Toronto Mail and Empire: “The Washington government knows why the American citizens whose names are on the passenger list of the Lusitania trusted themselves to the ship despite the warnings of the Kaiser’s agents and accomplices in New York. Those American men and women disregarded the warnings, not because they believed the Germans incapable of torpedoing a passenger vessel, but because they felt that the neutrality and puissance of their nation would be respected. The Washington government cannot let these American citizens who relied on its protection go unavenged.” Toronto Globe: “But what of the United States. Does President Wilson propose to let German submarines destroy the lives of American citizens because they choose to cross the Atlantic in a passenger ship flying the British flag? Does he still think the mad dog of Europe can be trusted at large? Is it not almost time to join in hunting down the brute?” Toronto Daily Star: “The sinking of the Lusitania was not necessary to prove what was already abundantly demonstrated--that there is no length of vindictiveness to which Germany will not go. There is no lesson to be drawn from it except that Germany must be fought to a finish, and that all the resources of the allied countries must be marshalled for that purpose. We are engaged in no ordinary war. The very existence of civilization is at stake. The civilized world is threatened by a nation that has deliberately gone back to barbarism and given a free rein to criminal instincts. Denunciation and rebuke are of no avail in such a case. The conflict is between a powerful criminal and those who desire to live under the reign of law; and the time has come for every man who believes in law, in every nation, to fight for the life of civilization.” VIEWS OF PROMINENT CANADIANS That the torpedoing of the Lusitania was not an act of war in the technical sense committed by Germany as against the United States, was the view expressed by Mr. McGregor Young, professor of international law in Toronto University, who said in an interview: “Certain acts are acts of war in the technical sense--acts, that is to say, which touch the state qua state. But the torpedoing of the Lusitania does not come within that category, so far as the United States is concerned. It is not an act such as is not compatible with friendly relations between that country and Germany. The Lusitania was a British ship, and the American passengers on board her were really an incident, as it were. Whether it would be consistent with the United States’ self-respect to put up with Germany’s action is another matter. That is a question as to which a nation must judge for itself.” Mr. E. F. B. Johnston, K.C., gave his opinion as follows: