CECIL CHESTERTON [Illustration: HUSBANDS AND FATHERS Belgian workmen were forcibly deported to Germany.] The Envoy to Her Majesty A certain number of Raemaekers’ cartoons concern the politics and the people of his own country in such a way that comment on them by one who is not fully conversant with the situation in Holland is an impertinence, but in this case the artist’s satire is patent to all. The contempt of the Queen at this bald rendering of Germany’s many veiled offers is fully apparent; every line of the figure is expressive of disdain, and the figure in the background appeals without result. It is that figure in the background which has most interest, however; it is yet another expression of the truth that these cartoons have made so vividly evident, that Germany will stop short of nothing to gain her ends. This envoy is the German as we knew him before the war, deferent, somewhat waiter-ish, and at the same time suggestive of the German commercial traveller--the very worst kind of commercial traveller, for whom the word “business” covers such underhand dealings as accompanied the furtherance of German plans in all countries--a spy in disguise. He says, in effect--“Yours is a very little country; in the day of our world-dominance it will be well that you should have our protection.” He wants the mouths of the Scheldt, and all that furtherance of German naval plans which dominance over Holland would give, and he offers all that Germany is prepared to offer to any ally or potential ally. But the Queen has turned away. E. CHARLES VIVIAN [Illustration: THE ENVOY TO HER MAJESTY “Madam, your soldiers will get splendid Prussian uniforms, and Your Majesty will have a place of honour in the retinue of the Kaiser.”] The German Band The German Band, as we know it in this country, has never been noted for harmonious music. Blatancy, stridency, false notes, and persistency after the coppers, have been its chief characteristics. And the same things prevail when it is at home. Never since the world began has there been such a campaign of barefaced humbug and lying as that organised by William, Hindenburg, Hollweg and Co. for the deceiving and fleecing of the much-tried countries temporarily under their sway. But the money had to be got in by hook or by crook, and by hook and by crook and in every nefarious way they have milked their unfortunate peoples dry. But there is another side to all this. In time, the veil of lies and false intelligence of victories in the North Sea, and at Verdun, and, indeed, wherever Germany has fought and failed, will be rent by the spear of Truth.