as something "terrible but sublime. There has been nothing like
it since Napoleon left the bones of half a million men behind him in
Russia." Even Lord Kitchener, in the House of Lords, said that Russia had
accomplished the greatest achievement of the war. And so, just afterwards,
with the equally empty rumour of Hindenburg's "victory," which sent Berlin
into such a frenzy of rejoicing. It believed without evidence because it
wanted to believe.

And another fruitful source of rumour is fear. The famous concrete
emplacement at Maubeuge will serve as an instance. We had the most
elaborate details of how the property was acquired by German agents, how in
secret the concrete platform was laid down, and how the great 42-cm.
howitzer shelled Maubeuge from it. And instantly we heard of concrete
emplacements in this country--at Willesden, Edinburgh, and elsewhere. We
began to suspect every one who had a garage or a machine shop with a
concrete foundation of being a German agent. I confess that I shared these
suspicions in regard to a certain factory overlooking London, and could not
wholly argue myself out of them, though I hadn't an atom of evidence beyond
the fact that the building had been owned by Germans and had a commanding
position. I was under the hypnotism of Maubeuge and the fears to which it
gave birth.

Yet there never was a concrete emplacement at Maubeuge, and no 42-cm.
howitzer was used against that fortress. The property belonged, not to
German agents, but to respectable Frenchmen, and the apology of the _Matin_
for the libel upon them may be read by anybody who is interested in these
myths of the war.

I refer to this subject to-day not to recall these historic fables, but to
show what cruel wrong we may do to the innocent by accepting rumours about
our neighbours without examining the facts. Was there ever a more pitiful
story than that told at the inquest on an elderly woman at Henham in
Suffolk? Her husband had been the village schoolmaster for twenty-eight
years. The couple had a son whom they sent to Germany to learn the
language. The average village schoolmaster has not much money for luxuries,
and I can imagine the couple screwing and saving to give their boy a good
start in life. When he had finished his training he set out to seek his
fortune in South America, and there in far Guatemala he became a teacher of
languages. When the war broke out he heard the call of the Motherland to
her children and li