From the archives | 23 October 2014

From ‘Topics of the day’, The Spectator, 24 October 1914: That spies are a great danger at the present time, and that espionage is being carried on on a gigantic scale, we do not doubt. It has been shown again and again that reports of the movements of our ships and of our troops, and every form of information useful to the enemy, are rapidly and secretly dispatched from this country day by day and hour by hour. It must not be supposed, however, that the men who betray our secrets to the enemy are necessarily Germans. Unfortunately there is every reason to believe that they are not only British subjects, but men of British birth. There is a percentage of bad men, of desperate men, and of bribable men in all countries. In a country of nearly 50 millions like ours, this percentage, though low, means a formidable number.