abrupt termination of our pleasant relations. Through connection with your firm, I have found out the secret of glucose-making, and am going back to impart it to the firm which I belong to in Germany. You owe me nothing." These few cases I print here because I think it but right to show that both before the war, and since, the public have not been so utterly blinded to the truth as the authorities had hoped. Many of the other cases before me are of such a character that I do not propose to reveal them to the public, still hoping against hope that proper inquiry may be instituted by a reliable Board formed to deal with the whole matter. And, for obvious reasons, premature mention of them might defeat the ends of justice by warning the spies that their "game" is known. I here maintain that there is a peril--a very grave and imminent peril--in attempting to further delude the public, and, by so doing, further influence public opinion. The seed of distrust in the Government has, alas! been sown in the public mind, and each day, as the alien question is evaded, it takes a firmer and firmer root. CHAPTER VIII THE PERIL OF INVASION There are few questions upon which experts differ more profoundly than that of a possible invasion of this country by Germans. Here, in England, opinion may be roughly divided into two schools. It is understood generally that the naval authorities assert that the position of our Fleet is such that even a raid by say ten thousand men, resolved to do us the greatest possible damage and cause the maximum of alarm even if the penalty be annihilation, is out of the question. On the other hand, the military authorities hold the view--a view expressed to me by the late Lord Roberts--that it would be quite possible for the Germans to land a force in Great Britain which would do an enormous amount of damage, physically and morally, before it was finally rounded up and destroyed by the overwhelming numbers of troops we could fling against it. What we think of the matter, however, is of less importance than what the enemy thinks, and it is beyond question that, at any rate until quite recently, the German War Staff regarded the invasion of England as perfectly practicable, and had made elaborate plans for carrying out their project. When writing my forecast "The Invasion of England," in 1905, I received the greatest advice and kind assistance from the late Lord Roberts, who spent many hours with me, and who personally revised and elaborated the German plan of campaign which I had supposed. Without his assistance the book would never have been written. I am aware of the strong views he held on the subject, and how indefatigable he was in endeavouring to bring the grave peril of invasion home to an apathetic nation. Poor "Bobs"! The public laughed at him and said: "Yes, of course. He is getting so old!"