A German editor in the United States had the effrontery to announce that American ships would be sunk as readily as the _Lusitania_. Secretary Bryan, of the Department of State, at that time a confirmed pacifist, resigned his post on June 8, thus drawing the sting of a second and sharper protest which went forward to Germany the next day. To this the Foreign Office replied on July 8 that American ships would be safe in the submarine zone under certain conditions, and the President on July 21 rejected this diplomatic sop as "very unsatisfactory." Count von Bernstorff finally announced, on September 1, that German submarines would sink no more liners without warning, and his government ratified his promise a fortnight later. The promise was at best a quibble, and it in no way restricted undersea depredations upon commerce and human life. After the _Lusitania_ affair followed the _Leelanaw_, the _Arabic_, and the _Hesperian_ and on February 16, 1916, Germany acknowledged her liability for the _Lusitania's_ destruction--the day after Secretary Lansing declared the right of commercial vessels to arm themselves in self-defense, and five days before the Crown Prince began the ten-months' battle of Verdun. The published correspondence of the State Department gives in detail the negotiations regarding maritime relations, a record of Imperial hypocrisy which indicates clearly the desire and intention of the Germans to retain their submarine warfare at any cost. There is not space here to brief the papers, nor any great need, for it was the _Lusitania_ which dictated the tone and outcome of the correspondence, and which brought the United States rudely face to face with the cruel facts of war. In spite of these facts, Germany employed her agents in desperate, devious and futile attempts to gloss over the crime. Relatives of those who had drowned were persuaded by agents (one of them was "a lawyer named Fowler, now under Federal indictment on another count") to sue the Cunard Line for damages for having mounted guns on the liner, thus making her liable to attack. Paul Koenig paid a German, Gustave Stahl, of Hoboken, to swear to an affidavit that he had seen guns on the ship; this affidavit was forwarded by Captain Boy-Ed on June 1, to Washington, and had a wide temporary effect upon public sentiment until Stahl was convicted of perjury and sentenced to 18 months in Atlanta. It was Koenig who hid Stahl where neither the police nor the press could find him after he made his statement, and it was Koenig who, at the command of the Federal authorities, produced him. It was Rintelen who dined on the night of the tragedy at the home of one of the victims; it was Rintelen who received the news with a mild expression of regret because "he had two good men aboard."