more ingenious excuses. One day he was informed of Germany's abuse of
neutral embassies and mail-bags; the next of the submarine bases in
Mexico, prepared as a threat against American shipping; the day after
that the whole infamous story of how Berlin had financed the Mexican
Revolution. Germany's efforts to provoke an American-Japanese war
leaked out, her attempts to spread disloyalty among German-Americans,
her conspiracies for setting fire to factories and powder-plants,
including the blowing up of bridges and the Welland Canal. Quietly,
circumstantially, without rancour, the details were published of
the criminal spider-web woven by the Dernburgs, Bernstorffs and Von
Papens, accredited creatures of the Kaiser, who with Machiavellian
smiles had professed friendship for those whom their hands itched to
slay and strangle. Gradually the camouflage of bovine geniality was
lifted from the face of Germany and the dripping fangs of the Blonde
Beast were displayed--the Minotaur countenance of one glutted
with human flesh, weary with rape and rapine, but still tragically
insatiable and lusting for the new sensation of hounding America to
destruction.

I have not placed these revelations in their proper sequence; some
were made after war had been declared. They had the effect of changing
every decent American into a self-appointed detective. The weight
of evidence put Germany's perfidy beyond dispute; clues to new and
endless chains of machinations were discovered daily. The Hun had come
as a guest into America's house with only one intent--to do murder as
soon as the lights were out.

The anger which these disclosures produced knew no bounds. Hun
apologists--the type of men who invariably believe that there is a
good deal to be said on both sides--quickly faded into patriots. There