According to the First Lord of the Admiralty, practically the whole fast cruiser force of the German Navy, including some great ships vital to their fleet and utterly irreplaceable, was risked for the passing pleasure of killing as many English people as possible, irrespective of sex, age, or condition, in the limited time available. Now we know sufficient of German thoroughness to be quite sure that they would never have risked a journey of over four hundred miles from their base, through a sea sown with mines, unless they were well acquainted with the channels left open. Knowledge of the exact positions in which we have placed our mines could only have been gained through spies amongst us. Surely this should be sufficient answer to Mr. McKenna's communiqué to the Press. A special correspondent of the London _Evening News_, who passed between London and Berlin twice, unsuspected, during the month of December, and even visited Vienna, writing on December 19th of what he saw in the German capital, declared that he heard the raid upon Scarborough discussed in certain circles in Berlin on December 16th, _three days before it took place_! In the course of his comments he wrote:-- "I always thought the spy mania in England exaggerated, but now I am absolutely persuaded that even those Englishmen who recognise this peril do not realise the lengths to which it goes. They have been suspecting waiters and servants, whilst the spies are in high social positions; they have contented themselves with searching the houses of German barbers and grocers, whilst neglecting the hands which collect and forward to Berlin the information gathered by more humble satellites. "It is very sad to have to say such things, but I think the most dangerous spies still in England are not Germans, whether naturalised or not, but are people belonging to neutral countries--even to countries actually fighting Germany--and subjects of Great Britain herself. "I would not have written this if I was not sure of it; the diplomat from whom I got the information assured me that there are some English and French of both sexes who come regularly to Berlin, or to frontier towns through neutral countries, and have conversations with officials and then return. The restrictions as to luggage and passports, both in France and in England, are not half as severe as they should be; _they are even slacker than at the beginning of the war_. I know, personally, of a number of stolen American passports under the shelter of which German spies are now travelling, and an Italian Consul with whom I happened to travel a few days ago, said he had discovered two fellows with false Italian passports almost perfectly imitated.