.

Conversations that I have had here in London about prisoners give
me the impression that the British public does not exactly
apprehend what a prisoner stands for in German eyes.

First, he is a hostage. If he be an officer his exact social value
is estimated by the authorities in Berlin, who have a complete card
index of all their officer prisoners, showing to what British
families they belong and whether they have social or political
connections in Britain. Thus when someone in England mistakenly,
and before sufficient German prisoners were in their hands, treated
certain submarine marauders differently from other prisoners, the
German Government speedily referred to this card-index, picked out
a number of officers with connections in the House of Lords and
House of Commons, and treated them as convicts.

The other German view of the prisoner is his cash value as a
labourer. I invite my readers to realise the enormous pecuniary
worth of the two million prisoner slaves now reclaiming swamps,
tilling the soil, building roads and railways, and working in
factories for their German taskmasters.

The most numerous body of prisoners in Germany are the Russians.
They are to be seen everywhere. In some cases they have greater
freedom than any other prisoners, and often, in isolated cases,
travel unguarded by rail or tramway to and from their work. If
they are not provided with good Russian uniforms, in which, of
course, they would not be able to escape, they are made conspicuous
by a wide stripe down the trouser or on the back. They are easy,
docile, physically strong, and accustomed to a lower grade of food
than any other prisoners, except the Serbs.

The British, of course, are much the smallest number in Germany,
but much the most highly prized for hate propaganda purposes.

"More difficult to manage," said one _Unteroffizier_ to me, "than
the whole of the rest of our two million." It is, indeed, a fact
that the 30,000 British prisoners, though the worst treated, are
the gayest, most outspoken, and rebellious against tyranny of the
whole collection.

There is, however, a brighter side to prison life in Germany, I am
happy to record. A number of really excellent camps have been
arranged to which neutral visitors are taken. When I told the
German Foreign Office that I would like to see the good side of
prison life, I was given permission by the _Kriegsministerium_ (War
Office) to visit the great camp at