THE “Black Hole of Calcutta” and the “Well of Cawnpore,” those dark spots on the history of India, stand out in their blackness against fairly light surroundings. Wittenberg, as dark in its way as either, scarcely stands out in the History of Brutality which is the history of the German conduct of the great war.

The terrible thing about Germany is the fact that she seems to have taken out letters patent for vileness; that vileness has become her right and prerogative, and that the neutral nations have accepted the fact as a natural one.

A very mean man, once he gets a reputation for meanness, can commit mean acts without raising much adverse comment.

In the same way Germany, by a system of uniform brutality, can commit “Wittenbergs” without creating any great excitement in the minds of neutral onlookers.

If England were to starve her German prisoners and set dogs on them and thrash them, and force them to labor after the fashion of Germany, the howl of outraged neutrals would be heard through the two Americas and the Scandinavias.

Germany does these things and worse, and there is no excitement over the business. It is the German method.

But, thank God, the future of humanity is not in the hands of the neutrals, and the men whose part it will be to punish crimes will remember Wittenberg. If not, Raemaekers will remind them.

H. DE VERE STACPOOLE.