3 JUNE 1916, Page 14

THE TREATMENT OF GERMAN PRISONERS. [To THR EDITOR OP THE

" SPECTATOR:1 Sts,—To misstate your opponent's case and then to reply to your own misstatement is a favourite Radical and Free Trader's method of argu- ment. Thus, we have in the Spectator, p. 647, the following : " We are glad to say that Mr. Tennant refused absolutely to yield to the wicked outcry that we should starve and ill-treat German prisoners in our hands because our prisoners are treated inhumanly by the Ger- mans." Of course, no one has ever made any such " outcry." All that has been demanded is that we should make suitable reprisals, exactly as our Allies the French' do, to ensure the proper treatment of our prisoners in German hands. Does the Spectator assert that our Allies " starve and ill-treat " their German prisoners It is a shameful thing that the Spectator should descend to such methods of argument, and to the suppression of its readers' views when it is unable to reply to them, just as if it was some halfpenny Radical rag—I am, Sir, &e., East Sussex Club, St. Leonards-on-Sea. J. H. E. Rem, Colonel.

[We will leave our readers to determine whether it is our habit to suppress letters challenging our views. It should:be noted that Colonel Reid does not tell us in what manner our Allies make reprisals on German prisoners, or how we are to follow in their alleged footsteps.—En. Spectator.]