he
weight of a horrible nightmare. He has found sheer delight in
keeping it in a state of perpetual anxiety over his boastful
utterances of power and the sharpened sword.

"Five threats of war have been launched against us since 1875. At
the sixth he finds himself caught in the toils he had laid for us.
He threatened the very springs of England's power, though she was
more than pacific in her attitude toward him.

"For many years, thanks to him, the Continent has had to join in a
giddy race of armaments, drying up the sources of economic
development and exposing our finances to a crisis which we shrank
from discussing. We must have done with this crowned comedian,
poet, musician, sailor, warrior, pastor; this commentator absorbed
in reconciling Hammurabi with the Bible, giving his opinion on
every problem of philosophy, speaking of everything, saying
nothing." M. Clemenceau summed up the Kaiser as "another Nero; but
Rome in flames is not sufficient for him--he demands the
destruction of the universe."

The Socialist, Upton Sinclair, speaking at the time, blamed Russia as
well as Germany and Austria. He also inclined to the view that the
assassination at Sarajevo was instigated by Austria. He said:

"I assert that never before in human history has there been a war
with less pretense of justification. It is the supreme crime of the
ages; a blow at the very throat of civilization. The three nations
which began it, Austria, Russia and Germany, are governed, the
first by a doddering imbecile, the second by a weak-minded
melancholic, and the third by an epileptic degenerate, drunk upon
the vision of himself as the war lord of Europe. Behind each of
These men is a little clique of blood-thirsty aristocrats. They
fall into a quarrel among themselves. The pretext is that Serbia
instigated the murder of the heir apparent to the Austrian throne.
There is good reason far believing that as a matter of fact this
murder was instigated by the war party in Austria, because the heir
apparent had democratic and anti-military tendencies. First they
murder him and then they use his death as a pretext for plunging
the whole of civilization into a murderous strife."

Herman Ridder, editor of the Staats-Zeitung of New York contributed a
German-American view. Mr. Ridder saw the hand