ion, presided over by the President. Their guilt was speedily
proved beyond the shadow of a doubt. Documents, memoranda, and
telegrams were produced by men who had seemed their most trusted
servants, but had been in reality members of the Brotherhood told off
to unearth their schemes.

Cyphers were translated which showed that they had practically sold
the resources of the country in advance to the Tsar and his allies,
and that they were only waiting the signal to declare war without
warning and without cause upon Britain, blockade her ports, and
starve her into surrender and acceptance of any terms that the
victors might choose to impose. Last of all, the terms of the bargain
between the League and the Ring were produced, signed by the late
President and the Secretary of State, and countersigned by the
Russian Minister at Washington.

The Court sat for three days, and reassembled on the fourth to
deliver its verdict and sentence. Fifteen members of the late
Government, including the President, the Vice-President, and the
Secretary of State, and twenty-four great capitalists composing the
Ring, were found guilty of giving and receiving bribes, directly and
indirectly, and of betraying and conspiring to betray the confidence
of the American people in its elected representatives, and also of
conspiring to make war without due cause on a friendly Power for
purely commercial reasons.

At eleven o'clock on the morning of the 9th of October the President
of the Federation rose in the Senate House, amidst breathless
silence, to pronounce the sentence of the Court.

"All the accused," he said, speaking in slow, deliberate tones, "have
been proved guilty of such treason against their own race and the
welfare of humanity as no men ever were guilty of before in all the
disreputable history of state-craft. In view of the suffering and
misery to millions of individuals, and the irreparable injury to the
cause of civilisation that would have resulted from the success of
their schemes, it would be impossible for human wit to devise any
punishment which in itself would be adequate. The sentence of the
Court is the extreme penalty known to human justice--Death!"

A shudder passed through the vast assembly as he pronounced the
ominous word, and the accused, who but a few days before had looked
upon the world as their footstool, gazed with blanched faces and
terror-stricken eyes upon each other. He paused for a moment, and
looked s