e the imports and exports so
important, in proportion to the number of the population, nowhere did
the average square mile yield such rich crops, nowhere was the railway
system so developed. Pauperism was practically unknown, and, even in the
large towns, the number of people dependent on public charity was
comparatively very small. To this picture of unequalled prosperity
oppose the present situation: Part of the countryside left without
culture for want of manure and horses; scarcely any cattle left in the
fields; commerce paralysed by the stoppage of railway and other
communications; industry at a complete standstill, with 500,000 men
thrown out of work and nearly half of the population which remained in
Belgium (3,500,000) on the verge of starvation and entirely dependent
for their subsistance on the work of the Commission for Relief.

It is said that the tree must be judged by its fruit. Such then is the
fruit of the German administration of Belgium. When he arrived in
Brussels, Governor von Bissing declared that he had come to dress
Belgium's wounds. What would he have done if he had meant to aggravate
them?

There is an insidious argument which must be met once and for ever. We
have seen how Germany is trying to throw the responsibility for the
misery prevailing in Belgium and for the present deportations on the
English blockade, which paralyses the industry and prevents the
introduction of raw materials. But, if this were the case, the situation
ought not to be worse in Belgium than in Germany. On the contrary,
thanks to the splendid work of the Commission for Relief, she ought to
be far better off. How is it then that--according to General von
Bissing's own declaration made to Mr. Julius Wertheimer, correspondent
of the _Vossische Zeitung_ (September the 1st, 1916)--how is it that
"the average cost of life is much higher in Belgium than in Germany,"
and that "a great number of inhabitants (tens of thousands of them) have
not eaten a piece of meat for many weeks?"

This inequality between the social conditions in Germany and in Belgium,
in spite of the advantages given to the latter by the introduction of
food through the blockade with England's consent, can easily be
explained: On the one hand, German industry has transformed itself, many
factories which could not continue their ordinary work owing to the
shortage of rawstuffs having been turned into war-factories in which
there is still a great demand for l