the larder.请将您地食物放进食物柜内。
• They promised never to raid the larder again.他们答应不再随便开食橱拿东西吃了。

10 stipulated   

vt.& vi.规定；约定adj.[法]合同规定的

参考例句：

• A delivery date is stipulated in the contract. 合同中规定了交货日期。
• Yes, I think that's what we stipulated. 对呀，我想那是我们所订定的。 来自辞典例句

11 insufficient   

adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的

参考例句：

• There was insufficient evidence to convict him.没有足够证据给他定罪。
• In their day scientific knowledge was insufficient to settle the matter.在他们的时代，科学知识还不能足以解决这些问题。

12 ward   

n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开

参考例句：

• The hospital has a medical ward and a surgical ward.这家医院有内科病房和外科病房。
• During the evening picnic,I'll carry a torch to ward off the bugs.傍晚野餐时，我要点根火把，抵挡蚊虫。

13 mites   

n.（尤指令人怜悯的）小孩( mite的名词复数 )；一点点；一文钱；螨

参考例句：

• The only discovered animals are water bears, mites, microscopic rotifers. 能够发现的动物只有海蜘蛛、螨和微小的轮虫。 来自辞典例句
• Mites are frequently found on eggs. 螨会经常出现在蛋上。 来自辞典例句

14 hideous   

adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的

参考例句：

• The whole experience had been like some hideous nightmare.整个经历就像一场可怕的噩梦。
• They're not like dogs,they're hideous brutes.它们不像狗，是丑陋的畜牲。

15 rickets   

n.软骨病，佝偻病，驼背

参考例句：

• A diet deficient in vitamin D may cause the disease rickets.缺少维生素D的饮食可能导致软骨病。
• It also appears to do more than just protect against rickets.除了防止软骨病，它还有更多的功能。

16 possessed   

adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的

参考例句：

• He flew out of the room like a man possessed.他像着了魔似地猛然冲出房门。
• He behaved like someone possessed.他行为举止像是魔怔了。

17 linen   

n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的

参考例句：

• The worker is starching the linen.这名工人正在给亚麻布上浆。
• Fine linen and cotton fabrics were known as well as wool.精细的亚麻织品和棉织品像羊毛一样闻名遐迩。

18 sanitary   

adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的

参考例句：

• It's not sanitary to let flies come near food.让苍蝇接近食物是不卫生的。
• The sanitary conditions in this restaurant are abominable.这家饭馆的卫生状况糟透了。

19 trenches   

深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕

参考例句：

• life in the trenches 第一次世界大战期间的战壕生活
• The troops stormed the enemy's trenches and fanned out across the fields. 部队猛攻敌人的战壕，并在田野上呈扇形散开。

20 joint   

adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合

参考例句：

• I had a bad fall,which put my shoulder out of joint.我重重地摔了一跤，肩膀脫臼了。
• We wrote a letter in joint names.我们联名写了封信。

21 sufficiently   

adv.足够地，充分地

参考例句：

• It turned out he had not insured the house sufficiently.原来他没有给房屋投足保险。
• The new policy was sufficiently elastic to accommodate both views.新政策充分灵活地适用两种观点。

22 rations   

定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量

参考例句：

• They are provisioned with seven days' rations. 他们得到了7天的给养。
• The soldiers complained that they were getting short rations. 士兵们抱怨他们得到的配给不够数。

23 stationary   

adj.固定的，静止不动的

参考例句：

• A stationary object is easy to be aimed at.一个静止不动的物体是容易瞄准的。
• Wait until the bus is stationary before you get off.你要等公共汽车停稳了再下车。

24 grievances   

n.委屈( grievance的名词复数 )；苦衷；不满；牢骚

参考例句：

• The trade union leader spoke about the grievances of the workers. 工会领袖述说工人们的苦情。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• He gave air to his grievances. 他申诉了他的冤情。 来自《简明英汉词典》

25 muddle   

n.困惑，混浊状态；vt.使混乱，使糊涂，使惊呆；vi.胡乱应付，混乱

参考例句：

• Everything in the room was in a muddle.房间里每一件东西都是乱七八糟的。
• Don't work in a rush and get into a muddle.克服忙乱现象。

26 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

27 apprehended   

逮捕，拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 )； 理解

参考例句：

• She apprehended the complicated law very quickly. 她很快理解了复杂的法律。
• The police apprehended the criminal. 警察逮捕了罪犯。