It never happened again. How could it possibly be repeated? The introduction of the barbaric elements of "frightfulness," hitherto confined to savage tribes at war, the use of such devilish inventions as poison gas and liquid fire, are due to the malignant minds of the German high command, and for them the German soldiers cannot be held accountable. But the native lowness of morality shown by so many of the German rank and file, their apparent insensitiveness to ordinary humane instincts, the well-authenticated stories of their filthy and cruel conduct in the occupied districts, inevitably tended to harden and embitter their adversaries against them too. Of the instances of their treachery to Irish soldiers which have been brought to my notice, I will mention only two. One arose out of the "truce" of Christmas Day, 1914, despite the goodwill of the occasion. The victim, Sergeant Timothy O'Toole, Leinster Regiment, first mentions that he took part in a game of football with the Germans, and then proceeds-- "I was returning to my own trench unaccompanied about 12.15 p.m. When I reached within fifteen paces I was sniped by a Hunnish swine, the bullet entering my back, penetrating my intestines. Following the example of Our Lord, I instantly forgave him, concluding he was only a black sheep, characteristic of any army or community, but I was labouring under a delusion. Within five minutes of being hit, I had quite a number around me, including officers and clergymen. I was so mortally wounded that the 'Padre' administered the last rite of the Church on the spot. Four stretcher bearers came out for me. I noticed the white band and Red Cross on their arms. Immediately I was lifted up on the stretcher. Though I was semi-unconscious I remember the bullets beating the ground like hailstone on a March day. I was wounded again, this time the bullet going through the lower part of my back. Here two of my bearers got hit, Privates Melia and Peters. The former died in hospital immediately after. Naturally the two bearers instantly dropped the stretcher. I fell violently to the ground--nice medicine for a man wounded in the abdomen." "Thank Providence, I am still living," Sergeant O'Toole adds, "but a living victim of German atrocity and barbarism." In the other case a very gallant young officer of the Dublin Fusiliers, Lieutenant Louis G. Doran, lost his life on the Somme, October 23, 1916, through the guile and falsehood of German soldiers. The circumstances are told in a letter written by Captain Louis C. Byrne to the father of Lieutenant Doran, Mr. Charles J. Doran of Blackrock, co. Dublin--