This very peculiar state of affairs explains the strange position occupied by the United States since the outbreak of the European War. From that time the German-Americans, in virtue of the immense means of influence and of action which they had prepared beforehand, have carried on a multifarious campaign, with extraordinary audacity in furtherance of the German game. Thus the German Ambassador, Count Bernstorff, and his military attachés von Papen, Boy-Ed, etc., have aided and abetted in the task of subverting the United States by a multitude of German-American spies and agents. During the first months of the war the German propaganda, carried on with extraordinary activity, was easily able to deceive a considerable part of American opinion as to the true origin of, and the responsibility for, the carnage going on in Europe. Afterwards, when the war dragged on, and the Allies placed considerable orders in the United States, the understrappers of the professional German spies engaged in an extraordinary series of outrages in order to terrorize the American workmen employed in executing the orders of the Allies. The object of these acts of violence, combined with the frivolous and interminable discussions which Count Bernstorff carried on with the Government of Washington, was first to induce the United States to issue an order prohibiting the Allies from arming their merchant ships for the purpose of self-defence against the German submarines; second, to persuade the Americans that the blockade of Germany by England was maintained in a manner contrary to the rules of international law; third, to slacken or stop the production of munitions of war destined for the Allies; and lastly, _supposing that the principal acquisitions contemplated by Pangermany had been effected in Europe_, to induce President Wilson to intervene in favour of peace under colour of putting an end to the European butchery—an intervention which, if it took place, would have the practical result of opening the negotiations for peace under conditions eminently favourable to the German plans of annexation. But at last the crimes of violence committed by the Germans in the United States opened the eyes of the American people and roused them to anger. We must understand that it was only gradually, and in spite of great difficulties, that the real citizens of the United States, hemmed in by the German organization as by a ring fence, were able to acquire true notions as to the European war. This progress of American opinion was further retarded by the circumstance that before the war, for various reasons, the Allied countries unquestionably occupied a much lower place in the esteem of the United States than Germany, which had gained for herself very great prestige by her extraordinary activity in commerce, industry, and science.