very long until I was impressed by the remarkable
control the Government had on public opinion by censorship of the
press. People believe, without exception, everything they read in the
newspapers. And I soon discovered that the censor was so accustomed to
dealing with German editors that he applied the same standards to the
foreign correspondents. A reporter could telegraph not what he
observed and heard, but what the censors desired American readers to
hear and know about Germany.

[Illustration: A Berlin "Extra"]

I was in St. Quentin, France (which the Germans on their 1917
withdrawal set on fire) at the headquarters of General von Below, when
news came May 8th that the _Lusitania_ was torpedoed. I read the
bulletins as they arrived. I heard the comments of the Germans who
were waging war in an enemy country. I listened as they spoke of the
loss of American and other women and children. I was amazed when I
heard them say that a woman had no more right on the _Lusitania_ than
she would have on an ammunition wagon on the Somme. The day before I
was in the first line trenches on the German front which crossed the
road running from Peronne to Albert. At that time this battlefield,
which a year and a half later was destined to be the scene of the
greatest slaughter in history, was as quiet and beautiful as this
picturesque country of northern France was in peace times. Only a few
trenches and barbed wire entanglements marred the scene.

On May 9th I left St. Quentin for Brussels. Here I was permitted by
the General Government to send a despatch reflecting the views of the
German army in France about the sinking of the _Lusitania_. I wrote
what I thought was a fair article. I told how the bulletin was posted
in front of the Hotel de Ville; how the officers and soldiers marching
to and away from the front stopped, read, smiled and congratulated each
other because the Navy was at last helping the Army "win the war."
There were no expressions of regret over the loss of life. These
officers and soldiers had seen so many dead, soldiers and civilians,
men and women, in Belgium and France that neither death nor murder
shocked them.

The telegram was approved by the military censor and forwarded to
Berlin. I stayed in Belgium two days longer, went to Louvain and Liege
and reached Berlin May 12th. The next day I learned at the Foreign
Office that my despatch was stopped because it conflicted with the
opinions