A GERMAN PIANO

Timaru Herald, Volume CVI, Issue 16227, 24 March 1917, Page 2

A GERMAN PIANO

•,'•■ .WHAT IT REVEALED. THE AVAR ANTICIPATED. Some remarkable mid particular],/ interesting facts hare been disclosed relative : co Germany's' premeditated participation in tho war by a recent discovery in Sydney, in one lot of a big consignment of German goods, before the ■war, which recently arrivedait Sydney. —Early in-If-14 n Sidney music warehouse ordered a number of pianos from i-prominent maker in Germany. The instruments were paid for hv the Arm in July of the same year, and despatched for shipment to Australia. The boat carrying them, of course, was of. German ownership. Ju.st about the time 6? the declarfiitien of (ho war bewee.n England and Germany the vessel was sailing down the eastern const of Africa. She was one of England's first Navy r-Tizes and w-is interned in a harbour of Portuguese East Africa-. "When Portugal declared war on Germany the former country courteously took charge of the shin's cargo, and reshinped it to j i'cj consignees. When-the was. discharged at Sydney and delivery taken of the Gei--n.ou. pianos the discovery was made. Lying on the notes behind the fallboard of one of 'the pianos a piece of white paper was found, on which was written iii ink:—"By the time'this reaches you,' England will be. at war wi!th Germanv. and you will.baye tpa<c-knowlerlgp the Kaiser ns your ruler. She will first attack France, then -Russia, and in five years' time Julie United Str.tes." ; . That the paper and the writing on it i O, of German origin is, it is sta'ted by a. prominent member, of the firm, indisputable: From the time when the piano lefib the hands of the manufacturers -up till .that when they were opened in. Sjdney it is certain that they were not in any way tampered with.;'■■'■"-They were cased ' securely as 1 thousands of other pianos of the same name from the same maker which were ordered during the past -and pre-war years by the Sydney company, and sold throughout the Commonweallth. ■Tt is calculated, that this - new proof fchat Germany, was ..the aggressor in tho European war was written early iii June of. 1914, two months prior to xhe outbreak of hos/bilities When it is considered tha.t the far-lory of the piario manufacturer in this ; case is situated in the heart of the Black Forest, in the interior of .'"Qenn'MKyj ilb is obvious ■that"practically all Germans'knew of the war long before it was officially'declared. ■ '."■' ;..'.' . . : ■ -