It is hardly necessary to say that the principle of holding towns to ransom is not admitted by any one to-day. Bluntschli, the German jurist, writes on this head a phrase which sounds ironical: “War has become civilised…… No one has any longer the right to pillage, and still less the right to destroy, without military necessity; _therefore there can no longer be any question of buying off this pretended right_.” On the other hand, the policy of terrorisation is not admitted. It is, however, very remarkable that the _Kölnische Zeitung_ apparently caves in to it by commenting on the gravity of the situation in which the Belgians were, owing to (1) the fact “_that their houses had been occupied by the enemy_,” and (2) the exhaustion of “_the whole resources of the town_.” Article 50 of the Hague Regulations stipulates, in fact, that no collective punishment, pecuniary or otherwise, can be enacted against the civil population by reason of individual acts for which they could not collectively be held responsible. German generals or publicists, therefore, have no authority to set up a system of collective indemnity, monetary or other, in punishment of individual acts, and still less to impose these indemnities under threat of pillaging and burning towns. As for the claim to recover the costs and expenses of war by a tax levied on the inhabitants of the invaded territory, the _Kölnische Zeitung_ is shamelessly lying when it says that such a claim is “recognised by international law.” Not a single authority in this sense can be quoted; on the contrary, there are express statements of the very opposite. The well-known Argentine writer, Calvo, declares that such a theory involves an abuse of force, and is “in flagrant contradiction to the principle which enacts that war is waged against a state, and not against individuals taken separately.” It was in conformity with this principle that the Germans themselves, in 1870, refused to admit that the amount of the monetary contributions previously levied in France (thirty-nine million francs) could be deducted from the five milliards imposed on France by the Treaty of Frankfurt, a confirmation as clear as it is unexpected of the principle which they are violating to-day. THE CHIEF EXAMPLES IN BELGIUM OF THIS BREACH OF INTERNATIONAL LAW The Germans imposed on the town of Liège a payment of ten million francs, and demanded fifty millions from the province. The provinces of Brabant and Brussels were assessed at 50 and 450 million francs respectively, “as a war contribution.” Moreover, it was declared in the note signed in the name of General Arnim by Captain Kriegsheim, of the general staff of the 4th army corps in presence of M. Max, Mayor of Brussels.