Not that the adventuress has not her share as well. A woman carried out most of the underground work connected with the Morocco loan; a woman stopped the clandestine marriage of one of the imperial princes, and another woman arranged a marriage between a Bourbon king and a member of the house of Hohenzollern. Yet another, according to Von Blowitz, brought off as skilful a coup in connection with the theft of documents as has ever been known. But these things are exceptions to the regular work of women spies, which is for the most part unromantic, petty, and mean—as is most espionage work, whether man or woman be concerned in its accomplishment.
In active service the woman plays a very small part, for the endurance of a man is required to undergo such rigours as usually fall to combatants and spies alike once the armies have taken the field. Here, however, women are of use in carrying messages and in similar minor capacities. Such of them as manage to keep their places in civilian establishments may be of great use in learning projected plans—though plans are usually kept too secret, since the organisation and extent of the German system of espionage is fairly well-known in official circles of other countries.
During the siege of Liège men masqueraded as women in order to obtain information for the German commander. In one particular case four ladies were observed in the town, and certain small points of make-up and attire caused the police to entertain suspicions. The ladies were seized and examined, and very few inquiries were sufficient to settle the question of their sex, while further inquiries certified them as German spies—and they paid the penalty of their daring. Before execution, spies captured in the present war have stated that they have been forced to take on their tasks; certain persons are selected by lot out of the army, and are given choice of the disguise with which they must go out to the front. In many cases the disguises are hopelessly inadequate, and all the men who go out know that they are going to almost certain death. But the man who, without some rehearsal, goes out disguised as a woman, is not only facing death, but looking for it—as do these German soldiers in like case.
Cases have come to light in Belgium in which wearers of the Red Cross have proved to be spies; women have been caught acting as nurses, keeping to their posts simply for the purpose of obtaining such information as shall be useful to the German forces. Such cases are rare, for the Red Cross nurse is usually well authenticated and deservedly above suspicion, but the rarity of the cases and the very small likelihood of detection renders them correspondingly dangerous. From their positions and duties they are in the very heart of things, and are able to get more information than those in other positions, though the transmission of news, after it has been obtained, is by no, means an easy business.
Eastern and Northern France, before the war, were full of women spies, planted under the fixed post system. They were mainly auxiliaries, for it was seldom that the charge of a fixed post was entrusted to a woman, for the simple reason that it is not easy for a women to set up in any kind of business and maintain it—at least, not so easy as it is for a man. The majority of these women spies in French departments were domestic servants, teachers, or less reputably engaged as waitresses in establishments for the sale of alcoholic liquors. For the last-mentioned class, the chief requirements in every case were that they should be decidedly attractive, unscrupulous, and able to make men talk. For remuneration, they depended mainly on their legitimate employers; the fixed agent, at his own discretion, paid out sums to them which made it worth their while to gather information, but they were expected to five on the country which they had come to betray to the staff at Berlin.
Since this treachery characterises the groundwork of all German espionage, and the plans of the military organisation are built on espionage, it follows that in the nature of things the German Empire must end: treachery is an ill foundation on which to build.