We do not even know the date of the alleged secret meetings of the Elders of Zion at which the lectures or reports, or whatever they were, recorded in these protocols were made and, presumably, considered. We do not know the name of the "most influential and most highly initiated" leader of Freemasonry from whom the documents were said to have been stolen. Neither do we know the name of the thief. We do not know the name of the author of the alleged protocols, though obviously it would make all the difference in the world whether these are summaries of statements made by a responsible leader of the Jewish people or the wild vaporings of such a crank as infests practically every conference and convention. We do not know who translated the alleged protocols, nor in what language they were written. Moreover, not one word of assurance does Professor Nilus give on his own account that he knows any of these things. He does not appear to have made any investigation of any kind. In view of the rest of his work we may be quite sure that had he done so he would have told us. He does not even tell us, in this edition of 1905, that the person from whom he acquired the "translation" was known to him as a reliable and trustworthy person. He does not profess to know anything more than I have already quoted from him. No one knows Nilus himself. So much for the explanation of 1905. Before I pass on to consider a later and different explanation made by the mysterious Nilus, a few brief observations upon the story now before us may not be out of place, especially since the _Dearborn Independent_ has accepted it and made it the basis of its propaganda. How is it possible for any person possessing anything approaching a trained mind, and especially for one accustomed to historical study, to accept as authentic, and without adequate corroboration, documents whose origin and history are so clouded with secrecy, mystery, and ignorance? And how can men and women who are to all appearances rational and high-minded bring themselves to indict and condemn a whole race, invoking thereby the perils of world-wide racial conflict, upon the basis of such flimsy, clouded, and tainted testimony? No decent and self-respecting judge or jury anywhere in the United States would, I dare believe, convict the humblest individual of even petty crime upon the basis of such testimony. Serious charges made by a complainant who does not appear in court and is not known to the court, an alleged translation of an alleged original, not produced in court, alleged to have been stolen by an anonymous thief not produced in court, from an alleged conspirator not named nor produced in court, and not a scintilla of corroborative evidence, direct or circumstantial--was ever a chain of evidence so flimsy? By comparison, the discovery of the _Book of Mormon_ is a well-attested event.