Take the case of the man Thierichens, Captain of the _Prinz Eitel Friedrich_, which was interned at Norfolk in March, 1915, after a successful career of six months as a commerce raider. For a long time Captain Thierichens was hailed in this country as a sort of naval hero; he received the admiration not only of men but of women. It was only after a considerable career in adulation that the tide of public estimation turned in regard to this man. His private correspondence was investigated, and it was found that he was carrying on correspondence with women in this country which showed a depth of human depravity on his part which cannot be understood and may not be described. This phase of German mentality was manifested also in the highest diplomatic representatives that that country sent abroad. These men had no sense of honor or morality, but curiously enough, they were not aware of their own lack. They performed the most pernicious acts of treason, and yet were never conscious they were committing any crime. Von Bernstorff, Dumba, von Papen, Boy-Ed, Bolo Pacha, Rintelen and Dr. Scheele—such a record of treachery never has been known in all the history of diplomacy; such a wholly devilish ingenuity, such an intellectual finesse in conspiracy, such a delicate exactness and such a crude brutality in destruction, never have been manifested on the part of any other nation in the world. The flower of centuries of civilization in Germany’s case had been merely a baneful, noisome bloom, and not the sweet product of an actual culture. The efflorescence of the German heart is the fungus of decay. Feed them? Why should we feed them? Trust them? Why should we trust them? Spare them? Why should we spare them? Receive them? Why should we receive them? Believe them? Why should we ever believe them? A fine band of conspirators was uncovered by investigations of attempted atrocities against our eastern shipping. There was a man named Robert Fay who had invented a ship bomb, and who had all the German money he needed back of him. His machine was a sort of tank which he fastened to the rudder post just below the water line of a ship which was being loaded and which stood high in the water. As the vessel was loaded, it would submerge the tank and leave everything out of sight under water. Fay had worked out one of the most ingenious devices which any of the investigating Government engineers had ever seen.