"For these cases of refusal, the German Authorities reserved the right to cause these recalcitrants to appear before Belgian tribunals and later before German military tribunals. It is therefore certain that the unemployed have the right to refuse to work for any motive approved by international law. When summoned before the tribunal they have the right to employ counsel in their defense and to state clearly their reasons for refusal. One might, of course, say that it is not a question obliging the workmen to participate in military enterprise; but it is only too evident that every Belgian deported to Germany will take the place there of a man who to-morrow will go to reinforce the ranks of the enemy. We should like to know, Excellency, whether these tribunals carry on their functions. "You fear that continued unemployment may depreciate the physical and moral status of the workmen. We, who know them, have more confidence in them. We have seen them suffer with a stoicism which exists only in proud and high souls. Did not the splendid idea come from them, of organizing throughout the entire country a vast chain of educational work for the unemployed in order to develop their technical knowledge and to increase their professional value? The _Comité National_ was not, alas, authorized to undertake this magnificent enterprise. Is it the idea that it is through forced labor, performed with black despair, like slaves, that our unhappy brothers will keep up their physical and moral energy? [Sidenote: The Germans have no right to talk about unemployment of Belgians.] "You fear also that 'the assistance which they receive will at length weigh down Belgian economic life.' We can with difficulty believe that Belgians, as you say, have had the smallness of soul to grudge in that form the bitter piece of bread and the little soup which have formed the food of so many working families for so many months; and what, after all, do the twelve million francs amount to that are distributed each month to from 500,000 to 600,000 unemployed, in comparison with the destruction, beyond reckoning, of goods and lives which the horrors of a war in which it has not the slightest responsibility have cost and still cost our country? With the most unshakable faith in our destinies; we, the most nearly interested, know that in the near future Flanders and _Wallonie_ will rise again, glorious, in history. [Sidenote: All Belgians understand the German scheme.]