WHO ARE THE HUNS?

62 Violation of the Neutral Suez Canal.
Great Britain, with a cold, cynical smile, simply thrusts the
solemn agreements regarding the Suez Canal, so oiten ratified
by international agreement, into the waste-paper basket as
soon as they become inconvenient to her."
We may add that at the same time the German coal depot
at this port, the property of a Hamburg firm, was locked up,
so that German ships might no longer be able to coal—hostile
acts of the worst imaginable kind!
A case still more crass, even though it occurred after the
declaration of war, is furnished by the acts committed against
the two steamers of the Hamburg-American Line, the "Istria"
and the "Sudmark." From the legal representative of the
Hamburg-American Line I received the following information,
dated Alexandria, the 22nd of October, 1914:
"I have in the meantime discovered that the steamers
which had been lying at Port Said and at Suez, were captured
in the following original and "legal" manner. On the 13th
inst. divisions of Egyptian Police appeared aboard all German
and Austrian steamers at Port Said and Suez, under the command
of an officer who declared to the Captains that no one
would be permitted to leave the ships and that these would
be forced to quit the harbor. The Captains naturally refused
to obey, whereupon the Egyptian port authorities put men
aboard, supplied the vessels with coal and provisions for 7 days
and thus sent the vessels out of the port on the 15th and 16th,
flying the German flag.
A few miles from Port Said the English cruiser "Warrior"
was awaiting them, and it is easily to be understood that her
Captain, on seeing such a number of enemy vessels, should at
once make efforts "legally" to "capture" them, and take them
to Alexandria. The Captain of the "Warrior" observed all the
regulations with the most painful meticulosity, and on reaching
Alexandria the steamers were handed over to a Prize Court.
The agent of the Hamburg-American Line in justifiable
anger remarks as follows with regard to this farce in connection
with international law: "The facts cited above might suffice
for a game for children, or if you prefer, a comedy in the style
of Nestroy—but in order to establish international rights this
ridiculous travesty is altogether insufficient."