It will be seen that the activities of the National Committee are fruitful and extensive. But more and more money is required, as savings are exhausted and as the public coffers are emptied by the Germans. In January 1915 the Sovereign Pontiff surrendered the Belgian contribution to Peter's Pence. As 40 million frs. per month (£1,600,000) is being paid to the Germans, poverty is rapidly increasing. The number of Belgians deprived of all resources and obliged to live entirely on charity had risen by February to 1,500,000. It was estimated that by June it would be 2,500,000, or more than one-third of the total population. In February the nourishment of this famishing host already demanded 10 million frs. (£400,000) per month; soon it will demand 12 to 13 millions. In this conjuncture Mr. Hoover, the President of the American Commission, went begging to the British Government, which promised £100,000 per month provided Germany would cease to make requisitions in Flanders and levy the tax of 40 millions. Germany refused. How will it end? _Belgium's Gratitude to America._ Belgium knows that she owes her relief to the United States. Without American charity our country would perish in the distress into which the German exactions have plunged her. No one in Belgium will ever forget this, and it is in the name of the whole nation that King Albert has publicly thanked America. It was in sign of homage, and also of gratitude, that on the 22nd February, 1915, on the anniversary of American Independence, the Belgians wore in their buttonholes a medallion of the Stars and Stripes, while thousands of the citizens of Brussels left their cards at the hotel of His Excellency Mr. Brand H. Whitlock. Baron von Bissing spoke of this as childishness; at Liége German officers even snatched the American colours from women and young girls. Massacre and arson are more familiar to _Kultur_ than gratitude. FOOTNOTES: [14] And also justified by the laws of warfare as affecting invasion. Moreover: "The rules which affect a _levée en masse_ (a general rising of the people to repel invaders, without organization) should be generously interpreted. The first duty of a citizen is to defend his country, and provided he does so loyally he should not be treated as a marauder or criminal." The Germans could not at the outset know that there was no _levée en masse_.--(TRANS.) [15] The Germans have tried to persuade Rome that these priests were not assassinated but killed in battle. [16] To give an idea of these accusations, it was said that in the cellars of a Louvain convent the corpses of fifty German soldiers were discovered, murdered by the monks. [17] If organized and disciplined, the civic guards and francs-tireurs would have formed part of the Belgian forces, provided they wore a recognizable sign and bore arms openly.--(TRANS.)