The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-03-17
NEUTRAL DESCRIBES TEUTONS' DECLINING FAITH IN VICTORY
Doctor Just Arrived in LOn- don From Augsburg Tells of Real Conditions in
 Empire

Lcndon, March 16 - Correspondence of the Associated Press.)-Germany' de- clining faith in victory is described by a well-to-do neutral medical man, who lately left Germany, after living In Augs- burg during the war period" Writing from Berne to the Daily Mail he declared that though still believing that Germany could not be beaten the German people had long since become war-weary and had given up hopes of the so-called German peace.
 The masses" he continued. "are in an hysterical state, one minute praying for peace at any price, and the next under the influence of some piece of news, some well organized patriotic con- cert or kinematograph exhibition got up by the fatherland (annexationsD party, at which they will be shouting wild ap- plause and singing Deutschland Deutschland Uber Alles'
 "The fatherland party is justly re- garded by many as the chief obstacle to peace In Bavaria it's propaganda is un- ceasing and is advancing by leaps and bounds. The party has unlimited funds and good business men to spend the money judiciousfy in cultivating the German will to power On the other hand, this junta of government officilas country squires, ironmasters, admirals and big manufacturers exercises an iS ent on it. Woe betide the village con- stable the concierge, the factory hand or agricultural laborer underling who dares refuse his monthly gift to the fatherland partys funds
 As for all the fuss about democrat ization, I think it is mostly moonshine manufactured for the benefit of the TO- matically inclined English radical. There is discontent simmering up and down the country, but to quiet it a pound of butter week would go farther than any promise of political reform. The riots that take place in the towns from time to time are the work of women whose husbands have long been away in the field and who have got out of hand Mobs of half-gr lads run wild and get into mischief, and worse than mis- chief
 Tn Bavaria the Emperor and Berlin never popular, are now less popular than ever. Bavarians are unmoved by Will liams choice of Von Hertling as chief adviser If Won Hertling had been a Bavarian born. they say. perhaps there might have been something in it. but he is Hessian. In Bavaria, as else where the Emperor has been completely overshadowed by Hinderburg, who, to the average German, is the war incar- nate and whatever there is great and glorious about him is putting the Elm peror and the royal princes entirely in the shade. On the other hand, linden burg came with the war and will go with the war Tn Bavaria and elsewhere the dynastic sentiment is so strong thai nothing can root it out.
 ''I consider that, however the war ends whether the German empire continues to hold together officially or not afterwards. the result will be an enormous intersifi- cation of separatist feeling in the vari- ous constituent states.
 AS regards the food position I should say that it Is only acute for people of small means. They are the only ones who suffer the bangs of real hunger. es- pecially the small officials, the police, the schoolnlasters, the ministers of religion, and people living on small salaries or an nuities or savings.
 sIt is generally recognized in Ger many that German prisoners of war in British hands have been we'll treated and the impression is now beginning to get abroad that the treatment of Brit ish prisoners has not always been what it might'