MOST of the horrors committed in civilized societies are the work of men or women who loathe the things they do, but would rather do the thing they loathe than endure some other evil that seems intolerable. The wretched Crippen poisons his wife, not because he hates her, or takes any pleasure in killing her, but because her continued existence makes the kind of life he wishes to lead impossible. But crime—and particularly murder—seems to have a fascination of its own. It is a truth preserved to us in the popular phrase, “tasting blood.” Those who come under the spell grow into maniacs, fiends in human shape, who, having plotted their first murder to gain some end that seems irresistibly desirable, find an unexpected and terrible excitement in it, and go on to the second from an irresistible desire to taste that dreadful pleasure again. These men are the legendary figures of horror—Bluebeard of the nursery, Jack the Ripper of history.

When Germany resolved to assault the civilization of the centuries and conquer the western world before that world grew too strong to be conquered, having no other motive than to annex the territories and steal the wealth of neighboring nations who had done her no harm, she embarked upon a course of crime on so vast and appalling a scale that she was doomed to exemplify in her own monstrous person the whole psychology of crime. It is quite likely that the first murders committed in Belgium were done not for the love of killing, but with the excellent (?) military purpose of terrorizing a conquered population, and so lessening the necessity for a garrison to keep them in order. The first murders of English men, women, and children, perpetrated at the bombardment of Yarmouth, Scarborough, and Whitby, may have been intended merely as a demonstration that Germany could strike even at an island that was impregnable. The first use of the submarine against a merchant ship may have been made in the hope that a mere demonstration of frightfulness would save her from the necessity of repeating it, by frightening every trading ship off the sea. But indulgence in blood brought upon our enemy the cruellest of all punishments. It brought an insatiable appetite, until the killing of old men and boys, but particularly of women and small children, has become a thing necessary to the men that do it and to the nation that sends them on their mission of murder.

ARTHUR POLLEN.