feeft alle. Schon merden die ersten Franzmänner ent dect. Von den Bäumen werden sie heruntergeknallt wie Eichhörnchen, unten mit Kolben und Seitengewehr warm" empfangen, brauchen sie teinen Arzt mehr, wir fämpfen nicht mehr gegen ehrliche Feinde, sondern gegen tüdische Räuber. Epringend geht's über die Lichtung hinüber - da! bort! in den Heden steden fie drin, nun aber drauf, Pardon wird nicht gegeben. Stehend, freihändig, höchstens taieend wird geschossen, an Deckung denkt niemand mehr. Bir tommen an eine Mulde, tote und verwundete Rothofen liegen messenhast umher, die Verwundeten werden erschlagen oder erstochen, denn schon wissen wir, daß diese Lumpen, wenn wir vorbei sind, uns im Rüden befeuern.

Mit der größten Erbitterung wird gekämpft. Dort legt im Seungrann long ausgestreckt, das Gesicht auf dem Boden, er stellt sich aber nur to.. Der Fußtritt eines strammen Musketiers belehrt ihn, daß wir da sind. Sich umdrehend, ruft er Pardon, aber (chon ist er mit den Worten: „Siehst du, du B..., fo stechen eure Dinger" auf der Erde festgenagelt. Neben mir das unheimliche Krachen kommt von den Kolbenschlägen her, die ein 154er wuchtig auf einen franzöfifchen Kahllopf niedersausen läßt. Wohlweislich benuste er zu der Arbeit ein französisches Gewehr, um das feinige nicht zu zerschlagen. Leute mit bejohders welchem Gemät geben verwundeten Franzosen die Gnadenkugel, die anderen hauen und fiechen nach Möglichkeit. Tapfer haben sich die Gegner geschlagen, es waren Elitetruppen, die wir vor uns hatten, auf 3010 Meter ließen sie uns herankommen, dann war's allerdings zu spät. Massenhaft meggeworfene Tornister und Waffen zeugen davon, daß sie slichen wollten, aber das Entfegen beim Anblick der jeldgraven „Un holde" hat ihnen die Füße gelähmt und mitten im schmalen Siege hat ihnen die deutsche Jurgel ihr „Stopp"

Figure 16.

there the red trousers are lying in. masses, here and there-dead or wounded. We club or stab the wounded, for we know that these rascals, as soon as we are gone by, will fire from behind. We find one Frenchman lying at full length upon his face, but he is counterfeiting death. A kick from a robust fusilier gives him notice that we are there. Turning over he asks for quarter, but he gets the reply-" Oh! is that the way, blackguard, that your tools work?" and he is pinned to the ground. On one side of me I hear curious cracklings. They're the blows which a soldier of the 154th is vigorously showering upon the bald pate of a Frenchman with the stock of his gun; he very wisely chose for this work a French gun, for fear of breaking his own. Some men of particularly sensitive soul grant the French wounded the grace to finish them with a bullet, but others scatter here and there, wherever they can, their clubbings and stabbings. Our adversaries have fought bravely. They were élite troops that we had before us. They had allowed us to come within thirty, and even within ten, meters-too close. Their arms and knapsacks thrown down in heaps showed that they wanted to fly, but upon the appearance of our gray phantoms ' "terror paralyzed them,

and, on the narrow path in which they crowded, the German bullets brought them the order to halt! There they are at the very entrance of their leafy hiding places, lying down moaning and asking for quarter, but whether their wounds are light or grievous, the brave fusiliers saved their country the expensive care which would have to be given to such a number of enemies.

Now the recital continues very ornate, very literary, and the writer relates how his Imperial Highness Prince Oscar of Prussia, being advised of the exploits (perhaps, indeed, other exploits than these) of the 154th and of the Regiment of Grenadiers, which forms the Brigade with the 154th, declared them both worthy of the name of " King's Brigade," and the recital closes with this phrase: "When night came on, with a prayer of thankfulness on our lips we fell asleep to await the coming day." Then adding, by way of postcript, a little phrase "Heimkehr vom Kampf." He carries the notebook-prose and verse together-to his Lieutenant, who countersigns it: "Certified as correct, De Niem, Lieutenant Commanding the Company," and then he sends his paper to his town of Jauer, where he is quite confident that he will find some newspaper publisher to accept it, printers to set it up, and a whole population to enjoy it. Now, let me ask any readerwhatever be his country-if he can imagine it possible for such a tale to be spread abroad in any paper in his language, in his native town, for the edification of his wife and his children. In what other country than in Germany is such a thing conceivable? Not in France, at all events. Now, if my readers want another document to show how customary it is in the German Army to mutilate the wounded, well, I will borrow one from the notebook of Private Paul Glöde of the Ninth Battalion of Pioneers, Ninth Corps, (Figs. 17 and 18:)

Aug. 12, 1914, in Belgium.-One can get an idea of the fury of our soldiers in seeing the destroyed villages. Not one house left untouched. Everything eatable is requisitioned by the unofficered soldiers. Several heaps of men and women put to execution. Young pigs are running about looking for their mothers.

But

Dogs chained, without food or drink. And the houses about them on fire. the just anger of our soldiers is accompanied also by pure vandalism. In the villages, already emptied of their inhabitants, the houses are set on fire. I feel sorry for this population. If they have made use of disloyal weapons, after all, they are only defending their own country. The atrocities which these noncombatants are still committing are venged after a savage fashion. Mutilations of the wounded are the order of the day.

re

This was written as early as the 12th of August-the tenth day after the invasion of innocent Belgium-and these wounded creatures that were tortured had done nothing more than defend their land against Germany-their native land-which Germany had sworn, not only to respect but, if need be, to defend. And yet, in many countries pharisees reading these lines will go forward tranquilly to their churches, or their temples, or their banking houses, or their foreign offices, saying: "In what do these things concern us?" "Ja, ja, this is war." Yes, it is war, but war such as was never made by the soldiers of Marceau, such as never will be made by the soldiers of Joffre, such as never has been made and never will be made by France" Mother of Arts, of Arms, and of Laws." Yes, it is war, but war such as Attila would not have carried on if he had subscribed to certain stipulations; for, in subscribing them, he would have awakened to the notion, which alone distinguishes the civilized man from the barbarian, distinguishes a nation from a horde-respect for the word once given. Yes, it is war, but war the theory of which could only be made up by such pedant megalomaniacs as the Julius von Hartmanns, the Bernhardis, and the Treitschkes; the theory which accords to the elect people the right to uproot from the laws and customs of war what centuries of humanity, of Christianity, and chivalry have at great pains injected into it; the theory of systematic and organized ferocity; today exposed to public reprobation, not only as an odious thing, but no less silly and absurd. For have we not reached the ridiculous when the incendiaries of Lou

[Continuation of Figure 17.] vain, and Malines, and Rheims, the assassins of women and children, and of the wounded, already find it necessary to repudiate their actions, at least in words, and to impose upon the servility of their ninety-three Kulturträger such denials as this: "It is not true that we are making war in contempt of the law of nations, nor that our soldiers are committing acts of cruelty, or of insubordination, or indiscipline. * * * We will carry this conflict through to the end as a civilized people, and we answer for this upon our good name and upon our honor!" Why this humble and. pitiful repudiation? Perhaps because their theory of war rested upon the postulate of their invincibility, and that, in the first shiver of their defeat upon

the Marne, it collapsed, and now their repudiation quickly follows-in dread of the lex talionis.

I will stop here. I leave the conclusion to the allied armies, already in sight of victory.

NOTE.-General Stenger's order of the day, mentioned on page was communicated orally by various officers in various units of the brigade. Consequently, the form in which we have received it may possibly be incomplete or altered. In face of any doubt, the French Government has ordered an inquiry to be made into the prisoners' camps. Not one of the prisoners to whom our magistrates presented the order of the day in the

above-mentioned form found a word to alter. They one and all declared that this was the order of the day which had been orally given in the ranks, repeated from man to man; many added the names of the officers who had communicated the order to them; some related in what a vile way it had been carried out under their eyes. All the evidence of these German soldiers was collected in a legal manner, under the sanction of an oath, and it is after reading their depositions that I wrote the order of the day.

The text of all this evidence was transmitted to all the French Embassies and Legations in foreign countries on the 24th of October, 1914. Every neutral wishing to clear his conscience is at liberty to obtain it from the representatives of the French Republic, who will certainly respond willingly.