ntage of restricted
submarine activity to cover the participation of American citizens as
aids to the Entente and to expand its war trade. Being simultaneous
and couched in the same key, the press outbursts bore every indication
of a common inspiration, probably official.

"Moderation in the use of Germany's undersea craft," said one group of
journals in effect, "merely serves to further American assistance to
the Entente Allies in men and munitions."

Another paper, the "Tageszeitung," characterized the American policy
as one in the pursuance of which President Wilson Was making a
threatened use of a "wooden sword," and called for a policy of the
utmost firmness against that country.

It was intimated from Washington that if any faction in Germany--in
this case the Pan-Germans--succeeded in reviving submarine methods
whereby ships were sunk without warning or without safeguards against
loss of American lives, the submarine crisis with Germany would be
reopened with all its possibilities. At the same time no serious
importance was attached by official Washington to the German clamor
for more frightfulness.

It was true that the Pan-Germans were making a powerful onslaught for
the overthrow of the German Chancellor, Dr. von Bethmann-Hollweg, who
was the only obstacle to a return to ruthless submarine warfare.
Moreover, as perceived by the "Berliner Tageblatt," "tension in the
atmosphere of imperial politics has reached such a high point that a
discharge must follow if the empire is not to suffer lasting damage."
But Washington looked for development on the high seas, not in the
political arena of Berlin, where the sound and fury of words did not
afford a safe barometer of governmental action.

By the end of September, 1916, a "lull" in German submarine activity
was reported, due, according to Lord Robert Cecil, to a shortage in
submarines. But reports showed that between June 1, 1916, and
September 24, 1916, 277 vessels, sixty-six of which were neutral, had
been sunk by submarines, fifteen of them without warning, and with the
loss of eighty-four lives. The abatement really took place in June and
July, 1916, following the American agreement with Germany in May,
1916. The "lull" may therefore be measured by these figures: Vessels
sunk in June, 57; in July, 42; in August, 103; in September (to the
24th), 75.

The only real lull was a cessation in attacks on liners. The British
view, based on the allegation that fif