Bought information is nearly
always unreliable information. A moment's consideration will show
that, should a man be base enough to sell his country's secrets to
his country's possible enemy, he would also unhesitatingly cheat,
if he could, the man who purchases that information, which, from
the very nature of the case, it is almost impossible to verify. In
all probability the so-called information would have been
carefully prepared at the General Staff for the express purpose of
fooling the briber. There is a different class of information
which, it seems to me, is more legitimate to acquire. The Russian
Ministries of Commerce and Finance always imagined that they could
overrule economic laws by decrees and stratagems. For instance,
they were perpetually endeavouring to divert the flow of trade
from its accustomed channels to some port they wished to stimulate
artificially into prosperity, by granting rebates, and by
exceptionally favourable railway rates. Large quantities of jute
sacking were imported from Dundee to be made into bags for the
shipment of Russian wheat.
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