GERMANY'S CRIMES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 131, 27 October 1914, Page 3

GERMANY'S CRIMES.

To th« Editor. Sir, —Most of u.s are not of.l enough to remember anything about the Indian Mutiny, and our Knowledge oi it is gathered from book::, but I can just remember as a child the thrill of horror that ran through the country when the news came of the massacre of Cawi'.pore, etc., and the terrible vengeance that was taken 011 the mutineers. Vet I believe it to bo a fact—it is certainly so stated in the history of the Mutiny by Lieut.-Col. Maliinson, which is regarded as a standard work—that though many innocent women and children were ruthlessly and cruelly slaughtered, there is not an authenticated case on record where a white woman was violated. Yet there wo were fighting against a foe, whom if they could not be called uncivilised, were at least civilised and educated in a very different school of morals to our own—a foe who, at the outset at least, had a genuine grievance in tho greased cartridges, and who were fighting in their own land to expel those whom (rightly or wrongly, Tt does not now matter) they considered intruders. To-day we are fighting a so-called civilised foe, a nation that professes Christianity, and the Emperor of wr.Wi, announces that he is the viie-regent oi the Almighty. And what do v.e find': There is nothing in recorded history

that exceeds in horror the stories of the present campaign in Belgium. For the senseless destruction of works oi art in public buildings, of cathedrals, we have no parallel in modern history, while to find parallels for outrages on women, children and helpless civilians we nnist go back to the campaign under tiie infamous Duke of Alva in the Low Countries. Kven in the Franco-German war of IS7O no such horrible atrocities were committed as we now hear of. Let the young men of this country read tho story told and vouched for by the Louden

Times in your columns of Friday, and let him in imagination place his sister or his mother in the place of those two Belgian girls, who, naked, violated and mutilated, had to take what miserable shelter they could get in the trenches alongside of our English soldiers, and let them swear that by the Clod Who made them t'hey will never rest till the nation who is responsible for these things is beaten to her knees and for ever rendered incapable of further offence. These tilings have happened in Belgium. Next year, if Germany is not smashed, they will happen iii England, and the year after that, or as soon after as may be convenient, tihcy may happen in Australia or Xew Zealand. Why not? Tke German character is the same whether ill these latitude or in those. We did not know, but now we have learnt. Wo knew they were an industrious nation, an artistic nation, an educated nation, and we thought they were a civilised nation. Yet we ought to have known tihat from the Kaiser down their civilisation was but skin decjf, and in time of stress would be sloughed oil'. l):d not the Kaiser a few \cars ago, not in the excitement of a campaign but in cold blood, when, addresing his troops going to China, say, "In this war you will take no prisoners—emulate the" example of the lluns under Attila, and strike terror in the hearts of \oi:r opponents." At that time we did not take his words seriously. Tliey were looked on as a bit of rhodoniontade, and it was overlooked. lint it is evident the Germans knew his meaning and have obeyed his orders. If we want another example of German callousness and indifference to pain, we can find it, though on a much smaller scale, in the conduct of the German doctor at Samoa, who refused to treat our soldiers for eye trouble, thus violating all the ethics of the medical profession. And \ye allow the blood brothers of these brutes to live amongst us, to spy out our ways and to work their dastardly will to injure us if and when they can. It is true they have not been discovered yet, or not all of them, so why should we trust them? Is their quiescence from good-will or lack of opportunity. The Government at Home after two months of war are still finding and arreting German spies. Why do we sit still and do nothing?— I am, etc., AN'TI-DACO.