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GENERAL NEWS NOTES OF THE DAY According to a dispatch from Amsterdam, Vor-waerts of Berlin, in a jplain-spoken attack on the system of Herr Von Waldow, the German food controller, declares that great masses of German people -not only are hungry, but are literally starving. The paper adds that agricultural producers and rich " residents in towns, are living in plenty, as. hoarding vis no longer prohibited. A warning is given that unless there is improvement in conditions, a. catastrophe may occur within a short time. pi American millionaires are declared to defraud the United States government of millions of dollars in income tax. This was revealed at the Federal Trade Commissions hearing in the Presidents food price investigation yesterday. By a system of "bearer" warrants, which absolutely conceal the identity of real owners of corporation stocks, certain rich men of the United States have succeeded in evading .payment of. income taxes and surtaxes, through making It impossible for the treasury to find out who awes the-tax. A sweeping investigation of the whole-, plan is expected. Secret service -operatives are believed to have rounded up members of the I. W. W. on charges they plotted to poison cattle and hogs throughout the west to endanger the nations meat supply as an attack upon the government. The last raid on the : Chicago headquarters of the organization, 1001 West Madison street, is said to have . been inspired by the necessity of uncovering this plot rather than to. get additional evidence against members, now under indictment and waiting trial. An extensive traffic in written communications to Germany, Austria nd northern Europe neutrals, involving use of invisible ink and a code system, has been discovered and stopped by custom officials within the last few weeks, treasury officials disclosed yesterday. The traffic, it was disclosed, was carried on largely by Swedish ship and marine men. Scores of persons now are under surveillance and several arrests will be made soon. Workmen from Essen, Germany, who have arrived in Holland, say the Krupp plant, the great German munition establishment, lias been ablaze for twenty-four hours. The plant at Essen, the main establishment of the Krupps, the largest manufacturers in Germany of arms and munitions, employed about 30,000 men before the war. It has been expanded greatly during the war. The peace terms of the Bolsheviki government at Petrograd call for the evacuation of all the Russian territory that the German armies now occupy, according to a report received in Stockholm by way of Haparanda. Furthermore, the Bolsheviki are said to insist that the Poles be allowed to work out their own problems of self-government without outside interference. Secretary Baker has a plan to permit farmer boys in the army to return to their homes at periodical intervals to assist in crop production. He outlined it yesterday to a delegation of New York farmers who protested against conditions created by the scarcity of labor. The farmers suggested that it would be necessary either to exempt farm labor or conscript it. Nilo Pecanha, foreign minister, presented his resignation to President Braz Friday on account of an incident in the chamber of deputies relating to domestic political affairs. The president declined to accept the ministers resignation on the ground that his services are indispensable. A powerful counter-offensive has been launched by the Italians between the Piave and Brenta rivers and in a series of attacks around Monte Azo-lone the Austro-German forces were driven from nearly all of the ground they had captured early in the week. A decree has been promulgated cancelling the exequaturs of Germans acting as consuls of neutral, countries in Brazil. The decree is directed against the consuls of Austria and Holland.
