Song of Myself by Walt Whitmas Essay - 1045 Words

Most people awake to a daily routine, in which they keep eyes dazed staring at the pavement they walk on yet so easily ignore. Usually, these same people go about their business with no more than a passing glance towards their fellow man. However, there is an enigmatic few that are more than mere pawns in the game of existence. They are passionate spectators who take in their surroundings with every sense. They rejoice in the vastness of the electric crowd and become one with it. By all means, these few can be called ‘idle city men’ or, according to Charles Baudelaire’s 1863 essay â€Å"The Painter of Modern Life†, they are flà ¢neurs. I believe a worthy example of a man such as this, is the persona in Walt Whitman’s â€Å"Song of Myself†. He is a†¦show more content†¦He begins the section with â€Å"I think I will do nothing for a long time but listen.† (24) Here the persona is invisible to the outside world, simply watching and waiting, responding to every single sound the city produces and relishes in its essence. This corresponds to Baudelaire’s flà ¢neur not only as a passionate spectator but also as one who sees the world, who is at the center of the world, and yet remains hidden from it, rejoicing in his incognito. Another very important aspect of the flà ¢neur is his ability to comprehend and understand not only his surroundings but himself as well. He must be aware of his being or in Baudelaire’s words be like â€Å"a kaleidoscope gifted with consciousness†. In section forty-two he writes: â€Å"I know perfectly well my own egotism, And know my omnivorous words, and cannot say any less. And would fetch you whoever you are flush with myself.† (44) Here he is making it known that he is mindful of who he is and what he is saying. This is an aspect that most ordinary people lack, but flà ¢neurs do not. Flà ¢neurs, like Whitman, know how to conduct themselves in society and are present in all they do and say. There is no loss for identity, no confusion in what is going on; there is only this awareness of all that indefinitely surrounds them in a certain place and moment in time, within themselves and the outside world. Truth be told, there

Essay on All Quiet On The Western Front - 6523 Words

Chapter 1 The chapter begins with German soldiers at rest after fourteen days of fierce battle on the Western Front. A double ration of food has been prepared so the soldiers are eating their fill. Paul Baumer, the protagonist and narrator of the novel, watches in amazement as his friends, Tjaden and Muller, eat another helping; he wonders where Tjaden puts all the food, for he is as thin as a rail. Baumer is only nineteen years of age. He enlisted in the German infantry because Kantorek, his high school teacher, had glorified war and talked him into fighting for the fatherland. Kropp, Behm, and Leer, former classmates of Baumer, were also persuaded by Kantorek to join the infantry. They are all now fellow soldiers along with Tjaden,†¦show more content†¦In spite of the pain, Kemmerich frets that his watch has been stolen by someone in the medical facility. His friends try to comfort him. Muller, however, has his eyes on Kemmerichs leather boots and tries to persuade Kemmerich to give them to him. Being the practical and logical one of the group, Muller feels that Kemmerich no longer has use for a matched pair. He also knows that one of the orderlies in the hospital will steal the boots, just as the watch was stolen. Moral decadence is obviously a by-product of the war. Notes It is obvious from the opening chapter that this novel will center on the war and the effects it has on a young group of soldiers, none of them more than twenty years of age. They are all friends and former classmates of Paul Baumer, the narrator and protagonist of the book; they have enlisted in the German infantry because their teacher, Kantorek, had painted for them a glorious picture of fighting and saving the homeland from destruction during World War I. In this first chapter, Baumer and his friends are away from the front lines, relaxing a bit after two weeks of fierce fighting. As each of the young men is introduced, it is apparent that they are tired, hungry, angry, and disillusioned over the war. The young soldiers are miserable over their plight and cast blame on Kantorek. All of them have been in the midst of battle on the Western Front and have seen the horror andShow MoreRelatedAll Quiet of the Western Front756 Words   |  3 PagesPlot Summary: All Quiet on the Western Front Written by Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front is the tale of a young man by the name of Paul. Paul who is nineteen years old gathers several of his friends from school and together they voluntarily join the army fighting for the Axis alliance. Before they are sent off into actual battle, they are faced with the brutal training camp. Along with this they face the cruelty of the life of a soldier. This made them question the reason forRead MoreAll Quiet on the Western Front700 Words   |  3 PagesThe greatest war novel of all time, All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, is a novel that depicted the hardships of a group of teenagers who enlisted in the German Army during World War 1. Enlisting right out of high school forced the teens to experience things they had never thought of. From the life of a soilder on the front line to troubles with home life, war had managed to once again destroy a group of teenagers. Throughout the novel, we saw the men of the Second CompanyRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front1797 Words   |  8 PagesTitle: All Quiet on the Western Front Creator: Erich Maria Remarque Date of Publication: 1929 Class: War Novel Anecdotal Information about Author: -Erich Maria Remarque was conceived on 22 June 1898 into a working people family in the German city of Osnabrà ¼ck to Peter Franz Remark (b. 14 June 1867, Kaiserswerth) and Anna Maria (nà ©e Stallknecht; conceived 21 November 1871, Katernberg). -During World War I, Remarque was recruited into the armed force at 18 years old. On 12 June 1917, heRead MoreAll Quiet on the Western Front943 Words   |  4 Pages The book All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, is about a group of 19 year old young men who are changed by the ways of war. There is paul: the main character; Tjaden: a tall, skinny locksmith, also the biggest eater; Albert Kropp: a lance-corporal and the clearest thinker; Muller: studious, intelligent, and likes school; Leer: has a preference for the girls from the prostitution houses and has a beard; Haie Westhus: a peat-digger, and big in size; Deterring: a peasant, he alwaysRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front2393 Words   |  10 PagesAll Quiet on the Western Front: Book Review Erich Maria Remarque, author of All Quiet on the Western Front, actually fought in WWI (Remarque 297). Because of this, he was able to write this book with accurate depictions of the war. He writes how being in combat can really take a toll on a person and affect them in a negative way. He also writes of the pain and suffering that the soldiers must cope with that comes along with living in constant fear and danger. When looking at the title of theRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front2085 Words   |  9 PagesThis essay will consider the different effects created by Erich Maria Remarque in his novel All Quiet on the Western Front. As a writer, Remarque unknowingly left his novel open to readers with completely different perspectives, and to various forms of criticism. This undoubtedly meant that every single reader had been affected by the novel in many different ways which unfortunately for Remarque may have been an effect that he never intended. This essay is divided into 5 main sections. Firstly itRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front1089 Words   |  5 Pages In Erich Maria Remarque’s novel, All Quiet on the Western Front, human nature is the only abstract periphery between belligerent barbarism and justifiable violence. Through the insipid bombardments that rained shells over the Germans’ heads and noxious implementation of mustard gas, Remarque dexterously misleads the reader into believing that he fights in an apathetic war where all remnants of human nature and identity have been destroyed with the introduction of trench warfare. Through Paul Baumer’sRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front1509 Words   |  7 Pagesâ€Å"He fell in October 1918, on a day that was so quiet and still on the whole front, that the army report confined itself to a single sentence: All quiet on the Western Front† (Remarque 296). Paul Baumer, the narrator of All Quiet on the Western Front, enlisted into the German army at a young age of nineteen with a group of friends from school. Kantorek, Paul’s teacher, â€Å"gave us long lectures until the whole of our class went, under his shepherding, to the District Commandant and volunteered† (RemarqueRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front1129 Words   |  5 PagesIn Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, soldiers at the front have a better idea than civilians of the true n ature of war because they have experienced the war while civilians have only read about it or listened to government propaganda. Remarque is trying to tell us that only those who experience the war can understand how awful war truly is. In All Quiet on the Western Front, the main character Paul goes back to his home, the people he meets still think that the Germans are winningRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front1790 Words   |  8 Pagessmell of cigar smoke, gunpowder, and dirt that filled the air. There was no nationalism; all Paul wanted was survival. World War I was supposed to be about nationalism and the propaganda forced upon the soldiers to feel superiority over other countries, but Paul helps to prove otherwise, as his story tells what is was like to be at the front, and how tough it was to be a soldier. â€Å"All Quiet on the Western Front† portrays war as it was actually experienced, replacing the romantic picture of glory and

Obamacare Pros And Cons Of Obamacare Essay Example For Students

Obamacare : Pros And Cons Of Obamacare Essay On March 23, 2010, President Barrack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA) into legislation. The bill was created to provide affordable and effective health care to all Americans. It has since provided tens of millions of uninsured Americans with affordable healthcare (â€Å"ObamaCare: Pros and Cons of ObamaCare†). While doing so, an estimated 31 million still remain uncovered as of 2016 (â€Å"Not ‘Everybody’ Is Covered Under ACA†). To this day, the health care plan has remained widely criticized and controversial. Many believe the Affordable Care Act has not done its duty and is unconstitutional to force healthcare upon Americans. Some of the people who share these views believe it isn’t the government’s job to provide welfare. They believe healthcare should be left to themselves to provide. On the other side of the argument, people and countries who support the Affordable Care Act consider it a step in the right direction. Some of these people view it as an essential necessity. Now is the Affordable Care Act really a necessity? Should the United States move in a different direction with its health care system? Some officials have suggested that the Affordable Care Act is not the best option for the United States. However, it is seen as a large step in the right direction. They believe it’s the best plan the U.S. has had in terms of attempting to cover all Americans with guaranteed healthcare, but certainly not the only possibility for our healthcare system. Some politicians have proposed for the United States to adopt a universal healthcare system similar to the likes of the Canada, Norway, the United Kingdom and Germany. These systems have been deemed and proven to be successful and effective through a single payer system. This pro. .eted and saved by insurance companies (What Would Universal Healthcare Look Like in the U.S.?). By eliminating for profit medical organizations, we can move toward being the most cost effective medical country in the world. Lastly, the U.S. government can continue to improve economic growth with the addition of universal healthcare. This system would create thousands of jobs, improve medical efficiency, and save the U.S. up to $1. 1 trillion over the next decade (Thrope). Given these changes, the U.S. can become the single most advanced country in the world. The opportunities are possible, so it’s crucial that the U.S. act and adopt a universal healthcare system. Lives are on the line and millions of Americans need guaranteed healthcare. The government needs to take action and do what the Affordable Care Act could not. Promote the general welfare to all its’ people!

The National Socialist German Workers Party and nazism Essay Example For Students

The National Socialist German Workers Party and nazism Essay The National Socialist German Workers Party almost died one morning in 1919. It numbered only a few dozen grumblers it had no organization and no political ideas. But many among the middle class admired the Nazis muscular opposition to the Social Democrats. And the Nazis themes of patriotism and militarism drew highly emotional responses from people who could not forget Germanys prewar imperial grandeur. In the national elections of September 1930, the Nazis garnered nearly 6. 5 million votes and became second only to the Social Democrats as the most popular party in Germany. In Northeim, where in 1928 Nazi candidates had received 123 votes, they now polled 1,742, a respectable 28 percent of the total. The nationwide success drew even faster in just three years, party membership would rise from about 100,000 to almost a million, and the number of local branches would increase tenfold. The new members included working-class people, farmers, and middle-class professionals. They were both better educated and younger then the Old Fighters, who had been the backbone of the party during its first decade. We will write a custom essay on The National Socialist German Workers Party and nazism specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now The Nazis now presented themselves as the party of the young, the strong, and the ure, in opposition to an establishment populated by the elderly, the weak, and the dissolute. Hitler was born in a small town in Austria in 1889. As a young boy, he showed little ambition. After dropping out of high school, he moved to Vienna to study art, but he was denied the chance to join Vienna academy of fine arts. When WWI broke out, Hitler joined Kaiser Wilhelmers army as a Corporal. He was not a person of great importance. He was a creature of a Germany created by WWI, and his behavior was shaped by that war and its consequences. He had emerged from Austria with many prejudices, including a owerful prejudice against Jews. Again, he was a product of his times for many Austrians and Germans were prejudiced against the Jews. In Hitlers case the prejudice had become maniacal it was a dominant force in his private and political personalities. Anti-Semitism was not a policy for Adolf Hitlerit was religion. And in the Germany of the 1920s, stunned by defeat, and the ravages of the Versailles treaty, it was not hard for a leader to convince millions that one element of the nations society was responsible for most of the evils heaped upon it. The fact is that Hitlers anti-Semitism was self- nflicted obstacle to his political success. The Jews, like other Germans, were shocked by the discovery that the war had not been fought to a standstill, as they were led to believe in November 1918, but that Germany had , in fact, been defeated and was to be treated as a vanquished country. Had Hitler not embarked on his policy of disestablishing the Jews as Germans, and later of exterminating them in Europe, he could have counted on their loyalty. There is no reason to believe anything else. On the evening of November 8, 1923, Wyuke Vavaruab State Cinnussuiber Gustav Rutter von Kahr was making a olitical speech in Munichs sprawling Brgerbrukeller, some 600 Nazis and right-wing sympathizers surrounded the beer hall. Hitler burst into the building and leaped onto a table, brandishing a revolver and firing a shot into the ceiling. The National Revolution, he cried, has begun! At that point, informed that fighting had broken out in another part of the city, Hitler rushed to that scene. His prisoners were allowed to leave, and they talked about organizing defenses against the Nazi coup. Hitler was of course furious. And he was far from finished. At about 11 oclock on the morning of November 9the anniversary of he founding of the German Republic in 19193,000 Hitler partisans again gathered outside the Brgerbrukeller. To this day, no one knows who fired the first shot. But a shot rang out, and it was followed by fusillades from both sides. Hermann Gring fell wounded in the thigh and both legs. Hitler flattened himself against the pavement; he was unhurt. General Ludenorff continued to march stolidly toward the police line, which parted to let him pass through (he was later arrested, tried and acquitted). Behind him, 16 Nazis and three policemen lay sprawled dead among the many wounded. The next year, Rhm and his band joined forces with the fledgling National Socialist Party in Adolf Hitlers Munich Beer Hall Putsch. Himmler took part in that uprising, but he played such a minor role that he escaped arrest. The Rhm- Hitler alliance survived the Putsch, and hms 1,500-man band grew into the Sturmabteilung, the SA, Hitlers brown- shirted private army, that bullied the Communists and Democrats. Hitler recruited a handful of men to act as his bodyguards and protect him from Communist toughs, other rivals, and even the S. A. if it got out of hand. .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .postImageUrl , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:hover , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:visited , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:active { border:0!important; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:active , .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1 .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .ub92e249baae3223de803ad02f80b4fd1:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: The Crow Review EssayThis tiny group was the embryonic SS. In 1933, after the Nazi Party had taken power in Germany, increasing trouble with the SA made a showdown inevitable. As German Chancellor, the Fhrer could no longer afford to tolerate the disruptive Brownshirts; under the ambitious Rhm, the SA had grown to be an organization of three million men, and its unpredictable activities prevented Hitler from consolidating his shaky control of the Reich. He had to dispose of the SA to hold the support of his industrial backers, to satisfy party leaders jealous of the SAs power, and most important, to win the allegiance of the conservative Army generals. Under pressure from all sides, and enraged by an SA plot against him that Heydrich had conveniently uncovered, Hitler turned the SS loose to purge its parent organization. They were too uncontrollable even for Hitler. They went about their business of terrorizing Jews with no mercy. But that is not what bothered Hitler, since the SA was so big, (3 million in 1933) and so out of control, Hitler sent his trusty comrade Josef Dietrich, commander of a SS bodyguard regiment to murder the leaders of the SA. The killings went on for two days and nights and took a tool of perhaps 200 enemies o the state. It was quite enough to reduce the SA to impotence, and it brought the hrer immediate returns. The dying President of the Reich, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, congratulated Hitler on crushing the troublesome SA, and the Army generals including that Hitler was now their pawnswore personal loyalty to him. In April 1933, scarcely three months after Adolf Hitler took power in Germany, the Nazis issued a degree, ordering the compulsory retirement of non-Aryans from the civil service. This edict, petty in itself, was the first spark in what was to become the Holocaust, one of the most ghastly pisodes in the modern history of mankind. Before he campaign against the Jews was halted by the defeat of Germany, something like 11 million people had been slaughtered in the name of Nazi racial purity. The Jews were not the only victims of the Holocaust. Millions of Russians, Poles, gypsies and other subhumans were also murdered. But Jews were the favored targetsfirst and foremost. It took the Nazis some time to work up to the full fury of their endeavor. In the years following 1933, the Jews were systematically deprived by law of their civil rights, of their jobs and property. Violence and brutality became a part of their everyday lives. Their places of worship were defiled, their windows smashed, their stores ransacked. Old men and young were pummeled and clubbed and stomped to death by Nazi jack boots. Jewish women were accosted and ravaged, in broad daylight, on main thoroughfares. Some Jews fled Germany. But most, with a kind of stubborn belief in God and Fatherland, sought to weather the Nazi terror. It was forlorn hope. In 1939, after Hitlers conquest of Poland, the Nazis cast aside all restraint. Jews in their millions were now herded into concentration camps, there to starve and perish as lave laborers. Other millions were driven into dismal ghettos, which served as holding pens until the Nazis got around to disposing of them. The mass killings began in 1941, with the German invasion of the Soviet Union. Nazi murder squads followed behind the Wehrmacht enthusiastically slaying Jews and other conquered peoples. Month by month the horrors escalated. First tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands of people were led off to remote fields and forest to be slaughtered by SS guns. Assembly-line death camps were established in Poland and train loads of Jews were collected rom all over occupied Europe and sent to their doom. At some of the camps, the Nazis took pains to disguise their intentions until the last moment. At others, the arriving Jews saw scenes beyond comprehension. Corpses were strewn all over the road, recalled one survivor. Starving human skeletons stumbled toward us. They fell right down in front of our eyes and lay there gasping out their last breath. What had begun as a mean little edict against Jewish civil servants was now ending the death six million Jews, Poles, gypsies, Russians, and other sub-humans Uncounted thousands of Jews and other hapless oncentration-camp inmates were used as guinea pigs in a wide range of medical and scientific experiments, most of them of little value. Victims were infected with typhus to see how different geographical groups reacted; to no ones surprise, all groups perished swiftly. .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .postImageUrl , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:hover , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:visited , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:active { border:0!important; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:active , .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965 .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u72f17030dde10b95fc0df0fe901b1965:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: Who is the person whom affected EssayFluids from diseased animals were injected into humans to observe the effect. Prisoners were forced to exist on sea water to see how long castaways might survive. Gynecology was an area of interest. Various methods of sterilization were practicedby massive X-ray, by irritants and drugs, by surgery without benefit of anesthetic. As techniques were perfected, it was determined that a doctor with 10 assistants could sterilize 1,000 women per day. The experimental people were also used by Nazi doctors who needed practice performing various operations. One doctor at Auschwitz perfected his amputation technique on live prisoners. After he had finished, his maimed patients were sent off to the gas chamber. A few Jews who had studied medicine were allowed to live if they assisted the SS doctors. I cut the flesh of healthy young girls, recalled a Jewish physician who survived at terrible cost. I immersed the bodies of dwarfs nd cripples in calcium chloride (to preserve them), or had them boiled so the carefully prepared skeletons might safely reach the Third Reichs museums to justify, for futuregenerations, the destruction of an entire race. I could never erase these memories from my mind. But the best killing machine were the shower baths of death. After their arrival at a death camp, the Jews who had been chosen to die at once were told that they were to have a shower. Filthy by their long, miserable journey, they sometimes applauded the announcement. Countless Jews and other victims went peacefully to the shower roomswhich ere gas chambers in disguise. In the anterooms to the gas chambers, many of the doomed people found nothing amiss. At Auschwitz, signs in several languages said, Bath and Disinfectant, and inside the chambers other signs admonished, Dont forget your soap and towel. Unsuspecting victims cooperated willingly. They got out of their clothes so routinely, Said a Sobibor survivor. What could be more natural? In time, rumors about the death camps spread, and underground newspapers in the Warsaw ghetto even ran reports that told of the gas chambers and the crematoriums. But many people did not believe the storied, and those who did were helpless in any case. Facing the guns of the SS guards, they could only hope and pray to survive. As one Jewish leader put it, We must be patient and a miracle will occur. There were no miracles. The victims, naked and bewildered, were shoved into a line. Their guards ordered them forward, and flogged those who hung back. The doors to the gas chambers were locked behind them. It was all over quickly. The war came home to Germany. Scarcely had Hitler recovered from the shock of the July 20 bombing when he was aced with the loss of France and Belgium and of great conquests in the East. Enemy troops in overwhelming numbers were converging on the Reich. By the middle of August 1944, the Russian summer offensives, beginning June 10 and unrolling one after another, had brought the Red Army to the border of East Prussia, bottled up fifty German divisions in the Baltic region, penetrated to Vyborg in Finland, destroyed Army Group Center and brought an advance on this front of four hundred miles in six weeks to the Vistula opposite Warsaw, while in the south a new attack which began n August 20 resulted in the conquest of Rumania by the end of the month and with it the Ploesti oil fields, the only major source of natural oil for the German armies. On August 26 Bulgaria formally withdrew from the war and the Germans began to hastily clear out of that country. In September Finland gave up and turned on the German troops which refused to evacuate its territory. In the West, France was liberated quickly. In General Patton, the commander of the newly formed U. S. Third Army, the Americans had found a tank general with the dash and flair of Rommel in Africa. After the capture of Avranches on July 30, he had left Brittany to wither on the vine and begun a great sweep around the German armies in Normandy, moving southeast to Orleans on the Loire and then due east toward the Seine south of Paris. By August 23 the Seine was reached southeast and northwest of the capital, and two days later the great city, the glory of France, was liberated after four years of German occupation when General Jacques Leclercs French 2nd Armored Division and the U. S. 4th Infantry Division broke into it and found that French resistance units were largely in control.