The pacifists have delved out of the infinite latency a very startling alleged truth, which they are effulging in language of lavish luminosity, to the effect that it is necessary only for a man to have a pecuniary interest or personal advantage involved in order to commit any kind of crime. They have discovered that room for a motive establishes the motive and proves the crime. They have discovered that those things which we call integrity and honor and conscience are no deterrents whatsoever to the commission of the most heinous offense against one's fellow men, so long as there is profit in it. They believe that, if only there is money in the game, an inventor or manufacturer or merchant will scheme for the commission of wholesale poisoning, maiming, and murder. They believe that the inventors and manufacturers of guns necessarily foster war in order to promote the sale of their wares. They surmise that inventors and manufacturers of smokeless powders and high explosives are capable of standing with the "black hand," capable of being gladdened at the dynamite outrage, at the street riot, at the slaughter of song-birds--anything that will consume dynamite or burn gunpowder. According to the pacifists, the principal lay of makers of war-materials is to connive with the officers of the Army and Navy to stir up international dissension and foment war, in order to create a demand for their products. The pacifists believe that army and navy officers are only too willing to co-operate in the nefarious business, because war brings higher pay and rapid promotion. They believe that it matters not to these "interested parties" how many of their countrymen are sacrificed on the firing line, or how many widows and orphans are made. The groans of the wounded and dying on the battle-field, and the lamentations in the desolated home, are music to the ears of those who supply the war-materials; for, with every shot from a rifle, fifty grains of gunpowder are burned, while bullets enough miss their mark to equal the weight of each man they kill. Consequently, there is substantial profit to the cartridge-maker and the gunpowder-manufacturer for every man killed with a rifle ball. But it is in shrapnel and the ammunition for the big guns that the greatest profit lies. Field-guns fire away ammunition costing from ten to twenty dollars a shot, at the rate of from twenty to forty shots a minute. This costs a lot of money. At the battle of Mukden, in the Russo-Japanese war, one battery of eight guns fired 11,159 rounds, or 1,395 rounds per gun. Think of the expense of that ammunition, and the profit to the manufacturers! It is estimated that when the big naval guns are fired, the cost of the smokeless-powder charge, the projectile and bursting charge, together with the wear and tear of the gun, amounts to more than $2,000 a shot, and the damage done to a warship hit may be many millions.