by an innocent population on whose ruin or massacre
they have resolved. We have many times ascertained the truth of this;
here is one among others:

One evening the Abbe Colin, Cure of Croismare, was standing near an
officer when the report of a gun rang out. The latter cried, "Monsieur
le Cure, that is enough to cause you to be shot as well as the
Burgomaster, and for a farm to be burned; look, there is one on fire."
"Sir," replied the priest, "you are too intelligent not to recognize
the sharp sound of your German rifle. For my part, I recognize it."
The German did not press the point.

Personal liberty, like human life, is the object of complete scorn on
the part of the German military authorities. Almost everywhere
citizens of every age have been dragged from their homes and led into
captivity, many have died or been killed on the way.

Arson, still more than murder, forms the usual procedure of our
adversaries. It is employed by them either as a means of systematic
devastation or as a means of terrorism. The German Army, in order to
provide for it, possesses a complete outfit, which comprises torches,
grenades, rockets, petrol pumps, fuse-sticks, and little bags of
pastilles made of compressed powder which are very inflammable. The
lust for arson is manifested chiefly against churches and against
monuments which have some special interest, either artistic or
historical.

In the departments through which we have gone thousands of houses have
been burned, but we have only investigated in our inquiry fires which
have been occasioned by exclusively criminal intention, and we have
not believed it our duty to deal with those that have been caused by
shells in the course of violent fighting, or due to circumstances
which it has not been possible to determine with absolute certainty,
such as those at Villotte-devant-Louppy, Rembercourt, Mogneville,
Amblaincourt, Pretz, Louppy-le-Chateau, and other places. The few
inhabitants who remained among the ruins furnished us with information
in absolute good faith on this subject.

We have constantly found definite evidence of theft, and we do not
hesitate to state that where a body of the enemy has passed it has
given itself up to a systematically organized pillage, in the presence
of its leaders, who have even themselves often taken part in it.
Cellars have been emptied to the last bottle, safes have been gutted,
considerable sums of money have been stolen or extorted; a g