thousand of them in the frock-coat of the civilian official and the rest in military uniforms." It is the fashion to say that Doctor Stieber was the organiser of the modern spy system of Germany, for the conduct of which some million pounds sterling are annually appropriated. The truth is, however, that the organisation goes much farther back, a well-known statesman of the Napoleonic period, Baron Stein, having been responsible for the practical application of the theories which lie implicit in the philosophy of Frederick the Great. In his turn, Stieber assumed control of the lines and developed them to a point at which improvement became almost impossible. Stieber was a typical adventurer of the middle class, a man who, it is clear enough, had in him all those elements of character which we associate with the criminal who operates along the higher lines. It is said that he qualified as a barrister, not so much with the object of practising law, as to discover its limitations, or in other words, to know for a certainty how far scheming and the exploitation of simpler natures can be made a lawful trade. He was born in Prussia in 1818, and having been called to the Prussian Bar, sought to apply his knowledge of legal matters as a kind of counsellor in a Silesian factory, Silesia being in those days, 1847, the nursery of that vast school of Socialism which has since gained over twenty millions of adherents throughout Germany—indeed, one-third of the empire's entire population. By far the larger percentage of the workmen attached to the factory at which he was employed were Socialists, and Stieber realised that if he could only penetrate the secrets and methods of this important socialistic nucleus, he might prove undoubtedly serviceable to the central government in Berlin. Accordingly he joined the Socialist brotherhood, professing to be entirely in sympathy with their aims and aspirations, and in a short while became an acknowledged leader of the Silesian movement. As a man of superior education, Stieber gained admittance to the family of the firm which employed him, won the heart of his employer's daughter and married her.