the main traveled routes as well as in remote places where a cargo is to be picked up or goods made in Germany can find a purchaser, is either interned in neutral ports or tied up in German harbors or condemned as lawful prize by British courts.
The German navy, which was the challenge of Germany to Britain on the seas, the greatest provocation one nation ever gave to another, which the German Emperor fondly imagined would make him as supreme on the sea as he imagined he was invincible on land, has been compelled to seek the security of its fortified bases. While British ships go about their ordinary business, while the great transatlantic lines under the British flag are running on their regular schedules, while cargoes of foodstuffs and other commodities are flowing in a never ending stream from American ports eastward and the current runs undisturbed in the reverse direction and British goods find their accustomed markets, Germany is beginning to feel the pinch of hunger, German industries are prostrate, German commerce is paralyzed.
It is these things that make Germany so bitter against England. They explain why Count von Bernstorff seeks to throw the responsibility upon England and hopes to gain American sympathy. He frankly admits that he is amazed by "the general hostility of the American press." The American press — and I think I speak with exact knowledge — has not been hostile, but it has been just. It has not been partisan, but it has pronounced judgment. On the evidence submitted it has rendered decision. Before the great bar of conscience the Kaiser has been brought to his assize. History has rendered its verdict. Without cause he provoked a war; to gratify ambition he sowed desolation. Little children he has made fatherless, and brides to mourn their husbands. The tears of the living and the blood of the dying drench Europe. His legions have marched, and with them have gone ruin, death, horror. He has spared neither young nor old. He has spread the torch and with flame and sword devasted city and plain. He has made the world a house of mourning; he has stricken down the firstborn and brought sorrow to the aged. He has made honor a jest and the word of a King a thing of scorn. He has invoked the name of God and defiled man made in the image of his Maker. Under his iron heel he has crushed civilization and checked its progress.
Knowing the truth, it would be amazing if the American press and the American people were able to withhold their sympathy from the nations forced by Germany to defend themselves.
