when in that State
Giles Cory perished under the awful torture, judicially applied,
known as the "peine forte et dure."

It is quite true that weak voices against annexations have been
heard.

Dernburg and Professor Hans Delbrueck (the latter not to be
confused with the disgraced, pig-slaughtering, ex-Vice-Chancellor),
in their petition against the annexation of Belgium, showed a
most reasonable spirit, and signing this petition with them were
many of the great men and great minds of Germany. But their
movement was a failure in Germany itself. Their campaign of
reason could make no headway against the "League of Six"--the six
great iron and steel companies of the West, who, with their paid
lansquenets of the press and hired accelerators of public
opinion, clamour for annexation so that they may rivet the chains
of their industrial monopoly on the whole continent of Europe.

The Conservatives and Junkers, on the other hand, favour
annexations to the East; especially do they eye greedily the
Baltic provinces where great estates are in the hands of
landowners of German blood. What a reinforcement to the
conservative cause would these Junkers of the Baltic be and, in
the Conservative view, if there are to be annexations in the West
which would increase the number of industrial subjects and,
undoubtedly social democrats, there must be a balancing accession
of agricultural interest on the Eastern frontier.

The only cloud in the serene blue sky of Junker hopes is the fact
that annexations in Poland would add to the number of Roman
Catholics and, therefore, to the power of the Centrum or Roman
Catholic party. Hence the desire to make of Poland an independent
kingdom, but one controlled by the Central Empires.

The Poles are more at ease, having been given more liberty, under
Austrian than under Prussian rule, and hence the tendency is to
put Poland under Austrian rule. The Prussians do not object to
this because it does not matter whether Prussia controls Poland
directly or through Prussia's control of Austria, now, alas, only
too apparent.

But the principal aim of the nobles and the landed aristocracy of
Germany, followed by their host of office-holders and dependents,
is to keep the "graft," to hold the offices, civil and military,
filled so long by these old Prussian families.

The von Lachnows, to imagine a typical Junker family, hold one
thousand acres of land in Brandenburg. The head of the house,
Baron von