GERMANS SORRY TO LEAVE.

Clutha Leader, Volume XLII, Issue 88, 12 May 1916, Page 7

GERMANS SORRY TO LEAVE.

AFFECTION FOR ENGLAND. The work of rounding up nil Germans and in England is now being prosecuted vigorously by the British authorities, and all aiiens who are citizens of countries fighting against the Allies are rap;diy be.ng either sent out of the country or interned. Many of tile cases are pitiful. Shiploads of the persons affected are forced to return to Germany although they have no ties whatsoever there, having lived almost ail their lives in England. The arrival of a shipload of these reluctant travellers at Amsterdam is described in the following letter from that city, published in 'The Times':

"A young German stood by my side. " 'Are you glad to be going?,' I asked. "His face looker very bitter as he turned, it towards me. 'Why should I Iri glad,' he said. 'There is nobody there. My wife and child are in , and wo were doing well when the war broke out. I should never have gone to Germany again. There is nothing for me to do in Germany." "An elderly man joined us.

" 'Twenty-six years,' lie said, in answer to my question, 'ami iu aJI that time I have never been five miles out of London . My wife is English, and my four children; they cannot speak Gorman. Wiiv should' I be made to go to n country which I have not seen l for '26 years, where I know nobody? The English hove always treated mo well, and 1 never wished to go away.' "This feeling—for I talked with more Ihau half the party —seemed .universal. 1 found not one who was glad, to be going 'home.' 'lt is not my .home,' was said again and again. Yet. curiously, many of them were still German in their syunpathy, though they had' nearly forgotten the country, and would gladly have stayed away from it . They took great p-ridp in her fighting strength. Yet all alike wished to live ii? England." German officers detained iu Biitish prisoners of war camps are now being given their pay in aluminum counters instead of in English gold and silver so as to aiake it more difficult for them to plan and carry out escapes. A start with thits new system of payment has been made at Donnington Hall, Leicestershire, the converted 'mansion fitted up for German officer prisoners, about the alleged luxuries of which a storm has raged in the English press.

The issue of tlie.se -aluminum counters in lieu of money was made necessary bv the habit of the Germans of secretly accumulating large sums in English gold for travelling and other expenses if they sueeeixled in getting free. These officers receive from 4s to 4s 6d a day, and Lieutenants Keilhack and Thielen, who recently got away from the prison mansion by driving a tunnel beneath the wall, had in their possession £7O, the accumulation of their "pay" a.s prisoners of war.