> in germany, however, the school, the press, and comic magazines cultivated a conception of the englishman's character, and almost more so of his empire, which inevitably led to one the most insidious delusions; for gradually everyone was infected by this nonsense, and the consequence was an underestimation for which we would have to pay most bitterly. this falsification went so deep that people became convinced that in the englishman they faced a businessman as shrewd as personally he was unbelievably cowardly. the fact that a world empire the size of the british could not be put together by mere subterfuge and swindling was unfortunately something that never even occurred to our exalted professors of academic science. the few who raised a voice of warning were ignored or killed by silence. i remember well my comrades' look of astonishment when we faced the tommies in person at flanders. after the very first days of battle the conviction dawned on them that these scotsmen did not exactly jibe with the pictures they had seen fit to give us in the comic magazines and press dispatches. it was then that i began my first reflections about the importance of the form of propaganda
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