“When the German Emperor took steps to appoint Catholic priests in the prisoners’ camps where Irish soldiers are interned, the English at once appointed forty-five Catholic priests with officer’s rank, to the British army in France.  Even this measure, as well as the sudden diplomatic activity at the Vatican, is little calculated to extinguish the hate for England in the Irish mind.

“On November 24th (1914) James Larkin began a propaganda in America.  He appealed to all Irishmen to send gold, weapons, and ammunition to Ireland, for the day of reckoning with England.  ‘We will fight,’ said Larkin, ’for the destruction of the British Empire and the foundation of an Irish republic; we will fight to deliver Ireland from that foul heap of ruins called England.’  The assembly broke into enthusiastic applause.

“At that moment the curtain was raised, and on the stage a company of Irish volunteers and a number of German uhlans were revealed.  The officers commanding the companies crossed swords and shook hands while the assembly sang the ‘Wacht am Rhein’ and ‘God save Ireland.’

“Sir Roger Casement has long been a thorn in the side of the English Government, therefore the latter has not shrunk from making a murderous conspiracy against the life of this distinguished Irish leader.  In agreement with Sir Edward Grey, the British Minister in Christiania, Mr. Findlay, tried to bribe Casement’s companion—­named Christensen—­to murder Sir Roger.  The attempted murder did not succeed, but the original documents are in the possession of the German Foreign Office, so that all doubt is excluded as to the English Government’s participation—­with their most honourable Grey at the head—­in this Machiavellian plan.”

This colossal Germanism concerning a plan to murder Sir Roger Casement has been assiduously spread throughout the German Press.  The Berlin Government allows the German people to believe that incriminating documents are in their possession, and the vilest statements to blacken Mr. Findlay’s character were printed in German newspapers when that gentleman was appointed to the Bulgarian Court in Sofia.

There are so few utterances in German war literature, which display reason or even moderation, that the author feels glad to be in a position to cite two.  In the May number of the Sueddeutsche-Monatshefte, Professor Wilhelm Franz (Tuebingen) reviewed one of the hate-books, viz., a work entitled “Pedlars and Heroes” by a German named Sombart.  A few passages will suffice to show that Germany is not quite devoid of straight-forward men, who dare to castigate hate.

“Towards the end of his book, Sombart solemnly assures the English that ’they need not fear us as a colonizing power; we (the Germans) have not the least ambition to conquer half-civilized and barbarian peoples in order to fill them with German spirit (Geist).  But the English can colonize and fill such peoples with their spirit—­for they have none, or at least only a pedlar’s.’