AMERICA'S AID.

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 15871, 10 April 1917, Page 7

AMERICA'S AID.

BILLIONS FOR THE ALLIED CAUSE. NEW ALLT'S FIRST CONTRIBUTION. (By Cable—Press Association—Copyright) (Attattallin ftad N.Z. Cable WASHINGTON, April 8. The Administration on Monday will ask Congress for authority for five billion dollars, of which three billion will be used to purchase Entente per cent, war bonds. It is stated that tho United States will not take the profits of the huge loan, and will offer the Entente the same interest as the bonds bear. This is America's im_ mediate contribution to the Allied cause. The remaining two billions "will bo used for War purposes. to FIGHT IN FRANCE. GAS MASKS AND STEEL HELMETS ORDERED.

NEW YORK, April 8. Tho fact that the Government has adopted types of gas masks and steel helmets and ordered trench bombs is interpreted aB a preparation for European fighting. Tho interned ships are being repaired. Documents showed that the Germans had planned to destroy six of their ships, but the plot was discovered, MEN AND MUNITIONS. CONSCRIPTION A NECESSITY. WASHINGTON, April 8. The Minister of War states that conscription is absolutely necessary, and also enormous orders for munitions, including 3,000,000 grenades. There are. sufficient small arms to equip 1,200,000 men. Or 7,000,000 men between the ages of 19 and 25 there are 4,000,000 detachable from commerce. THE PANAMA CANAL. COJOPERATENGIN DEFENCE. WASHINGTON, April 8. Panama reports state that the President, Dr. Ramon M. Valdes, has promised his fullest co-operation to the United States in defending the Catial. CUBA COMES IN, INTERNED GERMAN SHIPS SEIZED. HAVANA, April 8. President Menocal has signed the war declaration. Scenes of the wildest enthusiasm ensued. All interned ships have been seized. The war resolution has been posted. Cuba is considerably the largest of tho West Indian Islands. It has an area of 44,164 square miles, with a population of 2,473,600, of whom nearly one-third are mulattoes or negroes. Cuba was a Spanish possession from the time of its discovery in 1492 till by the Treaty of Paris, 1898, after the war with the United States, it was -relinquished by Spain and became independent under American suzerainty. The Constitution provides for a Republican form of government, with a President, Vice-President, Senate, and House of Representatives. The capital is Havana (297,159). . THE BREAK WITH AMERICA. AMERICAN AMBASSADOR LEAVES VIENNA. ZURICH, April 8. Mr Penfield, American Ambassador, with his staff, has left Vienna. THE MASTER-SPIES. WHOLESALE ARRESTS MADE. NEW YORK, April 8. Three hundred arrests for espionage have been made, mostly of master spies.

The arrests are proving a great deterrent to anti-Americanism. , Only a few names so far have been announced. A COUNCIL OF WAR. AMERICA AND THE ALLIES. WASHINGTON, April 8. A meeting of a War Council, at which the United States, Britain, and France are to be represented, will discuss plans on the basis of the fullest co-opera-tion. AMERICAN WHEAT CROP. WASHINGTON, April 8. The official estimate of tho winter wheat crop is 50,000.000 bushels below that of last Tear. ITALY CHEERS AMERICA. ROME, April 8. 'There was a great demonstration on Saturday on the occasion of the entry of the United States into the war. A huge crowd, carrying flags, marched to the American Embassy, and, in response to their calls, the Ambassador made a speech from the window, amidst tremendous enthusiasm. THE DANGEROUS HYPHEN. TWENTY THOUSAND GERMAN RESERVISTS. NEW YORK, April 8. The Secrot Service estimates _ that there aro 20,000 German reservists in America who would be susceptible to anti-American leadership, but who would be oowed by tho arrest of their leaders. Those arrested include the notorious Koenig, tho Hamburg-Amerika Company's chief detective, and. the Rev. I)t. Bruckner, who supplied a false affidavit to the effect that tho Lusitania was armed.

! SOUTH AiIEBICAN STATES. DESIRE TO ENTER THE WAR. (Australian and N.Z. Cable Association.) (Received April 10th, 1.10 a.m.) WASHINGTON, April 9. Reports indicate that a desire to enter the war exists in Brazil, Peru, Chile, Uruguay, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Guatemala. Tho attitude of the Argentine is doubtful. STARTLING DISCLOSURES. ON SEIZED GERMAN LINER. (Renter's Telegrams.) (Received Aoril 10th, 1.10 a.m.) NEW YORK, April 9. Blue prints, "with elaborate notes of tho United States fortifications were found on a German liner seized. There wero other startling disclosures when the sailors' baggage was overhauled. THE MEXICAN MENACE. MORE TROOPS MOVING. CARRANZA MAINTAINS SILENCE. (Received April 10th, 1 JO a.m.) EL PASO, April 9. The Mexican border menace is increasing. Five thousand more of General Carranza's followers are moving North from Torreon. Nino thousand have already evacuated Chehuahua City to General Villa. General Carranza continues silent as 'to his intentions. UNDER THE STARS AND STRIPES. AMERICAN AVIATORS HOIST THEIR OWN FLAG. (United Service.) I NEW YORK, April 9. The American squadron of aviators fighting with tho French will hoist the "Stare and Stripes" in future, and will be purely an American unit. They have already brought down thirty enemy machines. tFBOH A CORBESPON'DENT. > SAN FRANCISCO, March 11. Outspokenness, savouring of treason, is being strictly repressed in tho United States Army, and large numbers of German-Americans, who constitute onefourth of 'the Minnesota National Guardsmen, are under suspicion, following the conviction of Private Paul Scharfonberg. Co. L, First Minnesota Infantry, of treason. Scharfenberg was sentenced to five years at the Federal prison at Leavenworth, Texas. Ho was tried by a court-martial of Regular Army officers sitting at San Antonio, Tdxas, for furnishing military information to Germany. A letter addressed to relatives in Germany asserting that 10,000,000 Germans in the United States were ready to rise tip against tho American Government in the event of war with Germany, was intercepted by the British authorities and passed over to Washington officials. Scharfenberg is a native of Germany, and was with the United States forces on the Mexican border. Another of the ring of German spies infesting the United States has been brought into the net in New York in the arrest of Fritz Ivolb, a German reservist, who was found surrounded by several bombs and large quantities of nitro-glycerine and picric acid- Sixteen bombs were found in one of the conspirator's rooms. Kolb admitted that he intended going to Washington "to get President Wilson." Tho arrest followed investigation into ( tho Black Tom and Kingsland explosions, which wrought tremendous destruction a few months ago to allied war munitions stored ready for shipment from New York to England. The plot of Kolb and his two accomplices -who are being sought included the projected destruction of oil works at Tampico, Mexico, and the Remington Arms Works in Hoboken. England and Franco obtain vast supplies of fuel oil from the Tampico wells. The Commefcial Hotel, where Kolb ■was arrested, was the basis of operations of Lieutenant Fay, who confessed to plots against ships sailing from American harbours. One of Kolb's bombs was fully loaded with a time fuse when attention wascontred'on tho Presidential inauguration ceremonies at Washington. Like his confederates, Kolb haa been "operating" also in Mexico. That German activities in South America have been so far-reaching as to involve officers and men of the Peruvian Navy in plots to raid Allied commerce in the Pacific has been learned officially in Washington. The plan was to utilise two Peruvian submarines, the officers and crew of which had been bribed. The undersea vessels were to operate out of selected bases on the Peruvian coast. The German arrested was the agent of a line operating between Lima and Callao. For several months he had been active along the coast, taking long mysterious trips in motor-boats. He had purchased several high-powered motor-boats of the type usea by Great Britain in hunting submarines. Late in January this mnn •was taken from the steamer Maipn, of the Campania Sud Americano de Vaporee, tc Chilian line, by the British auxiliary cruiser Avoca. Mystery surrounded his arrest, and the Veal cause thereof had never been revealed until the present juncture. Following his arrest, the officers and crews of two Peruvian Navy submarines were placed under close arrest. It then became generally known

in Peru, that the men had been bribed by German gold to take part in expeditions planned by the German steamer agent. Their fate is not revealed. An accumulation of annoying activities of Dr. Paul Ritter, Swiss Minister 'to the United States and Germany's indirect representative in America, has tended to put him in the same nearpersona non grata class in which German Ambassador von Bernstortf several times found himself, following his proschemes of the last two years. While Government heads refused to comment officially on th© matter, 6ome privately admitted that the Administration was convinced that Dr. Ritter not only inherited Bernstorff's diplomatic work in the United States, hut that he had taken np as well certain German propaganda work that might force a flat "show-down" between himself and tho State Department. Tho first evidence of this sort of work was Dr. Ritter's dissemination of reports that Germany was anxious for a German-American conference, at which all points at issue between the two nations could be discussed. This propaganda work wa6 started exactly one week after severance of German-Ameri-can relations. Officials believe that the plan, by the very nature of the way it was made public, was an appeal over Government officials' heads to the people, chiefly the pacifist element, 'to urge such n conference. Germany's proposal to detain five American Consular officers nntil Germany was assured all her Consular officers and other officials were not being held up by the United States Government, was also circulated by Ritter through the Press, and the Washington officials were not officially acquainted of the fact. Ritter is becoming even more hated than Bernstorff and his conspiring "enchmen were.