irschen's conduct in the matter, but it has not yet appeared. It
should, however, be added, in fairness to him, that the anonymous
"outsider," from whom the American Legation got its only information as
to the developments of the trial, stated that Kirschen "made a very good
plea for Miss Cavell, using all arguments that could be brought in her
favor before the court."

This does not give the lover of fair play a great deal of comfort, for
if the anonymous informant was not a lawyer, the value to be attached to
his or her estimate of Kirschen's plea must be regarded as doubtful.

The same unknown informant told the American Legation that Miss Cavell
was prosecuted "for having helped English and French soldiers as well as
Belgian young men to cross the frontier and to go over to England." It
is stated on the same anonymous authority that Miss Cavell acknowledged
the assistance thus given and admitted that some of them had "thanked
her in writing when arriving in England."

From the same source the world gets its only information as to the exact
law which Miss Cavell was accused of violating. Paragraph 58 of the
German Military Code inflicts a sentence of death upon

"any person who, with the intention of helping the hostile power,
or of causing harm to the German or allied troops, is guilty of one
of the crimes of paragraph 90 of the German Penal Code,"

and the only pertinent section of paragraph 90, according to the same
informant, is the specific offence of

"guiding soldiers to the enemy" (in German--"Dem Feinde
Mannschaften zufuehrt").

I affirm with confidence that under this law Miss Cavell was innocent,
and that the true meaning of the law was perverted in order to inflict
the death sentence upon her.

I admit that a general and strained construction of the language above
quoted might be applicable to a defendant who gave refuge to hostile
soldiers in Brussels and thus enabled them to escape across the frontier
into Holland and thence into a belligerent country, but every penal law
must receive a construction that is favorable to the defendant and
agreeable to the dictates of humanity. Every civilized country construes
its penal laws in favour of the liberty of the subject, and no
punishment, especially one of death, is ever imposed unless the offence
charged comes indubitably within a rigid construction of the law.

Keeping in mind this elementary principle, it is obvious that t