17 NOVEMBER 1917, Page 10

CURRENT LITERATURE.

THE CRIME.

The Crime. Vol. I. By the Author of J'Aceuee I (Hodder and Stoughton. 16s. 6d. net.)—An elaborate reply by the author of J'Accuse 1 to the German critics of that famous book. The critics specially signalled out for refutation are Dr. Helfferioh, Professor Sehiemann, Professor Helmolt, Herr Paul Rohrbaeh, and the renegade Englishman, Herr Houston Stewart Chamberlain. The author lays no claim to be in possession of any material which is not universally accessible, but in very patient and thoroughly German fashion he has made the most of what is available. It must be admitted that his method becomes at times wearisome, and after working through this first volume one does not feel at all anxious to be required to read the second. Those chapters which are freshest and will be most read deal with the relations between Lord Grey of Fallodon and Count Liohnowsky, the German Ambassador in London, before the actual outbreak of war, and discuss the German claim that Russia, by being in so great a hurry to mobilize, was really the European '• Incendiary." The author shows that Lord Grey of Fallodon did everything humanly possible to avoid war and to bring the Auetro-Sorbian dispute into a Conference, and also that Russia was compelled to mobilize by the Austrian attack upon a small Slav neighbour.