"The Woman's Voice" invited the women writers of the sister countries to take part in this issue, and Miss Atika Farajallah kindly sent this article especially for "The Woman's Voice." Miss Farajallah is an Egyptian, a graduate of the American University in Cairo, whom the Egyptian government delegated to teach education and psychology in the schools of Iraq. Readers will find articles and answers by her in the pages of this magazine. "The Editorial Desk"
Shahriyar said: "How is it, Scheherazade, that I see these lands in ruins, the cities deserted, and the provinces where today the owl hoots?"
Scheherazade said: "Have you then no knowledge, O happy King, of what has come to pass in the world since our happy time?"
Shahriyar said: "And has anything come to pass in the world other than the beautiful, fragrant evenings lined with hidden magic and soft music borne on the wings of the breeze, and the outskirts redolent with the perfume of daisies?"
Scheherazade said: "Talk of war, my happy lord, fills mouths and breasts today as it has filled them in every time and every place. And you know it well, for you are the daring knight and the valiant hero: war gave birth to you, and you are her firstborn son. But tonight I shall tell you a wondrous tale in which — had people but heeded it — lies deliverance for mankind from its many afflictions that follow one upon another along its rugged road climbing toward the heights.
When evening came, the happy King sat in the seat where Scheherazade was accustomed to sit with him, and she said: "It has reached me, O happy King, that humanity still wars against itself, devours itself, and despises itself, as it used to do in our days and
long before our days — as if it were a soul seized and mastered by anger: its emotions at odds, its thoughts contradictory, its resolve crumbling, its mind distracted, so that it scarcely settles upon an opinion before abandoning it. And it has reached me that after every war people would gather in great assemblies which they called 'conferences,' in which the victors conspire against the vanquished, the oppressors lord it over the oppressed, and the conquerors divide the spoils. Every victor rejoices in what he has won, and every vanquished one grieves over what he has lost, and bends over his wounds to bind them, his breast filled with rancor and the love of revenge. If you looked, O happy King, at what they call conferences and councils and treaties and the rest, you would think them a market that opened and dispersed, where some gained and some lost. And matters go on in this fashion: the victor gathers in properties, monies, and spoils, and permits himself what neither custom nor law permits, while the vanquished folds his wing and prepares for battle, to avenge his honor and recover his properties and his monies. And after that no one thinks of the reform of the world. All people forget that they are brothers, that they are of Adam, and Adam of dust. For in the daze of surrender and the cloud of victory they are drunk on the wine of triumph, and there remain in the world no brothers, but victor and vanquished. And that is a division which does not allow this noble idea — the idea of brotherhood — to nest in breasts or strike its roots in hearts.
"Such is the condition of men in every age and time. They think only of their ambitions and their spoils, of what they have lost and what they have won. But they do not think of the world's aims, of the gains that all mankind together might win, and the goal toward which all mankind together should strive.
"And it has reached me, my lord, that wars have become world
wars: they no longer concern two states or two tribes, but have come to engulf the whole world, and their consequences concern the whole world; yet no one, it seems, has awakened to that truth.
"I do not wish, O King, to look at the great states or the small, nor do I wish to look at victor and vanquished so as to reconcile
them — that is a matter for the prophets and messengers and for everyone in whose heart God has placed the light of faith and guidance. I wish rather to look at a great error that repeats itself and follows upon itself while no one pays it any heed.
"And how would you have anyone, my lord, in all this tumult and chaos, this agitation and flood, pay heed to the little children?"
Shahriyar said: "Do you say the children, Scheherazade?"
Scheherazade said: "Yes, O happy King! After every war mankind finds itself before a great problem — and how many are the problems that wars leave behind them, exceeding those for whose sake they were fought! This problem is a problem from the standpoint of management, and it is the hope of all humanity from the standpoint of appraisal."
Shahriyar said: "Speak plainly, Scheherazade, for by God you speak in riddles."
The Queen said: "People let themselves be distracted from the children, though they are the Merciful's trust upon the earth,
the seeds of