Yet, looking back upon it all, I cannot but admit that his methods were justified. The disaffection was noticeable; and only a strong hand could put it down. Nordenholt’s tactics were probably the best under the circumstances; but nevertheless they brought him into a fresh orientation with regard to the workers. Instead of leading them, he began more and more openly to drive them along the road which he wished them to take. * * * * * I see that I have omitted to mention the attempted invasion of the Nitrogen Area from the coasts of Europe which took place just before this. To tell the truth, it was so complete a fiasco that it had almost passed from my mind; but a few words may be devoted to it here. When the Famine had done its work in Germany there still remained for a time a number of inhabitants who had seized the food in the country by force and who were thus enabled to prolong their existence while their fellows died out. They belonged mainly to the old military class. When they in turn ran short of supplies, their natural thought was to plunder someone weaker than themselves; and learning of the existence of the Clyde Valley colony, they determined that it furnished the most probable source of loot. Apparently they imagined that the Fleet in the Firth of Forth was deserted; for in order to excite no suspicion they had kept their airships at long-range in the reconnaissances which they undoubtedly made in advance of their actual onset; and it seems most probable that they imagined they had nothing to fear beyond the risks incident to the invasion of an unprotected country. At least, so it appears to me; and there were no survivors of the expedition from whom the truth might have been discovered. Under cover of night, they seem to have put most of their men on board merchant ships and sailed for the British coast at a time which would have brought them off the land in the early hours of the morning when, no doubt, they expected to get ashore without attracting attention, since they must have supposed all the coastal inhabitants had perished. Actually, however, their manœuvres had been followed by the seaplane patrol which cruised in the North Sea; and as soon as they left port, the Fleet was got into a state of preparedness. The two forces met somewhere on the high seas; the German squadron, utterly defenceless, was sunk without any resistance worthy of the name. This was the only actual attempt at invasion which the Nitrogen Area had to repel; for Nordenholt’s aeroplane propaganda had checked any desire on the part of the survivors of the Famine in this country to approach the Clyde Valley under any conditions. * * * * *