The reconstruction of South-Eastern Europe

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF

better than it was in the time of Attila and Ginghis Khan.

It is true that during the present war fearful and unspeakable atrocities have been committed in Belgium, France and Serbia. Many officers and privates of German or Magyar regiments have behaved like soldiers of Attila or Tamerlane. But there is a difference. The Huns of Attila boasted of the cruelties they committed; Attila professed to be the scourge of God, chosen to chastise a depraved and corrupt humanity. The soldiers of the German War Lord are ashamed of the atrocities committed by them, and when caught in flagrante delicto they protest and invoke the iron law of war necessity.

In courting victory the German militarists were obliged to deceive and persuade the German nation that its very existence was threatened by the wiles of British diplomacy, by the aggresSive spirit of Russian barbarism. The German militarists professed to make a defensive war and even tried to persuade the small nations remaining neutral that Germany is fighting for liberty and civilisation in Europe, expecting their sympathies to be ranged on her side, as she is recognised to be the leading nation of European civilisation. De la Rochefoucauld has said, in his maxims, that hypocrisy is the best homage to virtue. The hypocrisy of the German military party is the best proof that no large part of humanity to-day can be induced or

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