_(b) Monster Trials, Arbitrary Executions, Internment of Civilians, etc_. A notorious reason for imprisonment, and even execution, was the possession of the so-called Russian Manifesto dropped by Russian aeroplanes, being a proclamation of the Tsar to the people of Bohemia promising them the restoration of their independence. Mr. Matejovsky, of the Prague City Council, and fifteen municipal clerks were sentenced to many years' imprisonment for this offence in February, 1915. In May, 1915, six persons, among them two girls, were condemned to death in Kyjov, Moravia, for the same offence. On the same charge also sixty-nine other persons from Moravia were brought to Vienna and fifteen of them sentenced to death. One of the Czech girls who were executed for this offence was a Miss Kotikova, aged twenty-one, who, according to the _Arbeiter Zeitung_ of September 8, 1917, refused to say from whom she had received the manifesto, and through her heroic attitude saved the lives of others. Without a fair trial and without evidence, the editor of the National Socialist organ _Pokrok_ in Prostejov, Mr. Joseph Kotek, was sentenced to death on Christmas Eve of 1914. The sentence was passed at noon, confirmed at half-past four and carried out at half-past six. As no one could be found to act as hangman, Kotek was shot. The reason given for the verdict was that the accused editor of the _Pokrok_, which was suppressed as being dangerous to the State, delivered a speech at a meeting of a co-operative society in which he said that all Czechs were unanimous that they knew that Austria was losing the war and that they prayed to God that her downfall might be soon. He was further alleged to have said that it was doubtful how Europe would be divided after the war, but that in any case the Czecho-Slovak countries would be made independent as a wedge between Germany and Austria, and that if Germany won the Czechs would be germanised, like the Poles in Germany. The accused admitted that he did speak about the reorganisation of Europe, but not in the words used by the prosecution. But, as the _Arbeiter Zeitung_ said, even if he did say what the prosecution alleged, as a civilian he should never have been sentenced to death by a military tribunal. According to Czech papers, Kotek was buried among ordinary criminals outside the cemetery. The grave of the innocent martyr was not even marked with his name, and his wife was not allowed to visit it, because the military authorities forbade the sexton of the church to allow any one to see the graves of those executed for high treason. _Dr. Preiss_, the manager of the Czech bank, Zivnostenska Banka, which has its branches in Galicia, Rumania, Serbia and elsewhere, and four of his colleagues were imprisoned, because the Czechs would not subscribe to Austrian war loans and Dr. Preiss had done nothing to induce them to do so.