The peril to the Allies is the greater because of the vicious methods used by Germany. All military experts know that wars are fought incidentally with guns at the trenches, but in reality with granaries at the rear. Better a million well-fed men with naked fists than two million of armed men who are starving, for the starving men will soon be too weak to lift the guns and the well-fed men will grasp the weapons. From the view-point of food resources, Germany has from the beginning occupied a unique position, in that she is rimmed all around about with little nations unprepared and unarmed, and therefore impotent to protect their granaries and root cellars, their herds and flocks, when Germans came in to steal them. Whenever Germany has, therefore, been short of food, she has organized an expedition and looted some land like Belgium, as Poland. The next winter she sends an army out to loot Rumania. Now that the harvests have been gathered in upon the fields of Italy, Germany is trying to despoil that land. Whenever she has had to withdraw a million men from the fields to send them to the front Germany has impressed another million from Belgium, Poland or Rumania, and forced these slaves to plough her fields, reap her harvests, and all without wage. Sometimes she has gone through the form of buying grain from the Balkan States, but she has forced these peoples to take in return paper currency, which she can grind out so long as the printing presses hold out and which in the event of defeat she can easily repudiate. On the other hand, when Turkey and Bulgaria have turned towards Germany for guns and munitions, since they had nowhere else to go, Berlin has forced their rulers to pay in gold and silver. Germany's claim is probably true, that her people are as well-fed during the fourth winter of the war as they were during the first winter. These are not pleasant matters to consider, but these are the facts. Wise men want to know the facts, and then they know what plans they must make to overcome the worst and turn it into the best. Better be a wise pessimist than an ignorant optimist. Uninformed Micawbers always waiting for something to turn up have no place in this world war.