In isolated cases, where the
excitement of the public grew disquieting, the authorities immediately
intervened to protect persons menaced. In Russia, however, in France
and especially in Belgium the opposite of decency and humanity
prevailed. Instead of referring feelings of national antipathy and of
national conflicting interests to the decision of the battlefield, the
French mishandled in the most brutal manner the German population and
German travelers in Paris and other cities, who neither could nor
wished to defend themselves, and who desired solely to leave the
hostile country at once. The mob threatened and mishandled Germans in
the streets, in the railway stations and in the trains, and the
authorities permitted it.
The occurrences in Belgium are infamous beyond all description. Germany
would have exposed itself to the danger of a military defeat if it had
still respected the neutrality of Belgium after it had been announced
that strong French detachments stood ready to march through that country
against the advancing German Army. The Belgium Government was assured
that its interests would be conscientiously guarded if it would permit
the German Army to march through its territory. Its answer to this
assurance was a declaration of war.
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