The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-15

try for trying to starve us," he cried exultingly.
 Speaking in German, I told him did not believe the Zepps were ca pablo of doing so much damage, and that scarcely a week elapsed in Nun ster without the prisoners of war be- ing assured that London had ceased to exist.
 'I grant you, Brieger," I added, that nothing would please the Ger man people more than to know they had razed London to the ground; and I am equally sure that no tears would be shed in the F'atherland although all Lohdon's citizens, numbering near ly six millions went down to death beneath it's ruins. But why can't you be honest, Brieger?"
 What do you mean?" queried the farmer.
 "Just this. You know as well as I do that even had there been no block ade of Germany your military lead CTS could have employed these Zeppe- lins just the same"
 "No, no, never!' shouted Brieger. 'We could never have thought of do- ing such thing. We are clean fight CTS. We have been forced to use the Zeppelins to bring the Britishers to l their senses. Anyway, all of your towns are fortified, and the employ ment of our airships is legitimate warfare
 "Ah! But That Was Different Look here, Brieger," replied, "I am going to ask you one question: one I have put to a lot of your coun- | trymen-and I want a straight answer as between man and man." "You shall have it, said Bfieger.
 Would your Kaiser and his ad- visers mot have blockaded Britain with the German fleet if it had been powerful enough for the job at the outbreak of the war;" The German hesitated for a few moments and then remarked, q am sure that our Kaiser would never have tried to starve the women and children of Britain"
 @~'Your armies besieged Paris away back in the seventies I reminded him.
 "Ah but that was different" cried Brieger.
 | And that, my friends, is the method l OI IGdSOu1uS III 11GFT Brieger could not explain wherein the difference lay. He was confident however, that it had been perfectly right and proper for the Germans to besiege the capital of France, and that it was absolutely disgraceful on the part of the British to blockade his country.
 While I was at Dusseldorf in 1917 a German sentry used the very same expression-"Ah! but that was diff ferent." He had been cursing the Bri- tish because of an aerial raid made on a German town near the border
 "The British devils with their bombs levelled a whole street of houses, and several women and chiI- dren were foully murdered" he an- gri1V exclaimed. '"They gre barbar- isns, and our soldiers should show them no mercy"
 You cannot have forgotten how the Germans started this bombing of towns" I said. What about London, where hundreds of women and chil- dren have been killed by the Zeppe- lins and the Gothas ?"
 "Ah! but that was different" re- piled the sentry, and I was so dis gusted with the response that turn ed my back to him and walked away. One cannot hope to convince people of that type by mere talk. Foodstuffs from Holland Until the month of December, 1915, I repeat, foodstuffs were plentiful in the Fatherland, and this happy condi- tion of affairs was to some appreci- able extent due to the importations from Holland.
 know that tremendous quantities of goods came into the country from Holland, because for weeks on end I was employed at the railway station in Munster helping to unload train loads of butter, margarine, cheese, eggs, onions, Stc., &c. Hundreds of my fellow prisoners labored with me, the wages paid us being at the rate of six cents per day.
 This remuneration was doled out in the form of canteen money, and could only be expended in the can- teens at the prison camp. It was made of tin, and was not negotiable out side the camp.
 Butter was then selling at 40 cents per pound, which for many of the prisoners was really a prohibitive price. The difficulty, however, was skilfully overcome in many instances, and not all the butter that arrived from Holland reached Its proper des- tination. Quite a number of secret tea parties were held up at the camp, and the Dutch production was pro- fusely in evidence on the war bread Probably the most convincing dem onstration of the healthiness of the Hun larder at this period was the ac- tion of the authorities in presenting each of the 5000 prisoners at Munster with a pound of honey, a pound of
 biscuits, a packet of tobacco and a few apples. These formed the only presents we ever received from the Germans, with the exception of kicks bayonets, and other 'tkultured' forms of abuse.
 In the spring of 1916 the fat folks of Munster commenced to wear a
 worried look. The butchers shops
 were not so well stocked as they had previously been, and both the quan-
 tity and the quality displayed pitiful
 signs of deterioration. And prices scared skywards in a manner which produced disquietude in the minds , of the thrifty housewives.
 In June and July there was a seri-
 ous shortage of sugar, and potatoes
 were scarcely obtainable, with the re- , suit that a number of the more en- : frightened citizens began not only to
 grumble but to doubt whether their ? armies were really going to dominate | the whole world.
 During the autumn and towards the