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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
+other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
+the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
+to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
+
+Title: My Four Years in Germany
+
+Author: James W. Gerard
+
+Posting Date: February 12, 2015 [EBook #7238]
+Release Date: January, 2005
+First Posted: March 30, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert J. Hall
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO ATTEND THE OPENING OF THE ROYAL
+ACADEMY.]
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO A COURT BALL.]
+
+[Illustration: SAFE CONDUCT FOR AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS FAMILY,
+UNDER THE SIGNATURE OF SECRETARY ZIMMERMANN, FEBRUARY, 5, 1917.]
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS
+LEAVING ON A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+
+
+
+MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY
+
+BY JAMES W. GERARD
+
+LATE AMBASSADOR TO THE GERMAN IMPERIAL COURT
+
+
+
+
+TO MY SMALL BUT TACTFUL FAMILY OF ONE
+
+MY WIFE
+
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+I am writing what should have been the last chapter of this book
+as a foreword because I want to bring home to our people the
+gravity of the situation; because I want to tell them that the
+military and naval power of the German Empire is unbroken; that of
+the twelve million men whom the Kaiser has called to the colours
+but one million, five hundred thousand have been killed, five
+hundred thousand permanently disabled, not more than five hundred
+thousand are prisoners of war, and about five hundred thousand
+constitute the number of wounded or those on the sick list of
+each day, leaving at all times about nine million effectives
+under arms.
+
+I state these figures because Americans do not grasp either the
+magnitude or the importance of this war. Perhaps the statement
+that over five million prisoners of war are held in the various
+countries will bring home to Americans the enormous mass of men
+engaged.
+
+There have been no great losses in the German navy, and any losses
+of ships have been compensated for by the building of new ones.
+The nine million men, and more, for at least four hundred thousand
+come of military age in Germany every year, because of their
+experience in two and a half years of war are better and more
+efficient soldiers than at the time when they were called to
+the colours. Their officers know far more of the science of this
+war and the men themselves now have the skill and bearing of
+veterans.
+
+Nor should anyone believe that Germany will break under starvation
+or make peace because of revolution.
+
+The German nation is not one which makes revolutions. There will
+be scattered riots in Germany, but no simultaneous rising of the
+whole people. The officers of the army are all of one class,
+and of a class devoted to the ideals of autocracy. A revolution
+of the army is impossible; and at home there are only the boys
+and old men easily kept in subjection by the police.
+
+There is far greater danger of the starvation of our Allies than
+of the starvation of the Germans. Every available inch of ground
+in Germany is cultivated, and cultivated by the aid of the old
+men, the boys and the women, and the two million prisoners of
+war.
+
+The arable lands of Northern France and of Roumania are being
+cultivated by the German army with an efficiency never before
+known in these countries, and most of that food will be added
+to the food supplies of Germany. Certainly the people suffer;
+but still more certainly this war will not be ended because of
+the starvation of Germany.
+
+Although thinking Germans know that if they do not win the war
+the financial day of reckoning will come, nevertheless, owing to
+the clever financial handling of the country by the government
+and the great banks, there is at present no financial distress in
+Germany; and the knowledge that, unless indemnities are obtained
+from other countries, the weight of the great war debt will fall
+upon the people, perhaps makes them readier to risk all in a
+final attempt to win the war and impose indemnities upon not
+only the nations of Europe but also upon the United States of
+America.
+
+We are engaged in a war against the greatest military power the
+world has ever seen; against a people whose country was for so
+many centuries a theatre of devastating wars that fear is bred
+in the very marrow of their souls, making them ready to submit
+their lives and fortunes to an autocracy which for centuries has
+ground their faces, but which has promised them, as a result of
+the war, not only security but riches untold and the dominion of
+the world; a people which, as from a high mountain, has looked
+upon the cities of the world and the glories of them, and has
+been promised these cities and these glories by the devils of
+autocracy and of war.
+
+We are warring against a nation whose poets and professors, whose
+pedagogues and whose parsons have united in stirring its people
+to a white pitch of hatred, first against Russia, then against
+England and now against America.
+
+The U-Boat peril is a very real one for England. Russia may either
+break up into civil wars or become so ineffective that the millions
+of German troops engaged on the Russian front may be withdrawn
+and hurled against the Western lines. We stand in great peril,
+and only the exercise of ruthless realism can win this war for us.
+If Germany wins this war it means the triumph of the autocratic
+system. It means the triumph of those who believe not only in
+war as a national industry, not only in war for itself but also
+in war as a high and noble occupation. Unless Germany is beaten
+the whole world will be compelled to turn itself into an armed
+camp, until the German autocracy either brings every nation under
+its dominion or is forever wiped out as a form of government.
+
+We are in this war because we were forced into it: because Germany
+not only murdered our citizens on the high seas, but also filled
+our country with spies and sought to incite our people to civil
+war. We were given no opportunity to discuss or negotiate. The
+forty-eight hour ultimatum given by Austria to Serbia was not,
+as Bernard Shaw said, "A decent time in which to ask a man to
+pay his hotel bill." What of the six-hour ultimatum given to
+me in Berlin on the evening of January thirty-first, 1917, when
+I was notified at six that ruthless warfare would commence at
+twelve? Why the German government, which up to that moment had
+professed amity and a desire to stand by the _Sussex_ pledges,
+knew that it took almost two days to send a cable to America! I
+believe that we are not only justly in this war, but prudently
+in this war. If we had stayed out and the war had been drawn
+or won by Germany we should have been attacked, and that while
+Europe stood grinning by: not directly at first, but through an
+attack on some Central or South American State to which it would
+be at least as difficult for us to send troops as for Germany.
+And what if this powerful nation, vowed to war, were once firmly
+established in South or Central America? What of our boasted
+isolation then?
+
+It is only because I believe that our people should be informed
+that I have consented to write this book. There are too many
+thinkers, writers and speakers in the United States; from now
+on we need the doers, the organisers, and the realists who alone
+can win this contest for us, for democracy and for permanent
+peace!
+
+Writing of events so new, I am, of course, compelled to exercise
+a great discretion, to keep silent on many things of which I
+would speak, to suspend many judgments and to hold for future
+disclosure many things, the relation of which now would perhaps
+only serve to increase bitterness or to cause internal dissension
+in our own land.
+
+The American who travels through Germany in summer time or who
+spends a month having his liver tickled at Homburg or Carlsbad,
+who has his digestion restored by Dr. Dapper at Kissingen or
+who relearns the lost art of eating meat at Dr. Dengler's in
+Baden, learns little of the real Germany and its rulers; and in
+this book I tell something of the real Germany, not only that
+my readers may understand the events of the last three years
+but also that they may judge of what is likely to happen in our
+future relations with that country.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+       FOREWORD.
+     I MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY.
+    II POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL.
+   III DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN.
+    IV MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR.
+     V PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR.
+    VI AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR.
+   VII THE SYSTEM.
+  VIII THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR.
+    IX THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES.
+     X PRISONERS OF WAR.
+    XI FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC.
+   XII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS.
+  XIII MAINLY COMMERCIAL.
+   XIV WORK FOR THE GERMANS.
+    XV WAR CHARITIES.
+   XVI HATE.
+  XVII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS. (Continued).
+ XVIII LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN.
+   XIX THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR.
+    XX LAST.
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS LEAVING ON
+    A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS OF CREDENCE
+    TO THE EMPEROR.
+  THE HOUSE RENTED FOR USE AS EMBASSY.
+  A SALON IN THE EMBASSY.
+  THE BALL-ROOM OF THE EMBASSY.
+  PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER AT THE ROYAL PALACE.
+  THE ROYAL PALACE AT POTSDAM.
+  DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS AT THE TOWN HALL,
+    AUGUST, 1914.
+  RACING YACHTS AT KIEL.
+  THE KAISER'S YACHT, "HOHENZOLLERN".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO HIS SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY, AUGUST, 1914.
+  OUTSIDE THE EMBASSY IN THE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.
+  AT WORK IN THE EMBASSY BALL-ROOM, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.
+  COVER OF THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  SPECIMEN PAGE OF DRAWINGS FROM THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS.
+  THE "LUSITANIA" MEDAL.
+  PAGE FROM "FOR LIGHT AND TRUTH".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND PARTY IN SEDAN.
+  IN FRONT OF THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES.
+  FOOD ALLOTMENT POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT.
+  FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF THE KAISER'S PERSONAL TELEGRAM TO
+    PRESIDENT WILSON.
+  FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE'S REQUEST TO AMBASSADOR GERARD
+    TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE SUBMARINE ANNOUNCEMENT.
+  THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799.
+  INSTRUCTIONS SENT TO THE GERMAN PRESS ON WRITING UP A ZEPPELIN
+    RAID.
+  PETITION CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURE AMONG AMERICANS IN EUROPE.
+  PAGE FROM LISSAUER'S PAMPHLET SHOWING "HYMN OF HATE".
+  INSTRUCTIONS REGULATING APPEARANCE AT COURT.
+  A BERLIN EXTRA.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY
+
+The second day out on the _Imperator_, headed for a summer's
+vacation, a loud knocking woke me at seven A. M. The radio, handed
+in from a friend in New York, told me of my appointment as Ambassador
+to Germany.
+
+Many friends were on the ship. Henry Morgenthau, later Ambassador
+to Turkey, Colonel George Harvey, Adolph Ochs and Louis Wiley
+of the _New York Times_, Clarence Mackay, and others.
+
+The _Imperator_ is a marvellous ship of fifty-four thousand
+tons or more, and at times it is hard to believe that one is
+on the sea. In addition to the regular dining saloon, there is
+a grill room and Ritz restaurant with its palm garden, and, of
+course, an Hungarian Band. There are also a gymnasium and swimming
+pool, and, nightly, in the enormous ballroom dances are given,
+the women dressing in their best just as they do on shore.
+
+Colonel Harvey and Clarence Mackay gave me a dinner of twenty-four
+covers, something of a record at sea. For long afterwards in
+Germany, I saw everywhere pictures of the _Imperator_ including
+one of the tables set for this dinner. These were sent out over
+Germany as a sort of propaganda to induce the Germans to patronise
+their own ships and indulge in ocean travel. I wish that the
+propaganda had been earlier and more successful, because it is
+by travel that peoples learn to know each other, and consequently
+to abstain from war.
+
+On the night of the usual ship concert, Henry Morgenthau translated
+a little speech for me into German, which I managed to get through
+after painfully learning it by heart. Now that I have a better
+knowledge of German, a cold sweat breaks out when I think of
+the awful German accent with which I delivered that address.
+
+A flying trip to Berlin early in August to look into the house
+question followed, and then I returned to the United States.
+
+In September I went to Washington to be "instructed," talked
+with the President and Secretary, and sat at the feet of the
+Assistant Secretary of State, Alvey A. Adee, the revered Sage
+of the Department of State.
+
+On September ninth, 1913, having resigned as Justice of the Supreme
+Court of the State of New York, I sailed for Germany, stopping on
+the way in London in order to make the acquaintance of Ambassador
+Page, certain wise people in Washington having expressed the
+belief that a personal acquaintance of our Ambassadors made it
+easier for them to work together.
+
+Two cares assail a newly appointed Ambassador. He must first
+take thought of what he shall wear and where he shall live. All
+other nations have beautiful Embassies or Legations in Berlin,
+but I found that my two immediate predecessors had occupied a
+villa originally built as a two-family house, pleasantly enough
+situated, but two miles from the centre of Berlin and entirely
+unsuitable for an Embassy.
+
+There are few private houses in Berlin, most of the people living
+in apartments. After some trouble I found a handsome house on
+the Wilhelm Platz immediately opposite the Chancellor's palace
+and the Foreign Office, in the very centre of Berlin. This house
+had been built as a palace for the Princes Hatzfeld and had later
+passed into the possession of a banking family named von Schwabach.
+
+The United States Government, unlike other nations, does not
+own or pay the rent of a suitable Embassy, but gives allowance
+for offices, if the house is large enough to afford office room
+for the office force of the Embassy. The von Schwabach palace
+was nothing but a shell. Even the gas and electric light fixtures
+had been removed; and when the hot water and heating system,
+bath-rooms, electric lights and fixtures, etc., had been put
+in, and the house furnished from top to bottom, my first year's
+salary had far passed the minus point.
+
+The palace was not ready for occupancy until the end of January,
+1914, and, in the meantime, we lived at the Hotel Esplanade,
+and I transacted business at the old, two-family villa.
+
+There are more diplomats in Berlin than in any other capital in
+the world, because each of the twenty-five States constituting
+the German Empire sends a legation to Berlin; even the free cities
+of Hamburg, Lübeck and Bremen have a resident minister at the
+Empire's capital.
+
+Invariable custom requires a new Ambassador in Berlin to give
+two receptions, one to the Diplomatic Corps and the other to
+all those people who have the right to go to court. These are
+the officials, nobles and officers of the army and navy, and
+such other persons as have been presented at court. Such people
+are called _hoffähig_, meaning that they are fit for court.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS
+OF CREDENCE TO THE EMPEROR.]
+
+[Illustration: THE HOUSE ON THE WILHELM PLATZ, RENTED FOR USE
+AS THE EMBASSY.]
+
+It is interesting here to note that Jews are not admitted to
+court. Such Jews as have been ennobled and allowed to put the
+coveted "von" before their names have first of all been required
+to submit to baptism in some Christian church. Examples are the
+von Schwabach family, whose ancestral house I occupied in Berlin,
+and Friedlaender-Fuld, officially rated as the richest man in
+Berlin, who made a large fortune in coke and its by-products.
+
+These two receptions are really introductions of an Ambassador
+to official and court society.
+
+Before these receptions, however, and in the month of November,
+I presented my letters of credence as Ambassador to the Emperor.
+This presentation is quite a ceremony. Three coaches were sent
+for me and my staff, coaches like that in which Cinderella goes
+to her ball, mostly glass, with white wigged coachmen, outriders
+in white wigs and standing footmen holding on to the back part
+of the coach. Baron von Roeder, introducer of Ambassadors, came
+for me and accompanied me in the first coach; the men of the
+Embassy staff sat in the other two coaches. Our little procession
+progressed solemnly through the streets of Berlin, passing on
+the way through the centre division of the arch known as the
+Brandenburger Thor, the gateway that stands at the head of the
+Unter den Linden, a privilege given only on this occasion.
+
+We mounted long stairs in the palace, and in a large room were
+received by the aides and the officers of the Emperor's household,
+of course all in uniform. Then I was ushered alone into the adjoining
+room where the Emperor, very erect and dressed in the black uniform
+of the Death's Head Hussars, stood by a table. I made him a little
+speech, and presented my letters of credence and the letters
+of recall of my predecessor. The Emperor then unbent from his
+very erect and impressive attitude and talked with me in a very
+friendly manner, especially impressing me with his interest in
+business and commercial affairs. I then, in accordance with custom,
+asked leave to present my staff. The doors were opened. The staff
+came in and were presented to the Emperor, who talked in a very
+jolly and agreeable way to all of us, saying that he hoped above
+all to see the whole of the Embassy staff riding in the Tier
+Garten in the mornings.
+
+The Emperor is a most impressive figure, and, in his black uniform
+surrounded by his officers, certainly looked every inch a king.
+Although my predecessors, on occasions of this kind, had worn a
+sort of fancy diplomatic uniform designed by themselves, I decided
+to abandon this and return to the democratic, if unattractive and
+uncomfortable, dress-suit, simply because the newspapers of America
+and certain congressmen, while they have had no objection to the
+wearing of uniforms by the army and navy, police and postmen,
+and do not expect officers to lead their troops into battle in
+dress-suits, have, nevertheless, had a most extraordinary prejudice
+against American diplomats following the usual custom of adopting
+a diplomatic uniform.
+
+Some days after my presentation to the Emperor, I was taken to
+Potsdam, which is situated about half an hour's train journey from
+Berlin, and, from the station there, driven to the new palace and
+presented to the Empress. The Empress was most charming and affable,
+and presented a very distinguished appearance. Accompanied by Mrs.
+Gerard, and always, either by night or by day, in the infernal
+dress-suit, I was received by the Crown Prince and Princess, and
+others of the royal princes and their wives. On these occasions
+we sat down and did not stand, as when received by the Emperor
+and Empress, and simply made "polite conversation" for about
+twenty minutes, being received first by the ladies-in-waiting
+and aides. These princes were always in uniform of some kind.
+
+At the reception for the _hoffähig_ people Mrs. Gerard stood
+in one room and I in another, and with each of us was a
+representative of the Emperor's household to introduce the people
+of the court, and an army officer to introduce the people of the
+army. The officer assigned to me had the extraordinary name of
+der Pfortner von der Hoelle, which means the "porter of Hell."
+I have often wondered since by what prophetic instinct he was
+sent to introduce me to the two years and a half of world war
+which I experienced in Berlin. This unfortunate officer, a most
+charming gentleman, was killed early in the war.
+
+The Berlin season lasts from about the twentieth of January for
+about six weeks. It is short in duration because, if the
+_hoffähig_ people stay longer than six weeks in Berlin, they
+become liable to pay their local income tax in Berlin, where
+the rate is higher than in those parts of Germany where they
+have their country estates.
+
+The first great court ceremonial is the _Schleppencour_,
+so-called from the long trains or _Schleppen_ worn by the
+women. On this night we "presented" Mr. and Mrs. Robert K. Cassatt
+of Philadelphia, Mrs. Ernest Wiltsee, Mrs. and Miss Luce and
+Mrs. Norman Whitehouse. On the arrival at the palace with these
+and all the members of the Embassy Staff and their wives, we
+were shown up a long stair-case, at the top of which a guard of
+honour, dressed in costume of the time of Frederick the Great,
+presented arms to all Ambassadors, and ruffled kettle-drums.
+Through long lines of cadets from the military schools, dressed
+as pages, in white, with short breeches and powdered wigs, we
+passed through several rooms where all the people to pass in
+review were gathered. Behind these, in a room about sixty feet by
+fifty, on a throne facing the door were the Emperor and Empress,
+and on the broad steps of this throne were the princes and their
+wives, the court ladies-in-waiting and all the other members of
+the court. The wives of the Ambassadors entered the room first,
+followed at intervals of about twenty feet by the ladies of the
+Embassy and the ladies to be presented. As they entered the room
+and made a change of direction toward the throne, pages in white
+straightened out the ladies' trains with long sticks. Arrived
+opposite the throne and about twenty feet from it, each Ambassador's
+wife made a low curtsey and then stood on the foot of the throne,
+to the left of the Emperor and Empress, and as each lady of the
+Embassy, not before presented, and each lady to be presented
+stopped beside the throne and made a low curtsey, the Ambassadress
+had to call out the name of each one in a loud voice; and when
+the last one had passed she followed her out of the room, walking
+sideways so as not to turn her back on the royalties,--something
+of a feat when towing a train about fifteen feet long. When all the
+Ambassadresses had so passed, it was the turn of the Ambassadors,
+who carried out substantially the same programme, substituting low
+bows for curtsies. The Ambassadors were followed by the Ministers'
+wives, these by the Ministers and these by the dignitaries of
+the German Court. All passed into the adjoining hall, and there
+a buffet supper was served. The whole affair began at about eight
+o'clock and was over in an hour.
+
+At the court balls, which also began early in the evening, a
+different procedure was followed. There the guests were required
+to assemble before eight-twenty in the ball-room. As in the
+_Schleppencour_, on one side of the room was the throne with
+seats for the Emperor and Empress, and to the right of this throne
+were the chairs for the Ambassadors' wives who were seated in the
+order of their husbands' rank, with the ladies of their Embassy,
+and any ladies they had brought to the ball standing behind them.
+After them came the Ministers' wives, sitting in similar fashion;
+then the Ambassadors, standing with their staffs behind them on
+raised steps, with any men that they had asked invitations for,
+and the Ministers in similar order. To the left of the throne
+stood the wives of the Dukes and dignitaries of Germany and then
+their husbands. When all were assembled, promptly at the time
+announced, the orchestra, which was dressed in mediæval costume
+and sat in a gallery, sounded trumpets and then the Emperor and
+Empress entered the room, the Emperor, of course, in uniform,
+followed by the ladies and gentlemen of the household all in
+brilliant uniforms, and one or two officers of the court regiment,
+picked out for their great height and dressed in the kind of
+uniform Rupert of Hentzau wears on the stage,--a silver helmet
+surmounted by an eagle, a steel breast-plate, white breeches
+and coat, and enormous high boots coming half way up the thigh.
+The Grand Huntsman wore a white wig, three-cornered hat and a
+long green coat.
+
+On entering the room, the Empress usually commenced on one side
+and the Emperor on the other, going around the room and speaking
+to the Ambassadors' wives and Ambassadors, etc., in turn, and
+the Empress in similar fashion, chatting for a moment with the
+German dignitaries and their wives lined up on the opposite side
+of the room. After going perhaps half way around each side, the
+Emperor and Empress would then change sides. This going around
+the room and chatting with people in turn is called "making the
+circle", and young royalties are practised in "making the circle"
+by being made to go up to the trees in a garden and address a
+few pleasant words to each tree, in this manner learning one
+of the principal duties of royalty.
+
+The dancing is only by young women and young officers of noble
+families who have practised the dances before. They are under
+the superintendence of several young officers who are known as
+_Vortänzer_ and when anyone in Berlin in court society gives
+a ball these _Vortänzer_ are the ones who see that all dancing
+is conducted strictly according to rule and manage the affairs
+of the ball-room with true Prussian efficiency. Supper is about
+ten-thirty at a court ball and is at small tables. Each royalty
+has a table holding about eight people and to these people are
+invited without particular rule as to precedence. The younger
+guests and lower dignitaries are not placed at supper but find
+places at tables to suit themselves. After supper all go back
+to the ball-room and there the young ladies and officers, led
+by the _Vortänzer_ execute a sort of lancers, in the final
+figure of which long lines are formed of dancers radiating from
+the throne; and all the dancers make bows and curtsies to the
+Emperor and Empress who are either standing or sitting at this
+time on the throne. At about eleven-thirty the ball is over,
+and as the guests pass out through the long hall, they are given
+glasses of hot punch and a peculiar sort of local Berlin bun, in
+order to ward off the lurking dangers of the villainous winter
+climate.
+
+At the court balls the diplomats are, of course, in their best
+diplomatic uniform. All Germans are in uniform of some kind, but the
+women do not wear the long trains worn at the _Schleppencour_.
+They wear ordinary ball dresses. In connection with court dancing
+it is rather interesting to note that when the tango and turkey
+trot made their way over the frontiers of Germany in the autumn
+of 1913, the Emperor issued a special order that no officers of
+the army or navy should dance any of these dances or should go
+to the house of any person who, at any time, whether officers
+were present or not, had allowed any of these new dances to be
+danced. This effectually extinguished the turkey trot, the bunny
+hug and the tango, and maintained the waltz and the polka in their
+old estate. It may seem ridiculous that such a decree should
+be so solemnly issued, but I believe that the higher authorities
+in Germany earnestly desired that the people, and, especially,
+the officers of the army and navy, should learn not to enjoy
+themselves too much. A great endeavour was always made to keep
+them in a life, so far as possible, of Spartan simplicity. For
+instance, the army officers were forbidden to play polo, not
+because of anything against the game, which, of course, is splendid
+practice for riding, but because it would make a distinction in
+the army between rich and poor.
+
+[Illustration: A SALON IN THE AMERICAN EMBASSY.]
+
+[Illustration: THE BALLROOM OF THE EMBASSY. THIS WAS AFTERWARD
+TURNED INTO A WORKROOM FOR THE RELIEF OF AMERICANS IN WAR DAYS.]
+
+The Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, is a day of great
+celebration. At nine-thirty in the morning the Ambassadors, Ministers
+and all the dignitaries of the court attend Divine Service in the
+chapel of the palace. On this day in 1914, the Queen of Greece and
+many of the reigning princes of the German States were present.
+In the evening there was a gala performance in the opera house,
+the entire house being occupied by members of the court. Between
+the acts in the large foyer, royalties "made the circle," and I
+had quite a long conversation with both the Emperor and Empress
+and was "caught" by the King of Saxony. Many of the Ambassadors
+have letters of credence not only to the court at Berlin but
+also to the rulers of the minor German States. For instance,
+the Belgian Minister was accredited to thirteen countries in
+Germany and the Spanish Ambassador to eleven. For some reason
+or other, the American and Turkish Ambassadors are accredited
+only to the court at Berlin. Some of the German rulers feel this
+quite keenly, and the King of Saxony, especially. I had been
+warned that he was very anxious to show his resentment of this
+distinction by refusing to shake hands with the American Ambassador.
+He was in the foyer on the occasion of this gala performance
+and said that he would like to have me presented to him. I, of
+course, could not refuse, but forgot the warning of my predecessors
+and put out my hand, which the King ostentatiously neglected to
+take. A few moments later the wife of the Turkish Ambassador was
+presented to the King of Saxony and received a similar rebuff;
+but, as she was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and therefore
+a Royal Highness in her own right, she went around the King of
+Saxony, seized his hand, which he had put behind him, brought
+it around to the front and shook it warmly, a fine example of
+great presence of mind.
+
+Writing of all these things and looking out from a sky-scraper
+in New York, these details of court life seem very frivolous
+and far away. But an Ambassador is compelled to become part of
+this system. The most important conversations with the Emperor
+sometimes take place at court functions, and the Ambassador and
+his secretaries often gather their most useful bits of information
+over tea cups or with the cigars after dinner.
+
+Aside from the short season, Berlin is rather dull; Bismarck
+characterised it as a "desert of bricks and newspapers."
+
+In addition to making visits to the royalties, custom required
+me to call first upon the Imperial Chancellor and the Minister
+of Foreign Affairs. The other ministers are supposed to call
+first, although I believe the redoubtable von Tirpitz claimed
+a different rule. So, during the first winter I gradually made
+the acquaintance of those people who sway the destinies of the
+German Empire and its seventy millions.
+
+I dined with the Emperor and had long conversations with him on
+New Year's Day and at the two court balls.
+
+All during this winter Germans from the highest down tried to
+impress me with the great danger which they said threatened America
+from Japan. The military and naval attachés and I were told that
+the German information system sent news that Mexico was full
+of Japanese colonels and America of Japanese spies. Possibly
+much of the prejudice in America against the Japanese was cooked
+up by the German propagandists whom we later learned to know
+so well.
+
+It is noteworthy that during the whole of my first winter in
+Berlin I was not officially or semi-officially afforded an
+opportunity to meet any of the members of the Reichstag or any
+of the leaders in the business world. The great merchants, whose
+acquaintance I made, as well as the literary and artistic people,
+I had to seek out; because most of them were not _hoffähig_
+and I did not come in contact with them at any court functions,
+official dinners or even in the houses of the court nobles or
+those connected with the government.
+
+A very interesting character whom I met during the first winter
+and often conversed with, was Prince Henkel-Donnersmarck. Prince
+Donnersmarck, who died December, 1916, at the age of eighty-six
+years, was the richest male subject in Germany, the richest subject
+being Frau von Krupp-Böhlen, the heiress of the Krupp cannon
+foundry. He was the first governor of Lorraine during the war of
+1870 and had had a finger in all of the political and commercial
+activities of Germany for more than half a century. He told me, on
+one occasion, that he had advocated exacting a war indemnity of
+thirty milliards from France after the war of 1870, and said that
+France could easily pay it--and that that sum or much more should
+be exacted as an indemnity at the conclusion of the World War of
+1914. He said that he had always advocated a protective tariff
+for agricultural products in Germany as well as encouragement of
+the German manufacturing interests: that agriculture was necessary
+to the country in order to provide strong soldiers for war, and
+manufacturing industries to provide money to pay for the army and
+navy and their equipment. He made me promise to take his second
+son to America in order that he might see American life, and the
+great iron and coal districts of Pennsylvania. Of course, most
+of these conversations took place before the World War. After
+two years of that war and, as prospects of paying the expenses
+of the war from the indemnities to be exacted from the enemies
+of Germany gradually melted away, the Prince quite naturally
+developed a great anxiety as to how the expenses of the war should
+be paid by Germany; and I am sure that this anxiety had much to
+do with his death at the end of the year, 1916.
+
+Custom demanded that I should ask for an appointment and call on
+each of the Ambassadors on arrival. The British Ambassador was
+Sir Edward Goschen, a man of perhaps sixty-eight years, a widower.
+He spoke French, of course, and German; and, accompanied by his
+dog, was a frequent visitor at our house. I am very grateful
+for the help and advice he so generously gave me--doubly valuable
+as coming from a man of his fame and experience. Jules Cambon was
+the Ambassador of France. His brother, Paul, is Ambassador to
+the Court of St. James. Jules Cambon is well-known to Americans,
+having passed five years in this country. He was Ambassador to
+Spain for five years, and, at the time of my arrival, had been
+about the same period at Berlin. In spite of his long residence
+in each of these countries, he spoke only French; but he possessed
+a really marvellous insight into the political life of each of
+these nations. Bollati, the Italian Ambassador, was a great admirer
+of Germany; he spoke German well and did everything possible
+to keep Italy out of war with her former Allies in the Triple
+Alliance.
+
+Spain was represented by Polo de Bernabe, who now represents
+the interests of the United States in Germany, as well as those
+of France, Russia, Belgium, Serbia and Roumania. It is a curious
+commentary on the absurdity of war that, on leaving Berlin, I
+handed over the interests of the United States to this Ambassador,
+who, as Spanish minister to the United States, was handed his
+passports at the outbreak of the Spanish-American war! I am sure
+that not only he, but all his Embassy, will devotedly represent
+our interests in Germany. Sverbeeu represented the interests
+of Russia; Soughimoura, Japan; and Mouktar Pascha, Turkey. The
+wife of the latter was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and
+Mouktar Pascha himself a general of distinction in the Turkish
+army.
+
+An Ambassador must keep on intimate terms with his colleagues.
+It is often through them that he learns of important matters
+affecting his own country or others. All of these Ambassadors
+and most of the Ministers occupied handsome houses furnished
+by their government. They had large salaries and a fund for
+entertaining.
+
+During this first winter before the war, I saw a great deal of
+the German Crown Prince as well as of several of his brothers.
+
+I cannot subscribe to the general opinion of the Crown Prince. I
+found him a most agreeable man, a sharp observer and the possessor
+of intellectual attainments of no mean order. He is undoubtedly
+popular in Germany, excelling in all sports, a fearless rider
+and a good shot. He is ably seconded by the Crown Princess. The
+mother of the Crown Princess is a Russian Grand Duchess, and
+her father was a Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. She is a very
+beautiful woman made popular by her affable manners. The one
+defect of the Crown Prince has been his eagerness for war; but,
+as he has characterised this war as the most stupid ever waged
+in history, perhaps he will be satisfied, if he comes to the
+throne, with what all Germany has suffered in this conflict.
+
+The Crown Prince was very anxious, before the war, to visit the
+United States; and we had practically arranged to make a trip
+to Alaska in search of some of the big game there, with stops
+at the principal cities of America.
+
+The second son of the Kaiser, Prince Eitel Fritz, is considered
+by the Germans to have distinguished himself most in this war.
+He is given credit for great personal bravery.
+
+Prince Adalbert, the sailor prince, is quite American in his
+manners. In February, 1914, the Crown Prince and Princes Eitel
+Fritz and Adalbert came to our Embassy for a very small dance to
+which were asked all the pretty American girls then in Berlin.
+
+It is never the custom to invite royalties to an entertainment.
+They invite themselves to a dance or a dinner, and the list of
+proposed guests is always submitted to them. When a royalty arrives
+at the house, the host (and the hostess, if the royalty be a
+woman) always waits at the front door and escorts the royalties
+up-stairs. Allison Armour also gave a dance at which the Crown
+Prince was present, following a dinner at the Automobile Club.
+Armour has been a constant visitor to Germany for many years,
+usually going in his yacht to Kiel in summer and to Corfu, where
+the Emperor goes, in winter. As he has never tried to obtain
+anything from the Emperor, he has become quite intimate with him
+and with all the members of the royal family.
+
+The Chancellor, von Bethmann-Hollweg, is an enormous man of perhaps
+six feet five or six. He comes of a banking family in Frankfort.
+It is too soon to give a just estimate of his acts in this war.
+When I arrived in Berlin and until November, 1916, von Jagow
+was Minister of Foreign Affairs. In past years he had occupied
+the post of Ambassador to Italy, and with great reluctance took
+his place at the head of the Foreign Office. Zimmermann was
+an Under Secretary, succeeding von Jagow when the latter was
+practically forced out of office. Zimmermann, on account of his
+plain and hearty manners and democratic air, was more of a favourite
+with the Ambassadors and members of the Reichstag than von Jagow,
+who, in appearance and manner, was the ideal old-style diplomat
+of the stage.
+
+Von Jagow was not a good speaker and the agitation against him
+was started by those who claimed that, in answering questions
+in the Reichstag, he did not make a forceful enough appearance
+on behalf of the government. Von Jagow did not cultivate the
+members of the Reichstag and his delicate health prevented him
+from undertaking more than the duties of his office.
+
+As a matter of fact, I believe that von Jagow had a juster estimate
+of foreign nations than Zimmermann, and more correctly divined the
+thoughts of the American people in this war than did his successor.
+I thought that I enjoyed the personal friendship of both von
+Jagow and Zimmermann and, therefore, was rather unpleasantly
+surprised when I saw in the papers that Zimmermann had stated in
+the Reichstag that he had been compelled, from motives of policy,
+to keep on friendly terms with me. I sincerely hope that what he
+said on this occasion was incorrectly reported. Von Jagow, after
+his fall, took charge of a hospital at Libau in the occupied
+portion of Russia. This shows the devotion to duty of the Prussian
+noble class, and their readiness to take up any task, however
+humble, that may help their country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL
+
+My commission read, "Ambassador to Germany."
+
+It is characteristic of our deep ignorance of all foreign affairs
+that I was appointed Ambassador to a place which does not exist.
+Politically, there is no such place as "Germany." There are the
+twenty-five States, Prussia, Bavaria, Württemberg, Saxony, etc.,
+which make up the "German Empire," but there is no such political
+entity as "Germany."
+
+These twenty-five States have votes in the Bundesrat, a body
+which may be said to correspond remotely to our United States
+Senate. But each State has a different number of votes. Prussia
+has seventeen, Bavaria six, Württemberg and Saxony four each,
+Baden and Hesse three each, Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Brunswick
+two each, and the rest one each. Prussia controls Brunswick.
+
+The Reichstag, or Imperial Parliament, corresponds to our House
+of Representatives. The members are elected by manhood suffrage of
+those over twenty-five. But in practice the Reichstag is nothing
+but a debating society because of the preponderating power of the
+Bundesrat, or upper chamber. At the head of the ministry is the
+Chancellor, appointed by the Emperor; and the other Ministers, such
+as Colonies, Interior, Education, Justice and Foreign Affairs,
+are but underlings of the Chancellor and appointed by him. The
+Chancellor is not responsible to the Reichstag, as Bethmann-Hollweg
+clearly stated at the time of the Zabern affair, but only to the
+Emperor.
+
+It is true that an innovation properly belonging only to a
+parliamentary government was introduced some seven years ago,
+viz., that the ministers must answer questions (as in Great Britain)
+put them by the members of the Reichstag. But there the likeness
+to a parliamentary government begins and ends.
+
+The members of the Bundesrat are named by the Princes of the
+twenty-five States making up the German Empire. Prussia, which
+has seventeen votes, may name seventeen members of the Bundesrat
+or one member, who, however, when he votes casts seventeen votes.
+The votes of a State must always be cast as a unit. In the usual
+procedure bills are prepared and adopted in the Bundesrat and
+then sent to the Reichstag whence, if passed, they return to the
+Bundesrat where the final approval must take place. Therefore,
+in practice, the Bundesrat makes the laws with the assent of
+the Reichstag. The members of the Bundesrat have the right to
+appear and make speeches in the Reichstag. The fundamental
+constitution of the German Empire is not changed, as with us, by
+a separate body but is changed in the same way that an ordinary
+law is passed; except that if there are fourteen votes against
+the proposed change in the Bundesrat the proposition is defeated,
+and, further, the constitution cannot be changed with respect
+to rights expressly granted by it to anyone of the twenty-five
+States without the assent of that State.
+
+In order to pass a law a majority vote in the Bundesrat and Reichstag
+is sufficient if there is a quorum present, and a quorum is a
+majority of the members elected in the Reichstag: in the Bundesrat
+the quorum consists of such members as are present at a regularly
+called meeting, providing the Chancellor or the Vice-Chancellor
+attends.
+
+The boundaries of the districts sending members to the Reichstag
+have not been changed since 1872, while, in the meantime, a great
+shifting of population, as well as great increase of population
+has taken place. And because of this, the Reichstag to-day does
+not represent the people of Germany in the sense intended by the
+framers of the Imperial Constitution.
+
+Much of the legislation that affects the everyday life of a German
+emanates from the parliaments of Prussia, Bavaria and Saxony,
+etc., as with us in our State Legislatures. The purely legislative
+power of the ministers and Bundesrat is, however, large. These
+German States have constitutions of some sort. The Grand Duchies
+of Mecklenburg have no constitution whatever. It is understood
+that the people themselves do not want one, on financial grounds,
+fearing that many expenses now borne by the Grand Duke out of
+his large private income, would be saddled on the people. The
+other States have Constitutions varying in form. In Prussia there
+are a House of Lords and a House of Deputies. The members of
+the latter are elected by a system of circle votes, by which
+the vote of one rich man voting in circle number one counts as
+much as thousands voting in circle number three. It is the
+recognition by Bethmann-Hollweg that this vicious system must
+be changed that brought down on him the wrath of the Prussian
+country squires, who for so long have ruled the German Empire,
+filling places, civil and military, with their children and
+relatives.
+
+In considering Germany, the immense influence of the military
+party must not be left out of account; and, with the developments
+of the navy, that branch of the service also claimed a share in
+guiding the policy of the Government.
+
+The administrative, executive and judicial officers of Prussia
+are not elected. The country is governed and judged by men who
+enter this branch of the government service exactly as others
+enter the army or navy. These are gradually promoted through
+the various grades. This applies to judges, clerks of courts,
+district attorneys and the officials who govern the political
+divisions of Prussia, for Prussia is divided into circles,
+presidencies and provinces. For instance, a young man may enter
+the government service as assistant to the clerk of some court.
+He may then become district attorney in a small town, then clerk
+of a larger court, possibly attached to the police presidency
+of a large city; he may then become a minor judge, etc., until
+finally he becomes a judge of one of the higher courts or an
+over-president of a province. Practically the only elective officers
+who have any power are members of the Reichstag and the Prussian
+Legislature, and there, as I have shown, the power is very small.
+Mayors and City Councillors are elected in Prussia, but have
+little power; and are elected by the vicious system of circle
+voting.
+
+Time and again during the course of the Great War when I made
+some complaint or request affecting the interests of one of the
+various nations I represented, I was met in the Foreign Office
+by the statement, "We can do nothing with the military. Please
+read Bismarck's memoirs and you will see what difficulty he had
+with the military." Undoubtedly, owing to the fact that the
+Chancellor seldom took strong ground, the influence which both
+the army and navy claimed in dictating the policy of the Empire
+was greatly increased.
+
+Roughly speaking there are three great political divisions or
+parties in the German Reichstag. To the right of the presiding
+officer sit the Conservatives. Most of these are members from the
+Prussian Junker or squire class. They are strong for the rights
+of the crown and against any extension of the suffrage in Prussia
+or anywhere else. They form probably the most important body of
+conservatives now existing in any country in the world. Their
+leader, Heydebrand, is known as the uncrowned king of Prussia. On
+the left side the Social Democrats sit. As they evidently oppose
+the kingship and favour a republic, no Social Democratic member
+has ever been called into the government. They represent the great
+industrial populations of Germany. Roughly, they constitute about
+one-third of the Reichstag, and would sit there in greater numbers
+if Germany were again redistricted so that proper representation
+were given to the cities, to which there has been a great rush
+of population since the time when the Reichstag districts were
+originally constituted.
+
+In the centre, and holding the balance of power, sit the members
+of the Centrum or Catholic body. Among them are many priests. It
+is noteworthy that in this war Roman Catholic opinion in neutral
+countries, like Spain, inclines to the side of Germany; while
+in Germany, to protect their religious liberties, the Catholic
+population vote as Catholics to send Catholic members to the
+Reichstag, and these sit and vote as Catholics alone.
+
+Germans high in rank in the government often told me that no part
+of conquered Poland would ever be incorporated in Prussia or the
+Empire, because it was not desirable to add to the Roman Catholic
+population; that they had troubles enough with the Catholics now
+in Germany and had no desire to add to their numbers. This, and
+the desire to lure the Poles into the creation of a national
+army which could be utilised by the German machine, were the
+reasons for the creation by Germany (with the assent of Austria)
+of the new country of Poland.
+
+This Catholic party is the result in Germany of the
+_Kulturkampf_ or War for Civilisation, as it was called by
+Bismarck, a contest dating from 1870 between the State in Germany
+and the Roman Catholic Church.
+
+Prussia has always been the centre of Protestantism in Germany,
+although there are many Roman Catholics in the Rhine Provinces
+of Prussia, and in that part of Prussia inhabited principally
+by Poles, originally part of the Kingdom of Poland.
+
+Baden and Bavaria, the two principal South German States, and
+others are Catholic. In 1870, on the withdrawal of the French
+garrison from Rome, the Temporal Power of the Pope ended, and
+Bismarck, though appealed to by Catholics, took no interest in the
+defence of the Papacy. The conflict between the Roman Catholics
+and the Government in Germany was precipitated by the promulgation
+by the Vatican Council, in 1870, of the Dogma of the Infallibility
+of the Pope.
+
+A certain number of German pastors and bishops refused to subscribe
+to the new dogma. In the conflict that ensued these pastors and
+bishops were backed by the government. The religious orders were
+suppressed, civil marriage made compulsory and the State assumed
+new powers not only in the appointment but even in the education
+of the Catholic priests. The Jesuits were expelled from Germany
+in 1872. These measures, generally known as the May Laws, because
+passed in May, 1873, 1874 and 1875, led to the creation and
+strengthening of the Centrum or Catholic party. For a long period
+many churches were vacant in Prussia. Finally, owing to the growth
+of the Centrum, Bismarck gave in. The May Laws were rescinded
+in 1886 and the religious orders, the Jesuits excepted, were
+permitted to return in 1887. Civil marriage, however, remained
+obligatory in Prussia.
+
+Ever since the _Kulturkampf_ the Centrum has held the balance
+of power in Germany, acting sometimes with the Conservatives
+and sometimes with the Social Democrats.
+
+In addition to these three great parties, there are minor parties
+and groups which sometimes act with one party and sometimes with
+another, the National Liberals, for example, and the Progressives.
+Since the war certain members of the National Liberal party were
+most bitter in assailing President Wilson and the United States.
+In the demand for ruthless submarine war they acted with the
+Conservatives. There are also Polish, Hanoverian, Danish and
+Alsatian members of the Reichstag.
+
+There are three great race questions in Germany. First of all,
+that of Alsace-Lorraine. It is unnecessary to go at length into
+this well-known question. In the chapter on the affair at Zabern,
+something will be seen of the attitude of the troops toward the
+civil population. At the outbreak of the war several of the deputies,
+sitting in the Reichstag as members from Alsace-Lorraine, crossed
+the frontier and joined the French army.
+
+If there is one talent which the Germans superlatively lack, it
+is that of ruling over other peoples and inducing other people
+to become part of their nation.
+
+It is now a long time since portions of the Kingdom of Poland,
+by various partitions of that kingdom, were incorporated with
+Prussia, but the Polish question is more alive to-day than at
+the time of the last partition.
+
+The Poles are of a livelier race than the Germans, are Roman
+Catholics and always retain their dream of a reconstituted and
+independent Kingdom of Poland.
+
+It is hard to conceive that Poland was at one time perhaps the
+most powerful kingdom of Europe, with a population numbering
+twenty millions and extending from the Baltic to the Carpathians
+and the Black Sea, including in its territory the basins of the
+Warta, Vistula, Dwina, Dnieper and Upper Dniester, and that it
+had under its dominion besides Poles proper and the Baltic Slavs,
+the Lithuanians, the White Russians and the Little Russians or
+Ruthenians.
+
+The Polish aristocracy was absolutely incapable of governing its
+own country, which fell an easy prey to the intrigues of Frederick
+the Great and the two Empresses, Maria Theresa of Austria and
+Catherine of Russia. The last partition of Poland was in the
+year 1795.
+
+Posen, at one time one of the capitals of the old kingdom of
+Poland, is the intellectual centre of that part of Poland which has
+been incorporated into Prussia. For years Prussia has alternately
+cajoled and oppressed the Poles, and has made every endeavour to
+replace the Polish inhabitants with German colonists. A commission
+has been established which buys estates from Poles and sells
+them to Germans. This commission has the power of condemning
+the lands of Poles, taking these lands from them by force,
+compensating them at a rate determined by the commission and
+settling Germans on the lands so seized. This commission has
+its headquarters in Posen. The result has not been successful.
+All the country side surrounding Posen and the city itself are
+divided into two factions. By going to one hotel or the other
+you announce that you are pro-German or pro-Polish. Poles will
+not deal in shops kept by Germans or in shops unless the signs
+are in Polish.
+
+The sons of Germans who have settled in Poland under the protection
+of the commission often marry Polish women. The invariable result
+of these mixed marriages is that the children are Catholics and
+Poles. Polish deputies voting as Poles sit in the Prussian
+legislature and in the Reichstag, and if a portion of the old
+Kingdom of Poland is made a separate country at the end of this
+war, it will have the effect of making the Poles in Prussia more
+restless and more aggressive than ever.
+
+In order to win the sympathies of the Poles, the Emperor caused
+a royal castle to be built within recent years in the city of
+Posen, and appointed a popular Polish gentleman who had served
+in the Prussian army and was attached to the Emperor, the Count
+Hutten-Czapski, as its lord-warden. In this castle was a very
+beautiful Byzantine chapel built from designs especially selected
+by the Emperor. In January, 1914, we went with Allison Armour
+and the Cassatts, Mrs. Wiltsee and Mrs. Whitehouse on a trip
+to Posen to see this chapel.
+
+Some of our German friends tried to play a joke on us by telling
+us that the best hotel was the hotel patronised by the Poles. To
+have gone there would have been to declare ourselves anti-German
+and pro-Polish, but we were warned in time. The castle has a
+large throne room and ball-room; in the hall is a stuffed aurochs
+killed by the Emperor. The aurochs is a species of buffalo greatly
+resembling those which used to roam our western prairies. The
+breed has been preserved on certain great estates in eastern
+Germany and in the hunting forests of the Czar in the neighbourhood
+of Warsaw.
+
+Some of the Poles told me that at the first attempt to give a
+court ball in this new castle the Polish population in the streets
+threw ink through the carriage windows on the dresses of the
+ladies going to the ball and thus made it a failure. The chapel
+of the castle is very beautiful and is a great credit to the
+Emperor's taste as an architect.
+
+While being shown through the Emperor's private apartments in
+this castle, I noticed a saddle on a sort of elevated stool in
+front of a desk. I asked the guide what this was for: he told
+me that the Emperor, when working, always sits in a saddle.
+
+In Posen, in a book-store, the proprietor brought out for me a
+number of books caricaturing the German rule of Alsace-Lorraine.
+It is curious that a community of interests should make a market
+for these books in Polish Posen.
+
+Although not so well advertised, the Polish question is as acute
+as that of Alsace-Lorraine.
+
+After its successful war in 1866 against Austria, Bavaria, Saxony,
+Baden, Hanover, etc., Prussia became possessed of the two duchies
+of Schleswig-Holstein, which are to the south of Denmark on the
+Jutland Peninsula. Here, strangely enough, there is a Danish
+question. A number of Danes inhabit these duchies and have been
+irritated by the Prussian officials and officers into preserving
+their national feeling intact ever since 1866. Galling restrictions
+have been made, the very existence of which intensifies the hatred
+and prevents the assimilation of these Danes. For instance, Amundsen,
+the Arctic explorer, was forbidden to lecture in Danish in these
+duchies during the winter of 1913-14, and there were regulations
+enforced preventing more than a certain number of these Danish
+people from assembling in a hotel, as well as regulations against
+the employment of Danish servants.
+
+In 1866, after its successful war, Prussia wiped out the old
+kingdom of Hanover and drove its king into exile in Austria.
+To-day there is still a party of protest against this aggression.
+The Kaiser believes, however, that the ghost of the claim of
+the Kings of Hanover was laid when he married his only daughter
+to the heir of the House of Hanover and gave the young pair the
+vacant Duchy of Brunswick. That this young man will inherit the
+great Guelph treasure was no drawback to the match in the eyes
+of those in Berlin.
+
+There is a hatred of Prussia in other parts of Germany, but coupled
+with so much fear that it will never take practical shape. In
+Bavaria, for example, even the comic newspapers have for years
+ridiculed the Prussians and the House of Hohenzollern. The smashing
+defeat by Prussia of Austria and the allied German States, Bavaria,
+Saxony, Hesse, Hanover, etc., in 1866, and the growth of Prussianism
+since then in all of these countries, keep the people from any
+overt act. It is a question, perhaps, as to how these countries,
+especially Bavaria, would act in case of the utter defeat of
+Germany. But at present they must be counted on only as faithful
+servants, in a military way, of the German Emperor.
+
+Montesquieu, the author of the "Esprit des Lois," says, "All law
+comes from the soil," and it has been claimed that residence in
+the hot climate of the tropics in some measure changes Anglo-Saxon
+character. It is, therefore, always well in judging national
+character to know something of the physical characteristics and
+climate of the country which a nation inhabits.
+
+The heart of modern Germany is the great north central plain which
+comprises practically all of the original kingdom of Prussia,
+stretching northward from the Saxon and Hartz mountains to the
+North and Baltic seas. It is from this dreary and infertile plain
+that for many centuries conquering military races have poured
+over Europe. The climate is not so cold in winter as that of
+the northern part of the United States. There is much rain and
+the winter skies are so dark that the absence of the sun must
+have some effect upon the character of the people. The Saxons
+inhabit a more mountainous country; Württemberg and Baden are
+hilly; Bavaria is a land of beauty, diversified with lovely lakes
+and mountains. The soft outlines of the vine-covered hills of
+the Rhine Valley have long been the admiration of travellers.
+
+The inhabitants of Prussia were originally not Germanic, but
+rather Slavish in type; and, indeed, to-day in the forest of
+the River Spree, on which Berlin is situated, and only about
+fifty miles from that city, there still dwell descendants of
+the original Wendish inhabitants of the country who speak the
+Wendish language. The wet-nurses, whose picturesque dress is so
+noticeable on the streets of Berlin, all come from this Wendish
+colony, which has been preserved through the many wars that have
+swept over this part of Germany because of the refuge afforded
+in the swamps and forests of this district.
+
+The inhabitants of the Rhine Valley drink wine instead of beer.
+They are more lively in their disposition than the Prussians,
+Saxons and Bavarians, who are of a heavy and phlegmatic nature.
+The Bavarians are noted for their prowess as beer drinkers, and
+it is not at all unusual for prosperous burghers of Munich to
+dispose of thirty large glasses of beer in a day; hence the cures
+which exist all over Germany and where the average German business
+man spends part, at least, of his annual vacation.
+
+In peace times the Germans are heavy eaters. As some one says,
+"It is not true that the Germans eat all the time, but they eat
+all the time except during seven periods of the day when they
+take their meals." And it is a fact that prosperous merchants of
+Berlin, before the war, had seven meals a day; first breakfast
+at a comfortably early hour; second breakfast at about eleven, of
+perhaps a glass of milk or perhaps a glass of beer and sandwiches;
+a very heavy lunch of four or five courses with wine and beer;
+coffee and cakes at three; tea and sandwiches or sandwiches and
+beer at about five; a strong dinner with several kinds of wines
+at about seven or seven-thirty; and a substantial supper before
+going to bed.
+
+The Germans are wonderful judges of wines, and, at any formal
+dinner, use as many as eight varieties. The best wine is passed
+in glasses on trays, and the guests are not expected, of course,
+to take this wine unless they actually desire to drink it. I
+know one American woman who was stopping at a Prince's castle
+in Hungary and who, on the first night, allowed the butler to
+fill her glasses with wine which she did not drink. The second
+evening the butler passed her sternly by, and she was offered
+no more wine during her stay in the castle.
+
+Many of the doctors who were with me thought that the heavy eating
+and large consumption of wine and beer had unfavourably affected the
+German national character, and had made the people more aggressive
+and irritable and consequently readier for war. The influence of diet
+on national character should not be under-estimated. Meat-eating
+nations have always ruled vegetarians.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN
+
+During this first winter in Berlin, I spent each morning in the
+Embassy office, and, if I had any business at the Foreign Office,
+called there about five o'clock in the afternoon. It was the
+custom that all Ambassadors should call on Tuesday afternoons
+at the Foreign Office, going in to see the Foreign Minister in
+the order of their arrival in the waiting-room, and to have a
+short talk with him about current diplomatic affairs.
+
+In the previous chapter I have given a detailed account of the
+ceremonies of court life, because a knowledge of this life is
+essential to a grasp of the spirit which animates those ruling
+the destinies of the German Empire.
+
+My first winter, however, was not all cakes and ale. There were
+several interesting bits of diplomatic work. First, we were then
+engaged in our conflict with Huerta, the Dictator of Mexico,
+and it was part of my work to secure from Germany promises that
+she would not recognise this Mexican President.
+
+I also spent a great deal of time in endeavouring to get the
+German Government to take part officially in the San Francisco
+Fair, but, so far as I could make out, Great Britain, probably
+at the instance of Germany, seemed to have entered into some
+sort of agreement, or at any rate a tacit understanding, that
+neither country would participate officially in this Exposition.
+
+After the lamentable failure of the Jamestown Exposition, the
+countries of Europe were certainly not to be blamed for not spending
+their money in aid of a similar enterprise. But I believe that the
+attitude of Germany had a deeper significance, and that certain,
+at least, of the German statesmen had contemplated a
+_rapprochement_ with Great Britain and a mutual spanking
+of America and its Monroe Doctrine by these two great powers.
+Later I was informed, by a man high in the German Foreign Office,
+that Germany had proposed to Great Britain a joint intervention
+in Mexico, an invasion which would have put an end forever to
+the Monroe Doctrine, of course to be followed by the forceful
+colonisation of Central and South America by European Powers. I
+was told that Great Britain refused. But whether this proposition
+and refusal in fact were made, can be learned from the archives
+of the British Foreign Office.
+
+During this period of trouble with Mexico, the German Press,
+almost without exception, and especially that part of it controlled
+by the Government and by the Conservatives or Junkers, was most
+bitter in its attitude towards America.
+
+The reason for this was the underlying hatred of an autocracy
+for a successful democracy, envy of the wealth, liberty and
+commercial success of America, and a deep and strong resentment
+against the Monroe Doctrine which prevented Germany from using
+her powerful fleet and great military force to seize a foothold
+in the Western hemisphere.
+
+Germany came late into the field of colonisation in her endeavour
+to find "a place in the sun." The colonies secured were not habitable
+by white men. Togo, Kameroons, German East Africa, are too tropical
+in climate, too subject to tropical diseases, ever to become
+successful German colonies. German Southwest Africa has a more
+healthy climate but is a barren land. About the only successful
+industry there has been that of gathering the small diamonds that
+were discovered in the sands of the beaches and of the deserts
+running back from the sea.
+
+On the earnest request of Secretary Bryan, I endeavoured to persuade
+the German authorities to have Germany become a signatory to the
+so-called Bryan Peace Treaties. After many efforts and long
+interviews, von Jagow, the Foreign Minister, finally told me
+that Germany would not sign these treaties because the greatest
+asset of Germany in war was her readiness for a sudden assault,
+that they had no objection to signing the treaty with America,
+but that they feared they would then be immediately asked to
+sign similar treaties with Great Britain, France and Russia,
+that if they refused to sign with these countries the refusal
+would almost be equivalent to a declaration of war, and, if they
+did sign, intending in good faith to stand by the treaty, that
+Germany would be deprived of her greatest asset in war, namely,
+her readiness for a sudden and overpowering attack.
+
+I also, during this first winter, studied and made reports on
+the commercial situation of Germany and especially the German
+discriminations against American goods. To these matters I shall
+refer in more detail in another chapter.
+
+Opposition and attention to the oil monopoly project also occupied
+a great part of my working hours. Petroleum is used very extensively
+in Germany for illuminating purposes by the poorer part of the
+population, especially in the farming villages and industrial
+towns. This oil used in Germany comes from two sources of supply,
+from America and from the oil wells of Galicia and Roumania. The
+German American Oil Company there, through which the American
+oil was distributed, although a German company, was controlled by
+American capital, and German capital was largely interested in
+the Galician and Roumanian oil fields. The oil from Galicia and
+Roumania is not so good a quality as that imported from America.
+
+[Illustration: PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER WITH THE KAISER
+AT THE ROYAL PALACE, BERLIN.]
+
+Before my arrival in Germany the government had proposed a law
+creating the oil monopoly; that is to say, a company was to be
+created, controlled by the government for the purpose of carrying
+on the entire oil business of Germany, and no other person or
+company, by its provisions, was to be allowed to sell any
+illuminating oil or similar products in the Empire. The bill
+provided that the business of those engaged in the wholesale
+selling of oil, and their plants, etc., should be taken over
+by this government company, condemned and paid for. The German
+American Company, however, had also a retail business and plant
+throughout Germany for which it was proposed that no compensation
+should be given. The government bill also contained certain curious
+"jokers"; for instance, it provided for the taking over of all
+plants "within the customs limit of the German Empire," thus
+leaving out of the compensation a refinery which was situated
+in the free part of Hamburg, although, of course, by operation
+of this monopoly bill the refinery was rendered useless to the
+American controlled company which owned it.
+
+In the course of this investigation it came to light that the
+Prussian state railways were used as a means of discriminating
+against the American oil. American oil came to Germany through
+the port of Hamburg, and the Galician and Roumanian oil through
+the frontier town of Oderberg. Taking a delivery point equally
+distant between Oderberg and Hamburg, the rate charged on oil
+from Hamburg to this point was twice as great as that charged
+for a similar quantity of oil from Oderberg.
+
+I took up this fight on the line that the company must be compensated
+for all of its property, that used in retail as well as in wholesale
+business, and, second, that it must be compensated for the good-will
+of its business, which it had built up through a number of years
+by the expenditure of very large sums of money. Of course where
+a company has been in operation for years and is continually
+advertising its business, its good-will often is its greatest
+asset and has often been built up by the greatest expenditure
+of money. For instance, in buying a successful newspaper, the
+value does not lie in the real-estate, presses, etc., but in
+the good-will of the newspaper, the result of years of work and
+expensive advertising.
+
+I made no objection that the German government did not have a
+perfect right to create this monopoly and to put the American
+controlled company entirely out of the field, but insisted upon
+a fair compensation for all their property and good-will. Even a
+fair compensation for the property and good-will would have started
+the government monopoly company with a large debt upon which it
+would have been required to pay interest, and this interest, of
+course, would have been added to the cost of oil to the German
+consumers. In my final conversation on the subject with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg, he said, "You don't mean to say that President
+Wilson and Secretary Bryan will do anything for the Standard
+Oil Company?" I answered that everyone in America knew that
+the Standard Oil Company had neither influence with nor control
+over President Wilson and Secretary Bryan, but that they both
+could and would give the Standard Oil Company the same measure
+of protection which any American citizen doing business abroad
+had a right to expect from his government. I also said that I
+thought they had done enough for the Germans interested in the
+Galician and Roumanian oil fields when they had used the Prussian
+state railways to give these oil producers an unfair advantage
+over those importing American oil.
+
+Shortly after this the question of the creation of this oil monopoly
+was dropped and naturally has not been revived during the war,
+and I very much doubt whether, after the war, the people of
+liberalised Germany will consent to pay more for inferior oil in
+order to make good the investments of certain German banks and
+financiers in Galicia and Roumania. I doubt whether a more liberal
+Germany will wish to put the control of a great business in the
+hands of the government, thereby greatly increasing the number
+of government officials and the weight of government influence
+in the country. Heaven knows there are officials enough to-day
+in Germany, without turning over a great department of private
+industry to the government for the sole purpose of making good
+bad investments of certain financiers and adding to the political
+influence of the central government.
+
+In May, 1914, Colonel House and his beautiful wife arrived to pay
+us a visit in Berlin. He was, of course, anxious to have a talk
+with the Emperor, and this was arranged by the Emperor inviting
+the Colonel and me to what is called the _Schrippenfest_,
+at the new palace at Potsdam.
+
+For many years, in fact since the days of Frederick the Great,
+the learning (_Lehr_) battalion, composed of picked soldiers
+from all the regiments of Prussia, has been quartered at Potsdam,
+and on a certain day in April this battalion has been given a
+dinner at which they eat white rolls (_Schrippen_) instead
+of the usual black bread. This feast has been carried on from
+these older days and has become quite a ceremony.
+
+The Colonel and I motored to Potsdam, arrayed in dress-suits, and
+waited in one of the salons of the ground floor of the new palace.
+Finally the Emperor and the Empress and several of the Princes and
+their wives and the usual dignitaries of the Emperor's household
+arrived. The Colonel was presented to the royalties and then a
+Divine Service was held in the open air at one end of the palace.
+The Empress and Princesses occupied large chairs and the Emperor
+stood with his sons behind him and then the various dignitaries
+of the court. The Lehr Battalion was drawn up behind. There were
+a large band and the choir boys from the Berlin cathedral. The
+service was very impressive and not less so because of a great
+Zeppelin which hovered over our heads during the whole of the
+service.
+
+After Divine Service, the Lehr Battalion marched in review and
+then was given food and beer in long arbours constructed in front
+of the palace. While the men were eating, the Emperor and Empress
+and Princes passed among the tables, speaking to the soldiers.
+We then went to the new palace where in the extraordinary hall
+studded with curious specimens of minerals from all countries,
+a long table forming three sides of a square was set for about
+sixty people. Colonel House and I sat directly across the table
+from the Emperor, with General Falkenhayn between us. The Emperor
+was in a very good mood and at one time, talking across the table,
+said to me that the Colonel and I, in our black dress-suits,
+looked like a couple of crows, that we were like two undertakers
+at a feast and spoiled the picture. After luncheon the Emperor
+had a long talk with Colonel House, and then called me into the
+conversation.
+
+On May twenty-sixth, I arranged that the Colonel should meet
+von Tirpitz at dinner in our house. We did not guess then what
+a central figure in this war the great admiral was going to be.
+At that time and until his fall, he was Minister of Marine, which
+corresponds to our Secretary of the Navy Department, and what
+is called in German _Reichsmarineamt_. The Colonel also
+met the Chancellor, von Jagow, Zimmermann and many others.
+
+There are two other heads of departments, connected with the
+navy, of equal rank with the Secretary of the Naval Department
+and not reporting to him. These are the heads of the naval staff
+and the head of what is known as the Marine Cabinet. The head
+of the naval staff is supposed to direct the actual operations
+of warfare in the navy, and the head of the Marine Cabinet is
+charged with the personnel of the navy, with determining what
+officers are to be promoted and what officers are to take over
+ships or commands.
+
+While von Tirpitz was Secretary of the Navy, by the force of
+his personality, he dominated the two other departments, but
+since his fall the heads of these two other departments have
+held positions as important, if not more important, than that
+of Secretary of the Navy.
+
+On May thirty-first, we took Colonel and Mrs. House to the aviation
+field of Joachimsthal. Here the Dutch aviator Fokker was flying and
+after being introduced to us he did some stunts for our benefit.
+Fokker was employed by the German army and later became a naturalised
+German. The machines designed by him, and named after him, for
+a long time held the mastery of the air on the West front.
+
+The advice of Colonel House, a most wise and prudent counsellor,
+was at all times of the greatest value to me during my stay in
+Berlin. We exchanged letters weekly, I sending him a weekly bulletin
+of the situation in Berlin and much news and gossip too personal
+or too indefinite to be placed in official reports.
+
+War with Germany seemed a thing not even to be considered when
+in this month of May, 1914, I called on the Foreign Office, by
+direction, to thank the Imperial Government for the aid given
+the Americans at Tampico by German ships of war.
+
+Early in February, Mr. S. Bergmann, a German who had made a fortune
+in America and who had returned to Germany to take up again his
+German citizenship, invited me to go over the great electrical
+works which he had established. Prince Henry of Prussia, the
+brother of the Emperor, was the only other guest and together
+we inspected the vast works, afterwards having lunch in Mr.
+Bergmann's office. Prince Henry has always been interested in
+America since his visit here. On that visit he spent most of
+his time with German societies, etc. Of course, now we know he
+came as a propagandist with the object of welding together the
+Germans in America and keeping up their interest in the Fatherland.
+He made a similar trip to the Argentine just before the Great
+War, with a similar purpose, but I understand his excursion was
+not considered a great success, from any standpoint. A man of
+affable manners, no one is better qualified to go abroad as a
+German propagandist than he. If all Germans had been like him
+there would have been no World War in 1914.
+
+On March eighteenth, we were invited to a fancy-dress ball at
+the palace of the Crown Prince. The guests were mostly young
+people and officers. The Crown Princess wore a beautiful Russian
+dress with its characteristic high front piece on the head. The
+Crown Prince and all the officers present were in the picturesque
+uniforms of their respective regiments of a period of one hundred
+years ago. Prince Oscar, the fifth son of the Kaiser, looked
+particularly well.
+
+The hours for balls in Berlin, where officers attended, were a
+good example for hostesses in this country. The invitations read
+for eight o'clock and that meant eight o'clock. A cold dinner
+of perhaps four courses is immediately served on the arrival of
+the guests, who, with the exception of a very few distinguished
+ones, are not given any particular places. At a quarter to nine
+the dancing begins, supper is at about eleven and the guests go
+home at twelve, at an hour which enables the officers to get
+to bed early. During the season there were balls at the British
+and French Embassy and performances by the Russian Ballet, then
+in Berlin, at the Russian Embassy.
+
+The wonderful new Royal Library, designed by Ihne, was opened
+on March twenty-second. The Emperor attended, coming in with
+the beautiful Queen of Roumania walking by his side. She is an
+exceedingly handsome woman, half English and half Russian. Some
+days later I was presented to her at a reception held at the
+Roumanian Minister's and found her as pleasant to talk to as good
+to look upon.
+
+At the end of March there was a Horse Show. The horses did not
+get prizes for mere looks and manners in trotting and cantering,
+as here. They must all do something, for the horse is considered
+primarily as a war horse; such, for instance, as stopping suddenly
+and turning at a word of command. The jumping was excellent,
+officers riding in all the events. It was not a function of
+"society," but all "society" was there and most keenly interested;
+for in a warlike country, just as in the Middle Ages, the master's
+life may depend upon the qualities of his horse.
+
+I have always been fond of horses and horse-racing, and the
+race-tracks about Berlin were always an attraction for me.
+
+Many of the drivers and jockeys were Americans. Taral was a
+successful jockey for my father-in-law, Marcus Daly. He is the
+trainer of one of the best racing stables in Germany, that of
+the brothers Weinberg, who made a fortune in dye-stuffs. "Pop"
+Campbell, who trained Mr. Daly's Ogden, a Futurity winner, is
+also a Berlin trainer. The top notch jockey was Archibald of
+California. McCreery, who once trained for one of my brothers,
+had the stable which rivalled the Weinbergs', that of Baron
+Oppenheim, a rich banker of Cologne.
+
+The German officers are splendid riders and take part in many
+races. The Crown Prince himself is a successful jockey and racing
+stable owner.
+
+On June fifth, at the annual hunt race, the big steeplechase of
+the year, the Emperor himself appeared at the Grünewald track,
+occupying his private box, a sort of little house beyond the
+finish.
+
+Bookmakers are not allowed in Germany. The betting is in mutual
+pools. About seventeen per cent of the money paid is taken by the
+Jockey Club, the State and charities, so that the bettor, with
+this percentage running always against him, has little chance
+of ultimate success.
+
+Many of the races are confined to horses bred in Denmark and the
+Central Empires.
+
+All of us in the Embassy joined the Red White Tennis Club situated
+in the Grünewald about five miles from the centre of Berlin.
+The Crown Prince was a member and often played there. He is an
+excellent player, not quite up to championship form, but he can
+give a good account of himself in any company short of the top
+class. He has the advantage of always finding that the best players
+are only too glad to have an opportunity to play with him. At
+this Tennis Club during all the period of the feeling of hatred
+against America we were treated with, extreme courtesy by all
+our German fellow members.
+
+We saw a great deal of the two exchange professors in the winter
+of 1913-14, Professor Paul Shorey of the University of Chicago
+and Professor Archibald Coolidge of Harvard. These exchange
+professors give courses and lectures in the universities and
+their first appearance is quite an event. On this first day in
+1913, they each delivered a lecture in the University of Berlin,
+and on this lecture day Prince August Wilhelm, representing the
+Kaiser, attended. The Kaiser used invariably to attend, but of
+late years I am afraid has rather lost interest in this enterprise
+at first so much favoured by him.
+
+The _Cologne Gazette_ at one time after the commencement
+of the war, in an article, expressed great surprise that America
+should permit the export of munitions of war to the Allies and
+said, quite seriously, that Germany had done everything possible
+to win the favour of America, that Roosevelt had been offered a
+review of German troops, that the Emperor had invited Americans
+who came to Kiel on their yachts to dine with him, and that he
+had even sat through the lectures given by American exchange
+professors.
+
+Before the war there was but one cable direct from Germany to
+America. This cable was owned by a German company and reached
+America via the Azore Islands. I endeavoured to obtain permission
+for the Western Union Company to land a cable in Germany, but
+the opposition of the German company, which did not desire to
+have its monopoly interfered with, caused the applications of
+the Western Union to be definitely pigeon-holed. In August, 1914,
+after the outbreak of the war, when I told this to Ballin of
+the Hamburg American Line and von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche
+Bank, and when they thought of how much they could have saved
+for themselves and Germany and their companies if there had been
+an American owned cable landing in Germany, their anger at the
+delay on the part of official Germany knew no bounds. Within a
+very short time I received an answer from the Foreign Office
+granting the application of the Western Union Company, providing
+the cable went direct to America. This concession, however, came
+too late and, naturally, the Western Union did not take up the
+matter during the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR
+
+In 1913-1914 occurred a series of events known as the "Zabern
+Affair," which to my mind decided the "system"--the military
+autocracy--for a speedy war. In this affair the German people
+appeared at last to be opening their eyes, to recover in some
+degree from the panic fear of their neighbours which had made them
+submit to the arrogance and exactions of the military caste and to
+be almost ready to demilitarise themselves, a thing abhorrent to
+the upholders of caste, the system, the army and the Hohenzollerns.
+
+This writing on the wall--these letters forming the word
+"Zabern"--the actions of the Social Democrats and their growing
+boldness, all were warnings to the autocracy of its waning power,
+and impelled that autocracy towards war as a bloodletting cure
+for popular discontent.
+
+Prussia, which has imposed its will, as well as its methods of
+thought and life on all the rest of Germany, is undoubtedly a
+military nation.
+
+More than one hundred and twenty-five years ago Mirabeau, the great
+French orator at the commencement of the Revolution, said, "War is
+the national industry of Prussia." Later, Napoleon remarked that
+Prussia "was hatched from a cannon ball," and shortly before the
+Franco-Prussian war of 1870 the French military _attaché_, in
+reporting to his government, wrote that "other countries possessed
+an army, but in Prussia the army possessed the country."
+
+In practice the class of nobles in Prussia owns the army. Officers
+may enter the army in two ways, either by enlisting in the regiment,
+first as private and then being rapidly promoted to the position
+of non-commissioned officer, and then probationary ensign, or
+_avantageur_; or the young aspirant may come directly from
+a two years' course in one of the cadet schools and enter the
+regiment as probationary ensign. In both cases the young officer
+is observed by the officers during a period of probation and
+can become an officer of that regiment only by the consent of
+the regimental officers. In other words, each regiment is like
+a club, the officers having the right of black-ball.
+
+This system has practically confined the professional officers to
+a class of nobles. It is not at all unusual to find in a regiment
+officers whose ancestors were officers of the same regiment two
+hundred years or more ago.
+
+In addition to these officers who make the army their career,
+a certain number of Germans, after undergoing an enlistment in
+the army of one year and two periods of training thereafter,
+are made reserve officers. These reserve officers are called to
+the colours for manoeuvres and also, of course, when the whole
+nation is arrayed in war. These reserve officers seldom attain
+a rank higher than that of captain. They may, however, while
+exercising civil functions, be promoted, and in this manner the
+Chancellor, while occupying civil positions, has gradually been
+promoted to the rank of General and von Jagow, during the war, to
+the rank of Major. As a rule reserve officers are the one-yearers,
+or _Einjähriger_, who, because they have attained a certain
+standard of education, serve only one year with the army instead
+of the two required from others. The Bavarian army is in a sense
+independent of Prussia, but is modelled on the same system.
+
+For years officers of the army, both in the discharge of their
+duties and outside, have behaved in a very arrogant way toward
+the civil population. Time and again, while I was in Germany
+waiting in line at some ticket office, an officer has shoved
+himself ahead of all others without even a protest from those
+waiting. On one occasion, I went to the races in Berlin with my
+brother-in-law and bought a box. While we were out looking at
+the horses between the races, a Prussian officer and his wife
+seated themselves in our box. I called the attention of one of
+the ushers to this, but the usher said that he did not dare ask
+a Prussian officer to leave, and it was only after sending for
+the head usher and showing him my Jockey Club badge and my pass
+as Ambassador, that I was able to secure possession of my own
+box.
+
+There have been many instances in Germany where officers having
+a slight dispute with civilians have instantly cut the civilian
+down. Instances of this kind and the harsh treatment of the Germans
+by officers and under-officers, while serving in the army,
+undoubtedly created in Germany a spirit of antagonism not only
+to the army itself but to the whole military system of Prussia.
+Affairs were brought to a head by the so-called Zabern Affair. In
+this affair the internal antagonism between the civil population
+and professional soldiers, which had assumed great proportions
+in a period of long peace, seemed to reach its climax. Of course
+this antagonism had increased with the increase in 1913-14 of
+the effective strength of the standing army, bringing a material
+increase in the numbers of officers and non-commissioned officers
+who represent military professionalism.
+
+The Imperial Provinces or Reichsland, as Alsace and Lorraine are
+called, had been in a peculiar position within the body politic
+of Germany since their annexation in 1870. The Reichsland, as
+indicated by its name, was to be considered as common property
+of the German Empire and was not annexed to any one German State.
+Its government is by an Imperial Viceroy, with a kind of cabinet
+consisting of one Secretary of State, Civil and Under Secretaries
+and Department heads, assisted by a legislative body of two chambers,
+one elected by popular vote and the other consisting of members
+partly elected by municipal bodies, universities, churches and so
+forth, and partly appointed by the Imperial Government. The Viceroy
+and his cabinet are appointed by the Emperor in his capacity of
+the sovereign of the Reichsland. Until the thirty-first of May,
+1911, the Reichsland had no constitution of its own, the form
+of its government being regulated by the Reichstag and Federal
+Council (Bundesrat) in about the same way as the territories
+of the United States are ruled by Congress and the President.
+In 1911, Alsace-Lorraine received a constitution which gave it
+representation in the Federal Council, representation in the
+Reichstag having already been granted as early as 1871. The sympathy
+of Alsace-Lorraine for France had been increased by the policy of
+several of the German viceroys,--von Manteuffel, Prince Hohenlohe,
+Prince Münster and Count Wedel, who had, in their administrations,
+alternated severe measures with great leniency and had not improved
+conditions, so that the population, essentially South German,
+was undoubtedly irritated by the tone and manner of the North
+German officials.
+
+Great industries had been developed by the Imperial Government,
+especially textile and coal mining, and the industrial population
+centering in Mülhausen was hotly and thoroughly Social Democratic.
+The upper or well-to-do classes were tied to France by family
+connections and by religion. The bourgeois remained mildly
+anti-German, more properly speaking, anti-government, for similar
+reasons, and the working men were opposed to the government on
+social and economic grounds. The farming population, not troubling
+much about the politics, but being affected by the campaign of
+the nationalistic press, were in sympathy with France; so the
+atmosphere was well prepared for the coming storm.
+
+Zabern, or in French, Saverne, is a little town of between eight
+and nine thousand inhabitants, beautifully situated at the foot
+of the Vosges Mountains on the banks of the Rhine-Marne Canal.
+Its garrison comprised the staff and two battalions of Infantry
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, commanded by von Reuter, and among
+its officers was a Lieutenant von Forstner, a young man only
+twenty years old, whose boyish appearance had excited the school
+children and boys working in nearby iron factories to ridicule
+him. It became known that this young officer, while instructing
+his men, had insulted the French flag and had called the Alsatian
+recruits _Wackes_, a nick-name meaning "square-head," and
+frequently used by the people of Alsace-Lorraine in a jocular
+way, but hotly resented by them if used towards them by others.
+It was further reported that he had promised his men a reward
+of ten marks if one of them, in case of trouble, should bring
+down a Social Democrat. Forstner had told his men to beware,
+and warned them against listening to French foreign agents, whom
+the Germans claimed were inducing French soldiers to desert in
+order to join the French legion. It is probable that Forstner,
+in talking to his men of the French Foreign Legion, used language
+offensive to French ears. He admitted that he had used the word
+_Wackes_ in defiance of an order of the commanding general,
+and for this he had been punished with several days' confinement
+in a military prison. Lieutenant von Forstner, who was ordered
+to instruct his squad about the regulations in case of trouble
+with the civil population, claimed that he had only added to the
+usual instructions a statement that every true soldier should
+do his best to suppress any disturbances and that he, Forstner,
+would give a special reward to any of his men who would arrest
+one of "those damned Social Democrats."
+
+Reports of the acts of Forstner and other officers were rapidly
+spread among the population. The two newspapers of Zabern published
+articles. The excitement grew, and there were demonstrations
+against the officials and especially against Forstner. Finally,
+conditions became so bad that Colonel von Reuter requested the
+head of the local civil administration, Director Mahler, to restore
+order, stating that he would take the matter into his own hands
+if order was not restored. The director, a native of a small
+village near Zabern, replied coolly that he saw no necessity
+for interfering with peace loving and law abiding people. On
+November twenty-ninth, 1913, a large crowd assembled in front
+of the barracks. Colonel von Reuter ordered Lieutenant Schad,
+commanding the Guard as officer of the day, to disperse the crowd.
+Accordingly Lieutenant Schad called the Guard to arms and three
+times summoned the crowd to disperse and go home. The soldiers
+charged and drove the multitude across the Square and into a
+side street and arrested about fifteen persons, among them the
+President, two Judges and the State Attorney of the Zabern Supreme
+Court, who had just come out from the court building and who were
+caught in the crowd. They were subsequently released. The rest
+of the persons arrested were kept in the cellar of the barracks
+over night.
+
+The report of these occurrences caused immense excitement throughout
+Germany. A great outcry went up against militarism, even in quarters
+where no socialistic tendencies existed. This feeling was not
+helped by the fact that the General commanding the fifteenth
+army to which the Zabern regiment belonged was an exponent of
+extreme militaristic ideas; a man, who several years before, as
+Colonel of the Colonial troops, representing the war ministry
+before the Reichstag and debating there the question of the number
+of troops to be kept in German South West Africa, had most clearly
+shown his contempt for the Reichstag.
+
+Colonel von Reuter and Lieutenant Schad, when court-martialled
+for their acts in ordering the troops to move against the civil
+population, claimed the benefit of a Prussian law of 1820, which
+provided that in any city, town or village, the highest military
+officer in command must assume the authority, usually vested
+in the civil government, whenever for any reason the civil
+administration neglects to keep order. The Colonel and Lieutenant
+were subsequently acquitted on the ground that they had acted
+under the provisions of this law.
+
+The excitement throughout Germany was further increased by other
+circumstances. The Emperor remained during these critical days at
+Donaueschingen, the princely estate of his friend and favourite,
+Prince Fürstenberg, enjoying himself with fox-hunting, torch-light
+processions and cabaret performances. Of course, all this had been
+arranged long before anyone dreamed of any trouble in Zabern, and
+the Emperor could scarcely be expected to realise the gravity of
+the situation which suddenly arose. But this very fact created a
+bad impression. It was even rumoured that the Empress, alarmed by
+the situation, had ordered a train to be made ready in order to
+go to him and try to convince him of the necessity of returning
+to Berlin.
+
+[Illustration: THE GLORY WHICH IS POTSDAM. SUMMER RESIDENCE OF
+THE KAISER IN THE PARK OF SANS SOUCI.]
+
+[Illustration: DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS, AT
+THE TOWN HALL, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+The newly appointed minister of war, Falkenhayn, went to
+Donaueschingen, where he was joined by von Deimling. This action
+aggravated the situation, because the public concluded that the
+Emperor would hear the advice and report of military officers
+only. The sudden death, by heart failure, of the Emperor's closest
+friend, von Hulsen, chief of the Emperor's Military Cabinet,
+during a banquet at Donaueschingen, gave the rapidly developing
+events a tragic and mysterious colouring, and these conferences
+in Donaueschingen resulted in the tendering of their resignations
+by the Viceroy, von Wedel, and Secretary of State Zorn von Bulach,
+Viceroy and Secretary of State of Alsace-Lorraine, who felt that
+the military party had gained an upper hand in the conflict with the
+civil authorities. The Chancellor then hurried to Donaueschingen,
+arriving a few hours before the departure of the Emperor; and a
+subsequent order of the Emperor to General von Deimling to see
+to it that the military officers did not overstep their authority
+and directing him to investigate the occurrences and take measures
+to punish all guilty parties, somewhat quieted the nation and
+caused the two highest civil officials of Alsace-Lorraine to
+withdraw their resignations.
+
+Zabern, where a brigadier-general had been sent by von Deimling
+to restore civil government, had begun to quiet down. But the
+Chancellor had hardly returned to Berlin when another incident
+stirred Germany. While practising field service in the neighbourhood
+of Zabern and marching through a village, Lieutenant von Forstner
+had an altercation with a lame shoemaker and cut him down. This
+brutal act of militarism caused a new outburst throughout Germany.
+Forstner was tried by a court-martial for hitting and wounding
+an unarmed civilian, and sentenced by the lower court to one
+year's imprisonment, but acquitted by the higher court as having
+acted in "supposed self-defence."
+
+No less than three parties, the Centrum, the Progressives and
+the Social Democrats, addressed interpellations to the Chancellor
+about this occurrence at Zabern. I was present at the debate in
+the Reichstag, which took place on the fourth, fifth and sixth
+of December, 1913. Three South Germans, a member of the Centrum,
+Hauss, a Progressive named Roser, and the Socialist deputy from
+Mülhausen in Alsace, Peirotes, commenced by moving and seconding
+the interpellation and related in vehement language the occurrences
+at Zabern. The Chancellor replied in defence of the government.
+Unfortunately he had that morning received family news of a most
+unpleasant character, which added to his nervousness. He spoke
+with a low voice and looked like a downhearted and sick man. It
+was whispered afterwards in the lobbies that he had forgotten
+the most important part of his speech. The unfavourable impression
+which he made was increased by von Falkenhayn, appearing for the
+first time before the Reichstag. If the Reichstag members had
+been disappointed by the Chancellor, they were stirred to the
+highest pitch of bitterness by the speech of the War Minister. In
+a sharp, commanding voice he told them that the military officers
+had only done their duty, that they would not be swerved from their
+path by press agents or hysterical individuals, that Forstner
+was a very young officer who had been severely punished, but
+that this kind of courageous young officer was the kind that
+the country needed, etc. Immediately after this speech the
+Progressive party moved that the attitude of the Chancellor did
+not meet the approval of the representatives of the people, and
+it became evident that, for the first time in the history of the
+German Empire, a vote of censure directed against the government
+would be debated. The debate was continued all the next day, the
+Chancellor making another speech and saying what he probably had
+intended to say the day before. He related what he had achieved
+at Donaueschingen; that the Emperor had issued a cabinet order
+saying that the military authorities should be kept within legal
+bounds, that all the guilty persons would be punished, that the
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, had been removed from Zabern, that
+the absolute law of 1820 had been abolished for Alsace-Lorraine,
+and that no Chancellor should for one moment tolerate disregard
+of law by any government officials, civil or military, and remain
+in his position.
+
+This second speech of the Chancellor made a better impression
+and somewhat affected the more extreme members of the Reichstag,
+but it came too late to prevent the passage of the vote of censure
+by the remarkable majority of two hundred and ninety-three to
+fifty-four. Only the Conservatives voted against it. A few days
+later, when the Social Democrats demanded that the Chancellor
+take the consequence of the vote of distrust and resign, the
+attitude of the members of all the other parties, who had been
+favourably impressed by the second speech of the Chancellor,
+showed that they were not yet prepared to go the length of holding
+that a vote of distrust in the Reichstag must necessarily mean
+the resignation of the Chancellor.
+
+Public excitement gradually calmed down, and a complete change of
+the officials at Zabern helped to bring about a normal condition
+of affairs. The Viceroy, Count Wedel, and Secretary of State
+Zorn von Bulach, resigned and were replaced by von Dallwitz and
+Count Rödern.
+
+However, the everlasting question came up again a little later
+during the regular budget debate of the Reichstag. The Chancellor
+made his speech, giving a review of the political international
+situation. He was followed by Herr Scheidemann, leader of the
+Social Democrats, who mercilessly attacked the Chancellor and
+stated that if the Chancellor still thought that he was the right
+man at the helm, he, Scheidemann, would show that the contrary was
+the case. He then enumerated what he called the many political
+failures of the Chancellor, the failure of the bill to amend
+the Prussian franchise law, and stated that the few bills which
+had been passed, such as the bill giving Alsace-Lorraine a real
+constitution, had been carried only with the help of the Social
+Democratic party. The speaker then once more rehashed the incidents
+of the Zabern matter, referred to the attitude of the Emperor,
+who, he said, had evidently been too busy with hunting and
+festivities to devote time to such trivial matters as the Zabern
+Affair, and also said that, if the Chancellor had refused to
+withdraw, the only possible conclusion from the vote of the two
+hundred and ninety-three Reichstag members, who were certainly
+not influenced by personal feelings against the Chancellor, was
+that the Chancellor must be sticking to his post only because
+of the mistaken idea of the Emperor's authority and because he
+must believe in the fetish of personal government. Scheidemann
+begged that the same majority which had passed the vote of censure
+should now follow it up by voting down the Chancellor's salary
+and thus force him out of office.
+
+The Chancellor immediately replied, saying that he needed no
+advice from Herr Scheidemann, and that when the government had
+consented to change the rules of the Reichstag he had expressly
+reserved the authority either to regard or disregard any resolution
+passed after an interpellation, and that formerly, after discussing
+an interpellation and the answer of the government, no vote could
+be taken to approve or reject a resolution expressing its opinion
+of such course of action. Such resolutions might be considered as
+valuable material, but it had been agreed that they could have
+no binding effect either upon the government or any member of it,
+and that nobody had ever dreamed that by a mere change of business
+rules the whole constitution of the Empire was being changed and
+authority given to the Reichstag to dismiss ministers at will;
+that in France and Great Britain conditions were different, but
+that parliamentary government did not exist in Germany; that it
+was the constitutional privilege of the Emperor to appoint the
+Chancellor without any assistance or advice from the Reichstag;
+that he, the Chancellor, would resist with all his might every
+attempt to change this system; and that he, therefore, refused
+to resign because the resolution had no other effect than to
+make it evident that a difference of opinion existed between the
+Reichstag and the government.
+
+This debate took place on December ninth, 1913, and, with the
+exception of the Social Democrats and the Polish deputies, the
+leaders of all parties supported the view of the Chancellor.
+The motion to strike out the Chancellor's salary was voted down,
+only the Social Democrats and Poles voting in favour of it.
+
+It is unquestioned, however, that this Zabern Affair and the
+consequent attitude of the whole nation, as well as the extraordinary
+vote in the Reichstag, greatly alarmed the military party.
+
+It was perhaps the final factor which decided the advocates of
+the old military system of Germany in favour of a European war.
+Usually in past years when the Reichstag in adjournments had risen
+and cheered the name of the Emperor, the Social Democrats absented
+themselves from the Chamber, but when the Reichstag adjourned on
+May twentieth, 1914, these members remained in the Chamber and
+refused either to rise or to cheer the Emperor. The President
+of the Reichstag immediately called attention to this breach
+of respect to the Emperor, upon which the Socialists shouted,
+"That is our affair," and tried to drown the cheers with hoots
+and hisses at which the other parties applauded tumultuously.
+
+This occurrence I know greatly incensed the Emperor and did much,
+I believe, to win his consent to the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR
+
+To the outsider, the Germans seem a fierce and martial nation.
+But, in reality, the mass of the Germans, in consenting to the
+great sacrifice entailed by their enormous preparations for war,
+have been actuated by fear.
+
+This fear dates from the Thirty Years' War, the war which commenced
+in 1618 and was terminated in 1648. In 1648, when the Treaty
+of Westphalia was concluded, Germany was almost a desert. Its
+population had fallen from twenty millions to four millions.
+The few remaining people were so starved that cannibalism was
+openly practised. In the German States polygamy was legalised,
+and was a recognised institution for many years thereafter.
+
+Of thirty-five thousand Bohemian villages, only six thousand
+were left standing. In the lower Palatinate only one-tenth of the
+population survived; in Württemberg, only one-sixth. Hundreds of
+square miles of once fertile country were overgrown with forests
+inhabited only by wolves.
+
+A picture of this horrible period is found in the curious novel,
+"The Adventurous Simplicissimus," written by Grimmelshausen, and
+published in 1669, which describes the adventures of a wise peasant
+who finally leaves his native Germany and betakes himself to a desert
+island which he refuses to leave when offered an opportunity to
+go back to the Fatherland. He answers those who wish to persuade
+him to go back with words which seem quite appropriate to-day:
+"My God, where do you want to carry me? Here is peace. There is
+war. Here I know nothing of the arts of the court, ambitions,
+anger, envy, deceit, nor have I cares concerning my clothing and
+nourishment.... While I still lived in Europe everything was
+(O, woe that I must appear witness to such acts of Christians!)
+filled with war, burning, murder, robbery, plundering and the
+shame of women and virgins." The Munich weekly, "Simplicissimus,"
+whose powerful political cartoons have often startled Europe,
+takes its name from this character.
+
+After the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War, Germany was again
+and again ravaged by smaller wars, culminating in the Seven Years'
+War of Frederick the Great and the humbling of Germany under
+the heel of Napoleon. In the wars Of Frederick the Great, one
+tenth of the population was killed. Even the great Battle of
+the Nations at Leipsic in 1813 did not free Germany from wars,
+and in 1866 Prussia and the smaller North German States, with
+Italy, defeated Austria, assisted by Bavaria, Hesse-Cassel,
+Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, Saxony, Baden, Württemberg and Hanover.
+
+I am convinced that the fear of war induced by a hereditary instinct,
+caused the mass of the Germans to become the tools and dupes of
+those who played upon this very fear in order to create a military
+autocracy. On the other hand, and, especially, in the noble class,
+we have in Germany a great number of people who believe in war for
+its own sake. In part, these nobles are the descendants of the
+Teutonic Knights who conquered the Slav population of Prussia,
+and have ever since bound that population to their will.
+
+The Prussian army was created by the father of Frederick the
+Great, who went to the most ridiculous extremes in obtaining tall
+men at all costs for his force.
+
+The father of Frederick the Great gave the following written
+instructions to the two tutors of his son. "Above all let both
+tutors exert themselves to the utmost to inspire him with a love
+of soldiery and carefully impress upon his mind that, as nothing
+can confer honour and fame upon a prince except the sword, the
+monarch who seeks not his sole satisfaction in it must ever appear
+a contemptible character in the eyes of the world."
+
+Frederick the Great left, by the death of that father who had
+once threatened to execute him, at the head of a marvellous army
+with a full treasury, finally decided upon war, as he admits in
+his own letters, "in order to be talked about," and his desire
+to be talked about led to the Seven Years' War.
+
+The short war against Denmark in 1864, against Austria, Bavaria,
+etc., in 1866 and against France in 1870, enormously increased
+both the pride and prestige of the Prussian army. It must not
+be forgotten that at all periods of history it seems as if some
+blind instinct had driven the inhabitants of the inhospitable
+plains of North Germany to war and to conquest. The Cimbri and
+Teutones--the tribes defeated by Marius; Ariovistus, who was
+defeated by Julius Caesar; the Goths and the Visi-Goths; the
+Franks and the Saxons; all have poured forth from this infertile
+country, for the conquest of other lands. The Germans of to-day
+express this longing of the North Germans for pleasanter climes
+in the phrase in which they demand "a place in the sun."
+
+The nobles of Prussia are always for war. The business men and
+manufacturers and shipowners desire an increasing field for their
+activities. The German colonies were uninhabitable by Europeans.
+All his life the glittering Emperor and his generals had planned
+and thought of war; and the Crown Prince, surrounded by his
+remarkable collection of relics and reminders of Napoleon, dreamed
+only of taking the lead in a successful war of conquest. Early in
+the winter of 1913-14, the Crown Prince showed his collection of
+Napoleana to a beautiful American woman of my acquaintance, and
+said that he hoped war would occur while his father was alive,
+but, if not, he would start a war the moment he came to the throne.
+
+Since writing the above, the American woman who had this conversation
+with the Crown Prince wrote out for me the exact conversation
+in her own words, as follows: "I had given him Norman Angell's
+book, 'The Great Illusion,' which seeks to prove that war is
+unprofitable. He (the Crown Prince) said that whether war was
+profitable or not, when he came to the throne there would be war,
+if not before, just for the fun of it. On a previous occasion
+he had said that the plan was to attack and conquer France, then
+England, and after that my country (the United States of America);
+Russia was also to be conquered, and Germany would be master of
+the world."
+
+The extraordinary collection of relics, statues, busts, souvenirs,
+etc., of the first Napoleon, collected by the Crown Prince, which
+he was showing at the time of the first of these conversations
+to this American lady, shows the trend of his mind and that all
+his admiration is centred upon Napoleon, the man who sought the
+mastery of the world, and who is thought by admirers like the
+Crown Prince to have failed only because of slight mistakes which
+they feel, in his place, they would not have made.
+
+If the Germans' long preparations for war were to bear any fruit,
+countless facts pointed to the summer of 1914 as the time when the
+army should strike that great and sudden blow at the liberties
+of the world.
+
+It was in June, 1914, that the improved Kiel Canal was reopened,
+enabling the greatest warships to pass from the Baltic to the
+North Sea.
+
+In the Zeppelins the Germans had arms not possessed by any other
+country and with which they undoubtedly believed that they could
+do much more damage to England than was the case after the actual
+outbreak of hostilities. They had paid great attention to the
+development of the submarine. Their aeroplanes were superior to
+those of other nations. They believed that in the use of poison
+gas, which was prepared before the outbreak of the war, they had
+a prize that would absolutely demoralise their enemy. They had
+their flame throwers and the heavy artillery and howitzers which
+reduced the redoubtable forts of Liege and Namur to fragments
+within a few hours, and which made the holding of any fortresses
+impossible.
+
+On their side, by the imposition of a heavy tax called the
+_Wehrbeitrag_ or supplementary defence tax, they had, in
+1913, increased their army by a number of army corps. On the
+other hand, the law for three years' military service voted in
+France had not yet gone into effect, nor had the law for universal
+military service voted by the Belgian Chambers. Undoubtedly the
+Germans based great hopes upon the Bagdad railway which was to
+carry their influence to the East, and even threatened the rule
+of England in Egypt and India. Undoubtedly there was talk, too,
+of a Slav railroad to run from the Danube to the Adriatic which
+would cut off Germany from access to the Southern Sea. Francis
+Deloisi, the Frenchman, in his book published before the great
+war, called "De la Guerre des Balkans à la Guerre Européenne,"
+says, "In a word, the present war (Balkan) is the work of Russia,
+and the Danube Asiatic railway is a Russian project. If it succeeds,
+a continuous barrier of Slav peoples will bar the way to the
+Mediterranean of the path of Austro-German expansion from the
+Black Sea to the Adriatic. But here again the Romanoffs confront
+the Hapsburgs, the Austro-Serb conflict becomes the Austro-Russian
+conflict, two great groups are formed, and the Balkan conflict
+becomes the European conflict."
+
+Another reason for an immediate war was the loan by France to
+Russia made on condition that additional strategic railways were
+to be constructed by the Russians in Poland. Although this money
+had been received, the railways had not been constructed at the
+time of the opening of the Great War. Speaking of this situation,
+the Russian General Kuropatkin, in his report for the year 1900,
+said, "We must cherish no illusions as to the possibility of an
+easy victory over the Austrian army," and he then went on to say,
+"Austria had eight railways to transport troops to the Russian
+frontier while Russia had only four; and, while Germany had seventeen
+such railways running to the German-Russian frontier, the Russians
+had only five." Kuropatkin further said, "The differences are too
+enormous and leave our neighbours a superiority which cannot be
+overcome by the numbers of our troops, or their courage."
+
+Comparing the two armies, he said, "The invasion of Russia by
+German troops is more probable than the invasion of Germany by
+Russian troops"; and, "Our Western frontier, in the event of
+a European war, would be in such danger as it never has known
+in all the history of Russia."
+
+Agitation by workmen in Russia was believed in Germany to be
+the beginning of a revolution. Illuminating figures may be seen
+in the gold purchase of the German Imperial Bank: in 1911,
+174,000,000 marks; in 1912, 173,000,000 marks; but in 1913,
+317,000,000 marks.
+
+There was a belief in Germany that the French nation was degenerate
+and corrupt and unprepared for war. This belief became conviction
+when, in the debates of the French Senate, Senator Humbert, early
+in 1914, publicly exposed what he claimed to be the weakness
+and unpreparedness of France.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador in London, certainly
+reported to his government that England did not wish to enter
+the war. He claims now that he did not mean that England would
+not fight at all events, but undoubtedly the German Foreign Office
+believed that England would remain out of the war. The raising of
+the Ulster army by Sir Edward Carson, one of the most gigantic
+political bluffs in all history, which had no more revolutionary
+or military significance than a torchlight parade during one of
+our presidential campaigns, was reported by the German spies
+as a real and serious revolutionary movement; and, of course, it
+was believed by the Germans that Ireland would rise in general
+rebellion the moment that war was declared. In the summer of
+1914 Russia was believed to be on the edge of revolution.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, the movement against
+militarism, culminating in the extraordinary vote in the Reichstag
+against the government at the time of the Zabern Affair, warned
+the government and military people that the mass of Germans were
+coming to their senses and were preparing to shake off the bogy of
+militarism and fear, which had roosted so long on their shoulders
+like a Prussian old-man-of-the-sea. The Pan-Germans and the
+Annexationists were hot for war. The people alive could recall
+only three wars, the war against Denmark in 1864, which was settled
+in a few days and added the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein to
+the Prussian crown, and the war of 1866 in which Bavaria, Baden,
+Württemberg, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Saxony were defeated, when the
+Austrian kingdom of Hanover disappeared and the territories of
+Hesse-Cassel and Nassau, and the free city of Frankfort were
+added to Prussia. This war, from its declaration to the battle
+of Königgratz in which the Austrians were completely defeated,
+lasted only two weeks. In 1870 France was defeated within a month
+and a half after the opening of hostilities; so that the Kaiser
+was implicitly believed when, on the first day of the war, he
+appeared on the balcony of the palace and told the crowds who
+were keen for war, that "before the leaves have fallen from the
+trees you will be back in your homes." The army and all Germany
+believed him and believed, too, that a few short weeks would
+see the destruction of France and the consequent seizure of her
+rich colonies; that Russia could then be struck a good quick
+blow before she could concentrate her army and resources; that
+England would remain neutral; and that Germany would consequently
+become, if not the actual owner, at least the dictator of the
+world. Some one has since said that the Emperor must have meant
+pine trees.
+
+Working ever in the dark, either owning or influencing newspapers,
+the great munition and arms factory of the Krupp's insidiously
+poisoned the minds of the people with the microbe of war.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador to London, called upon
+me often after the outbreak of the war, and insisted that he
+had correctly reported the sentiments of England in saying that
+England did not want war. After his return to Germany the Germans
+quite unfairly treated him as a man who had failed and seemed
+to blame him because England had taken the only possible course
+open to her and ranged herself on the side of France and Russia.
+
+The dedication at Leipzig, in the year 1913, of the great monument
+to celebrate what is called the "War of Liberation," and the
+victory of Leipzig in the War of the Nations, 1813, had undoubtedly
+kindled a martial spirit in Germany. To my mind, the course which
+really determined the Emperor and the ruling class for war was
+the attitude of the whole people in the Zabern Affair and their
+evident and growing dislike of militarism. The fact that the
+Socialists, at the close of the session of the Reichstag, boldly
+remained in the Chamber and refused to rise or to cheer the name
+of the Emperor indicated a new spirit of resistance to autocracy;
+and autocracy saw that if it was to keep its hold upon Germany
+it must lead the nation into a short and successful war.
+
+This is no new trick of a ruling and aristocratic class. From
+the days when the patricians of Rome forced the people into war
+whenever the people showed a disposition to demand their rights,
+autocracies have always turned to war as the best antidote against
+the spirit of democracy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR
+
+Kiel, situated on the Baltic, on the eastern side of the peninsula
+of Jutland near the Baltic entrance of the Kiel Canal, is the
+principal naval centre of Germany.
+
+When the Germans decided to build up a great fleet the Emperor
+used every means to encourage a love of yachting and of the sea,
+and endeavoured to make the Kiel Week a rival of the week at
+Cowes, the English yachting centre.
+
+With this end in view, the rich Germans were encouraged and almost
+commanded to build and race yachts; and Americans and others who
+visited Kiel in their yachts were entertained by the Emperor
+in an intimacy impossible if they had come to Berlin merely as
+tourists, residing in a hotel.
+
+In June, 1914, we went to Kiel as guests of Allison Armour of
+Chicago, on his yacht, the _Utowana_. I was detained by
+business in Berlin and Mrs. Gerard preceded me to Kiel. I arrived
+there on Saturday, the twenty-seventh of June, and that night
+went with Armour to dine with the Emperor on board the Emperor's
+yacht, _Hohenzollern_.
+
+In the harbour were a fair number of German yachts, mostly sailing
+yachts, taking part in the races; the fine old yacht of Lord
+Brassey, _The Sunbeam_, and the yacht of the Prince of Monaco,
+in which he conducts his scientific voyages. A great English
+fleet, comprising some of the most powerful dreadnoughts, had
+also arrived, sent as an earnest of the good will and kindly
+feeling then supposed to exist between Great Britain and Germany.
+The redoubtable von Tirpitz was present on a German battleship,
+and the Hamburg American Line had an old transatlantic steamer,
+the _Deutschland_, rechristened the _Victoria Luise_,
+filled with guests, most of whom were invited on a hint from
+the Emperor.
+
+At dinner on the _Hohenzollern_ a number of English people
+were present. The Kaiser had on one side of him the wife of the
+British Admiral, Lady Maud Warrender, and on the other side, the
+Countess of March, whose husband is heir to the Duke of Richmond.
+I sat between Princess Münster and the Countess of March, and
+after dinner the Emperor drew me over to the rail of the ship,
+and talked to me for some time. I wish that diplomatic etiquette
+would permit me to reveal what he said, but even in war time I
+do not think I ought to violate the confidence that hospitality
+seals. However important and interesting, especially to the tame
+Socialists of Germany, I do not give this conversation with the
+Emperor, nor the conversation with him and Colonel House at the
+_Schrippenfest_, because I was his guest. Conversations
+with the Emperor which I had on later occasions were at official
+audiences and to these the same rule does not apply. He also
+invited me to sail with him in his yacht, the _Meteor_, in
+the races from Kiel to Eckernfjord on the coming Tuesday.
+
+[Illustration: THE EMPEROR'S RACING YACHT, AND OTHERS, AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: THE "HOHENZOLLERN".]
+
+Sunday afternoon Prince Henry and his wife, who reside in the
+castle at Kiel, were to give an afternoon reception and garden
+party; but on arriving at the gates we were told that the party
+would not take place. After going on board the _Utowana_,
+Frederick W. Wile, the celebrated correspondent of the
+_London Daily Mail_, ranged up alongside in a small launch and
+informed us that the Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the
+Austrian throne, and his wife had been assassinated at Sarajevo.
+There was much rushing to and fro in fast launches, the Emperor
+himself being summoned from the race which was in progress. That
+night we dined on board the yacht of the Prince of Monaco. All the
+diplomats and notables whom I met during the afternoon and evening
+seemed to think that there was no chance that the tragedy at
+Sarajevo would lead to war. The next morning the Emperor left
+early for Berlin, but expressly directed that the festivities
+and races at Kiel should be carried out as arranged.
+
+Monday afternoon there was a _Bierabend_ in the large hall
+of the yacht club at Kiel. The Emperor was to have presided at
+this dinner, but his place was taken by his brother, Prince Henry.
+Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador, who was living on one
+of the British battleships, sat on his right and I sat on his
+left. During the evening a curious incident happened. The Prince
+and I were talking of the dangers of after-dinner speaking and what
+a dangerous sport it was. In the midst of our conversation some
+one whispered to the Prince and he rose to his feet, proposed the
+health of the visiting British Admiral and fleet, and made a little
+speech. As he concluded, he said, addressing the officers of the
+British fleet: "We are sorry you are going and we are sorry you
+came." It is remarkable as showing the discipline of the German
+nation and their respect for authority that thereafter no German
+ever referred to this curious slip of the tongue. The night was
+rather mild and after dinner we walked about the gardens of the
+yacht club. I had a long and interesting conversation with the
+Prince of Monaco. That Prince, who receives such a large income
+from the company which carries on the gambling rooms at Monte
+Carlo, is a man of the world intensely interested in scientific
+research: there is practically no corner of the seven seas into
+which his yacht has not poked her nose in the search for material
+for the Sea Museum which he has established at Monaco.
+
+On Tuesday Armour and I boarded the Emperor's sailing yacht,
+the new _Meteor_. The race was a beautiful run from Kiel
+to Eckernfjord and was won by the _Meteor_. As the Emperor
+was not on board, I did not get one of the souvenir scarf-pins
+always given to guests who sail with him on a winning race. Among
+our crew was Grand Admiral von Köster, subsequently an advocate
+of the ruthless submarine war.
+
+Eckernfjord is a little fishing and bathing town. Near by is
+the country residence of Prince Henry, a rather modest house,
+built in brick in English Elizabethan style. The wife of Prince
+Henry was a Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt and is the sister of the
+Czarina of Russia. We had tea with Prince and Princess Henry,
+their family, the Duke of Sonderburg-Glücksburg and several others
+of his family. The billiard room of the house is decorated with
+the large original caricatures made by McCutcheon of the Prince's
+stay in America. Prince and Princess Henry came out to dine on
+the _Utowana_, and Armour and the Prince went ashore to
+attend another _Bierabend_, but I dodged the smoke and beer
+and remained on board. Before he left the yacht, I had a talk
+with Prince Henry. He seemed most exercised over the dislike of
+the Germans by all other peoples and asked me why I thought it
+existed. I politely told him that I thought it existed because of
+the success which the Germans had had in all fields of endeavour,
+particularly in manufacturing and commerce. He said, with great
+truth, that he believed a great deal of it came from the bad
+manners of the travelling Germans. Prince Henry is an able and
+reasonable man with a most delightful manner. He speaks English
+with a perfect English accent, and I think would be far happier
+as an English country gentleman than as the Grand Admiral of the
+German Baltic Fleet. He has been devoted to automobiling and
+has greatly encouraged that industry in Germany. The Automobile
+Club of Berlin is his particular pet.
+
+On returning to Kiel next day we spent several days longer there.
+I lunched on board his battleship with Grand Admiral von Tirpitz,
+sitting next to him at the table. He struck me then as an amiable
+sea dog, combining much political and worldly wisdom with his
+knowledge of the sea. From Kiel we motored one night to dine
+with a Count and Countess in their country house. This house
+had been built perhaps two hundred years, and was on one side of
+a square, the other three sides being formed by the great stone
+barns in which the produce of the estate was stored. Although
+the first floor of the house was elevated about eight feet above
+the ground, the family, on account of the dampness of that part
+of the world, lived in the second story, and the dining room
+was on this story. An ancestor of the Count had, at a time when
+this part of the country was part of Denmark and about the year
+1700, lent all his available money to the King of Denmark. A
+crude painting in the hall showed him sitting in the hall of
+this particular house, smoking a long pipe and surrounded by
+three or four sisters who were all spinning. Our hostess told us
+that this picture represented the lending ancestor being supported
+by his sisters while waiting the return of the loan which he
+had made to the Danish king, an early example of the situation
+disclosed by the popular song which runs: "Everybody works but
+father." Of course, no one ever expected a Prussian nobleman to
+do any work except in the line of war or in governing the inferior
+classes of the country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE SYSTEM
+
+People of other countries have been wondering why it is that
+the German government is able so easily to impose its will upon
+the German people. I have set out in another chapter, in detail,
+the political system from which you have seen that the Reichstag
+is nothing but a debating society; that the Prussians do not
+really have universal suffrage but, by reason of the vicious
+circle system of voting, the elective franchise remains in the
+hands of the few; and that the government of the country through the
+_Landräte_, _Regierungspräsidenten_ and _Oberpräsidenten_
+is a central system from above downwards and not the election
+of the rulers by the people; and, in the chapter on militarism
+and Zabern, I have told by what means the control of the army
+is kept in the hands of the class of nobles.
+
+These are not the only means by which the system controls the
+country. These alone would not suffice. From the time when he
+is four years old, the German is disciplined and taught that
+his government is the only good and effective form. The teachers
+in the schools are all government paid and teach the children
+only the principles desired by the rulers of the German people.
+There are no Saturday holidays in the German schools and their
+summer holidays are for only three to five weeks. You never see
+gangs of small boys in Germany. Their games and their walks are
+superintended by their teachers who are always inculcating in
+them reverence and awe for the military heroes of the past and
+present. On Saturday night the German boy is turned over by the
+State paid school teacher to the State paid pastor who adds divine
+authority to the principles of reverence for the German system.
+
+There is a real system of caste in Germany. For instance, I was
+playing tennis one day with a man and, while dressing afterwards,
+I asked him what he was. He answered that he was a _Kaufmann_,
+or merchant. For the German this answer was enough. It placed him
+in the merchant class. I asked him what sort of a _Kaufmann_
+he was. He then told me he was president of a large electrical
+company. Of course, with us he would have answered first that
+he was president of the electrical company, but being a German
+he simply disclosed his caste without going into details. It is
+a curious thing on the registers of guests in a German summer
+resort to see Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze registered
+with Mrs. Landrat Schwartz and Mrs. Second Lieutenant von Bing.
+Of course, there is no doubt as to the relative social positions
+of Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze and Mrs. Second Lieutenant
+von Bing. Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze may have a steam
+yacht and a tiara, an opera box and ten million marks. She may
+be an old lady noted for her works of charity. Her husband may
+have made discoveries of enormous value to the human race, but
+she will always be compelled to take her place behind Mrs. Second
+Lieutenant von Bing, even if the latter is only seventeen years
+old.
+
+Of course, occasionally, officers of the army and navy condescend
+to marry into the merchant caste, and if a girl has a choice
+of three equally attractive young men, one a doctor, earning
+ten thousand dollars a year; one a manufacturer, earning the
+same amount; and one an army officer with a "von" before his
+name and three thousand dollars a year, there is no hesitation
+on her part: she takes the noble and the army officer.
+
+For years all the highest official positions of the government
+have been held by members of the Prussian noble class, and when
+Zimmermann, of a substantial family in East Prussia, but not of
+noble birth, was made Foreign Minister, the most intense surprise
+was exhibited all over Germany at this innovation.
+
+One of the most successful ways of disciplining the people is
+by the _Rat_ system. _Rat_ means councillor, and is
+a title of honour given to any one who has attained a certain
+measure of success or standing in his chosen business or profession.
+For instance, a business man is made a commerce _Rat_; a
+lawyer, a justice _Rat_; a doctor, a sanitary _Rat_;
+an architect or builder, a building _Rat_; a keeper of the
+archives, an archive _Rat_; and so on. They are created in
+this way: first, a man becomes a plain _Rat_, then, later on,
+he becomes a secret _Rat_ or privy councillor; still later,
+a court secret _Rat_ and, later still, a _wirklicher_,
+or really and truly secret court _Rat_ to which may be added
+the title of Excellency, which puts the man who has attained
+this absolutely at the head of the _Rat_ ladder.
+
+But see the insidious working of the system. By German custom
+the woman always carries the husband's title. The wife of a
+successful builder is known as Mrs. Really Truly Secret Court
+Building _Rat_ and her social precedence over the other women
+depends entirely upon her husband's position in the _Rat_
+class. Titles of nobility alone do not count when they come in
+contact with a high government position. Now if a lawyer gets to
+be about forty years old and is not some sort of a _Rat_,
+his wife begins to nag him and his friends and relations look at
+him with suspicion. There must be something in his life which
+prevents his obtaining the coveted distinction and if there is
+anything in a man's past, if he has shown at any time any spirit of
+opposition to the government, as disclosed by the police registers,
+which are kept written up to date about every German citizen,
+then he has no chance of obtaining any of these distinctions
+which make up so much of the social life of Germany. It is a
+means by which the government keeps a far tighter hold on the
+intellectual part of its population than if they were threatened
+with torture and the stake. The Social Democrats, who, of course,
+have declared themselves against the existing system of government
+and in favour of a republic, can receive no distinctions from
+the government because they dared to lift their voices and their
+pens in criticism of the existing order. For them there is the
+fear of the law. Convictions for the crime of _Lèse-Majesté_
+are of almost daily occurrence and, at the opening of the war, an
+amnesty was granted in many of these cases, the ministry of war
+withdrawing many prosecutions against poor devils waiting their
+trial in jail because they had dared to speak disrespectfully of
+the army. The following quotation from a German book, written
+since the war, shows very clearly that this state of affairs
+existed: "In the beneficent atmosphere of general amnesty came the
+news that the Minister of War had withdrawn pending prosecutions
+against newspapers on account of their insults to the army or
+its members." (Dr. J. Jastrow, "Im Kriegszustand.")
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system and the military system, there
+exists the enormous mass of Prussian officials. In a country
+where so many things are under government control these officials
+are almost immeasurably more numerous than in other countries.
+In Prussia, for example, all the railways are government-owned,
+with the exception of one road about sixty miles long and a few
+small branch roads. This army of officials are retainers of the
+government, and not only, of course, themselves refrain from
+criticising the system, but also use their influence upon the
+members of their own family and all with whom they come in contact.
+They are subject to trial in special secret courts and one of
+them who dared in any way to criticise the existing system would
+not for long remain a member of it. Of course, the members of the
+Reichstag have the privilege of free speech without responsibility,
+and there are occasional Socialists, who know that they have
+nothing to expect from the government, who dare to speak in
+criticism.
+
+All the newspapers are subject to control as in no other country.
+In the first place their proprietors are subject to the influence
+of the _Rat_ system as is every other German, and the newspaper
+proprietor, whose sons perhaps enter the army, whose daughters
+may be married to naval officers or officials, and who seeks
+for his sons promotion as judge, state's attorney, etc., has
+to be very careful that the utterances of his newspaper do not
+prevent his promotion in the social scale or interfere with the
+career of his family and relations.
+
+Since the war while a preventive censure does not exist in Germany
+nevertheless a newspaper may be suppressed at will; a fearful
+punishment for a newspaper, which, by being suppressed for, say,
+five days or a week, has its business affairs thrown into the utmost
+confusion and suffers an enormous direct loss.
+
+Many of the larger newspapers are either owned or influenced by
+concerns like the Krupps'. For instance, during this war, all
+news coming from Germany to other countries has been furnished
+by either the Over-Seas Or Trans-Ocean service, both news agencies
+in which the Krupps are large stockholders. The smaller newspapers
+are influenced directly by the government.
+
+In the Middle Ages there was often declared a sort of truce to
+prevent fighting in a city, which was called the _Burgfrieden_
+or "peace of the city," and, at the beginning of this war, all
+political parties were supposed to declare a sort of
+_Burgfrieden_ and not try to obtain any political advantage.
+
+There was, therefore, intense indignation among the Social Democrats
+of Germany when it was discovered, in the spring of 1916, that
+the Minister of the Interior was making arrangements to send out
+news service to be furnished free to the smaller newspapers, and
+that he was engaged in instructing the various _Landräte_
+and other officials of the Interior Department how effectively to
+use this machinery in order to gull the people to the advantage
+of the government, and to keep them in ignorance of anything
+which might tend to turn them against the system.
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system there is, of course, the system
+of decorations. Countless orders and decorations are given in
+Germany. At the head is the Order of the Black Eagle; there are
+the Order of the Red Eagle, the Prussian Order of the Crown,
+the orders, "_Pour le Mérite_," the Order of the House of
+Hohenzollern, and many others, and in each of the twenty-five
+States there are also orders, distinctions and decorations. These
+orders in turn are divided into numerous classes. For instance, a
+man can have the Red Eagle order of the first, second, third or
+fourth class, and these may be complicated with a laurel crown,
+with an oak crown, with swords and with stars, etc. Even domestic
+servants, who have served a long time in one family, receive
+orders; and faithful postmen and other officials who have never
+appeared on the police books for having made statements against
+the government or the army are sure of receiving some sort of
+order.
+
+Once a year in Berlin a great festival is held called the
+_Ordensfest_, when all who hold orders or decorations of any
+kind are invited to a great banquet. The butler, who has served
+for twenty-five years, there rubs shoulders with the diplomat who
+has received a Black Eagle for adding a colony to the German
+Empire, and the faithful cook may be seated near an officer who
+has obtained "_Pour le Mérite_" for sinking an enemy warship.
+All this in one sense is democratic, but in its effect it tends
+to induce the plain people to be satisfied with a piece of ribbon
+instead of the right to vote, and to make them upholders of a
+system by which they are deprived of any opportunity to make
+a real advance in life.
+
+This system is the most complete that has ever existed in any
+country, because it has drawn so many of the inhabitants of the
+country into its meshes. Practically, the industrial workers
+of the great towns and the stupid peasants in the country are
+the only people in Germany left out of its net.
+
+I had a shooting place very near Berlin, in fact I could reach
+it in three quarters of an hour by motor from the Embassy door,
+and there I had an opportunity of studying the conditions of
+life of the peasant class.
+
+Germany is still a country of great proprietors. Lands may be held
+there by a tenure which was abolished in Great Britain hundreds of
+years ago. In Great Britain, property may only be tied up under
+fixed conditions during the lives of certain chosen people, in
+being at the death of the testator. In the State of New York,
+property may only be tied up during the lives of two persons,
+in being at the death of the person making the will, and for
+twenty-one years (the minority of an infant) thereafter. But
+in the Central Empires, property still may be tied up for an
+indefinite period under the feudal system, so that great estates,
+no matter how extravagant the life tenant may be, are not sold
+and do not come into the market for division among the people.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON THE WAY TO HIS SHOOTING
+PRESERVE.]
+
+[Illustration: A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+IT SHOWS THE EARLY INNOCULATION OF DISCIPLINE INTO THE GERMAN
+SMALL BOY.]
+
+For instance, to-day there exist estates in the Central Empires
+which must pass from oldest son to oldest son indefinitely and,
+failing that, to the next in line, and so on; and conditions
+have even been annexed by which children cannot inherit if their
+father has married a woman not of a stated number of quarterings
+of nobility. There is a Prince holding great estates in Hungary.
+He is a bachelor and if he desires his children to inherit these
+estates there are only thirteen girls in the world whom he can
+marry, according to the terms of the instrument by which some
+distant ancestor founded this inheritance.
+
+This vicious system has prevented extensive peasant proprietorship.
+The government, however, to a certain extent, has encouraged peasant
+proprietorship, but only with very small parcels of land; and it
+would be an unusual thing in Germany, especially in Prussia,
+to find a peasant owning more than twenty or thirty acres of
+land, most of the land being held by the peasants in such small
+quantities that after working their own lands they have time
+left to work the lands of the adjoining landed proprietor at a
+very small wage.
+
+All the titles, of the nobility are not confined to the oldest
+son. The "Pocketbook of Counts," published by the same firm which
+publishes the "Almanac de Gotha," contains the counts of Austria,
+Germany and Hungary together, showing in this way the intimate
+personal relation between the noble families of these three
+countries. All the sons of a count are counts, and so on, ad
+infinitum. Thus in Hungary there are probably seventy Counts
+Szecheny and about the same number of Zichy, etc. Some of the
+German noble families are not far behind. In fact it may be said
+that almost any person, in what is known as "society" in the
+Central Empires, has a title of some sort. The prefix "von" shows
+that the person is a noble and is often coupled with names of
+people who have no title. By custom in Germany, a "von" when
+he goes abroad is allowed to call himself Baron. But in Germany
+he could not do so. These noble families in the Central Empires,
+by the system of _Majorat_ which I have described, hold
+large landed estates, and naturally exert a great influence upon
+their labourers. As a rule the system of tenant farming does not
+exist; that is, estates are not leased to small farmers as was
+the custom in Ireland and is still in Great Britain, but estates
+are worked as great agricultural enterprises under superintendents
+appointed by the proprietor. This system, impossible in America or
+even in Great Britain, is possible in the Central Empires where
+the villages are full of peasants who, not so many generations
+ago, were serfs attached to the land and who lived in wholesome
+fear of the landed proprietors.
+
+This is the first method by which influence is exercised on the
+population. There is also the restricted franchise or "circle
+voting" which gives the control of the franchise to a few rich
+proprietors.
+
+As a rule, the oldest son enters the army as an officer and may
+continue, but if he has not displayed any special aptitude for
+the military profession he retires and manages his estate. These
+estates are calculated by their proprietors to give at least four
+per cent interest income on the value of the land. Many younger
+sons after a short term of service in the army, usually as officers
+and not as _Einjähriger_ leave the army and enter diplomacy
+or some other branch of the government service. The offices of
+judge, district attorney, etc., not being elective, this career
+as well as that leading to the position of _Landrat_ and
+over-president of a province is open to those who, because they
+belong to old Prussian landed families, find favour in the eyes
+of the government. Much is heard in Germany and out of Germany
+of the Prussian Squire or Junker.
+
+There is no leisure class among the Junkers. They are all workers,
+patriotic, honest and devoted to the Emperor and the Fatherland.
+If it is possible that government by one class is to be suffered,
+then the Prussian Junkers have proved themselves more fit for rule
+than any class in all history. Their virtues are Spartan, their
+minds narrow but incorruptible, and their bravery and patriotism
+undoubted. One can but admire them and their stern virtues. This
+class, largely because of its poverty and its constant occupation,
+does not travel; nor does the casual tourist or health seeker in
+Germany come in contact with these men. The Junkers will fight
+hard to keep their privileges, and the throne will fight hard
+for the Junkers because they are the greatest supporters of the
+Hohenzollerns.
+
+The workingmen in the cities are hard workers and probably work
+longer and get less out of life than any workingmen in the world.
+The laws so much admired and made ostensibly for their protection,
+such as insurance against unemployment, sickness, injury, old
+age, etc., are in reality skilful measures which bind them to
+the soil as effectively as the serfs of the Middle Ages were
+bound to their masters' estates.
+
+I have had letters from workingmen who have worked in America
+begging me for a steerage fare to America, saying that their
+insurance payments were so large that they could not save money
+out of their wages. Of course, after having made these payments
+for some years, the workingman naturally hesitates to emigrate
+and so lose all the premiums he has paid to the State. In peace
+times a skilled mechanic in Germany received less than two dollars
+a day, for which he was compelled to work at least ten hours.
+Agricultural labourers in the Central Empires are poorly paid.
+The women do much of the work done here by men. For instance,
+once when staying at a nobleman's estate in Hungary, I noticed
+that the gardeners were all women, and, on inquiring how much they
+received, I was told they were paid about twenty cents a day. The
+women in the farming districts of Germany are worked harder than
+the cattle. In summer time they are out in the fields at five or
+six in the morning and do not return until eight or later at night.
+For this work they are sometimes paid as high as forty-eight
+cents a day in harvest time. Nevertheless, these small wages
+tempt many Russians to Germany during the harvest season. At the
+outbreak of the war there were perhaps fifty thousand Russians
+employed in Germany; men, women and girls. These the Germans
+retained in a sort of slavery to work the fields. I spoke to
+one Polish girl who was working on an estate over which I had
+shooting rights, near Berlin. She told me that at the commencement
+of the war she and her family were working in Germany and that
+since the war they all desired to return to Poland but that the
+Germans would not permit it.
+
+This hard working of women in agricultural pursuits tends to
+stupefy and brutalise the rural population and keeps them in a
+condition of subjection to the Prussian Church and the Prussian
+system, and in readiness for war. Both Prussian Junkers and the
+German manufacturers look with favour upon the employment of
+so many women in farm work because the greater the number of
+the labourers, the smaller their wages throughout the country.
+
+When I first came to Germany I, of course, was filled with the
+ideas that prevailed in America that the German workingman had
+an easy time. My mind was filled with pictures of the German
+workingmen sitting with their families at tables, drinking beer
+and listening to classical music. After I had spent some time in
+Germany, I found that the reason that the German workingmen sat
+about the tables was because they were too tired to do anything
+else.
+
+I sincerely hope that after the war the workingmen of this country
+will induce delegates of their German brothers to make a tour
+of America. For when the German workingmen see how much better
+off the Americans are, they will return to Germany and demand
+shorter hours and higher wages; and the American will not be
+brought into competition with labour slaves such as the German
+workingmen of the period before the war.
+
+As one goes through the streets of Berlin there are no evidences
+of poverty to be seen; but over fifty-five per cent of the families
+in Berlin are families living in one room.
+
+The Germans are taken care of and educated very much in the same
+way that the authorities here look after the inmates of a poor-house
+or penitentiary. Such a thing as a German railway conductor rising
+to be president of the road is an impossibility in Germany; and
+the list of self-made men is small indeed,--by that I mean men
+who have risen from the ranks of the working-men.
+
+The Socialists, representing the element opposed to the
+Conservatives, elect a few members to the Prussian Lower House
+and about one-third of the members to the Reichstag, but otherwise
+have no part whatever in the government. No Socialist would have
+any chance whatever if he set out to enter the government service
+with the ambition of becoming a district attorney or judge. Jews
+have not much chance in the government service. A few exceptions
+have been made. At one time Dernburg, who carried on the propaganda
+in America during the first year of the war, and who is a Jew, was
+appointed Colonial Minister of the Empire.
+
+In my opinion, the liberalisation of Prussia has been halted
+by the fact that there has been no party of protest except that
+of the Socialists, and the Socialists, because they have, in
+effect, demanded abolition of the monarchy and the establishment
+of a republic as part of their programme, have been unable to
+do anything in the obtaining of the reforms.
+
+Up to the beginning of the war there was great dissatisfaction.
+The people were irritated by certain direct taxes such as the
+tax upon matches, and because every Protestant in Prussia was
+compelled to pay a tax for the support of the church, unless
+he made a declaration that he was an atheist.
+
+The only class in Germany which knows something of the outside
+world is the _Kaufmann_ class. Prussian nobles of the ruling
+class are not travellers. They are always busy with the army and
+navy, government employments or their estates; and, as a rule,
+too poor to travel. The poor, of course, do not travel, and the
+_Kaufmann_, although he learns much in his travels in other
+countries to make him dissatisfied with the small opportunity
+which he has in a political way in Germany, is satisfied to let
+things stand because of the enormous profits which he makes
+through the low wages and long hours of the German workingman.
+
+Lawyers and judges amount to little in Germany and we do not
+find there a class of political lawyers who, in republics, always
+seem to get the management of affairs in their own hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR
+
+After my return from Kiel to Berlin a period of calm ensued.
+No one seemed to think that the murders at Sarajevo would have
+any effect upon the world.
+
+The Emperor had gone North on his yacht, but, as I believe, not
+until a certain line of action had been agreed upon.
+
+Most of the diplomats started on their vacations. Sir Edward
+Goschen, British Ambassador, as well as the Russian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. This shows, of course, how little war was expected
+in diplomatic circles.
+
+I went on two visits to German country-houses in Silesia, where
+the richest estates are situated. One of these visits was to the
+country-house of a Count, one of the wealthiest men in Germany,
+possessed of a fortune of about twenty to thirty million dollars.
+He has a great estate in Silesia, farmed, as I explained, not by
+tenant farmers, but by his own superintendents. In the centre is
+a beautiful country house or castle. We were thirty-two guests in
+the house-party. This Count and his charming wife had travelled
+much and evidently desired to model their country life on that
+of England. Our amusements were tennis, swimming and clay-pigeon
+shooting, with dancing and music at night. Life such as this,
+and especially, the lavish entertainment of so many guests, is
+something very exceptional in Prussian country life and quite
+a seven months' wonder for the country side.
+
+Some days after my return to Berlin the ultimatum of Austria
+was sent to Serbia. Even then there was very little excitement,
+and, when the Serbian answer was published, it was believed that
+this would end the incident, and that matters would be adjusted
+by dilatory diplomats in the usual way.
+
+On the twenty-sixth of July, matters began to boil. The Emperor
+returned on this day and, from the morning of the twenty-seventh,
+took charge. On the twenty-seventh, also, Sir Edward Goschen
+returned to Berlin. I kept in touch, so far as possible, with
+the other diplomats, as the German officials were exceedingly
+uncommunicative, although I called on von Jagow every day and tried
+to get something out of him. On the night of the twenty-ninth,
+the Chancellor and Sir Edward had their memorable conversation in
+which the Chancellor, while making no promises about the French
+colonies, agreed, if Great Britain remained neutral, to make
+"no territorial aggressions at the expense of France."
+
+The Chancellor further stated to Sir Edward, that ever since he
+had been Chancellor the object of his policy had been to bring
+about an understanding with England and that he had in mind a
+general neutrality agreement between Germany and England.
+
+On the thirtieth, Sir Edward Grey refused the bargain proposed,
+namely that Great Britain should engage to stand by while the
+French colonies were taken and France beaten, so long as French
+territory was not taken. Sir Edward Grey said that the so-called
+bargain at the expense of France would constitute a disgrace
+from which the good name of Great Britain would never recover.
+He also refused to bargain with reference to the neutrality of
+Belgium.
+
+Peace talk continued, however, on both the thirtieth and
+thirty-first, and many diplomats were still optimistic. On the
+thirty-first I was lunching at the Hotel Bristol with Mrs. Gerard
+and Thomas H. Birch, our minister to Portugal, and his wife.
+I left the table and went over and talked to Mouktar Pascha,
+the Turkish Ambassador, who assured me that there was no danger
+whatever of war. But in spite of his assurances and judging by
+the situation and what I learned from other diplomats, I had
+cabled to the State Department on the morning of that day saying
+that a general European war was inevitable. On the thirty-first,
+_Kriegsgefahrzustand_ or "condition of danger of war" was
+proclaimed at seven P. M., and at seven P. M. the demand was made
+by Germany that Russia should demobilise within twelve hours. On
+the thirtieth, I had a talk with Baron Beyens, the Minister of
+Belgium, and Jules Cambon, the French Ambassador, in the garden
+of the French Embassy in the afternoon. They both agreed that
+nothing could prevent war except the intervention of America.
+
+Both Ambassador Cambon and Minister Beyens were very sad and
+depressed. After leaving them I met Sir Edward Grey upon the
+street and had a short conversation with him. He also was very
+depressed.
+
+Acting on my own responsibility, I sent the following letter to
+the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Is there nothing that my country can do? Nothing that I can
+  do towards stopping this dreadful war?
+
+  I am sure that the President would approve any act of mine
+  looking towards peace.
+
+               Yours ever,
+      (Signed) JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+To this letter I never had any reply.
+
+On the first of August at five P. M. the order for mobilisation
+was given, and at seven-ten P. M. war was declared by Germany on
+Russia, the Kaiser proclaiming from the balcony of the palace
+that "he knew no parties more."
+
+Of course, during these days the population of Berlin was greatly
+excited. Every night great crowds of people paraded the streets
+singing "Deutschland Ueber Alles" and demanding war. Extras,
+distributed free, were issued at frequent intervals by the
+newspapers, and there was a general feeling among the Germans
+that their years of preparation would now bear fruit, that Germany
+would conquer the world and impose its _Kultur_ upon all nations.
+
+On the second of August, I called in the morning to say good-bye
+to the Russian Ambassador. His Embassy was filled with unfortunate
+Russians who had gone there to seek protection and help. Right
+and left, men and women were weeping and the whole atmosphere
+seemed that of despair.
+
+On the day the Russian Ambassador left, I sent him my automobile
+to take him to the station. The chauffeur and footman reported to
+me that the police protection was inadequate, that the automobile
+was nearly overturned by the crowd, and that men jumped on the
+running board and struck the Ambassador and the ladies with him
+in the face with sticks. His train was due to leave at one-fifteen
+P. M. At about ten minutes of one, while I was standing in my
+room in the Embassy surrounded by a crowd of Americans, Mrs.
+James, wife of the Senator from Kentucky and Mrs. Post Wheeler,
+wife of our Secretary to the Embassy in Japan, came to me and
+said that they were anxious to get through to Japan via Siberia
+and did not know what to do. I immediately scribbled a note to
+the Russian Ambassador asking him to take them on the train with
+him. This, and the ladies, I confided to the care of a red-headed
+page boy of the Embassy who spoke German. By some miracle he
+managed to get them to the railroad station before the Ambassador's
+train left, the Ambassador kindly agreeing to take them with
+him. His train, however, instead of going to Russia, was headed
+for Denmark; and from there the two ladies crossed to Sweden,
+thence to England, and so home, it being perhaps as well for them
+that they did not have an opportunity to attempt the Siberian
+journey during this period of mobilisation.
+
+The Russian Ambassador reciprocated by confiding to me a Russian
+Princess who had intended to go out with him but who, intimidated,
+perhaps, by the scenes on the way to the station, had lost her
+nerve at the railway station and refused to depart with the
+Ambassador. She remained for a while in Berlin, and after some
+weeks recovered sufficient courage to make the trip to Denmark.
+
+On the morning of August fourth, having received an invitation
+the day before, I "attended" at the Palace in Berlin. In the room
+where the court balls had been held in peace times, a certain
+number of the members of the Reichstag were assembled. The diplomats
+were in a gallery on the west side of the room. Soon the Emperor,
+dressed in field grey uniform and attended by several members of
+his staff and a number of ladies, entered the room. He walked
+with a martial stride and glanced toward the gallery where the
+diplomats were assembled, as if to see how many were there. Taking
+his place upon the throne and standing, he read an address to
+the members of the Reichstag. The members cheered him and then
+adjourned to the Reichstag where the Chancellor addressed them,
+making his famous declaration about Belgium, stating that "necessity
+knew no law," and that the German troops were perhaps at that
+moment crossing the Belgian frontier. Certain laws which had
+been prepared with reference to the government of the country,
+and which I will give in more detail in another place, as well as
+the war credit, were voted upon by the Reichstag. The Socialists
+had not been present in the Palace, but joined now in voting the
+necessary credits.
+
+On the afternoon of August fourth, I went to see von Jagow to
+try and pick up any news. The British Ambassador sat in the
+waiting-room of the Foreign Office. Sir Edward told me that he
+was there for the purpose of asking for his passports. He spoke
+in English, of course, and I am sure that he was overheard by a
+man sitting in the room who looked to me like a German newspaper
+man, so that I was not surprised when, late in the afternoon,
+extra sheets appeared upon the street announcing that the British
+Ambassador had asked for his passports and that Great Britain
+had declared war.
+
+At this news the rage of the population of Berlin was indescribable.
+The Foreign Office had believed, and this belief had percolated
+through all classes in the capital, that the English were so
+occupied with the Ulster rebellion and unrest in Ireland that
+they would not declare war.
+
+[Illustration: CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY AWAITING BULLETINS,
+AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: THE AMERICAN EMBASSY WAS THE CENTRE OF INTEREST
+TO MANY IN THOSE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.]
+
+After dinner I went to the station to say good bye to the French
+Ambassador, Jules Cambon. The route from the French Embassy by
+the Branderburg Thor to the Lehrter railway station was lined
+with troops and police, so that no accident whatever occurred.
+There was no one at the station except a very inferior official
+from the German Foreign Office. Cambon was in excellent spirits
+and kept his nerve and composure admirably. His family, luckily,
+were not in Berlin at the time of the outbreak of the war. Cambon
+instead of being sent out by way of Switzerland, whence of course
+the road to France was easy, was sent North to Denmark. He was
+very badly treated on the train, and payment for the special
+train, in gold, was exacted from him by the German government.
+
+Then I went for a walk about Berlin, soon becoming involved in
+the great crowd in front of the British Embassy on the Wilhelm
+Strasse. The crowd threw stones, etc., and managed to break all
+the windows of the Embassy. The Germans charged afterwards that
+people in the Embassy had infuriated the crowd by throwing pennies
+to them. I did not see any occurrences of this kind. As the Unter
+den Linden and the Wilhelm Platz are paved with asphalt the crowd
+must have brought with them the missiles which they used, with
+the premeditated design of smashing the Embassy windows. A few
+mounted police made their appearance but were at no time in
+sufficient numbers to hold the crowd in check.
+
+Afterwards I went around to the Unter den Linden where there was
+a great crowd in front of the Hotel Adlon. A man standing on the
+outskirts of the crowd begged me not to go into the hotel, as he
+said the people were looking for English newspaper correspondents.
+
+So threatening was the crowd towards the English correspondents
+that Wile rang up the porter of the Embassy after we had gone
+to bed and, not wishing to disturb us, he occupied the lounge in
+the porter's rooms.
+
+Believing that possibly the British Embassy might be in such
+a condition that Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador,
+might not care to spend the night there, I ordered an automobile
+and went up through the crowd which still choked the Wilhelm
+Strasse, with Holand Harvey, the Second Secretary to the British
+Embassy. Sir Edward and his secretaries were perfectly calm and
+politely declined the refuge which I offered them in our Embassy.
+I chatted with them for a while, and, as I was starting to leave, a
+servant told me that the crowds in the street had greatly increased
+and were watching my automobile. I sent out word by the servant
+to open the automobile, as it was a landau, and to tell the
+chauffeur, when I got in, to drive very slowly.
+
+I drove slowly through the crowd, assailed only by the peculiar
+hissing word that the Germans use when they are especially angry
+and which is supposed to convey the utmost contempt. This word
+is "_Pfui_" and has a peculiar effect when hissed out from
+thousands of Teutonic throats.
+
+As we left the outskirts of the crowd, a man of respectable
+appearance jumped on the running board of the automobile, spit
+at me, saying "_Pfui_," and struck Harvey in the face with
+his hat. I stopped the automobile, jumped out and chased this man
+down the street and caught him. My German footman came running
+up and explained that I was the American Ambassador and not an
+Englishman. The man who struck Harvey thereupon apologised and
+gave his card. He was a Berlin lawyer who came to the Embassy
+next morning and apologised again for his "mistake."
+
+The following day, August fifth, I spent part of the time taking
+over from Sir Edward the British interests. Joseph C. Grew, our
+First Secretary, and I went to the British Embassy; seals were
+placed upon the archives, and we received such instructions and
+information as could be given us, with reference to the British
+subjects in Germany and their interests. The British correspondents
+were collected in the Embassy and permission was obtained for
+them to leave on the Embassy train.
+
+During the day British subjects, without distinction as to age
+or sex, were seized, wherever found, and sent to the fortress
+of Spandau. I remonstrated with von Jagow and told him that that
+was a measure taken only in the Middle Ages, and I believe that
+he remonstrated with the authorities and arranged for a cessation
+of the arbitrary arrests of women.
+
+Frederick W. Wile, the well-known American correspondent of the
+_London Daily Mail_, was to go out also with the British
+party, on the ground that he had been a correspondent of a British
+newspaper. In the evening I went to the Foreign Office to get his
+passport, and, while one of the department chiefs was signing
+the passport, he stopped in the middle of his signature, threw
+down the pen on the table, and said he absolutely refused to
+sign a passport for Wile because he hated him so and because
+he believed he had been largely instrumental in the bringing
+about of the war. Of course this latter statement was quite
+ridiculous, but it took me some time before I could persuade
+this German official to calm his hate and complete his signature.
+
+I have heard a few people say that Wile was unduly fearful of
+what the Germans might do to him, but the foregoing incident
+shows that his fears were well grounded, and knowing of this
+incident, which I did not tell him, I was very glad to have him
+accept the hospitality of the Embassy for the night preceding
+his departure. He was perfectly cool, although naturally much
+pleased when I informed him that his departure had been arranged.
+
+Sir Edward and his staff and the British correspondents left next
+morning early, about six A. M. No untoward incidents occurred
+at the time of their departure which was, of course, unknown to
+the populace of Berlin.
+
+During these first days there was a great spy excitement in Germany.
+People were seized by the crowds in the streets and, in some
+instances, on the theory that they were French or Russian spies,
+were shot. Foreigners were in a very dangerous situation throughout
+Germany, and many Americans were subjected to arrest and indignities.
+
+A curious rumour spread all over Germany to the effect that
+automobiles loaded with French gold were being rushed across the
+country to Russia. Peasants and gamekeepers and others turned
+out on the roads with guns, and travelling by automobile became
+exceedingly dangerous. A German Countess was shot, an officer
+wounded and the Duchess of Ratibor was shot in the arm. It was
+sometime before this excitement was allayed, and many notices
+were published in the newspapers before this mania was driven
+from the popular brain.
+
+There were rumours also that Russians had poisoned the Muggelsee,
+the lake from whence Berlin draws part of its water supply. There
+were constant rumours of the arrest of Russian spies disguised as
+women throughout Germany.
+
+Many Americans were detained under a sort of arrest in their
+hotels; among these were Archer Huntington and his wife; Charles
+H. Sherrill, formerly our minister to the Argentine and many
+others.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES
+
+Of course, as soon as there was a prospect of war, the Embassy
+was overrun with Americans. Few Americans had taken the precaution
+of travelling with passports, and passports had become a necessity.
+All of the Embassy force and all the volunteers that I could
+prevail upon to serve, even a child of eleven years old, who
+was stopping in the house with us, were taking applications of
+the Americans who literally in thousands crowded the Wilhelm
+Platz in front of the Embassy.
+
+The question of money became acute. Travellers who had letters
+of credit and bank checks for large sums could not get a cent
+of money in Germany. The American Express Company, I believe,
+paid all holders of its checks. When, with Mr. Wolf, President
+of the American Association of Commerce and Trade in Berlin, I
+called upon the director of the Imperial Bank and begged him
+to arrange something for the relief of American travellers in
+Germany, he refused to do anything; and I then suggested to him
+that he might give paper money, which they were then printing
+in Germany, to the Americans for good American credits such as
+letters of credit and bank checks, and that they would then have a
+credit in America which might become very valuable in the future.
+He, however, refused to see this. Director Herbert Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank was the far-seeing banker who relieved the
+situation. Gutmann arranged with me that the Dresdener Bank,
+the second largest bank in Germany, would cash the bank checks,
+letters of credit and the American Express Company's drafts and
+international business checks, etc., of Americans for reasonable
+amounts, provided the Embassy seal was put on the letter of credit
+or check to show that the holder was an American, and, outside
+of Berlin, the seal of the American Consulate. This immediately
+relieved the situation.
+
+With the exception of Mr. Wolf who was, however, quite busy with
+his own affairs, I had no American Committees such as were organised
+in London and Paris to help me in Berlin. In Munich, however, the
+Americans there organised themselves into an efficient committee.
+Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Pulitzer were in Berlin and immediately went
+to work in our Embassy. Mr. Pulitzer busied himself at giving
+out passports and Mrs. Pulitzer proved herself a very efficient
+worker. She and Mrs. Ruddock, wife of our Third Secretary, and
+Mrs. Gherhardi, wife of the Naval Attaché, with Mrs. Gerard formed
+a sort of relief committee to look after the Americans who were
+without help or resources.
+
+I arranged, with the very efficient help of Lanier Winslow, for
+special trains to carry the Americans in Germany to Holland.
+Trains were run from Switzerland, Munich and Carlsbad across
+Germany to Holland, and from Berlin were run a number of trains
+to Holland.
+
+The first room on entering the Embassy was the ticket-office,
+and there, first Mr. Winslow, and afterwards Captain Fenton,
+sold tickets, giving tickets free to those who were certified
+to be without funds by the committee of Mrs. Pulitzer and Mrs.
+Gerard. This committee worked on the second floor of the Embassy
+in the ballroom, part of it being roped off to keep the crowds
+back from the ladies.
+
+Each week I bought a number of steerage passages from the Holland
+American Line and the ladies resold them in the ballroom. We had
+to do this because the Holland American Line had no licence to sell
+steerage tickets in Germany; but by buying two or three hundred
+at a time direct from the Company, I was enabled to peddle them
+out in our ballroom to those Americans who, in their eagerness to
+reach their own country, were willing to endure the discomforts
+of travel in the steerage.
+
+Winslow accompanied one special train to Holland, and I must
+say that I sympathised with him when I learned of what he had
+to do in the way of chasing lost hand-baggage and finding milk
+for crying babies.
+
+These special trains were started from the Charlottenburg station,
+in a quiet part of Berlin so that no crowd was attracted by the
+departure of the Americans. The Carlsbad train went through very
+successfully, taking the Americans who had been shut up in Carlsbad
+since the commencement of the war.
+
+One of the curious developments of this time was a meeting of
+sympathy for the Americans stranded in Germany, held in the town
+hall of Berlin on the eleventh of August. This meeting was commenced
+in one of the meeting rooms of the town hall, but so many people
+attended that we were compelled to adjourn to the great hall.
+There speeches were made by the over-Burgomaster, von Gwinner,
+Professor von Harnack and me. Another professor, who spoke excellent
+English, with an English accent, made a bitter attack upon Great
+Britain. In the pamphlet in which the speeches of Harnack and
+the over-Burgomaster were published this professor's speech was
+left out. In his speech stating the object of the meeting, the
+over-Burgomaster said: "Since we hear that a large number of
+American citizens in the German Empire, and, especially, in Berlin,
+find themselves in embarrassments due to the shutting off of
+means of return to their own country, we here solemnly declare
+it to be our duty to care for them as brethren to the limit of
+our ability, and we appeal to all citizens of Berlin and the
+whole of the German Empire to co-operate with us to this end."
+
+Professor von Harnack, head of the Royal Library in Berlin, is
+one of the ablest of the German professors. In his speech he gave
+expression to the feeling that was prevalent in the first days
+of the war that Germany was defending itself against a Russian
+invasion which threatened to blot out the German _Kultur_. He
+said, after referring to Western civilisation: "But in the face
+of this civilisation, there arises now before my eyes another
+civilisation, the civilisation of the tribe, with its patriarchal
+organisation, the civilisation of the horde that is gathered and
+kept together by despots,--the Mongolian Muscovite civilisation.
+This civilisation could not endure the light of the eighteenth
+century, still less the light of the nineteenth century, and
+now in the twentieth century it breaks loose and threatens us.
+This unorganised Asiatic mass, like the desert with its sands,
+wants to gather up our fields of grain."
+
+Nothing was done for the Americans stranded in Germany by the
+Germans with the exception of the arrangements for the payment
+of funds by the Dresdener Bank on the letters of credit and the
+dispatching of special trains by the railroad department of the
+German government. As a matter of fact, nothing more could have
+been required of the Germans, as it was naturally the duty of
+the American government to take care of its citizens stranded
+abroad.
+
+Almost the instant that war was declared, I cabled to our government
+suggesting that a ship should be sent over with gold because,
+of course, with gold, no matter what the country, necessaries
+can always be bought. Rumours of the dispatch of the Tennessee
+and other ships from America, reached Berlin and a great number
+of the more ignorant of the Americans got to believe that these
+ships were being sent over to take Americans home.
+
+[Illustration: WORKING IN THE EMBASSY BALLROOM AT THE OUTBREAK
+OF HOSTILITIES, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: WAR DAYS IN BERLIN. AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.]
+
+One morning an American woman spoke to me and said she would
+consent to go home on one of these ships provided she was given
+a state-room with a bath and Walker-Gordon milk for her children,
+while another woman of German extraction used to sit for hours
+in a corner of the ballroom, occasionally exclaiming aloud with
+much feeling, "O God, will them ships never come?"
+
+In these first days of the war we also made a card index of all
+the Americans in Berlin, and, so far as possible, in Germany;
+in order to weed out those who had received the passports in
+the first days when possibly some people not entitled to them
+received them, and to find the deserving cases. All Americans
+were required to present themselves at the Embassy and answer
+a few questions, after which, if everything seemed all right,
+their passports were marked "recommended for transportation to
+America."
+
+I sent out circulars from time to time to the consuls throughout
+Germany giving general instructions with regard to the treatment
+of Americans. The following circular sent out on August twelfth
+is a sample:
+
+                "AMERICAN EMBASSY,
+                   BERLIN, August 12, 1914.
+
+  "_To the Consular Representatives_
+    _of the United States in Germany,_
+      _and for the general information of_
+        _American Citizens._
+
+  "A communication will to-morrow be published in the _Berlin
+  Lokal Anzeiger_ regarding the sending of a special train to
+  the Dutch frontier for the special conveyance of Americans.
+  Other trains will probably be arranged for from time to time.
+  No further news has been received regarding the sending of
+  transports from the United States, but applications for
+  repatriation are being considered by the Embassy and the
+  various consular offices throughout Germany according to the
+  Embassy's last circular and the announcements published in
+  the _Lokal Anzeiger_.
+
+  "All Americans leaving Berlin must have their passports stamped
+  by the Foreign Office, for which purpose they should apply to
+  _Geheimer Legationsrat_ Dr. Eckhardt at Wilhelmstrasse
+  76. Americans residing outside of Berlin should ascertain from
+  their respective consular representatives what steps they should
+  take in this regard.
+
+  "Letters for the United States may be sent to the Embassy and
+  will be forwarded at the first opportunity.
+
+  "German subjects who desire to communicate with friends in
+  Great Britain, Russia, France or Belgium, or who desire to
+  send money, should make their requests to the Imperial Foreign
+  Office. Americans are permitted to enter Italy. The steamers
+  of the Italian lines are running at present, but are full for
+  some time in advance. The Embassy is also informed that the
+  steamer from Vlissingen, Holland, runs daily at 11 A. M. The
+  Ambassador cannot, however, recommend Americans to try to
+  reach Holland by the ordinary schedule trains, as he has
+  received reports of delays _en route_, owing to the fact
+  that all civil travellers are ejected from trains when troops
+  require accommodations. It is better to wait for special trains
+  arranged for by the Embassy.
+
+  "The Dresdener Bank and its branches throughout Germany will
+  cash _for Americans only_ letters of credit and checks
+  issued by good American banks in limited amounts. Included
+  in this category are the checks of the Bankers' Association,
+  Bankers' Trust Company, International Mercantile Marine Company,
+  and American Express Company. All checks and letters of credit
+  must, however, be stamped by American consuls, and consuls must
+  see that the consular stamp is affixed to those checks and
+  letters of credit only as are the bona fide property of American
+  citizens. The Commerz & Disconto Bank makes the same offer and
+  the Deutsche Bank will cash checks and letters of credit drawn
+  by its correspondents.
+
+  "American consular officers may also draw later on the Dresdener
+  Bank for their salaries and the official expenses of their
+  consulates. Before drawing such funds from the bank, however,
+  all consular officers should submit their expense accounts to me
+  for approval. These expense accounts should be transmitted to
+  the Embassy at the earliest opportunity.
+
+                         "THE AMBASSADOR."
+
+It will be noticed from the above circular that all Americans
+were required to have their passports stamped at the Foreign
+Office. One American did not receive back his passport, although
+he had left it at the Foreign Office. The Foreign Office claimed
+that it had delivered the passport to some one from the Embassy,
+but we were not very much surprised when this identical passport
+turned up later in the possession of Lodi, the confessed German
+spy, who was shot in the Tower of London.
+
+After a time the American Government cabled me to advance money
+to destitute Americans; and the ladies in the ballroom, with
+their assistants, attended to this branch, advancing money where
+needed or so much as a person needed to make up the balance of
+passage on steerage tickets from Holland to the United States.
+At the same time we gradually built up a banking system. Those
+in the United States who had friends or relatives in Germany
+sent them money by giving the money to our State Department,
+and the State Department in turn cabled me to make a payment.
+This payment was made by my drawing a draft for the amount stated
+on the State Department, the recipient selling this draft at a
+fixed rate to the Deutsche Bank in Berlin. This business assumed
+great proportions, and after the Americans who were in a hurry to
+go home had disappeared, the ones remaining were kept in funds
+by their friends and relatives through this sort of bank under
+our management.
+
+On August twenty-third, Assistant Secretary of War Breckenridge,
+who had come from America on the warship _Tennessee_, bringing
+gold with him, and a certain number of army officers, arrived
+in Berlin and took over our relief organisation in so far as it
+applied to the repatriation of Americans, housing it in rooms
+hired in a nearby hotel, the Kaiserhoff. This commission: was
+composed of Majors J. A. Ryan, J. H. Ford and G. W. Martin and
+Captains Miller and Fenton, but the relief committee and the
+banking office were still continued in the Embassy ballroom.
+
+A bulletin was published under the auspices of the American
+Association of Commerce and Trade and the advice there given was
+that all Americans having the means to leave should do so when
+the opportunity for leaving by special trains was presented, and
+proceed direct to London whence they could obtain transportation
+to the United States. All Americans without means were directed
+to apply to the relief commission which was authorized to pay
+for the transportation and subsistence of stranded Americans
+in order to enable them to return home.
+
+The enormous quantity of baggage left behind by Americans in
+Germany was a problem requiring solution.
+
+In spite of repeated advice to leave, many Americans insisted
+on remaining in Germany. Few of them were business people; there
+were many song-birds, piano players, and students. We had much
+trouble with these belated Americans. For example, one woman
+and her daughter refused to leave when advised, but stayed on
+and ran up bills for over ten thousand marks; and as arrest for
+debt exists in Germany, they could not leave when they finally
+decided to go. All of us in the Embassy had to subscribe the
+money necessary to pay their most pressing debts and they finally
+left the country, leaving an added prejudice against Americans.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PRISONERS OF WAR
+
+During the period of the first months of the war, in addition
+to other work, it became necessary to look after those subjects
+of other nations who had been confided to my care.
+
+At first the British were allowed considerable liberty, although
+none were permitted to leave the country. They were required to
+report to the police at stated times during the day and could
+not remain out late at night.
+
+The Japanese had received warning from their Embassy as to the
+turn that events might take and, before sending its ultimatum,
+the Japanese government had warned its citizens, so that a great
+number of them had left Germany. After the declaration of war by
+Japan, all the Japanese in Germany were immediately imprisoned.
+This was stated to be in order to save them from the fury of
+the population and certainly the people seemed to be greatly
+incensed against the Japanese. When I finally obtained permission
+for their release and departure from Germany I had to send some
+one with the parties of Japanese to the Swiss frontier in order
+to protect them from injury. They were permitted to leave only
+through Switzerland and, therefore, had to change cars at Munich.
+Before sending any of them to Munich I invariably telegraphed
+our Consul there to notify the Munich police so that proper
+protection could be provided at the railway station.
+
+On one occasion a number of Japanese were waiting in the Embassy
+in order to take the night train for Munich. I sent a servant
+to take them out in order that they might get something to eat
+in a restaurant, but as no restaurant in Berlin would sell them
+food, arrangements were made to give them meals in the Embassy.
+
+The members of the Siamese Legation, who in appearance greatly
+resemble the Japanese, were often subjected to indignities, and
+for a long time did not dare move about freely in Berlin, or
+even leave their houses.
+
+The Japanese were marvels of courtesy. After I visited some of
+them at the civilian camp of Ruhleben, they wrote me a letter
+thanking me for the visit. Nearly every Japanese leaving Germany
+on his arrival in Switzerland wrote me a grateful letter.
+
+When I finally left Germany, as I stepped from the special train
+at Zürich, a Japanese woman, who had been imprisoned in Germany
+and whose husband I had visited in a prison, came forward to thank
+me. A Japanese man was waiting in the hotel office in Berne when
+I arrived there, for a similar purpose, and the next morning
+early the Japanese Minister called and left a beautiful clock for
+Mrs. Gerard as an expression of his gratitude for the attention
+shown to his countrymen. It was really a pleasure to be able to
+do something for these polite and charming people.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to a German prison
+camp. This was to the camp at Doeberitz situated about eight
+miles west of Berlin, a sort of military camp with permanent
+barracks. Some of these barracks were used for the confinement
+of such British civilians as the Germans had arrested in the
+first days of the war. There were only a few British among the
+prisoners, with a number of Russian and French. I was allowed
+to converse freely with the prisoners and found that they had
+no complaints. As the war went on, however, a number of British
+prisoners of war were taken by the Germans during the course of
+the great retreat of the British in Northern France. Then officers
+and privates began to come into Germany and were distributed
+in various camps. Finally, in the autumn of 1914, the British
+Government decided on interning a great number of Germans in
+Great Britain; and the German government immediately, and as
+a reprisal, interned all the British civilian men who, up to
+this time, had enjoyed comparative freedom in Berlin and other
+cities of the Empire. The British civilians were shut up in a
+race track about five miles from the centre of Berlin, called
+Ruhleben. This race track in peace times was used for contests
+of trotting horses and on it were the usual grandstands and brick
+stable buildings containing box stalls with hay lofts above,
+where the race horses were kept.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to the police presidency
+in Berlin where political prisoners, when arrested, were confined. A
+small number of British prisoners subject to especial investigation
+were there interned. This prison, which I often subsequently
+visited, was clean and well kept, and I never had any particular
+complaints from the prisoners confined there, except, of course,
+as the war progressed, concerning the inadequacy of the food.
+
+I had organised a special department immediately on the breaking
+out of the war to care for the interests of the British. At first
+Mr. Boylston Beal, a lawyer of Boston, assisted by Mr. Rivington
+Pyne of New York, was at the head of this department, of which
+later the Honourable John B. Jackson, formerly our Minister to
+the Balkan States, Greece and Cuba, took charge. He volunteered
+to give his assistance at the commencement of the war and I was
+glad of his help, especially as he had been twelve years secretary
+in the Berlin Embassy and, therefore, was well acquainted not
+only with Germany but with German official life and customs. Mr.
+Jackson was most ably assisted by Charles H. Russell, Jr., of
+New York, and Lithgow Osborne. Of course, others in the Embassy
+had much to do with this department.
+
+The first privates, prisoners of war, came to the camp of Doeberitz
+near Berlin. Early in the war Mr. Grew, our First Secretary, and
+Consul General Lay visited the camp for officers at Torgau. The
+question of the inspection of prisoners of the camps and the rights
+of Ambassadors charged with the interests of hostile powers was
+quite in the clouds. So many reports came to Germany about the
+bad treatment in England of German prisoners of war that I finally
+arranged to have Mr. Jackson visit them and report. This was arranged
+by my colleague, our Ambassador to Great Britain, and in the first
+winter Mr. Jackson made his trip there. His report of conditions
+there did much to allay the German belief as to the ill-treatment
+of their subjects who were prisoners in Great Britain and helped
+me greatly in bringing about better conditions in Germany. After
+vainly endeavouring to get the German government to agree to some
+definite plan for the inspection of the prisoners, after my notes
+to the Foreign Office had remained unanswered for a long period of
+time, and after sending a personal letter to von Jagow calling his
+attention to the fact that the delay was injuring German prisoners
+in other countries, I finally called on von Bethmann-Hollweg
+and told him that my notes concerning prisoners were sent by
+the Foreign Office to the military authorities: that, while I
+could talk with officials of the Foreign Office, I never came into
+contact with the people who really passed upon the notes sent by
+me, and who made the decisions as to the treatment of prisoners
+of war and inspection of their camps; and I begged the Chancellor
+to break down diplomatic precedent and allow me to speak with
+the military authorities who decided these questions. I said,
+"If I cannot get an answer to my proposition about prisoners, I
+will take a chair and sit in front of your palace in the street
+until I receive an answer."
+
+The result was a meeting in my office.
+
+I discussed the question involved with two representatives from
+the Foreign Office, two from the General Staff, two from the War
+Department and with Count Schwerin who commanded the civilian camp
+at the Ruhleben race track. In twenty minutes we managed to reach
+an agreement which I then and there drew up: the substance of
+which, as between Great Britain and Germany, was that the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Germany and the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Great Britain should have
+the right to visit the prison camps on giving reasonable notice,
+which was to be twenty-four hours where possible, and should have
+the right to converse with the prisoners, within sight but out
+of hearing, of the camp officials; that an endeavour should be
+made to adjust matters complained of with the camp authorities
+before bringing them to the notice of higher authorities; that
+ten representatives should be named by our Ambassador and that
+these should receive passes enabling them to visit the camps
+under the conditions above stated. This agreement was ratified
+by the British and German Governments and thereafter for a long
+time we worked under its provisions and in most questions dealt
+direct with the War Department.
+
+Of course, before this meeting I had managed to get permission
+to visit the camps of Ruhleben and Doeberitz near Berlin; and
+Mr. Michaelson, our consul at Cologne, and Mr. Jackson and others
+at the Embassy had been permitted to visit certain camps. But
+immediately preceding the meeting on the fourth of March and
+while matters were still being discussed we were compelled to
+a certain extent to suspend our visits.
+
+In the first days of the war it was undoubtedly and unfortunately
+true that prisoners of war taken by the Germans, both at the time
+of their capture and in transit to the prison camps, were often
+badly treated by the soldiers, guards or the civil population.
+
+The instances were too numerous, the evidence too overwhelming,
+to be denied. In the prison camps themselves, owing to the peculiar
+system of military government in Germany, the treatment of the
+prisoners varied greatly. As I have, I think, stated in another
+place, Germany is divided into army corps districts. Over each
+of these districts is, in time of war, a representative corps
+commander who is clothed with absolute power in that district,
+his orders superseding those of all civilian officials. These
+corps commanders do not report to the war department but are
+in a measure independent and very jealous of their rights. For
+instance, to show the difficulty of dealing with these corps
+commanders, after my arrangements concerning the inspection of
+prisoners of war had been ratified by both the Imperial and British
+governments, I went to Halle to inspect the place of detention
+for officers there. Halle is some hours from Berlin and when
+I had driven out to the camp, I was met by the commander who
+told me that I might visit the camp but that I could not speak
+to the prisoners out of hearing. I told him that our arrangement
+was otherwise, but, as he remained firm I returned to Berlin.
+I complained to the Foreign Office and was told there that the
+matter would be arranged and so I again, some days later, returned
+to Halle. My experience on the second trip was exactly the same
+as the first. I spoke to von Jagow who explained the situation to
+me, and advised me to visit first the corps commander at Magdeburg
+and try and arrange the matter with him. I did so and was finally
+permitted to visit this camp and to talk to the officers out of
+ear-shot.
+
+This camp of Halle was continued during the war, although not at
+all a fit place for the detention of officers, who were lodged in
+the old factory buildings surrounded by a sort of courtyard covered
+with cinders. This building was situated in the industrial part
+of the town of Halle. There was no opportunity for recreation
+or games, although several enterprising officers had tried to
+arrange a place where they could knock, a tennis ball against
+the wall.
+
+It was the policy of the Germans to put some prisoners of each
+nation in each camp. This was probably so that no claim could
+be made that the prisoners from one nation among the Allies were
+treated better or worse than the prisoners from another nation.
+
+In the beginning of the war the Germans were surprised by the great
+number of prisoners taken and had made no adequate preparations
+for their reception. Clothing and blankets were woefully wanting,
+so I immediately bought what I could in the way of underclothes
+and blankets at the large department stores of Berlin and the
+wholesalers and sent these to the camps where the British prisoners
+were confined. I also sent to the Doeberitz camp articles such
+as sticks for wounded men who were recovering, and crutches,
+and even eggs and other nourishing delicacies for the sick.
+
+At first the prisoners were not compelled to work to any extent,
+but at the time I left Germany the two million prisoners of war
+were materially assisting the carrying on of the agriculture
+and industries of the Empire.
+
+The League of Mercy of New York having telegraphed me in 1914,
+asking in what way funds could best be used in the war, I suggested
+in answer that funds for the prisoners of war were urgently needed.
+Many newspapers poked fun at me for this suggestion, and one bright
+editor said that if the Germans did not treat their prisoners
+properly they should be made to! Of course, unless this particular
+editor had sailed up the Spree in a canoe and bombarded the royal
+palace, I know of no other way of "making" the Germans do anything.
+The idea, however, of doing some work for the prisoners of war was
+taken up by the Young Men's Christian Association. Dr. John R.
+Mott was at the head of this work and was most ably and devotedly
+assisted by the Rev. Archibald C. Harte. I shall give an account
+of their splendid work in a chapter devoted to the charitable
+work of the war.
+
+At only one town in Germany was any interest in the fate of the
+prisoners of war evinced. This was, I am glad to say, in the
+quaint university town of Göttingen. I visited this camp with
+Mr. Harte, in April, 1915, to attend the opening of the first
+Y. M. C. A. camp building in Germany. The camp was commanded by
+Colonel Bogen, an officer strict in his discipline, but, as all
+the prisoners admitted, just in his dealings with them. There
+were, as I recall, about seven thousand prisoners in this camp,
+Russian, French, Belgian and British. It is a pity that the methods
+of Colonel Bogen and his arrangements for camp buildings, etc.,
+were not copied in other camps in Germany. Here, as I have said,
+the civil population took some interest in the fate of the
+unfortunate prisoners within their gates, led in this by several
+professors in the University. The most active of these professors
+was Professor Stange who, working with a French lawyer who had been
+captured near Arras while in the Red Cross, provided a library
+for the prisoners and otherwise helped them. Of course, these
+charitable acts of Professor Stange did not find favor with many
+of his fellow townsmen of Göttingen, and he was not surprised
+when he awoke one morning to find that during the night his house
+had been painted red, white and blue, the colours of France,
+England and America.
+
+I heard of so many instances of the annoyance of prisoners by
+the civil population that I was quite pleased one day to read
+a paragraph in the official newspaper, the _North German
+Gazette_, which ran somewhat as follows: "The following
+inhabitants of (naming a small town near the borders of Denmark),
+having been guilty of improper conduct towards prisoners of war,
+have been sentenced to the following terms of imprisonment and
+the following fines and their names are printed here in order
+that they may be held up to the contempt of all future generations
+of Germans." And then followed a list of names and terms of
+imprisonment and fines. I thought that this was splendid, that
+the German government had at last been aroused to the necessity
+of protecting their prisoners of war from the annoyances of the
+civil population, and I wrote to our consul in Kiel and asked him
+to investigate the case. From him I learned that some unfortunate
+prisoners passing through the town (in a part of Germany inhabited
+by Scandinavians) had made signs that they were suffering from
+hunger and thirst, that some of the kind-hearted people among
+the Scandinavian population had given them something to eat and
+drink and for this they were condemned to fines, to prison and
+to have their names held up to the contempt of Germans for all
+time.
+
+I do not know of anyone thing that can give a better idea of
+the official hate for the nations with which Germany was at war
+than this.
+
+The day after visiting the camp at Göttingen, I visited the
+officers' camp situated at the town of Hanover Münden. Here
+about eight hundred officers, of whom only thirteen were British,
+were confined in an old factory building situated on the bank of
+the river below the town. The Russian officers handed me some
+arrows tipped with nails which had been shot at them by the
+kind-hearted little town boys, and the British pointed out to me
+the filthy conditions of the camp. In this, as in unfortunately
+many other officer camps, the inclination seemed to be to treat the
+officers not as captured officers and gentlemen, but as convicts.
+I had quite a sharp talk with the commander of this camp before
+leaving and he afterwards took violent exception to the report
+which I made upon his camp. However, I am pleased to say that
+he reformed, as it were, and I was informed by my inspectors
+that he had finally made his camp one of the best in Germany.
+
+Much as I should have liked to, I could not spend much time myself
+in visiting the prison camps; many duties and frequent crises kept
+me in Berlin, but members of the Embassy were always travelling
+in this work of camp inspection.
+
+For some time my reports were published in parliamentary "White
+Papers," but in the end our government found that the publication
+of these reports irritated the Germans to such a degree that the
+British Government was requested not to publish them any more.
+Copies of the reports were always sent by me both to Washington
+and to London, and handed to the Berlin Foreign Office.
+
+[Illustration: A COVER OF THE MONTHLY ISSUED BY THE RUHLEBEN
+PRISONERS.]
+
+While Winston Churchill was at the head of the British Admiralty,
+it was stated that the German submarine prisoners would not be
+treated as ordinary prisoners of war; but would be put in a place
+by themselves on the ground that they were pirates and murderers,
+and not entitled to the treatment accorded in general to prisoners
+of war. Great indignation was excited by this in Germany; the
+German government immediately seized thirty-seven officers, picking
+those whom they supposed related to the most prominent families
+in Great Britain, and placed them in solitary confinement. A
+few were confined in this way in Cologne, but the majority were
+put in the ordinary jails of Magdeburg and Burg.
+
+As soon as I heard of this, accompanied by Mr. Charles H. Russell,
+Jr., of my staff, I went to Magdeburg, using my ordinary pass
+for the visiting of prisoners. The German authorities told me
+afterwards that if they had known I was going to make this visit
+they would not have permitted it, but on this occasion the corps
+commander system worked for me. Accompanied by an adjutant, in
+peace times a local lawyer from the corps commander's office in
+Magdeburg, and other officers, I visited these British officers
+in their cells in the common jail at Magdeburg. They were in
+absolutely solitary confinement, each in a small cell about eleven
+feet long and four feet wide. Some cells were a little larger,
+and the prisoners were allowed only one hour's exercise a day in
+the courtyard of the prison. The food given them was not bad, but
+the close confinement was very trying, especially to Lieutenant
+Goschen, son of the former Ambassador to Germany, who had been
+wounded and in the hospital at Douai. Among them I found an old
+acquaintance, Captain Robin Grey, who had been often in New York.
+The German authorities agreed to correct several minor matters of
+which the officers complained and then we went to the neighbouring
+town of Burg, where other officers were confined in the same manner
+and under similar conditions in the ordinary jail. After visiting
+these prisoners and obtaining for them from the authorities some
+modifications of the rules which had been established we visited
+the regular officers' camp at Burg.
+
+This was at that time what I should call a bad camp, crowded and
+with no space for recreation. Later, conditions were improved
+and more ground allowed to the prisoners for games, etc. At the
+time of my first visit I found that the commander, a polite but
+peppery officer, was in civil life a judge of the Supreme Court
+at Leipzig, the highest court in the Empire. As I had been a
+judge in the State of New York, we foregathered and adjourned
+for lunch with his staff to the hotel in Burg.
+
+After Churchill left the British Admiralty, his successor reversed
+his ruling and the submarine prisoners were placed in the ordinary
+confinement of prisoners of war. When the Germans were assured of
+this, the thirty-seven officers who had been in reprisal placed
+in solitary confinement were sent back to ordinary prison camps.
+In fact in most cases I managed to get the Germans to send them
+to what were called "good" camps.
+
+Lieutenant Goschen, however, became quite in and was taken to the
+hospital in Magdeburg. At the time of his capture, the Germans
+had told me, in answer to my inquiries, that he was suffering
+from a blow on the head with the butt end of a rifle, but an
+X-ray examination at Magdeburg showed that fragments of a bullet
+had penetrated his brain and that he was, therefore, hardly a
+fit subject to be chosen as one of the reprisal prisoners. I
+told von Jagow that I thought it in the first place a violation
+of all diplomatic courtesy to pick out the son of the former
+Ambassador to Germany as a subject for reprisals and secondly
+that, in picking him, they had taken a wounded man; that the
+fact that they did not know that he had fragments of a bullet in
+his brain made the situation even worse because that ignorance
+was the result of the want of a proper examination in the German
+hospitals; and I insisted that, because of this manifestly unfair
+treatment which had undoubtedly caused the very serious condition
+of Lieutenant Goschen, he should be returned to England in the
+exchange of those who were badly wounded. I am pleased to say
+that von Jagow saw my point of view and finally secured permission
+for Lieutenant Goschen to leave for England.
+
+Dr. Ohnesorg, one of our assistant Naval Attachés, went with
+him to England on account of the seriousness of his condition,
+and I was very glad to hear from his father that he had arrived
+safely in London.
+
+Undoubtedly the worst camp which I visited in Germany was that
+of Wittenberg. Wittenberg is the ancient town where Luther lived
+and nailed his theses to the church door. The camp is situated
+just outside the city in a very unattractive spot next to the
+railway. An outbreak of typhus fever prevented us from visiting
+the camp, although Mr. Jackson conversed with some of the prisoners
+from outside the barrier of barbed wire. When the typhus was
+finally driven out, Mr. Lithgow Osborne visited the camp and his
+report of conditions there was such that I visited it myself,
+in the meantime holding up his report until I had verified it.
+
+With Mr. Charles H. Russell, Jr., I visited the camp. Typhus
+fever seems to be continually present in Russia. It is carried by
+the body louse and it is transmitted from one person to another.
+Russian soldiers seem to carry this disease with them without
+apparently suffering much from it themselves. The Russian soldiers
+arriving at Wittenberg were not properly disinfected and, in
+consequence, typhus fever broke out in camp. Several British
+medical officers were there with their prisoners, because, by the
+provisions of the Hague conventions, captured medical officers
+may be kept with the troops of their nation, if prisoners have
+need of their services. These medical officers protested with
+the camp commander against the herding together of the French
+and British prisoners with the Russians, who, as I have said,
+were suffering from typhus fever. But the camp commander said,
+"You will have to know your Allies;" and kept all of his prisoners
+together, and thus as surely condemned to death a number of French
+and British prisoners of war as though he had stood them against
+the wall and ordered them shot by a firing squad. Conditions in
+the camp during the period of this epidemic were frightful. The
+camp was practically deserted by the Germans and I understand
+that the German doctor did not make as many visits to the camp
+as the situation required.
+
+At the time I visited the camp the typhus epidemic, of course,
+had been stamped out. The Germans employed a large number of
+police dogs in this camp and these dogs not only were used in
+watching the outside of the camp in order to prevent the escape
+of prisoners but also were used within the camp. Many complaints
+were made to me by prisoners concerning these dogs, stating that
+men had been bitten by them. It seemed undoubtedly true that the
+prisoners there had been knocked about and beaten in a terrible
+manner by their guards, and one guard went so far as to strike one
+of the British medical officers. There were about thirty-seven
+civilian prisoners in the camp who had been there all through
+the typhus epidemic. I secured the removal of these civilian
+prisoners to the general civilian camp at Ruhleben, and the
+conditions at Wittenberg may be judged by the fact that when
+it was announced to these civilians that they were to be taken
+from Wittenberg to another camp one of them was so excited by
+the news of release that he fell dead upon the spot.
+
+In talking over conditions at Wittenberg with von Jagow I said,
+"Suppose I go back to Wittenberg and shoot some of these dogs,
+what can you do to me?" Soon after the dogs disappeared from
+the camp.
+
+The food in all these camps for civilians and for private soldiers
+was about the same. It consisted of an allowance of bread of
+the same weight as that given the civilian population. This was
+given out in the morning with a cup of something called coffee,
+but which in reality was an extract of acorns or something of the
+kind without milk or sugar; in the middle of the day, a bowl of
+thick soup in which the quantity of meat was gradually diminished
+as war went on, as well as the amount of potatoes for which at
+a later period turnips and carrots were, to a large extent,
+substituted; and in the evening in good camps there was some sort
+of thick soup given out or an apple, or an almost infinitesimal
+piece of cheese or sausage.
+
+In the war department at Berlin there was a Prisoners of War
+Department in charge of Colonel, later General, Friedrich. This
+department, however, did not seem to be in a position to issue
+orders to the corps commanders commanding the army corps districts
+of Germany, who had absolute control of the prison camps within
+their districts. Colonel Friedrich, however, and his assistants
+endeavoured to standardise the treatment of prisoners of war in
+the different corps districts, and were able to exert a certain
+amount of pressure on the corps commanders. They determined on
+the general reprisals to be taken in connection with prisoners
+of war. For instance, when some of the Germans, who had been
+taken prisoners by the British and who were in England, were
+sent to work in the harbour of Havre, the Germans retaliated
+by sending about four times the number of British prisoners to
+work at Libau in the part of Russia then occupied by the Germans.
+But while the British permitted our Embassy in Paris to inspect
+the prisoners of war at Havre, the Germans for months refused
+to allow me permission to send anyone to inspect those British
+prisoners at Libau.
+
+Cases came to my attention where individual corps commanders
+on their own initiative directed punitive measures against the
+prisoners of war in their districts, on account of the rumours
+of the bad treatment of German citizens in England. Thus the
+commander in the district where the camp of Doeberitz was situated
+issued an order directing reprisals against prisoners under his
+command on account of what he claimed to be the bad treatment
+of German women in England. It required constant vigilance to
+seek out instances of this kind and cause them to be remedied.
+
+I did not find the Germans at all efficient in the handling of
+prisoners of war. The authority was so divided that it was hard
+to find who was responsible for any given bad conditions. For
+instance, for a long period of time I contended with the German
+authorities for better living conditions at the civilian camp of
+Ruhleben. I was promised time and again by Colonel Friedrich,
+by the camp commander and by the Foreign
+Office that these conditions would be remedied. In that camp men
+of education, men in delicate health, were compelled to sleep
+and live six in a box stall or so closely that the beds touched
+each other in hay-lofts, the outside walls of which were only
+four feet high.
+
+I finally almost in despair wrote identical personal letters,
+after having exhausted all ordinary diplomatic steps, to General
+von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of Brandenburg, to the commander
+of the corps district in which the Ruhleben camp was situated,
+and to the Minister of War: and the only result was that each
+of the officers addressed claimed that he had been personally
+insulted by me because I had presumed to call his attention to
+the inhuman conditions under which the prisoners were compelled
+to live in the Ruhleben camp.
+
+The commander of this civilian camp of Ruhleben was a very handsome
+old gentleman, named Count Schwerin. His second in command for
+a long time was a Baron Taube. Both of these officers had been
+long retired from the army and were given these prison commands
+at the commencement of the war. Both of them were naturally
+kind-hearted but curiously sensitive and not always of even temper.
+On the whole I think that they sympathised with the prisoners
+and did their best to obtain a bettering of the conditions of
+their confinement. The prisoners organised themselves in their
+various barracks, each barrack having a captain of the barrack,
+the captains electing one of their number as a camp captain or
+_Obmann_.
+
+The man who finally appeared as head man of the camp was an
+ex-cinematograph proprietor, named Powell. In my mind he, assisted
+by Beaumont and other captains, conducted the affairs of the camp
+as well as possible, given the difficulty of dealing with the
+prisoners on one hand and the prison authorities on the other
+hand. Naturally he was always subject to opposition from many
+prisoners, among whom those of aristocratic tendencies objected
+to being under the control of one not of the highest caste in
+Great Britain; and there were others who either envied him his
+authority or desired his place. The camp authorities allowed
+Powell to visit the Embassy at least once a week and in that
+way I was enabled, to keep in direct touch with the camp. At
+two periods during my stay in Berlin I spent enough days at the
+camp to enable every prisoner who had a complaint of any kind
+to present it personally to me.
+
+The organisation of this camp was quite extraordinary. I found
+it impossible to get British prisoners to perform the ordinary
+work of cleaning up the camp, and so forth, always expected of
+prisoners themselves; and so, with the funds furnished me from
+the British Government, the camp captain was compelled to pay a
+number of the poorer prisoners to perform this work. Secretaries
+Ruddock and Kirk of our Embassy undertook the uninteresting and
+arduous work of superintending these payments as well as of our
+other financial affairs. This work was most trying and they deserve
+great credit for their self-denial. By arrangement with the British
+Government, I was also enabled to pay the poorer prisoners an
+allowance of five marks a week, thus permitting them to buy little
+luxuries and necessities and extra food at the camp canteen which
+was early established in the camp. I also furnished the capital to
+the camp canteen, enabling it to make its purchases and carry on
+its business. In this establishment everything could be purchased
+which was purchasable in Germany, and for months after the
+commencement of the war articles of luxury were sold at a profit
+and articles of food sold at a loss for the benefit of those
+who required an addition to the camp diet. There was a street
+in the camp of little barracks or booths which the prisoners
+christened Bond Street, and where many stores were in operation
+such as a tailor shop, shoe-maker's, watch-maker's, etc. Acting
+with Powell, I succeeded in getting the German authorities to
+turn over the kitchens to the prisoners. Four of the prisoners
+who did most excellent self-denying work in these kitchens deserve
+to be specially mentioned. They were Ernest L. Pyke, Herbert.
+Kasmer, Richard H. Carrad and George Fergusson.
+
+The men in this camp subsisted to a great extent upon the packages
+of food sent to them from England. Credit must be given to the
+German authorities for the fairly prompt and efficient delivery
+of the packages of food sent from England, Denmark and Switzerland
+to prisoners of war in all camps.
+
+In Ruhleben the educated prisoners volunteered to teach the ignorant:
+two hundred and ninety-seven different educational courses were
+offered to those who desired to improve their minds. A splendid
+orchestra was organised, a dramatic society which gave plays in
+French and one which gave plays in English and another one which
+gave operas. On New Year's day, 1916, I attended at Ruhleben do
+really wonderful performance of the pantomime of "Cinderella";
+and, in January, 1917, a performance of "The Mikado" in a theatre
+under one of the grand stands. In these productions, of course,
+the female parts were taken by young men and the scenery, costumes
+and accessories were all made by the prisoners. There was a camp
+library of over five thousand volumes sent over by the British
+Government and a reading and meeting hall, erected by the American
+Y. M. C. A. There was even a system of postal service with special
+stamps so that a prisoner in one barrack could write to a friend in
+another and have a letter delivered by the camp postal authorities.
+The German authorities had not hired the entire race track from
+the Race Track Association so that I made a special contract
+with the race track owners and hired from them the in-field and
+other portions not taken over by German authorities. Here the
+prisoners had tennis courts and played hockey, foot-ball and
+cricket and held athletic games. Expert dentists in the camp
+took care of the poorer prisoners as did an oculist hired by me
+with British funds, and glasses were given them from the same
+funds.
+
+The prisoners who needed a little better nourishment than that
+afforded by the camp diet and their parcels from England, could
+obtain cards giving them the right to eat in the Casino or camp
+official restaurant where they were allowed a certain indicated
+amount of wine or beer with their meals, and finally arrangements
+were arrived at by which the German guards left the camp, simply
+guarding it from the outside; and the policing was taken over
+by the camp police department, under the charge of the prison
+camp commander and committee. The worst features, of course,
+were the food and housing. Human nature seems always to be the
+same. Establishment of clubs seems inherent to the Anglo-Saxon
+nature. Ten or more persons would combine together and erect a
+sort of wooden shed against the brick walls of a barrack, hire
+some poorer person to put on a white jacket and be addressed as
+"steward," put in the shed a few deck chairs and a table and
+enjoy the sensation of exclusiveness and club life thereby given.
+
+Owing to the failure of Germany and Great Britain to come to an
+agreement for a long time as to the release of captured crews
+of ships, there were in Ruhleben men as old as seventy-five years
+and boys as young as fifteen. There were in all between fifty and
+sixty of these ships' boys. They lived in a barrack by themselves
+and under the supervision of a ship's officer who volunteered to
+look after them as sort of a monitor. They were taught navigation
+by the older prisoners and I imagine were rather benefited by their
+stay in the camp. I finally made arrangements by which these boys
+were released from England and Germany. With the exception of
+the officers and crews of the ships, prisoners were not interned
+who were over fifty-five.
+
+The British Government was generous in the allowance of money for
+Ruhleben prisoners. The amount allowed by the German Government to
+the camp commanders for feeding the prisoners was extremely small,
+only sixty pfennigs a day. At first many of the camp commanders
+made contracts with caterers for the feeding of the prisoners
+and as the caterers' profit had to come out of this very small
+sum the amount of food which the remainder purchased for the
+prisoners was small indeed. As the war went on the prisoners'
+department of the war office tried to induce the camp commanders to
+abandon the contractors' system and purchase supplies themselves.
+A sort of convention of camp commanders was held in Berlin which I
+attended. Lectures were there given on food and its purchase, and
+methods of disinfecting prisoners, on providing against typhus,
+and on housing and other subjects. A daily lunch was served,
+supposed to be composed of the exact rations given at the prison
+camps.
+
+The schedules of food, etc., made out by the camp commanders
+and furnished to foreign correspondents were often not followed
+in practice. I know on one occasion when I was at the camp at
+Doeberitz, the camp commander gave me his schedule of food for
+the week. This provided that soup with pieces of meat was to be
+given on the day of my visit, but on visiting the camp kitchen I
+found that the contractor was serving fish instead of meat. Some
+of the camp commanders not only treated their prisoners kindly but
+introduced manufactures of furniture, etc., to help the prisoners
+to pass their time. The camps of Krossen and Göttingen deserve
+special mention. At Giessen, the camp commander had permitted
+the erection of a barrack in which certain prisoners who were
+electrical experts gave lessons in electrical fitting, etc.,
+to their fellow prisoners. There was also a studio in this camp
+where prisoners with artistic talent were furnished with paints
+and allowed to work. As more and more people were called to the
+front in Germany, greater use was made of the prisoners, and in
+the summer of 1916 practically all the prisoners were compelled
+to work outside of the camps. They were paid a small extra sum
+for this, a few cents a day, and as a rule were benefited by the
+change of scene and occupation. The Russians especially became
+very useful to the Germans as agricultural laborers.
+
+Professor Alonzo E. Taylor of the University of Pennsylvania,
+a food expert, and Dr. D. J. McCarthy, also of Philadelphia,
+joined my staff in 1916 and proved most efficient and fearless
+inspectors of prison camps. Dr. Taylor could use the terms calories,
+proteins, etc., as readily as German experts and at a greater
+rate of speed. His report showing that the official diet of the
+prisoners in Ruhleben was a starvation diet incensed the German
+authorities to such fury that they forbade him to revisit Ruhleben.
+Professor Buckhaus, the German expert, agreed with him in some of
+his findings. I do not know what will happen to the Professor,
+who seemed willing to do his best for the prisoners. He wrote a
+booklet on the prison camps which he asked permission to dedicate
+to me, but the War Office, which published the book, refused
+to allow him to make this dedication. It was a real pleasure
+to see the way in which Dr. Taylor carried on his work of food
+inspection; and his work, as well as that of the other doctors
+sent from America to join my staff, Drs. Furbush, McCarthy, Roler,
+Harns, Webster and Luginbuhl, did much to better camp conditions.
+
+Dr. Caldwell, the sanitary expert, known for his great work in
+Serbia, now I believe head of the hospital at Pittsburgh, reported
+in regard to the prison diet: "While of good quality and perhaps
+sufficient in quantity by weight, it is lacking in the essential
+elements which contribute to the making of a well-balanced and
+satisfactory diet. It is lacking particularly in fat and protein
+content which is especially desirable during the colder months
+of the year. There is considerable doubt whether this diet alone
+without being supplemented by the articles of food received by
+the prisoners from their homes would in any way be sufficient
+to maintain the prisoners in health and strength."
+
+Dr. Caldwell also visited Wittenberg and found the commander by
+temperament, and so on, unfitted for such a position.
+
+The Germans, as Dr. Taylor has pointed out, tried to feed prisoners
+on schedule like horses. There is, however, a nervous discrimination
+in eating so far as man is concerned; and a diet, scientifically
+fitted to keep him alive, may fail because of its mere monotony.
+
+Think of living as the prisoners of war in Germany have for years,
+without ever having anything (except black bread) which cannot
+be eaten with a spoon.
+
+Officer prisoners were, after matters had settled down and after
+several bitter contests which I had with the German authorities,
+fairly well treated. There was, as in the case of the camps for
+the privates, a great difference between camps, and a great
+difference between camp commanders. Mr. Jackson did most of the
+visiting of the officers' camps. In many camps the officers were
+allowed a tennis court and other amusements, as well as light
+wine or beer at meals, but the length of the war had a bad effect
+on the mental condition of many of the officers.
+
+A great step forward was made when arrangements were entered
+into between Germany and Great Britain whereby wounded and sick
+officers and men, when passed by the Swiss Commission which visited
+both countries, were sent to Switzerland; sent still as prisoners
+of war, subject to return to Germany or England respectively, but
+the opportunity afforded by change of food and scene, as well as
+reunion of families, saved many a life. By arrangements between
+the two countries, also, the severely wounded prisoners were set
+free. I believe that this exchange of the heavily wounded between
+the Germans and the Russians was the factor which prevented the
+entrance of Sweden into the war. These wounded men traversed the
+whole length of Sweden in the railway, and the spectacle afforded
+to the Swedish population of these poor stumps of humanity, victims
+of war, has quite effectually kept the Swedish population from
+an attack of unnecessary war fever.
+
+Officers and men who tried to escape were not very severely punished
+in Germany unless they had broken or stolen something in their
+attempt. Officers were usually subjected to a jail confinement
+for a period and then often sent to a sort of punitive camp.
+Such a camp was situated in one of the Ring forts surrounding
+the city of Kustrin which I visited in September, 1916. There
+the officers had no opportunity for exercise except in a very
+small courtyard or on the roof, which was covered with grass, of
+the building in which they were confined. I arranged, however,
+on my visit for the construction of a tennis court outside. The
+British officers in Germany practically subsisted on their parcels
+received from home, and during the end of my stay a much better
+tea could be had with the prison officers than with the camp
+commander. The prisoners had real tea and marmalade and white
+bread to offer, luxuries which had long since disappeared from all
+German tables. On the whole, the quarters given to the officers'
+prisons in Germany were not satisfactory, and were not of the
+kind that should have been offered to officer prisoners of war.
+
+At the time I left Germany there were nearly two million prisoners
+of war in the Empire, of whom about ten thousand were Russian
+officers, nine thousand French officers and about one thousand
+British officers.
+
+As a rule our inspectors found the hospitals, where the prisoners
+of war were, in as good condition as could be expected.
+
+I think this was largely due to the fact that so many doctors
+in Germany are Jews. The people who are of the Jewish race are
+people of gentle instincts. In these hospitals a better diet
+was given to the prisoners. There were, of course, in addition
+to the regular hospitals, hospitals where the severely wounded
+prisoners were sent. Almost uniformly these hospitals were clean
+and the prisoners were well taken care of.
+
+[Illustration: IN RUHLEBEN CAMP. A SPECIMEN BOTH OF THE
+PRISONER-ARTIST'S WORK AND OF THE TYPES ABOUT HIM.]
+
+At Ruhleben there was a hospital which in spite of many
+representations was never in proper shape. In addition, there
+was in the camp a special barrack established by the prisoners
+themselves for the care of those who were so ill or so weak as
+to require special attention but who were not ill enough to be
+sent to the hospital. This barrack was for a long time in charge
+of a devoted gentleman, a prisoner, whose name I have unfortunately
+forgotten, but whose self-sacrifice deserves special mention.
+
+I arranged with the camp authorities and the German authorities
+for permission to enter into a contract with Dr. Weiler. Under
+this contract Dr. Weiler, who had a sanatorium in the West of
+Berlin, received patients from Ruhleben. Those who were able paid
+for themselves, the poorer ones being paid for by the British
+Government. This sanatorium, occupied several villas. I had many
+disputes with Dr. Weiler, but finally managed to get this sanatorium
+in such condition that the prisoners who resided there were fairly
+well taken care of.
+
+An arrangement was made between Great Britain and Germany by
+which civilians unfit for military service were sent to their
+respective countries, and just before I left I effected an
+arrangement by which all civilians over forty-five years old,
+with the exception of twenty who might be held by each country
+for military reasons, were to be released. I do not know whether
+this arrangement was actually carried out in full. With the lapse
+of time the mental condition of the older prisoners in Ruhleben
+had become quite alarming. Soldier prisoners, when they enter the
+army, are always in good physical condition and enter with the
+expectation of either being killed or wounded or taken prisoner,
+and have made their arrangements accordingly. But these unfortunate
+civilian prisoners were often men in delicate health, and all
+were in a constant state of great mental anxiety as to the fate
+of their business and their enterprises and their families. In
+1916, not only Mr. Grafton Minot, who for some time had devoted
+himself exclusively to the Ruhleben prisoners, but also Mr. Ellis
+Dresel, a distinguished lawyer of Boston, who had joined the
+Embassy as a volunteer, took up the work. Mr. Dresel visited
+Ruhleben almost daily and by listening to the stories and complaints
+of the prisoners materially helped their mental condition.
+
+The Germans collected all the soldier prisoners of Irish nationality
+in one camp at Limburg not far from Frankfurt a. M. These efforts
+were made to induce them to join the German army. The men were
+well treated and were often visited by Sir Roger Casement who,
+working with the German authorities, tried to get these Irishmen
+to desert their flag and join the Germans. A few weaklings were
+persuaded by Sir Roger who finally discontinued his visits, after
+obtaining about thirty recruits, because the remaining Irishmen
+chased him out of the camp.
+
+I received information of the shooting of one prisoner, and although
+the camp authorities had told Dr. McCarthy that the investigation
+had been closed and the guard who did the shooting exonerated,
+nevertheless, when I visited the camp in order to investigate, I
+was told that I could not do so because the matter of the shooting
+was still under investigation. Nor was I allowed to speak to those
+prisoners who had been witnesses at the time of the shooting.
+I afterwards learned that another Irishman had been shot by a
+guard on the day before my visit, and the same obstacles to my
+investigation were drawn about this case.
+
+The Irishmen did not bear confinement well, and at the time of
+my visit among them many of them were suffering from tuberculosis
+in the camp hospital. They seemed also peculiarly subject to
+mental breakdowns. Two devoted Catholic priests, Father Crotty
+and a Brother Warren from a religious house in Belgium, were
+doing wonderful work among these prisoners.
+
+The sending out of the prisoners of war to work throughout Germany
+has had one very evil effect. It has made it to the financial
+advantage of certain farmers and manufacturers to have the war
+continued. The Prussian land owners or Junkers obtain four or
+five times as much for their agricultural products as they did
+before the war and have the work on their farms performed by
+prisoners of war to whom they are required to pay only six cents
+a day. When the _Tageblatt_ called attention to this it was
+suppressed for several days.
+
+At many of these so-called working camps our inspectors were
+refused admission on the ground that they might learn trade or
+war secrets. They succeeded, however, in having the men sent
+outside in order that they might inspect them and hear their
+complaints. There were in Germany about one hundred central camps
+and perhaps ten thousand or more so-called working camps, in
+summer time, throughout the country. Some of the British prisoners
+were put to work on the sewage farm of Berlin but we succeeded
+in getting them sent back to their parent camp.
+
+The prisoners of war were often accused of various breaches of
+discipline and crimes. Members of the Embassy would attend these
+trials, and we endeavoured to see that the prisoners were properly
+represented. But the Germans often refused us an opportunity
+to see the prisoners before their trial, or even before their
+execution. The case of Captain Fryatt is in point.
+
+Captain Fryatt who commanded a British merchant ship was captured
+and taken to the civilian camp at Ruhleben. In searching him the
+Germans claimed that he wore a watch presented to him for an
+attempt to ram a German submarine. They, therefore, took Fryatt
+from the Ruhleben camp and sent him to Bruges for trial. When I
+heard of this I immediately sent two formal notes to the German
+Foreign Office demanding the right to see Fryatt and hire counsel
+to represent him, inquiring what sort of counsel would be permitted
+to attend the trial and asking for postponement of the trial
+until these matters could be arranged. The German Foreign Office
+had informed me that they had backed up these requests and I
+believe them, but the answer of the German admiralty to my notes
+was to cause the trial to proceed the morning after the day on
+which my notes were delivered and to shoot Fryatt before noon
+of the same day.
+
+As to the evidence regarding the watch, the British Foreign Office
+learned that, when captured, Captain Fryatt had neither a watch
+nor any letter to indicate that he had tried to ram a submarine!
+
+This cruel and high-handed outrage caused great indignation in
+England, and even in certain circles in Germany; and the manner
+in which my request was treated was certainly a direct insult
+to the country which I represented. In conversation with me,
+Zimmermann and the Chancellor and von Jagow all expressed the
+greatest regret over this incident, which shows how little control
+the civilian branch of the government has over the military in
+time of war. Later on, when similar charges were made against
+another British sea captain, the Foreign Office, I think through
+the influence of the Emperor, was able to prevent a recurrence
+of the Fryatt outrage.
+
+As I have said, many of the camp commanders in Germany were men,
+excellent and efficient and kind hearted, who did what they could
+for the prisoners. It is a pity that these men should bear the
+odium which attaches to Germany because of the general bad treatment
+of prisoners of war in the first days of the war, and because
+certain commanders of prison camps were not fitted for their
+positions.
+
+The commander at the camp at Wittenberg was replaced, but the
+Germans have never acknowledged that bad conditions had existed
+in that camp. Shortly before we left Germany the war department
+seemed to gain more control of the prisoners of war situation,
+and on our representations at least one camp commander was
+permanently relieved. If examples had been made early in the
+war of the camp commanders who were not fit for their places
+and of those who had in any way mishandled prisoners of war, the
+German people as a whole would not have had to bear the burden
+of this odium. The many prisoners will return to their homes
+with a deep and bitter hatred of all things German.
+
+The British Government took a great interest in the British prisoners
+in Germany. Nothing was omitted and every suggestion made by me
+was immediately acted on; while many most valuable hints were
+given me from London as to prisoners' affairs. Their Majesties,
+the King and Queen, showed a deep personal concern in the welfare
+of the unfortunate British in German hands; and this concern
+never flagged during the period of my stay in Berlin. Lord Robert
+Cecil and Lord Newton were continually working for the benefit
+of British prisoners.
+
+At a time when the British prisoners were without proper clothing,
+the British Government sent me uniforms, overcoats, etc., and I
+hired a warehouse in Berlin as a distributing point; but, after
+some months, the German authorities refused to allow me to continue
+this method of distribution on the ground that it was the duty
+of Germany to provide the prisoners with clothes. But Germany
+was not performing this duty and the British prisoners had to
+suffer because of this German official woodenheadedness.
+
+In the spring of 1916, quite characteristically, the Germans
+broke their "treaty" concerning visits to prisoners, and refused
+to permit us to speak to prisoners out of hearing. Von Jagow
+told me that this was because of the trouble made among Russian
+prisoners by the visits of Madam Sazonoff, but this had nothing
+to do with the arrangement between Great Britain and Germany.
+
+I think that the Germans suspected that I had learned from fellow
+prisoners of the cruel and unnecessary shooting of two Irish
+prisoners at Limburg. It was not from prisoners, however, that
+I obtained this information, but from Germans who wrote to me.
+
+In addition to the English and Japanese, I had the protection
+of the Serbian and Roumanian subjects and the protection of the
+interests of a very small country, the Republic of San Marino.
+Soon after the Serbians and Roumanians appeared in the prison
+camps of Germany we made reports on the condition and treatment
+of these prisoners, as well as reports concerning the British.
+
+I was able to converse with some Serbians, in the first days
+of the war, in their native tongue, which, curiously enough,
+was Spanish. Immediately after the persecution of the Jews in
+Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella and other monarchs, a number of
+Spanish Jews emigrated to Serbia where they have remained ever
+since, keeping their old customs and speaking the old Spanish
+of the time of Cervantes.
+
+The German authorities, in the most petty manner, often concealed
+from me the presence of British prisoners, especially civilians,
+in prison camps. For a long time I was not informed of the presence
+of British civilians in Sennelager and it was only by paying
+a surprise visit by motor to the camp at Brandenburg that I
+discovered a few British, the crew of a trawler, there. It was
+on information contained in an anonymous letter, evidently from
+the wife of some German officer, that I visited Brandenburg where
+the crew of this trawler, deprived of money, were without any of
+the little comforts or packages that mitigate life in a German
+prison camp.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC
+
+At the commencement of the war for some days I was cut off from
+communication with the United States; but we soon established a
+chain of communication, at first through Italy and later by way
+of Denmark. At all times cables from Washington to Berlin, or
+_vice versa_, took, on the average, two days in transmission.
+
+After the fall of Liège, von Jagow sent for me and asked me if
+I would transmit through the American Legation a proposition
+offering Belgium peace and indemnity if no further opposition
+were made to the passage of German troops through Belgium. As the
+proposition was a proposition for peace, I took the responsibility
+of forwarding it and sent the note of the German Government to
+our Minister at the Hague for transmission to our Minister in
+Belgium.
+
+Dr. Van Dyke, our Minister at the Hague, refused to have anything
+to do with the transmission of this proposition and turned the
+German note over to the Holland Minister for Foreign Affairs,
+and through this channel the proposition reached the Belgian
+Government.
+
+The State Department cabled me a message from the President to
+the Emperor which stated that the United States stood ready at
+any time to mediate between the warring powers, and directed
+me to present this proposition direct to the Emperor.
+
+I, therefore, asked for an audience with the Emperor and received
+word from the chief Court Marshal that the Emperor would receive
+me at the palace in Berlin on the morning of August tenth. I
+drove in a motor into the courtyard of the palace and was there
+escorted to the door which opened on a flight of steps leading
+to a little garden about fifty yards square, directly on the
+embankment of the River Spree, which flows past the Royal Palace.
+As I went down the steps, the Empress and her only daughter,
+the Duchess of Brunswick, came up. Both stopped and shook hands
+with me, speaking a few words. I found the Emperor seated at a
+green iron table under a large canvas garden umbrella. Telegraph
+forms were scattered on the table in front of him and basking in
+the gravel were two small dachshunds. I explained to the Emperor
+the object of my visit and we had a general conversation about
+the war and the state of affairs. The Emperor took some of the
+large telegraph blanks and wrote out in pencil his reply to the
+President's offer, This reply, of course, I cabled immediately
+to the State Department.
+
+  _For the President of the_
+      _United States personally:_
+
+                                                     10/VIII 14.
+
+  1. H. R. H. Prince Henry was received by his Majesty King George
+  V in London, who empowered him to transmit to me verbally, that
+  England would remain neutral if war broke out on the Continent
+  involving Germany and France, Austria and Russia. This message
+  was telegraphed to me by my brother from London after his
+  conversation with H. M. the King, and repeated verbally on the
+  twenty-ninth of July.
+
+  2. My Ambassador in London transmitted a message from Sir E.
+  Grey to Berlin saying that only in case France was likely to
+  be crushed England would interfere.
+
+  3. On the thirtieth my Ambassador in London reported that Sir
+  Edward Grey in course of a "private" conversation told him that
+  if the conflict remained localized between _Russia_--not
+  Serbia--and _Austria_, England would not move, but if we
+  "mixed" in the fray she would take quick decisions and grave
+  measures; i. e., if I left my ally Austria in the lurch to
+  fight alone England would not touch me.
+
+  4. This communication being directly counter to the King's
+  message to me, I telegraphed to H. M. on the twenty-ninth or
+  thirtieth, thanking him for kind messages through my brother
+  and begging him to use all his power to keep France and
+  Russia--his Allies--from making any war-like preparations
+  calculated to disturb my work of mediation, stating that I
+  was in constant communication with H. M. the Czar. In the
+  evening the King kindly answered that he had ordered his
+  Government to use every possible influence with his Allies
+  to refrain from taking any provocative military measures. At
+  the same time H. M. asked me if I would transmit to Vienna
+  the British proposal that Austria was to take Belgrade and a
+  few other Serbian towns and a strip of country as a "main-mise"
+  to make sure that the Serbian promises on paper should be
+  fulfilled in reality. This proposal was in the same moment
+  telegraphed to me from Vienna for London, quite in conjunction
+  with the British proposal; besides, I had telegraphed to H. M.
+  the Czar the same as an idea of mine, before I received the two
+  communications from Vienna and London, as both were of the same
+  opinion.
+
+  5. I immediately transmitted the telegrams _vice versa_ to
+  Vienna and London. I felt that I was able to tide the question
+  over and was happy at the peaceful outlook.
+
+  6. While I was preparing a note to H. M. the Czar the next
+  morning, to inform him that Vienna, London and Berlin were agreed
+  about the treatment of affairs, I received the telephones from
+  H. E. the Chancellor that in the night before the Czar had given
+  the order to mobilize the whole of the Russian army, which was,
+  of course, also meant against Germany; whereas up till then the
+  southern armies had been mobilized against Austria.
+
+  7. In a telegram from London my Ambassador informed me he
+  understood the British Government would guarantee neutrality
+  of France and wished to know whether Germany would refrain from
+  attack. I telegraphed to H. M. the King personally that
+  mobilization being already carried out could not be stopped, but
+  if H. M. could guarantee with his armed forces the neutrality of
+  France I would refrain _from attacking her_, _leave her alone_
+  and employ my troops elsewhere. H. M. answered that he thought my
+  offer was based on a misunderstanding; and, as far as I can make
+  out, Sir E. Grey never took my offer into serious consideration.
+  He never answered it. Instead, he declared England had to defend
+  Belgian neutrality, which had to be violated by Germany on
+  strategical grounds, news having been received that France was
+  already preparing to enter Belgium, and the King of Belgians
+  having refused my petition for a free passage under guarantee
+  of his country's freedom. I am most grateful for the President's
+  message.
+
+                                                  WILLIAM, H. R.
+
+When the German Emperor in my presence indited his letter to
+President Wilson of August tenth, 1914, he asked that I cable
+it immediately to the State Department and that I simultaneously
+give it to the press. As I have already stated, I cabled the
+document immediately to the State Department at Washington, but
+I withheld it from publication.
+
+My interview with the Emperor was in the morning. That afternoon
+a man holding a high position in Germany sent for me. I do not
+give his name because I do not wish to involve him in any way
+with the Emperor, so I shall not even indicate whether he is a
+royalty or an official. He said:
+
+"You had an interview today with the Emperor. What happened?"
+
+I told of the message given me for the President which was intended
+for publication by the Emperor. He said:
+
+"I think you ought to show that message to me; you know the Emperor
+is a constitutional Emperor and there was once a great row about
+such a message."
+
+I showed him the message, and when he had read it he said: "I
+think it would be inadvisable for us to have this message published,
+and in the interest of good feeling between Germany and America.
+If you cable it ask that publication be withheld."
+
+I complied with his request and it is characteristic of the
+President's desire to preserve good relations that publication
+was withheld. Now, when the two countries are at war; when the
+whole world, and especially our own country, has an interest in
+knowing how this great calamity of universal war came to the
+earth, the time has come when this message should be given out
+and I have published it by permission.
+
+This most interesting document in the first place clears up one
+issue never really obscure in the eyes of the world--the deliberate
+violation of the neutrality of Belgium, whose territory "had to
+be violated by Germany on strategical grounds." The very weak
+excuse is added that "news had been received that France was
+already preparing to enter Belgium,"--not even a pretense that
+there had ever been any actual violation of Belgium's frontier
+by the French prior to the German invasion of that unfortunate
+country. Of course the second excuse that the King of the Belgians
+had refused entrance to the Emperor's troops under guarantee of
+his country's freedom is even weaker than the first. It would
+indeed inaugurate a new era in the intercourse of nations if a
+small nation could only preserve its freedom by at all times,
+on request, granting free passage to the troops of a powerful
+neighbour on the march to attack an adjoining country.
+
+And aside from the violation of Belgian neutrality, what would
+have become of England and of the world if the Prussian autocracy
+had been left free to defeat--one by one--the nations of the
+earth? First, the defeat of Russia and Serbia by Austria and
+Germany, the incorporation of a large part of Russia in the German
+Empire, German influence predominant in Russia and all the vast
+resources of that great Empire at the command of Germany. All the
+fleets in the world could uselessly blockade the German coasts
+if Germany possessed the limitless riches of the Empire of the
+Romanoffs.
+
+[Illustration: ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS, WHICH THE GERMANS DECLARED
+HAD BEEN FOUND IN LONGWY.]
+
+The German army drawing for reserves on the teeming populations
+of Russia and Siberia would never know defeat. And this is not
+idle conjecture, mere dreaming in the realm of possibilities,
+because the Russian revolution has shown us how weak and tottering
+in reality was the dreaded power of the Czar.
+
+Russia, beaten and half digested, France would have been an easy
+prey, and England, even if then joining France in war, would
+have a far different problem to face if the V-boats were now
+sailing from Cherbourg and Calais and Brest and Bordeaux on the
+mission of piracy and murder, and then would come our turn and
+that of Latin America. The first attack would come not on us,
+but on South or Central America--at some point to which it would
+be as difficult for us to send troops to help our neighbor as
+it would be for Germany to attack.
+
+Remember that in Southern Brazil nearly four hundred thousand
+Germans are sustained, as I found out, in their devotion to the
+Fatherland by annual grants of money for educational purposes
+from the Imperial treasury in Berlin.
+
+It was not without reason that at this interview, when the Kaiser
+wrote this message to the President, he said that the coming
+in of England had changed the whole situation and would make
+the war a long one. The Kaiser talked rather despondently about
+the war. I tried to cheer him up by saying the German troops
+would soon enter Paris, but he answered, "The English change
+the whole situation--an obstinate nation--they will keep up the
+war. It cannot end soon."
+
+It was the entry of England into the war, in defence of the rights
+of small nations, in defence of the guaranteed neutrality of
+Belgium, which saved the world from the harsh dominion of the
+conquest-hungry Prussians and therefore saved as well the two
+Americas and their protecting doctrine of President Monroe.
+
+The document, which is dated August tenth, 1914, supersedes the
+statement made by the German Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg in
+his speech before the Reichstag on August fourth, 1914, in which
+he gave the then official account of the entrance into the war of
+the Central Empires. It will be noted that von Bethmann-Hollweg
+insisted that France began the war in the sentence reading: "There
+were bomb-throwing fliers, cavalry patrols, invading companies
+in the Reichsland (Alsace-Lorraine). Thereby France, although
+the condition of war had not yet been declared, had attacked our
+territory." But the Emperor makes no mention of this fact, of
+supreme importance if true, in his writing to President Wilson
+six days later.
+
+Quite curiously, at this time there was a belief on the part
+of the Germans that Japan would declare war on the Allies and
+range herself on the side of the Central Powers. In fact on one
+night there was a friendly demonstration in front of the Japanese
+Embassy, but these hopes were soon dispelled by the ultimatum
+of Japan sent on the sixteenth of August, and, finally, by the
+declaration of war on August twenty-third.
+
+During the first days of the war the warring powers indulged in
+mutual recriminations as to the use of dumdum bullets and I was
+given several packages of cartridges containing bullets bored out
+at the top which the Germans said had been found in the French
+fortress of Longwy, with a request that I send an account of them
+to President Wilson and ask for his intervention in the matter.
+Very wisely President Wilson refused to do anything of the kind,
+as otherwise he would have been deluged with constant complaints
+from both sides as to the violations of the rules of war.
+
+The cartridges given to me were in packages marked on the outside
+"_Cartouches de Stand_" and from this I took it that possibly
+these cartridges had been used on some shooting range near the
+fort and the bullets bored out in order that they might not go
+too far, if carelessly fired over the targets.
+
+On August fifth, with our Naval Attaché, Commander Walter Gherardi,
+I called upon von Tirpitz, to learn from him which ports be
+considered safest for the ships to be sent from America with gold
+for stranded Americans. He recommended Rotterdam.
+
+I also had a conversation on this day with Geheimrat Letze of
+the Foreign Office with reference to the proposition that English
+and German ships respectively should have a delay of until the
+fourteenth of August in which to leave the English or German
+ports in which they chanced to be.
+
+The second week in August, my wife's sister and her husband,
+Count Sigray, arrived in Berlin. Count Sigray is a reserve officer
+of the Hungarian Hussars and was in Montana when the first rumours
+of war came. He and his wife immediately started for New York and
+sailed on the fourth of August. They landed in England, and as
+England had not yet declared war on Austria, they were able to
+proceed on their journey. With them were Count George Festetics
+and Count Cziraki, the former from the Austrian Embassy in London
+and the latter from that in Washington. They were all naturally
+very much excited about war and the events of their trip. The
+Hungarians as a people are quite like Americans. They have agreeable
+manners and are able to laugh in a natural way, something which
+seems to be a lost art in Prussia. Nearly all the members of
+Hungarian noble families speak English perfectly and model their
+clothes, sports and country life, as far as possible, after the
+English.
+
+The thirteenth saw the departure of our first special train
+containing Americans bound for Holland. I saw the Americans off
+at the Charlottenburg station. They all departed in great spirits
+and very glad of an opportunity to leave Germany.
+
+I had some negotiations about the purchase by America or Americans
+of the ships of the North German Lloyd, but nothing came of these
+negotiations. Trainloads of Americans continued to leave, but
+there seemed to be no end to the Americans coming into Berlin
+from all directions.
+
+On August twenty-ninth, Count Szoegyeny, the Austrian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. He had been Ambassador there for twenty-two years and
+I suppose because of his advancing years the Austrian Government
+thought that he had outlived his usefulness. Quite a crowd of
+Germans and diplomats were at the station to witness the rather
+sad farewell. His successor was Prince Hohenlohe, married to a
+daughter of Archduke Frederick. She expressly waived her right
+to precedence as a royal highness, and agreed to take only the
+precedence given to her as the wife of the Ambassador, in order not
+to cause feeling in Berlin. Prince Hohenlohe, a rather easy-going
+man, who had been most popular in Russia and Austria, immediately
+made a favourable impression in Berlin and successfully occupied
+the difficult position of mediator between the governments of
+Berlin and Vienna.
+
+On September fourth the Chancellor gave me a statement to give
+to the reporters in which he attacked England, claiming that
+England did not desire the friendship of Germany but was moved by
+commercial jealousy and a desire to crush her; that the efforts
+made for peace had failed because Russia, under all circumstances,
+was resolved upon war; and that Germany had entered Belgium in
+order to forestall the planned French advance. He also claimed
+that England, regardless of consequences to the white race, had
+excited Japan to a pillaging expedition, and claimed that Belgian
+girls and women had gouged out the eyes of the wounded; that
+officers had been invited to dinner and shot across the table;
+and Belgian women had cut the throats of soldiers quartered in
+their houses while they were asleep. The Chancellor concluded by
+saying, in this statement, that everyone knows that the German
+people is not capable of unnecessary cruelty or of any brutality.
+
+We were fully occupied with taking care of the English prisoners
+and interests, the Americans, and negotiations relating to commercial
+questions, and to getting goods required in the United States out
+of Germany, when, on October seventh, a most unpleasant incident,
+and one which for some time caused the members of our Embassy
+to feel rather bitterly toward the German Foreign Office, took
+place.
+
+A great number of British civilians, men and women, were stranded
+in Berlin. To many of these were paid sums of money in the form
+of small allowances on behalf of the British Government. In order
+to facilitate this work, we placed the clerks employed in this
+distribution in the building formerly occupied by the British Consul
+in Berlin. Of course, the great crowds of Americans resorting to
+our Embassy, when combined with the crowds of British, made it
+almost impossible even to enter the Embassy, and establishment
+of this outlying relief station materially helped this situation.
+I occupied it, and employed English men and English women in this
+relief work by the express permission of the Imperial Foreign
+Office, which I thought it wise to obtain in view of the fact
+that the Germans seemed daily to become more irritable and
+suspicious, especially after the Battle of the Marne.
+
+On the night of October second, our Second Secretary, Harvey, went
+to this relief headquarters at about twelve o'clock at night, and
+was witness to a raid made by the Berlin police on this establishment
+of ours. The men and women working were arrested, and all books
+and papers which the police could get at were seized by them.
+The next morning I went around to the place and on talking with
+the criminal detectives in charge, was told by them that they had
+made the raid by the orders of the Foreign Office. When I spoke
+to the Foreign Office about this, they denied that they had given
+directions for the raid and made a sort of half apology. The raid
+was all the more unjustified because only the day before I had had
+a conversation with the Adjutant of the Berlin Kommandantur and
+told him that, although I had permission from the Foreign Office,
+I thought it would be better to dismiss the English employed and
+employ only Americans or Germans; and I sent round to my friend,
+Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and asked him to
+recommend some German accountants to me.
+
+The Kommandantur is the direct office of military control. When
+the Adjutant heard of the raid he was almost as indignant as I
+was, and on the tenth of October informed me that he had learned
+that the raid had been made on the joint orders of the Foreign
+Office and von Tirpitz's department.
+
+The books and papers of an Embassy, including those relating
+to the affairs of foreign nations temporarily in the Embassy's
+care, are universally recognised in international law as not,
+subject to seizure, nor did the fact that I was carrying on this
+work outside the actual Embassy building have any bearing on
+this point so long as the building was directly under my control
+and, especially, as the only work carried on was work properly
+in my hands in my official capacity. The Foreign Office saw that
+they had made a mistake, but at Zimmermann's earnest request
+I agreed, as it were, to forget the incident. Later on, this
+precedent might have been used by our government had they desired
+to press the matter of the seizure of von Igel's papers. Von Igel,
+it will be remembered, was carrying on business of a private
+nature in a private office hired by him. Nevertheless, as he
+had been employed in some capacity in the German Embassy at
+Washington, Count von Bernstorff claimed immunity from seizure
+for the papers found in that office.
+
+On August sixteenth the Kaiser left Berlin for the front. I wrote
+to his master of the household, saying that I should like an
+opportunity to be at the railway station to say good-bye to the
+Emperor, but was put off on various excuses. Thereafter the Emperor
+practically abandoned Berlin and lived either in Silesia, at
+Pless, or at some place near the Western front.
+
+At first, following the precedent of the war of 1870, the more
+important members of the government followed the Kaiser to the
+front, even the Chancellor and the Minister of Foreign Affairs
+abandoning their offices in Berlin. Not long afterwards, when it
+was apparent that the war must be carried on on several fronts
+and that it was not going to be the matter of a few weeks which
+the Germans had first supposed, these officials returned to their
+offices in Berlin. In the meantime, however, much confusion had
+been caused by this rather ridiculous effort to follow the customs
+of the war of 1870.
+
+When von Jagow, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent at the
+Great General Headquarters, the diplomats remaining behind conducted
+their negotiations with Zimmermann, who in turn had to transmit
+everything to the great general headquarters.
+
+In August, there were apparently rumours afloat in countries
+outside of Germany that prominent Socialists at the outbreak of
+the war had been shot. The State Department cabled me to find
+out whether there was any truth in these rumours, with particular
+reference to Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg.
+
+Liebknecht is a lawyer practicing in Berlin and so I telephoned
+him, asking him to come and see me. He did so, and of course, by
+his presence verified the fact that he had not been executed.
+He told me that the rumours as to the treatment of the Socialists
+were entirely unfounded and said that he had no objection to my
+cabling a statement that the Socialists were opposed to Czarismus
+and that he personally had confidence in the German army and the
+cause of the German people.
+
+Many people confuse Liebknecht with his father, now dead. Liebknecht,
+the son, is a man of perhaps forty-three years, with dark bushy
+hair and moustache and wearing eye-glasses, a man of medium height
+and not at all of strong build. In the numerous interruptions
+made by him during the debates in the Reichstag, during the first
+year of the war, his voice sounded high and shrill. Of course,
+anyone who defies the heavy hand of autocracy must suffer from
+nervousness. We all knew that sooner or later autocracy would
+"get" Liebknecht, and its opportunity came when he appeared in
+citizen's clothes at an attempted mass-meeting at the Potsdamerplatz.
+For the offence of appearing out of uniform after being called
+and mobilized, and for alleged incitement of the people, he was
+condemned for a long term of imprisonment. One can but admire
+his courage. I believe that he earns his living by the practice
+of law before one of the minor courts. It is hard to say just
+what _rôle_ he will play in the future. It is probable that
+when the Socialists settle down after the war and think things
+over, they will consider that the leadership of Scheidemann has
+been too conservative; that he submitted too readily to the powers
+of autocracy and too easily abandoned the program of the Socialists.
+In this case, Liebknecht perhaps will be made leader of the
+Socialists, and it is within the bounds of probability that
+Scheidemann and certain of his party may become Liberals rather
+than Socialists.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS
+
+In the autumn of 1914, the rush of getting the Americans out
+of Germany was over. The care of the British civilians was on a
+business basis and there were comparatively few camps of prisoners
+of war. Absolutely tired by working every day and until twelve
+at night, I went to Munich for a two weeks' rest.
+
+On February fourth, 1915, Germany announced that on February
+eighteenth the blockade of England through submarines would commence.
+
+Some very peculiar and mysterious negotiations thereafter ensued.
+About February eighth, an American who was very intimate with
+the members of the General Staff came to me with a statement
+that Germany desired peace and was ready to open negotiations
+to that end. It was, however, to be made a condition of these
+peace negotiations that this particular American should go to
+Paris and to Petrograd and inform the governments there of the
+overwhelming strength of the German armies and of their positions,
+which knowledge, it was said, he had obtained by personally visiting
+both the fronts, it was further intimated that von Tirpitz himself
+was anxious that peace should be concluded, possibly because of
+his fear that the proposed blockade would not be successful.
+
+Of course, I informed the State Department of these mysterious
+manoeuvres.
+
+I was taken by back stairways to a mysterious meeting with von
+Tirpitz at night in his rooms in the Navy Department. When I was
+alone with him, however, he had nothing definite to say or to
+offer; if there was any opportunity at that time to make peace
+nothing came of it. It looked somewhat to me as if the whole
+idea had been to get this American to go to Paris and Petrograd,
+certify from his personal observation to the strength of the
+German armies and position, and thereby to assist in enticing
+one or both of these countries to desert the allied cause. All of
+this took place about ten days before the eighteenth of February,
+the time named for the announcement of the blockade of England.
+
+Medals were struck having the head of von Tirpitz on one side
+and on the other the words "Gott strafe England," and a picture
+of a sort of Neptune assisted by a submarine rising from the
+sea to blockade the distant English coast.
+
+The Ambassador is supposed to have the right to demand an audience
+with the Kaiser at any time, and as there were matters connected
+with the treatment of prisoners as well as this coming submarine
+warfare which I wished to take up with him, I had on various
+occasions asked for an audience with him; on each occasion my
+request had been refused on some excuse or other, and I was not
+even permitted to go to the railway station to bid him good-bye
+on one occasion when he left for the front.
+
+When our Military Attaché, Major Langhorne, left in March, 1915,
+he had a farewell audience with the Kaiser and I then asked him
+to say to the Kaiser that I had not seen him for so long a time
+that I had forgotten what he looked like. Langhorne reported
+to me that he had given his message to the Kaiser and that the
+Kaiser said, "I have nothing against Mr. Gerard personally, but
+I will not see the Ambassador of a country which furnishes arms
+and ammunition to the enemies of Germany."
+
+Before the departure of Langhorne, I had succeeded in getting
+Germany to agree that six American army officers might visit
+Germany as military observers. When they arrived, I presented
+them at the Foreign Office, etc., and they were taken on trips
+to the East and West fronts.
+
+They were not allowed to see much, and their request to be attached
+to a particular unit was refused. Nearly everywhere they were
+subject to insulting remarks or treatment because of the shipment
+of munitions of war to the Allies from America; and finally after
+they had been subjected to deliberate insults at the hands of
+several German generals, Mackensen particularly distinguishing
+himself, the United States Government withdrew them from Germany.
+
+Colonel (now General) Kuhn, however, who was of these observers,
+was appointed Military Attaché in place of Major Langhorne. Speaking
+German fluently and acting with great tact, he managed for a long
+time to keep sufficiently in the good graces of the Germans to
+be allowed to see something of the operations of the various
+fronts. There came a period in 1916 when he was no longer invited
+to go on the various excursions made by the foreign military
+attachés and finally Major Nicolai, the general intelligence
+officer of the Great General Headquarters, sent for him early in
+the autumn of 1916, and informed him that he could no longer go
+to any of the fronts. Colonel Kuhn answered that he was aware of
+this already. Major Nicolai said that he gave him this information
+by direct order of General Ludendorf, that General Ludendorf had
+stated that he did not believe America could do more damage to
+Germany than she had done if the two countries were actually
+at war, and that he considered that, practically, America and
+Germany were engaged in hostilities. On this being reported to
+Washington, Colonel Kuhn was quite naturally recalled.
+
+I cannot praise too highly the patience and tact shown by Colonel
+Kuhn in dealing with the Germans. Although accused in the German
+newspapers of being a spy, and otherwise attacked, he kept his
+temper and observed all that he could for the benefit of his own
+country. As he had had an opportunity to observe the Russian-Japanese
+war, his experiences at that time, coupled with his experiences
+in Germany, make him, perhaps, our greatest American expert on
+modern war.
+
+It was with the greatest pleasure that I heard from Secretary
+Baker that he had determined to promote Colonel Kuhn to the rank
+of General and make him head of our War College, where his teachings
+will prove of the greatest value to the armies of the United States.
+
+Colonel House and his wife arrived to pay us a visit on March 19,
+1915, and remained until the twenty-eighth. During this period the
+Colonel met all the principal members of the German Government and
+many men of influence and prominence in the world of affairs, such
+as Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and Dr. Walter
+Rathenau, who succeeded his father as head of the Allgemeine
+Elektricitats Gesellschaft and hundreds of other corporations. The
+Colonel dined at the house of Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister,
+and lunched with von Gwinner.
+
+In April, negotiations were continued about the sinking of the
+_William P. Fry_, an American boat loaded with food and
+destined for Ireland. The American Government on behalf of the
+owners of the _William P. Fry_ claimed damages for the boat.
+Nothing was said about the cargo, but in the German answer it was
+stated that the cargo of the _William P. Fry_ consisting of
+foodstuffs destined for an armed port of the enemy and, therefore,
+presumed to be destined for the armed forces of the enemy was,
+because of this, contraband. I spoke to von Jagow about this and
+told him that I thought that possibly this would seem to amount
+to a German justification of the British blockade of Germany.
+He said that this note had been drawn by Director Kriege who
+was their expert on international law, and that he would not
+interfere with Kriege's work. Of course, as a matter of fact,
+all foodstuffs shipped to Germany would have to be landed at
+some armed port, and, therefore, according to the contentions
+of Germany, these would be supposed to be destined to the armed
+forces of the enemy and become contraband of war.
+
+At international law, it had always been recognised that private
+individuals and corporations have the right to sell arms and
+ammunitions of war to any belligerent and, in the Hague Convention
+held in 1907, this right was expressly ratified and confirmed.
+This same Director Kriege who represented Germany at this Hague
+Conference in 1907, in the debates on this point said: "The neutral
+boats which engage in such a trade, commit a violation of the
+duties of neutrality. However, according to a principle generally
+recognised, the State of which the boat flies the flag is not
+responsible for this violation. The neutral States are not called
+upon to forbid their subjects a commerce which, from the point of
+view of the belligerents, ought to be considered as unlawful."
+(Conférence International de la Paix, La Haye, 15 Juin-18 Octobre
+1907. Vol. III, p. 859.)
+
+During our trouble with General Huerta, arms and ammunition for
+Huerta's forces from Germany were landed from German ships in
+Mexico. During the Boer war the Germans, who openly sympathised
+with the Boers, nevertheless furnished to England great quantities
+of arms and munitions, expressly destined to be used against
+the Boers; and this, although it was manifest that there was
+no possibility whatever that the Boers could obtain arms and
+munitions from German sources during the war. For instance, the
+firm of Eberhardt in Dusseldorf furnished one hundred and nine
+cannon, complete, with wagons, caissons and munitions, etc., to
+the English which were expressly designed for use against the
+Boers.
+
+At one time the Imperial Foreign Office sent me a formal note
+making reference to a paragraph in former Ambassador Andrew D.
+White's autobiography with reference to the alleged stoppage
+in a German port of a boat laden with arms and ammunition, for
+use against the Americans in Cuba during the Spanish War. Of
+course, former Ambassador White wrote without having the Embassy
+records at hand and those records show that the position he took
+at the time of this alleged stoppage was eminently correct.
+
+The files show that he wrote the letter to the State Department
+in which he stated that knowledge came to him of the proposed
+sailing of this ship, but he did not protest because he had been
+advised by a Naval Attaché that the United States did not have
+the right to interfere. The Department of State wrote to him
+commending his action in not filing any protest and otherwise
+interfering.
+
+It seemed as if the German Government expressly desired to stir
+up hatred against America on this issue in order to force the
+American Government through fear of either the German Government,
+or the German-American propagandists at home, to put an immediate
+embargo on the export of these supplies.
+
+In the autumn of 1914 Zimmermann showed me a long list sent him
+by Bernstorff showing quantities of saddles, automobiles, motor
+trucks, tires, explosives, foodstuffs and so on, exported from
+America to the Allies and intimated that this traffic had reached
+such proportions that it should be stopped.
+
+In February, 1915, in the official _Communiqué_ of the day
+appeared the following statement: "Heavy artillery fire in certain
+sections of the West front, mostly with American ammunition;"
+and in April in the official _Communiqué_ something to this
+effect: "Captured French artillery officers say that they have
+great stores of American ammunition." I obtained through the State
+Department in Washington a statement from the French Ambassador
+certifying that up to that time, the end of April, 1915, no shells
+whatever of the French artillery had been furnished from America.
+
+Nothing, however, would satisfy the Germans. They seemed determined
+that the export of every article, whether of food or munitions
+which might prove of use to the Allies in the war, should be
+stopped. Newspapers were filled with bitter attacks upon America
+and upon President Wilson, and with caricatures referring to
+the sale of munitions.
+
+It never seemed to occur to the Germans that we could not violate
+the Hague Convention in order to change the rules of the game
+because one party, after the commencement of hostilities, found
+that the rule worked to his disadvantage. Nor did the Germans
+consider that America could not vary its international law with
+the changing fortunes of war and make one ruling when the Germans
+lost control of the sea and another ruling if they regained it.
+
+From early in 1915 until I left Germany, I do not think I ever
+had a conversation with a German without his alluding to this
+question. Shortly before leaving Germany, in January, 1917, and
+after I had learned of the probability of the resumption of ruthless
+submarine war, at an evening party at the house of Dr. Solf, the
+Colonial Minister, a large German who turned out to be one of
+the Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, planted himself some
+distance away from me and addressed me in German saying, "You are
+the American Ambassador and I want to tell you that the conduct
+of America in furnishing arms and ammunition to the enemies of
+Germany is stamped deep on the German heart, that we will never
+forget it and will some day have our revenge." He spoke in a
+voice so loud and slapped his chest so hard that everyone in
+the room stopped their conversation in order to hear. He wore
+on his breast the orders of the Black Eagle, the Red Eagle, the
+Elephant and the Seraphim, and when he struck all this menagerie
+the rattle alone was quite loud. I reminded him politely of the
+Hague Convention, of the fact that we could not change international
+law from time to time with the change in the situation of the war,
+and that Germany had furnished arms to England to use against the
+Boers. But he simply answered, "We care nothing for treaties,"
+and my answer, "That is what they all say," was a retort too
+obvious to be omitted.
+
+The German press continually published articles to the effect
+that the war would be finished if it were not for the shipment
+of supplies from America. All public opinion was with the German
+Government when the warning was issued on February fourth, 1915,
+stating that the blockade of England would commence on the eighteenth
+and warning neutral ships to keep out of the war zone. From then
+on we had constant cases and crises with reference to the sinking
+of American boats by the German submarine. There were the cases
+of the _Gulfflight_ and the _Cushing_ and the _Falaba_, an English
+boat sunk without warning on which Americans were killed. On May
+sixth, 1915, Director Kriege of the Foreign Office asked Mr. Jackson
+to call and see him, and told him that he would like to have the
+following three points brought to the attention of the American
+public:
+
+  "1. As the result of the English effort to stop all foreign
+  commerce with Germany, Germany would do everything in her power
+  to destroy English commerce and merchant shipping. There was,
+  however, never at any time an intention to destroy or interfere
+  with neutral commerce or to attack neutral shipping unless
+  engaged in contraband trade. In view of the action of the
+  British Government in arming merchant vessels and causing
+  them to disguise their national character, the occasional
+  destruction of a neutral ship was unavoidable. Naval officers
+  in command of submarines had been instructed originally, and
+  new and more stringent instructions had been issued repeatedly,
+  to use the utmost care, consistent with their own safety, to
+  avoid attacks on neutral vessels.
+
+  "2. In case a neutral ship should be destroyed by a submarine
+  the German Government is prepared to make an immediate and
+  formal expression of its regret and to pay an indemnity, without
+  having recourse to a prize court.
+
+  "3. All reports with regard to the destruction of a neutral
+  vessel by a German submarine are investigated at once by both
+  the German Foreign Office and Admiralty and the result is
+  communicated to the Government concerned, which is requested in
+  return to communicate to the German Government the result of its
+  own independent investigation. Where there is any material
+  divergence in the two reports as to the presumed cause of
+  destruction (torpedo or mine), the question is to be submitted
+  to investigation by a commission composed of representatives of
+  the two nations concerned, with a neutral arbiter whose decision
+  will be final. This course has already been adopted in two cases,
+  in which a Dutch and a Norwegian vessel, respectively, were
+  concerned. The German Government reserves its right to refuse
+  this international arbitration in exceptional cases where for
+  military reasons the German Admiralty are opposed to its taking
+  place."
+
+Director Kriege told Mr. Jackson that a written communication in
+which the substance of the foregoing would be contained, would
+soon to be made to the Embassy.
+
+Mr. Jackson put this conversation down in the form above given
+and showed Director Kriege a copy of it. Later in the day Geheimrat
+Simon called on Mr. Jackson at the Embassy and said that Dr.
+Kriege would like to have point two read as follows:
+
+  "In case _through any unfortunate mistake a neutral ship_,"
+  and continuing to the end; and that Dr. Kriege would like to
+  change what was written on point three beginning with "Where
+  there is" so that it should read, as follows:--"Where there is
+  any material divergence in the two reports as to the presumed
+  cause of destruction (torpedo or mine), the German Government has
+  already in several instances declared its readiness to submit
+  the question to the decision of an international commission in
+  accordance with the Hague Convention for the friendly settlement
+  of international disputes."
+
+This had been suggested by Director Kriege in case it should
+be decided to make a communication to the American Press. Mr.
+Jackson told Geheimrat Simon that he would report the subject of
+his conversation to me, but that it would depend upon me whether
+any communication should be made to the American Government or
+to the press upon the subject.
+
+Of course, the news of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ on
+May seventh and of the great loss of American lives brought
+about a very critical situation, and naturally nothing was done
+with Kriege's propositions.
+
+It is unnecessary here for me to go into the notes which were
+exchanged between the two governments because all that is already
+public property.
+
+Sometime after I had delivered our first _Lusitania_ Note of
+May 11th, 1915, Zimmermann was lunching with us. A good looking
+American woman, married to a German, was also of the party and
+after lunch although I was talking to some one else I overheard
+part of her conversation with Zimmermann. When Zimmermann left
+I asked her what it was that he had said about America, Germany,
+Mr. Bryan and the _Lusitania_. She then told me that she
+had said to Zimmermann that it was a great pity that we were
+to leave Berlin as it looked as if diplomatic relations between
+the two countries would be broken, and that Zimmermann told her
+not to worry about that because they had just received word from
+the Austrian Government that Dr. Dumba, the Austrian Ambassador
+in Washington, had cabled that the _Lusitania_ Note from
+America to Germany was only sent as a sop to public opinion in
+America and that the government did not really mean what was
+said in that note. I then called on Zimmermann at the Foreign
+Office and he showed me Dumba's telegram which was substantially
+as stated above. Of course, I immediately cabled to the State
+Department and also got word to President Wilson. The rest of
+the incident is public property. I, of course, did not know what
+actually occurred between Mr. Bryan and Dr. Dumba, but I am sure
+that Dr. Dumba must have misunderstood friendly statements made
+by Mr. Bryan.
+
+It was very lucky that I discovered the existence of this Dumba
+cablegram in this manner which savours almost of diplomacy as
+represented on the stage. If the Germans had gone on in the belief
+that the _Lusitania_ Note was not really meant, war would
+have inevitably resulted at that time between Germany and America,
+and it shows how great events may be shaped by heavy luncheons
+and a pretty woman.
+
+Before this time much indignation had been caused in Germany
+by the fact that the _Lusitania_ on her eastward voyage
+from New York early in February, 1915, had raised the American
+flag when nearing British waters.
+
+Shortly after this incident had become known, I was at the
+Wintergarten, a large concert hall in Berlin, with Grant Smith,
+First Secretary of the Embassy at Vienna and other members of
+my staff. We naturally spoke English among ourselves, a fact
+which aroused the ire of a German who had been drinking heavily
+and who was seated in the next box. He immediately began to call
+out that some one was speaking English and when told by one of
+the attendants that it was the American Ambassador, he immediately
+cried in a loud voice that Americans were even worse than English
+and that the _Lusitania_ had been flying the American flag as
+protection in British waters.
+
+The audience, however, took sides against him and told him to
+shut up and as I left the house at the close of the performance,
+some Germans spoke to me and apologised for his conduct. The
+next day the manager of the Wintergarten called on me also to
+express his regret for the occurrence.
+
+About a year afterwards I was at the races one day and saw this
+man and asked him what he meant by making such a noise at the
+Wintergarten. He immediately apologised and said that he had
+been drinking and hoped that I would forget the incident. This
+was the only incident of the kind which occurred to me during
+all the time that I was in Germany.
+
+Both before and after the sinking of the _Lusitania_, the
+German Foreign Office put forward all kinds of proposals with
+reference to American ships in the war zone. On one afternoon,
+Zimmermann, who had a number of these proposals drafted in German,
+showed them to me and I wrote down the English translation for him
+to see how it would look in English. These proposals were about
+the sailing from America of what might be called certified ships,
+the ships to be painted and striped in a distinctive way, to come
+from certified ports at certain certified times, America to agree
+that these ships should carry no contraband whatever. All these
+proposals were sternly rejected by the President.
+
+On February sixteenth, the German answer to our note of February
+tenth had announced that Germany declined all responsibility for
+what might happen to neutral ships and, in addition, announced
+that mines would be allowed in waters surrounding Great Britain
+and Ireland. This note also contained one of Zimmermann's proposed
+solutions, namely, that American warships should convoy American
+merchantmen.
+
+The German note of the sixteenth also spoke about the great traffic
+in munitions from the United States to the Allies, and contained
+a suggestion that the United States should induce the Allies to
+adopt the Declaration of London and omit the importation not
+only of food but also of all raw materials into Germany.
+
+February twentieth was the date of the conciliatory note addressed
+by President Wilson to both Great Britain and Germany; and contained
+the suggestion that submarines should not be employed against
+merchant vessels of any nationality and that food should be allowed
+to go through for the civil population of Germany consigned to
+the agencies named by the United States in Germany, which were
+to see that the food was received and distributed to the civil
+population.
+
+In the meantime the mines on the German coast had destroyed two
+American ships, both loaded with cotton for Germany; one called
+the _Carib_ and the other the _Evelyn_.
+
+In America, Congress refused to pass a law to put it in the power
+of the President to place an embargo on the export of munitions
+of war.
+
+In April, Count Bernstorff delivered his note concerning the
+alleged want of neutrality of the United States, referring to
+the numerous new industries in war materials being built up in
+the United States, stating, "In reality the United States is
+supplying only Germany's enemies, a fact which is not in any
+way modified by the theoretical willingness to furnish Germany
+as well."
+
+To this note, Secretary Bryan in a note replied that it was
+impossible, in view of the indisputable doctrines of accepted
+international law, to make any change in our own laws of neutrality
+which meant unequally affecting, during the progress of the war,
+the relations of the United States with the various nations at
+war; and that the placing of embargoes on the trade in arms which
+constituted such a change would be a direct violation of the
+neutrality of the United States.
+
+But all these negotiations, reproaches and recriminations were
+put an end to by the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_, with the
+killing of American women and civilians who were passengers on
+that vessel.
+
+I believed myself that we would immediately break diplomatic
+relations, and prepared to leave Germany. On May eleventh, I
+delivered to von Jagow the _Lusitania_ Note, which after
+calling attention to the cases of the sinking of American boats,
+ending with the _Lusitania_, contained the statement, "The
+Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of
+the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the
+sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and
+its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercises and
+enjoyments."
+
+During this period I had constant conversations with von Jagow
+and Zimmermann, and it was during the conversations about this
+submarine warfare that Zimmermann on one occasion said to me:
+"The United States does not dare to do anything against Germany
+because we have five hundred thousand German reservists in America
+who will rise in arms against your government if your government
+should dare to take any action against Germany." As he said this,
+he worked himself up to a passion and repeatedly struck the table
+with his fist. I told him that we had five hundred and one thousand
+lamp posts in America, and that was where the German reservists
+would find themselves if they tried any uprising; and I also
+called his attention to the fact that no German-Americans making
+use of the American passports which they could easily obtain,
+were sailing for Germany by way of Scandinavian countries in
+order to enlist in the German army. I told him that if he could
+show me one person with an American passport who had come to
+fight in the German army I might more readily believe what he
+said about the Germans in America rising in revolution.
+
+As a matter of fact, during the whole course of the war, I knew
+of only one man with American citizenship who enlisted in the
+German army. This was an American student then in Germany who
+enlisted in a German regiment. His father, a business man in New
+York, cabled me asking me to have his son released from the German
+army; so I procured the discharge of the young man who immediately
+wrote to me and informed me that he was over twenty-one, and
+that he could not see what business his father had to interfere
+with his military ambitions. I thereupon withdrew my request
+with reference to him, but he had already been discharged from
+the army. When his regiment went to the West front he stowed
+away on the cars with it, was present at the attack on Ypres,
+and was shot through the body. He recovered in a German hospital,
+received the Iron Cross, was discharged and sailed for America.
+What has since become of him I do not know.
+
+I do not intend to go in great detail into this exchange of notes
+and the public history of the submarine controversy, as all that
+properly belongs to the history of the war rather than to an
+account of my personal experiences; and besides, as Victor Hugo
+said, "History is not written with a microscope." All will remember
+the answer of Germany to the American _Lusitania_ Note, which
+answer, delivered on May twenty-ninth, contained the charge that
+the _Lusitania_ was armed and carried munitions, and had been
+used in the transport of Canadian troops. In the meantime, however,
+the American ship, _Nebraskan_, had been torpedoed off the coast
+of Ireland on the twenty-sixth; and, on May twenty-eighth, Germany
+stated that the American steamer, _Gulfflight_, had been torpedoed
+by mistake, and apologised for this act.
+
+Von Jagow gave me, about the same time, a Note requesting that
+American vessels should be more plainly marked and should illuminate
+their marking at night.
+
+The second American _Lusitania_ Note was published on June
+eleventh, 1915; and its delivery was coincident with the resignation
+of Mr. Bryan as Secretary of State. In this last Note President
+Wilson (for, of course, it is an open secret that he was the
+author of these Notes) made the issue perfectly plain, referring
+to the torpedoing of enemy passenger ships. "Only her actual
+resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so
+for the purpose of visit could have afforded the commander of the
+submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of
+those on board the ship in jeopardy." On July eighth the German
+answer to this American _Lusitania_ Note was delivered, and
+again stated that "we have been obliged to adopt a submarine war
+to meet the declared intentions of our enemies and the method of
+warfare adopted by them in contravention of international law".
+Again referring to the alleged fact of the _Lusitania's_
+carrying munitions they said: "If the _Lusitania_ had been
+spared, thousands of cases of munitions would have been sent to
+Germany's enemies and thereby thousands of German mothers and
+children robbed of breadwinners." The note then contained some
+of Zimmermann's favourite proposals, to the effect that German
+submarine commanders would be instructed to permit the passage of
+American steamers marked in a special way and of whose sailing
+they had been notified in advance, provided that the American
+Government guaranteed that these vessels did not carry contraband
+of war. It was also suggested that a number of neutral vessels
+should be added to those sailing under the American flag, to
+give greater opportunity for those Americans who were compelled
+to travel abroad, and the Note's most important part continued:
+"In particular the Imperial Government is unable to admit that
+the American citizens can protect an enemy ship by mere fact
+of their presence on board."
+
+July twenty-first, the American Government rejected the proposals
+of Germany saying, "The lives of noncombatants may in no case
+be put in jeopardy unless the vessel resists or seeks to escape
+after being summoned to submit to examination," and disposed
+of the claim that the acts of England gave Germany the right
+to retaliate, even though American citizens should be deprived
+of their lives in the course of retaliation by stating: "For a
+belligerent act of retaliation is _per se_ an act beyond the
+law, and the defense, of an act as retaliatory, is an admission
+that it is illegal." Continuing it said: "If a belligerent cannot
+retaliate against an enemy without injuring the lives of neutrals,
+as well as their property, humanity, as well as justice and a
+due regard for the dignity of neutral powers, should dictate
+that the practice be discontinued."
+
+It was also said: "The United States cannot believe that the
+Imperial Government will longer refrain from disavowing the wanton
+act of its naval commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or
+from offering reparation for the American lives lost, so far
+as reparation can be made for the needless destruction of human
+life by an illegal act." And the meat of the Note was contained
+in the following sentence: "Friendship itself prompts it (the
+United States) to say to the Imperial Government that repetition
+by the commanders of German naval vessels of acts in contravention
+of those rights must be regarded by the Government of the United
+States, when they affect American citizens, as being deliberately
+unfriendly."
+
+There the matter has remained so far as the Lusitania was concerned
+until now. In the meantime, the attack of the American ship,
+_Nebraskan_, was disavowed; the German Note stating that
+"the torpedo was not meant for the American flag and is to be
+considered an unfortunate accident."
+
+The diplomatic situation with regard to the use of the submarine
+and the attack on many merchant ships without notice and without
+putting the passengers in safety was still unsettled when on
+August nineteenth, 1915, the British ship _Arabic_, was
+torpedoed, without warning, not far from the place where the
+_Lusitania_ had gone down. Two Americans were among the
+passengers killed.
+
+The German Government, after the usual quibbling, at length,
+in its Note of September seventh, claimed that the Captain of
+the German submarine, while engaged in preparing to sink the
+_Dunsley_, became convinced that the approaching _Arabic_
+was trying to ram him and, therefore, fired his torpedo. The
+Imperial Government refused to admit any liability but offered
+to arbitrate.
+
+There followed almost immediately the case of the _Ancona_,
+sunk by a submarine flying the Austrian flag. This case was naturally
+out of my jurisdiction, but formed a link in the chain, and then
+came the sinking of the _Persia_ in the Mediterranean. On this
+boat our consul to Aden lost his life.
+
+In the Note of Count Bernstorff to Secretary Lansing, dated September
+first, 1915, Count Bernstorff said that liners would not be sunk
+by German submarines without warning, and without putting the
+passengers in safety, provided that the liners did not try to
+escape or offer resistance; and it was further stated that this
+policy was in effect before the sinking of the _Arabic_.
+
+There were long negotiations during this period concerning the
+_Arabic_. At one time it looked as if diplomatic relations
+would be broken; but finally the Imperial Government consented
+to acknowledge that the submarine commander had been wrong in
+assuming that the _Arabic_ intended to ram his boat, offered
+to pay an indemnity and disavowed the act of the commander. It
+was stated that orders so precise had been given to the submarine
+commanders that a "recurrence of incidents similar to the
+_Arabic_ is considered out of the question."
+
+In the same way the Austrian Government gave way to the demands
+of America in the _Ancona_ case at the end of December, 1915.
+Ambassador Penfield, in Austria, won great praise by his admirable
+handling of this case.
+
+The negotiations as to the still pending _Lusitania_ case
+were carried on in Washington by Count Bernstorff and Secretary
+Lansing, and finally Germany offered to pay an indemnity for
+the death of the Americans on the _Lusitania_ whose deaths
+Germany "greatly regretted," but refused to disavow the act of
+the submarine commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or to admit
+that such act was illegal.
+
+About this time our State Department sent out a Note proposing
+in effect that submarines should conform to "cruiser" warfare,
+only sinking a vessel which defended itself or tried to escape,
+and that before sinking a vessel its passengers and crew should
+be placed in safety; and that, on the other hand, merchant vessels
+of belligerent nationality should be prohibited from carrying
+any armaments whatever. This suggestion was not followed up.
+
+Zimmermann (not the one in the Foreign Office) wrote an article
+in the _Lokal Anzeiger_ of which he is an editor, saying
+that the United States had something on their side in the question
+of the export of munitions. I heard that von Kessel, commander of
+the _Mark of Brandenburg_ said that he, Zimmermann, ought to be
+shot as a traitor. Zimmermann hearing of this made von Kessel
+apologise, but was shortly afterwards mobilised.
+
+Colonel House had arrived in Germany at the end of January, 1916,
+and remained only three days. He was quite worried by the situation
+and by an interview he had had with Zimmermann in which Zimmermann
+expressed the readiness of Germany to go to war with the United
+States.
+
+In February, 1916, the Junkers in the Prussian Lower House started
+a fight against the Chancellor and discussed submarine war, a
+matter out of their province. The Chancellor hit back at them hard
+and had the best of the exchange. At this period it was reported
+that the Emperor went to Wilhelmshafen to warn the submarine
+commanders to be careful.
+
+About March first it was reported that a grand council of war
+was held at Charleville and that in spite of the support of von
+Tirpitz by Falkenhayn, the Chief of Staff, the Chancellor was
+supported by the Emperor, and once more beat the propositions
+to recommence ruthless submarine war.
+
+In March too, the "illness" of von Tirpitz was announced, followed
+shortly by his resignation. On March nineteenth, his birthday,
+a demonstration was looked for and I saw many police near his
+dwelling, but nothing unusual occurred. I contemplated a trip
+to America, but both the Chancellor and von Jagow begged me not
+to go.
+
+From the time of the _Lusitania_ sinking to that of the _Sussex_
+all Germany was divided into two camps. The party of the Chancellor
+tried to keep peace with America and did not want to have Germany
+branded as an outlaw among nations. Von Tirpitz and his party of
+naval and military officers called for ruthless submarine war, and
+the Conservatives, angry with Bethmann-Hollweg because of his
+proposed concession as to the extension of the suffrage, joined
+the opposition. The reception of our last _Lusitania_ Note in
+July, 1915, was hostile and I was accused of being against Germany,
+although, of course, I had nothing to do with the preparation of
+this Note.
+
+In August, 1915, the deputies representing the great industrials
+of Germany joined in the attack on the Chancellor. These men
+wished to keep Northern France and Belgium, because they hoped
+to get possession of the coal and iron deposits there and so
+obtain a monopoly of the iron and steel trade of the continent.
+Accelerators of public opinion, undoubtedly hired by the Krupp
+firm, were hard at work. These Annexationists were opposed by the
+more reasonable men who signed a petition against the annexation
+of Belgium. Among the signers of this reasonable men's petition
+were Prince Hatzfeld (Duke of Trachenberg) head of the Red Cross,
+Dernburg, Prince Henkel Donnersmarck, Professor Delbrück, von
+Harnack and many others.
+
+The rage of the Conservatives at the _Arabic_ settlement
+knew no bounds, and after a bitter article had appeared in the
+_Tageszeitung_ about the _Arabic_ affair, that newspaper was
+suppressed for some days,--a rather unexpected showing of backbone
+on the part of the Chancellor. Reventlow who wrote for this newspaper
+is one of the ablest editorial writers in Germany. An ex-naval
+officer, he is bitter in his hatred of America. It was said that
+he once lived in America and lost a small fortune in a Florida
+orange grove, but I never succeeded in having this verified.
+
+In November, 1915, after the _Arabic_ settlement there followed
+a moment for us of comparative calm. Mrs. Gerard was given the
+Red Cross Orders of the first and third classes, and Jackson
+and Rives of the Embassy Staff the second and third class. The
+third class is always given because one cannot have the first
+and second unless one has the third or lowest.
+
+There were rumours at this time of the formation of a new party;
+really the Socialists and Liberals, as the Socialists as such were
+too unfashionable, in too bad odour, to open a campaign against
+the military under their own name. This talk came to nothing.
+
+The Chancellor always complained bitterly that he could not
+communicate in cipher _via_ wireless with von Bernstorff.
+On one occasion he said to me, "How can I arrange as I wish to
+in a friendly way the _Ancona_ and _Lusitania_ cases
+if I cannot communicate with my Ambassador? Why does the United
+States Government not allow me to communicate in cipher?" I said,
+"The Foreign Office tried to get me to procure a safe-conduct for
+the notorious von Rintelen on the pretense that he was going to do
+charitable work for Belgium in America; perhaps Washington thinks
+you want to communicate with people like that." The Chancellor then
+changed the subject and said that there would be bad feeling in
+Germany against America after the war. I answered that that idea
+had been expressed by a great many Germans and German newspapers,
+and that I had had private letters from a great many Americans
+who wrote that if Germany intended to make war on America, after
+this war, perhaps we had better go in now. He then very amiably
+said that war with America would be ridiculous. He asked me why
+public opinion in America was against Germany, and I answered
+that matters like the Cavell case had made a bad impression in
+America and that I knew personally that even the Kaiser did not
+approve of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_. The Chancellor
+said, "How about the _Baralong_?" I replied that I did not
+know the details and that there seemed much doubt and confusion
+about that affair, but that there was no doubt about the fact
+that Miss Cavell was shot and that she was a woman. I then took
+up in detail with him the treatment of British prisoners and
+said that this bad treatment could not go on. This was only one
+of the many times when I complained to the Chancellor about the
+condition of prisoners. I am sure that he did not approve of the
+manner in which prisoners of war in Germany were treated; but
+he always complained that he was powerless where the military
+were concerned, and always referred me to Bismarck's memoirs.
+
+During this winter of submarine controversy an interview with
+von Tirpitz, thinly veiled as an interview with a "high naval
+authority," was published in that usually most conservative of
+newspapers, the _Frankfurter Zeitung_. In this interview the
+"high naval authority" advocated ruthless submarine war with
+England, and promised to bring about thereby the speedy surrender
+of that country. After the surrender, which was to include the
+whole British fleet, the German fleet with the surrendered British
+fleet added to its force, was to sail for America, and exact from
+that country indemnities enough to pay the whole cost of the war.
+
+After his fall, von Tirpitz, in a letter to some admirers who
+had sent him verses and a wreath, advocated holding the coast of
+Flanders as a necessity for the war against England and America.
+
+The successor of von Tirpitz was Admiral von Holtzendorff, whose
+brother is Ballin's right hand man in the management of the Hamburg
+American Line. Because of the more reasonable influence and
+surroundings of von Holtzendorff, I regarded his appointment as
+a help towards peaceful relations between Germany and America.
+
+I have told in another chapter how the Emperor had refused to
+receive me as Ambassador of a country which was supplying munitions
+to the Allies.
+
+From time to time since I learned of this in March, 1915, I kept
+insisting upon my right as Ambassador to be received by the Emperor;
+and finally early in October, 1915, wrote the following letter
+to the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Some time ago I requested you to arrange an audience for me
+  with his majesty.
+
+  Please take no further trouble about this matter.
+
+  Sincerely yours,
+
+  JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+This seemed to have the desired effect. I was informed that I
+would be received by the Emperor in the new palace at Potsdam
+on October twenty-second. He was then to pay a flying visit to
+Berlin to receive the new Peruvian Minister and one or two others.
+We went down in the train to Potsdam, von Jagow accompanying us,
+in the morning; and it was arranged that we should return on
+the train leaving Potsdam a little after one o'clock. I think
+that the authorities of the palace expected that I would be with
+the Emperor for a few minutes only, as when I was shown into the
+room where he was, a large room opening from the famous shell
+hall of the palace, the Peruvian Minister and the others to be
+received were standing waiting in that hall.
+
+The Emperor was alone in the room and no one was present at our
+interview. He was dressed in a Hussar uniform of the new field
+grey, the parade uniform of which the frogs and trimmings were
+of gold. A large table in the corner of the room was covered
+with maps, compasses, scales and rulers; and looked as if the
+Emperor there, in company with some of his aides, or possibly
+the chief of staff, had been working out the plan of campaign
+of the German armies.
+
+The Emperor was standing; so, naturally, I stood also; and, according
+to his habit, which is quite Rooseveltian, he stood very close to
+me and talked very earnestly. I was fortunately able to clear
+up two distinct points which he had against America.
+
+The Emperor said that he had read in a German paper that a number
+of submarines built in America for England had crossed the Atlantic
+to England, escorted by ships of the American Navy. I was, of
+course, able to deny this ridiculous story at the time and furnish
+definite proofs later. The Emperor complained because a loan to
+England and France had been floated in America. I said that the
+first loan to a belligerent floated in America was a loan to
+Germany. The Emperor sent for some of his staff and immediately
+inquired into the matter. The members of the staff confirmed my
+statement. The Emperor said that he would not have permitted
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ if he had known, and that
+no gentleman would kill so many women and children. He showed,
+however, great bitterness against the United States and repeatedly
+said, "America had better look out after this war:" and "I shall
+stand no nonsense from America after the war."
+
+The interview lasted about an hour and a quarter, and when I finally
+emerged from the room the officers of the Emperor's household were
+in such a state of agitation that I feel sure they must have
+thought that something fearful had occurred. As I walked rapidly
+towards the door of the palace in order to take the carriage which
+was to drive me to the train, one of them walked along beside
+me saying, "Is it all right? Is it all right?"
+
+The unfortunate diplomats who were to have been received and
+who had been standing all this time outside the door waiting for
+an audience missed their train and their luncheon.
+
+At this interview, the Emperor looked very careworn and seemed
+nervous. When I next saw him, however, which was not until the
+end of April, 1916, he was in much better condition.
+
+I was so fearful in reporting the dangerous part of this interview,
+on account of the many spies not only in my own Embassy but also
+in the State Department, that I sent but a very few words in a
+roundabout way by courier direct to the President.
+
+The year, 1916, opened with this great question still unsettled
+and, in effect, Germany gave notice that after March first, 1916,
+the German submarines would sink all armed merchantmen of the
+enemies of Germany without warning. It is not my place here to
+go into the agitation of this question in America or into the
+history of the votes in Congress, which in fact upheld the policy
+of the President. A proposal as to armed merchantmen was issued by
+our State Department and the position taken in this was apparently
+abandoned at the time of the settlement of the _Sussex_ case
+to which I now refer.
+
+In the latter half of March, 1916, a number of boats having Americans
+on board were torpedoed without warning. These boats were the
+_Eaglejoint_, the _Englishman_, the _Manchester Engineer_ and the
+_Sussex_. One American was killed or drowned on the _Englishman_,
+but the issue finally came to a head over the torpedoing of the
+channel passenger boat, _Sussex_ which carried passengers between
+Folkstone and Dieppe, France.
+
+On March twenty-fourth the _Sussex_ was torpedoed near the
+coast of France. Four hundred and thirty-six persons, of whom
+seventy-five were Americans, were on board. The captain and a
+number of the passengers saw the torpedo and an endeavour was
+made to avoid it. After the boat was struck the many passengers
+took to the boats. Three Americans were injured and over forty
+persons lost their lives, although the boat was not sunk but
+was towed to Boulogne.
+
+I was instructed to inquire from the German Government as to
+whether a German submarine had sunk the _Sussex_. The Foreign
+Office finally, at my repeated request, called on the Admiralty
+for a report of the torpedoing of the _Sussex_; and finally
+on the tenth of April the German Note was delivered to me. In the
+meantime, and before the delivery of this Note I had been assured
+again and again that the _Sussex_ had not been torpedoed by
+a German submarine. In this Note a rough sketch was enclosed,
+said to have been made by the officer commanding the submarine, of
+a vessel which he admitted he had torpedoed, in the same locality
+where the _Sussex_ had been attacked and at about the same
+time of day. It was said that this boat which was torpedoed was
+a mine layer of the recently built _Arabic_ class and that a
+great explosion which was observed to occur in the torpedoed ship
+warranted the certain conclusion that great amounts of munitions
+were on board. The Note concluded: "The German Government must
+therefore assume that injury to the _Sussex_ was attributable
+to another cause than attack by a German submarine." The Note
+contained an offer to submit any difference of opinion that might
+develop to be investigated by a mixed commission in accordance
+with the Hague Convention of 1907. The _Englishman_ and
+the _Eaglepoint_, it was claimed, were attacked by German
+submarines only after they had attempted to escape, and an
+explanation was given as to the _Manchester Engineer_. With
+reference to the _Sussex_, the note continued: "Should the
+American Government have at its disposal other material at the
+conclusion of the case of the _Sussex_, the German Government
+would ask that it be communicated, in order to subject this material
+also to investigation."
+
+In the meantime, American naval officers, etc., had been engaged
+in collecting facts as to the sinking of the _Sussex_, and
+this evidence, which seemed overwhelming and, in connection with
+the admissions in the German note, absolutely conclusive, was
+incorporated in the note sent to Germany in which Germany was
+notified: "Unless the Imperial Government should now immediately
+declare and effect abandonment of this present method of submarine
+warfare against passenger and freight carrying vessels, the
+Government of the United States can have no choice but to sever
+diplomatic relations with the German Empire altogether."
+
+The issue was now clearly defined.
+
+I have already spoken of the fact that for a long time there had
+been growing up two parties in Germany. One party headed by von
+Tirpitz in favour of what the Germans called _rücksichtloser_,
+or ruthless submarine war, in which all enemy merchant ships
+were to be sunk without warning, and the party then headed by
+the Chancellor which desired to avoid a conflict with America
+on this issue.
+
+As I have explained in a former chapter, the military have always
+claimed to take a hand in shaping the destinies and foreign policies
+of Germany. When the Germans began to turn their attention to the
+creation of a fleet, von Tirpitz was the man who, in a sense,
+became the leader of the movement and, therefore, the creator of
+the modern navy of Germany. A skilful politician, he for years
+dominated the Reichstag and on the question of submarine warfare
+was most efficiently seconded by the efforts of the Navy League,
+an organization having perhaps one million members throughout
+Germany. Although only one of the three heads of the navy (he
+was Secretary of the Navy), by the force of his personality, by
+the political position which he had created for himself, and by
+the backing of his friends in the Navy League he really dominated
+the other two departments of the navy, the Marine Staff and the
+Marine Cabinet.
+
+Like most Germans of the ruling class, ambition is his only passion.
+These Spartans do not care either for money or for the luxury
+which it brings. Their life is on very simple lines, both in
+the Army and Navy, in order that the officers shall not vie with
+one another in expenditure, and in order that the poorer officers
+and their wives shall not be subject to the humiliation which
+would be caused if they had to live in constant contact with
+brother officers living on a more luxurious footing.
+
+Von Tirpitz' ambition undoubtedly led him to consider himself
+as a promising candidate for Bethmann-Hollweg's shoes. The whole
+submarine issue, therefore, became not only a question of military
+expediency and a question for the Foreign Office to decide in
+connection with the relations of America to Germany, but also a
+question of internal politics, a means of forcing the Chancellor
+out of office. The advocates for the ruthless war were drawn from
+the Navy and from the Army, and those who believed in the use
+of any means of offence against their enemies and particularly
+in the use of any means that would stop the shipment of munitions
+of war to the Allies. The Army and the Navy were joined by the
+Conservatives and by all those who hoped for the fall of the
+Chancellor. The conservative newspapers, and even the Roman Catholic
+newspapers were violent in their call for ruthless submarine war
+as well as violent in their denunciations of the United States
+of America.
+
+American passengers on merchant ships of the enemy were called
+_Schutzengel_ (guardian angels), and caricatures were published,
+such as one which showed the mate reporting to the Captain of
+an English boat that everything was in readiness for sailing
+and the Captain's inquiry, "Are you sure that the American
+_Schutzengel_ is on board?" The numerous notes sent by America
+to Germany also formed a frequent subject of caricature and I
+remember particularly one quite clever one in the paper called
+_Brummer_, representing the celebrations in a German port
+on the arrival of the one hundredth note from America when the
+Mayor of the town and the military, flower girls and singing
+societies and _Turnverein_ were drawn up in welcoming array.
+
+The liberal papers were inclined to support the Chancellor in
+his apparent intention to avoid an open break with America. But
+even the liberal papers were not very strong in their stand.
+
+The military, of course, absolutely despised America and claimed
+that America could do no more harm by declaring war than it was
+doing then to Germany; and that possibly the war preparations
+of America might cut down the amount of the munitions available
+for export to the enemies of the Empire. As to anything that
+America could do in a military way, the Navy and the Army were
+unanimous in saying that as a military or naval factor the United
+States might be considered as less than nothing. This was the
+situation when the last _Sussex_ Note of America brought
+matters to a crisis, and even the crisis itself was considered
+a farce as it had been simmering for so long a period.
+
+I arranged that Colonel House should have an interview with the
+Chancellor at this time, and after dinner one night he had a long
+talk with the Chancellor in which the dangers of the situation
+were pointed out.
+
+With this arrival of the last American _Sussex_ Note, I
+felt that the situation was almost hopeless; that this question
+which had dragged along for so long must now inevitably lead
+to a break of relations and possibly to war. Von Jagow had the
+same idea and said that it was "fate," and that there was nothing
+more to be done. I myself felt that nothing could alter public
+opinion in Germany; that in spite of von Tirpitz' fall, which had
+taken place some time before, the advocates of ruthless submarine
+warfare would win, and that to satisfy them Germany would risk
+a break with America.
+
+I was sitting in my office in a rather dazed and despairing state
+when Professor Ludwig Stein, proprietor of a magazine called
+_North and South_ and a writer of special articles on Germany's
+foreign relations for the _Vossische Zeitung_, under the
+name of "Diplomaticus," called to see me.
+
+He informed me that he thought the situation was not yet hopeless,
+that there was still a large party of reasonable men in Germany
+and that he thought much good could be done if I should go to
+the great general headquarters and have a talk with the Kaiser,
+who, he informed me, was reported to be against a break.
+
+I told Dr. Stein that, of course, I was perfectly willing to
+go if there was the slightest chance of preventing war; and I
+also told the Chancellor that if he was going to decide this
+question in favor of peace it would be possibly easier for him
+if the decision was arrived at under the protection, as it were,
+of the Emperor; or that, if the decision lay with the Emperor,
+I might possibly be able to help in convincing him if I had an
+opportunity to lay the American side of the case before him. I
+said, moreover, that I was ready at any time on short notice
+to proceed to the Emperor's headquarters.
+
+Dr. Hecksher, a member of the Reichstag, who must be classed
+among the reasonable men of Germany, also advocated my speaking
+directly to the Kaiser.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MAINLY COMMERCIAL
+
+Nothing surprised me more, as the war developed, than the discovery
+of the great variety and amount of goods exported from Germany to
+the United States.
+
+Goods sent from the United States to Germany are mainly prime
+materials: approximately one hundred and sixty million dollars a
+year of cotton; seventy-five million dollars of copper; fifteen
+millions of wheat; twenty millions of animal fats; ten millions
+of mineral oil and a large amount of vegetable oil. Of course,
+the amount of wheat is especially variable. Some manufactured
+goods from America also find their way to Germany to the extent
+of perhaps seventy millions a year, comprising machinery such as
+typewriters and a miscellaneous line of machinery and manufactures.
+The principal exports from Germany to America consist of dye
+stuffs and chemical dyes, toys, underwear, surgical instruments,
+cutlery, stockings, knit goods, etc., and a raw material called
+potash, also known as kali. The last is a mineral found nowhere
+in the world except in Germany and a few places in Austria. Potash
+is essential to the manufacture of many fertilizers, fertilizer
+being composed as a rule of potash, phosphates and nitrates.
+The nitrates in past years have been exported to all countries
+from Chile. Phosphate rock is mined in South Carolina and Florida
+and several other places in the world. Curiously enough, both
+nitrates and potash are essential ingredients also of explosives
+used in war. Since the war, the German supply from Chile was
+cut off; but the Germans, following a system used in Norway for
+many years before the war, established great electrical plants
+for the extraction of nitrates from the atmosphere. Since the
+war, American agriculture has suffered for want of potash and
+German agriculture has suffered for want of phosphates, possibly
+of nitrates also; because I doubt whether sufficient nitrogen
+is extracted from the air in Germany to provide for more than
+the needs of the explosive industry.
+
+The dyestuff industry had been developed to such a point in Germany
+that Germany supplied the whole world. In the first months of the
+war some enterprising Americans, headed by Herman Metz, chartered
+a boat, called _The Matanzas_, and sent it to Rotterdam
+where it was loaded with a cargo of German dyestuffs. The boat
+sailed under the American flag and was not interfered with by
+the English. Later on the German Department of the Interior,
+at whose head was Delbrück, refused to allow dyestuffs to leave
+Germany except in exchange for cotton, and, finally, the export of
+dyestuffs from Germany ceased and other countries were compelled
+to take up the question of manufacture. This state of affairs
+may lead to the establishment of the industry permanently in the
+United States, although that industry will require protection
+for some years, as, undoubtedly, Germany in her desperate effort
+to regain a monopoly of this trade will be ready to spend enormous
+sums in order to undersell the American manufacturers and drive
+them out of business.
+
+The commercial submarines, _Deutschland_ and _Bremen_,
+were to a great extent built with money furnished by the dyestuff
+manufacturers, who hoped that by sending dyestuffs in this way to
+America they could prevent the development of the industry there.
+I had many negotiations with the Foreign Office with reference
+to this question of dyestuffs.
+
+The export of toys from Germany to the United States forms a
+large item in the bill which we pay annually to Germany. Many
+of these toys are manufactured by the people in their own homes
+in the picturesque district known as the Black Forest. Of course,
+the war cut off, after a time, the export of toys from Germany;
+and the American child, having in the meantime learned to be
+satisfied with some other article, his little brother will demand
+this very article next Christmas, and thus, after the war, Germany
+will find that much of this trade has been permanently lost.
+
+Just as the textile trade of the United States was dependent upon
+the German dyestuffs for colours, so the sugar beet growers of
+America were dependent upon Germany for their seed. I succeeded,
+with the able assistance of the consul at Magdeburg and Mr. Winslow
+of my staff, in getting shipments of beet seed out of Germany. I
+have heard since that these industries too, are being developed
+in America, and seed obtained from other countries, such as Russia.
+
+Another commodity upon which a great industry in the United States
+and Mexico depends is cyanide. The discovery of the cyanide process
+of treating gold and silver ores permitted the exploitation of
+many mines which could not be worked under the older methods.
+At the beginning of the war there was a small manufactory of
+cyanide owned by Germans at Perth Amboy and Niagara Falls, but
+most of the cyanide used was imported from Germany. The American
+German Company and the companies manufacturing in Germany and
+in England all operated under the same patents, the English and
+German companies having working agreements as to the distribution
+of business throughout the world.
+
+The German Vice-Chancellor and head of the Department of the
+Interior, Delbrück, put an export prohibition on cyanide early in
+the war; and most pigheadedly and obstinately claimed that cyanide
+was manufactured nowhere but in Germany, and that, therefore, if
+he allowed cyanide to leave Germany for the United States or
+Mexico the English would capture it and would use it to work
+South African mines, thus adding to the stock of gold and power
+in war of the British Empire. It was a long time before the German
+manufacturers and I could convince this gentleman that cyanide
+sufficient to supply all the British mines was manufactured near
+Glasgow, Scotland. He then reluctantly gave a permit for the
+export of a thousand tons of cyanide; and its arrival in the
+United States permitted many mines there and in Mexico to continue
+operations, and saved many persons from being thrown out of
+employment. When Delbrück finally gave a permit for the export
+of four thousand tons more of cyanide, the psychological moment
+had passed and we could not obtain through our State Department
+a pass from the British.
+
+I am convinced that Delbrück made a great tactical mistake on
+behalf of the German Government when he imposed this prohibition
+against export of goods to America. Many manufacturers of textiles,
+the users of dyestuffs, medicines, seeds and chemicals in all forms,
+were clamouring for certain goods and chemicals from Germany. But it
+was the prohibition against export by the Germans which prevented
+their receiving these goods. If it had been the British blockade
+alone a cry might have arisen in the United States against this
+blockade which might have materially changed the international
+situation.
+
+The Germans also refused permission for the export of potash
+from Germany. They hoped thereby to induce the United States
+to break the British blockade, and offered cargoes of potash
+in exchange for cargoes of cotton or cargoes of foodstuffs. The
+Germans claimed that potash was used in the manufacture of munitions
+and that, therefore, in no event would they permit the export
+unless the potash was consigned to the American Government, with
+guarantees against its use except in the manufacture of fertilizer,
+this to be checked up by Germans appointed as inspectors. All
+these negotiations, however, fell through and no potash has been
+exported from Germany to the United States since the commencement
+of the war. Enough potash, however, is obtained in the United
+States for munition purposes from the burning of seaweed on the
+Pacific Coast, from the brines in a lake in Southern California
+and from a rock called alunite in Utah. Potash is also obtainable
+from feldspar, but I do not know whether any plant has been
+established for its production from this rock. I recently heard
+of the arrival of some potash from a newly discovered field in
+Brazil, and there have been rumours of its discovery in Spain.
+I do not know how good this Spanish and Brazilian potash is, and
+I suppose the German potash syndicate will immediately endeavour
+to control these fields in order to hold the potash trade of the
+world in its grip.
+
+It was a long time after the commencement of the war before England
+declared cotton a contraband. I think this was because of the fear
+of irritating the United States; but, in the meantime, Germany
+secured a great quantity of cotton, which, of course, was used or
+stored for the manufacture of powder. Since the cotton imports
+have been cut off the Germans claim that they are manufacturing
+a powder equally good by using wood pulp. Of course, I have not
+been able to verify this, absolutely.
+
+Germany had endeavoured before the war in every way to keep American
+goods out of the German markets, and even the Prussian state
+railways are used, as I have shown in the article where I speak
+of the attempt to establish an oil monopoly in Germany, in order
+to discriminate against American mineral oils. This same method
+has been applied to other articles such as wood, which otherwise
+might be imported from America and in some cases regulations
+as to the inspection of meat, etc., have proved more effective
+in keeping American goods out of the market than a prohibitive
+tariff.
+
+The meat regulation is that each individual package of meat must
+be opened and inspected; and, of course, when a sausage has been
+individually made to sit up and bark no one desires it as an
+article of food thereafter. American apples were also discriminated
+against in the custom regulations of Germany. Nor could I induce
+the German Government to change their tariff on canned salmon,
+an article which would prove a welcome addition to the German diet.
+
+The German workingman, undoubtedly the most exploited and fooled
+workingman in the world, is compelled not only to work for low
+wages and for long hours, but to purchase his food at rates fixed
+by the German tariff made for the benefit of the Prussian Junkers
+and landowners.
+
+Of course, the Prussian Junkers excuse the imposition of the
+tariff on food and the regulations made to prevent the entry
+of foodstuffs on the ground that German agriculture must be
+encouraged, first, in order to enable the population to subsist
+in time of war and blockade; and, secondly, in order to encourage
+the peasant class which furnishes the most solid soldiers to
+the Imperial armies.
+
+The nations and business men of the world will have to face after
+the war a new condition which we may call socialized buying and
+socialized selling.
+
+Not long after the commencement of the war the Germans placed a
+prohibitive tariff upon the import of certain articles of luxury
+such as perfumes; their object, of course, being to keep the
+German people from sending money out of the country and wasting
+their money in useless expenditures. At the same time a great
+institution was formed called the Central Einkauf Gesellschaft.
+This body, formed under government auspices of men appointed from
+civil life, is somewhat similar to one of our national defence
+boards. Every import of raw material into Germany falls into the
+hands of this central buying company, and if a German desires
+to buy any raw material for use in his factory he must buy it
+through this central board.
+
+I have talked with members of this board and they all unite in
+the belief that this system will be continued after the war.
+
+For instance, if a man in Germany wishes to buy an automobile
+or a pearl necklace or a case of perfumery, he will be told,
+"You can buy this if you can buy it in Germany. But if you have
+to send to America for the automobile, if you have to send to
+Paris for the pearls or the perfumery, you cannot buy them."
+In this way the gold supply of Germany will be husbanded and
+the people will either be prevented from making comparatively
+useless expenditures or compelled to spend money to benefit home
+industry.
+
+On the other hand, when a man desires to buy some raw material,
+for example, copper, cotton, leather, wheat or something of that
+kind, he will not be allowed to buy abroad on his own hook. The
+Central Einkauf Gesellschaft will see that all those desiring to
+buy cotton or copper put in their orders on or before a certain
+date. When the orders are all in, the quantities called for will
+be added up by this central board; and then one man, representing
+the board, will be in a position to go to America to purchase
+the four million bales of cotton or two hundred million pounds
+of copper.
+
+The German idea is that this one board will be able to force the
+sellers abroad to compete against each other in their eagerness
+to sell. The one German buyer will know about the lowest price at
+which the sellers can sell their product. By the buyer's standing
+out alone with this great order the Germans believe that the
+sellers, one by one, will fall into his hands and sell their
+product at a price below that which they could obtain if the
+individual sellers of America were meeting the individual buyers
+of Germany in the open market.
+
+When the total amount of the commodity ordered has been purchased,
+it will be divided up among the German buyers who put in their
+orders with the central company, each order being charged with
+its proportionate share of the expenses of the commission and,
+possibly, an additional sum for the benefit of the treasury of
+the Empire.
+
+Before the war a German manufacturer took me over his great factory
+where fifteen thousand men and women were employed, showed me
+great quantities of articles made from copper, and said: "We buy
+this copper in America and we get it a cent and a half a pound
+less than we should pay for it because our government permits us
+to combine for the purpose of buying, but your government does
+not allow your people to combine for the purpose of selling.
+You have got lots of silly people who become envious of the rich
+and pass laws to prevent combination, which is the logical
+development of all industry."
+
+The government handling of exchange during the war was another
+example of the use of the centralised power of the Government
+for the benefit of the whole nation.
+
+In the first year of the war, when I desired money to spend in
+Germany, I drew a check on my bank in New York in triplicate
+and sent a clerk with it to the different banks in Berlin, to
+obtain bids in marks, selling it then, naturally, to the highest
+bidder. But soon the Government stepped in. The Imperial Bank
+was to fix a daily rate of exchange, and banks and individuals
+were forbidden to buy or sell at a different rate. That this
+fixed rate was a false one, fixed to the advantage of Germany, I
+proved at the time when the German official rate was 5.52 marks
+for a dollar, by sending my American checks to Holland, buying
+Holland money with them and German money with the Holland money,
+in this manner obtaining 5.74 marks for each dollar. And just
+before leaving Germany I sold a lot of American gold to a German
+bank at the rate of 6.42 marks per dollar, although on that day
+the official rate was 5.52 and although the buyer of the gold,
+because the export of gold was forbidden, would have to lose
+interest on the money paid me or on the gold purchased, until
+the end of the war. What the Germans thought of the value of
+the mark is shown by this transaction.
+
+The only thing that can maintain a fair price after the war for
+the products of American firms, miners and manufacturers is
+permission to combine for selling abroad. There is before Congress
+a bill called the Webb Bill permitting those engaged in export
+trade to combine, and this bill, which is manifestly for the
+benefit of the American producer of raw materials and foods and
+manufactured articles, should be passed.
+
+It was also part of our commercial work to secure permits for
+the exportation from Belgium of American owned goods seized by
+Germany. We succeeded in a number of cases in getting these goods
+released. In other cases, the American owned property was taken
+over by the government, but the American owners were compensated
+for the loss.
+
+Germany took over belligerent property and put it in the hands
+of receivers. In all cases where the majority of the stock of a
+German corporation was owned by another corporation or individuals
+of belligerent nationality, the German corporation was placed in
+the hands of a receiver. The German Government, however, would
+not allow the inquiry into the stock ownership to go further than
+the first holding corporation. There were many cases where the
+majority of the stock of a German corporation was owned by an
+English corporation and the majority of the stock of the English
+corporation, in turn, owned by an American corporation or by
+Americans. In this case the German Government refused to consider
+the American ownership of the English stock, and put the German
+company under government control.
+
+With the low wages paid to very efficient workingmen who worked
+for long hours and with no laws against combination, it was always
+a matter of surprise to me that the Germans who were in the process
+of getting all the money in the world should have allowed their
+military autocracy to drive them into war.
+
+I am afraid that, after this war, if we expect to keep a place for
+our trade in the world, we may have to revise some of our ideas as
+to so-called trusts and the Sherman Law. Trusts or combinations
+are not only permitted, but even encouraged in Germany. They are
+known there as "cartels" and the difference between the American
+trust and the German cartel is that the American trust has, as
+it were, a centralised government permanently taking over and
+combining the competing elements in any given business, while in
+Germany the competing elements form a combination by contract for
+a limited number of years. This combination is called a cartel
+and during these years each member of the cartel is assigned a
+given amount of the total production and given a definite share
+of the profits of the combination. The German cartel, therefore,
+as Consul General Skinner aptly said, may be likened to a
+confederation existing by contract for a limited period of time
+and subject to renewal only at the will of its members.
+
+It may be that competition is a relic of barbarism and that one
+of the first signs of a higher civilisation is an effort to modify
+the stress of competition. The debates of Congress tend to show
+that, in enacting the Sherman Law, Congress did not intend to forbid
+the restraint of competition among those in the same business but
+only intended to prohibit the forming of a combination by those
+who, combined, would have a monopoly of a particular business or
+product. It is easy to see why all the coal mines in the country
+should be prohibited from combining; but it is not easy to see
+why certain people engaged in the tobacco business should be
+prohibited from taking their competitors into their combination,
+because tobacco is a product which could be raised upon millions
+of acres of our land and cannot be made the subject of a monopoly.
+
+The German courts have expressly said that if prices are so low
+that the manufacturers of a particular article see financial
+ruin ahead, a formation of a cartel by them must be looked upon
+as a justified means of self-preservation. The German laws are
+directed to the end to which it seems to be such laws should
+logically be directed; namely, to the prevention of unfair
+competition.
+
+So long as the question of monopoly is not involved, competition
+can always be looked for when a combination is making too great
+profits; and the new and competing corporation and individuals
+should be protected by law against the danger of price cutting
+for the express purpose of driving the new competitor out of
+business. However, it must be remembered that a combination acting
+unfairly in competition may be more oppressive than a monopoly.
+I myself am not convinced by the arguments of either side. It
+is a matter for the most serious study.
+
+The object of the American trust has been to destroy its competitors.
+The object of the German cartel to force its competitors to join the
+cartel.
+
+In fact the government in Germany becomes part of these cartels
+and takes an active hand in them, as witness the participation
+of the German Government in the potash syndicate, when contracts
+made by certain American buyers with German mines were cancelled
+and all the potash producing mines of Germany and Austria forced
+into one confederation; and witness the attempt by the government,
+which I have described in another chapter, to take over and
+make a monopoly of the wholesale and retail oil business of the
+country.
+
+The recent closer combination of dyestuff industries of Germany,
+with the express purpose of meeting and destroying American
+competition after the war, is interesting as showing German methods.
+For a number of years the dye-stuff industry of Germany was
+practically controlled by six great companies, some of these
+companies employing as high as five hundred chemists in research
+work. In 1916 these six companies made an agreement looking to a
+still closer alliance not only for the distribution of the product
+but also for the distribution of ideas and trade secrets. For
+years, these great commercial companies supplied all the countries
+of the world not only with dyestuffs and other chemical products
+but also with medicines discovered by their chemists and made
+from coal tar; which, although really nothing more than patent
+medicines, were put upon the market as new and great and beneficial
+discoveries in medicine. The Badische Anilin and Soda Fabrik,
+with a capital of fifty-four million marks has paid dividends
+in the ten years from 1903 to 1913, averaging over twenty-six
+per cent.
+
+The Farbwerke Meister Lucius und Bruning at Hoeckst, near Frankfort,
+during the same period, with a capital of fifty million marks,
+has paid dividends averaging over twenty-seven per cent; and
+the chemical works of Bayer and Company, near Cologne, during
+the same period with a capital of fifty-four millions of marks
+has paid dividends averaging over thirty per cent.
+
+Much of the commercial success of the Germans during the last
+forty years is due to the fact that each manufacturer, each
+discoverer in Germany, each exporter knew that the whole weight
+and power of the Government was behind him in his efforts to
+increase his business. On the other hand, in America, business
+men have been terrorized, almost into inaction, by constant
+prosecutions. What was a crime in one part of the United States,
+under one Circuit Court of Appeals, was a perfectly legitimate
+act in another.
+
+If we have to meet the intense competition of Germany after the
+war, we have got to view all these problems from new angles. For
+instance, there is the question of free ports. Representative
+Murray Hulbert has introduced, in the House of Representatives, a
+resolution directing the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary
+of War and the Secretary of Commerce to report to Congress as
+to the advisability of the establishment of free ports within
+the limits of the established customs of the United States.
+Free ports exist in Germany and have existed for a long time,
+although Germany is a country with a protective tariff. In a
+free port raw goods are manufactured and then exported, of course
+to the advantage of the country permitting the establishment of
+free ports, because by this manufacture of raw materials and
+their re-export, without being subject to duty, money is earned
+by the manufacturers to the benefit of their own country and
+employment is given to many workingmen. This, of course, improves
+the condition of these workingmen and of all others in the country;
+as it is self-evident that the employment of each workingman in
+an industry, which would not exist except for the existence of
+the free port, withdraws that workingman from the general labour
+market and, therefore, benefits the position of his remaining
+fellow labourers.
+
+Although free ports do not exist in the United States, an attempt
+has been made to give certain industries, by means of what are
+known as "drawbacks," the same benefit that they would enjoy
+were free ports existant in our country.
+
+Thus the refiners of raw sugar from Cuba pay a duty on this sugar
+when it enters the United States, but receive this duty back when
+a corresponding amount of refined sugar is exported to other
+countries.
+
+There has lately been an attack made upon this system in the
+case, however, of the sugar refiners only, and the question has
+been treated in some newspapers as if these refiners were obtaining
+some unfair advantage from the government, whereas, as a matter
+of fact, the allowance of these "drawbacks" enables the sugar
+refiners to carry on the refining of the sugar for export much
+as they would if their refineries existed in free ports modelled
+on the German system.
+
+The repeal of the provision of allowing "drawbacks" in this and
+other industries will probably send the industries to Canada or
+some other territory where this system, equivalent to the free
+port, is permitted to exist.
+
+A few days before I left Germany I had a conversation with a
+manufacturer of munitions who employs about eighteen thousand
+people in his factories, which, before the war, manufactured
+articles other than munitions. I asked him how the government
+treated the manufacturers of munitions, and he said that they
+were allowed to make good profits, although they had to pay out
+a great proportion of these profits in the form of taxes on their
+excess or war profits; that the government desired to encourage
+manufacturers to turn their factories into factories for the
+manufacture of all articles in the war and required by the nation
+in sustaining war; and that the manufacturers would do this provided
+that it were only a question as to how much of their profits
+they would be allowed to keep, but that if the Government had
+attempted to fix prices so low that there would have been a doubt
+as to whether the manufacturer could make a profit or not, the
+production of articles required for war would never have reached
+the high mark that it had in Germany.
+
+As a matter of fact, about the only tax imposed in Germany since
+the outbreak of the war has been the tax upon cost or war profits.
+It has been the policy of Germany to pay for the war by great
+loans raised by popular subscription, after authorisation by the
+Reichstag. I calculate that the amounts thus raised, together
+with the floating indebtedness, amount to date to about eighty
+billions of marks.
+
+For a long time the Germans expected that the expenses of the
+war would be paid from the indemnities to be recovered by Germany
+from the nations at war with it.
+
+Helfferich shadowed this forth in his speech in the Reichstag,
+on August 20, 1915, when he said: "If we wish to have the power
+to settle the terms of peace according to our interests and our
+requirements, then we must not forget the question of cost. We
+must have in view that the whole future activity of our people,
+so far as this is at all possible, shall be free from burdens.
+The leaden weight of billions has been earned by the instigators
+of this war, and in the future they, rather than we, will drag
+it about after them."
+
+Of course, by "instigators of the war" Helfferich meant the opponents
+of Germany, but I think that unconsciously he was a true prophet
+and that the "leaden weight of the billions" which this war has
+cost Germany will be dragged about after the war by Germany,
+the real instigator of this world calamity.
+
+In December, 1915, Helfferich voiced the comfortable plea that,
+because the Germans were spending their money raised by the war
+loans in Germany, the weight of these loans was not a real weight
+upon the German people. He said: "We are paying the money almost
+exclusively to ourselves; while the enemy is paying its loans
+abroad--a guarantee that in the future we shall maintain the
+advantage."
+
+This belief of the Germans and Helfferich is one of the notable
+fallacies of the war. The German war loans have been subscribed
+mainly by the great companies of Germany; by the Savings Banks,
+the Banks, the Life and Fire Insurance and Accident Insurance
+Companies, etc.
+
+Furthermore, these loans have been pyramided; that is to say,
+a man who subscribed and paid for one hundred thousand marks
+of loan number one could, when loan number two was called for,
+take the bonds he had bought of loan number one to his bank and
+on his agreement to spend the proceeds in subscribing to loan
+number two, borrow from the bank eighty thousand marks on the
+security of his first loan bonds, and so on.
+
+There is an annual increment, not easily ascertainable with
+exactness, but approximately ascertainable to the wealth of every
+country in the world. Just as when a man is working a farm there
+is in normal years an increment or accretion of wealth or income
+to him above the cost of the production of the products of the
+soil which he sells, there is such an annual increment to the
+wealth of each country taken as a whole. Some experts have told
+me they calculated that, at the outside, in prosperous peace times
+the annual increment of German wealth is ten billion marks.
+
+Now when we have the annual interest to be paid by Germany exceeding
+the annual increment of the country, the social and even moral
+bankruptcy of the country must ensue. If repudiation of the loan
+or any part of it is then forced, the loss naturally falls upon
+those who have taken the loan. The working-man or small capitalist,
+who put all his savings in the war loan, is without support for his
+old age, and so with the man who took insurance in the Insurance
+Companies or put his savings in a bank. If that bank becomes
+bankrupt through repudiation of the war loan, you then have the
+country in a position where the able-bodied are all working to
+pay what they can towards the interest of the government loan,
+after earning enough to keep themselves and their families alive;
+and the old and the young, without support and deprived of their
+savings, become mere poor-house burdens on the community.
+
+Already the mere interest of the war loan of Germany amounts to
+four billions of marks a year; to this must be added, of course,
+the interest of the previous indebtedness of the country and
+of each political subdivision thereof, including cities, all
+of which have added to their before-the-war debt, by incurring
+great debts to help the destitute in this war; and, of course,
+to all this must be added the expenses of the administration
+of the government and the maintenance of the army and navy.
+
+It is the contemplation of this state of affairs, when he is
+convinced that indemnities are not to be exacted from other
+countries, that will do most to persuade the average intelligent
+German business man that peace must be had at any cost.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+WORK FOR THE GERMANS
+
+The interests of Germany in France, England and Russia were placed
+with our American Ambassadors in these countries. This, of course,
+entailed much work upon our Embassy, because we were the medium of
+communication between the German Government and these Ambassadors.
+I found it necessary to establish a special department to look
+after these matters. At its head was Barclay Rives who had been
+for many years in our diplomatic service and who joined my Embassy
+at the beginning of the war. First Secretary of our Embassy in
+Vienna for ten or twelve years, he spoke German perfectly and
+was acquainted with many Germans and Austrians. Inquiries about
+Germans who were prisoners, negotiations relative to the treatment
+of German prisoners, and so on, came under this department.
+
+One example will show the nature of this work. When the Germans
+invaded France, a German cavalry patrol with two officers, von
+Schierstaedt and Count Schwerin, and several men penetrated as
+far as the forest of Fontainebleau, south of Paris. There they got
+out of touch with the German forces and wandered about for days in
+the forest. In the course of their wanderings they requisitioned
+some food from the inhabitants, and took, I believe, an old coat
+for one of the officers who had lost his, and requisitioned a
+wagon to carry a wounded man. After their surrender to the French,
+the two officers were tried by a French court martial, charged
+with pillaging and sentenced to be degraded from their rank and
+transported to Cayenne (the Devil's Island of the Dreyfus case).
+The Germans made strong representations, and our very skilled
+Ambassador in Paris, the Honourable William C. Sharp, took up
+the matter with the Foreign Office and succeeded in preventing
+the transportation of the officers. The sending of the officers
+and men, however, into a military prison where they were treated
+as convicts caused great indignation throughout Germany. The
+officers had many and powerful connections in their own country
+who took up their cause. There were bitter articles in the German
+press and caricatures and cartoons were published.
+
+I sent Mr. Rives to Paris and told him not to leave until he
+had seen these officers. He remained in Paris some weeks and
+finally through Mr. Sharp obtained permission to visit the officers
+in the military prison. Later the French showed a tendency to
+be lenient in this case, but it was hard to find a way for the
+French Government to back down gracefully. Schierstaedt having
+become insane in the meantime, a very clever way out of the
+difficulty was suggested, I believe by Mr. Sharp. Schierstaedt
+having been found to be insane was presumably insane at the time
+of the patrol's wandering in the forest of Fontainebleau. As he
+was the senior officer, the other officer and the men under him
+were not responsible for obeying his commands. The result was
+that Schwerin and the men of the patrol were put in a regular
+prison camp and Schierstaedt was very kindly sent by the French
+back to Germany, where he recovered his reason sufficiently to
+be able to come and thank me for the efforts made on his behalf.
+
+I made every endeavour so far as it lay in my power to oblige
+the Germans. We helped them in the exchange of prisoners and
+the care of German property in enemy countries.
+
+There were rumours in Berlin that Germans taken as prisoners in
+German African Colonies were forced to work in the sun, watched
+and beaten by coloured guards. This was taken up by one of the
+Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg who had been Governor of Togoland
+and who also took great interest in sending clothes, etc., to
+these prisoners. Germany demanded that the prisoners in Africa
+be sent to a more temperate climate.
+
+Another royalty who was busied with prisoners' affairs was Prince
+Max of Baden. He is heir to the throne of Baden, although not a
+son of the reigning Duke. He is very popular and, for my part,
+I admire him greatly. He travels with Emerson's essays in his
+pocket and keeps up with the thought and progress of all countries.
+Baden will be indeed happy in having such a ruler. Prince Max was
+a man so reasonable, so human, that I understand that von Jagow
+was in favour of putting him at the head of a central department
+for prisoners of war. I agreed with von Jagow that in such case
+all would go smoothly and humanely. Naturally, von Jagow could
+only mildly hint at the desirability of this appointment. A prince,
+heir to one of the thrones of Germany, with the rank of General
+in the army, he seemed ideally fitted for such a position, but
+unfortunately the opposition of the army and, particularly, of
+the representative corps commanders was so great that von Jagow
+told me the plan was impossible of realisation. I am sure if
+Prince Max had been at the head of such a department, Germany
+would not now be suffering from the odium of mistreating its
+prisoners and that the two million prisoners of war in Germany
+would not return to their homes imbued with an undying hate.
+
+Prince Max was very helpful in connection with the American mission
+to Russia for German prisoners which I had organised and which I
+have described in the chapter on war charities.
+
+All complaints made by the Imperial Government with reference
+to the treatment of German prisoners, and so forth, in enemy
+countries were first given to me and transmitted by our Embassy
+to the American Ambassadors having charge of German interests
+in enemy countries. All this, with the correspondence ensuing,
+made a great amount of clerical work.
+
+I think that every day I received one or more Germans, who were
+anxious about prisoner friends, making inquiries, and wishing
+to consult me on business matters in the United States, etc.
+All of these people showed gratitude for what we were able to
+do for them, but their gratitude was only a drop in the ocean
+of officially inspired hatred of America.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WAR CHARITIES
+
+As soon as the war was declared and millions of men marched forward
+intent upon killing, hundreds of men and women immediately took up
+the problem of helping the soldiers, the wounded and the prisoners
+and of caring for those left behind by the men who had gone to
+the front.
+
+The first war charity to come under my observation was the American
+Red Cross. Two units containing three doctors and about twelve
+nurses, each, were sent to Germany by the American National Red
+Cross. Before their arrival I took up with the German authorities
+the questions as to whether these would be accepted and where
+they would be placed. The German authorities accepted the units
+and at first decided to send one to each front. The young man
+assigned to the West front was Goldschmidt Rothschild, one of the
+last descendants of the great Frankfort family of Rothschild. He
+had been attached to the German Embassy in London before the war.
+The one assigned to the unit for the East front was Count Hélie
+de Talleyrand. Both of these young men spoke English perfectly
+and were chosen for that reason, and both have many friends in
+England and America.
+
+Talleyrand was of a branch of the celebrated Talleyrand family and
+possessed German citizenship. During the Napoleonic era the great
+Talleyrand married one of his nephews to a Princess of Courland
+who, with her sister, was joint heiress of the principality of
+Sagan in Germany. The share of the other sister was bought by
+the sister who married young Talleyrand, and the descendants of
+that union became princes of Sagan and held the Italian title
+of Duke de Dino and the French title of Duke de Valençay.
+
+Some of the descendants of this nephew of the great Talleyrand
+remained in Germany, and this young Talleyrand, assigned to the
+Red Cross unit, belonged to that branch. Others settled in France,
+and among these was the last holder of the title and the Duke
+de Dino, who married, successively, two Americans, Miss Curtis
+and Mrs. Sampson. It was a custom in this family that the holder
+of the principal title, that of the Prince of Sagan, allowed
+the next two members in succession to bear the titles of Duke
+de Dino and Duke de Valençay. Before the last Prince of Sagan
+died in France, his son Hélie married the American, Anna Gould,
+who had divorced the Count Castellane. On the death of his father
+and in accordance with the statutes of the House of Sagan the
+members of the family who were German citizens held a family
+council and, with the approval of the Emperor of Germany, passed
+over the succession from Anna Gould's husband to her son, so
+that her son has now the right to the title and not his father,
+but the son must become a German citizen at his majority.
+
+The younger brother of the husband of Anna Gould bears the title
+of Duke de Valençay and is the divorced husband of the daughter
+of Levi P. Morton, formerly Vice-President of the United States.
+This young Talleyrand to whom I have referred and who was assigned
+to the American Red Cross unit, although he was a German by
+nationality, did not wish to fight in this war against France in
+which country he had so many friends and relations and, therefore,
+this assignment to the American Red Cross was most welcome to
+him.
+
+On the arrival of the American doctors and nurses in Berlin,
+it was decided to send both units to the East front and to put
+one in the small Silesian town of Gleiwitz and the other in
+the neighbouring town of Kosel. Count Talleyrand went with these
+two units, Goldschmidt Rothschild being attached to the Prussian
+Legation in Munich.
+
+We had a reception in the Embassy for these doctors and nurses
+which was attended by Prince Hatzfeld, Duke of Trachenberg, who
+was head of the German Red Cross, and other Germans interested
+in this line of work. The Gleiwitz and Kosel units remained in
+these towns for about a year until the American Red Cross withdrew
+its units from Europe.
+
+At about the time of the withdrawal of these units, I had heard
+much of the sufferings of German prisoners in Russia. I had many
+conversations with Zimmermann of the German Foreign Office and
+Prince Hatzfeld on this question, as well as with Prince Max
+of Baden, the heir presumptive to the throne of that country;
+and I finally arranged that such of these American doctors and
+nurses as volunteered should be sent to Russia to do what they
+could for the German prisoners of war there. Nine doctors and
+thirty-eight nurses volunteered. They were given a great reception
+in Berlin, the German authorities placed a large credit in the
+hands of this mission, and, after I had obtained through our
+State Department the consent of the Russian Government for the
+admission of the mission, it started from Berlin for Petrograd.
+The German authorities and the Germans, as a whole, were very
+much pleased with this arrangement. Officers of the Prussian army
+were present at the departure of the trains and gave flowers to
+all the nurses. It is very unfortunate that after their arrival
+in Russia this mission was hampered in every way, and had the
+greatest difficulty in obtaining permission to do any work at
+all. Many of them, however, managed to get in positions where
+they assisted the German prisoners. For instance, in one town
+where there were about five thousand Germans who had been sent
+there to live one of our doctors managed to get appointed as
+city physician and, aided by several of the American nurses,
+was able to do a great work for the German population. Others of
+our nurses managed to get as far as Tomsk in Siberia and others
+were scattered through the Russian Empire.
+
+Had this mission under Dr. Snoddy been able to carry out its
+work as originally planned, it would not only have done much
+good to the German prisoners of war, but would have helped a
+great deal to do away with the bitter feeling entertained by
+Germans towards Americans. Even with the limited opportunity given
+this mission, it undoubtedly materially helped the prisoners.
+
+On arriving in Berlin on their way home to America from Gleiwitz
+and Kosel, the doctors and nurses of these American units were
+all awarded the German Red Cross Order of the second class and
+those who had been in Austria were similarly decorated by the
+Austro-Hungarian Government.
+
+Among those who devoted themselves to works of charity during
+this war no one stands higher than Herbert C. Hoover.
+
+I cannot find words to express my admiration for this man whose
+great talents for organisation were placed at the service of
+humanity. Every one knows of what he accomplished in feeding the
+inhabitants of Belgium and Northern France. Mr. Hoover asked me
+to become one of the chairmen of the International Commission for
+the Relief of Belgium and I was happy to have the opportunity in
+Berlin to second his efforts. There was considerable business in
+connection with the work of the commission. I had many interviews
+with those in authority with reference to getting their ships
+through, etc. Mr. Hoover and I called on the Chancellor and
+endeavoured to get him to remit the fine of forty million francs
+a month which the Germans had imposed upon Belgium. This, however,
+the Chancellor refused to do. Later on in April, 1915, I was
+able as an eye-witness to see how efficiently Mr. Hoover's
+organisation fed, in addition to the people of Belgium, the French
+population in that part of Northern France in the occupation of
+the Germans.
+
+Mr. Hoover surrounded himself with an able staff, Mr. Vernon
+Kellogg and others, and in America men like Mr. A. J. Hemphill
+were his devoted supporters.
+
+Early in 1915, Mr. Ernest P. Bicknell, who had first come to
+Germany representing the American Red Cross, returned representing
+not only that organisation but also the Rockefeller Foundation. With
+him was Mr. Wickliffe Rose, also of the Rockefeller Foundation;
+and with these two gentlemen I took up the question of the relief
+of Poland. Mr. Rose and Mr. Bicknell together visited Poland and
+saw with their own eyes the necessity for relief. A meeting was
+held in the Reichstag attended by Prince Hatzfeld of the German
+Red Cross, Director Guttmann, of the Dresdener Bank, Geheimrat
+Lewald, of the Imperial Ministry of the Interior, representing the
+German Government, and many others connected with the government,
+military and financial interests of Germany.
+
+The Commission for the Relief in Poland, of which I was to be
+chairman, was organised and included the Spanish Ambassador,
+His Excellency the Bishop of Posen, the Prince Bishop of Cracow,
+Jacob H. Schiff of New York, and others. Messrs. Warwick, Greene
+and Wadsworth were to take up the actual executive work.
+
+In conjunction with Messrs. Rose and Bicknell, I drew up a sort
+of treaty, having particularly in mind certain difficulties
+encountered by the American Relief Commission in Belgium. The
+main point in this treaty was that the German Government agreed
+not to requisition either food or money within the limits of the
+territory to be relieved, which territory comprised that part
+of Poland within German occupation up to within, as I recall it,
+fifty kilometres of the firing line. The one exception was that
+a fine might be levied on a community where all the inhabitants
+had made themselves jointly and severally liable according to the
+provisions of the Hague Convention. The Rockefeller Foundation
+on its part agreed to pay all the expenses of the executive work
+of the commission. This treaty, after being submitted to General
+Hindenburg and approved by him, was signed by Dr. Lewald,
+representing the German Government, by Mr. Bicknell, representing
+the Rockefeller Foundation, and by me, representing the new
+commission for the relief of Poland.
+
+Work was immediately commenced under this arrangement and, so
+far as possible, food was purchased in Holland and Denmark, but
+there was little to be had in these countries. The Allies, however,
+refused to allow food to enter Germany for the purpose of this
+commission, and so the matter fell through. Later, when the Allies
+were willing to permit the food to enter, it was the German
+Government that refused to reaffirm this treaty and refused to
+agree that the German army of occupation should not requisition
+food in occupied Poland. Of course, under these circumstances, no
+one could expect the Allies to consent to the entry of food; because
+the obvious result would be that the Germans would immediately,
+following the precedent established by them in Northern France,
+take all the food produced in the country for their army and
+the civil population of Germany, and allow the Poles to be fed
+with food sent in from outside, while perhaps their labour was
+utilised in the very fields the products of which were destined
+for German consumption.
+
+There is no question that the sufferings of the people of Poland
+have been very great, and when the history of Poland during the
+war comes to be written the world will stand aghast at the story
+of her sufferings. It is a great pity that these various schemes
+for relief did not succeed. The Rockefeller Commission, however,
+up to the time I left Germany did continue to carryon some measure
+of relief and succeeded in getting in condensed milk, to some
+extent, for the children of that unfortunate country. These
+negotiations brought me in contact with a number of Poles resident
+in Berlin, whom I found most eager to do what they could to relieve
+the situation. I wish here to express my admiration for the work
+of the Rockefeller Commission in Europe. Not only were the ideas
+of the Commission excellent and businesslike but the men selected
+to carry them into effect were without exception men of high
+character and possessed of rare executive ability.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, I was ridiculed in the
+American newspapers because I had suggested, in answer to a cable
+of the League of Mercy, that some work should be done for the
+prisoners of war. I do not know whether the great work undertaken
+by Dr. John R. Mott and his associates was suggested by my answer or
+not; that does not matter. But this work undertaken by the American
+Y. M. C. A. certainly mattered a great deal to the prisoners of
+war in Europe. Dr. Mott after serving on the Mexican Commission,
+has gone to Russia as a member of the Commission to that country.
+
+The Y. M. C. A. organisation headed by Dr. Mott, who was most
+ably assisted by the Reverend Archibald C. Harte, took up this
+work, which was financed, I have been told, by the McCormick
+family of Chicago, Cleveland H. Dodge, John D. Rockefeller and
+others. Mr. Harte obtained permission from the German authorities
+for the erection of meeting halls and for work in German camps.
+When he had obtained this authorisation from Germany he went
+to Russia, where he was able to get a similar authorisation.
+
+At first in Russia, I have heard, the prisoners of war were allowed
+great liberty and lived unguarded in Siberian villages where they
+obtained milk, bread, butter, eggs and honey at very reasonable
+rates. As the war went on they were more and more confined to
+barracks and there their situation was sad indeed. In the winter
+season, it is dark at three in the afternoon and remains dark
+until ten the following morning. Of course, I did not see the
+Russian prison camps. The work carried on there was similar to
+that carried on in the German camps by Mr. Harte and his band
+of devoted assistants.
+
+I was particularly interested in this work because I hoped that
+the aid given to the German prisoners of war in Russia would help
+to do away with the great hate and prejudice against Americans in
+Germany. So I did all I could, not only to forward Mr. Harte's
+work, but to suggest and organise the sending of the expedition
+of nurses and doctors, which I have already described, to the
+Russian camps.
+
+Of course, Mr. Harte in this work did not attempt to cover all
+the prison camps in Germany. He did much to help the mental and
+physical conditions of the prisoners in Ruhleben, the English
+civilian camp near Berlin. The American Y. M. C. A. built a great
+hall where religious exercises were held, plays and lectures
+given, and where prisoners had a good place to read and write
+in during the day. A library was established in this building.
+
+The work carried on by the Y. M. C. A. may be briefly described
+as coming under the following heads: religious activities;
+educational activities; work shops, and gardens; physical exercises
+and out-door sports; diet kitchens for convalescents; libraries
+and music, including orchestra, choruses, and so on.
+
+When I left Germany on the breaking of diplomatic relations, a
+number of these Y. M. C. A. workers left with me.
+
+The German women exhibited notable qualities in war. They engaged
+in the Red Cross work, including the preparation of supplies and
+bandages for the hospitals, and the first day of mobilisation saw
+a number of young girls at every railway station in the country
+with food and drink for the passing soldiers. At railway junctions
+and terminals in the large cities, stations were established
+where these Red Cross workers gave a warm meal to the soldiers
+passing through. In these terminal stations there were also women
+workers possessed of sufficient skill to change the dressings
+of the lightly wounded.
+
+On the Bellevuestrasse, Frau von Ihne, wife of the great architect,
+founded a home for blinded soldiers. In this home soldiers were
+taught to make brooms, brushes, baskets, etc.
+
+German women who had country places turned these into homes for
+the convalescent wounded. But perhaps the most noteworthy was
+the National Frauendienst or Service for Women, organised the
+first day of the war. The relief given by the State to the wives
+and children of soldiers was distributed from stations in Berlin,
+and in the neighbourhood of each of these stations the Frauendienst
+established an office where women were always in attendance,
+ready to give help and advice to the soldiers' wives. There there
+were card-indexes of all the people within the district and of
+their needs. At the time I left Germany I believe that there
+were upwards of seven thousand women engaged in Berlin in social
+service, in instructing the women in the new art of cooking without
+milk, eggs or fat and seeing to it that the children had their
+fair share of milk. It is due to the efforts of these social
+workers that the rate of infant mortality in Berlin decreased
+during the war.
+
+A war always causes a great unsettling in business and trade;
+people no longer buy as many articles of luxury and the workers
+engaged in the production of these articles are thrown out of
+employment. In Germany, the National Women's Service, acting
+with the labour exchanges, did its best to find new positions
+for those thrown out of work. Women were helped over a period
+of poverty until they could find new places and were instructed
+in new trades.
+
+Many women engaged in the work of sending packages containing
+food and comforts to the soldiers at the front and to the German
+prisoners of war in other countries.
+
+Through the efforts of the American Association of Commerce and
+Trade, and the Embassy, a free restaurant was established in
+Berlin in one of the poorer districts. About two hundred people
+were fed here daily in a hall decorated with flags and plants.
+This was continued even after we left Germany.
+
+At Christmas, 1916, Mrs. Gerard and I visited this kitchen with
+Mr. and Mrs. Wolf and General von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, and one of his daughters. Presents were distributed
+to the children and the mothers received an order for goods in
+one of the department stores. The German Christmas songs were
+sung and when a little German child offered a prayer for peace,
+I do not think there was any one present who could refrain from
+weeping.
+
+Many of the German women of title, princesses, etc., established
+base hospitals of their own and seemed to manage these hospitals
+with success.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+HATE
+
+On my way from Berlin to America, in February, 1917, at a dinner
+in Paris, I met the celebrated Italian historian, Ferrero. In a
+conversation with him after dinner, I reminded him of the fact
+that both he and a Frenchman, named Huret, who had written on
+America, had stated in their books that the thing which struck
+them most in the study of the American people was the absence
+of hate.
+
+Ferrero recalled this and in the discussion which followed and
+in which the French novelist, Marcel Prevost, took part, all
+agreed that there was more hate in Europe than in America; first,
+because the peoples of Europe were confined in small space and,
+secondly, because the European, whatever his rank or station,
+lacked the opportunities for advancement and consequently the
+eagerness to press on ahead, and that fixing of the thought on
+the future, instead of the past, which formed part of the American
+character.
+
+In a few hours in Europe it is possible to travel in an automobile
+across countries where the people differ violently from the countries
+surrounding them, not only in language, customs and costumes,
+but also in methods of thought and physical appearance.
+
+The day I left Berlin I went to see Herr von Gwinner, head of
+the Deutsche Bank, with reference to a charitable fund which
+had been collected for widows and orphans in Germany. In our
+talk, von Gwinner said that Europeans envied America because we
+seemed to be able to assimilate all those people who, as soon
+as they landed on our shores, sought to forget their old race
+hatreds and endeavoured, as speedily as possible, to adopt American
+clothes, language and thought. I told him I thought it was because
+in our country we did not try to force anyone; that there was
+nothing to prevent a Pole speaking Polish and wearing Polish
+dress, if he chose; that the only weapon we used against those
+who desired to uphold the customs of Europe was that of ridicule;
+and that it was the repressive measures such as, for example,
+the repressive action taken by Prussia against the Poles and
+the Danes, the Alsatians and the Lorrainers, that had aroused
+a combative instinct in these peoples and made them cling to
+every vestige of their former nationality.
+
+At first, with the coming of war, the concentrated hate of the
+German people seemed to be turned upon the Russians. Even Liebknecht,
+when he called upon me in order to show that he had not been
+shot, as reported in America, spoke of the perils of Czarismus
+and the hatred of the German people for the Russians. But later,
+and directed by the master hand of the governing class, all the
+hatred of the Germans was concentrated upon England.
+
+The cartoon in _Punch_ representing a Prussian family having
+its morning "Hate" was, in some aspects, not at all exaggerated.
+Hate in Germany is cultivated as a noble passion, and, during the
+war, divines and generals vied with each other in its praise.
+Early in 1917, the Prussian General in command at Limburg made a
+speech in which he extolled the advantages of hate and said that
+there was nothing like getting up in the morning after having
+passed a night in thought and dreams of hate.
+
+[Illustration: THIS PAGE FROM THE SCURRILOUS PUBLICATION OF MARTEN
+AND HIS COLLEAGUES SHOWS THE PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WREATH AND THE
+CRAPE-DRAPED AMERICAN FLAG.]
+
+The phrase "Gott strafe England" seemed to be all over Germany.
+It was printed on stamps to be affixed to the back of letters
+like our Red Cross stamps. I even found my German body servant
+in the Embassy affixing these stamps to the back of all letters,
+official and otherwise, that were sent out. He was stopped when
+discovered. Paper money was stamped with the words: "Gott strafe
+England," "und America" being often added as the war progressed
+and America refused to change the rules of the game and stop
+the shipment of supplies to the Allies.
+
+Everyone is familiar with Lissauer's "Hymn of Hate." It is not
+extraordinary that one man in a country at war should produce a
+composition of this kind; but it is extraordinary as showing the
+state of mind of the whole country, that the Emperor should have
+given him the high order of the Red Eagle of the Second Class as
+a reward for having composed this extraordinary document.
+
+Undoubtedly at first the British prisoners of war were treated
+very roughly and were starved and beaten by their guards on the
+way from the front to the concentration camps. Officers, objects
+usually considered more than sacred in Germany, even when wounded
+were subjected to brutal treatment and in the majority of their
+prisons were treated more like convicts than officers and gentlemen.
+
+As the Germans gradually awoke to the fact that President Wilson
+was not afraid of the German vote and that the export of supplies
+from America would not be stopped, this stream of hate was turned
+on America. There was a belief in Germany that President Wilson
+was opposed by a majority of people of the United States, that
+he did not represent the real sentiment of America, and that the
+sentiment there was favourable to Germany.
+
+Unfortunately many Americans in Germany encouraged the German
+people and the German Government in this belief. Americans used
+to travel about, giving lectures and making speeches attacking
+their own country and their own President, and the newspapers
+published many letters of similar import from Americans resident
+in Germany.
+
+One of the most active of these was a man named Maurice Somborn,
+a German American, who represented in Germany an American business
+house. He made it a practice to go about in Berlin and other
+cities and stand up in cafes and beer halls in order to make
+addresses attacking the President and the United States. So bold
+did he become that he even, in the presence of a number of people
+in my room, one day said that he would like to hang Secretary
+Bryan as high as Haman and President Wilson one foot higher.
+The American newspapers stated that I called a servant and had
+him thrown out of the Embassy. This statement is not entirely
+true: I selfishly kept that pleasure for myself.
+
+The case of Somborn gave me an idea and I cabled to the Department
+of State asking authority to take up the passports of all Americans
+who abused their own country on the ground that they had violated
+the right, by their abuse, to the protection of a passport. The
+Department of State sustained my view and, by my direction, the
+consul in Dresden took up the passports of a singer named Rains
+and a gentleman of leisure named Recknagel who had united in
+addressing a letter to the Dresden newspapers abusing the President.
+It was sometime before I got Somborn's passport and I later on
+received from him the apologies of a broken and contrite man
+and obtained permission from Washington to issue him a passport
+in order to enable him to return to America.
+
+Of course, these vilifiers of their own country were loud in their
+denunciations of me, but the prospect of losing the protection of
+their passports kept many of these men from open and treasonable
+denunciation of their own country.
+
+The Government actually encouraged the formation of societies which
+had for their very object the scattering of literature attacking
+the President and the United States. The most conspicuous of these
+organisations was the so-called League of Truth. Permanently
+connected with it was an American dentist who had been in jail
+in America and who had been expelled from Dresden by the police
+authorities there. The secretary was a German woman who posed as
+an American, and had been on the stage as a snake dancer. The
+principal organiser was a German named Marten who had won the
+favour of the German authorities by writing a book on Belgium
+denying that any atrocities had taken place there. Marten secured
+subscriptions from many Germans and Americans resident in Germany,
+opened headquarters in rooms on the Potsdamerstrasse and engaged
+in the business of sending out pamphlets and leaflets attacking
+America. One of his principal supporters was a man named Stoddard
+who had made a fortune by giving travel lectures in America and
+who had retired to his handsome villa, in Meran, in Austria.
+Stoddard issued a pamphlet entitled, "What shall we do with Wilson?"
+and some atrocious attempts at verse, all of which were sent
+broadcast by the League of Truth.
+
+This was done with the express permission of the German authorities
+because during the war no societies or associations of any kind
+could meet, be formed or act without the express permission and
+superintendence of both the military and police authorities.
+Anyone who has lived in Germany knows that it would be impossible
+even in peace times to hang a sign or a wreath on a public statue
+without the permission of the local authorities; and yet on the
+Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, 1916, this League
+of Truth was permitted to place an enormous wreath, over four
+feet high, on the statue of Frederick the Great, with an American
+flag draped in mourning attached, and a silk banner on which was
+printed in large letters of gold, "Wilson and his press are not
+America." The League of Truth then had a photograph taken of this
+wreath which was sent all over Germany, again, of course, with
+the permission of the authorities. The wreath and attachments,
+in spite of frequent protests on my part to Zimmermann and von
+Jagow, remained in this conspicuous position until the sixth of
+May, 1916. After the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note, I again
+called von Jagow's attention to the presence of this wreath,
+and I told him that if this continuing insult to our flag and
+President was not taken away that I would go the next day with
+a cinematograph operator and take it away myself. The next day
+the wreath had disappeared.
+
+This League, in circulars, occasionally attacked me, and in a
+circular which they distributed shortly after my return to Germany
+at the end of December, 1916, it was stated, "What do you think
+of the American Ambassador? When he came to Germany after his
+trip to America he brought a French woman with him." And the
+worst of this statement was that it was true. But the League,
+of course, did not state that my wife came with me bringing her
+French maid by the express permission of the German Foreign Office.
+
+I have had occasion many times to wonder at the curious twists
+of the German mind, but I have never been able to understand on
+what possible theory the German Government permitted and even
+encouraged the existence of this League of Truth. Certainly the
+actions of the League, headed by a snake dancer and a dentist,
+would not terrorise the American Congress, President Wilson or me
+into falling in with all the views of the German Government, and
+if the German Government was desirous of either the President's
+friendship or mine why was this gang of good-for-nothings allowed
+to insult indiscriminately their country, their President and
+their Ambassador?
+
+One of the friends of Marten, head of this League, was (------)
+(---------), a man who at the time he was an officer of the National
+Guard of the State of New York, accepted a large sum of money
+"for expenses" from Bernstorff. Of course, in any country abroad
+acceptance by an officer of money from a foreign Ambassador could
+not be explained and could have only one result--a blank wall and
+firing party for the receiver of foreign pay. Perhaps we have
+grown so indulgent, so soft and so forgetful of the obligations
+which officers owe to their flag and country that on (---------)'s
+return from Germany he will be able to go on a triumphant lecture
+tour through the United States.
+
+There was published in Berlin in English a rather ridiculous
+paper called the _Continental Times_, owned by an Austrian
+Jewess who had been married to an Englishman. The Foreign Office,
+after the outbreak of the war, practically took over this sheet by
+buying monthly many thousand copies. News coloured hysterically
+to favour the Central Empires was printed in this paper, which
+was headed "A Paper for Americans," under the editorship of an
+Englishman of decent family named Stanhope, who, of course, in
+consequence did not have to inhabit the prison camp of Ruhleben.
+(--------) was a contributor to this newspaper, and scurrilous
+articles attacking President Wilson appeared. Finally (---------)
+wrote a lying article for this paper in which he charged that
+Conger of the Associated Press had learned of Sir Roger Casement's
+proposed expedition; that Conger told me; that I cabled the news to
+Washington to the State Department; and that a member of President
+Wilson's Cabinet then gave the information to the British Ambassador.
+Later in a wireless which the Foreign Office permitted (---------)
+to send Senator O'Gorman of New York, (---------) varied his
+lie and charged that I had sent the information direct to Great
+Britain.
+
+_The Continental Times_ was distributed in the prison camps
+and after (---------)'s article I said to von Jagow, "I have
+had enough of this nonsense which is supported by the Foreign
+Office and if articles of the nature of (---------)'s appear
+again I shall make a public statement that the prisoners of war
+in Germany are subjected to a cruel and unusual punishment by
+having the lying _Continental Times_ placed in their hands,
+a paper which purports to be published for Americans but which
+is supported by the Foreign Office, owned by an Austrian and
+edited by a renegade Englishman!"
+
+This _Continental Times_ business again caused one to wonder
+at the German psychology which seems to think that the best way
+to make friends is to attack them. The author of "The Gentle
+Art of Making Enemies" must have attended a German school.
+
+An Ambassador is supposed to be protected but not even when I
+filed affidavits in the Foreign Office, in 1916, made by the
+ex-secretary of the "League of Truth" and by a man who was constantly
+with Marten and the dentist, that Marten had threatened to shoot
+me, did the Foreign Office dare or wish to do anything against
+this ridiculous League. These affidavits were corroborated by
+a respectable restaurant keeper in Berlin and his assistants
+who testified that Marten with several ferocious looking German
+officers had come to his restaurant "looking" for me. I never
+took any precaution against these lunatics whom I knew to be
+a bunch of cowardly swindlers.
+
+Marten and his friends were also engaged in a propaganda against
+the Jews.
+
+The activities of Marten were caused by the fact that he made
+money out of his propaganda; as numerous fool Germans and traitorous
+Americans contributed to his war chest, and by the fact that
+his work was so favourably received by the military that this
+husky coward was excused from all military service.
+
+It seemed, too, as if the Government was anxious to cultivate
+the hate against America. Long before American ammunition was
+delivered in any quantity to England and long before any at all
+was delivered to France, not only did the Government influence
+newspapers and official gazettes, but the official _Communiqués_
+alleged that quantities of American ammunition were being used
+on the West front.
+
+The Government seemed to think that if it could stir up enough
+hate against America in Germany on this ammunition question the
+Americans would become terrorised and stop the shipment.
+
+The Government allowed medals to be struck in honour of each
+little general who conquered a town--"von Emmich, conqueror of
+Liege," etc., a pernicious practice as each general and princeling
+wanted to continue the war until he could get his face on a
+medal--even if no one bought it. But the climax was reached when
+medals celebrating the sinking of the _Lusitania_ were sold
+throughout Germany. Even if the sinking of the _Lusitania_
+had been justified only one who has lived in Germany since the
+war can understand the disgustingly bad taste which can gloat
+over the death of women and babies.
+
+I can recall now but two writers in all Germany who dared to say
+a good word for America. One of these, Regierungsrat Paul Krause,
+son-in-law of Field Marshal Von der Goltz, wrote an article in
+January, 1917, in the _Lokal Anzeiger_ pointing out the
+American side of the question of this munition shipment; and
+that bold and fearless speaker and writer, Maximilian Harden,
+dared to make a defence of the American standpoint. The principal
+article in one of the issues of his paper, _Die Zukunft_,
+was headed "If I were Wilson." After some copies had been sold
+the issue was confiscated by the police, whether at the instance
+of the military or at the instance of the Chancellor, I do not
+know. Everyone had the impression in Berlin that this confiscation
+was by order of General von Kessel, the War Governor of the Mark
+of Brandenburg.
+
+I met Harden before the war and occasionally conversed with him
+thereafter. Once in a while he gave a lecture in the great hall
+of the Philharmonic, always filling the hall to overflowing.
+In his lectures, which, of course, were carefully passed on by
+the police, he said nothing startling. His newspaper is a weekly
+publication; a little book about seven inches by four and a half,
+but wielding an influence not at all commensurate with its size.
+
+The liberal papers, like the largest paper of Berlin, the
+_Tageblatt_, edited by Theodor Wolff, while not violently
+against America, were not favourable. But the articles in the
+Conservative papers and even some of the organs of the Catholic
+Party invariably breathed hatred against everything American.
+
+In the Reichstag, America and President Wilson were often attacked
+and never defended. On May thirtieth, 1916, in the course of a
+debate on the censorship, Strasemann, of the National Liberal
+Party and of the branch of that party with Conservative leanings,
+violently opposed President Wilson and said that he was not wanted
+as a peacemaker.
+
+Government, newspapers and politicians all united in opposing
+America.
+
+I believe that to-day all the bitterness of the hate formerly
+concentrated on Great Britain has now been concentrated on the
+United States. The German-Americans are hated worse than the
+native Americans. They have deeply disappointed the Germans:
+first, because although German-Americans contributed enormously
+towards German war charities the fact of this contribution was
+not known to the recipients in Germany. Money sent to the German
+Red Cross from America was acknowledged by the Red Cross; but no
+publicity was given in Germany to the fact that any of the money
+given was from German-Americans. Secondly, the German-Americans
+did not go, as they might have done, to Germany, through neutral
+countries, with American passports, and enter the German army;
+and, thirdly, the most bitter disappointment of all, the
+German-Americans have not yet risked their property and their
+necks, their children's future and their own tranquillity, by
+taking arms against the government of America in the interest
+of the Hohenzollerns.
+
+For years, a clever propaganda had been carried on in America
+to make all Germans there feel that they were Germans of one
+united nation, to make those who had come from Hesse and Bavaria,
+or Saxony and Württemberg, forget that as late as 1866 these
+countries had been overrun and conquered by Prussian militarism.
+When Prince Henry, the Kaiser's brother, visited America, he
+spent most of his time with German-Americans and German-American
+societies in order to assist this propaganda.
+
+Even in peace time, the German-American who returns to the village
+in which he lived as a boy and who walks down the village street
+exploiting himself and his property, does not help good relations
+between the two countries. Envy is the mother of hate and the
+envied and returned German-American receives only a lip welcome
+in the village of his ancestors.
+
+Caricatures of Uncle Sam, and of President Wilson were published
+in all German papers. A caricature representing our President
+releasing the dove of peace with one hand while he poured out
+munitions for the Allies with the other was the least unpleasant.
+
+As I have said, from the tenth of August, 1914, to the twenty-fifth
+of September, 1915, the Emperor continually refused to receive
+me on the ground that he would not receive the Ambassador of a
+country which furnished munitions to the enemies of Germany; and
+we were thoroughly black-listed by all the German royalties. I did
+not see one, however humble, after the outbreak of the war, with
+the exception of Prince Max of Baden, who had to do with prisoners
+of war in Germany and in other countries. On one occasion I sent
+one of my secretaries to the palace of Princess August Wilhelm,
+wife of one of the Kaiser's sons, with a contribution of money
+for her hospital, she having announced that she would personally
+receive contributions on that day. She took the money from the
+secretary and spoke bitterly against America on account of the
+shipment of arms.
+
+Even some boxes of cigarettes we sent another royalty at the front
+at Christmas time, 1914, were not acknowledged.
+
+Dr. Jacobs, who was the correspondent in Berlin of _Musical America_,
+and who remained there until about the twenty-sixth of April, 1917,
+was called on about the sixteenth of April, 1917, to the Kommandantur
+and subjected to a cross-examination. During this cross-examination
+he was asked if he knew about the "League of Truth," and why he
+did not join that organisation. Whether it was a result of his
+non-joining or not, I do not know, but during the remainder of his
+stay in Berlin he was compelled to report twice a day to the police
+and was not allowed to leave his house after eight o'clock in the
+evening. The question, however, put to him shows the direct interest
+that the German authorities took in the existence of this malodorous
+organisation.
+
+It appears in some of the circulars issued by the League of Truth
+that I was accused of giving American passports to Englishmen
+in order to enable them to leave the country.
+
+After I left Germany there was an interpellation in the Reichstag
+about this, and Zimmermann was asked about the charge which he
+said he had investigated and found untrue.
+
+In another chapter I have spoken of the subject of the selling
+of arms and supplies by America to the Allies. No German ever
+forgets this. The question of legality or treaties never enters
+his mind: he only knows that American supplies and munitions
+killed his brother, son or father. It is a hate we must meet for
+long years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS (_Continued_)
+
+A few days after the events narrated in Chapter XII, von Jagow
+called to see me at the Embassy and invited me to visit the Emperor
+at the Great General Headquarters; but he did not state why I
+was asked, and I do not know to this day whether the Chancellor
+and those surrounding the Emperor had determined on a temporary
+settlement of the submarine question with the United States and
+wished to put that settlement out, as it were, under the protection
+of the Emperor, or whether the Emperor was undecided and those
+in favour of peace wished me to present to him the American side
+of the question. I incline to the latter view. Von Jagow informed
+me that an officer from the Foreign Office would accompany me and
+that I should be allowed to take a secretary and the huntsman
+(_Leibjaeger_), without whom no Ambassador ever travels in
+Germany.
+
+Mr. Grew, our counsellor, was very anxious to go and I felt on
+account of his excellent work, as well as his seniority, that
+he was entitled to be chosen. Lieutenant von Prittwitz, who was
+attached to the Foreign Office as a sort of special aide to von
+Jagow, was detailed to accompany us. We were given a special
+salon car and left on the evening of Friday, April twenty-eighth.
+As we neared the front by way of the line running through Saar
+Brucken, our train was often halted because of long trains of
+hospital cars on their way from the front to the base hospitals
+in the rear; and as we entered France there were many evidences of
+the obstinate fights which had raged in this part of the country
+in August, 1914. Parts of the towns and villages which we passed
+were in ruins, and rough trench lines were to be discerned on
+some of the hillsides. At the stations, weeping French women
+dressed in black were not uncommon sights, having just heard
+perhaps of the death, months before, of a husband, sweetheart
+or son who had been mobilised with the French army.
+
+The fortress city of Metz through which we passed seemed to be as
+animated as a beehive. Trains were continuously passing. Artillery
+was to be seen on the roads and automobiles were hurrying to and
+fro.
+
+The Great General Headquarters of the Kaiser for the Western
+Front is in the town of Charleville-Mézières, situated on the
+Meuse in the Department of the Ardennes, which Department at that
+time was the only French Department wholly in the possession of
+the Germans. We were received at the railway station by several
+officers and escorted in one of the Kaiser's automobiles, which had
+been set apart for my use, to a villa in the town of Charleville,
+owned by a French manufacturer named Perin. This pretty little red
+brick villa had been christened by the Germans, "Sachsen Villa,"
+because it had been occupied by the King of Saxony when he had
+visited the Kaiser. A French family servant and an old gardener
+had been left in the villa, but for the few meals which we took
+there two of the Emperor's body huntsmen had been assigned, and
+they brought with them some of the Emperor's silver and china.
+
+The Emperor had been occupying a large villa in the town of
+Charleville until a few days before our arrival. After the engineer
+of his private train had been killed in the railway station by
+a bomb dropped from a French aeroplane, and after another bomb
+had dropped within a hundred yards of the villa occupied by the
+Kaiser, he moved to a red brick château situated on a hill outside
+of Charleville, known as either the Château Bellevue or Bellaire.
+
+Nearly every day during our stay, we lunched and dined with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the villa of a French banker, which he occupied.
+About ten people were present at these dinners, the Chancellor's
+son-in-law, Zech, Prittwitz, two experts in international law,
+both attached to the Foreign Office, and, at two dinners, von
+Treutler, the Prussian Minister to Bavaria, who had been assigned
+to represent the Foreign Office near the person of the Kaiser and
+Helfferich who, towards the end of our stay, had been summoned
+from Berlin.
+
+I had been working hard at German and as von Bethmann-Hollweg
+does not like to talk English and as some of these persons did not
+speak that language we tried to carry on the table conversation
+in German, but I know that when I tried to explain, in German,
+to Helfferich the various tax systems of America, I swam out
+far beyond my linguistic depth.
+
+During our stay here I received cables from the Department of
+State which were transmitted from Berlin in cipher, and which
+Grew was able to decipher as he had brought a code book with
+him. In one of these it was expressly intimated that in any
+settlement of the submarine controversy America would make no
+distinction between armed and unarmed merchant ships.
+
+We formed for a while quite a happy family. The French owners
+of the villa seemed to have had a fondness for mechanical toys.
+After dinner every night these toys were set going, much to the
+amusement of von Bethmann-Hollweg. One of these toys, about two
+feet high, was a Hoochi-Koochi dancer and another successful one
+was a clown and a trained pig, both climbing a step ladder and
+performing marvellous feats thereon. Grew, who is an excellent
+musician, played the piano for the Chancellor and at his special
+request played pieces by Bach, the favourite composer of von
+Bethmann-Hollweg's deceased wife. One day we had tea in the garden
+of the villa formerly occupied by the Emperor, with the Prince
+of Pless (who is always with the Kaiser, and who seemed to be a
+prime favourite with him), von Treutler and others, and motored
+with Prince Pless to see some marvellous Himalayan pheasants
+reared by an old Frenchman, an ex-jailer, who seemed to have a
+strong instinct to keep something in captivity.
+
+The Kaiser's automobile, which he had placed at my disposal,
+had two loaded rifles standing upright in racks at the right
+and left sides of the car, ready for instant use. On one day we
+motored, always, of course, in charge of the officers detailed
+to take care of us, to the ancient walled city of Rocroy and
+through the beautiful part of the Ardennes forest lying to the
+east of it, returning to Charleville along the heights above
+the valley of the Meuse.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS PARTY IN SEDAN.]
+
+[Illustration: WITH GERMAN OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE FRENCH
+FOOD COMMISSION BEFORE THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES, WHERE NAPOLEON
+III AND BISMARCK MET AFTER THE BATTLE OF SEDAN.]
+
+The feeding of the French population, which is carried on by
+the American Relief Commission, was a very interesting thing
+to see and, in company with one of the members of the French
+committee, we saw the workings of this system of American Relief.
+We first visited a storehouse in Charleville, the headquarters
+for the relief district of which Charleville may be called the
+capital.
+
+For relief purposes Northern France is divided into six districts.
+From the central distribution point in each district, food is
+sent to the commune within the district, the commune being the
+ultimate unit of distribution and each commune containing on
+the average about five hundred souls. We then motored to one
+of the communes where the distribution of food for the week was
+to take place that afternoon. Here in a factory, closed since the
+war, the people of the commune were lined up with their baskets
+waiting for their share of the rations. On entering a large room
+of the factory, each stopped first at a desk and there either paid
+in cash for the week's allowance of rations or signed an agreement
+to pay at some future date. The individuals who had no prospect
+of being able to pay received the rations for nothing. About
+one-third were in each class. The money used was not always French,
+or real money, but was, as a rule, the paper money issued in
+that part of Northern France by each town and redeemable after
+the war.
+
+Signs were hung up showing the quantity that each person was
+entitled to receive for the next fifteen days and the sale price
+per kilo to each inhabitant. For instance, in this particular
+period for the first fifteen days of the month of May, 1916,
+each inhabitant could, in this district, receive the following
+allowances at the following rates:
+
+  ARTICLE           AMOUNT PER HEAD               PRICE
+  Flour                4 K. 500   The Kilogram   0 fr. 48
+  Rice                   K. 500                  0 fr. 55
+  Beans                  K. 500                  0 fr. 90
+  Bacon                  K. 500                  2 fr. 80
+  Lard                   K. 250                  2 fr. 30
+  Green Coffee           K. 250                  1 fr. 70
+  Crystallized Sugar     K. 150                  0 fr. 90
+  Salt                   K. 200                  0 fr. 10
+  Soap (hard)            K. 250                  1 fr. 00
+
+In addition to these articles each inhabitant of the commune
+which we visited, also received on the day of our visit a small
+quantity of carrot seed to plant in the small plot of ground
+which each was permitted to retain out of his own land by the
+German authorities.
+
+The unfortunate people who received this allowance looked very
+poor and very hungry and very miserable. Many of them spoke to
+me, not only here but also in Charleville, and expressed their
+great gratitude to the American people for what was being done
+for them. Those in Charleville said that they had heard that I
+was in their town because of trouble pending between America
+and Germany. They said they hoped that there would be no war
+between the two countries because if war came they did not know
+what would become of them and that, in the confusion of war,
+they would surely be left to starve.
+
+In Charleville notices were posted directing the inhabitants
+not to go out on the streets after, I think, eight o'clock in
+the evening, and also notices informing the population that they
+would be allowed a small quantity of their own land for the purpose
+of growing potatoes.
+
+After visiting the factory building where the distribution of
+rations was taking place, we motored to Sedan, stopping on the
+way at the hamlet of Bazeilles, and visiting the cottage where
+Bismarck and Emperor Napoleon the Third had their historic interview
+after the battle of Sedan.
+
+The old lady who owns this house received us and showed us bullet
+marks made on her house in the war of 1870, as well as in the
+present war. She apologised because she had had the window-pane,
+broken by a rifle shot in this war, replaced on account of the
+cold. As a girl, she had received Bismarck and Napoleon and had
+shown them to the room upstairs where they had held their
+consultation. I asked her which chair in this room Bismarck had
+sat in, and sat in it myself, for luck. I also contributed to the
+collection of gold pieces given to her by those who had visited
+her cottage.
+
+In Sedan we visited an old mill where stores of the relief commission
+were kept, and in the mayor's office were present at a sort of
+consultation between the Prussian officers and members of the
+French Committee of Sedan in which certain details relative to
+the feeding of the population were discussed.
+
+The relief work is not, of course, carried on right up to the
+battle line but we visited a small village not many kilometres in
+the rear of the German line. In this village we were, as before,
+shown the stores kept for distribution by the relief commission.
+As there were many soldiers in this village I said I thought that
+these soldiers must have stores of their own but, in order to
+be sure that they were not living on the supplies of the relief
+commission, I thought it only fair that I should see where the
+soldiers' stores were kept. I was taken across the railroad track
+to where their stores were kept and, judging from the labels on
+the barrels and boxes, I should say that a great many of these
+stores had come from Holland.
+
+During this trip about the country, I saw a number of women and
+girls working, or attempting to work, in the fields. Their appearance
+was so different from that of the usual peasant that I spoke to
+the accompanying officers about it. I was told, however, that
+these were the peasants of the locality who dressed unusually
+well in that part of France. Later on in Charleville, at the
+lodging of an officer and with Count Wengersky, who was detailed
+to act as sort of interpreter and guide to the American Relief
+Commission workers, I met the members of the American Relief
+Commission who were working in Northern France and who had been
+brought on a special train for the purpose of seeing me to
+Charleville. This Count Wengersky spoke English well. Having
+been for a number of years agent of the Hamburg American Line in
+London, he was used to dealing with Americans and was possessed
+of more tact than usually falls to the lot of the average Prussian
+officer. We had tea and cakes in these lodgings, and then some
+of the Americans drew me aside and told me the secret of the
+peculiar looking peasants whom I had seen at work in the fields
+surrounding Charleville.
+
+It seems that the Germans had endeavoured to get volunteers from
+the great industrial town of Lille, Roubeix and Tourcoing to
+work these fields; that after the posting of the notices calling
+for volunteers only fourteen had appeared. The Germans then gave
+orders to seize a certain number of inhabitants and send them
+out to farms in the outlying districts to engage in agricultural
+work. The Americans told me that this order was carried out with
+the greatest barbarity; that a man would come home at night and
+find that his wife or children had disappeared and no one could
+tell him where they had gone except that the neighbours would
+relate that the German non-commissioned officers and a file of
+soldiers had carried them off. For instance, in a house of a
+well-to-do merchant who had perhaps two daughters of fifteen and
+seventeen, and a man servant, the two daughters and the servant
+would be seized and sent off together to work for the Germans
+in some little farm house whose location was not disclosed to
+the parents. The Americans told me that this sort of thing was
+causing such indignation among the population of these towns
+that they feared a great uprising and a consequent slaughter and
+burning by the Germans.
+
+That night at dinner I spoke to von Bethmann-Hollweg about this
+and told him that it seemed to me absolutely outrageous; and that,
+without consulting with my government, I was prepared to protest
+in the name of humanity against a continuance of this treatment
+of the civil population of occupied France. The Chancellor told
+me that he had not known of it, that it was the result of orders
+given by the military, that he would speak to the Emperor about
+it and that he hoped to be able to stop further deportations.
+I believe that they were stopped, but twenty thousand or more who
+had been taken from their homes were not returned until months
+afterwards. I said in a speech which I made in May on my return to
+America that it required the joint efforts of the Pope, the King
+of Spain and our President to cause the return of these people to
+their homes; and I then saw that some German press agency had
+come out with an article that I had made false statements about
+this matter because these people were not returned to their homes
+as a result of the representations of the Pope, the King of Spain
+and our President, but were sent back because the Germans had
+no further use for them. It seems to me that this denial makes
+the case rather worse than before.
+
+At the Chancellor's house in the evenings we had discussions
+on the submarine situation and I had several long talks with
+von Bethmann-Hollweg alone in a corner of the room while the
+others listened to music or set the mechanical toys in motion.
+These discussions, without doubt, were reported to the Emperor
+either by the Chancellor or by von Treutler who at that time
+was high in favor with his Majesty.
+
+I remember on one evening I was asked the question as to what
+America could do, supposing the almost impossible, that America
+should resent the recommencement of ruthless submarine warfare
+by the Germans and declare war. I said that nearly all of the
+great inventions used in this war had been made by Americans;
+that the very submarine which formed the basis of our discussion
+was an American invention, and so were the barbed wire and the
+aeroplane, the ironclad, the telephone and the telegraph, so
+necessary to trench warfare; that even that method of warfare
+had been first developed on something of the present scale in our
+Civil War; and that I believed that, if forced to it, American
+genius could produce some invention which might have a decisive
+effect in this war. My German auditors seemed inclined to believe
+that there was something in my contentions. But they said, "While
+possibly you might invent something in America, while possibly
+you will furnish money and supplies to the Allies, you have no
+men; and the public sentiment of your country is such that you
+will not be able to raise an army large enough to make any
+impression." I said that possibly if hostilities once broke out
+with the Germans, the Germans might force us by the commission
+of such acts as had aroused England, to pass a law for universal
+military service. This proposition of mine was branded by the
+Germans as absolutely impossible; and, therefore, I am sure that
+the adoption by the United States of universal service in the
+first round of the war struck a very severe blow at the morale
+of Germany.
+
+The Chancellor always desired to make any settlement of the submarine
+question contingent upon our doing something against England;
+but I again and again insisted that we could not agree to do
+anything against some other power as a condition of obtaining
+a recognition of our rights from the German Empire.
+
+During my stay at the General Headquarters, General Falkenhayn,
+although he was there at the time, carefully avoided me, which
+I took to be a sign that he was in favour of war with America.
+In fact, I heard afterwards that he had insisted on giving his
+views on the subject, but that a very high authority had told
+him to confine himself to military operations.
+
+After we had been a day or so at Charleville, the Vice-Chancellor,
+Helfferich, arrived. I have always believed that he was sent for
+to add his weight to the arguments in favour of peace and to
+point out that it was necessary for Germany to hate the friendship
+of America after the war, so as to have markets where she could
+place her goods. And I am convinced that at this time, at any rate,
+the influence of Helfferich was cast in the scale in favour of
+peace.
+
+Finally, I was told that on the next day, which was Monday, May
+first, I was to lunch with the Emperor. Grew was invited to accompany
+me, and the Chancellor said that he would call for me about an
+hour before the time set for lunch as the Emperor desired to
+have a talk with me before lunch. In the afternoon an extract
+from the log of a German submarine commander was sent to me in
+which the submarine commander had stated that he had sighted a
+vessel which he could easily have torpedoed, but as the vessel
+was one hundred and twenty miles from land, he had not done so
+because the crew might not be able from that distance to reach a
+harbour. When the Chancellor called for me the following morning,
+he asked me if I had read this extract from the submarine officer's
+log, and noted how he had refrained from torpedoing a boat one
+hundred and twenty miles from land. I told the Chancellor that I
+had read the extract, but that I had also read in the newspaper
+that very morning that a ship had been torpedoed in stormy weather
+at exactly the same distance from land and the crew compelled
+to seek safety in the ship's boats; that, anyway, "one swallow
+did not make a summer," and that reports were continually being
+received of boats being torpedoed at great distances from land.
+
+We then got in the motor and motored to the château about a mile
+off, where the Kaiser resided. We got out of the motor before
+going into the courtyard of the château, and immediately I was
+taken by the Chancellor into a garden on the gently sloping hillside
+below the château. Here the Emperor, dressed in uniform, was
+walking.
+
+As I drew near the Emperor, he said immediately, "Do you come
+like the great pro-consul bearing peace or war in either hand?"
+By this he referred, of course, to the episode in which Quintus
+Fabius Maximus, chief of the Roman envoys sent to Hannibal in
+the Second Punic War, doubled his toga in his hand, held it up
+and said: "In this fold I carry peace and war: choose which you
+will have." "Give us which you prefer," was the reply. "Then
+take war," answered the Roman, letting the toga fall. "We accept
+the gift," cried the Carthaginian Senator, "and welcome."
+
+I said, "No, your Majesty, only hoping that the differences between
+two friendly nations may be adjusted." The Emperor then spoke of
+what he termed the uncourteous tone of our notes, saying that
+we charged the Germans with barbarism in warfare and that, as
+Emperor and head of the Church, he had wished to carry on the
+war in a knightly manner. He referred to his own speech to the
+members of the Reichstag at the commencement of the war and said
+that the nations opposed to Germany had used unfair methods and
+means, that the French especially were not like the French of
+'70, but that their officers, instead of being nobles, came from
+no one knew where. He then referred to the efforts to starve out
+Germany and keep out milk and said that before he would allow
+his family and grand-children to starve he would blow up Windsor
+Castle and the whole Royal family of England. We then had a long
+discussion in detail of the whole submarine question, in the
+course of which the Emperor said that the submarine had come
+to stay, that it was a weapon recognised by all countries, and
+that he had seen a picture of a proposed giant submarine in an
+American paper, the _Scientific American_. He stated that,
+anyway, there was no longer any international law. To this last
+statement the Chancellor agreed. He further said that a person
+on an enemy merchant ship was like a man travelling on a cart
+behind the battle lines--he had no just cause of complaint if
+injured. He asked me why we had done nothing to England because
+of her alleged violations of international law,--why we had not
+broken the British blockade.
+
+In addition to the technical arguments based on international
+law, I answered that no note of the United States had made any
+general charge of barbarism against Germany; that we complained
+of the manner of the use of submarines and nothing more; that we
+could never promise to do anything to England or to any other
+country in return for a promise from Germany or any third country
+to keep the rules of international law and respect the rights and
+lives of our citizens; that we were only demanding our rights
+under the recognised rules of international law and it was for
+us to decide which rights we would enforce first; that, as I
+had already told the Chancellor, if two men entered my grounds
+and one stepped on my flower beds and the other killed my sister,
+I should probably first pursue the murderer of my sister; that
+those travelling on the seas in enemy merchant ships were in a
+different position from those travelling in a cart behind the
+enemy's battle lines on land because the land travellers were
+on enemy's territory, while those on the sea were on territory
+which, beyond the three-mile limit, was free and in no sense
+enemy's territory. We also discussed the position taken by the
+German Government in one of the _Frye_ Notes, in which the
+German expert had taken the position that a cargo of food destined
+for an armed enemy port was presumed to be for the armies of
+the enemy, and therefore contraband. The Emperor spoke of the
+case of the _Dacia_ with some bitterness, but when I went
+into an explanation the Chancellor joined in the conversation
+and said that our position was undoubtedly correct. I said that
+it was not our business to break the blockade--that there were
+plenty of German agents in the United States who could send food
+ships and test the question; that one ship I knew of, the
+_Wilhelmina_, laden with food, had been seized by the British,
+who then compromised with the owners, paying them, I believed, a
+large sum for the disputed cargo. And in taking up the doctrine
+of ultimate destination of goods, i.e., goods sent to a neutral
+country but really destined for a belligerent, I said I thought
+that during our Civil War we had taken against England exactly
+the same stand which England now took; and I said I thought that
+one of the decisions of our Supreme Court was based on a shipment
+to Matamoras, Mexico, but which the Supreme Court had decided
+was really for the Confederacy.
+
+Discussing the submarine question, the Emperor and Chancellor
+spoke of the warning given in the _Lusitania_ case; and
+I said: "If the Chancellor warns me not to go out on the
+Wilhelmplatz, where I have a perfect right to go, the fact that
+he gave the warning does not justify him in killing me if I
+disregarded his warning and go where I have a right to go." The
+conversation then became more general and we finally left the
+garden and went into the château, where the Emperor's aides and
+guests were impatiently waiting for lunch.
+
+This conversation lasted far beyond lunch time. Anxious heads
+were seen appearing from the windows and terraces of the château
+to which we finally adjourned. I sat between the Emperor and
+Prince Pless. Conversation was general for the most of the time,
+and subjects such as the suffragettes and the peace expedition
+of Henry Ford were amusingly discussed.
+
+After lunch, I again had a long talk with the Emperor but of a
+more general nature than the conversation in the garden.
+
+That night about eleven o'clock, after again dining with the
+Chancellor, we left Charleville in the same special salon car,
+arriving at Berlin about four P. M. the next day, where at the
+station were a crowd of German and American newspaper correspondents,
+all anxious to know what had happened.
+
+At this last dinner at the Chancellor's he took me off in a corner
+and said, "As I understand it, what America wants is cruiser
+warfare on the part of the submarines." And I said, "Yes, that
+is it exactly. They may exercise the right of visit and search,
+must not torpedo or sink vessels without warning, and must not
+sink any vessel unless the passengers and crew are put in a place
+of safety."
+
+On the morning of the third of May, I heard that the German note
+had been drafted, but that it would contain a clause to the
+effect that while the German submarines would not go beyond cruiser
+warfare, this rule, nevertheless, would not apply to armed
+merchantmen.
+
+As such a proposition as this would, of course, only bring up
+the subject again, I immediately ordered my automobile and called
+on the Spanish Ambassador, stating to him what I had heard about
+the contents of the note; that this would mean, without doubt, a
+break with America; and that, as I had been instructed to hand
+the Embassy over to him, I had come to tell him of that fact. I
+gave the same information to other colleagues, of course hoping
+that what I said would directly or indirectly reach the ears
+of the German Foreign Office. Whether it did or not, I do not
+know, but the _Sussex_ Note when received did not contain
+any exception with reference to armed merchantmen.
+
+With the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note and the President's
+answer thereto, which declined assent to the claim of Germany
+to define its attitude toward our rights in accordance with what
+we might do in regard to the enforcement of our rights against
+England, the submarine question seemed, at least for the moment,
+settled. I, however, immediately warned the Department that I
+believed that the rulers of Germany would at some future date,
+forced by public opinion, and by the von Tirpitz and Conservative
+parties, take up ruthless submarine war again, possibly in the
+autumn but at any rate about February or March, 1917.
+
+In my last conversation with the Chancellor before leaving the
+Great General Headquarters, when he referred to the cruiser warfare
+of the submarines, he also said, "I hope now that if we settle this
+matter your President will be great enough to take up the question
+of peace." It was as a result of intimations from government
+circles that, after my return to Berlin, I gave an interview to
+a representative of a Munich newspaper, expressing my faith in
+the coming of peace, although I was careful to say that it might
+be a matter of months or even years.
+
+Thereafter, on many occasions the Chancellor impressed upon me
+the fact that America must do something towards arranging a peace
+and that if nothing was done to this end, public opinion in Germany
+would undoubtedly force a resumption of a ruthless submarine war.
+
+In September of 1916, I having mentioned that Mrs. Gerard was
+going to the United States on a short visit, von Jagow insistently
+urged me to go also in order to make every effort to induce the
+President to do something towards peace; and, as a result of his
+urging and as a result of my own desire to make the situation
+clear in America, I sailed from Copenhagen on the twenty-eighth
+of September with Mrs. Gerard, on the Danish ship, _Frederick VIII_,
+bound for New York. I had spent almost three years in Berlin,
+having been absent during that time from the city only five or
+six days at Kiel and two week-ends in Silesia in 1914, with two
+weeks at Munich in the autumn, two days at Munich and two days at
+Parten-Kirchen in 1916, and two week-ends at Heringsdorf, in the
+summer of the same year, with visits to British prison camps
+scattered through the two and a half years of war.
+
+On the _Frederick VIII_ were Messrs. Herbert Swope of the
+_New York World_ and William C. Bullitt of the _Philadelphia Ledger_,
+who had been spending some time in Germany. I impressed upon each
+of these gentlemen my fixed belief that Germany intended shortly,
+unless some definite move was made toward peace, to commence
+ruthless submarine war; and they made this view clear in the
+articles which they wrote for their respective newspapers.
+
+Mr. Swope's articles which appeared in the _New York World_
+were immediately republished by him in a book called "Inside the
+German Empire." In Mr. Swope's book on page ninety-four, he says,
+"The campaign for the ruthless U-boat warfare is regarded by one
+man in this country who speaks with the highest German authority,
+as being in the nature of a threat intended to accelerate and
+force upon us a movement toward peace. Ambassador Gerard had
+his attention drawn to this just before he left Berlin but he
+declined to accept the interpretation."
+
+On page eighty-eight he writes, "Our Embassy in Berlin expected
+just such a demonstration as was given by the U-53 in October
+when she sank six vessels off Nantucket, as a lesson of what
+Germany could do in our waters if war came."
+
+On page seventy-four he says further, "Throughout Germany the
+objection for the resumption of ruthless U-boat warfare of the
+_Lusitania_ type grows stronger day by day. The Chancellor
+is holding out against it, but how long he can restrain it no one
+can say. I left Germany convinced that only peace could prevent
+its resumption. And the same opinion is held by every German
+with whom I spoke, and it is held also by Ambassador Gerard.
+The possibility was so menacing that the principal cause of the
+Ambassador's return in October was that he might report to
+Washington. The point was set out in press despatches at that
+time."
+
+I wrote a preface to Mr. Swope's book for the express purpose
+of informing the American public in this way that I believed
+that Germany intended at an early date to resume the ruthless
+V-boat warfare.
+
+Our trip home on the _Frederick VIII_ was without incident
+except for the fact that on the ninth day of October, Swope came to
+the door of my stateroom about twelve o'clock at night and informed
+me that the captain had told him to tell me that the wireless had
+brought the news that German submarines were operating directly
+ahead of us and had just sunk six ships in the neighbourhood
+of Nantucket. I imagine that the captain slightly changed the
+course of our ship, but next day the odour of burning oil was
+quite noticeable for hours.
+
+These Danish ships in making the trip from Copenhagen to New
+York were compelled to put in at the port of Kirkwall in the
+Orkney Islands, north of Scotland, where the ship was searched by
+the British authorities. On the occasion of our visit to Kirkwall,
+on this trip, a Swede, who had been so foolish as to make a sketch
+of the harbour and defences of Kirkwall from the top deck of the
+_Frederick VIII_, was taken off the boat by the British. The
+British had very cleverly spotted him doing this from the shore
+or a neighbouring boat, through a telescope.
+
+Ships can enter Kirkwall only by daylight and at six o'clock
+every evening trawlers draw a net across the entrance to the
+harbour as a protection against submarines. A passage through
+this net is not opened until daylight the following morning.
+
+Captain Thomson of the _Frederick VIII_, the ship which
+carried us to America and back to Copenhagen, by his evident
+mastery of his profession gave to all of his passengers a feeling
+of confidence on the somewhat perilous voyage in those dangerous
+waters.
+
+When I reached America, on October eleventh, I was given a most
+flattering reception and the freedom of the City of New York.
+Within a few days after my arrival, the President sent for me
+to visit him at Shadow Lawn, at Long Branch, and I was with him
+for over four hours and a quarter in our first conference. I saw
+him, of course, after the election, before returning to Germany,
+and in fact sailed on the fourth of December at his special request.
+
+Before I left I was impressed with the idea that he desired above
+all things both to keep and to make peace. Of course, this question
+of making peace is a very delicate one. A direct offer on our part
+might have subjected us to the same treatment which we gave Great
+Britain during our Civil War when Great Britain made overtures
+looking towards the establishment of peace, and the North answered,
+practically telling the British Government that it could attend
+to its own business, that it would brook no interference and would
+regard further overtures as unfriendly acts.
+
+The Germans started this war without any consultation with the
+United States, and then seemed to think that they had a right
+to demand that the United States make peace for them on such
+terms and at such time as they chose; and that the failure to
+do so gave them a vested right to break all the laws of warfare
+against their enemies and to murder the citizens of the United
+States on the high seas, in violation of the declared principles
+of international law.
+
+Nevertheless, I think that the inclination of the President was
+to go very far towards the forcing of peace.
+
+Our trip from New York to Copenhagen was uneventful, cold and
+dark. We were captured by a British cruiser west of the Orkneys
+and taken in for the usual search to the port of Kirkwall where
+we remained two days.
+
+The President impressed upon me his great interest in the Belgians
+deported to Germany. The action of Germany in thus carrying a
+great part of the male population of Belgium into virtual slavery
+had roused great indignation in America. As the revered Cardinal
+Farley said to me a few days before my departure, "You have to
+go back to the times of the Medes and the Persians to find a
+like example of a whole people carried into bondage."
+
+Mr. Grew had made representations about this to the Chancellor
+and, on my return, I immediately took up the question.
+
+I was informed that it was a military measure, that Ludendorf had
+feared that the British would break through and overrun Belgium
+and that the military did not propose to have a hostile population
+at their backs who might cut the rail lines of communication,
+telephones and telegraphs; and that for this reason the deportation
+had been decided on. I was, however, told that I would be given
+permission to visit these Belgians. The passes, nevertheless,
+which alone made such visiting possible were not delivered until
+a few days before I left Germany.
+
+Several of these Belgians who were put at work in Berlin managed
+to get away and come to see me. They gave me a harrowing account
+of how they had been seized in Belgium and made to work in Germany
+at making munitions to be used probably against their own friends.
+I said to the Chancellor, "There are Belgians employed in making
+shells contrary to all rules of war and the Hague conventions."
+He said, "I do not believe it." I said, "My automobile is at the
+door. I can take you, in four minutes, to where thirty Belgians
+are working on the manufacture of shells." But he did not find
+time to go.
+
+Americans must understand that the Germans will stop at nothing
+to win this war, and that the only thing they respect is force.
+
+While I was in America von Jagow, as had been predicted by his
+enemies in Berlin, had fallen and Zimmermann had been given his
+place.
+
+I remained a day in Copenhagen, in order to arrange for the
+transportation to Germany of the three tons of food which I had
+brought from New York, and, also, in order to lunch with Count
+Rantzau, the German Minister, a most able diplomat.
+
+Therefore, the President's peace note arrived in Berlin just
+ahead of me and was delivered by Mr. Grew a few hours before my
+arrival. Joseph C. Grew, of Boston, was next in command during
+all my stay in Berlin. He most ably carried on the work of the
+Embassy during my absence on the trip to America, in the autumn
+of 1916; and at all times was of the greatest assistance to me. I
+hope to see him go far in his career. This note was dated December
+eighteenth, 1916, and was addressed by the Secretary of State
+to the American Ambassadors at the capitals of the belligerent
+powers. It commenced as follows: "The President directs me to
+send you the following communication to be presented immediately
+to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the government to which
+you are accredited.
+
+"The President of the United States has instructed me to suggest
+to the (here is inserted a designation of the government addressed)
+a course of action in regard to the present war which he hopes
+that the government will take under consideration as suggested
+in the most friendly spirit, etc."
+
+In the note which was sent to the Central Powers it was stated:
+"The suggestion which I am instructed to make, the President
+has long had it in mind to offer. He is somewhat embarrassed
+to offer it at this particular time because it may now seem to
+have been prompted by a desire to play a part in connection with
+the recent overtures of the Central Powers."
+
+Of course, the President thus referred to the address made by
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the Reichstag in December, in which, after
+reviewing generally the military situation, the Chancellor said:
+"In a deep moral and religious sense of duty towards this nation
+and beyond it towards humanity, the Emperor now considers that the
+moment has come for official action towards peace. His Majesty,
+therefore, in complete harmony and in common with our Allies decided
+to propose to the hostile powers to enter peace negotiations."
+And the Chancellor continued, saying that a note to this effect
+had been transmitted that morning to all hostile powers, through
+the representatives of these powers to whom the interests and
+rights of Germany in the enemy States had been entrusted; and
+that, therefore, the representatives of Spain, the United States
+and Switzerland had been asked to forward the note.
+
+Coincidently with this speech of the Chancellor's, which was
+December twelfth, 1916, the Emperor sent a message to the commanding
+generals reading as follows: "Soldiers! In agreement with the
+sovereigns of my Allies and with the consciousness of victory,
+I have made an offer of peace to the enemy. Whether it will be
+accepted is still uncertain. Until that moment arrives you will
+fight on."
+
+I return to the President's note.
+
+The President suggested that early occasion be sought to callout
+from all the nations now at war an avowal of their respective
+views as to the terms upon which the war might be concluded,
+and the arrangements which would be deemed satisfactory as a
+guarantee against its renewal.
+
+He called the attention of the world to the fact that according
+to the statements of the statesmen of the belligerent powers,
+the objects which all sides had in mind seemed to be the same.
+And the President finally said that he was not proposing peace,
+not even offering mediation; but merely proposing that soundings
+be taken in order that all nations might know how near might
+be the haven of peace for which all mankind longed.
+
+Shortly after the publication of this note Secretary Lansing
+gave an interview to the representatives of the American press
+in which he stated that America was very near war. This interview
+he later explained.
+
+As soon as possible after my return to Berlin I had interviews
+with Zimmermann and the Chancellor. Zimmermann said that we were
+such personal friends that he was sure we could continue to work,
+as we had in the past, in a frank and open manner, putting all
+the cards upon the table and working together in the interests of
+peace. I, of course, agreed to this and it seemed, on the surface,
+as if everything would go smoothly.
+
+Although the torpedoing without warning of the _Marina_,
+while I was in the United States, had resulted in the death of a
+number of Americans on board, nevertheless there seemed to be an
+inclination on the part of the government and people of the United
+States to forget this incident provided Germany would continue to
+keep her pledges given in the _Sussex_ Note. During all
+the period of the war in Germany I had been on good terms with
+the members of the government, namely, the Chancellor, von Jagow,
+Zimmermann and the other officials of the Foreign Office, as well
+as with Helfferich, Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister, Kaempf, the
+President of the Reichstag and a number of the influential men
+of Germany such as von Gwinner, of the Deutsche Bank, Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank, Dr. Walter Rathenau, who for a long time was
+at the head of the department for the supply and conservation of
+raw materials, General von Kessel, Over-Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, in spite of many tiffs with him over the treatment
+of prisoners, Theodor Wolff, editor of the _Tageblatt_, Professor
+Stein, Maximilian Harden and many others.
+
+For a long time the fight waged by the Chancellor was America's
+fight and a fight for peace, so much so that the newspapers which
+attacked the Chancellor were the same ones which had attacked
+President Wilson, America and Americans in general, and which had
+very often included me in their attacks. During every crisis between
+America and Germany I had acted with von Jagow and Zimmermann in
+a most confidential way, looking forward always to one object,
+namely, the preservation of peace between our respective countries.
+Many suggestions were made which, I think, materially aided up
+to that time in the preservation of peace.
+
+The Chancellor and the Foreign Office, however, through sheer
+weakness did nothing to prevent the insults to our flag and President
+perpetrated by the "League of Truth"; although both under the law
+and the regulations of the "State of Siege" this gang could not
+operate without the consent of the authorities. So far as I was
+concerned personally, a few extra attacks from tooth carpenters
+and snake dancers meant nothing, but certainly aroused my interest
+in the workings of the Teutonic official brain.
+
+On my return everyone in official life,--the Chancellor, Zimmermann,
+von Stumm who succeeded Zimmermann, von der Busche, formerly
+German Minister in the Argentine, who had equal rank with Stumm
+in the Foreign Office--all without exception and in the most
+convincing language assured me that cases like that of the
+_Marina_, for example, were only accidents and that there
+was every desire on the part of Germany to maintain the pledges
+given in the _Sussex_ Note.
+
+And the great question to be solved is whether the Germans in
+making their offers of peace, in begging me to go to America to
+talk peace to the President, were sincerely anxious for peace,
+or were only making these general offers of peace in order to
+excuse in the eyes of the world a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare and to win to their side public opinion in the United
+States, in case such warfare should be resumed.
+
+Had the decision rested with the Chancellor and with the Foreign
+Office, instead of with the military, I am sure that the decision
+would have been against the resumption of this ruthless war.
+But Germany is not ruled in war time by the civilian power.
+Hindenburg at the time I left for America was at the head of
+the General Staff and Ludendorf, who had been Chief of Staff,
+had been made the Quartermaster General in order that he might
+follow Hindenburg to General Headquarters.
+
+Hindenburg, shortly before his battle of the Masurian Lakes,
+was a General living in retirement at Hanover. Because he had
+for years specialised in the study of this region he was suddenly
+called to the command of the German army which was opposing the
+Russian invasions. Ludendorf, who had been Colonel of a regiment
+at the attack on Liège, was sent with him as his Chief of Staff.
+The success of Hindenburg in his campaigns is too well known
+to require recapitulation here. He became the popular idol of
+Germany, the one general-in fact the one man--whom the people felt
+that they could idolise. But shortly before my trip to America an
+idea was creeping through the mind of the German people leading
+them to believe that Hindenburg was but the front, and that the
+brains of the combination had been furnished by Ludendorf. Many
+Germans in a position to know told me that the real dictator
+of Germany was Ludendorf.
+
+My trip to America was made principally at the instance of von
+Jagow and the Chancellor, and, in my farewell talk with the
+Chancellor a few days before leaving, I asked if it could not
+be arranged, since he was always saying that the civilian power
+was inferior to that of the military, that I should see Hindenburg
+and Ludendorf before I left. This proposed meeting he either
+could not or would not arrange, and shortly after my return I
+again asked the Chancellor if I could not see, if not the Emperor,
+at least Hindenburg and Ludendorf, who the Chancellor himself
+had said were the leaders of the military, and, therefore, the
+leaders of Germany. Again I was put off.
+
+In the meantime and in spite of the official assurance given
+to me certain men in Germany, in a position to know, warned me
+that the government intended to resume ruthless submarine war.
+Ludendorf, they said, had declared in favour of this war and,
+according to them, that meant its adoption.
+
+At first I thought that Germany would approach the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war _via_ the armed merchantman issue.
+
+The case of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners seemed to bear out
+this theory. A German raider captured and sunk a number of enemy
+vessels and sent one of the captured boats, the _Yarrowdale_,
+with a prize crew to Swinemunde. On board, held as prisoners,
+were a number of the crews of the captured vessels; and among
+those men I learned "under the rose," were some Americans. The
+arrival of the _Yarrowdale_ was kept secret for some time,
+but as soon as I received information of its arrival, I sent
+note after note to the Foreign Office demanding to know if there
+were any Americans among the prisoner crews.
+
+For a long time I received no answer, but finally Germany admitted
+what I knew already, that Americans taken with the crews of captured
+ships were being held as prisoners of war, the theory of the
+Germans being that all employed on armed enemy merchant ships
+were enemy combatants. I supposed that possibly Germany might
+therefore approach the submarine controversy by this route and
+claim that armed merchantmen were liable to be sunk without notice.
+
+Instructed by the State Department, I demanded the immediate
+release of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners. This was accorded
+by Germany, but, after the breaking of relations, the prisoners
+were held back; and it was not until after we left Germany that
+they were finally released.
+
+I asked permission to visit these prisoners and sent Mr. Ayrault
+and Mr. Osborne to the place where I knew they were interned.
+The permission to visit them arrived, but on the same day orders
+were given to remove the prisoners to other camps. Mr. Osborne
+and Mr. Ayrault, however, being on the ground, saw the prisoners
+before their removal and reported on their conditions.
+
+On January sixth the American Association of Commerce and Trade
+gave me a dinner at the Hotel Adlon. This was made the occasion
+of a sort of German-American love-feast. Zimmermann, although
+he had to go early in the evening to meet the Foreign Minister
+of Austria-Hungary, was present; Helfferich, Vice-Chancellor
+and Secretary of the Interior; Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister;
+Sydow, Minister of Commerce; Dernburg; von Gwinner of the Deutsche
+Bank; Gutmann of the Dresdener Bank; Under Secretary von der
+Busche of the Foreign Office; the Mayor and the Police President
+of Berlin; the President of the Berlin Chamber of Commerce; Under
+Secretary von Stumm of the Foreign Office; and many others of
+that office. There were present also Under Secretary Richter
+of the Interior Department; Lieutenant Colonel Doeutelmoser of
+the General Staff; the editors and proprietors of the principal
+newspapers in Berlin; Count Montgelas, who had charge of American
+affairs in the Foreign Office; naval officers like Captain Lans;
+the American correspondents in Germany; and Prince Isenburg;
+rubbing shoulders with the brewers, George Ehret and Krueger,
+of New York and Newark. There were literary lights like Ludwig
+Fulda, Captain Persius, Professor Hans Delbrück, Dr. Paasche,
+Vice-President of the Reichstag, and many others equally celebrated
+as the ones that I have named. Speeches were made by Mr. Wolf,
+President of the American Association of Commerce and Trade,
+Helfferich, Zimmermann, von Gwinner and me. A tone of the greatest
+friendliness prevailed. Zimmermann referred to our personal
+friendship and said that he was sure that we should be able to
+manage everything together. Helfferich in his speech said that
+I, by learning German and studying the life of the German people,
+was one of the few diplomats that had come to Germany who had
+learned something of the real life and psychology of the Germans.
+Von Gwinner made a speech in English that would have done credit
+to any American after-dinner speaker; and I, in my short address,
+said that the relations between the two countries had never been
+better and that so long as my personal friends like Zimmermann
+and other members of the government, who I named, were in office,
+I was sure that the good relations between the two countries
+would be maintained. I spoke also of the sums of money that I had
+brought back with me for the benefit of the widows and orphans
+of Germany.
+
+The majority of the German newspapers spoke in a very kindly
+way about this dinner and about what was said at it. Of course,
+they all took what I said as an expression of friendliness, and
+only Reventlow claimed that, by referring to the members of the
+government, I was interfering in the internal affairs of Germany.
+
+The speeches and, in fact, this dinner constituted a last desperate
+attempt to preserve friendly relations. Both the reasonable men
+present and I knew, almost to a certainty, that return to ruthless
+submarine war had been decided on and that only some lucky chance
+could prevent the military, backed by the made public opinion, from
+insisting on a defiance of international law and the laws of humanity.
+
+The day after the dinner the Chancellor sent for me and expressed
+approval of what I said and thanked me for it and on the surface
+it seemed as if everything was "as merry as a marriage bell."
+Unfortunately, I am afraid that all this was only on the surface,
+and that perhaps the orders to the submarine commanders to recommence
+ruthless war had been given the day preceding this love-feast.
+
+The Germans believed that President Wilson had been elected with
+a mandate to keep out of war at any cost, and that America could
+be insulted, flouted and humiliated with impunity. Even before
+this dinner we had begun to get rumours of the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war and within a few days I was cabling to
+the Department information based not upon absolute facts but upon
+reports which seemed reliable and which had been collected through
+the able efforts of our very capable naval attaché, Commander
+Gherardi.
+
+And this information was confirmed by the hints given to me by
+various influential Germans. Again and again after the sixth of
+January, I was assured by Zimmermann and others in the Foreign
+Office that nothing of the kind was contemplated.
+
+Now were the German moves in the direction of peace sincere or not?
+
+From the time when the Chancellor first spoke of peace, I asked
+him and others what the peace terms of Germany were. I could
+never get any one to state any definite terms of peace and on
+several occasions when I asked the Chancellor whether Germany
+was willing to withdraw from Belgium, he always said, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." Finally in January, 1917, when he was again
+talking of peace, I said, "What are these peace terms to which
+you refer continually? Will you allow me to ask a few questions
+as to the specific terms of peace? First are the Germans willing
+to withdraw from Belgium?" The Chancellor answered, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." I said, "What are these guarantees?" He said,
+"We must possibly have the forts of Liege and Namur; we must
+have other forts and garrisons throughout Belgium. We must have
+possession of the railroad lines. We must have possession of the
+ports and other means of communication. The Belgians will not
+be allowed to maintain an army, but we must be allowed to retain
+a large army in Belgium. We must have the commercial control of
+Belgium." I said, "I do not see that you have left much for the
+Belgians except that King Albert will have the right to reside in
+Brussels with an honor guard." And the Chancellor said, "We cannot
+allow Belgium to be an outpost (_Vorwerk_) of England"; and
+I said, "I do not suppose the English, on the other hand, wish
+it to become an outpost of Germany, especially as von Tirpitz
+has said that the coast of Flanders should be retained in order
+to make war on England and America." I continued, "How about
+Northern France?" He said, "We are willing to leave Northern
+France, but there must be a rectification of the frontier." I
+said, "How about the Eastern frontier?" He said, "We must have
+a very substantial rectification of our frontier." I said, "How
+about Roumania?" He said, "We shall leave Bulgaria to deal with
+Roumania." I said, "How about Serbia?" He said, "A very small
+Serbia may be allowed to exist, but that is a question for Austria.
+Austria must be left to do what she wishes to Italy, and we must
+have indemnities from all countries and all our ships and colonies
+back."
+
+Of course, "rectification of the frontier" is a polite term for
+"annexation."
+
+On the twenty-second of January, 1917, our President addressed
+the Senate; and in his address he referred to his Note of the
+eighteenth of December, sent to all belligerent governments. In
+this address he stated, referring to the reply of the Entente
+Powers to his Peace Note of the eighteenth of December, "We are
+that much nearer to the definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war."
+
+He referred to the willingness of both contestants to discuss
+terms of peace, as follows: "The Central Powers united in reply
+which stated merely that they were ready to meet their antagonists
+in conference to discuss terms of peace. The Entente Powers have
+replied much more definitely and have stated, in general terms,
+indeed, but with sufficient definiteness to imply details, the
+arrangements, guarantees and acts of reparation which they deem
+to be the indispensable conditions of a satisfactory settlement.
+We are that much nearer a definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war." The President further referred to a
+world concert to guarantee peace in the future and said, "The
+present war must first be ended, but we owe it to candour and
+to a just regard for the opinion of mankind to say that so far
+as our participation in guarantees of future peace is concerned,
+it makes a great deal of difference in what way and upon what
+terms it is ended." He said that the statesmen of both of the
+groups of nations at war had stated that it was not part of the
+purpose they had in mind to crush their antagonists, and he said
+that it must be implied from these assurances that the peace
+to come must be "a peace without victory."
+
+In the course of his address he said: "Statesmen everywhere are
+agreed that there should be a united, independent and autonomous
+Poland." In another place he said: "So far as practicable, moreover,
+every great people now struggling toward a full development of
+its resources and its powers should be assured a direct outlet
+to the highways of the sea." Where this cannot be done by cession
+of territory it can no doubt be arranged by the neutralisation
+of direct rights of way; and he closed by proposing in effect
+that the nations of the world should adopt the Monroe Doctrine
+and that no nation should seek to explain its policy for any
+other nation or people.
+
+After the receipt of the Ultimatum of January thirty-first from
+Germany, the Chancellor, in a conversation I had with him, referred
+to this Peace Note of December eighteenth and to the speech of
+January twenty-second.
+
+[Illustration: A POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT, SHOWING
+THE ALLOTMENT OF FOOD TO EACH PERSON FOR THE FIRST FIFTEEN DAYS
+OF MAY, 1916.]
+
+I must say here that on my return to Germany I went very far
+in assuring the Chancellor and other members of the Government
+of the President's desire to see peace established in the world;
+and I told them that I believed that the President was ready
+to go very far in the way of coercing any nation which refused
+a reasonable peace; but I also impressed on all the members of
+the Government with whom I came in contact my belief that the
+election had not in any way altered the policy of the President,
+and I warned them of the danger to our good relations if ruthless
+submarine warfare should be resumed.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg, however, at this interview after the
+thirty-first of January, said that he had been compelled to take
+up ruthless submarine war because it was evident that President
+Wilson could do nothing towards peace. He spoke particularly of
+the President's speech of January twenty-second and said that
+in that speech the President had made it plain that he considered
+that the answer of the Entente Powers to his Peace Note formed a
+basis for peace, which was a thing impossible for Germany even
+to consider; and said further (and this was a criticism I heard
+not only from him, but also from many Germans), that when the
+President spoke of a united and independent Poland he evidently
+meant to take away from Germany that part of Poland which had been
+incorporated in the Kingdom of Prussia and give it to this new
+and independent Kingdom, thereby bringing the Eastern frontier of
+Germany within two hours by motor from Berlin; and that, further,
+when the President spoke of giving each nation a highway to the
+sea, he meant that the German port of Dantzig should be turned over
+to this new State of Poland, thereby not only taking a Prussian
+port but cutting the extreme Eastern part of Prussia from the
+remainder of the country. I said that these objections appeared
+to me very frivolous; that the President, of course, like a clever
+lawyer endeavouring to gain his end, which was peace, had said
+that all parties were apparently agreed that there should be a
+peace; that if Germany were fighting a merely defensive war,
+as she had always claimed, she should be greatly delighted when
+the President declared that all the weight of America was in
+favor of a peace without victory, which meant, of course, that
+Germany should be secured from that crushing and dismemberment
+which Germany's statesmen had stated so often that they feared.
+I said, further, that I was sure that when the President spoke
+of the united and independent State of Poland he had not, of
+course, had reference to Poland at any particular period of its
+history, but undoubtedly to Poland as constituted by Germany
+and Austria themselves; and that, in referring to the right of
+a nation to have access to the sea, he had in mind Russia and
+the Dardanelles rather than to any attempt to take a Prussian
+port for the benefit of Poland.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg said that one of the principal reasons why
+Germany had determined upon a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare was because of this speech of the President to the American
+Senate. Of course, the trouble with this feeling and the criticism
+of the President's speech made by the Chancellor is that the
+orders for the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare had been
+given long before the news of the speech came to Germany.
+
+I had cabled the information collected by Commander Gherardi
+as to the orders given to submarines long before the date of
+the President's speech, and it happened that on the night after
+I had received the German note announcing this resumption I was
+taking a walk after dinner about the snow-covered streets of
+Berlin. In the course of this walk I met a young German woman of
+my acquaintance who was on intimate terms with the Crown Princess.
+She was on her way on foot from the opera house, where she had
+been with the Crown Princess, to the underground station, for
+by this time, of course, taxis had become an unknown luxury in
+Berlin, and I joined her. I told her of the Ultimatum which, I
+had received at six o'clock that evening from Zimmermann and I
+told her that I was sure that it meant the breaking of diplomatic
+relations and our departure from Germany. She expressed great
+surprise that the submarine warfare was set to commence on the
+thirty-first of January and said that weeks before they had been
+talking over the matter at the Crown Princess's and that she
+had heard then that the orders had been given to commence it on
+the fifteenth. In any event it is certain that the orders to the
+submarine commanders had been given long prior to the thirty-first
+and probably as early as the fifteenth.
+
+I sincerely believe that the only object of the Germans in making
+these peace offers was first to get the Allies, if possible, in
+a conference and there detach some or one of them by the offer
+of separate terms; or, if this scheme failed, then it was believed
+that the general offer and talk about peace would create a sentiment
+so favourable to the Germans that they might, without fear of
+action by the United States, resume ruthless submarine warfare
+against England.
+
+A week or two before the thirty-first of January, Dr. Solf asked
+me if I did not think that it would be possible for the United
+States to permit the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare
+against Great Britain. He said that three months time was all
+that would be required to bring Great Britain to her knees and end
+the war. And in fact so cleverly did von Tirpitz, Grand Admiral
+von Meuster, the Conservatives and the enemies of the Chancellor
+and other advocates of submarine war carry on their propaganda
+that the belief was ingrained in the whole of the German nation
+that a resumption of this ruthless war would lead within three
+months to what all Germans so ardently desired--peace. It was
+impossible for any government to resist the popular demand for
+the use of this illegal means of warfare, because army and navy
+and people were convinced that ruthless submarine war spelled
+success and a glorious peace.
+
+But this peace, of course, meant only a German peace, a peace
+as outlined to me by the Chancellor; a peace impossible for the
+Allies and even for the world to accept; a peace which would
+leave Germany immensely powerful and ready immediately after
+the war to take up a campaign against the nations of the Western
+hemisphere; a peace which would compel every nation, so long
+as German autocracy remained in the saddle, to devote its best
+energies, the most fruitful period of each man's life, to
+preparations for war.
+
+On January thirtieth, I received a definite intimation of the
+coming Ultimatum the next day and, judging that the hint meant
+the resumption of ruthless submarine war, I telegraphed a warning
+to the American Ambassadors and Ministers as well as to the State
+Department. On January thirty-first at about four o'clock in the
+afternoon I received from Zimmermann a short letter of which
+the following is a copy:
+
+  "The Secretary of State of the Foreign Office, Zimmermann,
+  requests the honor of the visit of his Excellency, the
+  Ambassador of the United States of America, this afternoon
+  at six o'clock in the Foreign Office, Wilhelmstrasse 75/76.
+
+  "Berlin, the 31st January, 1917."
+
+Pursuant to this letter, I went to the Foreign Office at six
+o'clock. Zimmermann then read to me in German a note from the
+Imperial Government, announcing the creation of the war zones
+about Great Britain and France and the commencement of ruthless
+submarine warfare at twelve P. M. that night. I made no comment,
+put the note in my pocket and went back to the Embassy. It was
+then about seven P. M. and, of course, the note was immediately
+translated and despatched with all speed to America.
+
+After the despatch of the note I had an interview with the Chancellor
+in which he, as I have stated above, criticised both the Peace
+Note of December eighteenth as not being definite enough and
+the speech to the Senate of January twenty-second; and further
+said that he believed that the situation had changed, that, in
+spite of what the President had said in the note before the
+_Sussex_ settlement, he was now for peace, that he had been
+elected on a peace platform, and that nothing would happen.
+Zimmermann at the time he delivered the note told me that this
+submarine warfare was a necessity for Germany, and that Germany
+could not hold out a year on the question of food. He further
+said, "Give us only two months of this kind of warfare and we
+shall end the war and make peace within three months."
+
+Saturday, February third, the President announced to Congress
+the breaking of diplomatic relations with Germany. The news of
+this, of course, did not reach Berlin until the next day; and on
+this Saturday afternoon Mrs. Gerard and I had an engagement to go
+to the theatre with Zimmermann and Mrs. Friedlaender-Fuld-Mitford,
+a young lady whose father is considered the richest man in Berlin,
+and who had been married to a young Englishman, named Mitford, a
+son of Lord Redesdale. Through no fault on the lady's part, there
+had been an annulment of this marriage; and she was occupying a
+floor of her own in the handsome house of her father and mother
+on the Pariser-Platz in Berlin. We stopped for Mrs. Mitford and
+took her to the theatre where we saw a very clever play, I think
+by Thoma, called "Die Verlorene Tochter" (The Prodigal Daughter).
+Zimmermann did not come to the play but joined us later at the
+Friedlaender-Fuld House where we had a supper of four in Mrs.
+Mitford's apartments. After supper, while I was talking to
+Zimmermann, he spoke of the note to America and said: "During
+the past month, this is what I have been doing so often at the
+General Headquarters with the Emperor. I often thought of telling
+you what was going on as I used to tell you in the old days,
+but I thought that you would only say that such a course would
+mean a break of diplomatic relations, and so I thought there was
+no use in telling you. But as you will see, everything will be
+all right. America will do nothing, for President Wilson is for
+peace and nothing else. Everything will go on as before. I have
+arranged for you to go to the Great General Headquarters and see
+the Kaiser next week and everything will be all right."
+
+The next day, Sunday, we had a German who is connected with the
+Foreign Office and his American wife to lunch, and another German
+who had been in America, also connected with the Foreign Office.
+Just as we were going in to lunch some one produced a copy of the
+"_B. Z._", the noon paper published in Berlin, which contained what
+seemed to be an authentic account of the breaking of diplomatic
+relations by America. The lunch was far from cheerful. The Germans
+looked very sad and said practically nothing, while I tried to
+make polite conversation at my end of the table.
+
+The next day I went over to see Zimmermann, having that morning
+received the official despatch from Washington, and told him
+that I had come to demand my passports.
+
+Of course, Zimmermann by that time had received the news and
+had had time to compose himself. The American correspondents
+told me that when he saw them on the day before, he had at first
+refused to say anything and then had been rather violent in his
+language and had finally shown great emotion. I am sure, from
+everything I observed, that the break of diplomatic relations
+came as an intense surprise to him and to the other members of
+the government, and yet I cannot imagine why intelligent men
+should think that the United States of America had fallen so low
+as to bear without murmur this sudden kick in the face.
+
+The police who had always been about our Embassy since the
+commencement of the war, were now greatly increased in numbers;
+and guarded not only the front of the house, but also the rear and
+the surrounding streets; but there was no demonstration whatever
+on the part of the people of Berlin. On Tuesday afternoon I went
+out for a walk, walking through most of the principal streets
+of Berlin, absolutely alone, and on my return to the Embassy
+I found Count Montgelas, who, with the rank of Minister, was
+at the head of the department which included American affairs
+in the Foreign Office. I asked Montgelas why I had not received
+my passports, and he said that I was being kept back because
+the Imperial Government did not know what had happened to Count
+Bernstorff and that there had been rumours that the German ships
+in America had been confiscated by our government. I said that
+I was quite sure that Bernstorff was being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. I
+said, moreover, "I do not see why I have to disprove your idea that
+Bernstorff is being maltreated and the German ships confiscated. It
+seems to me it is for you to prove this; and, at any event, why
+don't you have the Swiss Government, which now represents you,
+cable to its Minister in Washington and get the exact facts?" He
+said, "Well, you know, the Swiss are not used to cabling."
+
+He then produced a paper which was a re-affirmation of the treaty
+between Prussia and the United States of 1799, with some very
+extraordinary clauses added to it. He asked me to read this over
+and either to sign it or to get authority to sign it, and said
+that if it was not signed it would be very difficult for Americans
+to leave the country, particularly the American correspondents.
+I read this treaty over and then said, "Of course I cannot sign
+this on my own responsibility and I will not cable to my government
+unless I can cable in cipher and give them my opinion of this
+document." He said, "That is impossible." This treaty was as
+follows:
+
+  Agreement between Germany and the United States of America
+  concerning the treatment of each other's citizens and their
+  private property after the severance of diplomatic relations.
+
+  _Article 1._
+
+  After the severance of diplomatic relations between Germany and
+  the United States of America and in the event of the outbreak of
+  war between the two Powers the citizens of either party and their
+  private property in the territory of the other party shall be
+  treated according to Article 23 of the treaty of amity and
+  commerce between Prussia and the United States of 11 July, 1799,
+  with the following explanatory and supplementary clauses.
+
+  _Article 2._
+
+  German merchants in the United States and American merchants
+  in Germany shall so far as the treatment of their persons and
+  their property is concerned be held in every respect on a par
+  with the other persons mentioned in Article 23. Accordingly
+  they shall even after the period provided for in Article 23 has
+  elapsed be entitled to remain and continue their profession in
+  the country of their residence.
+
+  Merchants as well as the other persons mentioned in Article 23
+  may be excluded from fortified places or other places of military
+  importance.
+
+  _Article 3._
+
+  Germans in the United States and Americans in Germany shall
+  be free to leave the country of their residence within the
+  times and by the routes that shall be assigned to them by the
+  proper authorities.
+
+  The persons departing shall be entitled to take along their
+  personal property including money, valuables and bank accounts
+  excepting such property the exportation of which is prohibited
+  according to general provisions.
+
+  _Article 4._
+
+  The protection of Germans in the United States and of Americans
+  in Germany and of their property shall be guaranteed in accordance
+  with the laws existing in the countries of either party. They
+  shall be under no other restrictions concerning the enjoyment of
+  their private rights and the judicial enforcement of their rights
+  than neutral residents; they may accordingly not be transferred
+  to concentration camps nor shall their private property be subject
+  to sequestration or liquidation or other compulsory alienation
+  except in cases that under the existing laws apply also to neutrals.
+
+  As a general rule, German property in the United States and
+  American property in Germany shall not be subject to sequestration
+  or liquidation or other compulsory alienation under other
+  conditions than neutral property.
+
+  _Article 5._
+
+  Patent rights or other protected rights held by Germans in the
+  United States or Americans in Germany shall not be declared
+  void; nor shall the exercise of such rights be impeded nor shall
+  such rights be transferred to others without the consent of the
+  person entitled thereto; provided that regulations made exclusively
+  in the interest of the State shall apply.
+
+  _Article 6._
+
+  Contracts made between Germans and Americans either before or
+  after the severance of diplomatic relations, also obligations
+  of all kinds between Germans and Americans shall not be declared
+  cancelled, void or in suspension except under provisions applicable
+  to neutrals.
+
+  Likewise the citizens of either party shall not be impeded in
+  fulfilling their liabilities arising from such obligations either
+  by injunctions or by other provisions unless these apply also to
+  neutrals.
+
+  _Article 7._
+
+  The provisions of the sixth Hague Convention relative to the
+  treatment of enemy merchant ships at outbreak of hostilities
+  shall apply to the merchant vessels of either party and their
+  cargo.
+
+  The aforesaid ships may not be forced to leave port unless at
+  the same time they be given a pass recognised as binding by all
+  the enemy sea powers to a home port or a port of an allied country
+  or to another port of the country in which the ship happens to be.
+
+  _Article 8._
+
+  The regulations of chapter 3 of the eleventh Hague Convention
+  relative to certain restrictions in the exercise of the right
+  of capture in maritime war shall apply to the captains, officers
+  and members of the crews of merchant ships specified in Article
+  7 and of such merchant ships that may be captured in the course
+  of a possible war.
+
+  _Article 9._
+
+  This agreement shall apply also to the colonies and other
+  foreign possessions of either party.
+
+  Berlin, February, 1917.
+
+I then said, "I shall not cable at all. Why do you come to me with
+a proposed treaty after we have broken diplomatic relations and
+ask an Ambassador who is held as a prisoner to sign it? Prisoners
+do not sign treaties and treaties signed by them would not be
+worth anything." And I also said, "After your threat to keep
+Americans here and after reading this document, even if I had
+authority to sign it I would stay here until hell freezes over
+before I would put my name to such a paper."
+
+Montgelas seemed rather rattled, and in his confusion left the
+paper with me--something, I am sure, he did not intend to do
+in case of a refusal. Montgelas was an extremely agreeable man
+and I think at all times had correctly predicted the attitude
+of America and had been against acts of frightfulness, such as
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ and the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war. I am sure that a gentleman like Montgelas
+undertook with great reluctance to carry out his orders in the
+matter of getting me to sign this treaty.
+
+I must cheerfully certify that even the most pro-German American
+correspondents in Berlin, when I told them of Montgelas' threat,
+showed the same fine spirit as their colleagues. All begged me
+not to consider them or their liberty where the interests of
+America were involved.
+
+As soon as diplomatic relations were broken, and I broke them
+formally not only in my conversation with Zimmermann of Monday
+morning but also by sending over a formal written request for my
+passports on the evening of that day, our telegraph privileges were
+cut off. I was not even allowed to send telegrams to the American
+consuls throughout Germany giving them their instructions. Mail
+also was cut off, and the telephone. My servants were not even
+permitted to go to the nearby hotel to telephone. In the meantime
+we completed our preparations for departure. We arranged to turn
+over American interests, and the interests of Roumania and Serbia
+and Japan, to the Spanish Embassy; and the interests of Great
+Britain to the Dutch. I have said already that I believe that
+Ambassador Polo de Bernabe will faithfully protect the interests
+of America, and I believe that Baron Gevers will fearlessly fight
+the cause of the British prisoners.
+
+We sold our automobiles; and two beautiful prize winning saddle
+horses, one from Kentucky and one from Virginia, which I had
+brought with me from America, went on the stage, that is, I sold
+them to the proprietor of the circus in Berlin!
+
+The three tons of food which we had brought with us from America
+we gave to our colleagues in the diplomatic corps,--the Spaniards,
+Greeks, Dutch and the Central and South Americans. I had many
+friends among the diplomats of the two Americas who were all
+men of great ability and position in their own country. I think
+that most of them know only too well the designs against Central
+and South America cherished by the Pan-Germans.
+
+Finally, I think on the morning of Friday, Mr. Oscar King Davis,
+correspondent of the _New York Times_, received a wireless
+from Mr. Van Anda, editor of the _New York Times_, telling
+him that Bernstorff and his staff were being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. In
+the evening our telephone was reconnected, and we were allowed to
+receive some telegrams and to send open telegrams to the consuls,
+etc. throughout Germany; and we were notified that we would probably
+be allowed to leave the next day in the evening.
+
+Always followed by spies, I paid as many farewell visits to my
+diplomatic colleagues as I was able to see; and on Saturday I
+thought that, in spite of the ridiculous treatment accorded us in
+cutting off the mail and telephone and in holding me for nearly
+a week, I would leave in a sporting spirit: I therefore, had
+my servant telephone and ask whether Zimmermann and von
+Bethmann-Hollweg would receive me. I had a pleasant farewell
+talk of about half an hour with each of them and I expressly told
+the Chancellor that I had come to bid him a personal farewell,
+not to make a record for any White Book, and that anything he
+said would remain confidential. I also stopped in to thank Dr.
+Zahn, of the Foreign Office, who had arranged the details of our
+departure and gave him a gold cigarette case as a souvenir of
+the occasion. At the last moment, the Germans allowed a number
+of the consuls and clerks who had been working in the Embassy,
+and the American residents in Berlin, to leave on the train with
+us; so that we were about one hundred and twenty persons in all
+on this train, which left the Potsdamer station at eight-ten in
+the evening. The time of our departure had not been publicly
+announced, but although the automobiles, etc. in front of the
+Embassy might have attracted a crowd, there was no demonstration
+whatever; and, in fact, during this week that I was detained in
+Berlin I walked allover the city every afternoon and evening,
+went into shops, and so on, without encountering any hostile
+demonstration.
+
+There was a large crowd in the station to see us off. All the
+Spanish Embassy, Dutch, Greeks and many of our colleagues from
+Central and South America were there. There were, from the Foreign
+Office, Montgelas, Dr. Roediger, Prittwitz and Horstmann. As the
+train pulled out, a number of the Americans left in Berlin who
+were on the station platform raised quite a vigorous cheer.
+
+Two officers had been sent by the Imperial Government to accompany
+us on this train; one, a Major von der Hagen, sent by the General
+Staff and the other, a representative of the Foreign Office, Baron
+Wernher von Ow-Wachendorf. It was quite thoughtful of the Foreign
+Office to send this last officer, as it was by our efforts that
+he had secured his exchange when he was a prisoner in England;
+and he, therefore, would be supposed to entertain kindly feelings
+for our Embassy.
+
+I had ordered plenty of champagne and cigars to be put on the
+train and we were first invited to drink champagne with the officers
+in the dining car; then they joined us in the private salon car
+which we occupied in the end of the train. The journey was
+uneventful. Outside some of the stations a number of people were
+drawn up who stared at the train in a bovine way, but who made
+no demonstration of any kind.
+
+We went through Württemburg and entered Switzerland by way of
+Schaffhausen. The two officers left us at the last stop on the
+German side. I had taken the precaution before we left Berlin to
+find out their names, and, as they left us, I gave each of them
+a gold cigarette case inscribed with his name and the date.
+
+At the first station on the Swiss side a body of Swiss troops
+were drawn up, presenting arms, and the Colonel commanding the
+Swiss army (there are no generals in Switzerland), attended by
+several staff officers, came on the train and travelled with
+us nearly to Zurich.
+
+I started to speak French to one of these staff officers, but
+he interrupted me by saying in perfect English, "You do not have
+to speak French to me. My name is Iselin, many of my relations
+live in New York and I lived there myself some years."
+
+At Zurich we left the German special train, and were met on the
+platform by some grateful Japanese, the American Consul and a
+number of French and Swiss newspaper reporters, thus ending our
+exodus from Germany.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN
+
+I have already expressed a belief that Germany will not be forced
+to make peace because of a revolution, and that sufficient food
+will be somehow found to carry the population during at least
+another year of war.
+
+What then offers a prospect of reasonable peace, supposing, of
+course, that the Germans fail in the submarine blockade of England
+and that the crumbling up of Russia does not release from the
+East frontier soldiers enough to break the lines of the British
+and French in France?
+
+I think that it is only by an evolution of Germany herself toward
+liberalism that the world will be given such guarantees of future
+peace as will justify the termination of this war.
+
+There is, properly speaking, no great liberal party in the political
+arena in Germany. As I have said, the Reichstag is divided roughly
+into Conservatives, Roman Catholics, or Centrum, and Social
+Democrats. The so-called National Liberal party has in this war
+shown itself a branch of the Conservative party, and on some issues
+as bitter, as conservative, as the Junkers themselves. Herr
+Bassermann and Herr Stresemann have not shown themselves leaders of
+liberal thought, nor has their leadership been such as to inspire
+confidence in their political sagacity.
+
+It was Stresemann who on May thirtieth, 1916, said in the Reichstag
+referring to President Wilson as a peacemaker, "We thrust the
+hand of Wilson aside." On the day following, the day on which
+the President announced to Congress the breaking of diplomatic
+relations, news of that break had not yet arrived in Berlin and
+Herr Stresemann on that peaceful Sunday morning was engaged in
+making a speech to the members of the National Liberal party
+in which he told them that as a result of his careful study of
+the American situation, of his careful researches into American
+character and politics, he could assure them that America would
+never break with Germany. As he concluded his speech and sat
+down amid the applause of his admirers, a German who had been
+sitting in the back of the room rose and read from the noon paper,
+the "_B. Z._", a despatch from Holland giving the news that
+America had broken relations with Germany. The political skill
+and foresight of Herr Stresemann may be judged from the above
+incident.
+
+The Socialists, or Social Democrats, more properly speaking,
+have shown themselves in opposition to the monarchical form of
+government in Germany. This has put them politically, militarily
+and socially beyond the pale.
+
+After a successful French attack in the Champagne, I heard it
+said of a German woman, whose husband was thought to be killed,
+that her rage and despair had been so great that she had said she
+would become a Social Democrat; and her expression was repeated
+as showing to what lengths grief had driven her. This girl was
+the wife of an ordinary clerk working in Berlin.
+
+The Social Democrats are not given offices, are not given titles:
+they never join the class of "_Rat_," and they cannot hope
+to become officers of the army. Did not Lieutenant Forstner,
+the notorious centre of the Zabern Affair, promise a reward to
+the first one of his men who in case of trouble should shoot
+one "of those damn Social Democrats"?
+
+There is, therefore, no refuge at present politically, for the
+reasonable men of liberal inclinations; and it is these liberal
+men who must themselves create a liberal party: a party, membership
+in which will not entail a loss of business, a loss of prospects
+of promotion and social degradation.
+
+There are many such men in Germany to-day; perhaps some of the
+conservative Socialists will join such a party, and there are
+men in the government itself whose habits of mind and thought
+are not incompatible with membership in a liberal organisation.
+The Chancellor himself is, perhaps, at heart a Liberal. He comes
+of a banking family in Frankfort and while there stands before
+his name the "von" which means nobility, and while he owns a
+country estate, the whole turn of his thought is towards a
+philosophical liberalism. Zimmermann, the Foreign Secretary,
+although the mental excitement caused by his elevation to the
+Foreign Office at a time of stress, made him go over to the advocates
+of ruthless submarine war, lock, stock and barrel, is nevertheless
+at heart a Liberal and violently opposed to a system which draws
+the leaders of the country from only one aristocratic class.
+Dr. Solf, the Imperial Colonial Minister, while devoted to the
+Emperor and his family is a man so reasonable in his views, so
+indulgent of the views of others, and indulgent without weakness,
+that he would make an ideal leader of a liberalised Germany.
+The great bankers, merchants and manufacturers, although they
+appreciate the luscious dividends that they have received during
+the peaceful years since 1870, nevertheless feel under their
+skins the ignominy of living in a country where a class exists
+by birth, a class not even tactful enough to conceal its ancient
+contempt for all those who soil their hands business or trade.
+
+In fact such a party is a necessity for Germany as a buffer against
+the extreme Social Democrats.
+
+At the close of the war the soldiers who have fought in the mud
+of the trenches for three years will most insistently demand a
+redistricting of the Reichstag and an abolition of the inadequate
+circle voting of Prussia. And when manhood suffrage comes in
+Prussia and when the industrial population of Germany gets that
+representation in the Reichstag out of which they have been brazenly
+cheated for so many years, it may well be that a great liberal
+party will be the only defence of private property against the
+assault of an enraged and justly revengeful social democracy.
+
+The workingmen of Germany have been fooled for a long time. They
+constitute that class of which President Lincoln spoke, "You
+can fool some of the people all of the time"; and the middle
+class of manufacturers, merchants, etc. have acquiesced in the
+system because of the profits that they have made.
+
+The difficulty of making peace with Germany, as at present
+constituted, is that the whole world feels that peace made with
+its present government would not be lasting; that such a peace
+would mean the detachment of some of the Allies from the present
+world alliance against Germany; preparation by Germany, in the
+light of her needs as disclosed by this war; and the declaration
+of a new war in which there would be no battle of the Marne to
+turn back the tide of German world conquest.
+
+For a long time before this war, radicals in Great Britain pinned
+a great faith to the Socialist party of Germany. How little that
+faith was justified appeared in July and August of 1914 when the
+Socialist party tamely voted credits for the war; a war declared
+by the Emperor on the mere statement that it was a defensive
+war; declared because it was alleged that certain invasions of
+German territory, never since substantiated, had taken place.
+
+The Socialist party is divided. It is a great pity that the world
+cannot deal with men of the type of Scheidemann, who, in other
+democracies, would appear so conservative as to be almost
+reactionary. But Scheidemann and his friends, while they have,
+in their attempted negotiations with the Socialists of other
+countries, the present protection of the Imperial Government,
+will have no hand in dictating terms of peace so long as that
+government is in existence. They are being used in an effort
+to divide the Allies.
+
+As President Wilson said in his message to Russia of May
+twenty-sixth, 1917: "The war has begun to go against Germany,
+and, in their desperate desire to escape the inevitable ultimate
+defeat, those who are in authority in Germany are using every
+possible instrumentality, are making use even of the influence of
+the groups and parties among their own subjects to whom they have
+never been just or fair or even tolerant to promote a propaganda on
+both sides of the sea which will preserve for them their influence
+at home and their power abroad, to the undoing of the very men
+they are using."
+
+There is an impression abroad that the Social Democratic party
+of Germany, usually known abroad as the Socialist party, partakes
+of at least some of the characteristics of a great liberal party.
+This is far from being the case. By their acts, if not by their
+express declarations, they have shown themselves as opposed to
+the monarchical form of government and their leaders are charged
+with having declared themselves openly in favour of free love
+and against religion. The Roman Catholic Church recognises in
+Social Democracy its greatest enemy, and has made great efforts
+to counteract its advance by fostering a sort of Roman Catholic
+trades-union for a religious body of Socialists. The Social Democrat
+in Germany is almost an outcast. Although one third of the members
+of the Reichstag belong to this party, its members are never
+called to hold office in the government; and the attitude of
+the whole of the governing class, of all the professors,
+school-teachers, priests of both Protestant and Roman Catholic
+religions of the prosperous middle classes, is that of violent
+opposition to the doctrines of Social Democracy. The world must
+entertain no illusion that the Social Democratic leaders speak
+for Germany.
+
+If the industrial populations had their fair share of representation
+in the Reichstag they might perhaps even control that body. But,
+as I have time and again reiterated, the Reichstag has only the
+power of public opinion; and the Germany of to-day is ruled by
+officials appointed from above downwards. All of these officials in
+Germany must be added to the other classes that I have mentioned.
+There are more officials there than in any other country in the
+world. As they owe their very existence to the government, they
+must not only serve that government, but also make the enemies
+of that government their own. Therefore, they and the circle
+of their connections are opponents of the Social Democrats.
+
+All this shows how difficult it is at present for the men of
+reasonable and liberal views, who do not wish to declare themselves
+against both religion and morality, to find a political refuge.
+
+The Chancellor, himself a liberal at heart, as I have said, has
+declared that there must be changes in Germany. It is perhaps
+within the bounds of probability that a great new liberal party
+will be formed to which I have referred, composed of the more
+conservative Social Democrats, of the remains of the National
+Liberal and Progressive parties and of the more liberal of the
+Conservatives. The important question is then whether the Roman
+Catholic party or Centrum will voluntarily dissolve and its members
+cease to seek election merely as representatives of the Roman
+Catholic Church.
+
+It is perhaps too much to expect that the Centrum party, as a
+whole and as at present constituted, will declare for liberalism
+and parliamentary government and for a fair redistricting of
+the divisions in Germany which elect members to the Reichstag,
+but there are many wise and farseeing men in this party; and
+its leaders, Dr. Spahn and Erzberger, are fearless and able men.
+
+For some years a movement has been going on in the Centrum party
+looking to this end. Many members believed that the time had
+come when it was no longer necessary that the Roman Catholics
+in order to safeguard their religious liberties continue the
+political existence of the Centrum, and attempts were made to
+bring about this change. It was decided adversely, however, by
+the Roman Catholics. But the question is not dead. Voluntary
+dissolution of the Centrum as a Roman Catholic party would
+immediately bring about a creation of a true liberal party to
+which all Germans could belong without a loss of social prestige,
+without becoming declared enemies of the monarchy and without
+declaring themselves against religion and morality.
+
+At the Congress which will meet after the war it will be easy
+for the nations of the world to deal with the representatives
+of a liberal Germany, with representatives of a government still
+monarchical in form, but possessed of either a constitution like
+that of the United States or ruled by a parliamentary government.
+I believe that the tendency of German liberalism is towards the
+easiest transition, that of making the Chancellor and his ministers
+responsible to the Reichstag and bound to resign after a vote
+of want of confidence by that body.
+
+At the time of the Zabern Affair, Scheidemann claimed that the
+resignation of the Chancellor must logically follow a vote of
+want of confidence; and it was von Bethmann-Hollweg who refused
+to resign, saying that he was responsible to the Emperor alone.
+It requires no violent change to bring about this establishment
+of parliamentary government, and, if the members of the Reichstag
+should be elected from districts fairly constituted, the world
+would then be dealing with a liberalised Germany, and a Germany
+which has become liberalised without any violent change in the
+form of its government.
+
+Of course, coincident with this parliamentary reform, the vicious
+circle system of voting in Prussia must end.
+
+This change to a government by a responsible ministry can be
+accomplished under the constitution of the German Empire by a
+mere majority vote of the Reichstag and a vote in the Bundesrat,
+in which less than fourteen votes are against the proposed change
+in the constitution. This means that the consent of the Emperor
+as Prussian King must be obtained, and that of a number of the
+rulers of the German States.
+
+In the reasonable liberalisation of Germany, if it comes, Theodor
+Wolff and his father-in-law, Mosse, will play leading parts.
+The great newspaper, the _Tageblatt_, which Mosse owns and
+Wolff edits, has throughout the war been a beacon light at once
+of reason and of patriotism. And other great newspapers will
+take the same enlightened course.
+
+I am truly sorry for Georg Bernhard, the talented editor of the
+_Vossiche Zeitung_, who, a Liberal and a Jew, wears the
+livery of Junkerdom, I am sure to his great distaste.
+
+After I left Germany the _Vossiche Zeitung_ made the most
+ridiculous charges against me, such as that I issued American
+passports to British subjects. The newspaper might as well have
+solemnly charged that I sent notes to the Foreign Office in sealed
+envelopes. Having charge of British interests, I could not issue
+British passports to British citizens allowed to leave Germany,
+but, according to universal custom in similar cases and the express
+consent of the Imperial Foreign Office, I gave these returning
+British, American passports superstamped with the words "British
+subject." A mare's nest, truly!
+
+The fall of von Bethmann-Hollweg was a triumph of kitchen intrigue
+and of Junkerism. I believe that he is a liberal at heart, that
+it was against his best judgment that the ruthless submarine
+war was resumed, the pledges of the _Sussex_ Note broken
+and Germany involved in war with America. If he had resigned,
+rather than consent to the resumption of V-boat war, he would
+have stood out as a great Liberal rallying point and probably
+have returned to a more real power than he ever possessed. But
+half because of a desire to retain office, half because of a
+mistaken loyalty to the Emperor, he remained in office at the
+sacrifice of his opinions; and when he laid down that office no
+title of Prince or even of Count waited him as a parting gift.
+In his retirement he will read the lines of Schiller--a favourite
+quotation in Germany--"Der Mohr hat seine Schuldigkeit gethan,
+der Mohr kann gehen." "The Moor has done his work, the Moor can
+go." And in his old age he will exclaim, as Shakespeare makes
+the great Chancellor of Henry the Eighth exclaim, "Oh Cromwell,
+Cromwell! Had I but served my God with half the zeal I served
+my King, He would not, in mine age, have left me naked to mine
+enemies." But this God is not the private War God of the Prussians
+with whom they believe they have a gentlemen's working agreement,
+but the God of Christianity, of humanity and of all mankind.
+
+It would have been easier for Germany to make peace with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg at the helm. The whole world knows him and honours
+him for his honesty.
+
+Helfferich remained as Vice-Chancellor and Minister of the Interior:
+a powerful, and agile intellect, a man, I am sure, opposed to
+militarism. Reasonable in his views, one can sit at the council
+table with him and arrive at compromises and results, but his
+intense patriotism and surpassing ability make him an opponent
+to be feared.
+
+Kühlmann has the Foreign Office. Far more wily than Zimmermann,
+he will continue to strive to embroil us with Japan and Mexico,
+but he will not be caught. Second in command in London, he reported
+then that England would enter the war. The rumours scattered
+broadcast, as he took office, to the effect that he was opposed
+to ruthless V-boat war were but evidences of a more skilful hand
+in a campaign to predispose the world in his favour and, therefore,
+to assist him in any negotiations he might have on the carpet.
+Beware of the wily Kühlmann!
+
+Baiting the Chancellor is the favourite sport of German political
+life. No sooner does the Kaiser name a Chancellor than hundreds
+of little politicians, Reichstag members, editors, reporters
+and female intriguers try to drive him from office. When von
+Bethmann-Hollweg showed an inclination towards Liberalism, and
+advocated a juster electoral system for Prussia, the Junkers, the
+military and the upholders of the caste system joined their forces
+to those of the usual intriguers; and it was only a question of
+time until the Chancellor's official head fell in the basket.
+
+His successor is a Prussian bureaucrat. No further description
+is necessary.
+
+Of course no nation will permit itself to be reformed from without.
+The position of the world in arms with reference to Germany is
+simply this. It is impossible to make peace with Germany as at
+present constituted, because that peace will be but a truce,
+a short breathing space before the German military autocrats
+again send the sons of Germany to death in the trenches for the
+advancement of the System and the personal glory and advantage
+of stuffy old generals and prancing princes.
+
+The world does not believe that a free Germany will needlessly
+make war, believe in war for war's sake or take up the profession
+of arms as a national industry.
+
+The choice lies with the German people. And how admirably has
+our great President shown that people that we war not with them
+but with the autocracy which has led them into the shambles of
+dishonour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR
+
+With the declaration of war the ultimate power in Germany was
+transferred from the civil to the military authorities.
+
+At five o'clock on the afternoon of Friday, and immediately after
+the declaration of a State of War, the Guard of the Grenadier
+Regiment Kaiser Alexander, under the command of a Lieutenant with
+four drummers, took its place before the monument of Frederick
+the Great in the middle of the Unter den Linden. The drummers
+sounded a ruffle on their drums and the Lieutenant read an order
+beginning with the words "By all highest order: A State of War
+is proclaimed in Berlin and in the Province of Brandenburg."
+This order was signed by General von Kessel as Over-Commander
+of the Mark of Brandenburg; and stated that the complete power
+was transferred to him; that the civil officials might remain
+in office, but must obey the orders and regulations of the
+Over-Commander; that house-searchings and arrests by officials
+thereto empowered could take place at any time; that strangers
+who could not show good reason for remaining in Berlin, had
+twenty-four hours in which to leave; that the sale of weapons,
+powder and explosives to civilians was forbidden; and that civilians
+were forbidden to carry weapons without permission of the proper
+authorities.
+
+The same transfer of authority took place in each army
+corps--_Bezirk_, or province or district in Germany; and
+in each army corps district or province the commanding general
+took over the ultimate power. In Berlin it was necessary to create
+a new officer, the Over-Commander of the Mark, because two army
+corps, the third and the army corps of the guards, had their
+head-quarters in Berlin. These army corps commanders were not
+at all bashful about the use of the power thus transferred to
+them. Some of them even prescribed the length of the dresses
+to be worn by the women; and many women, having followed the
+German sport custom of wearing knickerbockers in the winter sports
+resorts of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the Generalkommando, or
+Headquarters for Bavaria issued in January, 1917, the following
+order: "The appearance of many women in Garmisch-Partenkirchen
+has excited lively anger and indignation in the population there.
+This bitterness is directed particularly against certain women,
+frequently of ripe age, who do not engage in sports, but nevertheless
+show themselves in public continually clad in knickerbockers. It
+has even happened that women so dressed have visited churches
+during the service. Such behaviour is a cruelty to the earnest
+minds of the mountain population and, in consequence, there are
+often many disagreeable occurrences in the streets. Officials,
+priests and private citizens have turned to the Generalkommando
+with the request for help; and the Generalkommando has, therefore,
+empowered the district officials in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to
+take energetic measures against this misconduct; if necessary
+with the aid of the police."
+
+I spent two days at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in February, 1916.
+Some of the German girls looked very well in their "knickers,"
+but I agree with the Generalkommando that the appearance of some
+of the older women was "cruelty" not only to the "earnest mountain
+population" but to any observer.
+
+These corps commanders are apparently responsible direct to the
+Emperor; and therefore much of the difficulty that I had concerning
+the treatment of prisoners was due to this system, as each corps
+commander considered himself supreme in his own district not
+only over the civil and military population but over the prison
+camps within his jurisdiction.
+
+On the fourth of August, 1914, a number of laws were passed,
+which had been evidently prepared long in advance, making various
+changes made necessary by war, such as alteration of the Coinage
+Law, the Bank Law, and the Law of Maximum Prices. Laws as to
+the high prices were made from time to time. For instance, the
+law of the twenty-eighth of October, 1914, provided in detail
+the maximum prices for rye in different parts of Germany. The
+maximum price at wholesale per German ton of native rye must
+not exceed 220 marks in Berlin, 236 marks in Cologne, 209 marks
+in Koenigsberg, 228 marks in Hamburg, 235 marks in Frankfort a/M.
+
+The maximum price for the German ton of native wheat was set at
+forty marks per ton higher than the above rates for rye. This
+maximum price was made with reference to deliveries without sacks
+and for cash payments.
+
+The law as to the maximum prices applied to all objects of daily
+necessity, not only to food and fodder but to oil, coal and wood.
+Of course, these maximum prices were changed from time to time,
+but I think I can safely state that at no time in the war, while
+I was in Berlin, were the simple foods more expensive than in
+New York.
+
+The so-called "war bread," the staple food of the population,
+which was made soon after the commencement of the war, was composed
+partially of rye and potato flour. It was not at all unpalatable,
+especially when toasted; and when it was seen that the war would
+not be as short as the Germans had expected, the bread cards
+were issued. That is, every Monday morning each person was given
+a card which had annexed to it a number of little perforated
+sections about the size of a quarter of a postage stamp, each
+marked with twenty-five, fifty or one hundred. The total of these
+figures constituted the allowance of each person in grammes per
+week. The person desiring to buy bread either at a baker's or in
+a restaurant must turn in these little stamped sections for an
+amount equivalent to the weight of bread purchased. Each baker
+was given a certain amount of meal at the commencement of each
+week, and he had to account for this meal at the end of the week
+by turning in its equivalent in bread cards.
+
+As food became scarce, the card system was applied to meat, potatoes,
+milk, sugar, butter and soap. Green vegetables and fruits were
+exempt from the card system, as were for a long time chickens,
+ducks, geese, turkeys and game. Because of these exemptions the
+rich usually managed to live well, although the price of a goose
+rose to ridiculous heights. There was, of course, much underground
+traffic in cards and sales of illicit or smuggled butter, etc.
+The police were very stern in their enforcement of the law and
+the manager of one of the largest hotels in Berlin was taken to
+prison because he had made the servants give him their allowance
+of butter, which he in turn sold to the rich guests of the hotel.
+
+No one over six years of age at the time I left could get milk
+without a doctor's certificate. One result of this was that the
+children of the poor were surer of obtaining milk than before
+the war, as the women of the Frauendienst and social workers
+saw to it that each child had its share.
+
+The third winter of the war, owing to a breakdown of means of
+transportation and want of laborers, coal became very scarce.
+All public places, such as theatres, picture galleries, museums,
+and cinematograph shows, were closed in Munich for want of coal.
+In Berlin the suffering was not as great but even the elephants
+from Hagenbeck's Show were pressed into service to draw the coal
+carts from the railway stations.
+
+Light was economized. All the apartment houses (and all Berlin
+lives in apartment houses) were closed at nine o'clock. Stores
+were forbidden to illuminate their show windows and all theatres
+were closed at ten. Only every other street electric light was
+lit; of the three lights in each lamp, only one.
+
+As more and more men were called to the front, women were employed
+in unusual work. The new underground road in Berlin is being
+built largely by woman labour. This is not so difficult a matter
+in Berlin as in New York, because Berlin is built upon a bed
+of sand and the difficulties of rock excavation do not exist.
+Women are employed on the railroads, working with pickaxes on
+the road-bed. Women drive the great yellow post carts of Berlin.
+There were women guards on the underground road, women conductors
+on the tramways and women even become motor men on the tramcars.
+Banks, insurance companies and other large business institutions
+were filled with women workers who invaded the sacred precincts
+of many military and governmental offices.
+
+A curious development of the hate of all things foreign was the
+hunt led by the Police President of Berlin, von Jagow (a cousin
+of the Foreign Minister), for foreign words. Von Jagow and his
+fellow cranks decided that all words of foreign origin must be
+expunged from the German language. The title of the Hotel Bristol
+on the Unter den Linden disappeared. The Hotel Westminster on
+the same street became Lindenhof. There is a large hotel called
+"The Cumberland," with a pastry department over which there was
+a sign, the French word, _Confissérie_. The management was
+compelled to take this sign down, but the hotel was allowed to
+retain the name of Cumberland, because the father-in-law of the
+Kaiser's only daughter is the Duke of Cumberland. The word
+"chauffeur" was eliminated, and there, were many discussions as
+to what should be substituted. Many declared for Kraftwagenfuhrer
+or "power wagon driver."
+
+But finally the word was Germanised as "Schauffoer." Prussians
+took down the sign, _Confektion_, but the climax came when
+the General in command of the town of Breslau wrote a confectioner
+telling him to stop the use of the word "_bonbon_" in selling
+his candy. The confectioner, with a sense of humour and a nerve
+unusual in Germany, wrote back to the General that he would gladly
+discontinue the use of the word "_bonbon_" when the General
+ceased to call himself "General," and called the attention of
+this high military authority to the fact that "General" was as
+much a French word as "_bonbon_."
+
+Unusual means were adopted in order to get all the gold coins
+in the country into the Imperial Bank. There were signs in every
+surface and underground car which read, "Whoever keeps back a
+gold coin injures the Fatherland." And if a soldier presented
+to his superiors a twenty mark gold piece, he received in return
+twenty marks in paper money and two days leave of absence. In
+like manner a school boy who turned in ten marks in gold received
+ten marks in paper and was given a half holiday. Cinematograph
+shows gave these patrons who paid in gold an extra ticket, good
+for another day. An American woman residing at Berlin was awakened
+one morning at eight o'clock by two police detectives who told
+her that they had heard that she had some gold coins in her
+possession, and that if she did not turn them in for paper money
+they would wreck her apartment in their search for them. She,
+therefore, gave them the gold which I afterwards succeeded in
+getting the German Government to return to her. Later, the export
+of gold was forbidden, and even travellers arriving with gold
+were compelled to give it up in return for paper money.
+
+While, of course, I cannot ascertain the exact amounts, I found,
+nevertheless, that great quantities of food and other supplies
+came into Germany from Holland and the Scandinavian countries,
+particularly from Sweden. Now that we are in the war we should
+take strong measures and cut off exports to these countries which
+export food, raw material, etc. to Germany. Sweden is particularly
+active in this traffic, but I understand that sulphur pyrites
+are sent from Norway, and sulphuric acid made therefrom is an
+absolute essential to the manufacture of munitions of war.
+
+Potash, which is found as a mineral only in Germany and Austria,
+was used in exchange of commodities with Sweden and in this way
+much copper, lard, etc. reached Germany.
+
+Early in the summer of 1915, the first demonstration took place
+in Berlin. About five hundred women collected in front of the
+Reichstag building. They were promptly suppressed by the police
+and no newspaper printed an account of the occurrence. These
+women were rather vague in their demands. They called von Buelow
+an old fat-head for his failure in Italy and complained that the
+whipped cream was not so good as before the war. There was some
+talk of high prices for food, and the women all said that they
+wanted their men back from the trenches.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early summer brought also a number of cranks to Berlin. Miss Jane
+Addams and her fellow suffragists, after holding a convention
+in Holland, moved on Berlin. I succeeded in getting both the
+Chancellor and von Jagow to consent to receive them, a meeting to
+which they looked forward with unconcealed perturbation. However,
+one of them seems to have impressed Miss Addams, for, as I write
+this, I read in the papers that she is complaining that we should
+not have gone to war because we thereby risk hurting somebody's
+feelings.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On July twenty-seventh, 1915, I reported that I had learned that
+the Germans were picking out the Revolutionists and Liberals
+from the many Russian prisoners of war, furnishing them with
+money and false passports and papers, and sending them back to
+Russia to stir up a revolution.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A German friend of mine told me that a friend of his who manufactured
+field glasses had received a large order from the Bulgarian
+Government. This manufacturer went to the Foreign Office and
+asked whether he should deliver the goods. He was told not only
+to deliver them but to do it as quickly as possible. By learning
+of this I was able to predict long in advance the entry of Bulgaria
+on the side of the Central Powers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Even a year after the commencement of the war there were reasonable
+people in Germany. I met Ballin, head of the great Hamburg American
+Line, on August ninth. I said to him, "When are you going to
+stop this crazy fighting?" The next day Ballin called on me and
+said that the sensible people of Germany wanted peace and that
+without annexation. He told me that every one was afraid to talk
+peace, that each country thought it a sign of weakness, and that
+he had advised the Chancellor to put a statement in an official
+paper to say that Germany fought only to defend herself and was
+ready to make an honourable peace. He told me that the Emperor at
+that time was against the annexation of Belgium.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In calculating the great war debt built up by Germany, it must
+not be forgotten that German municipalities and other political
+districts have incurred large debts for war purposes, such as
+extra relief given to the wives and children of soldiers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In November, 1915, there were food disturbances and a serious
+agitation against a continuance of the war; and, in Leipzig,
+a Socialist paper was suppressed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The greatest efforts were made at all times to get in gold; and
+some time before I left Germany an advertisement was published
+in the newspapers requesting Germans to give up their jewelry for
+the Fatherland. Many did so: among them, I believe, the Empress
+and other royalties.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, 1915, a prominent banker in Berlin said to me that
+the Germans were sick of the war; that the Krupps and other big
+industries were making great sums of money and were prolonging
+the war by insisting upon the annexation of Belgium; and that
+the Junkers were also in favour of the continuance of the war
+because of the fact that they were getting four or five times
+the money for their products while their work was being done by
+prisoners. He said that the _Kaufleute_ (merchant middle class)
+will have to pay the cost of the war and that the Junkers will
+not be taxed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, butter became very scarce and the women waiting
+in long lines before the shops often rushed the shops. In this
+month many copper roofs were removed from buildings in Berlin.
+I was told by a friend in the Foreign Office that the notorious
+von Rintelen was sent to America to buy up the entire product of
+the Dupont powder factories, and that he exceeded his authority
+if he did anything else.
+
+In December, on the night of the day of the peace interpellation
+in the Reichstag a call was issued by placards for a meeting
+on the Unter den Linden. I went out on the streets during the
+afternoon and found that the police had so carefully divided
+the city into districts that it was impossible for a crowd of
+any size to gather on the Unter den Linden. There was quite a
+row at the session in the Reichstag. Scheidemann, the Socialist,
+made a speech very moderate in tone; but he was answered by the
+Chancellor and then an endeavour was made to close the debate.
+The Socialists made such a noise, however, that the majority gave
+way and another prominent Socialist, Landsberger, was allowed
+to speak for the Socialists. He also made a reasonable speech
+in the course of which he said that even Socialists would not
+allow Alsace-Lorraine to go back to France. He made use of a
+rather good phrase, saying that the "Dis-United States of Europe
+were making war to make a place for the United States of America."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The banks sent out circulars to all holders of safe deposit boxes,
+asking them to disclose the contents. This was part of the campaign
+to get in hoarded gold.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, we had many visitors. S. S. McClure, Hermann
+Bernstein, Inez Milholland Boissevain--all of the Ford Peace
+Ship--appeared in Berlin. I introduced Mrs. Boissevain to Zimmermann
+who admired her extremely.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, I visited Munich and from there a Bavarian
+officer prison camp and the prison camp for private soldiers,
+both at Ingolstadt. I also conferred with Archdeacon Nies of
+the American Episcopal Church who carried on a much needed work
+in visiting the prison camps in Bavaria.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The American Colony in Munich maintained with the help of friends
+in America, a Red Cross hospital under the able charge of Dr.
+Jung, a Washington doctor, and his wife. The nursing was done by
+American and German girls. The American Colony at Munich also fed
+a number of school children every day. I regret to say, however,
+that many of the Americans in Munich were loud in their abuse of
+President Wilson and their native country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In March, 1916, I was sounded on the question of Germany's sending
+an unofficial envoy, like Colonel House, to America to talk
+informally to the President and prominent people. I was told that
+Solf would probably be named.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In 1916, the importation of many articles of luxury into Germany
+was forbidden. This move was naturally made in order to keep
+money in the country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A Dane who had a quantity of manganese in Brazil sold it to a
+Philadelphia firm for delivery to the United States Steel Company.
+The German Government in some way learned of this and the Dane
+was arrested and put in jail. His Minister had great difficulty
+in getting him out.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Liebknecht, in April of 1916, made matters lively at the Reichstag
+sessions. During the Chancellor's speech, Liebknecht interrupted
+him and said that the Germans were not free; next he denied that
+the Germans had not wished war; and, another time, he called
+attention to the attempts of the Germans to induce the Mohammedan
+and Irish prisoners of war to desert to the German side. Liebknecht
+finally enraged the government supporters by calling out that
+the subscription to the loan was a swindle.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+After the _Sussex_ settlement I think that the Germans wished
+to inaugurate an era of better feeling between Germany and the
+United States. At any rate, and in answer to many anonymous attacks
+made against me, the _North German Gazette_, the official
+newspaper, published a sort of certificate from the government
+to the effect that I was a good boy and that the rumours of my
+bitter hostility to Germany were unfounded.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In May, 1916, Wertheim, head of the great department store in
+Berlin, told me that they had more business than in peace times.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early in June 1 had two long talks with Prince von Buelow. He
+speaks English well and is suspected by his enemies of having
+been polishing it up lately in order to make ready for possible
+peace conferences. He is a man of a more active brain than the
+present Chancellor, and is very restless and anxious in some
+way to break into the present political situation.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In June, the anonymous attacks on the Chancellor by pamphlet
+and otherwise, incensed him to such a degree that he made an
+open answer in the Reichstag and had rather the best of the
+situation. Many anonymous lies and rumours were flying about
+Berlin at this period, and even Helfferich had to deny publicly
+the anonymous charges that he had been anonymously attacking
+the Chancellor.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In July, the committee called the National Committee for an
+Honourable Peace was formed with Prince Wedel at its head. Most
+of the people in this League were friends of the Chancellor, and
+one of the three real heads was the editor of the
+_Frankfurter Zeitung_, the Chancellor's organ. It was planned that
+fifty speakers from this committee would begin to speak all over
+Germany on August first, but when they began to speak their views
+were so dissimilar and the speeches of most of them so ridiculous
+that the movement failed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In August, I spent two Saturdays and Sundays at Heringsdorf,
+a summer resort on the Baltic. Before going there I had to get
+special permission from the military authorities through the
+Foreign Office, as foreigners are not allowed to reside on the
+coast of Germany. Regulations that all windows must be darkened
+at night and no lights shown which could be seen from the sea
+were strictly enforced by the authorities.
+
+There are three bathing places. In each of them the bath houses,
+etc. surround three sides of a square, the sea forming the fourth
+side. Bathing is allowed only on this fourth side for a space
+of sixty-five yards long. One of these bathing places is for
+women and one for men, and the third is the so-called Familienbad
+(family bath) where mixed bathing is allowed. German women are
+very sensible in the matter of their bathing costumes and do
+not wear the extraordinary creations seen in America. They wear
+bathing sandals but no stockings, and, as most of them have fine
+figures but dress badly, they appear at their best at Heringsdorf.
+Both sea and air seemed somewhat cold for bathing. On account
+of their sensible dress, most of the German women are expert
+swimmers.
+
+I noticed one very handsome blonde girl who sat on her bathing
+mantle exciting the admiration of the beach because of her fine
+figure. She suddenly dived into the pockets of the bathing mantle
+and produced an enormous black bread sandwich which she proceeded
+to consume quite unconsciously, after which she swam out to sea.
+No healthy German can remain long separated from food; and I
+noticed in the prospectus of the different boarding-houses at
+Heringsdorf that patrons were offered, in addition to about four
+meals or more a day, an extra sandwich to take to the beach to
+be consumed during the bathing hour.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There is a beautiful little English church in Berlin which was
+especially favoured by the Kaiser's mother during her life. Because
+of this, the Kaiser permitted this church to remain open, and
+the services were continued during the war. The pastor, Rev. Mr.
+Williams, obtained permission to visit the British prisoners,
+and most devotedly travelled from one prison camp to another.
+Both he and his sister, whose charitable work for the British
+deserves mention, were at one time thrown into jail, charged
+with spying.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I at first attended the hybrid American church, but when, in
+1915, I think, the committee hired a German _woman_ preacher
+I ceased to attend. The American, the Reverend Dr. Crosser, who
+was in charge when I arrived in Berlin left, to my everlasting
+regret, in the spring before the war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Poor Creelman, the celebrated newspaper correspondent, died in
+Berlin. We got him in to a good hospital and some one from the
+Embassy visited him every day.
+
+The funeral services were conducted in the American Church by
+the Rev. Dr. Dickie, long a resident of Berlin, whose wife had
+presented the library to the American church. The Foreign Office
+sent Herr Horstmann as its representative.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+While to-day all royalties and public men pose for the movies,
+Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria and his family are probably the first
+royalties to act in a cinematograph. In 1916, there was released
+in Berlin a play in which Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria, his wife
+and two daughters by a former wife appeared, acting as Bulgarian
+royalties in the development of the plot.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The difference between von Jagow and Zimmermann was that von
+Jagow had lived abroad, had met people from all countries and
+knew that there was much to learn about the psychology of the
+inhabitants of countries other than Germany. Zimmermann, in the
+early part of his career, had been consul at Shanghai; and, on
+his way back, had passed through America, spending two days in
+San Francisco and three in New York. He seemed to think that
+this transcontinental trip had given him an intimate knowledge
+of American character. Von Jagow, on the other hand, almost as
+soon as war began, spent many hours talking to me about America
+and borrowed from me books and novels on that country. The novel
+in which he took the greatest interest was "Turmoil," by Booth
+Tarkington.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I think there must have been a period quite recently when the
+German Government tried to imbue the people with a greater degree
+of frightfulness, because all of us in visiting camps, etc. observed
+that the _landsturm_ men or older soldiers were much more merciful
+than the younger ones.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Alexander Cochran, a New York yachtsman, volunteered to become a
+courier between the London Embassy and ours. On his first trip,
+although he had two passports (his regular passport and a special
+courier's passport), he was arrested and compelled to spend the
+night on the floor of the guard-room at the frontier town of
+Bentheim. This ended his aspirations to be a courier. He is now
+a commander in the British Navy, having joined it with his large
+steam yacht, the _Warrior_ some time before the United States
+entered the war. In the piping times of peace he had been the
+guest of the Emperor at Kiel.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A British prisoner, who escaped from Ruhleben, was caught in a
+curious manner. Prisoners in Ruhleben received bread from outside,
+as I have explained in the chapter on prisoners of war. This bread
+is white, something unknown in Germany since the war. The escaped
+prisoner took with him some sandwiches made of the bread he had
+received in Ruhleben and most incautiously ate one of these
+sandwiches in a railway station. He was immediately surrounded
+by a crowd of Germans anxious to know where he had obtained the
+white bread, and, in this way, was detected and returned to prison.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On our way out in September, 1916, we were given a large dinner
+in Copenhagen by our skilful minister there, the Hon. Maurice
+F. Egan, who has devoted many years of his life to the task of
+adding the three beautiful Danish islands to the dominions of the
+United States. He is an able diplomat, very popular in Copenhagen,
+where he is dean of the diplomatic corps. At this dinner we met
+Countess Hegerman-Lindencron, whose interesting books, "The Sunny
+Side of Diplomatic Life" and "The Courts of Memory," have had
+a large circulation in America. In Copenhagen, too, both on the
+way out and in, we lunched with Count Rantzau-Brockedorff, then
+German Minister there. Count Rantzau is skilful and wily, and not
+at all military in his instincts; and, I should say, far more
+inclined to arrive at a reasonable compromise than the average
+German diplomat. He is a charming International, with none of the
+rough points and aggressive manners which characterise so many
+Prussian officials.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In judging the German people, we must remember that, while they
+have made great progress in the last forty years in commerce
+and chemistry, the very little liberty they possess is a plant
+of very recent growth. About the year 1780, Frederick the Great
+having sent some money to restore the burned city of Greiffenberg,
+in Silesia, the magistrates of that town called upon him to thank
+him. They kneeled and their spokesman said, "We render unto your
+Majesty in the name of the inhabitants of Greiffenberg, our humble
+thanks for the most gracious gift which your Majesty deigned to
+bestow in aid and to assist us in rebuilding our homes.
+
+"The gratitude of such dust as we, is, as we are aware, of no
+moment or value to you. We shall, however, implore God to grant
+your Majesty His divine favours in return for your royal bounty."
+
+Too many Germans, to-day, feel that they are mere dust before
+the almost countless royalties of the German Empire. And these
+royalties are too prone to feel that the kingdoms, dukedoms and
+principalities of Germany and their inhabitants are their private
+property. The Princes of Nassau and Anspach and Hesse, at the
+time of our Revolution, sold their unfortunate subjects to the
+British Government to be exported to fight the Americans. Our
+American soil covers the bones of many a poor German peasant
+who gave up his life in a war from which he gained nothing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Frederick the Great, the model and exemplar of all German
+royalties; died in 1786, he disposed of the Kingdom of Prussia
+in his will as if it had been one of his horses. "I bequeath
+unto my dear nephew, Frederick William, as unto my immediate
+successor, the Kingdom of Prussia, the provinces, towns, palaces,
+forts, fortresses, all ammunition and arsenals, all lands mine
+by inheritance or right of conquest, the crown jewels, gold and
+silver service of plate in Berlin, country houses, collections
+of coins, picture galleries, gardens, and so forth." Contrast
+this will with the utterances of Washington and Hamilton made
+at the same time!
+
+In the Grand Duchies of Mecklenburg, serfdom was not abolished
+until 1819.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The spies and the influencers of American correspondents made
+their headquarters at a large Berlin hotel. A sketch of their
+activities is given by de Beaufort in his book, "Behind the German
+Veil."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Among the American correspondents in Berlin during the war great
+credit should be given to Carl W. Ackerman and Seymour B. Conger,
+correspondents of the United and Associated Presses respectively,
+who at all times and in spite of their surroundings and in the
+face of real difficulties preserved their Americanism unimpaired
+and refused to succumb to the alluring temptations held out to
+them. I do not mean to imply that the other correspondents were
+not loyal, but the pro-Germanism of many of them unfortunately
+gave the Imperial Foreign Office and the great general staff a
+wrong impression of Americans. It is the splendid patriotism
+under fire of Ackerman and Conger that deserves special mention.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+LAST
+
+I was credited by the Germans with having hoodwinked and jollied
+the Foreign Office and the Government into refraining for two
+years from using illegally their most effective weapon.
+
+This, of course, is not so. I always told the Foreign Office the
+plain simple truth and the event showed that I correctly predicted
+the attitude of America.
+
+Our American national game, poker, has given us abroad an unfair
+reputation. We are always supposed to be bluffing. A book was
+published in Germany about the President called, "President Bluff."
+
+I only regret that those high in authority in Germany should
+have preferred to listen to pro-German correspondents who posed
+as amateur super-Ambassadors rather than to the authorised
+representatives of America. I left Germany with a clear conscience
+and the knowledge that I had done everything possible to keep
+the peace.
+
+An Ambassador, of course, does not determine the policy of his
+own country. One of his principal duties, if not the principal
+one, is to keep his own country informed--to know beforehand what
+the country to which he is accredited will do, and I think that
+I managed to give the State Department advance information of
+the moves of the rulers of Germany.
+
+I had the support of a loyal and devoted staff of competent
+secretaries and assistants, and both Secretaries Bryan and Lansing
+were most kind in the backing given by their very ably organised
+department.
+
+I sent Secretary Lansing a confidential letter every week and, of
+course, received most valuable hints from him. Secretary Lansing
+was very successful in his tactful handling of the American
+Ambassadors abroad and in getting them to work together as cheerful
+members of the same team.
+
+When I returned to America, after living for two and a half years
+in the centre of this world calamity, everything seemed petty
+and small. I was surprised that people could still seek little
+advantages, still be actuated by little jealousies and revenges.
+Freed from the round of daily work I felt for the first time the
+utter horror and uselessness of all the misery these Prussian
+military autocrats had brought upon the world; and what a reckoning
+there will be in Germany some day when the plain people realise
+the truth, when they learn what base motives actuated their rulers
+in condemning a whole generation of the earth to war and death!
+
+Is it not a shame that the world should have been so disturbed;
+that peaceful men are compelled to lie out in the mud and filth
+in the depth of raw winter, shot at and stormed at and shelled,
+waiting for a chance to murder some other inoffensive fellow
+creature? Why must the people in old Poland die of hunger, not
+finding dogs enough to eat in the streets of Lemberg? The long
+lines of broken peasants in Serbia and in Roumania; the population
+of Belgium and Northern France torn from their homes to work
+as slaves for the Germans; the poor prisoners of war starving
+in their huts or working in factories and mines; the cries of
+the old and the children, wounded by bombs from Zeppelins; the
+wails of the mothers for their sons; the very rustling of the air
+as the souls of the ten million dead sweep to another world,--why
+must all these horrors come upon a fair green earth, where we
+believed that love and help and friendship, genius and science
+and commerce, religion and civilisation, once ruled?
+
+It is because in the dark, cold Northern plains of Germany there
+exists an autocracy, deceiving a great people, poisoning their
+minds from one generation to another and preaching the virtue
+and necessity of war; and until that autocracy is either wiped
+out or made powerless, there can be no peace on earth.
+
+The golden dream of conquest was almost accomplished. A little
+more advance, a few more wagon loads of ammunition, and there
+would have been no battle of the Marne, no Joffre, a modern Martel,
+to hammer back the invading hordes of barbarism.
+
+I have always stated that Germany is possessed yet of immense
+military power; and, to win, the nations opposed to Germany must
+learn to think in a military way. The mere entrance, even of
+a great nation like our own, into the war, means nothing in a
+military way unless backed by military power.
+
+And there must be no German peace. The old _régime_, left
+in control of Germany, of Bulgaria, of Turkey, would only seek
+a favourable moment to renew the war, to strive again for the
+mastery of the world.
+
+Fortunately America bars the way,--America led by a fighting
+President who win allow no compromise with brutal autocracy.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+[Illustration: THIS AND THE FOLLOWING FIVE PAGES ARE A FAC-SIMILE
+REPRODUCTION OF THE TELEGRAM IN THE KAISER'S OWN HANDWRITING
+WHICH HE GAVE AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CABLE TO PRESIDENT WILSON.]
+
+[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE ZIMMERMAN'S REQUEST
+TO AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE THE ANNOUNCEMENT
+OF RUTHLESS SUBMARINE WARFARE AGAINST THE ALLIES.]
+
+[Illustration: THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799 BETWEEN
+THE UNITED STATES AND PRUSSIA, WHICH AMBASSADOR GERARD WAS ASKED
+TO SIGN WHEN LEAVING GERMANY AFTER DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS HAD BEEN
+SEVERED.]
+
+[Illustration: A FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF A MULTIGRAPH SET OF
+INSTRUCTIONS SENT OUT BY THE GERMAN PRESS BUREAU TO THE NEWSPAPERS
+FOR THE PURPOSE OF ENABLING THEM TO WRITE UP THE LATEST ZEPPELIN
+RAID ON LONDON. THE INSTRUCTIONS WARN THEM THAT THEIR ACCOUNTS
+MUST NOT READ LIKE A REPRINT, BUT MUST SEEM TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN
+INDEPENDENTLY.]
+
+[Illustration: A PETITION TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES,
+CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURES AMONG THE AMERICANS IN EUROPE, OSTENSIBLY
+TO PROTEST AGAINST THE AMERICAN MANUFACTURE OF MUNITIONS OF WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF A PAMPHLET FOR PROPAGANDA PURPOSES,
+IN WHICH WIDE PUBLICITY WAS GIVEN TO LISSAUER'S FAMOUS "HYMN
+OF HATE".]
+
+[Illustration: AN EXCELLENT EXAMPLE OF TEUTONIC EFFICIENCY. MINUTE
+REGULATIONS IN REGARD TO PRESENTATION AT COURT.]
+
+[Illustration: A BERLIN EXTRA. GERMANY DISCLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY
+FOR THE WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO SAIL ON S. M. J. "METEOR".]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO DINE ON THE KAISER'S YACHT,
+"HOHENZOLLERN," AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO THE GARDEN PARTY AT KIEL OF PRINCE
+HENRY OF PRUSSIA, WHICH WAS GIVEN UP BECAUSE OF THE NEWS OF THE
+MURDERS AT SARAJEVO.]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
+copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
+this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
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+*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
+
+
+Title: My Four Years in Germany
+
+Author: James W. Gerard
+
+Release Date: January, 2005 [EBook #7238]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on March 30, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert J. Hall
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO ATTEND THE OPENING OF THE ROYAL
+ACADEMY.]
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO A COURT BALL.]
+
+[Illustration: SAFE CONDUCT FOR AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS FAMILY,
+UNDER THE SIGNATURE OF SECRETARY ZIMMERMANN, FEBRUARY, 5, 1917.]
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS
+LEAVING ON A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+
+
+
+MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY
+
+BY JAMES W. GERARD
+
+LATE AMBASSADOR TO THE GERMAN IMPERIAL COURT
+
+
+
+
+TO MY SMALL BUT TACTFUL FAMILY OF ONE
+
+MY WIFE
+
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+I am writing what should have been the last chapter of this book
+as a foreword because I want to bring home to our people the
+gravity of the situation; because I want to tell them that the
+military and naval power of the German Empire is unbroken; that of
+the twelve million men whom the Kaiser has called to the colours
+but one million, five hundred thousand have been killed, five
+hundred thousand permanently disabled, not more than five hundred
+thousand are prisoners of war, and about five hundred thousand
+constitute the number of wounded or those on the sick list of
+each day, leaving at all times about nine million effectives
+under arms.
+
+I state these figures because Americans do not grasp either the
+magnitude or the importance of this war. Perhaps the statement
+that over five million prisoners of war are held in the various
+countries will bring home to Americans the enormous mass of men
+engaged.
+
+There have been no great losses in the German navy, and any losses
+of ships have been compensated for by the building of new ones.
+The nine million men, and more, for at least four hundred thousand
+come of military age in Germany every year, because of their
+experience in two and a half years of war are better and more
+efficient soldiers than at the time when they were called to
+the colours. Their officers know far more of the science of this
+war and the men themselves now have the skill and bearing of
+veterans.
+
+Nor should anyone believe that Germany will break under starvation
+or make peace because of revolution.
+
+The German nation is not one which makes revolutions. There will
+be scattered riots in Germany, but no simultaneous rising of the
+whole people. The officers of the army are all of one class,
+and of a class devoted to the ideals of autocracy. A revolution
+of the army is impossible; and at home there are only the boys
+and old men easily kept in subjection by the police.
+
+There is far greater danger of the starvation of our Allies than
+of the starvation of the Germans. Every available inch of ground
+in Germany is cultivated, and cultivated by the aid of the old
+men, the boys and the women, and the two million prisoners of
+war.
+
+The arable lands of Northern France and of Roumania are being
+cultivated by the German army with an efficiency never before
+known in these countries, and most of that food will be added
+to the food supplies of Germany. Certainly the people suffer;
+but still more certainly this war will not be ended because of
+the starvation of Germany.
+
+Although thinking Germans know that if they do not win the war
+the financial day of reckoning will come, nevertheless, owing to
+the clever financial handling of the country by the government
+and the great banks, there is at present no financial distress in
+Germany; and the knowledge that, unless indemnities are obtained
+from other countries, the weight of the great war debt will fall
+upon the people, perhaps makes them readier to risk all in a
+final attempt to win the war and impose indemnities upon not
+only the nations of Europe but also upon the United States of
+America.
+
+We are engaged in a war against the greatest military power the
+world has ever seen; against a people whose country was for so
+many centuries a theatre of devastating wars that fear is bred
+in the very marrow of their souls, making them ready to submit
+their lives and fortunes to an autocracy which for centuries has
+ground their faces, but which has promised them, as a result of
+the war, not only security but riches untold and the dominion of
+the world; a people which, as from a high mountain, has looked
+upon the cities of the world and the glories of them, and has
+been promised these cities and these glories by the devils of
+autocracy and of war.
+
+We are warring against a nation whose poets and professors, whose
+pedagogues and whose parsons have united in stirring its people
+to a white pitch of hatred, first against Russia, then against
+England and now against America.
+
+The U-Boat peril is a very real one for England. Russia may either
+break up into civil wars or become so ineffective that the millions
+of German troops engaged on the Russian front may be withdrawn
+and hurled against the Western lines. We stand in great peril,
+and only the exercise of ruthless realism can win this war for us.
+If Germany wins this war it means the triumph of the autocratic
+system. It means the triumph of those who believe not only in
+war as a national industry, not only in war for itself but also
+in war as a high and noble occupation. Unless Germany is beaten
+the whole world will be compelled to turn itself into an armed
+camp, until the German autocracy either brings every nation under
+its dominion or is forever wiped out as a form of government.
+
+We are in this war because we were forced into it: because Germany
+not only murdered our citizens on the high seas, but also filled
+our country with spies and sought to incite our people to civil
+war. We were given no opportunity to discuss or negotiate. The
+forty-eight hour ultimatum given by Austria to Serbia was not,
+as Bernard Shaw said, "A decent time in which to ask a man to
+pay his hotel bill." What of the six-hour ultimatum given to
+me in Berlin on the evening of January thirty-first, 1917, when
+I was notified at six that ruthless warfare would commence at
+twelve? Why the German government, which up to that moment had
+professed amity and a desire to stand by the _Sussex_ pledges,
+knew that it took almost two days to send a cable to America! I
+believe that we are not only justly in this war, but prudently
+in this war. If we had stayed out and the war had been drawn
+or won by Germany we should have been attacked, and that while
+Europe stood grinning by: not directly at first, but through an
+attack on some Central or South American State to which it would
+be at least as difficult for us to send troops as for Germany.
+And what if this powerful nation, vowed to war, were once firmly
+established in South or Central America? What of our boasted
+isolation then?
+
+It is only because I believe that our people should be informed
+that I have consented to write this book. There are too many
+thinkers, writers and speakers in the United States; from now
+on we need the doers, the organisers, and the realists who alone
+can win this contest for us, for democracy and for permanent
+peace!
+
+Writing of events so new, I am, of course, compelled to exercise
+a great discretion, to keep silent on many things of which I
+would speak, to suspend many judgments and to hold for future
+disclosure many things, the relation of which now would perhaps
+only serve to increase bitterness or to cause internal dissension
+in our own land.
+
+The American who travels through Germany in summer time or who
+spends a month having his liver tickled at Homburg or Carlsbad,
+who has his digestion restored by Dr. Dapper at Kissingen or
+who relearns the lost art of eating meat at Dr. Dengler's in
+Baden, learns little of the real Germany and its rulers; and in
+this book I tell something of the real Germany, not only that
+my readers may understand the events of the last three years
+but also that they may judge of what is likely to happen in our
+future relations with that country.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+       FOREWORD.
+     I MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY.
+    II POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL.
+   III DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN.
+    IV MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR.
+     V PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR.
+    VI AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR.
+   VII THE SYSTEM.
+  VIII THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR.
+    IX THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES.
+     X PRISONERS OF WAR.
+    XI FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC.
+   XII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS.
+  XIII MAINLY COMMERCIAL.
+   XIV WORK FOR THE GERMANS.
+    XV WAR CHARITIES.
+   XVI HATE.
+  XVII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS. (Continued).
+ XVIII LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN.
+   XIX THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR.
+    XX LAST.
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS LEAVING ON
+    A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS OF CREDENCE
+    TO THE EMPEROR.
+  THE HOUSE RENTED FOR USE AS EMBASSY.
+  A SALON IN THE EMBASSY.
+  THE BALL-ROOM OF THE EMBASSY.
+  PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER AT THE ROYAL PALACE.
+  THE ROYAL PALACE AT POTSDAM.
+  DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS AT THE TOWN HALL,
+    AUGUST, 1914.
+  RACING YACHTS AT KIEL.
+  THE KAISER'S YACHT, "HOHENZOLLERN".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO HIS SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY, AUGUST, 1914.
+  OUTSIDE THE EMBASSY IN THE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.
+  AT WORK IN THE EMBASSY BALL-ROOM, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.
+  COVER OF THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  SPECIMEN PAGE OF DRAWINGS FROM THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS.
+  THE "LUSITANIA" MEDAL.
+  PAGE FROM "FOR LIGHT AND TRUTH".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND PARTY IN SEDAN.
+  IN FRONT OF THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES.
+  FOOD ALLOTMENT POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT.
+  FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF THE KAISER'S PERSONAL TELEGRAM TO
+    PRESIDENT WILSON.
+  FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE'S REQUEST TO AMBASSADOR GERARD
+    TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE SUBMARINE ANNOUNCEMENT.
+  THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799.
+  INSTRUCTIONS SENT TO THE GERMAN PRESS ON WRITING UP A ZEPPELIN
+    RAID.
+  PETITION CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURE AMONG AMERICANS IN EUROPE.
+  PAGE FROM LISSAUER'S PAMPHLET SHOWING "HYMN OF HATE".
+  INSTRUCTIONS REGULATING APPEARANCE AT COURT.
+  A BERLIN EXTRA.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY
+
+The second day out on the _Imperator_, headed for a summer's
+vacation, a loud knocking woke me at seven A. M. The radio, handed
+in from a friend in New York, told me of my appointment as Ambassador
+to Germany.
+
+Many friends were on the ship. Henry Morgenthau, later Ambassador
+to Turkey, Colonel George Harvey, Adolph Ochs and Louis Wiley
+of the _New_York_Times_, Clarence Mackay, and others.
+
+The _Imperator_ is a marvellous ship of fifty-four thousand
+tons or more, and at times it is hard to believe that one is
+on the sea. In addition to the regular dining saloon, there is
+a grill room and Ritz restaurant with its palm garden, and, of
+course, an Hungarian Band. There are also a gymnasium and swimming
+pool, and, nightly, in the enormous ballroom dances are given,
+the women dressing in their best just as they do on shore.
+
+Colonel Harvey and Clarence Mackay gave me a dinner of twenty-four
+covers, something of a record at sea. For long afterwards in
+Germany, I saw everywhere pictures of the _Imperator_ including
+one of the tables set for this dinner. These were sent out over
+Germany as a sort of propaganda to induce the Germans to patronise
+their own ships and indulge in ocean travel. I wish that the
+propaganda had been earlier and more successful, because it is
+by travel that peoples learn to know each other, and consequently
+to abstain from war.
+
+On the night of the usual ship concert, Henry Morgenthau translated
+a little speech for me into German, which I managed to get through
+after painfully learning it by heart. Now that I have a better
+knowledge of German, a cold sweat breaks out when I think of
+the awful German accent with which I delivered that address.
+
+A flying trip to Berlin early in August to look into the house
+question followed, and then I returned to the United States.
+
+In September I went to Washington to be "instructed," talked
+with the President and Secretary, and sat at the feet of the
+Assistant Secretary of State, Alvey A. Adee, the revered Sage
+of the Department of State.
+
+On September ninth, 1913, having resigned as Justice of the Supreme
+Court of the State of New York, I sailed for Germany, stopping on
+the way in London in order to make the acquaintance of Ambassador
+Page, certain wise people in Washington having expressed the
+belief that a personal acquaintance of our Ambassadors made it
+easier for them to work together.
+
+Two cares assail a newly appointed Ambassador. He must first
+take thought of what he shall wear and where he shall live. All
+other nations have beautiful Embassies or Legations in Berlin,
+but I found that my two immediate predecessors had occupied a
+villa originally built as a two-family house, pleasantly enough
+situated, but two miles from the centre of Berlin and entirely
+unsuitable for an Embassy.
+
+There are few private houses in Berlin, most of the people living
+in apartments. After some trouble I found a handsome house on
+the Wilhelm Platz immediately opposite the Chancellor's palace
+and the Foreign Office, in the very centre of Berlin. This house
+had been built as a palace for the Princes Hatzfeld and had later
+passed into the possession of a banking family named von Schwabach.
+
+The United States Government, unlike other nations, does not
+own or pay the rent of a suitable Embassy, but gives allowance
+for offices, if the house is large enough to afford office room
+for the office force of the Embassy. The von Schwabach palace
+was nothing but a shell. Even the gas and electric light fixtures
+had been removed; and when the hot water and heating system,
+bath-rooms, electric lights and fixtures, etc., had been put
+in, and the house furnished from top to bottom, my first year's
+salary had far passed the minus point.
+
+The palace was not ready for occupancy until the end of January,
+1914, and, in the meantime, we lived at the Hotel Esplanade,
+and I transacted business at the old, two-family villa.
+
+There are more diplomats in Berlin than in any other capital in
+the world, because each of the twenty-five States constituting
+the German Empire sends a legation to Berlin; even the free cities
+of Hamburg, Lubeck and Bremen have a resident minister at the
+Empire's capital.
+
+Invariable custom requires a new Ambassador in Berlin to give
+two receptions, one to the Diplomatic Corps and the other to
+all those people who have the right to go to court. These are
+the officials, nobles and officers of the army and navy, and
+such other persons as have been presented at court. Such people
+are called _hoffahig_, meaning that they are fit for court.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS
+OF CREDENCE TO THE EMPEROR.]
+
+[Illustration: THE HOUSE ON THE WILHELM PLATZ, RENTED FOR USE
+AS THE EMBASSY.]
+
+It is interesting here to note that Jews are not admitted to
+court. Such Jews as have been ennobled and allowed to put the
+coveted "von" before their names have first of all been required
+to submit to baptism in some Christian church. Examples are the
+von Schwabach family, whose ancestral house I occupied in Berlin,
+and Friedlaender-Fuld, officially rated as the richest man in
+Berlin, who made a large fortune in coke and its by-products.
+
+These two receptions are really introductions of an Ambassador
+to official and court society.
+
+Before these receptions, however, and in the month of November,
+I presented my letters of credence as Ambassador to the Emperor.
+This presentation is quite a ceremony. Three coaches were sent
+for me and my staff, coaches like that in which Cinderella goes
+to her ball, mostly glass, with white wigged coachmen, outriders
+in white wigs and standing footmen holding on to the back part
+of the coach. Baron von Roeder, introducer of Ambassadors, came
+for me and accompanied me in the first coach; the men of the
+Embassy staff sat in the other two coaches. Our little procession
+progressed solemnly through the streets of Berlin, passing on
+the way through the centre division of the arch known as the
+Brandenburger Thor, the gateway that stands at the head of the
+Unter den Linden, a privilege given only on this occasion.
+
+We mounted long stairs in the palace, and in a large room were
+received by the aides and the officers of the Emperor's household,
+of course all in uniform. Then I was ushered alone into the adjoining
+room where the Emperor, very erect and dressed in the black uniform
+of the Death's Head Hussars, stood by a table. I made him a little
+speech, and presented my letters of credence and the letters
+of recall of my predecessor. The Emperor then unbent from his
+very erect and impressive attitude and talked with me in a very
+friendly manner, especially impressing me with his interest in
+business and commercial affairs. I then, in accordance with custom,
+asked leave to present my staff. The doors were opened. The staff
+came in and were presented to the Emperor, who talked in a very
+jolly and agreeable way to all of us, saying that he hoped above
+all to see the whole of the Embassy staff riding in the Tier
+Garten in the mornings.
+
+The Emperor is a most impressive figure, and, in his black uniform
+surrounded by his officers, certainly looked every inch a king.
+Although my predecessors, on occasions of this kind, had worn a
+sort of fancy diplomatic uniform designed by themselves, I decided
+to abandon this and return to the democratic, if unattractive and
+uncomfortable, dress-suit, simply because the newspapers of America
+and certain congressmen, while they have had no objection to the
+wearing of uniforms by the army and navy, police and postmen,
+and do not expect officers to lead their troops into battle in
+dress-suits, have, nevertheless, had a most extraordinary prejudice
+against American diplomats following the usual custom of adopting
+a diplomatic uniform.
+
+Some days after my presentation to the Emperor, I was taken to
+Potsdam, which is situated about half an hour's train journey from
+Berlin, and, from the station there, driven to the new palace and
+presented to the Empress. The Empress was most charming and affable,
+and presented a very distinguished appearance. Accompanied by Mrs.
+Gerard, and always, either by night or by day, in the infernal
+dress-suit, I was received by the Crown Prince and Princess, and
+others of the royal princes and their wives. On these occasions
+we sat down and did not stand, as when received by the Emperor
+and Empress, and simply made "polite conversation" for about
+twenty minutes, being received first by the ladies-in-waiting
+and aides. These princes were always in uniform of some kind.
+
+At the reception for the _hoffahig_ people Mrs. Gerard stood
+in one room and I in another, and with each of us was a
+representative of the Emperor's household to introduce the people
+of the court, and an army officer to introduce the people of the
+army. The officer assigned to me had the extraordinary name of
+der Pfortner von der Hoelle, which means the "porter of Hell."
+I have often wondered since by what prophetic instinct he was
+sent to introduce me to the two years and a half of world war
+which I experienced in Berlin. This unfortunate officer, a most
+charming gentleman, was killed early in the war.
+
+The Berlin season lasts from about the twentieth of January for
+about six weeks. It is short in duration because, if the
+_hoffahig_ people stay longer than six weeks in Berlin, they
+become liable to pay their local income tax in Berlin, where
+the rate is higher than in those parts of Germany where they
+have their country estates.
+
+The first great court ceremonial is the _Schleppencour_,
+so-called from the long trains or _Schleppen_ worn by the
+women. On this night we "presented" Mr. and Mrs. Robert K. Cassatt
+of Philadelphia, Mrs. Ernest Wiltsee, Mrs. and Miss Luce and
+Mrs. Norman Whitehouse. On the arrival at the palace with these
+and all the members of the Embassy Staff and their wives, we
+were shown up a long stair-case, at the top of which a guard of
+honour, dressed in costume of the time of Frederick the Great,
+presented arms to all Ambassadors, and ruffled kettle-drums.
+Through long lines of cadets from the military schools, dressed
+as pages, in white, with short breeches and powdered wigs, we
+passed through several rooms where all the people to pass in
+review were gathered. Behind these, in a room about sixty feet by
+fifty, on a throne facing the door were the Emperor and Empress,
+and on the broad steps of this throne were the princes and their
+wives, the court ladies-in-waiting and all the other members of
+the court. The wives of the Ambassadors entered the room first,
+followed at intervals of about twenty feet by the ladies of the
+Embassy and the ladies to be presented. As they entered the room
+and made a change of direction toward the throne, pages in white
+straightened out the ladies' trains with long sticks. Arrived
+opposite the throne and about twenty feet from it, each Ambassador's
+wife made a low curtsey and then stood on the foot of the throne,
+to the left of the Emperor and Empress, and as each lady of the
+Embassy, not before presented, and each lady to be presented
+stopped beside the throne and made a low curtsey, the Ambassadress
+had to call out the name of each one in a loud voice; and when
+the last one had passed she followed her out of the room, walking
+sideways so as not to turn her back on the royalties,--something
+of a feat when towing a train about fifteen feet long. When all the
+Ambassadresses had so passed, it was the turn of the Ambassadors,
+who carried out substantially the same programme, substituting low
+bows for curtsies. The Ambassadors were followed by the Ministers'
+wives, these by the Ministers and these by the dignitaries of
+the German Court. All passed into the adjoining hall, and there
+a buffet supper was served. The whole affair began at about eight
+o'clock and was over in an hour.
+
+At the court balls, which also began early in the evening, a
+different procedure was followed. There the guests were required
+to assemble before eight-twenty in the ball-room. As in the
+_Schleppencour_, on one side of the room was the throne with
+seats for the Emperor and Empress, and to the right of this throne
+were the chairs for the Ambassadors' wives who were seated in the
+order of their husbands' rank, with the ladies of their Embassy,
+and any ladies they had brought to the ball standing behind them.
+After them came the Ministers' wives, sitting in similar fashion;
+then the Ambassadors, standing with their staffs behind them on
+raised steps, with any men that they had asked invitations for,
+and the Ministers in similar order. To the left of the throne
+stood the wives of the Dukes and dignitaries of Germany and then
+their husbands. When all were assembled, promptly at the time
+announced, the orchestra, which was dressed in mediaval costume
+and sat in a gallery, sounded trumpets and then the Emperor and
+Empress entered the room, the Emperor, of course, in uniform,
+followed by the ladies and gentlemen of the household all in
+brilliant uniforms, and one or two officers of the court regiment,
+picked out for their great height and dressed in the kind of
+uniform Rupert of Hentzau wears on the stage,--a silver helmet
+surmounted by an eagle, a steel breast-plate, white breeches
+and coat, and enormous high boots coming half way up the thigh.
+The Grand Huntsman wore a white wig, three-cornered hat and a
+long green coat.
+
+On entering the room, the Empress usually commenced on one side
+and the Emperor on the other, going around the room and speaking
+to the Ambassadors' wives and Ambassadors, etc., in turn, and
+the Empress in similar fashion, chatting for a moment with the
+German dignitaries and their wives lined up on the opposite side
+of the room. After going perhaps half way around each side, the
+Emperor and Empress would then change sides. This going around
+the room and chatting with people in turn is called "making the
+circle", and young royalties are practised in "making the circle"
+by being made to go up to the trees in a garden and address a
+few pleasant words to each tree, in this manner learning one
+of the principal duties of royalty.
+
+The dancing is only by young women and young officers of noble
+families who have practised the dances before. They are under
+the superintendence of several young officers who are known as
+_Vortanzer_ and when anyone in Berlin in court society gives
+a ball these _Vortanzer_ are the ones who see that all dancing
+is conducted strictly according to rule and manage the affairs
+of the ball-room with true Prussian efficiency. Supper is about
+ten-thirty at a court ball and is at small tables. Each royalty
+has a table holding about eight people and to these people are
+invited without particular rule as to precedence. The younger
+guests and lower dignitaries are not placed at supper but find
+places at tables to suit themselves. After supper all go back
+to the ball-room and there the young ladies and officers, led
+by the _Vortanzer_ execute a sort of lancers, in the final
+figure of which long lines are formed of dancers radiating from
+the throne; and all the dancers make bows and curtsies to the
+Emperor and Empress who are either standing or sitting at this
+time on the throne. At about eleven-thirty the ball is over,
+and as the guests pass out through the long hall, they are given
+glasses of hot punch and a peculiar sort of local Berlin bun, in
+order to ward off the lurking dangers of the villainous winter
+climate.
+
+At the court balls the diplomats are, of course, in their best
+diplomatic uniform. All Germans are in uniform of some kind, but the
+women do not wear the long trains worn at the _Schleppencour_.
+They wear ordinary ball dresses. In connection with court dancing
+it is rather interesting to note that when the tango and turkey
+trot made their way over the frontiers of Germany in the autumn
+of 1913, the Emperor issued a special order that no officers of
+the army or navy should dance any of these dances or should go
+to the house of any person who, at any time, whether officers
+were present or not, had allowed any of these new dances to be
+danced. This effectually extinguished the turkey trot, the bunny
+hug and the tango, and maintained the waltz and the polka in their
+old estate. It may seem ridiculous that such a decree should
+be so solemnly issued, but I believe that the higher authorities
+in Germany earnestly desired that the people, and, especially,
+the officers of the army and navy, should learn not to enjoy
+themselves too much. A great endeavour was always made to keep
+them in a life, so far as possible, of Spartan simplicity. For
+instance, the army officers were forbidden to play polo, not
+because of anything against the game, which, of course, is splendid
+practice for riding, but because it would make a distinction in
+the army between rich and poor.
+
+[Illustration: A SALON IN THE AMERICAN EMBASSY.]
+
+[Illustration: THE BALLROOM OF THE EMBASSY. THIS WAS AFTERWARD
+TURNED INTO A WORKROOM FOR THE RELIEF OF AMERICANS IN WAR DAYS.]
+
+The Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, is a day of great
+celebration. At nine-thirty in the morning the Ambassadors, Ministers
+and all the dignitaries of the court attend Divine Service in the
+chapel of the palace. On this day in 1914, the Queen of Greece and
+many of the reigning princes of the German States were present.
+In the evening there was a gala performance in the opera house,
+the entire house being occupied by members of the court. Between
+the acts in the large foyer, royalties "made the circle," and I
+had quite a long conversation with both the Emperor and Empress
+and was "caught" by the King of Saxony. Many of the Ambassadors
+have letters of credence not only to the court at Berlin but
+also to the rulers of the minor German States. For instance,
+the Belgian Minister was accredited to thirteen countries in
+Germany and the Spanish Ambassador to eleven. For some reason
+or other, the American and Turkish Ambassadors are accredited
+only to the court at Berlin. Some of the German rulers feel this
+quite keenly, and the King of Saxony, especially. I had been
+warned that he was very anxious to show his resentment of this
+distinction by refusing to shake hands with the American Ambassador.
+He was in the foyer on the occasion of this gala performance
+and said that he would like to have me presented to him. I, of
+course, could not refuse, but forgot the warning of my predecessors
+and put out my hand, which the King ostentatiously neglected to
+take. A few moments later the wife of the Turkish Ambassador was
+presented to the King of Saxony and received a similar rebuff;
+but, as she was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and therefore
+a Royal Highness in her own right, she went around the King of
+Saxony, seized his hand, which he had put behind him, brought
+it around to the front and shook it warmly, a fine example of
+great presence of mind.
+
+Writing of all these things and looking out from a sky-scraper
+in New York, these details of court life seem very frivolous
+and far away. But an Ambassador is compelled to become part of
+this system. The most important conversations with the Emperor
+sometimes take place at court functions, and the Ambassador and
+his secretaries often gather their most useful bits of information
+over tea cups or with the cigars after dinner.
+
+Aside from the short season, Berlin is rather dull; Bismarck
+characterised it as a "desert of bricks and newspapers."
+
+In addition to making visits to the royalties, custom required
+me to call first upon the Imperial Chancellor and the Minister
+of Foreign Affairs. The other ministers are supposed to call
+first, although I believe the redoubtable von Tirpitz claimed
+a different rule. So, during the first winter I gradually made
+the acquaintance of those people who sway the destinies of the
+German Empire and its seventy millions.
+
+I dined with the Emperor and had long conversations with him on
+New Year's Day and at the two court balls.
+
+All during this winter Germans from the highest down tried to
+impress me with the great danger which they said threatened America
+from Japan. The military and naval attaches and I were told that
+the German information system sent news that Mexico was full
+of Japanese colonels and America of Japanese spies. Possibly
+much of the prejudice in America against the Japanese was cooked
+up by the German propagandists whom we later learned to know
+so well.
+
+It is noteworthy that during the whole of my first winter in
+Berlin I was not officially or semi-officially afforded an
+opportunity to meet any of the members of the Reichstag or any
+of the leaders in the business world. The great merchants, whose
+acquaintance I made, as well as the literary and artistic people,
+I had to seek out; because most of them were not _hoffahig_
+and I did not come in contact with them at any court functions,
+official dinners or even in the houses of the court nobles or
+those connected with the government.
+
+A very interesting character whom I met during the first winter
+and often conversed with, was Prince Henkel-Donnersmarck. Prince
+Donnersmarck, who died December, 1916, at the age of eighty-six
+years, was the richest male subject in Germany, the richest subject
+being Frau von Krupp-Bohlen, the heiress of the Krupp cannon
+foundry. He was the first governor of Lorraine during the war of
+1870 and had had a finger in all of the political and commercial
+activities of Germany for more than half a century. He told me, on
+one occasion, that he had advocated exacting a war indemnity of
+thirty milliards from France after the war of 1870, and said that
+France could easily pay it--and that that sum or much more should
+be exacted as an indemnity at the conclusion of the World War of
+1914. He said that he had always advocated a protective tariff
+for agricultural products in Germany as well as encouragement of
+the German manufacturing interests: that agriculture was necessary
+to the country in order to provide strong soldiers for war, and
+manufacturing industries to provide money to pay for the army and
+navy and their equipment. He made me promise to take his second
+son to America in order that he might see American life, and the
+great iron and coal districts of Pennsylvania. Of course, most
+of these conversations took place before the World War. After
+two years of that war and, as prospects of paying the expenses
+of the war from the indemnities to be exacted from the enemies
+of Germany gradually melted away, the Prince quite naturally
+developed a great anxiety as to how the expenses of the war should
+be paid by Germany; and I am sure that this anxiety had much to
+do with his death at the end of the year, 1916.
+
+Custom demanded that I should ask for an appointment and call on
+each of the Ambassadors on arrival. The British Ambassador was
+Sir Edward Goschen, a man of perhaps sixty-eight years, a widower.
+He spoke French, of course, and German; and, accompanied by his
+dog, was a frequent visitor at our house. I am very grateful
+for the help and advice he so generously gave me--doubly valuable
+as coming from a man of his fame and experience. Jules Cambon was
+the Ambassador of France. His brother, Paul, is Ambassador to
+the Court of St. James. Jules Cambon is well-known to Americans,
+having passed five years in this country. He was Ambassador to
+Spain for five years, and, at the time of my arrival, had been
+about the same period at Berlin. In spite of his long residence
+in each of these countries, he spoke only French; but he possessed
+a really marvellous insight into the political life of each of
+these nations. Bollati, the Italian Ambassador, was a great admirer
+of Germany; he spoke German well and did everything possible
+to keep Italy out of war with her former Allies in the Triple
+Alliance.
+
+Spain was represented by Polo de Bernabe, who now represents
+the interests of the United States in Germany, as well as those
+of France, Russia, Belgium, Serbia and Roumania. It is a curious
+commentary on the absurdity of war that, on leaving Berlin, I
+handed over the interests of the United States to this Ambassador,
+who, as Spanish minister to the United States, was handed his
+passports at the outbreak of the Spanish-American war! I am sure
+that not only he, but all his Embassy, will devotedly represent
+our interests in Germany. Sverbeeu represented the interests
+of Russia; Soughimoura, Japan; and Mouktar Pascha, Turkey. The
+wife of the latter was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and
+Mouktar Pascha himself a general of distinction in the Turkish
+army.
+
+An Ambassador must keep on intimate terms with his colleagues.
+It is often through them that he learns of important matters
+affecting his own country or others. All of these Ambassadors
+and most of the Ministers occupied handsome houses furnished
+by their government. They had large salaries and a fund for
+entertaining.
+
+During this first winter before the war, I saw a great deal of
+the German Crown Prince as well as of several of his brothers.
+
+I cannot subscribe to the general opinion of the Crown Prince. I
+found him a most agreeable man, a sharp observer and the possessor
+of intellectual attainments of no mean order. He is undoubtedly
+popular in Germany, excelling in all sports, a fearless rider
+and a good shot. He is ably seconded by the Crown Princess. The
+mother of the Crown Princess is a Russian Grand Duchess, and
+her father was a Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. She is a very
+beautiful woman made popular by her affable manners. The one
+defect of the Crown Prince has been his eagerness for war; but,
+as he has characterised this war as the most stupid ever waged
+in history, perhaps he will be satisfied, if he comes to the
+throne, with what all Germany has suffered in this conflict.
+
+The Crown Prince was very anxious, before the war, to visit the
+United States; and we had practically arranged to make a trip
+to Alaska in search of some of the big game there, with stops
+at the principal cities of America.
+
+The second son of the Kaiser, Prince Eitel Fritz, is considered
+by the Germans to have distinguished himself most in this war.
+He is given credit for great personal bravery.
+
+Prince Adalbert, the sailor prince, is quite American in his
+manners. In February, 1914, the Crown Prince and Princes Eitel
+Fritz and Adalbert came to our Embassy for a very small dance to
+which were asked all the pretty American girls then in Berlin.
+
+It is never the custom to invite royalties to an entertainment.
+They invite themselves to a dance or a dinner, and the list of
+proposed guests is always submitted to them. When a royalty arrives
+at the house, the host (and the hostess, if the royalty be a
+woman) always waits at the front door and escorts the royalties
+up-stairs. Allison Armour also gave a dance at which the Crown
+Prince was present, following a dinner at the Automobile Club.
+Armour has been a constant visitor to Germany for many years,
+usually going in his yacht to Kiel in summer and to Corfu, where
+the Emperor goes, in winter. As he has never tried to obtain
+anything from the Emperor, he has become quite intimate with him
+and with all the members of the royal family.
+
+The Chancellor, von Bethmann-Hollweg, is an enormous man of perhaps
+six feet five or six. He comes of a banking family in Frankfort.
+It is too soon to give a just estimate of his acts in this war.
+When I arrived in Berlin and until November, 1916, von Jagow
+was Minister of Foreign Affairs. In past years he had occupied
+the post of Ambassador to Italy, and with great reluctance took
+his place at the head of the Foreign Office. Zimmermann was
+an Under Secretary, succeeding von Jagow when the latter was
+practically forced out of office. Zimmermann, on account of his
+plain and hearty manners and democratic air, was more of a favourite
+with the Ambassadors and members of the Reichstag than von Jagow,
+who, in appearance and manner, was the ideal old-style diplomat
+of the stage.
+
+Von Jagow was not a good speaker and the agitation against him
+was started by those who claimed that, in answering questions
+in the Reichstag, he did not make a forceful enough appearance
+on behalf of the government. Von Jagow did not cultivate the
+members of the Reichstag and his delicate health prevented him
+from undertaking more than the duties of his office.
+
+As a matter of fact, I believe that von Jagow had a juster estimate
+of foreign nations than Zimmermann, and more correctly divined the
+thoughts of the American people in this war than did his successor.
+I thought that I enjoyed the personal friendship of both von
+Jagow and Zimmermann and, therefore, was rather unpleasantly
+surprised when I saw in the papers that Zimmermann had stated in
+the Reichstag that he had been compelled, from motives of policy,
+to keep on friendly terms with me. I sincerely hope that what he
+said on this occasion was incorrectly reported. Von Jagow, after
+his fall, took charge of a hospital at Libau in the occupied
+portion of Russia. This shows the devotion to duty of the Prussian
+noble class, and their readiness to take up any task, however
+humble, that may help their country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL
+
+My commission read, "Ambassador to Germany."
+
+It is characteristic of our deep ignorance of all foreign affairs
+that I was appointed Ambassador to a place which does not exist.
+Politically, there is no such place as "Germany." There are the
+twenty-five States, Prussia, Bavaria, Wurttemberg, Saxony, etc.,
+which make up the "German Empire," but there is no such political
+entity as "Germany."
+
+These twenty-five States have votes in the Bundesrat, a body
+which may be said to correspond remotely to our United States
+Senate. But each State has a different number of votes. Prussia
+has seventeen, Bavaria six, Wurttemberg and Saxony four each,
+Baden and Hesse three each, Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Brunswick
+two each, and the rest one each. Prussia controls Brunswick.
+
+The Reichstag, or Imperial Parliament, corresponds to our House
+of Representatives. The members are elected by manhood suffrage of
+those over twenty-five. But in practice the Reichstag is nothing
+but a debating society because of the preponderating power of the
+Bundesrat, or upper chamber. At the head of the ministry is the
+Chancellor, appointed by the Emperor; and the other Ministers, such
+as Colonies, Interior, Education, Justice and Foreign Affairs,
+are but underlings of the Chancellor and appointed by him. The
+Chancellor is not responsible to the Reichstag, as Bethmann-Hollweg
+clearly stated at the time of the Zabern affair, but only to the
+Emperor.
+
+It is true that an innovation properly belonging only to a
+parliamentary government was introduced some seven years ago,
+viz., that the ministers must answer questions (as in Great Britain)
+put them by the members of the Reichstag. But there the likeness
+to a parliamentary government begins and ends.
+
+The members of the Bundesrat are named by the Princes of the
+twenty-five States making up the German Empire. Prussia, which
+has seventeen votes, may name seventeen members of the Bundesrat
+or one member, who, however, when he votes casts seventeen votes.
+The votes of a State must always be cast as a unit. In the usual
+procedure bills are prepared and adopted in the Bundesrat and
+then sent to the Reichstag whence, if passed, they return to the
+Bundesrat where the final approval must take place. Therefore,
+in practice, the Bundesrat makes the laws with the assent of
+the Reichstag. The members of the Bundesrat have the right to
+appear and make speeches in the Reichstag. The fundamental
+constitution of the German Empire is not changed, as with us, by
+a separate body but is changed in the same way that an ordinary
+law is passed; except that if there are fourteen votes against
+the proposed change in the Bundesrat the proposition is defeated,
+and, further, the constitution cannot be changed with respect
+to rights expressly granted by it to anyone of the twenty-five
+States without the assent of that State.
+
+In order to pass a law a majority vote in the Bundesrat and Reichstag
+is sufficient if there is a quorum present, and a quorum is a
+majority of the members elected in the Reichstag: in the Bundesrat
+the quorum consists of such members as are present at a regularly
+called meeting, providing the Chancellor or the Vice-Chancellor
+attends.
+
+The boundaries of the districts sending members to the Reichstag
+have not been changed since 1872, while, in the meantime, a great
+shifting of population, as well as great increase of population
+has taken place. And because of this, the Reichstag to-day does
+not represent the people of Germany in the sense intended by the
+framers of the Imperial Constitution.
+
+Much of the legislation that affects the everyday life of a German
+emanates from the parliaments of Prussia, Bavaria and Saxony,
+etc., as with us in our State Legislatures. The purely legislative
+power of the ministers and Bundesrat is, however, large. These
+German States have constitutions of some sort. The Grand Duchies
+of Mecklenburg have no constitution whatever. It is understood
+that the people themselves do not want one, on financial grounds,
+fearing that many expenses now borne by the Grand Duke out of
+his large private income, would be saddled on the people. The
+other States have Constitutions varying in form. In Prussia there
+are a House of Lords and a House of Deputies. The members of
+the latter are elected by a system of circle votes, by which
+the vote of one rich man voting in circle number one counts as
+much as thousands voting in circle number three. It is the
+recognition by Bethmann-Hollweg that this vicious system must
+be changed that brought down on him the wrath of the Prussian
+country squires, who for so long have ruled the German Empire,
+filling places, civil and military, with their children and
+relatives.
+
+In considering Germany, the immense influence of the military
+party must not be left out of account; and, with the developments
+of the navy, that branch of the service also claimed a share in
+guiding the policy of the Government.
+
+The administrative, executive and judicial officers of Prussia
+are not elected. The country is governed and judged by men who
+enter this branch of the government service exactly as others
+enter the army or navy. These are gradually promoted through
+the various grades. This applies to judges, clerks of courts,
+district attorneys and the officials who govern the political
+divisions of Prussia, for Prussia is divided into circles,
+presidencies and provinces. For instance, a young man may enter
+the government service as assistant to the clerk of some court.
+He may then become district attorney in a small town, then clerk
+of a larger court, possibly attached to the police presidency
+of a large city; he may then become a minor judge, etc., until
+finally he becomes a judge of one of the higher courts or an
+over-president of a province. Practically the only elective officers
+who have any power are members of the Reichstag and the Prussian
+Legislature, and there, as I have shown, the power is very small.
+Mayors and City Councillors are elected in Prussia, but have
+little power; and are elected by the vicious system of circle
+voting.
+
+Time and again during the course of the Great War when I made
+some complaint or request affecting the interests of one of the
+various nations I represented, I was met in the Foreign Office
+by the statement, "We can do nothing with the military. Please
+read Bismarck's memoirs and you will see what difficulty he had
+with the military." Undoubtedly, owing to the fact that the
+Chancellor seldom took strong ground, the influence which both
+the army and navy claimed in dictating the policy of the Empire
+was greatly increased.
+
+Roughly speaking there are three great political divisions or
+parties in the German Reichstag. To the right of the presiding
+officer sit the Conservatives. Most of these are members from the
+Prussian Junker or squire class. They are strong for the rights
+of the crown and against any extension of the suffrage in Prussia
+or anywhere else. They form probably the most important body of
+conservatives now existing in any country in the world. Their
+leader, Heydebrand, is known as the uncrowned king of Prussia. On
+the left side the Social Democrats sit. As they evidently oppose
+the kingship and favour a republic, no Social Democratic member
+has ever been called into the government. They represent the great
+industrial populations of Germany. Roughly, they constitute about
+one-third of the Reichstag, and would sit there in greater numbers
+if Germany were again redistricted so that proper representation
+were given to the cities, to which there has been a great rush
+of population since the time when the Reichstag districts were
+originally constituted.
+
+In the centre, and holding the balance of power, sit the members
+of the Centrum or Catholic body. Among them are many priests. It
+is noteworthy that in this war Roman Catholic opinion in neutral
+countries, like Spain, inclines to the side of Germany; while
+in Germany, to protect their religious liberties, the Catholic
+population vote as Catholics to send Catholic members to the
+Reichstag, and these sit and vote as Catholics alone.
+
+Germans high in rank in the government often told me that no part
+of conquered Poland would ever be incorporated in Prussia or the
+Empire, because it was not desirable to add to the Roman Catholic
+population; that they had troubles enough with the Catholics now
+in Germany and had no desire to add to their numbers. This, and
+the desire to lure the Poles into the creation of a national
+army which could be utilised by the German machine, were the
+reasons for the creation by Germany (with the assent of Austria)
+of the new country of Poland.
+
+This Catholic party is the result in Germany of the
+_Kulturkampf_ or War for Civilisation, as it was called by
+Bismarck, a contest dating from 1870 between the State in Germany
+and the Roman Catholic Church.
+
+Prussia has always been the centre of Protestantism in Germany,
+although there are many Roman Catholics in the Rhine Provinces
+of Prussia, and in that part of Prussia inhabited principally
+by Poles, originally part of the Kingdom of Poland.
+
+Baden and Bavaria, the two principal South German States, and
+others are Catholic. In 1870, on the withdrawal of the French
+garrison from Rome, the Temporal Power of the Pope ended, and
+Bismarck, though appealed to by Catholics, took no interest in the
+defence of the Papacy. The conflict between the Roman Catholics
+and the Government in Germany was precipitated by the promulgation
+by the Vatican Council, in 1870, of the Dogma of the Infallibility
+of the Pope.
+
+A certain number of German pastors and bishops refused to subscribe
+to the new dogma. In the conflict that ensued these pastors and
+bishops were backed by the government. The religious orders were
+suppressed, civil marriage made compulsory and the State assumed
+new powers not only in the appointment but even in the education
+of the Catholic priests. The Jesuits were expelled from Germany
+in 1872. These measures, generally known as the May Laws, because
+passed in May, 1873, 1874 and 1875, led to the creation and
+strengthening of the Centrum or Catholic party. For a long period
+many churches were vacant in Prussia. Finally, owing to the growth
+of the Centrum, Bismarck gave in. The May Laws were rescinded
+in 1886 and the religious orders, the Jesuits excepted, were
+permitted to return in 1887. Civil marriage, however, remained
+obligatory in Prussia.
+
+Ever since the _Kulturkampf_ the Centrum has held the balance
+of power in Germany, acting sometimes with the Conservatives
+and sometimes with the Social Democrats.
+
+In addition to these three great parties, there are minor parties
+and groups which sometimes act with one party and sometimes with
+another, the National Liberals, for example, and the Progressives.
+Since the war certain members of the National Liberal party were
+most bitter in assailing President Wilson and the United States.
+In the demand for ruthless submarine war they acted with the
+Conservatives. There are also Polish, Hanoverian, Danish and
+Alsatian members of the Reichstag.
+
+There are three great race questions in Germany. First of all,
+that of Alsace-Lorraine. It is unnecessary to go at length into
+this well-known question. In the chapter on the affair at Zabern,
+something will be seen of the attitude of the troops toward the
+civil population. At the outbreak of the war several of the deputies,
+sitting in the Reichstag as members from Alsace-Lorraine, crossed
+the frontier and joined the French army.
+
+If there is one talent which the Germans superlatively lack, it
+is that of ruling over other peoples and inducing other people
+to become part of their nation.
+
+It is now a long time since portions of the Kingdom of Poland,
+by various partitions of that kingdom, were incorporated with
+Prussia, but the Polish question is more alive to-day than at
+the time of the last partition.
+
+The Poles are of a livelier race than the Germans, are Roman
+Catholics and always retain their dream of a reconstituted and
+independent Kingdom of Poland.
+
+It is hard to conceive that Poland was at one time perhaps the
+most powerful kingdom of Europe, with a population numbering
+twenty millions and extending from the Baltic to the Carpathians
+and the Black Sea, including in its territory the basins of the
+Warta, Vistula, Dwina, Dnieper and Upper Dniester, and that it
+had under its dominion besides Poles proper and the Baltic Slavs,
+the Lithuanians, the White Russians and the Little Russians or
+Ruthenians.
+
+The Polish aristocracy was absolutely incapable of governing its
+own country, which fell an easy prey to the intrigues of Frederick
+the Great and the two Empresses, Maria Theresa of Austria and
+Catherine of Russia. The last partition of Poland was in the
+year 1795.
+
+Posen, at one time one of the capitals of the old kingdom of
+Poland, is the intellectual centre of that part of Poland which has
+been incorporated into Prussia. For years Prussia has alternately
+cajoled and oppressed the Poles, and has made every endeavour to
+replace the Polish inhabitants with German colonists. A commission
+has been established which buys estates from Poles and sells
+them to Germans. This commission has the power of condemning
+the lands of Poles, taking these lands from them by force,
+compensating them at a rate determined by the commission and
+settling Germans on the lands so seized. This commission has
+its headquarters in Posen. The result has not been successful.
+All the country side surrounding Posen and the city itself are
+divided into two factions. By going to one hotel or the other
+you announce that you are pro-German or pro-Polish. Poles will
+not deal in shops kept by Germans or in shops unless the signs
+are in Polish.
+
+The sons of Germans who have settled in Poland under the protection
+of the commission often marry Polish women. The invariable result
+of these mixed marriages is that the children are Catholics and
+Poles. Polish deputies voting as Poles sit in the Prussian
+legislature and in the Reichstag, and if a portion of the old
+Kingdom of Poland is made a separate country at the end of this
+war, it will have the effect of making the Poles in Prussia more
+restless and more aggressive than ever.
+
+In order to win the sympathies of the Poles, the Emperor caused
+a royal castle to be built within recent years in the city of
+Posen, and appointed a popular Polish gentleman who had served
+in the Prussian army and was attached to the Emperor, the Count
+Hutten-Czapski, as its lord-warden. In this castle was a very
+beautiful Byzantine chapel built from designs especially selected
+by the Emperor. In January, 1914, we went with Allison Armour
+and the Cassatts, Mrs. Wiltsee and Mrs. Whitehouse on a trip
+to Posen to see this chapel.
+
+Some of our German friends tried to play a joke on us by telling
+us that the best hotel was the hotel patronised by the Poles. To
+have gone there would have been to declare ourselves anti-German
+and pro-Polish, but we were warned in time. The castle has a
+large throne room and ball-room; in the hall is a stuffed aurochs
+killed by the Emperor. The aurochs is a species of buffalo greatly
+resembling those which used to roam our western prairies. The
+breed has been preserved on certain great estates in eastern
+Germany and in the hunting forests of the Czar in the neighbourhood
+of Warsaw.
+
+Some of the Poles told me that at the first attempt to give a
+court ball in this new castle the Polish population in the streets
+threw ink through the carriage windows on the dresses of the
+ladies going to the ball and thus made it a failure. The chapel
+of the castle is very beautiful and is a great credit to the
+Emperor's taste as an architect.
+
+While being shown through the Emperor's private apartments in
+this castle, I noticed a saddle on a sort of elevated stool in
+front of a desk. I asked the guide what this was for: he told
+me that the Emperor, when working, always sits in a saddle.
+
+In Posen, in a book-store, the proprietor brought out for me a
+number of books caricaturing the German rule of Alsace-Lorraine.
+It is curious that a community of interests should make a market
+for these books in Polish Posen.
+
+Although not so well advertised, the Polish question is as acute
+as that of Alsace-Lorraine.
+
+After its successful war in 1866 against Austria, Bavaria, Saxony,
+Baden, Hanover, etc., Prussia became possessed of the two duchies
+of Schleswig-Holstein, which are to the south of Denmark on the
+Jutland Peninsula. Here, strangely enough, there is a Danish
+question. A number of Danes inhabit these duchies and have been
+irritated by the Prussian officials and officers into preserving
+their national feeling intact ever since 1866. Galling restrictions
+have been made, the very existence of which intensifies the hatred
+and prevents the assimilation of these Danes. For instance, Amundsen,
+the Arctic explorer, was forbidden to lecture in Danish in these
+duchies during the winter of 1913-14, and there were regulations
+enforced preventing more than a certain number of these Danish
+people from assembling in a hotel, as well as regulations against
+the employment of Danish servants.
+
+In 1866, after its successful war, Prussia wiped out the old
+kingdom of Hanover and drove its king into exile in Austria.
+To-day there is still a party of protest against this aggression.
+The Kaiser believes, however, that the ghost of the claim of
+the Kings of Hanover was laid when he married his only daughter
+to the heir of the House of Hanover and gave the young pair the
+vacant Duchy of Brunswick. That this young man will inherit the
+great Guelph treasure was no drawback to the match in the eyes
+of those in Berlin.
+
+There is a hatred of Prussia in other parts of Germany, but coupled
+with so much fear that it will never take practical shape. In
+Bavaria, for example, even the comic newspapers have for years
+ridiculed the Prussians and the House of Hohenzollern. The smashing
+defeat by Prussia of Austria and the allied German States, Bavaria,
+Saxony, Hesse, Hanover, etc., in 1866, and the growth of Prussianism
+since then in all of these countries, keep the people from any
+overt act. It is a question, perhaps, as to how these countries,
+especially Bavaria, would act in case of the utter defeat of
+Germany. But at present they must be counted on only as faithful
+servants, in a military way, of the German Emperor.
+
+Montesquieu, the author of the "Esprit des Lois," says, "All law
+comes from the soil," and it has been claimed that residence in
+the hot climate of the tropics in some measure changes Anglo-Saxon
+character. It is, therefore, always well in judging national
+character to know something of the physical characteristics and
+climate of the country which a nation inhabits.
+
+The heart of modern Germany is the great north central plain which
+comprises practically all of the original kingdom of Prussia,
+stretching northward from the Saxon and Hartz mountains to the
+North and Baltic seas. It is from this dreary and infertile plain
+that for many centuries conquering military races have poured
+over Europe. The climate is not so cold in winter as that of
+the northern part of the United States. There is much rain and
+the winter skies are so dark that the absence of the sun must
+have some effect upon the character of the people. The Saxons
+inhabit a more mountainous country; Wurttemberg and Baden are
+hilly; Bavaria is a land of beauty, diversified with lovely lakes
+and mountains. The soft outlines of the vine-covered hills of
+the Rhine Valley have long been the admiration of travellers.
+
+The inhabitants of Prussia were originally not Germanic, but
+rather Slavish in type; and, indeed, to-day in the forest of
+the River Spree, on which Berlin is situated, and only about
+fifty miles from that city, there still dwell descendants of
+the original Wendish inhabitants of the country who speak the
+Wendish language. The wet-nurses, whose picturesque dress is so
+noticeable on the streets of Berlin, all come from this Wendish
+colony, which has been preserved through the many wars that have
+swept over this part of Germany because of the refuge afforded
+in the swamps and forests of this district.
+
+The inhabitants of the Rhine Valley drink wine instead of beer.
+They are more lively in their disposition than the Prussians,
+Saxons and Bavarians, who are of a heavy and phlegmatic nature.
+The Bavarians are noted for their prowess as beer drinkers, and
+it is not at all unusual for prosperous burghers of Munich to
+dispose of thirty large glasses of beer in a day; hence the cures
+which exist all over Germany and where the average German business
+man spends part, at least, of his annual vacation.
+
+In peace times the Germans are heavy eaters. As some one says,
+"It is not true that the Germans eat all the time, but they eat
+all the time except during seven periods of the day when they
+take their meals." And it is a fact that prosperous merchants of
+Berlin, before the war, had seven meals a day; first breakfast
+at a comfortably early hour; second breakfast at about eleven, of
+perhaps a glass of milk or perhaps a glass of beer and sandwiches;
+a very heavy lunch of four or five courses with wine and beer;
+coffee and cakes at three; tea and sandwiches or sandwiches and
+beer at about five; a strong dinner with several kinds of wines
+at about seven or seven-thirty; and a substantial supper before
+going to bed.
+
+The Germans are wonderful judges of wines, and, at any formal
+dinner, use as many as eight varieties. The best wine is passed
+in glasses on trays, and the guests are not expected, of course,
+to take this wine unless they actually desire to drink it. I
+know one American woman who was stopping at a Prince's castle
+in Hungary and who, on the first night, allowed the butler to
+fill her glasses with wine which she did not drink. The second
+evening the butler passed her sternly by, and she was offered
+no more wine during her stay in the castle.
+
+Many of the doctors who were with me thought that the heavy eating
+and large consumption of wine and beer had unfavourably affected the
+German national character, and had made the people more aggressive
+and irritable and consequently readier for war. The influence of diet
+on national character should not be under-estimated. Meat-eating
+nations have always ruled vegetarians.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN
+
+During this first winter in Berlin, I spent each morning in the
+Embassy office, and, if I had any business at the Foreign Office,
+called there about five o'clock in the afternoon. It was the
+custom that all Ambassadors should call on Tuesday afternoons
+at the Foreign Office, going in to see the Foreign Minister in
+the order of their arrival in the waiting-room, and to have a
+short talk with him about current diplomatic affairs.
+
+In the previous chapter I have given a detailed account of the
+ceremonies of court life, because a knowledge of this life is
+essential to a grasp of the spirit which animates those ruling
+the destinies of the German Empire.
+
+My first winter, however, was not all cakes and ale. There were
+several interesting bits of diplomatic work. First, we were then
+engaged in our conflict with Huerta, the Dictator of Mexico,
+and it was part of my work to secure from Germany promises that
+she would not recognise this Mexican President.
+
+I also spent a great deal of time in endeavouring to get the
+German Government to take part officially in the San Francisco
+Fair, but, so far as I could make out, Great Britain, probably
+at the instance of Germany, seemed to have entered into some
+sort of agreement, or at any rate a tacit understanding, that
+neither country would participate officially in this Exposition.
+
+After the lamentable failure of the Jamestown Exposition, the
+countries of Europe were certainly not to be blamed for not spending
+their money in aid of a similar enterprise. But I believe that the
+attitude of Germany had a deeper significance, and that certain,
+at least, of the German statesmen had contemplated a
+_rapprochement_ with Great Britain and a mutual spanking
+of America and its Monroe Doctrine by these two great powers.
+Later I was informed, by a man high in the German Foreign Office,
+that Germany had proposed to Great Britain a joint intervention
+in Mexico, an invasion which would have put an end forever to
+the Monroe Doctrine, of course to be followed by the forceful
+colonisation of Central and South America by European Powers. I
+was told that Great Britain refused. But whether this proposition
+and refusal in fact were made, can be learned from the archives
+of the British Foreign Office.
+
+During this period of trouble with Mexico, the German Press,
+almost without exception, and especially that part of it controlled
+by the Government and by the Conservatives or Junkers, was most
+bitter in its attitude towards America.
+
+The reason for this was the underlying hatred of an autocracy
+for a successful democracy, envy of the wealth, liberty and
+commercial success of America, and a deep and strong resentment
+against the Monroe Doctrine which prevented Germany from using
+her powerful fleet and great military force to seize a foothold
+in the Western hemisphere.
+
+Germany came late into the field of colonisation in her endeavour
+to find "a place in the sun." The colonies secured were not habitable
+by white men. Togo, Kameroons, German East Africa, are too tropical
+in climate, too subject to tropical diseases, ever to become
+successful German colonies. German Southwest Africa has a more
+healthy climate but is a barren land. About the only successful
+industry there has been that of gathering the small diamonds that
+were discovered in the sands of the beaches and of the deserts
+running back from the sea.
+
+On the earnest request of Secretary Bryan, I endeavoured to persuade
+the German authorities to have Germany become a signatory to the
+so-called Bryan Peace Treaties. After many efforts and long
+interviews, von Jagow, the Foreign Minister, finally told me
+that Germany would not sign these treaties because the greatest
+asset of Germany in war was her readiness for a sudden assault,
+that they had no objection to signing the treaty with America,
+but that they feared they would then be immediately asked to
+sign similar treaties with Great Britain, France and Russia,
+that if they refused to sign with these countries the refusal
+would almost be equivalent to a declaration of war, and, if they
+did sign, intending in good faith to stand by the treaty, that
+Germany would be deprived of her greatest asset in war, namely,
+her readiness for a sudden and overpowering attack.
+
+I also, during this first winter, studied and made reports on
+the commercial situation of Germany and especially the German
+discriminations against American goods. To these matters I shall
+refer in more detail in another chapter.
+
+Opposition and attention to the oil monopoly project also occupied
+a great part of my working hours. Petroleum is used very extensively
+in Germany for illuminating purposes by the poorer part of the
+population, especially in the farming villages and industrial
+towns. This oil used in Germany comes from two sources of supply,
+from America and from the oil wells of Galicia and Roumania. The
+German American Oil Company there, through which the American
+oil was distributed, although a German company, was controlled by
+American capital, and German capital was largely interested in
+the Galician and Roumanian oil fields. The oil from Galicia and
+Roumania is not so good a quality as that imported from America.
+
+[Illustration: PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER WITH THE KAISER
+AT THE ROYAL PALACE, BERLIN.]
+
+Before my arrival in Germany the government had proposed a law
+creating the oil monopoly; that is to say, a company was to be
+created, controlled by the government for the purpose of carrying
+on the entire oil business of Germany, and no other person or
+company, by its provisions, was to be allowed to sell any
+illuminating oil or similar products in the Empire. The bill
+provided that the business of those engaged in the wholesale
+selling of oil, and their plants, etc., should be taken over
+by this government company, condemned and paid for. The German
+American Company, however, had also a retail business and plant
+throughout Germany for which it was proposed that no compensation
+should be given. The government bill also contained certain curious
+"jokers"; for instance, it provided for the taking over of all
+plants "within the customs limit of the German Empire," thus
+leaving out of the compensation a refinery which was situated
+in the free part of Hamburg, although, of course, by operation
+of this monopoly bill the refinery was rendered useless to the
+American controlled company which owned it.
+
+In the course of this investigation it came to light that the
+Prussian state railways were used as a means of discriminating
+against the American oil. American oil came to Germany through
+the port of Hamburg, and the Galician and Roumanian oil through
+the frontier town of Oderberg. Taking a delivery point equally
+distant between Oderberg and Hamburg, the rate charged on oil
+from Hamburg to this point was twice as great as that charged
+for a similar quantity of oil from Oderberg.
+
+I took up this fight on the line that the company must be compensated
+for all of its property, that used in retail as well as in wholesale
+business, and, second, that it must be compensated for the good-will
+of its business, which it had built up through a number of years
+by the expenditure of very large sums of money. Of course where
+a company has been in operation for years and is continually
+advertising its business, its good-will often is its greatest
+asset and has often been built up by the greatest expenditure
+of money. For instance, in buying a successful newspaper, the
+value does not lie in the real-estate, presses, etc., but in
+the good-will of the newspaper, the result of years of work and
+expensive advertising.
+
+I made no objection that the German government did not have a
+perfect right to create this monopoly and to put the American
+controlled company entirely out of the field, but insisted upon
+a fair compensation for all their property and good-will. Even a
+fair compensation for the property and good-will would have started
+the government monopoly company with a large debt upon which it
+would have been required to pay interest, and this interest, of
+course, would have been added to the cost of oil to the German
+consumers. In my final conversation on the subject with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg, he said, "You don't mean to say that President
+Wilson and Secretary Bryan will do anything for the Standard
+Oil Company?" I answered that everyone in America knew that
+the Standard Oil Company had neither influence with nor control
+over President Wilson and Secretary Bryan, but that they both
+could and would give the Standard Oil Company the same measure
+of protection which any American citizen doing business abroad
+had a right to expect from his government. I also said that I
+thought they had done enough for the Germans interested in the
+Galician and Roumanian oil fields when they had used the Prussian
+state railways to give these oil producers an unfair advantage
+over those importing American oil.
+
+Shortly after this the question of the creation of this oil monopoly
+was dropped and naturally has not been revived during the war,
+and I very much doubt whether, after the war, the people of
+liberalised Germany will consent to pay more for inferior oil in
+order to make good the investments of certain German banks and
+financiers in Galicia and Roumania. I doubt whether a more liberal
+Germany will wish to put the control of a great business in the
+hands of the government, thereby greatly increasing the number
+of government officials and the weight of government influence
+in the country. Heaven knows there are officials enough to-day
+in Germany, without turning over a great department of private
+industry to the government for the sole purpose of making good
+bad investments of certain financiers and adding to the political
+influence of the central government.
+
+In May, 1914, Colonel House and his beautiful wife arrived to pay
+us a visit in Berlin. He was, of course, anxious to have a talk
+with the Emperor, and this was arranged by the Emperor inviting
+the Colonel and me to what is called the _Schrippenfest_,
+at the new palace at Potsdam.
+
+For many years, in fact since the days of Frederick the Great,
+the learning (_Lehr_) battalion, composed of picked soldiers
+from all the regiments of Prussia, has been quartered at Potsdam,
+and on a certain day in April this battalion has been given a
+dinner at which they eat white rolls (_Schrippen_) instead
+of the usual black bread. This feast has been carried on from
+these older days and has become quite a ceremony.
+
+The Colonel and I motored to Potsdam, arrayed in dress-suits, and
+waited in one of the salons of the ground floor of the new palace.
+Finally the Emperor and the Empress and several of the Princes and
+their wives and the usual dignitaries of the Emperor's household
+arrived. The Colonel was presented to the royalties and then a
+Divine Service was held in the open air at one end of the palace.
+The Empress and Princesses occupied large chairs and the Emperor
+stood with his sons behind him and then the various dignitaries
+of the court. The Lehr Battalion was drawn up behind. There were
+a large band and the choir boys from the Berlin cathedral. The
+service was very impressive and not less so because of a great
+Zeppelin which hovered over our heads during the whole of the
+service.
+
+After Divine Service, the Lehr Battalion marched in review and
+then was given food and beer in long arbours constructed in front
+of the palace. While the men were eating, the Emperor and Empress
+and Princes passed among the tables, speaking to the soldiers.
+We then went to the new palace where in the extraordinary hall
+studded with curious specimens of minerals from all countries,
+a long table forming three sides of a square was set for about
+sixty people. Colonel House and I sat directly across the table
+from the Emperor, with General Falkenhayn between us. The Emperor
+was in a very good mood and at one time, talking across the table,
+said to me that the Colonel and I, in our black dress-suits,
+looked like a couple of crows, that we were like two undertakers
+at a feast and spoiled the picture. After luncheon the Emperor
+had a long talk with Colonel House, and then called me into the
+conversation.
+
+On May twenty-sixth, I arranged that the Colonel should meet
+von Tirpitz at dinner in our house. We did not guess then what
+a central figure in this war the great admiral was going to be.
+At that time and until his fall, he was Minister of Marine, which
+corresponds to our Secretary of the Navy Department, and what
+is called in German _Reichsmarineamt_. The Colonel also
+met the Chancellor, von Jagow, Zimmermann and many others.
+
+There are two other heads of departments, connected with the
+navy, of equal rank with the Secretary of the Naval Department
+and not reporting to him. These are the heads of the naval staff
+and the head of what is known as the Marine Cabinet. The head
+of the naval staff is supposed to direct the actual operations
+of warfare in the navy, and the head of the Marine Cabinet is
+charged with the personnel of the navy, with determining what
+officers are to be promoted and what officers are to take over
+ships or commands.
+
+While von Tirpitz was Secretary of the Navy, by the force of
+his personality, he dominated the two other departments, but
+since his fall the heads of these two other departments have
+held positions as important, if not more important, than that
+of Secretary of the Navy.
+
+On May thirty-first, we took Colonel and Mrs. House to the aviation
+field of Joachimsthal. Here the Dutch aviator Fokker was flying and
+after being introduced to us he did some stunts for our benefit.
+Fokker was employed by the German army and later became a naturalised
+German. The machines designed by him, and named after him, for
+a long time held the mastery of the air on the West front.
+
+The advice of Colonel House, a most wise and prudent counsellor,
+was at all times of the greatest value to me during my stay in
+Berlin. We exchanged letters weekly, I sending him a weekly bulletin
+of the situation in Berlin and much news and gossip too personal
+or too indefinite to be placed in official reports.
+
+War with Germany seemed a thing not even to be considered when
+in this month of May, 1914, I called on the Foreign Office, by
+direction, to thank the Imperial Government for the aid given
+the Americans at Tampico by German ships of war.
+
+Early in February, Mr. S. Bergmann, a German who had made a fortune
+in America and who had returned to Germany to take up again his
+German citizenship, invited me to go over the great electrical
+works which he had established. Prince Henry of Prussia, the
+brother of the Emperor, was the only other guest and together
+we inspected the vast works, afterwards having lunch in Mr.
+Bergmann's office. Prince Henry has always been interested in
+America since his visit here. On that visit he spent most of
+his time with German societies, etc. Of course, now we know he
+came as a propagandist with the object of welding together the
+Germans in America and keeping up their interest in the Fatherland.
+He made a similar trip to the Argentine just before the Great
+War, with a similar purpose, but I understand his excursion was
+not considered a great success, from any standpoint. A man of
+affable manners, no one is better qualified to go abroad as a
+German propagandist than he. If all Germans had been like him
+there would have been no World War in 1914.
+
+On March eighteenth, we were invited to a fancy-dress ball at
+the palace of the Crown Prince. The guests were mostly young
+people and officers. The Crown Princess wore a beautiful Russian
+dress with its characteristic high front piece on the head. The
+Crown Prince and all the officers present were in the picturesque
+uniforms of their respective regiments of a period of one hundred
+years ago. Prince Oscar, the fifth son of the Kaiser, looked
+particularly well.
+
+The hours for balls in Berlin, where officers attended, were a
+good example for hostesses in this country. The invitations read
+for eight o'clock and that meant eight o'clock. A cold dinner
+of perhaps four courses is immediately served on the arrival of
+the guests, who, with the exception of a very few distinguished
+ones, are not given any particular places. At a quarter to nine
+the dancing begins, supper is at about eleven and the guests go
+home at twelve, at an hour which enables the officers to get
+to bed early. During the season there were balls at the British
+and French Embassy and performances by the Russian Ballet, then
+in Berlin, at the Russian Embassy.
+
+The wonderful new Royal Library, designed by Ihne, was opened
+on March twenty-second. The Emperor attended, coming in with
+the beautiful Queen of Roumania walking by his side. She is an
+exceedingly handsome woman, half English and half Russian. Some
+days later I was presented to her at a reception held at the
+Roumanian Minister's and found her as pleasant to talk to as good
+to look upon.
+
+At the end of March there was a Horse Show. The horses did not
+get prizes for mere looks and manners in trotting and cantering,
+as here. They must all do something, for the horse is considered
+primarily as a war horse; such, for instance, as stopping suddenly
+and turning at a word of command. The jumping was excellent,
+officers riding in all the events. It was not a function of
+"society," but all "society" was there and most keenly interested;
+for in a warlike country, just as in the Middle Ages, the master's
+life may depend upon the qualities of his horse.
+
+I have always been fond of horses and horse-racing, and the
+race-tracks about Berlin were always an attraction for me.
+
+Many of the drivers and jockeys were Americans. Taral was a
+successful jockey for my father-in-law, Marcus Daly. He is the
+trainer of one of the best racing stables in Germany, that of
+the brothers Weinberg, who made a fortune in dye-stuffs. "Pop"
+Campbell, who trained Mr. Daly's Ogden, a Futurity winner, is
+also a Berlin trainer. The top notch jockey was Archibald of
+California. McCreery, who once trained for one of my brothers,
+had the stable which rivalled the Weinbergs', that of Baron
+Oppenheim, a rich banker of Cologne.
+
+The German officers are splendid riders and take part in many
+races. The Crown Prince himself is a successful jockey and racing
+stable owner.
+
+On June fifth, at the annual hunt race, the big steeplechase of
+the year, the Emperor himself appeared at the Grunewald track,
+occupying his private box, a sort of little house beyond the
+finish.
+
+Bookmakers are not allowed in Germany. The betting is in mutual
+pools. About seventeen per cent of the money paid is taken by the
+Jockey Club, the State and charities, so that the bettor, with
+this percentage running always against him, has little chance
+of ultimate success.
+
+Many of the races are confined to horses bred in Denmark and the
+Central Empires.
+
+All of us in the Embassy joined the Red White Tennis Club situated
+in the Grunewald about five miles from the centre of Berlin.
+The Crown Prince was a member and often played there. He is an
+excellent player, not quite up to championship form, but he can
+give a good account of himself in any company short of the top
+class. He has the advantage of always finding that the best players
+are only too glad to have an opportunity to play with him. At
+this Tennis Club during all the period of the feeling of hatred
+against America we were treated with, extreme courtesy by all
+our German fellow members.
+
+We saw a great deal of the two exchange professors in the winter
+of 1913-14, Professor Paul Shorey of the University of Chicago
+and Professor Archibald Coolidge of Harvard. These exchange
+professors give courses and lectures in the universities and
+their first appearance is quite an event. On this first day in
+1913, they each delivered a lecture in the University of Berlin,
+and on this lecture day Prince August Wilhelm, representing the
+Kaiser, attended. The Kaiser used invariably to attend, but of
+late years I am afraid has rather lost interest in this enterprise
+at first so much favoured by him.
+
+The _Cologne_Gazette_ at one time after the commencement
+of the war, in an article, expressed great surprise that America
+should permit the export of munitions of war to the Allies and
+said, quite seriously, that Germany had done everything possible
+to win the favour of America, that Roosevelt had been offered a
+review of German troops, that the Emperor had invited Americans
+who came to Kiel on their yachts to dine with him, and that he
+had even sat through the lectures given by American exchange
+professors.
+
+Before the war there was but one cable direct from Germany to
+America. This cable was owned by a German company and reached
+America via the Azore Islands. I endeavoured to obtain permission
+for the Western Union Company to land a cable in Germany, but
+the opposition of the German company, which did not desire to
+have its monopoly interfered with, caused the applications of
+the Western Union to be definitely pigeon-holed. In August, 1914,
+after the outbreak of the war, when I told this to Ballin of
+the Hamburg American Line and von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche
+Bank, and when they thought of how much they could have saved
+for themselves and Germany and their companies if there had been
+an American owned cable landing in Germany, their anger at the
+delay on the part of official Germany knew no bounds. Within a
+very short time I received an answer from the Foreign Office
+granting the application of the Western Union Company, providing
+the cable went direct to America. This concession, however, came
+too late and, naturally, the Western Union did not take up the
+matter during the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR
+
+In 1913-1914 occurred a series of events known as the "Zabern
+Affair," which to my mind decided the "system"--the military
+autocracy--for a speedy war. In this affair the German people
+appeared at last to be opening their eyes, to recover in some
+degree from the panic fear of their neighbours which had made them
+submit to the arrogance and exactions of the military caste and to
+be almost ready to demilitarise themselves, a thing abhorrent to
+the upholders of caste, the system, the army and the Hohenzollerns.
+
+This writing on the wall--these letters forming the word
+"Zabern"--the actions of the Social Democrats and their growing
+boldness, all were warnings to the autocracy of its waning power,
+and impelled that autocracy towards war as a bloodletting cure
+for popular discontent.
+
+Prussia, which has imposed its will, as well as its methods of
+thought and life on all the rest of Germany, is undoubtedly a
+military nation.
+
+More than one hundred and twenty-five years ago Mirabeau, the great
+French orator at the commencement of the Revolution, said, "War is
+the national industry of Prussia." Later, Napoleon remarked that
+Prussia "was hatched from a cannon ball," and shortly before the
+Franco-Prussian war of 1870 the French military _attache_, in
+reporting to his government, wrote that "other countries possessed
+an army, but in Prussia the army possessed the country."
+
+In practice the class of nobles in Prussia owns the army. Officers
+may enter the army in two ways, either by enlisting in the regiment,
+first as private and then being rapidly promoted to the position
+of non-commissioned officer, and then probationary ensign, or
+_avantageur_; or the young aspirant may come directly from
+a two years' course in one of the cadet schools and enter the
+regiment as probationary ensign. In both cases the young officer
+is observed by the officers during a period of probation and
+can become an officer of that regiment only by the consent of
+the regimental officers. In other words, each regiment is like
+a club, the officers having the right of black-ball.
+
+This system has practically confined the professional officers to
+a class of nobles. It is not at all unusual to find in a regiment
+officers whose ancestors were officers of the same regiment two
+hundred years or more ago.
+
+In addition to these officers who make the army their career,
+a certain number of Germans, after undergoing an enlistment in
+the army of one year and two periods of training thereafter,
+are made reserve officers. These reserve officers are called to
+the colours for manoeuvres and also, of course, when the whole
+nation is arrayed in war. These reserve officers seldom attain
+a rank higher than that of captain. They may, however, while
+exercising civil functions, be promoted, and in this manner the
+Chancellor, while occupying civil positions, has gradually been
+promoted to the rank of General and von Jagow, during the war, to
+the rank of Major. As a rule reserve officers are the one-yearers,
+or _Einjahriger_, who, because they have attained a certain
+standard of education, serve only one year with the army instead
+of the two required from others. The Bavarian army is in a sense
+independent of Prussia, but is modelled on the same system.
+
+For years officers of the army, both in the discharge of their
+duties and outside, have behaved in a very arrogant way toward
+the civil population. Time and again, while I was in Germany
+waiting in line at some ticket office, an officer has shoved
+himself ahead of all others without even a protest from those
+waiting. On one occasion, I went to the races in Berlin with my
+brother-in-law and bought a box. While we were out looking at
+the horses between the races, a Prussian officer and his wife
+seated themselves in our box. I called the attention of one of
+the ushers to this, but the usher said that he did not dare ask
+a Prussian officer to leave, and it was only after sending for
+the head usher and showing him my Jockey Club badge and my pass
+as Ambassador, that I was able to secure possession of my own
+box.
+
+There have been many instances in Germany where officers having
+a slight dispute with civilians have instantly cut the civilian
+down. Instances of this kind and the harsh treatment of the Germans
+by officers and under-officers, while serving in the army,
+undoubtedly created in Germany a spirit of antagonism not only
+to the army itself but to the whole military system of Prussia.
+Affairs were brought to a head by the so-called Zabern Affair. In
+this affair the internal antagonism between the civil population
+and professional soldiers, which had assumed great proportions
+in a period of long peace, seemed to reach its climax. Of course
+this antagonism had increased with the increase in 1913-14 of
+the effective strength of the standing army, bringing a material
+increase in the numbers of officers and non-commissioned officers
+who represent military professionalism.
+
+The Imperial Provinces or Reichsland, as Alsace and Lorraine are
+called, had been in a peculiar position within the body politic
+of Germany since their annexation in 1870. The Reichsland, as
+indicated by its name, was to be considered as common property
+of the German Empire and was not annexed to any one German State.
+Its government is by an Imperial Viceroy, with a kind of cabinet
+consisting of one Secretary of State, Civil and Under Secretaries
+and Department heads, assisted by a legislative body of two chambers,
+one elected by popular vote and the other consisting of members
+partly elected by municipal bodies, universities, churches and so
+forth, and partly appointed by the Imperial Government. The Viceroy
+and his cabinet are appointed by the Emperor in his capacity of
+the sovereign of the Reichsland. Until the thirty-first of May,
+1911, the Reichsland had no constitution of its own, the form
+of its government being regulated by the Reichstag and Federal
+Council (Bundesrat) in about the same way as the territories
+of the United States are ruled by Congress and the President.
+In 1911, Alsace-Lorraine received a constitution which gave it
+representation in the Federal Council, representation in the
+Reichstag having already been granted as early as 1871. The sympathy
+of Alsace-Lorraine for France had been increased by the policy of
+several of the German viceroys,--von Manteuffel, Prince Hohenlohe,
+Prince Munster and Count Wedel, who had, in their administrations,
+alternated severe measures with great leniency and had not improved
+conditions, so that the population, essentially South German,
+was undoubtedly irritated by the tone and manner of the North
+German officials.
+
+Great industries had been developed by the Imperial Government,
+especially textile and coal mining, and the industrial population
+centering in Mulhausen was hotly and thoroughly Social Democratic.
+The upper or well-to-do classes were tied to France by family
+connections and by religion. The bourgeois remained mildly
+anti-German, more properly speaking, anti-government, for similar
+reasons, and the working men were opposed to the government on
+social and economic grounds. The farming population, not troubling
+much about the politics, but being affected by the campaign of
+the nationalistic press, were in sympathy with France; so the
+atmosphere was well prepared for the coming storm.
+
+Zabern, or in French, Saverne, is a little town of between eight
+and nine thousand inhabitants, beautifully situated at the foot
+of the Vosges Mountains on the banks of the Rhine-Marne Canal.
+Its garrison comprised the staff and two battalions of Infantry
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, commanded by von Reuter, and among
+its officers was a Lieutenant von Forstner, a young man only
+twenty years old, whose boyish appearance had excited the school
+children and boys working in nearby iron factories to ridicule
+him. It became known that this young officer, while instructing
+his men, had insulted the French flag and had called the Alsatian
+recruits _Wackes_, a nick-name meaning "square-head," and
+frequently used by the people of Alsace-Lorraine in a jocular
+way, but hotly resented by them if used towards them by others.
+It was further reported that he had promised his men a reward
+of ten marks if one of them, in case of trouble, should bring
+down a Social Democrat. Forstner had told his men to beware,
+and warned them against listening to French foreign agents, whom
+the Germans claimed were inducing French soldiers to desert in
+order to join the French legion. It is probable that Forstner,
+in talking to his men of the French Foreign Legion, used language
+offensive to French ears. He admitted that he had used the word
+_Wackes_ in defiance of an order of the commanding general,
+and for this he had been punished with several days' confinement
+in a military prison. Lieutenant von Forstner, who was ordered
+to instruct his squad about the regulations in case of trouble
+with the civil population, claimed that he had only added to the
+usual instructions a statement that every true soldier should
+do his best to suppress any disturbances and that he, Forstner,
+would give a special reward to any of his men who would arrest
+one of "those damned Social Democrats."
+
+Reports of the acts of Forstner and other officers were rapidly
+spread among the population. The two newspapers of Zabern published
+articles. The excitement grew, and there were demonstrations
+against the officials and especially against Forstner. Finally,
+conditions became so bad that Colonel von Reuter requested the
+head of the local civil administration, Director Mahler, to restore
+order, stating that he would take the matter into his own hands
+if order was not restored. The director, a native of a small
+village near Zabern, replied coolly that he saw no necessity
+for interfering with peace loving and law abiding people. On
+November twenty-ninth, 1913, a large crowd assembled in front
+of the barracks. Colonel von Reuter ordered Lieutenant Schad,
+commanding the Guard as officer of the day, to disperse the crowd.
+Accordingly Lieutenant Schad called the Guard to arms and three
+times summoned the crowd to disperse and go home. The soldiers
+charged and drove the multitude across the Square and into a
+side street and arrested about fifteen persons, among them the
+President, two Judges and the State Attorney of the Zabern Supreme
+Court, who had just come out from the court building and who were
+caught in the crowd. They were subsequently released. The rest
+of the persons arrested were kept in the cellar of the barracks
+over night.
+
+The report of these occurrences caused immense excitement throughout
+Germany. A great outcry went up against militarism, even in quarters
+where no socialistic tendencies existed. This feeling was not
+helped by the fact that the General commanding the fifteenth
+army to which the Zabern regiment belonged was an exponent of
+extreme militaristic ideas; a man, who several years before, as
+Colonel of the Colonial troops, representing the war ministry
+before the Reichstag and debating there the question of the number
+of troops to be kept in German South West Africa, had most clearly
+shown his contempt for the Reichstag.
+
+Colonel von Reuter and Lieutenant Schad, when court-martialled
+for their acts in ordering the troops to move against the civil
+population, claimed the benefit of a Prussian law of 1820, which
+provided that in any city, town or village, the highest military
+officer in command must assume the authority, usually vested
+in the civil government, whenever for any reason the civil
+administration neglects to keep order. The Colonel and Lieutenant
+were subsequently acquitted on the ground that they had acted
+under the provisions of this law.
+
+The excitement throughout Germany was further increased by other
+circumstances. The Emperor remained during these critical days at
+Donaueschingen, the princely estate of his friend and favourite,
+Prince Furstenberg, enjoying himself with fox-hunting, torch-light
+processions and cabaret performances. Of course, all this had been
+arranged long before anyone dreamed of any trouble in Zabern, and
+the Emperor could scarcely be expected to realise the gravity of
+the situation which suddenly arose. But this very fact created a
+bad impression. It was even rumoured that the Empress, alarmed by
+the situation, had ordered a train to be made ready in order to
+go to him and try to convince him of the necessity of returning
+to Berlin.
+
+[Illustration: THE GLORY WHICH IS POTSDAM. SUMMER RESIDENCE OF
+THE KAISER IN THE PARK OF SANS SOUCI.]
+
+[Illustration: DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS, AT
+THE TOWN HALL, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+The newly appointed minister of war, Falkenhayn, went to
+Donaueschingen, where he was joined by von Deimling. This action
+aggravated the situation, because the public concluded that the
+Emperor would hear the advice and report of military officers
+only. The sudden death, by heart failure, of the Emperor's closest
+friend, von Hulsen, chief of the Emperor's Military Cabinet,
+during a banquet at Donaueschingen, gave the rapidly developing
+events a tragic and mysterious colouring, and these conferences
+in Donaueschingen resulted in the tendering of their resignations
+by the Viceroy, von Wedel, and Secretary of State Zorn von Bulach,
+Viceroy and Secretary of State of Alsace-Lorraine, who felt that
+the military party had gained an upper hand in the conflict with the
+civil authorities. The Chancellor then hurried to Donaueschingen,
+arriving a few hours before the departure of the Emperor; and a
+subsequent order of the Emperor to General von Deimling to see
+to it that the military officers did not overstep their authority
+and directing him to investigate the occurrences and take measures
+to punish all guilty parties, somewhat quieted the nation and
+caused the two highest civil officials of Alsace-Lorraine to
+withdraw their resignations.
+
+Zabern, where a brigadier-general had been sent by von Deimling
+to restore civil government, had begun to quiet down. But the
+Chancellor had hardly returned to Berlin when another incident
+stirred Germany. While practising field service in the neighbourhood
+of Zabern and marching through a village, Lieutenant von Forstner
+had an altercation with a lame shoemaker and cut him down. This
+brutal act of militarism caused a new outburst throughout Germany.
+Forstner was tried by a court-martial for hitting and wounding
+an unarmed civilian, and sentenced by the lower court to one
+year's imprisonment, but acquitted by the higher court as having
+acted in "supposed self-defence."
+
+No less than three parties, the Centrum, the Progressives and
+the Social Democrats, addressed interpellations to the Chancellor
+about this occurrence at Zabern. I was present at the debate in
+the Reichstag, which took place on the fourth, fifth and sixth
+of December, 1913. Three South Germans, a member of the Centrum,
+Hauss, a Progressive named Roser, and the Socialist deputy from
+Mulhausen in Alsace, Peirotes, commenced by moving and seconding
+the interpellation and related in vehement language the occurrences
+at Zabern. The Chancellor replied in defence of the government.
+Unfortunately he had that morning received family news of a most
+unpleasant character, which added to his nervousness. He spoke
+with a low voice and looked like a downhearted and sick man. It
+was whispered afterwards in the lobbies that he had forgotten
+the most important part of his speech. The unfavourable impression
+which he made was increased by von Falkenhayn, appearing for the
+first time before the Reichstag. If the Reichstag members had
+been disappointed by the Chancellor, they were stirred to the
+highest pitch of bitterness by the speech of the War Minister. In
+a sharp, commanding voice he told them that the military officers
+had only done their duty, that they would not be swerved from their
+path by press agents or hysterical individuals, that Forstner
+was a very young officer who had been severely punished, but
+that this kind of courageous young officer was the kind that
+the country needed, etc. Immediately after this speech the
+Progressive party moved that the attitude of the Chancellor did
+not meet the approval of the representatives of the people, and
+it became evident that, for the first time in the history of the
+German Empire, a vote of censure directed against the government
+would be debated. The debate was continued all the next day, the
+Chancellor making another speech and saying what he probably had
+intended to say the day before. He related what he had achieved
+at Donaueschingen; that the Emperor had issued a cabinet order
+saying that the military authorities should be kept within legal
+bounds, that all the guilty persons would be punished, that the
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, had been removed from Zabern, that
+the absolute law of 1820 had been abolished for Alsace-Lorraine,
+and that no Chancellor should for one moment tolerate disregard
+of law by any government officials, civil or military, and remain
+in his position.
+
+This second speech of the Chancellor made a better impression
+and somewhat affected the more extreme members of the Reichstag,
+but it came too late to prevent the passage of the vote of censure
+by the remarkable majority of two hundred and ninety-three to
+fifty-four. Only the Conservatives voted against it. A few days
+later, when the Social Democrats demanded that the Chancellor
+take the consequence of the vote of distrust and resign, the
+attitude of the members of all the other parties, who had been
+favourably impressed by the second speech of the Chancellor,
+showed that they were not yet prepared to go the length of holding
+that a vote of distrust in the Reichstag must necessarily mean
+the resignation of the Chancellor.
+
+Public excitement gradually calmed down, and a complete change of
+the officials at Zabern helped to bring about a normal condition
+of affairs. The Viceroy, Count Wedel, and Secretary of State
+Zorn von Bulach, resigned and were replaced by von Dallwitz and
+Count Rodern.
+
+However, the everlasting question came up again a little later
+during the regular budget debate of the Reichstag. The Chancellor
+made his speech, giving a review of the political international
+situation. He was followed by Herr Scheidemann, leader of the
+Social Democrats, who mercilessly attacked the. Chancellor and
+stated that if the Chancellor still thought that he was the right
+man at the helm, he, Scheidemann, would show that the contrary was
+the case. He then enumerated what he called the many political
+failures of the Chancellor, the failure of the bill to amend
+the Prussian franchise law, and stated that the few bills which
+had been passed, such as the bill giving Alsace-Lorraine a real
+constitution, had been carried only with the help of the Social
+Democratic party. The speaker then once more rehashed the incidents
+of the Zabern matter, referred to the attitude of the Emperor,
+who, he said, had evidently been too busy with hunting and
+festivities to devote time to such trivial matters as the Zabern
+Affair, and also said that, if the Chancellor had refused to
+withdraw, the only possible conclusion from the vote of the two
+hundred and ninety-three Reichstag members, who were certainly
+not influenced by personal feelings against the Chancellor, was
+that the Chancellor must be sticking to his post only because
+of the mistaken idea of the Emperor's authority and because he
+must believe in the fetish of personal government. Scheidemann
+begged that the same majority which had passed the vote of censure
+should now follow it up by voting down the Chancellor's salary
+and thus force him out of office.
+
+The Chancellor immediately replied, saying that he needed no
+advice from Herr Scheidemann, and that when the government had
+consented to change the rules of the Reichstag he had expressly
+reserved the authority either to regard or disregard any resolution
+passed after an interpellation, and that formerly, after discussing
+an interpellation and the answer of the government, no vote could
+be taken to approve or reject a resolution expressing its opinion
+of such course of action. Such resolutions might be considered as
+valuable material, but it had been agreed that they could have
+no binding effect either upon the government or any member of it,
+and that nobody had ever dreamed that by a mere change of business
+rules the whole constitution of the Empire was being changed and
+authority given to the Reichstag to dismiss ministers at will;
+that in France and Great Britain conditions were different, but
+that parliamentary government did not exist in Germany; that it
+was the constitutional privilege of the Emperor to appoint the
+Chancellor without any assistance or advice from the Reichstag;
+that he, the Chancellor, would resist with all his might every
+attempt to change this system; and that he, therefore, refused
+to resign because the resolution had no other effect than to
+make it evident that a difference of opinion existed between the
+Reichstag and the government.
+
+This debate took place on December ninth, 1913, and, with the
+exception of the Social Democrats and the Polish deputies, the
+leaders of all parties supported the view of the Chancellor.
+The motion to strike out the Chancellor's salary was voted down,
+only the Social Democrats and Poles voting in favour of it.
+
+It is unquestioned, however, that this Zabern Affair and the
+consequent attitude of the whole nation, as well as the extraordinary
+vote in the Reichstag, greatly alarmed the military party.
+
+It was perhaps the final factor which decided the advocates of
+the old military system of Germany in favour of a European war.
+Usually in past years when the Reichstag in adjournments had risen
+and cheered the name of the Emperor, the Social Democrats absented
+themselves from the Chamber, but when the Reichstag adjourned on
+May twentieth, 1914, these members remained in the Chamber and
+refused either to rise or to cheer the Emperor. The President
+of the Reichstag immediately called attention to this breach
+of respect to the Emperor, upon which the Socialists shouted,
+"That is our affair," and tried to drown the cheers with hoots
+and hisses at which the other parties applauded tumultuously
+
+This occurrence I know greatly incensed the Emperor and did much,
+I believe, to win his consent to the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR
+
+To the outsider, the Germans seem a fierce and martial nation.
+But, in reality, the mass of the Germans, in consenting to the
+great sacrifice entailed by their enormous preparations for war,
+have been actuated by fear.
+
+This fear dates from the Thirty Years' War, the war which commenced
+in 1618 and was terminated in 1648. In 1648, when the Treaty
+of Westphalia was concluded, Germany was almost a desert. Its
+population had fallen from twenty millions to four millions.
+The few remaining people were so starved that cannibalism was
+openly practised. In the German States polygamy was legalised,
+and was a recognised institution for many years thereafter.
+
+Of thirty-five thousand Bohemian villages, only six thousand
+were left standing. In the lower Palatinate only one-tenth of the
+population survived; in Wurttemberg, only one-sixth. Hundreds of
+square miles of once fertile country were overgrown with forests
+inhabited only by wolves.
+
+A picture of this horrible period is found in the curious novel,
+"The Adventurous Simplicissimus," written by Grimmelshausen, and
+published in 1669, which describes the adventures of a wise peasant
+who finally leaves his native Germany and betakes himself to a desert
+island which he refuses to leave when offered an opportunity to
+go back to the Fatherland. He answers those who wish to persuade
+him to go back with words which seem quite appropriate to-day:
+"My God, where do you want to carry me? Here is peace. There is
+war. Here I know nothing of the arts of the court, ambitions,
+anger, envy, deceit, nor have I cares concerning my clothing and
+nourishment.... While I still lived in Europe everything was
+(O, woe that I must appear witness to such acts of Christians!)
+filled with war, burning, murder, robbery, plundering and the
+shame of women and virgins." The Munich weekly, "Simplicissimus,"
+whose powerful political cartoons have often startled Europe,
+takes its name from this character.
+
+After the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War, Germany was again
+and again ravaged by smaller wars, culminating in the Seven Years'
+War of Frederick the Great and the humbling of Germany under
+the heel of Napoleon. In the wars Of Frederick the Great, one
+tenth of the population was killed. Even the great Battle of
+the Nations at Leipsic in 1813 did not free Germany from wars,
+and in 1866 Prussia and the smaller North German States, with
+Italy, defeated Austria, assisted by Bavaria, Hesse-Cassel,
+Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, Saxony, Baden, Wurttemberg and Hanover.
+
+I am convinced that the fear of war induced by a hereditary instinct,
+caused the mass of the Germans to become the tools and dupes of
+those who played upon this very fear in order to create a military
+autocracy. On the other hand, and, especially, in the noble class,
+we have in Germany a great number of people who believe in war for
+its own sake. In part, these nobles are the descendants of the
+Teutonic Knights who conquered the Slav population of Prussia,
+and have ever since bound that population to their will.
+
+The Prussian army was created by the father of Frederick the
+Great, who went to the most ridiculous extremes in obtaining tall
+men at all costs for his force.
+
+The father of Frederick the Great gave the following written
+instructions to the two tutors of his son. "Above all let both
+tutors exert themselves to the utmost to inspire him with a love
+of soldiery and carefully impress upon his mind that, as nothing
+can confer honour and fame upon a prince except the sword, the
+monarch who seeks not his sole satisfaction in it must ever appear
+a contemptible character in the eyes of the world."
+
+Frederick the Great left, by the death of that father who had
+once threatened to execute him, at the head of a marvellous army
+with a full treasury, finally decided upon war, as he admits in
+his own letters, "in order to be talked about," and his desire
+to be talked about led to the Seven Years' War.
+
+The short war against Denmark in 1864, against Austria, Bavaria,
+etc., in 1866 and against France in 1870, enormously increased
+both the pride and prestige of the Prussian army. It must not
+be forgotten that at all periods of history it seems as if some
+blind instinct had driven the inhabitants of the inhospitable
+plains of North Germany to war and to conquest. The Cimbri and
+Teutones--the tribes defeated by Marius; Ariovistus, who was
+defeated by Julius Caesar; the Goths and the Visi-Goths; the
+Franks and the Saxons; all have poured forth from this infertile
+country, for the conquest of other lands. The Germans of to-day
+express this longing of the North Germans for pleasanter climes
+in the phrase in which they demand "a place in the sun."
+
+The nobles of Prussia are always for war. The business men and
+manufacturers and shipowners desire an increasing field for their
+activities. The German colonies were uninhabitable by Europeans.
+All his life the glittering Emperor and his generals had planned
+and thought of war; and the Crown Prince, surrounded by his
+remarkable collection of relics and reminders of Napoleon, dreamed
+only of taking the lead in a successful war of conquest. Early in
+the winter of 1913-14, the Crown Prince showed his collection of
+Napoleana to a beautiful American woman of my acquaintance, and
+said that he hoped war would occur while his father was alive,
+but, if not, he would start a war the moment he came to the throne.
+
+Since writing the above, the American woman who had this conversation
+with the Crown Prince wrote out for me the exact conversation
+in her own words, as follows: "I had given him Norman Angell's
+book, 'The Great Illusion,' which seeks to prove that war is
+unprofitable. He (the Crown Prince) said that whether war was
+profitable or not, when he came to the throne there would be war,
+if not before, just for the fun of it. On a previous occasion
+he had said that the plan was to attack and conquer France, then
+England, and after that my country (the United States of America);
+Russia was also to be conquered, and Germany would be master of
+the world."
+
+The extraordinary collection of relics, statues, busts, souvenirs,
+etc., of the first Napoleon, collected by the Crown Prince, which
+he was showing at the time of the first of these conversations
+to this American lady, shows the trend of his mind and that all
+his admiration is centred upon Napoleon, the man who sought the
+mastery of the world, and who is thought by admirers like the
+Crown Prince to have failed only because of slight mistakes which
+they feel, in his place, they would not have made.
+
+If the Germans' long preparations for war were to bear any fruit,
+countless facts pointed to the summer of 1914 as the time when the
+army should strike that great and sudden blow at the liberties
+of the world.
+
+It was in June, 1914, that the improved Kiel Canal was reopened,
+enabling the greatest warships to pass from the Baltic to the
+North Sea.
+
+In the Zeppelins the Germans had arms not possessed by any other
+country and with which they undoubtedly believed that they could
+do much more damage to England than was the case after the actual
+outbreak of hostilities. They had paid great attention to the
+development of the submarine. Their aeroplanes were superior to
+those of other nations. They believed that in the use of poison
+gas, which was prepared before the outbreak of the war, they had
+a prize that would absolutely demoralise their enemy. They had
+their flame throwers and the heavy artillery and howitzers which
+reduced the redoubtable forts of Liege and Namur to fragments
+within a few hours, and which made the holding of any fortresses
+impossible.
+
+On their side, by the imposition of a heavy tax called the
+_Wehrbeitrag_ or supplementary defence tax, they had, in
+1913, increased their army by a number of army corps. On the
+other hand, the law for three years' military service voted in
+France had not yet gone into effect, nor had the law for universal
+military service voted by the Belgian Chambers. Undoubtedly the
+Germans based great hopes upon the Bagdad railway which was to
+carry their influence to the East, and even threatened the rule
+of England in Egypt and India. Undoubtedly there was talk, too,
+of a Slav railroad to run from the Danube to the Adriatic which
+would cut off Germany from access to the Southern Sea. Francis
+Deloisi, the Frenchman, in his book published before the great
+war, called "De la Guerre des Balkans a la Guerre Europeenne,"
+says, "In a word, the present war (Balkan) is the work of Russia,
+and the Danube Asiatic railway is a Russian project. If it succeeds,
+a continuous barrier of Slav peoples will bar the way to the
+Mediterranean of the path of Austro-German expansion from the
+Black Sea to the Adriatic. But here again the Romanoffs confront
+the Hapsburgs, the Austro-Serb conflict becomes the Austro-Russian
+conflict, two great groups are formed, and the Balkan conflict
+becomes the European conflict."
+
+Another reason for an immediate war was the loan by France to
+Russia made on condition that additional strategic railways were
+to be constructed by the Russians in Poland. Although this money
+had been received, the railways had not been constructed at the
+time of the opening of the Great War. Speaking of this situation,
+the Russian General Kuropatkin, in his report for the year 1900,
+said, "We must cherish no illusions as to the possibility of an
+easy victory over the Austrian army," and he then went on to say,
+"Austria had eight railways to transport troops to the Russian
+frontier while Russia had only four; and, while Germany had seventeen
+such railways running to the German-Russian frontier, the Russians
+had only five." Kuropatkin further said, "The differences are too
+enormous and leave our neighbours a superiority which cannot be
+overcome by the numbers of our troops, or their courage."
+
+Comparing the two armies, he said, "The invasion of Russia by
+German troops is more probable than the invasion of Germany by
+Russian troops"; and, "Our Western frontier, in the event of
+a European war, would be in such danger as it never has known
+in all the history of Russia."
+
+Agitation by workmen in Russia was believed in Germany to be
+the beginning of a revolution. Illuminating figures may be seen
+in the gold purchase of the German Imperial Bank: in 1911,
+174,000,000 marks; in 1912, 173,000,000 marks; but in 1913,
+317,000,000 marks.
+
+There was a belief in Germany that the French nation was degenerate
+and corrupt and unprepared for war. This belief became conviction
+when, in the debates of the French Senate, Senator Humbert, early
+in 1914, publicly exposed what he claimed to be the weakness
+and unpreparedness of France.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador in London, certainly
+reported to his government that England did not wish to enter
+the war. He claims now that he did not mean that England would
+not fight at all events, but undoubtedly the German Foreign Office
+believed that England would remain out of the war. The raising of
+the Ulster army by Sir Edward Carson, one of the most gigantic
+political bluffs in all history, which had no more revolutionary
+or military significance than a torchlight parade during one of
+our presidential campaigns, was reported by the German spies
+as a real and serious revolutionary movement; and, of course, it
+was believed by the Germans that Ireland would rise in general
+rebellion the moment that war was declared. In the summer of
+1914 Russia was believed to be on the edge of revolution.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, the movement against
+militarism, culminating in the extraordinary vote in the Reichstag
+against the government at the time of the Zabern Affair, warned
+the government and military people that the mass of Germans were
+coming to their senses and were preparing to shake off the bogy of
+militarism and fear, which had roosted so long on their shoulders
+like a Prussian old-man-of-the-sea. The Pan-Germans and the
+Annexationists were hot for war. The people alive could recall
+only three wars, the war against Denmark in 1864, which was settled
+in a few days and added the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein to
+the Prussian crown, and the war of 1866 in which Bavaria, Baden,
+Wurttemberg, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Saxony were defeated, when the
+Austrian kingdom of Hanover disappeared and the territories of
+Hesse-Cassel and Nassau, and the free city of Frankfort were
+added to Prussia. This war, from its declaration to the battle
+of Koniggratz in which the Austrians were completely defeated,
+lasted only two weeks. In 1870 France was defeated within a month
+and a half after the opening of hostilities; so that the Kaiser
+was implicitly believed when, on the first day of the war, he
+appeared on the balcony of the palace and told the crowds who
+were keen for war, that "before the leaves have fallen from the
+trees you will be back in your homes." The army and all Germany
+believed him and believed, too, that a few short weeks would
+see the destruction of France and the consequent seizure of her
+rich colonies; that Russia could then be struck a good quick
+blow before she could concentrate her army and resources; that
+England would remain neutral; and that Germany would consequently
+become, if not the actual owner, at least the dictator of the
+world. Some one has since said that the Emperor must have meant
+pine trees.
+
+Working ever in the dark, either owning or influencing newspapers,
+the great munition and arms factory of the Krupp's insidiously
+poisoned the minds of the people with the microbe of war.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador to London, called upon
+me often after the outbreak of the war, and insisted that he
+had correctly reported the sentiments of England in saying that
+England did not want war. After his return to Germany the Germans
+quite unfairly treated him as a man who had failed and seemed
+to blame him because England had taken the only possible course
+open to her and ranged herself on the side of France and Russia.
+
+The dedication at Leipzig, in the year 1913, of the great monument
+to celebrate what is called the "War of Liberation," and the
+victory of Leipzig in the War of the Nations, 1813, had undoubtedly
+kindled a martial spirit in Germany. To my mind, the course which
+really determined the Emperor and the ruling class for war was
+the attitude of the whole people in the Zabern Affair and their
+evident and growing dislike of militarism. The fact that the
+Socialists, at the close of the session of the Reichstag, boldly
+remained in the Chamber and refused to rise or to cheer the name
+of the Emperor indicated a new spirit of resistance to autocracy;
+and autocracy saw that if it was to keep its hold upon Germany
+it must lead the nation into a short and successful war.
+
+This is no new trick of a ruling and aristocratic class. From
+the days when the patricians of Rome forced the people into war
+whenever the people showed a disposition to demand their rights,
+autocracies have always turned to war as the best antidote against
+the spirit of democracy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR
+
+Kiel, situated on the Baltic, on the eastern side of the peninsula
+of Jutland near the Baltic entrance of the Kiel Canal, is the
+principal naval centre of Germany.
+
+When the Germans decided to build up a great fleet the Emperor
+used every means to encourage a love of yachting and of the sea,
+and endeavoured to make the Kiel Week a rival of the week at
+Cowes, the English yachting centre.
+
+With this end in view, the rich Germans were encouraged and almost
+commanded to build and race yachts; and Americans and others who
+visited Kiel in their yachts were entertained by the Emperor
+in an intimacy impossible if they had come to Berlin merely as
+tourists, residing in a hotel.
+
+In June, 1914, we went to Kiel as guests of Allison Armour of
+Chicago, on his yacht, the _Utowana_. I was detained by
+business in Berlin and Mrs. Gerard preceded me to Kiel. I arrived
+there on Saturday, the twenty-seventh of June, and that night
+went with Armour to dine with the Emperor on board the Emperor's
+yacht, _Hohenzollern_.
+
+In the harbour were a fair number of German yachts, mostly sailing
+yachts, taking part in the races; the fine old yacht of Lord
+Brassey, _The_Sunbeam_, and the yacht of the Prince of Monaco,
+in which he conducts his scientific voyages. A great English
+fleet, comprising some of the most powerful dreadnoughts, had
+also arrived, sent as an earnest of the good will and kindly
+feeling then supposed to exist between Great Britain and Germany.
+The redoubtable von Tirpitz was present on a German battleship,
+and the Hamburg American Line had an old transatlantic steamer,
+the _Deutschland_, rechristened the _Victoria_Luise_,
+filled with guests, most of whom were invited on a hint from
+the Emperor.
+
+At dinner on the _Hohenzollern_ a number of English people
+were present. The Kaiser had on one side of him the wife of the
+British Admiral, Lady Maud Warrender, and on the other side, the
+Countess of March, whose husband is heir to the Duke of Richmond.
+I sat between Princess Munster and the Countess of March, and
+after dinner the Emperor drew me over to the rail of the ship,
+and talked to me for some time. I wish that diplomatic etiquette
+would permit me to reveal what he said, but even in war time I
+do not think I ought to violate the confidence that hospitality
+seals. However important and interesting, especially to the tame
+Socialists of Germany, I do not give this conversation with the
+Emperor, nor the conversation with him and Colonel House at the
+_Schrippenfest_, because I was his guest. Conversations
+with the Emperor which I had on later occasions were at official
+audiences and to these the same rule does not apply. He also
+invited me to sail with him in his yacht, the _Meteor_, in
+the races from Kiel to Eckernfjord on the coming Tuesday.
+
+[Illustration: THE EMPEROR'S RACING YACHT, AND OTHERS, AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: THE "HOHENZOLLERN".]
+
+Sunday afternoon Prince Henry and his wife, who reside in the
+castle at Kiel, were to give an afternoon reception and garden
+party; but on arriving at the gates we were told that the party
+would not take place. After going on board the _Utowana_,
+Frederick W. Wile, the celebrated correspondent of the
+_London_Daily_Mail_, ranged up alongside in a small launch and
+informed us that the Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the
+Austrian throne, and his wife had been assassinated at Sarajevo.
+There was much rushing to and fro in fast launches, the Emperor
+himself being summoned from the race which was in progress. That
+night we dined on board the yacht of the Prince of Monaco. All the
+diplomats and notables whom I met during the afternoon and evening
+seemed to think that there was no chance that the tragedy at
+Sarajevo would lead to war. The next morning the Emperor left
+early for Berlin, but expressly directed that the festivities
+and races at Kiel should be carried out as arranged.
+
+Monday afternoon there was a _Bierabend_ in the large hall
+of the yacht club at Kiel. The Emperor was to have presided at
+this dinner, but his place was taken by his brother, Prince Henry.
+Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador, who was living on one
+of the British battleships, sat on his right and I sat on his
+left. During the evening a curious incident happened. The Prince
+and I were talking of the dangers of after-dinner speaking and what
+a dangerous sport it was. In the midst of our conversation some
+one whispered to the Prince and he rose to his feet, proposed the
+health of the visiting British Admiral and fleet, and made a little
+speech. As he concluded, he said, addressing the officers of the
+British fleet: "We are sorry you are going and we are sorry you
+came." It is remarkable as showing the discipline of the German
+nation and their respect for authority that thereafter no German
+ever referred to this curious slip of the tongue. The night was
+rather mild and after dinner we walked about the gardens of the
+yacht club. I had a long and interesting conversation with the
+Prince of Monaco. That Prince, who receives such a large income
+from the company which carries on the gambling rooms at Monte
+Carlo, is a man of the world intensely interested in scientific
+research: there is practically no corner of the seven seas into
+which his yacht has not poked her nose in the search for material
+for the Sea Museum which he has established at Monaco.
+
+On Tuesday Armour and I boarded the Emperor's sailing yacht,
+the new _Meteor_. The race was a beautiful run from Kiel
+to Eckernfjord and was won by the _Meteor_. As the Emperor
+was not on board, I did not get one of the souvenir scarf-pins
+always given to guests who sail with him on a winning race. Among
+our crew was Grand Admiral von Koster, subsequently an advocate
+of the ruthless submarine war.
+
+Eckernfjord is a little fishing and bathing town. Near by is
+the country residence of Prince Henry, a rather modest house,
+built in brick in English Elizabethan style. The wife of Prince
+Henry was a Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt and is the sister of the
+Czarina of Russia. We had tea with Prince and Princess Henry,
+their family, the Duke of Sonderburg-Glucksburg and several others
+of his family. The billiard room of the house is decorated with
+the large original caricatures made by McCutcheon of the Prince's
+stay in America. Prince and Princess Henry came out to dine on
+the _Utowana_, and Armour and the Prince went ashore to
+attend another _Bierabend_, but I dodged the smoke and beer
+and remained on board. Before he left the yacht, I had a talk
+with Prince Henry. He seemed most exercised over the dislike of
+the Germans by all other peoples and asked me why I thought it
+existed. I politely told him that I thought it existed because of
+the success which the Germans had had in all fields of endeavour,
+particularly in manufacturing and commerce. He said, with great
+truth, that he believed a great deal of it came from the bad
+manners of the travelling Germans. Prince Henry is an able and
+reasonable man with a most delightful manner. He speaks English
+with a perfect English accent, and I think would be far happier
+as an English country gentleman than as the Grand Admiral of the
+German Baltic Fleet. He has been devoted to automobiling and
+has greatly encouraged that industry in Germany. The Automobile
+Club of Berlin is his particular pet.
+
+On returning to Kiel next day we spent several days longer there.
+I lunched on board his battleship with Grand Admiral von Tirpitz,
+sitting next to him at the table. He struck me then as an amiable
+sea dog, combining much political and worldly wisdom with his
+knowledge of the sea. From Kiel we motored one night to dine
+with a Count and Countess in their country house. This house
+had been built perhaps two hundred years, and was on one side of
+a square, the other three sides being formed by the great stone
+barns in which the produce of the estate was stored. Although
+the first floor of the house was elevated about eight feet above
+the ground, the family, on account of the dampness of that part
+of the world, lived in the second story, and the dining room
+was on this story. An ancestor of the Count had, at a time when
+this part of the country was part of Denmark and about the year
+1700, lent all his available money to the King of Denmark. A
+crude painting in the hall showed him sitting in the hall of
+this particular house, smoking a long pipe and surrounded by
+three or four sisters who were all spinning. Our hostess told us
+that this picture represented the lending ancestor being supported
+by his sisters while waiting the return of the loan which he
+had made to the Danish king, an early example of the situation
+disclosed by the popular song which runs: "Everybody works but
+father." Of course, no one ever expected a Prussian nobleman to
+do any work except in the line of war or in governing the inferior
+classes of the country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE SYSTEM
+
+People of other countries have been wondering why it is that
+the German government is able so easily to impose its will upon
+the German people. I have set out in another chapter, in detail,
+the political system from which you have seen that the Reichstag
+is nothing but a debating society; that the Prussians do not
+really have universal suffrage but, by reason of the vicious
+circle system of voting, the elective franchise remains in the
+hands of the few; and that the government of the country through the
+_Landrate_, _Regierungsprasidenten_ and _Oberprasidenten_
+is a central system from above downwards and not the election
+of the rulers by the people; and, in the chapter on militarism
+and Zabern, I have told by what means the control of the army
+is kept in the hands of the class of nobles.
+
+These are not the only means by which the system controls the
+country. These alone would not suffice. From the time when he
+is four years old, the German is disciplined and taught that
+his government is the only good and effective form. The teachers
+in the schools are all government paid and teach the children
+only the principles desired by the rulers of the German people.
+There are no Saturday holidays in the German schools and their
+summer holidays are for only three to five weeks. You never see
+gangs of small boys in Germany. Their games and their walks are
+superintended by their teachers who are always inculcating in
+them reverence and awe for the military heroes of the past and
+present. On Saturday night the German boy is turned over by the
+State paid school teacher to the State paid pastor who adds divine
+authority to the principles of reverence for the German system.
+
+There is a real system of caste in Germany. For instance, I was
+playing tennis one day with a man and, while dressing afterwards,
+I asked him what he was. He answered that he was a _Kaufmann_,
+or merchant. For the German this answer was enough. It placed him
+in the merchant class. I asked him what sort of a _Kaufmann_
+he was. He then told me he was president of a large electrical
+company. Of course, with us he would have answered first that
+he was president of the electrical company, but being a German
+he simply disclosed his caste without going into details. It is
+a curious thing on the registers of guests in a German summer
+resort to see Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze registered
+with Mrs. Landrat Schwartz and Mrs. Second Lieutenant von Bing.
+Of course, there is no doubt as to the relative social positions
+of Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze and Mrs. Second Lieutenant
+von Bing. Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze may have a steam
+yacht and a tiara, an opera box and ten million marks. She may
+be an old lady noted for her works of charity. Her husband may
+have made discoveries of enormous value to the human race, but
+she will always be compelled to take her place behind Mrs. Second
+Lieutenant von Bing, even if the latter is only seventeen years
+old.
+
+Of course, occasionally, officers of the army and navy condescend
+to marry into the merchant caste, and if a girl has a choice
+of three equally attractive young men, one a doctor, earning
+ten thousand dollars a year; one a manufacturer, earning the
+same amount; and one an army officer with a "von" before his
+name and three thousand dollars a year, there is no hesitation
+on her part: she takes the noble and the army officer.
+
+For years all the highest official positions of the government
+have been held by members of the Prussian noble class, and when
+Zimmermann, of a substantial family in East Prussia, but not of
+noble birth, was made Foreign Minister, the most intense surprise
+was exhibited all over Germany at this innovation.
+
+One of the most successful ways of disciplining the people is
+by the _Rat_ system. _Rat_ means councillor, and is
+a title of honour given to any one who has attained a certain
+measure of success or standing in his chosen business or profession.
+For instance, a business man is made a commerce _Rat_; a
+lawyer, a justice _Rat_; a doctor, a sanitary _Rat_;
+an architect or builder, a building _Rat_; a keeper of the
+archives, an archive _Rat_; and so on. They are created in
+this way: first, a man becomes a plain _Rat_, then, later on,
+he becomes a secret _Rat_ or privy councillor; still later,
+a court secret _Rat_ and, later still, a _wirklicher_,
+or really and truly secret court _Rat_ to which may be added
+the title of Excellency, which puts the man who has attained
+this absolutely at the head of the _Rat_ ladder.
+
+But see the insidious working of the system. By German custom
+the woman always carries the husband's title. The wife of a
+successful builder is known as Mrs. Really Truly Secret Court
+Building _Rat_ and her social precedence over the other women
+depends entirely upon her husband's position in the _Rat_
+class. Titles of nobility alone do not count when they come in
+contact with a high government position. Now if a lawyer gets to
+be about forty years old and is not some sort of a _Rat_,
+his wife begins to nag him and his friends and relations look at
+him with suspicion. There must be something in his life which
+prevents his obtaining the coveted distinction and if there is
+anything in a man's past, if he has shown at any time any spirit of
+opposition to the government, as disclosed by the police registers,
+which are kept written up to date about every German citizen,
+then he has no chance of obtaining any of these distinctions
+which make up so much of the social life of Germany. It is a
+means by which the government keeps a far tighter hold on the
+intellectual part of its population than if they were threatened
+with torture and the stake. The Social Democrats, who, of course,
+have declared themselves against the existing system of government
+and in favour of a republic, can receive no distinctions from
+the government because they dared to lift their voices and their
+pens in criticism of the existing order. For them there is the
+fear of the law. Convictions for the crime of _Lese-Majeste_
+are of almost daily occurrence and, at the opening of the war, an
+amnesty was granted in many of these cases, the ministry of war
+withdrawing many prosecutions against poor devils waiting their
+trial in jail because they had dared to speak disrespectfully of
+the army. The following quotation from a German book, written
+since the war, shows very clearly that this state of affairs
+existed: "In the beneficent atmosphere of general amnesty came the
+news that the Minister of War had withdrawn pending prosecutions
+against newspapers on account of their insults to the army or
+its members." (Dr. J. Jastrow, "Im Kriegszustand.")
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system and the military system, there
+exists the enormous mass of Prussian officials. In a country
+where so many things are under government control these officials
+are almost immeasurably more numerous than in other countries.
+In Prussia, for example, all the railways are government-owned,
+with the exception of one road about sixty miles long and a few
+small branch roads. This army of officials are retainers of the
+government, and not only, of course, themselves refrain from
+criticising the system, but also use their influence upon the
+members of their own family and all with whom they come in contact.
+They are subject to trial in special secret courts and one of
+them who dared in any way to criticise the existing system would
+not for long remain a member of it. Of course, the members of the
+Reichstag have the privilege of free speech without responsibility,
+and there are occasional Socialists, who know that they have
+nothing to expect from the government, who dare to speak in
+criticism.
+
+All the newspapers are subject to control as in no other country.
+In the first place their proprietors are subject to the influence
+of the _Rat_ system as is every other German, and the newspaper
+proprietor, whose sons perhaps enter the army, whose daughters
+may be married to naval officers or officials, and who seeks
+for his sons promotion as judge, state's attorney, etc., has
+to be very careful that the utterances of his newspaper do not
+prevent his promotion in the social scale or interfere with the
+career of his family and relations.
+
+Since the war while a preventive censure does not exist in Germany
+nevertheless a newspaper may be suppressed at will; a fearful
+punishment for a newspaper, which, by being suppressed for, say,
+five days or a week, has its business affairs thrown into the utmost
+confusion and suffers an enormous direct loss.
+
+Many of the larger newspapers are either owned or influenced by
+concerns like the Krupps'. For instance, during this war, all
+news coming from Germany to other countries has been furnished
+by either the Over-Seas Or Trans-Ocean service, both news agencies
+in which the Krupps are large stockholders. The smaller newspapers
+are influenced directly by the government.
+
+In the Middle Ages there was often declared a sort of truce to
+prevent fighting in a city, which was called the _Burgfrieden_
+or "peace of the city," and, at the beginning of this war, all
+political parties were supposed to declare a sort of
+_Burgfrieden_ and not try to obtain any political advantage.
+
+There was, therefore, intense indignation among the Social Democrats
+of Germany when it was discovered, in the spring of 1916, that
+the Minister of the Interior was making arrangements to send out
+news service to be furnished free to the smaller newspapers, and
+that he was engaged in instructing the various _Landrate_
+and other officials of the Interior Department how effectively to
+use this machinery in order to gull the people to the advantage
+of the government, and to keep them in ignorance of anything
+which might tend to turn them against the system.
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system there is, of course, the system
+of decorations. Countless orders and decorations are given in
+Germany. At the head is the Order of the Black Eagle; there are
+the Order of the Red Eagle, the Prussian Order of the Crown,
+the orders, "_Pour_le_Merite_," the Order of the House of
+Hohenzollern, and many others, and in each of the twenty-five
+States there are also orders, distinctions and decorations. These
+orders in turn are divided into numerous classes. For instance, a
+man can have the Red Eagle order of the first, second, third or
+fourth class, and these may be complicated with a laurel crown,
+with an oak crown, with swords and with stars, etc. Even domestic
+servants, who have served a long time in one family, receive
+orders; and faithful postmen and other officials who have never
+appeared on the police books for having made statements against
+the government or the army are sure of receiving some sort of
+order.
+
+Once a year in Berlin a great festival is held called the
+_Ordensfest_, when all who hold orders or decorations of any
+kind are invited to a great banquet. The butler, who has served
+for twenty-five years, there rubs shoulders with the diplomat who
+has received a Black Eagle for adding a colony to the German
+Empire, and the faithful cook may be seated near an officer who
+has obtained "_Pour_le_Merite_" for sinking an enemy warship.
+All this in one sense is democratic, but in its effect it tends
+to induce the plain people to be satisfied with a piece of ribbon
+instead of the right to vote, and to make them upholders of a
+system by which they are deprived of any opportunity to make
+a real advance in life.
+
+This system is the most complete that has ever existed in any
+country, because it has drawn so many of the inhabitants of the
+country into its meshes. Practically, the industrial workers
+of the great towns and the stupid peasants in the country are
+the only people in Germany left out of its net.
+
+I had a shooting place very near Berlin, in fact I could reach
+it in three quarters of an hour by motor from the Embassy door,
+and there I had an opportunity of studying the conditions of
+life of the peasant class.
+
+Germany is still a country of great proprietors. Lands may be held
+there by a tenure which was abolished in Great Britain hundreds of
+years ago. In Great Britain, property may only be tied up under
+fixed conditions during the lives of certain chosen people, in
+being at the death of the testator. In the State of New York,
+property may only be tied up during the lives of two persons,
+in being at the death of the person making the will, and for
+twenty-one years (the minority of an infant) thereafter. But
+in the Central Empires, property still may be tied up for an
+indefinite period under the feudal system, so that great estates,
+no matter how extravagant the life tenant may be, are not sold
+and do not come into the market for division among the people.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON THE WAY TO HIS SHOOTING
+PRESERVE.]
+
+[Illustration: A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+IT SHOWS THE EARLY INNOCULATION OF DISCIPLINE INTO THE GERMAN
+SMALL BOY.]
+
+For instance, to-day there exist estates in the Central Empires
+which must pass from oldest son to oldest son indefinitely and,
+failing that, to the next in line, and so on; and conditions
+have even been annexed by which children cannot inherit if their
+father has married a woman not of a stated number of quarterings
+of nobility. There is a Prince holding great estates in Hungary.
+He is a bachelor and if he desires his children to inherit these
+estates there are only thirteen girls in the world whom he can
+marry, according to the terms of the instrument by which some
+distant ancestor founded this inheritance.
+
+This vicious system has prevented extensive peasant proprietorship.
+The government, however, to a certain extent, has encouraged peasant
+proprietorship, but only with very small parcels of land; and it
+would be an unusual thing in Germany, especially in Prussia,
+to find a peasant owning more than twenty or thirty acres of
+land, most of the land being held by the peasants in such small
+quantities that after working their own lands they have time
+left to work the lands of the adjoining landed proprietor at a
+very small wage.
+
+All the titles, of the nobility are not confined to the oldest
+son. The "Pocketbook of Counts," published by the same firm which
+publishes the "Almanac de Gotha," contains the counts of Austria,
+Germany and Hungary together, showing in this way the intimate
+personal relation between the noble families of these three
+countries. All the sons of a count are counts, and so on, ad
+infinitum. Thus in Hungary there are probably seventy Counts
+Szecheny and about the same number of Zichy, etc. Some of the
+German noble families are not far behind. In fact it may be said
+that almost any person, in what is known as "society" in the
+Central Empires, has a title of some sort. The prefix "von" shows
+that the person is a noble and is often coupled with names of
+people who have no title. By custom in Germany, a "von" when
+he goes abroad is allowed to call himself Baron. But in Germany
+he could not do so. These noble families in the Central Empires,
+by the system of _Majorat_ which I have described, hold
+large landed estates, and naturally exert a great influence upon
+their labourers. As a rule the system of tenant farming does not
+exist; that is, estates are not leased to small farmers as was
+the custom in Ireland and is still in Great Britain, but estates
+are worked as great agricultural enterprises under superintendents
+appointed by the proprietor. This system, impossible in America or
+even in Great Britain, is possible in the Central Empires where
+the villages are full of peasants who, not so many generations
+ago, were serfs attached to the land and who lived in wholesome
+fear of the landed proprietors.
+
+This is the first method by which influence is exercised on the
+population. There is also the restricted franchise or "circle
+voting" which gives the control of the franchise to a few rich
+proprietors.
+
+As a rule, the oldest son enters the army as an officer and may
+continue, but if he has not displayed any special aptitude for
+the military profession he retires and manages his estate. These
+estates are calculated by their proprietors to give at least four
+per cent interest income on the value of the land. Many younger
+sons after a short term of service in the army, usually as officers
+and not as _Einjahriger_ leave the army and enter diplomacy
+or some other branch of the government service. The offices of
+judge, district attorney, etc., not being elective, this career
+as well as that leading to the position of _Landrat_ and
+over-president of a province is open to those who, because they
+belong to old Prussian landed families, find favour in the eyes
+of the government. Much is heard in Germany and out of Germany
+of the Prussian Squire or Junker.
+
+There is no leisure class among the, Junkers. They are all workers,
+patriotic, honest and devoted to the Emperor and the Fatherland.
+If it is possible that government by one class is to be suffered,
+then the Prussian Junkers have proved themselves more fit for rule
+than any class in all history. Their virtues are Spartan, their
+minds narrow but incorruptible, and their bravery and patriotism
+undoubted. One can but admire them and their stern virtues. This
+class, largely because of its poverty and its constant occupation,
+does not travel; nor does the casual tourist or health seeker in
+Germany come in contact with these men. The Junkers will fight
+hard to keep their privileges, and the throne will fight hard
+for the Junkers because they are the greatest supporters of the
+Hohenzollerns.
+
+The workingmen in the cities are hard workers and probably work
+longer and get less out of life than any workingmen in the world.
+The laws so much admired and made ostensibly for their protection,
+such as insurance against unemployment, sickness, injury, old
+age, etc., are in reality skilful measures which bind them to
+the soil as effectively as the serfs of the Middle Ages were
+bound to their masters' estates.
+
+I have had letters from workingmen who have worked in America
+begging me for a steerage fare to America, saying that their
+insurance payments were so large that they could not save money
+out of their wages. Of course, after having made these payments
+for some years, the workingman naturally hesitates to emigrate
+and so lose all the premiums he has paid to the State. In peace
+times a skilled mechanic in Germany received less than two dollars
+a day, for which he was compelled to work at least ten hours.
+Agricultural labourers in the Central Empires are poorly paid.
+The women do much of the work done here by men. For instance,
+once when staying at a nobleman's estate in Hungary, I noticed
+that the gardeners were all women, and, on inquiring how much they
+received, I was told they were paid about twenty cents a day. The
+women in the farming districts of Germany are worked harder than
+the cattle. In summer time they are out in the fields at five or
+six in the morning and do not return until eight or later at night.
+For this work they are sometimes paid as high as forty-eight
+cents a day in harvest time. Nevertheless, these small wages
+tempt many Russians to Germany during the harvest season. At the
+outbreak of the war there were perhaps fifty thousand Russians
+employed in Germany; men, women and girls. These the Germans
+retained in a sort of slavery to work the fields. I spoke to
+one Polish girl who was working on an estate over which I had
+shooting rights, near Berlin. She told me that at the commencement
+of the war she and her family were working in Germany and that
+since the war they all desired to return to Poland but that the
+Germans would not permit it.
+
+This hard working of women in agricultural pursuits tends to
+stupefy and brutalise the rural population and keeps them in a
+condition of subjection to the Prussian Church and the Prussian
+system, and in readiness for war. Both Prussian Junkers and the
+German manufacturers look with favour upon the employment of
+so many women in farm work because the greater the number of
+the labourers, the smaller their wages throughout the country.
+
+When I first came to Germany I, of course, was filled with the
+ideas that prevailed in America that the German workingman had
+an easy time. My mind was filled with pictures of the German
+workingmen sitting with their families at tables, drinking beer
+and listening to classical music. After I had spent some time in
+Germany, I found that the reason that the German workingmen sat
+about the tables was because they were too tired to do anything
+else.
+
+I sincerely hope that after the war the workingmen of this country
+will induce delegates of their German brothers to make a tour
+of America. For when the German workingmen see how much better
+off the Americans are, they will return to Germany and demand
+shorter hours and higher wages; and the American will not be
+brought into competition with labour slaves such as the German
+workingmen of the period before the war.
+
+As one goes through the streets of Berlin there are no evidences
+of poverty to be seen; but over fifty-five per cent of the families
+in Berlin are families living in one room.
+
+The Germans are taken care of and educated very much in the same
+way that the authorities here look after the inmates of a poor-house
+or penitentiary. Such a thing as a German railway conductor rising
+to be president of the road is an impossibility in Germany; and
+the list of self-made men is small indeed,--by that I mean men
+who have risen from the ranks of the working-men.
+
+The Socialists, representing the element opposed to the
+Conservatives, elect a few members to the Prussian Lower House
+and about one-third of the members to the Reichstag, but otherwise
+have no part whatever in the government. No Socialist would have
+any chance whatever if he set out to enter the government service
+with the ambition of becoming a district attorney or judge. Jews
+have not much chance in the government service. A few exceptions
+have been made. At one time Dernburg, who carried on the propaganda
+in America during the first year of the war, and who is a Jew, was
+appointed Colonial Minister of the Empire.
+
+In my opinion, the liberalisation of Prussia has been halted
+by the fact that there has been no party of protest except that
+of the Socialists, and the Socialists, because they have, in
+effect, demanded abolition of the monarchy and the establishment
+of a republic as part of their programme, have been unable to
+do anything in the obtaining of the reforms.
+
+Up to the beginning of the war there was great dissatisfaction.
+The people were irritated by certain direct taxes such as the
+tax upon matches, and because every Protestant in Prussia was
+compelled to pay a tax for the support of the church, unless
+he made a declaration that he was an atheist.
+
+The only class in Germany which knows something of the outside
+world is the _Kaufmann_ class. Prussian nobles of the ruling
+class are not travellers. They are always busy with the army and
+navy, government employments or their estates; and, as a rule,
+too poor to travel. The poor, of course, do not travel, and the
+_Kaufmann_, although he learns much in his travels in other
+countries to make him dissatisfied with the small opportunity
+which he has in a political way in Germany, is satisfied to let
+things stand because of the enormous profits which he makes
+through the low wages and long hours of the German workingman.
+
+Lawyers and judges amount to little in Germany and we do not
+find there a class of political lawyers who, in republics, always
+seem to get the management of affairs in their own hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR
+
+After my return from Kiel to Berlin a period of calm ensued.
+No one seemed to think that the murders at Sarajevo would have
+any effect upon the world.
+
+The Emperor had gone North on his yacht, but, as I believe, not
+until a certain line of action had been agreed upon.
+
+Most of the diplomats started on their vacations. Sir Edward
+Goschen, British Ambassador, as well as the Russian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. This shows, of course, how little war was expected
+in diplomatic circles.
+
+I went on two visits to German country-houses in Silesia, where
+the richest estates are situated. One of these visits was to the
+country-house of a Count, one of the wealthiest men in Germany,
+possessed of a fortune of about twenty to thirty million dollars.
+He has a great estate in Silesia, farmed, as I explained, not by
+tenant farmers, but by his own superintendents. In the centre is
+a beautiful country house or castle. We were thirty-two guests in
+the house-party. This Count and his charming wife had travelled
+much and evidently desired to model their country life on that
+of England. Our amusements were tennis, swimming and clay-pigeon
+shooting, with dancing and music at night. Life such as this,
+and especially, the lavish entertainment of so many guests, is
+something very exceptional in Prussian country life and quite
+a seven months' wonder for the country side.
+
+Some days after my return to Berlin the ultimatum of Austria
+was sent to Serbia. Even then there was very little excitement,
+and, when the Serbian answer was published, it was believed that
+this would end the incident, and that matters would be adjusted
+by dilatory diplomats in the usual way.
+
+On the twenty-sixth of July, matters began to boil. The Emperor
+returned on this day and, from the morning of the twenty-seventh,
+took charge. On the twenty-seventh, also, Sir Edward Goschen
+returned to Berlin. I kept in touch, so far as possible, with
+the other diplomats, as the German officials were exceedingly
+uncommunicative, although I called on von Jagow every day and tried
+to get something out of him. On the night of the twenty-ninth,
+the Chancellor and Sir Edward had their memorable conversation in
+which the Chancellor, while making no promises about the French
+colonies, agreed, if Great Britain remained neutral, to make
+"no territorial aggressions at the expense of France."
+
+The Chancellor further stated to Sir Edward, that ever since he
+had been Chancellor the object of his policy had been to bring
+about an understanding with England and that he had in mind a
+general neutrality agreement between Germany and England.
+
+On the thirtieth, Sir Edward Grey refused the bargain proposed,
+namely that Great Britain should engage to stand by while the
+French colonies were taken and France beaten, so long as French
+territory was not taken. Sir Edward Grey said that the so-called
+bargain at the expense of France would constitute a disgrace
+from which the good name of Great Britain would never recover.
+He also refused to bargain with reference to the neutrality of
+Belgium.
+
+Peace talk continued, however, on both the thirtieth and
+thirty-first, and many diplomats were still optimistic. On the
+thirty-first I was lunching at the Hotel Bristol with Mrs. Gerard
+and Thomas H. Birch, our minister to Portugal, and his wife.
+I left the table and went over and talked to Mouktar Pascha,
+the Turkish Ambassador, who assured me that there was no danger
+whatever of war. But in spite of his assurances and judging by
+the situation and what I learned from other diplomats, I had
+cabled to the State Department on the morning of that day saying
+that a general European war was inevitable. On the thirty-first,
+_Kriegsgefahrzustand_ or "condition of danger of war" was
+proclaimed at seven P. M., and at seven P. M. the demand was made
+by Germany that Russia should demobilise within twelve hours. On
+the thirtieth, I had a talk with Baron Beyens, the Minister of
+Belgium, and Jules Cambon, the French Ambassador, in the garden
+of the French Embassy in the afternoon. They both agreed that
+nothing could prevent war except the intervention of America.
+
+Both Ambassador Cambon and Minister Beyens were very sad and
+depressed. After leaving them I met Sir Edward Grey upon the
+street and had a short conversation with him. He also was very
+depressed.
+
+Acting on my own responsibility, I sent the following letter to
+the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Is there nothing that my country can do? Nothing that I can
+  do towards stopping this dreadful war?
+
+  I am sure that the President would approve any act of mine
+  looking towards peace.
+
+               Yours ever,
+      (Signed) JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+To this letter I never had any reply.
+
+On the first of August at five P. M. the order for mobilisation
+was given, and at seven-ten P. M. war was declared by Germany on
+Russia, the Kaiser proclaiming from the balcony of the palace
+that "he knew no parties more."
+
+Of course, during these days the population of Berlin was greatly
+excited. Every night great crowds of people paraded the streets
+singing "Deutschland Ueber Alles" and demanding war. Extras,
+distributed free, were issued at frequent intervals by the
+newspapers, and there was a general feeling among the Germans
+that their years of preparation would now bear fruit, that Germany
+would conquer the world and impose its _Kultur_ upon all nations.
+
+On the second of August, I called in the morning to say good-bye
+to the Russian Ambassador. His Embassy was filled with unfortunate
+Russians who had gone there to seek protection and help. Right
+and left, men and women were weeping and the whole atmosphere
+seemed that of despair.
+
+On the day the Russian Ambassador left, I sent him my automobile
+to take him to the station. The chauffeur and footman reported to
+me that the police protection was inadequate, that the automobile
+was nearly overturned by the crowd, and that men jumped on the
+running board and struck the Ambassador and the ladies with him
+in the face with sticks. His train was due to leave at one-fifteen
+P. M. At about ten minutes of one, while I was standing in my
+room in the Embassy surrounded by a crowd of Americans, Mrs.
+James, wife of the Senator from Kentucky and Mrs. Post Wheeler,
+wife of our Secretary to the Embassy in Japan, came to me and
+said that they were anxious to get through to Japan via Siberia
+and did not know what to do. I immediately scribbled a note to
+the Russian Ambassador asking him to take them on the train with
+him. This, and the ladies, I confided to the care of a red-headed
+page boy of the Embassy who spoke German. By some miracle he
+managed to get them to the railroad station before the Ambassador's
+train left, the Ambassador kindly agreeing to take them with
+him. His train, however, instead of going to Russia, was headed
+for Denmark; and from there the two ladies crossed to Sweden,
+thence to England, and so home, it being perhaps as well for them
+that they did not have an opportunity to attempt the Siberian
+journey during this period of mobilisation.
+
+The Russian Ambassador reciprocated by confiding to me a Russian
+Princess who had intended to go out with him but who, intimidated,
+perhaps, by the scenes on the way to the station, had lost her
+nerve at the railway station and refused to depart with the
+Ambassador. She remained for a while in Berlin, and after some
+weeks recovered sufficient courage to make the trip to Denmark.
+
+On the morning of August fourth, having received an invitation
+the day before, I "attended" at the Palace in Berlin. In the room
+where the court balls had been held in peace times, a certain
+number of the members of the Reichstag were assembled. The diplomats
+were in a gallery on the west side of the room. Soon the Emperor,
+dressed in field grey uniform and attended by several members of
+his staff and a number of ladies, entered the room. He walked
+with a martial stride and glanced toward the gallery where the
+diplomats were assembled, as if to see how many were there. Taking
+his place upon the throne and standing, he read an address to
+the members of the Reichstag. The members cheered him and then
+adjourned to the Reichstag where the Chancellor addressed them,
+making his famous declaration about Belgium, stating that "necessity
+knew no law," and that the German troops were perhaps at that
+moment crossing the Belgian frontier. Certain laws which had
+been prepared with reference to the government of the country,
+and which I will give in more detail in another place, as well as
+the war credit, were voted upon by the Reichstag. The Socialists
+had not been present in the Palace, but joined now in voting the
+necessary credits.
+
+On the afternoon of August fourth, I went to see von Jagow to
+try and pick up any news. The British Ambassador sat in the
+waiting-room of the Foreign Office. Sir Edward told me that he
+was there for the purpose of asking for his passports. He spoke
+in English, of course, and I am sure that he was overheard by a
+man sitting in the room who looked to me like a German newspaper
+man, so that I was not surprised when, late in the afternoon,
+extra sheets appeared upon the street announcing that the British
+Ambassador had asked for his passports and that Great Britain
+had declared war.
+
+At this news the rage of the population of Berlin was indescribable.
+The Foreign Office had believed, and this belief had percolated
+through all classes in the capital, that the English were so
+occupied with the Ulster rebellion and unrest in Ireland that
+they would not declare war.
+
+[Illustration: CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY AWAITING BULLETINS,
+AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: THE AMERICAN EMBASSY WAS THE CENTRE OF INTEREST
+TO MANY IN THOSE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.]
+
+After dinner I went to the station to say good bye to the French
+Ambassador, Jules Cambon. The route from the French Embassy by
+the Branderburg Thor to the Lehrter railway station was lined
+with troops and police, so that no accident whatever occurred.
+There was no one at the station except a very inferior official
+from the German Foreign Office. Cambon was in excellent spirits
+and kept his nerve and composure admirably. His family, luckily,
+were not in Berlin at the time of the outbreak of the war. Cambon
+instead of being sent out by way of Switzerland, whence of course
+the road to France was easy, was sent North to Denmark. He was
+very badly treated on the train, and payment for the special
+train, in gold, was exacted from him by the German government.
+
+Then I went for a walk about Berlin, soon becoming involved in
+the great crowd in front of the British Embassy on the Wilhelm
+Strasse. The crowd threw stones, etc., and managed to break all
+the windows of the Embassy. The Germans charged afterwards that
+people in the Embassy had infuriated the crowd by throwing pennies
+to them. I did not see any occurrences of this kind. As the Unter
+den Linden and the Wilhelm Platz are paved with asphalt the crowd
+must have brought with them the missiles which they used, with
+the premeditated design of smashing the Embassy windows. A few
+mounted police made their appearance but were at no time in
+sufficient numbers to hold the crowd in check.
+
+Afterwards I went around to the Unter den Linden where there was
+a great crowd in front of the Hotel Adlon. A man standing on the
+outskirts of the crowd begged me not to go into the hotel, as he
+said the people were looking for English newspaper correspondents.
+
+So threatening was the crowd towards the English correspondents
+that Wile rang up the porter of the Embassy after we had gone
+to bed and, not wishing to disturb us, he occupied the lounge in
+the porter's rooms.
+
+Believing that possibly the British Embassy might be in such
+a condition that Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador,
+might not care to spend the night there, I ordered an automobile
+and went up through the crowd which still choked the Wilhelm
+Strasse, with Holand Harvey, the Second Secretary to the British
+Embassy. Sir Edward and his secretaries were perfectly calm and
+politely declined the refuge which I offered them in our Embassy.
+I chatted with them for a while, and, as I was starting to leave, a
+servant told me that the crowds in the street had greatly increased
+and were watching my automobile. I sent out word by the servant
+to open the automobile, as it was a landau, and to tell the
+chauffeur, when I got in, to drive very slowly.
+
+I drove slowly through the crowd, assailed only by the peculiar
+hissing word that the Germans use when they are especially angry
+and which is supposed to convey the utmost contempt. This word
+is "_Pfui_" and has a peculiar effect when hissed out from
+thousands of Teutonic throats.
+
+As we left the outskirts of the crowd, a man of respectable
+appearance jumped on the running board of the automobile, spit
+at me, saying "_Pfui_," and struck Harvey in the face with
+his hat. I stopped the automobile, jumped out and chased this man
+down the street and caught him. My German footman came running
+up and explained that I was the American Ambassador and not an
+Englishman. The man who struck Harvey thereupon apologised and
+gave his card. He was a Berlin lawyer who came to the Embassy
+next morning and apologised again for his "mistake."
+
+The following day, August fifth, I spent part of the time taking
+over from Sir Edward the British interests. Joseph C. Grew, our
+First Secretary, and I went to the British Embassy; seals were
+placed upon the archives, and we received such instructions and
+information as could be given us, with reference to the British
+subjects in Germany and their interests. The British correspondents
+were collected in the Embassy and permission was obtained for
+them to leave on the Embassy train.
+
+During the day British subjects, without distinction as to age
+or sex, were seized, wherever found, and sent to the fortress
+of Spandau. I remonstrated with von Jagow and told him that that
+was a measure taken only in the Middle Ages, and I believe that
+he remonstrated with the authorities and arranged for a cessation
+of the arbitrary arrests of women.
+
+Frederick W. Wile, the well-known American correspondent of the
+_London_Daily_Mail_, was to go out also with the British
+party, on the ground that he had been a correspondent of a British
+newspaper. In the evening I went to the Foreign Office to get his
+passport, and, while one of the department chiefs was signing
+the passport, he stopped in the middle of his signature, threw
+down the pen on the table, and said he absolutely refused to
+sign a passport for Wile because he hated him so and because
+he believed he had been largely instrumental in the bringing
+about of the war. Of course this latter statement was quite
+ridiculous, but it took me some time before I could persuade
+this German official to calm his hate and complete his signature.
+
+I have heard a few people say that Wile was unduly fearful of
+what the Germans might do to him, but the foregoing incident
+shows that his fears were well grounded, and knowing of this
+incident, which I did not tell him, I was very glad to have him
+accept the hospitality of the Embassy for the night preceding
+his departure. He was perfectly cool, although naturally much
+pleased when I informed him that his departure had been arranged.
+
+Sir Edward and his staff and the British correspondents left next
+morning early, about six A. M. No untoward incidents occurred
+at the time of their departure which was, of course, unknown to
+the populace of Berlin.
+
+During these first days there was a great spy excitement in Germany.
+People were seized by the crowds in the streets and, in some
+instances, on the theory that they were French or Russian spies,
+were shot. Foreigners were in a very dangerous situation throughout
+Germany, and many Americans were subjected to arrest and indignities.
+
+A curious rumour spread all over Germany to the effect that
+automobiles loaded with French gold were being rushed across the
+country to Russia. Peasants and gamekeepers and others turned
+out on the roads with guns, and travelling by automobile became
+exceedingly dangerous. A German Countess was shot, an officer
+wounded and the Duchess of Ratibor was shot in the arm. It was
+sometime before this excitement was allayed, and many notices
+were published in the newspapers before this mania was driven
+from the popular brain.
+
+There were rumours also that Russians had poisoned the Muggelsee,
+the lake from whence Berlin draws part of its water supply. There
+were constant rumours of the arrest of Russian spies disguised as
+women throughout Germany.
+
+Many Americans were detained under a sort of arrest in their
+hotels; among these were Archer Huntington and his wife; Charles
+H. Sherrill, formerly our minister to the Argentine and many
+others.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES
+
+Of course, as soon as there was a prospect of war, the Embassy
+was overrun with Americans. Few Americans had taken the precaution
+of travelling with passports, and passports had become a necessity.
+All of the Embassy force and all the volunteers that I could
+prevail upon to serve, even a child of eleven years old, who
+was stopping in the house with us, were taking applications of
+the Americans who literally in thousands crowded the Wilhelm
+Platz in front of the Embassy.
+
+The question of money became acute. Travellers who had letters
+of credit and bank checks for large sums could not get a cent
+of money in Germany. The American Express Company, I believe,
+paid all holders of its checks. When, with Mr. Wolf, President
+of the American Association of Commerce and Trade in Berlin, I
+called upon the director of the Imperial Bank and begged him
+to arrange something for the relief of American travellers in
+Germany, he refused to do anything; and I then suggested to him
+that he might give paper money, which they were then printing
+in Germany, to the Americans for good American credits such as
+letters of credit and bank checks, and that they would then have a
+credit in America which might become very valuable in the future.
+He, however, refused to see this. Director Herbert Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank was the far-seeing banker who relieved the
+situation. Gutmann arranged with me that the Dresdener Bank,
+the second largest bank in Germany, would cash the bank checks,
+letters of credit and the American Express Company's drafts and
+international business checks, etc., of Americans for reasonable
+amounts, provided the Embassy seal was put on the letter of credit
+or check to show that the holder was an American, and, outside
+of Berlin, the seal of the American Consulate. This immediately
+relieved the situation.
+
+With the exception of Mr. Wolf who was, however, quite busy with
+his own affairs, I had no American Committees such as were organised
+in London and Paris to help me in Berlin. In Munich, however, the
+Americans there organised themselves into an efficient committee.
+Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Pulitzer were in Berlin and immediately went
+to work in our Embassy. Mr. Pulitzer busied himself at giving
+out passports and Mrs. Pulitzer proved herself a very efficient
+worker. She and Mrs. Ruddock, wife of our Third Secretary, and
+Mrs. Gherhardi, wife of the Naval Attache, with Mrs. Gerard formed
+a sort of relief committee to look after the Americans who were
+without help or resources.
+
+I arranged, with the very efficient help of Lanier Winslow, for
+special trains to carry the Americans in Germany to Holland.
+Trains were run from Switzerland, Munich and Carlsbad across
+Germany to Holland, and from Berlin were run a number of trains
+to Holland.
+
+The first room on entering the Embassy was the ticket-office,
+and there, first Mr. Winslow, and afterwards Captain Fenton,
+sold tickets, giving tickets free to those who were certified
+to be without funds by the committee of Mrs. Pulitzer and Mrs.
+Gerard. This committee worked on the second floor of the Embassy
+in the ballroom, part of it being roped off to keep the crowds
+back from the ladies.
+
+Each week I bought a number of steerage passages from the Holland
+American Line and the ladies resold them in the ballroom. We had
+to do this because the Holland American Line had no licence to sell
+steerage tickets in Germany; but by buying two or three hundred
+at a time direct from the Company, I was enabled to peddle them
+out in our ballroom to those Americans who, in their eagerness to
+reach their own country, were willing to endure the discomforts
+of travel in the steerage.
+
+Winslow accompanied one special train to Holland, and I must
+say that I sympathised with him when I learned of what he had
+to do in the way of chasing lost hand-baggage and finding milk
+for crying babies.
+
+These special trains were started from the Charlottenburg station,
+in a quiet part of Berlin so that no crowd was attracted by the
+departure of the Americans. The Carlsbad train went through very
+successfully, taking the Americans who had been shut up in Carlsbad
+since the commencement of the war.
+
+One of the curious developments of this time was a meeting of
+sympathy for the Americans stranded in Germany, held in the town
+hall of Berlin on the eleventh of August. This meeting was commenced
+in one of the meeting rooms of the town hall, but so many people
+attended that we were compelled to adjourn to the great hall.
+There speeches were made by the over-Burgomaster, von Gwinner,
+Professor von Harnack and me. Another professor, who spoke excellent
+English, with an English accent, made a bitter attack upon Great
+Britain. In the pamphlet in which the speeches of Harnack and
+the over-Burgomaster were published this professor's speech was
+left out. In his speech stating the object of the meeting, the
+over-Burgomaster said: "Since we hear that a large number of
+American citizens in the German Empire, and, especially, in Berlin,
+find themselves in embarrassments due to the shutting off of
+means of return to their own country, we here solemnly declare
+it to be our duty to care for them as brethren to the limit of
+our ability, and we appeal to all citizens of Berlin and the
+whole of the German Empire to co-operate with us to this end."
+
+Professor von Harnack, head of the Royal Library in Berlin, is
+one of the ablest of the German professors. In his speech he gave
+expression to the feeling that was prevalent in the first days
+of the war that Germany was defending itself against a Russian
+invasion which threatened to blot out the German _Kultur_. He
+said, after referring to Western civilisation: "But in the face
+of this civilisation, there arises now before my eyes another
+civilisation, the civilisation of the tribe, with its patriarchal
+organisation, the civilisation of the horde that is gathered and
+kept together by despots,--the Mongolian Muscovite civilisation.
+This civilisation could not endure the light of the eighteenth
+century, still less the light of the nineteenth century, and
+now in the twentieth century it breaks loose and threatens us.
+This unorganised Asiatic mass, like the desert with its sands,
+wants to gather up our fields of grain."
+
+Nothing was done for the Americans stranded in Germany by the
+Germans with the exception of the arrangements for the payment
+of funds by the Dresdener Bank on the letters of credit and the
+dispatching of special trains by the railroad department of the
+German government. As a matter of fact, nothing more could have
+been required of the Germans, as it was naturally the duty of
+the American government to take care of its citizens stranded
+abroad.
+
+Almost the instant that war was declared, I cabled to our government
+suggesting that a ship should be sent over with gold because,
+of course, with gold, no matter what the country, necessaries
+can always be bought. Rumours of the dispatch of the Tennessee
+and other ships from America, reached Berlin and a great number
+of the more ignorant of the Americans got to believe that these
+ships were being sent over to take Americans home.
+
+[Illustration: WORKING IN THE EMBASSY BALLROOM AT THE OUTBREAK
+OF HOSTILITIES, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: WAR DAYS IN BERLIN. AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.]
+
+One morning an American woman spoke to me and said she would
+consent to go home on one of these ships provided she was given
+a state-room with a bath and Walker-Gordon milk for her children,
+while another woman of German extraction used to sit for hours
+in a corner of the ballroom, occasionally exclaiming aloud with
+much feeling, "O God, will them ships never come?"
+
+In these first days of the war we also made a card index of all
+the Americans in Berlin, and, so far as possible, in Germany;
+in order to weed out those who had received the passports in
+the first days when possibly some people not entitled to them
+received them, and to find the deserving cases. All Americans
+were required to present themselves at the Embassy and answer
+a few questions, after which, if everything seemed all right,
+their passports were marked "recommended for transportation to
+America."
+
+I sent out circulars from time to time to the consuls throughout
+Germany giving general instructions with regard to the treatment
+of Americans. The following circular sent out on August twelfth
+is a sample:
+
+                "AMERICAN EMBASSY,
+                   BERLIN, August 12, 1914.
+
+  "_To_the_Consular_Representatives_
+    _of_the_United_States_in_Germany,_
+      _and_for_the_general_information_of_
+        _American_Citizens._
+
+  "A communication will to-morrow be published in the _Berlin_
+  _Lokal_Anzeiger_ regarding the sending of a special train to
+  the Dutch frontier for the special conveyance of Americans.
+  Other trains will probably be arranged for from time to time.
+  No further news has been received regarding the sending of
+  transports from the United States, but applications for
+  repatriation are being considered by the Embassy and the
+  various consular offices throughout Germany according to the
+  Embassy's last circular and the announcements published in
+  the _Lokal_Anzeiger_.
+
+  "All Americans leaving Berlin must have their passports stamped
+  by the Foreign Office, for which purpose they should apply to
+  _Geheimer_Legationsrat_ Dr. Eckhardt at Wilhelmstrasse
+  76. Americans residing outside of Berlin should ascertain from
+  their respective consular representatives what steps they should
+  take in this regard.
+
+  "Letters for the United States may be sent to the Embassy and
+  will be forwarded at the first opportunity.
+
+  "German subjects who desire to communicate with friends in
+  Great Britain, Russia, France or Belgium, or who desire to
+  send money, should make their requests to the Imperial Foreign
+  Office. Americans are permitted to enter Italy. The steamers
+  of the Italian lines are running at present, but are full for
+  some time in advance. The Embassy is also informed that the
+  steamer from Vlissingen, Holland, runs daily at 11 A. M. The
+  Ambassador cannot, however, recommend Americans to try to
+  reach Holland by the ordinary schedule trains, as he has
+  received reports of delays _en_route_, owing to the fact
+  that all civil travellers are ejected from trains when troops
+  require accommodations. It is better to wait for special trains
+  arranged for by the Embassy.
+
+  "The Dresdener Bank and its branches throughout Germany will
+  cash _for_Americans_only_ letters of credit and checks
+  issued by good American banks in limited amounts. Included
+  in this category are the checks of the Bankers' Association,
+  Bankers' Trust Company, International Mercantile Marine Company,
+  and American Express Company. All checks and letters of credit
+  must, however, be stamped by American consuls, and consuls must
+  see that the consular stamp is affixed to those checks and
+  letters of credit only as are the bona fide property of American
+  citizens. The Commerz & Disconto Bank makes the same offer and
+  the Deutsche Bank will cash checks and letters of credit drawn
+  by its correspondents.
+
+  "American consular officers may also draw later on the Dresdener
+  Bank for their salaries and the official expenses of their
+  consulates. Before drawing such funds from the bank, however,
+  all consular officers should submit their expense accounts to me
+  for approval. These expense accounts should be transmitted to
+  the Embassy at the earliest opportunity.
+
+                         "THE AMBASSADOR."
+
+It will be noticed from the above circular that all Americans
+were required to have their passports stamped at the Foreign
+Office. One American did not receive back his passport, although
+he had left it at the Foreign Office. The Foreign Office claimed
+that it had delivered the passport to some one from the Embassy,
+but we were not very much surprised when this identical passport
+turned up later in the possession of Lodi, the confessed German
+spy, who was shot in the Tower of London.
+
+After a time the American Government cabled me to advance money
+to destitute Americans; and the ladies in the ballroom, with
+their assistants, attended to this branch, advancing money where
+needed or so much as a person needed to make up the balance of
+passage on steerage tickets from Holland to the United States.
+At the same time we gradually built up a banking system. Those
+in the United States who had friends or relatives in Germany
+sent them money by giving the money to our State Department,
+and the State Department in turn cabled me to make a payment.
+This payment was made by my drawing a draft for the amount stated
+on the State Department, the recipient selling this draft at a
+fixed rate to the Deutsche Bank in Berlin. This business assumed
+great proportions, and after the Americans who were in a hurry to
+go home had disappeared, the ones remaining were kept in funds
+by their friends and relatives through this sort of bank under
+our management.
+
+On August twenty-third, Assistant Secretary of War Breckenridge,
+who had come from America on the warship _Tennessee_, bringing
+gold with him, and a certain number of army officers, arrived
+in Berlin and took over our relief organisation in so far as it
+applied to the repatriation of Americans, housing it in rooms
+hired in a nearby hotel, the Kaiserhoff. This commission: was
+composed of Majors J. A. Ryan, J. H. Ford and G. W. Martin and
+Captains Miller and Fenton, but the relief committee and the
+banking office were still continued in the Embassy ballroom.
+
+A bulletin was published under the auspices of the American
+Association of Commerce and Trade and the advice there given was
+that all Americans having the means to leave should do so when
+the opportunity for leaving by special trains was presented, and
+proceed direct to London whence they could obtain transportation
+to the United States. All Americans without means were directed
+to apply to the relief commission which was authorized to pay
+for the transportation and subsistence of stranded Americans
+in order to enable them to return home.
+
+The enormous quantity of baggage left behind by Americans in
+Germany was a problem requiring solution.
+
+In spite of repeated advice to leave, many Americans insisted
+on remaining in Germany. Few of them were business people; there
+were many song-birds, piano players, and students. We had much
+trouble with these belated Americans. For example, one woman
+and her daughter refused to leave when advised, but stayed on
+and ran up bills for over ten thousand marks; and as arrest for
+debt exists in Germany, they could not leave when they finally
+decided to go. All of us in the Embassy had to subscribe the
+money necessary to pay their most pressing debts and they finally
+left the country, leaving an added prejudice against Americans.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PRISONERS OF WAR
+
+During the period of the first months of the war, in addition
+to other work, it became necessary to look after those subjects
+of other nations who had been confided to my care.
+
+At first the British were allowed considerable liberty, although
+none were permitted to leave the country. They were required to
+report to the police at stated times during the day and could
+not remain out late at night.
+
+The Japanese had received warning from their Embassy as to the
+turn that events might take and, before sending its ultimatum,
+the Japanese government had warned its citizens, so that a great
+number of them had left Germany. After the declaration of war by
+Japan, all the Japanese in Germany were immediately imprisoned.
+This was stated to be in order to save them from the fury of
+the population and certainly the people seemed to be greatly
+incensed against the Japanese. When I finally obtained permission
+for their release and departure from Germany I had to send some
+one with the parties of Japanese to the Swiss frontier in order
+to protect them from injury. They were permitted to leave only
+through Switzerland and, therefore, had to change cars at Munich.
+Before sending any of them to Munich I invariably telegraphed
+our Consul there to notify the Munich police so that proper
+protection could be provided at the railway station.
+
+On one occasion a number of Japanese were waiting in the Embassy
+in order to take the night train for Munich. I sent a servant
+to take them out in order that they might get something to eat
+in a restaurant, but as no restaurant in Berlin would sell them
+food, arrangements were made to give them meals in the Embassy.
+
+The members of the Siamese Legation, who in appearance greatly
+resemble the Japanese, were often subjected to indignities, and
+for a long time did not dare move about freely in Berlin, or
+even leave their houses.
+
+The Japanese were marvels of courtesy. After I visited some of
+them at the civilian camp of Ruhleben, they wrote me a letter
+thanking me for the visit. Nearly every Japanese leaving Germany
+on his arrival in Switzerland wrote me a grateful letter.
+
+When I finally left Germany, as I stepped from the special train
+at Zurich, a Japanese woman, who had been imprisoned in Germany
+and whose husband I had visited in a prison, came forward to thank
+me. A Japanese man was waiting in the hotel office in Berne when
+I arrived there, for a similar purpose, and the next morning
+early the Japanese Minister called and left a beautiful clock for
+Mrs. Gerard as an expression of his gratitude for the attention
+shown to his countrymen. It was really a pleasure to be able to
+do something for these polite and charming people.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to a German prison
+camp. This was to the camp at Doeberitz situated about eight
+miles west of Berlin, a sort of military camp with permanent
+barracks. Some of these barracks were used for the confinement
+of such British civilians as the Germans had arrested in the
+first days of the war. There were only a few British among the
+prisoners, with a number of Russian and French. I was allowed
+to converse freely with the prisoners and found that they had
+no complaints. As the war went on, however, a number of British
+prisoners of war were taken by the Germans during the course of
+the great retreat of the British in Northern France. Then officers
+and privates began to come into Germany and were distributed
+in various camps. Finally, in the autumn of 1914, the British
+Government decided on interning a great number of Germans in
+Great Britain; and the German government immediately, and as
+a reprisal, interned all the British civilian men who, up to
+this time, had enjoyed comparative freedom in Berlin and other
+cities of the Empire. The British civilians were shut up in a
+race track about five miles from the centre of Berlin, called
+Ruhleben. This race track in peace times was used for contests
+of trotting horses and on it were the usual grandstands and brick
+stable buildings containing box stalls with hay lofts above,
+where the race horses were kept.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to the police presidency
+in Berlin where political prisoners, when arrested, were confined. A
+small number of British prisoners subject to especial investigation
+were there interned. This prison, which I often subsequently
+visited, was clean and well kept, and I never had any particular
+complaints from the prisoners confined there, except, of course,
+as the war progressed, concerning the inadequacy of the food.
+
+I had organised a special department immediately on the breaking
+out of the war to care for the interests of the British. At first
+Mr. Boylston Beal, a lawyer of Boston, assisted by Mr. Rivington
+Pyne of New York, was at the head of this department, of which
+later the Honourable John B. Jackson, formerly our Minister to
+the Balkan States, Greece and Cuba, took charge. He volunteered
+to give his assistance at the commencement of the war and I was
+glad of his help, especially as he had been twelve years secretary
+in the Berlin Embassy and, therefore, was well acquainted not
+only with Germany but with German official life and customs. Mr.
+Jackson was most ably assisted by Charles H. Russell, Jr., of
+New York, and Lithgow Osborne. Of course, others in the Embassy
+had much to do with this department.
+
+The first privates, prisoners of war, came to the camp of Doeberitz
+near Berlin. Early in the war Mr. Grew, our First Secretary, and
+Consul General Lay visited the camp for officers at Torgau. The
+question of the inspection of prisoners of the camps and the rights
+of Ambassadors charged with the interests of hostile powers was
+quite in the clouds. So many reports came to Germany about the
+bad treatment in England of German prisoners of war that I finally
+arranged to have Mr. Jackson visit them and report. This was arranged
+by my colleague, our Ambassador to Great Britain, and in the first
+winter Mr. Jackson made his trip there. His report of conditions
+there did much to allay the German belief as to the ill-treatment
+of their subjects who were prisoners in Great Britain and helped
+me greatly in bringing about better conditions in Germany. After
+vainly endeavouring to get the German government to agree to some
+definite plan for the inspection of the prisoners, after my notes
+to the Foreign Office had remained unanswered for a long period of
+time, and after sending a personal letter to von Jagow calling his
+attention to the fact that the delay was injuring German prisoners
+in other countries, I finally called on von Bethmann-Hollweg
+and told him that my notes concerning prisoners were sent by
+the Foreign Office to the military authorities: that, while I
+could talk with officials of the Foreign Office, I never came into
+contact with the people who really passed upon the notes sent by
+me, and who made the decisions as to the treatment of prisoners
+of war and inspection of their camps; and I begged the Chancellor
+to break down diplomatic precedent and allow me to speak with
+the military authorities who decided these questions. I said,
+"If I cannot get an answer to my proposition about prisoners, I
+will take a chair and sit in front of your palace in the street
+until I receive an answer."
+
+The result was a meeting in my office.
+
+I discussed the question involved with two representatives from
+the Foreign Office, two from the General Staff, two from the War
+Department and with Count Schwerin who commanded the civilian camp
+at the Ruhleben race track. In twenty minutes we managed to reach
+an agreement which I then and there drew up: the substance of
+which, as between Great Britain and Germany, was that the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Germany and the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Great Britain should have
+the right to visit the prison camps on giving reasonable notice,
+which was to be twenty-four hours where possible, and should have
+the right to converse with the prisoners, within sight but out
+of hearing, of the camp officials; that an endeavour should be
+made to adjust matters complained of with the camp authorities
+before bringing them to the notice of higher authorities; that
+ten representatives should be named by our Ambassador and that
+these should receive passes enabling them to visit the camps
+under the conditions above stated. This agreement was ratified
+by the British and German Governments and thereafter for a long
+time we worked under its provisions and in most questions dealt
+direct with the War Department.
+
+Of course, before this meeting I had managed to get permission
+to visit the camps of Ruhleben and Doeberitz near Berlin; and
+Mr. Michaelson, our consul at Cologne, and Mr. Jackson and others
+at the Embassy had been permitted to visit certain camps. But
+immediately preceding the meeting on the fourth of March and
+while matters were still being discussed we were compelled to
+a certain extent to suspend our visits.
+
+In the first days of the war it was undoubtedly and unfortunately
+true that prisoners of war taken by the Germans, both at the time
+of their capture and in transit to the prison camps, were often
+badly treated by the soldiers, guards or the civil population.
+
+The instances were too numerous, the evidence too overwhelming,
+to be denied. In the prison camps themselves, owing to the peculiar
+system of military government in Germany, the treatment of the
+prisoners varied greatly. As I have, I think, stated in another
+place, Germany is divided into army corps districts. Over each
+of these districts is, in time of war, a representative corps
+commander who is clothed with absolute power in that district,
+his orders superseding those of all civilian officials. These
+corps commanders do not report to the war department but are
+in a measure independent and very jealous of their rights. For
+instance, to show the difficulty of dealing with these corps
+commanders, after my arrangements concerning the inspection of
+prisoners of war had been ratified by both the Imperial and British
+governments, I went to Halle to inspect the place of detention
+for officers there. Halle is some hours from Berlin and when
+I had driven out to the camp, I was met by the commander who
+told me that I might visit the camp but that I could not speak
+to the prisoners out of hearing. I told him that our arrangement
+was otherwise, but, as he remained firm I returned to Berlin.
+I complained to the Foreign Office and was told there that the
+matter would be arranged and so I again, some days later, returned
+to Halle. My experience on the second trip was exactly the same
+as the first. I spoke to von Jagow who explained the situation to
+me, and advised me to visit first the corps commander at Magdeburg
+and try and arrange the matter with him. I did so and was finally
+permitted to visit this camp and to talk to the officers out of
+ear-shot.
+
+This camp of Halle was continued during the war, although not at
+all a fit place for the detention of officers, who were lodged in
+the old factory buildings surrounded by a sort of courtyard covered
+with cinders. This building was situated in the industrial part
+of the town of Halle. There was no opportunity for recreation
+or games, although several enterprising officers had tried to
+arrange a place where they could knock, a tennis ball against
+the wall.
+
+It was the policy of the Germans to put some prisoners of each
+nation in each camp. This was probably so that no claim could
+be made that the prisoners from one nation among the Allies were
+treated better or worse than the prisoners from another nation.
+
+In the beginning of the war the Germans were surprised by the great
+number of prisoners taken and had made no adequate preparations
+for their reception. Clothing and blankets were woefully wanting,
+so I immediately bought what I could in the way of underclothes
+and blankets at the large department stores of Berlin and the
+wholesalers and sent these to the camps where the British prisoners
+were confined. I also sent to the Doeberitz camp articles such
+as sticks for wounded men who were recovering, and crutches,
+and even eggs and other nourishing delicacies for the sick.
+
+At first the prisoners were not compelled to work to any extent,
+but at the time I left Germany the two million prisoners of war
+were materially assisting the carrying on of the agriculture
+and industries of the Empire.
+
+The League of Mercy of New York having telegraphed me in 1914,
+asking in what way funds could best be used in the war, I suggested
+in answer that funds for the prisoners of war were urgently needed.
+Many newspapers poked fun at me for this suggestion, and one bright
+editor said that if the Germans did not treat their prisoners
+properly they should be made to! Of course, unless this particular
+editor had sailed up the Spree in a canoe and bombarded the royal
+palace, I know of no other way of "making" the Germans do anything.
+The idea, however, of doing some work for the prisoners of war was
+taken up by the Young Men's Christian Association. Dr. John R.
+Mott was at the head of this work and was most ably and devotedly
+assisted by the Rev. Archibald C. Harte. I shall give an account
+of their splendid work in a chapter devoted to the charitable
+work of the war.
+
+At only one town in Germany was any interest in the fate of the
+prisoners of war evinced. This was, I am glad to say, in the
+quaint university town of Gottingen. I visited this camp with
+Mr. Harte, in April, 1915, to attend the opening of the first
+Y. M. C. A. camp building in Germany. The camp was commanded by
+Colonel Bogen, an officer strict in his discipline, but, as all
+the prisoners admitted, just in his dealings with them. There
+were, as I recall, about seven thousand prisoners in this camp,
+Russian, French, Belgian and British. It is a pity that the methods
+of Colonel Bogen and his arrangements for camp buildings, etc.,
+were not copied in other camps in Germany. Here, as I have said,
+the civil population took some interest in the fate of the
+unfortunate prisoners within their gates, led in this by several
+professors in the University. The most active of these professors
+was Professor Stange who, working with a French lawyer who had been
+captured near Arras while in the Red Cross, provided a library
+for the prisoners and otherwise helped them. Of course, these
+charitable acts of Professor Stange did not find favor with many
+of his fellow townsmen of Gottingen, and he was not surprised
+when he awoke one morning to find that during the night his house
+had been painted red, white and blue, the colours of France,
+England and America.
+
+I heard of so many instances of the annoyance of prisoners by
+the civil population that I was quite pleased one day to read
+a paragraph in the official newspaper, the _North_German
+_Gazette_, which ran somewhat as follows: "The following
+inhabitants of (naming a small town near the borders of Denmark),
+having been guilty of improper conduct towards prisoners of war,
+have been sentenced to the following terms of imprisonment and
+the following fines and their names are printed here in order
+that they may be held up to the contempt of all future generations
+of Germans." And then followed a list of names and terms of
+imprisonment and fines. I thought that this was splendid, that
+the German government had at last been aroused to the necessity
+of protecting their prisoners of war from the annoyances of the
+civil population, and I wrote to our consul in Kiel and asked him
+to investigate the case. From him I learned that some unfortunate
+prisoners passing through the town (in a part of Germany inhabited
+by Scandinavians) had made signs that they were suffering from
+hunger and thirst, that some of the kind-hearted people among
+the Scandinavian population had given them something to eat and
+drink and for this they were condemned to fines, to prison and
+to have their names held up to the contempt of Germans for all
+time.
+
+I do not know of anyone thing that can give a better idea of
+the official hate for the nations with which Germany was at war
+than this.
+
+The day after visiting the camp at Gottingen, I visited the
+officers' camp situated at the town of Hanover Munden. Here
+about eight hundred officers, of whom only thirteen were British,
+were confined in an old factory building situated on the bank of
+the river below the town. The Russian officers handed me some
+arrows tipped with nails which had been shot at them by the
+kind-hearted little town boys, and the British pointed out to me
+the filthy conditions of the camp. In this, as in unfortunately
+many other officer camps, the inclination seemed to be to treat the
+officers not as captured officers and gentlemen, but as convicts.
+I had quite a sharp talk with the commander of this camp before
+leaving and he afterwards took violent exception to the report
+which I made upon his camp. However, I am pleased to say that
+he reformed, as it were, and I was informed by my inspectors
+that he had finally made his camp one of the best in Germany.
+
+Much as I should have liked to, I could not spend much time myself
+in visiting the prison camps; many duties and frequent crises kept
+me in Berlin, but members of the Embassy were always travelling
+in this work of camp inspection.
+
+For some time my reports were published in parliamentary "White
+Papers," but in the end our government found that the publication
+of these reports irritated the Germans to such a degree that the
+British Government was requested not to publish them any more.
+Copies of the reports were always sent by me both to Washington
+and to London, and handed to the Berlin Foreign Office.
+
+[Illustration: A COVER OF THE MONTHLY ISSUED BY THE RUHLEBEN
+PRISONERS.]
+
+While Winston Churchill was at the head of the British Admiralty,
+it was stated that the German submarine prisoners would not be
+treated as ordinary prisoners of war; but would be put in a place
+by themselves on the ground that they were pirates and murderers,
+and not entitled to the treatment accorded in general to prisoners
+of war. Great indignation was excited by this in Germany; the
+German government immediately seized thirty-seven officers, picking
+those whom they supposed related to the most prominent families
+in Great Britain, and placed them in solitary confinement. A
+few were confined in this way in Cologne, but the majority were
+put in the ordinary jails of Magdeburg and Burg.
+
+As soon as I heard of this, accompanied by Mr. Charles H. Russell,
+Jr., of my staff, I went to Magdeburg, using my ordinary pass
+for the visiting of prisoners. The German authorities told me
+afterwards that if they had known I was going to make this visit
+they would not have permitted it, but on this occasion the corps
+commander system worked for me. Accompanied by an adjutant, in
+peace times a local lawyer from the corps commander's office in
+Magdeburg, and other officers, I visited these British officers
+in their cells in the common jail at Magdeburg. They were in
+absolutely solitary confinement, each in a small cell about eleven
+feet long and four feet wide. Some cells were a little larger,
+and the prisoners were allowed only one hour's exercise a day in
+the courtyard of the prison. The food given them was not bad, but
+the close confinement was very trying, especially to Lieutenant
+Goschen, son of the former Ambassador to Germany, who had been
+wounded and in the hospital at Douai. Among them I found an old
+acquaintance, Captain Robin Grey, who had been often in New York.
+The German authorities agreed to correct several minor matters of
+which the officers complained and then we went to the neighbouring
+town of Burg, where other officers were confined in the same manner
+and under similar conditions in the ordinary jail. After visiting
+these prisoners and obtaining for them from the authorities some
+modifications of the rules which had been established we visited
+the regular officers' camp at Burg.
+
+This was at that time what I should call a bad camp, crowded and
+with no space for recreation. Later, conditions were improved
+and more ground allowed to the prisoners for games, etc. At the
+time of my first visit I found that the commander, a polite but
+peppery officer, was in civil life a judge of the Supreme Court
+at Leipzig, the highest court in the Empire. As I had been a
+judge in the State of New York, we foregathered and adjourned
+for lunch with his staff to the hotel in Burg.
+
+After Churchill left the British Admiralty, his successor reversed
+his ruling and the submarine prisoners were placed in the ordinary
+confinement of prisoners of war. When the Germans were assured of
+this, the thirty-seven officers who had been in reprisal placed
+in solitary confinement were sent back to ordinary prison camps.
+In fact in most cases I managed to get the Germans to send them
+to what were called "good" camps.
+
+Lieutenant Goschen, however, became quite in and was taken to the
+hospital in Magdeburg. At the time of his capture, the Germans
+had told me, in answer to my inquiries, that he was suffering
+from a blow on the head with the butt end of a rifle, but an
+X-ray examination at Magdeburg showed that fragments of a bullet
+had penetrated his brain and that he was, therefore, hardly a
+fit subject to be chosen as one of the reprisal prisoners. I
+told von Jagow that I thought it in the first place a violation
+of all diplomatic courtesy to pick out the son of the former
+Ambassador to Germany as a subject for reprisals and secondly
+that, in picking him, they had taken a wounded man; that the
+fact that they did not know that he had fragments of a bullet in
+his brain made the situation even worse because that ignorance
+was the result of the want of a proper examination in the German
+hospitals; and I insisted that, because of this manifestly unfair
+treatment which had undoubtedly caused the very serious condition
+of Lieutenant Goschen, he should be returned to England in the
+exchange of those who were badly wounded. I am pleased to say
+that von Jagow saw my point of view and finally secured permission
+for Lieutenant Goschen to leave for England.
+
+Dr. Ohnesorg, one of our assistant Naval Attaches, went with
+him to England on account of the seriousness of his condition,
+and I was very glad to hear from his father that he had arrived
+safely in London.
+
+Undoubtedly the worst camp which I visited in Germany was that
+of Wittenberg. Wittenberg is the ancient town where Luther lived
+and nailed his theses to the church door. The camp is situated
+just outside the city in a very unattractive spot next to the
+railway. An outbreak of typhus fever prevented us from visiting
+the camp, although Mr. Jackson conversed with some of the prisoners
+from outside the barrier of barbed wire. When the typhus was
+finally driven out, Mr. Lithgow Osborne visited the camp and his
+report of conditions there was such that I visited it myself,
+in the meantime holding up his report until I had verified it.
+
+With Mr. Charles H. Russell, Jr., I visited the camp. Typhus
+fever seems to be continually present in Russia. It is carried by
+the body louse and it is transmitted from one person to another.
+Russian soldiers seem to carry this disease with them without
+apparently suffering much from it themselves. The Russian soldiers
+arriving at Wittenberg were not properly disinfected and, in
+consequence, typhus fever broke out in camp. Several British
+medical officers were there with their prisoners, because, by the
+provisions of the Hague conventions, captured medical officers
+may be kept with the troops of their nation, if prisoners have
+need of their services. These medical officers protested with
+the camp commander against the herding together of the French
+and British prisoners with the Russians, who, as I have said,
+were suffering from typhus fever. But the camp commander said,
+"You will have to know your Allies;" and kept all of his prisoners
+together, and thus as surely condemned to death a number of French
+and British prisoners of war as though he had stood them against
+the wall and ordered them shot by a firing squad. Conditions in
+the camp during the period of this epidemic were frightful. The
+camp was practically deserted by the Germans and I understand
+that the German doctor did not make as many visits to the camp
+as the situation required.
+
+At the time I visited the camp the typhus epidemic, of course,
+had been stamped out. The Germans employed a large number of
+police dogs in this camp and these dogs not only were used in
+watching the outside of the camp in order to prevent the escape
+of prisoners but also were used within the camp. Many complaints
+were made to me by prisoners concerning these dogs, stating that
+men had been bitten by them. It seemed undoubtedly true that the
+prisoners there had been knocked about and beaten in a terrible
+manner by their guards, and one guard went so far as to strike one
+of the British medical officers. There were about thirty-seven
+civilian prisoners in the camp who had been there all through
+the typhus epidemic. I secured the removal of these civilian
+prisoners to the general civilian camp at Ruhleben, and the
+conditions at Wittenberg may be judged by the fact that when
+it was announced to these civilians that they were to be taken
+from Wittenberg to another camp one of them was so excited by
+the news of release that he fell dead upon the spot.
+
+In talking over conditions at Wittenberg with von Jagow I said,
+"Suppose I go back to Wittenberg and shoot some of these dogs,
+what can you do to me?" Soon after the dogs disappeared from
+the camp.
+
+The food in all these camps for civilians and for private soldiers
+was about the same. It consisted of an allowance of bread of
+the same weight as that given the civilian population. This was
+given out in the morning with a cup of something called coffee,
+but which in reality was an extract of acorns or something of the
+kind without milk or sugar; in the middle of the day, a bowl of
+thick soup in which the quantity of meat was gradually diminished
+as war went on, as well as the amount of potatoes for which at
+a later period turnips and carrots were, to a large extent,
+substituted; and in the evening in good camps there was some sort
+of thick soup given out or an apple, or an almost infinitesimal
+piece of cheese or sausage.
+
+In the war department at Berlin there was a Prisoners of War
+Department in charge of Colonel, later General, Friedrich. This
+department, however, did not seem to be in a position to issue
+orders to the corps commanders commanding the army corps districts
+of Germany, who had absolute control of the prison camps within
+their districts. Colonel Friedrich, however, and his assistants
+endeavoured to standardise the treatment of prisoners of war in
+the different corps districts, and were able to exert a certain
+amount of pressure on the corps commanders. They determined on
+the general reprisals to be taken in connection with prisoners
+of war. For instance, when some of the Germans, who had been
+taken prisoners by the British and who were in England, were
+sent to work in the harbour of Havre, the Germans retaliated
+by sending about four times the number of British prisoners to
+work at Libau in the part of Russia then occupied by the Germans.
+But while the British permitted our Embassy in Paris to inspect
+the prisoners of war at Havre, the Germans for months refused
+to allow me permission to send anyone to inspect those British
+prisoners at Libau.
+
+Cases came to my attention where individual corps commanders
+on their own initiative directed punitive measures against the
+prisoners of war in their districts, on account of the rumours
+of the bad treatment of German citizens in England. Thus the
+commander in the district where the camp of Doeberitz was situated
+issued an order directing reprisals against prisoners under his
+command on account of what he claimed to be the bad treatment
+of German women in England. It required constant vigilance to
+seek out instances of this kind and cause them to be remedied.
+
+I did not find the Germans at all efficient in the handling of
+prisoners of war. The authority was so divided that it was hard
+to find who was responsible for any given bad conditions. For
+instance, for a long period of time I contended with the German
+authorities for better living conditions at the civilian camp of
+Ruhleben. I was promised time and again by Colonel Friedrich,
+by the camp commander and by the Foreign
+
+Office that these conditions would be remedied. In that camp men
+of education, men in delicate health, were compelled to sleep
+and live six in a box stall or so closely that the beds touched
+each other in hay-lofts, the outside walls of which were only
+four feet high.
+
+I finally almost in despair wrote identical personal letters,
+after having exhausted all ordinary diplomatic steps, to General
+von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of Brandenburg, to the commander
+of the corps district in which the Ruhleben camp was situated,
+and to the Minister of War: and the only result was that each
+of the officers addressed claimed that he had been personally
+insulted by me because I had presumed to call his attention to
+the inhuman conditions under which the prisoners were compelled
+to live in the Ruhleben camp.
+
+The commander of this civilian camp of Ruhleben was a very handsome
+old gentleman, named Count Schwerin. His second in command for
+a long time was a Baron Taube. Both of these officers had been
+long retired from the army and were given these prison commands
+at the commencement of the war. Both of them were naturally
+kind-hearted but curiously sensitive and not always of even temper.
+On the whole I think that they sympathised with the prisoners
+and did their best to obtain a bettering of the conditions of
+their confinement. The prisoners organised themselves in their
+various barracks, each barrack having a captain of the barrack,
+the captains electing one of their number as a camp captain or
+_Obmann_.
+
+The man who finally appeared as head man of the camp was an
+ex-cinematograph proprietor, named Powell. In my mind he, assisted
+by Beaumont and other captains, conducted the affairs of the camp
+as well as possible, given the difficulty of dealing with the
+prisoners on one hand and the prison authorities on the other
+hand. Naturally he was always subject to opposition from many
+prisoners, among whom those of aristocratic tendencies objected
+to being under the control of one not of the highest caste in
+Great Britain; and there were others who either envied him his
+authority or desired his place. The camp authorities allowed
+Powell to visit the Embassy at least once a week and in that
+way I was enabled, to keep in direct touch with the camp. At
+two periods during my stay in Berlin I spent enough days at the
+camp to enable every prisoner who had a complaint of any kind
+to present it personally to me.
+
+The organisation of this camp was quite extraordinary. I found
+it impossible to get British prisoners to perform the ordinary
+work of cleaning up the camp, and so forth, always expected of
+prisoners themselves; and so, with the funds furnished me from
+the British Government, the camp captain was compelled to pay a
+number of the poorer prisoners to perform this work. Secretaries
+Ruddock and Kirk of our Embassy undertook the uninteresting and
+arduous work of superintending these payments as well as of our
+other financial affairs. This work was most trying and they deserve
+great credit for their self-denial. By arrangement with the British
+Government, I was also enabled to pay the poorer prisoners an
+allowance of five marks a week, thus permitting them to buy little
+luxuries and necessities and extra food at the camp canteen which
+was early established in the camp. I also furnished the capital to
+the camp canteen, enabling it to make its purchases and carry on
+its business. In this establishment everything could be purchased
+which was purchasable in Germany, and for months after the
+commencement of the war articles of luxury were sold at a profit
+and articles of food sold at a loss for the benefit of those
+who required an addition to the camp diet. There was a street
+in the camp of little barracks or booths which the prisoners
+christened Bond Street, and where many stores were in operation
+such as a tailor shop, shoe-maker's, watch-maker's, etc. Acting
+with Powell, I succeeded in getting the German authorities to
+turn over the kitchens to the prisoners. Four of the prisoners
+who did most excellent self-denying work in these kitchens deserve
+to be specially mentioned. They were Ernest L. Pyke, Herbert.
+Kasmer, Richard H. Carrad and George Fergusson.
+
+The men in this camp subsisted to a great extent upon the packages
+of food sent to them from England. Credit must be given to the
+German authorities for the fairly prompt and efficient delivery
+of the packages of food sent from England, Denmark and Switzerland
+to prisoners of war in all camps.
+
+In Ruhleben the educated prisoners volunteered to teach the ignorant:
+two hundred and ninety-seven different educational courses were
+offered to those who desired to improve their minds. A splendid
+orchestra was organised, a dramatic society which gave plays in
+French and one which gave plays in English and another one which
+gave operas. On New Year's day, 1916, I attended at Ruhleben do
+really wonderful performance of the pantomime of "Cinderella";
+and, in January, 1917, a performance of "The Mikado" in a theatre
+under one of the grand stands. In these productions, of course,
+the female parts were taken by young men and the scenery, costumes
+and accessories were all made by the prisoners. There was a camp
+library of over five thousand volumes sent over by the British
+Government and a reading and meeting hall, erected by the American
+Y. M. C. A. There was even a system of postal service with special
+stamps so that a prisoner in one barrack could write to a friend in
+another and have a letter delivered by the camp postal authorities.
+The German authorities had not hired the entire race track from
+the Race Track Association so that I made a special contract
+with the race track owners and hired from them the in-field and
+other portions not taken over by German authorities. Here the
+prisoners had tennis courts and played hockey, foot-ball and
+cricket and held athletic games. Expert dentists in the camp
+took care of the poorer prisoners as did an oculist hired by me
+with British funds, and glasses were given them from the same
+funds.
+
+The prisoners who needed a little better nourishment than that
+afforded by the camp diet and their parcels from England, could
+obtain cards giving them the right to eat in the Casino or camp
+official restaurant where they were allowed a certain indicated
+amount of wine or beer with their meals, and finally arrangements
+were arrived at by which the German guards left the camp, simply
+guarding it from the outside; and the policing was taken over
+by the camp police department, under the charge of the prison
+camp commander and committee. The worst features, of course,
+were the food and housing. Human nature seems always to be the
+same. Establishment of clubs seems inherent to the Anglo-Saxon
+nature. Ten or more persons would combine together and erect a
+sort of wooden shed against the brick walls of a barrack, hire
+some poorer person to put on a white jacket and be addressed as
+"steward," put in the shed a few deck chairs and a table and
+enjoy the sensation of exclusiveness and club life thereby given.
+
+Owing to the failure of Germany and Great Britain to come to an
+agreement for a long time as to the release of captured crews
+of ships, there were in Ruhleben men as old as seventy-five years
+and boys as young as fifteen. There were in all between fifty and
+sixty of these ships' boys. They lived in a barrack by themselves
+and under the supervision of a ship's officer who volunteered to
+look after them as sort of a monitor. They were taught navigation
+by the older prisoners and I imagine were rather benefited by their
+stay in the camp. I finally made arrangements by which these boys
+were released from England and Germany. With the exception of
+the officers and crews of the ships, prisoners were not interned
+who were over fifty-five.
+
+The British Government was generous in the allowance of money for
+Ruhleben prisoners. The amount allowed by the German Government to
+the camp commanders for feeding the prisoners was extremely small,
+only sixty pfennigs a day. At first many of the camp commanders
+made contracts with caterers for the feeding of the prisoners
+and as the caterers' profit had to come out of this very small
+sum the amount of food which the remainder purchased for the
+prisoners was small indeed. As the war went on the prisoners'
+department of the war office tried to induce the camp commanders to
+abandon the contractors' system and purchase supplies themselves.
+A sort of convention of camp commanders was held in Berlin which I
+attended. Lectures were there given on food and its purchase, and
+methods of disinfecting prisoners, on providing against typhus,
+and on housing and other subjects. A daily lunch was served,
+supposed to be composed of the exact rations given at the prison
+camps.
+
+The schedules of food, etc., made out by the camp commanders
+and furnished to foreign correspondents were often not followed
+in practice. I know on one occasion when I was at the camp at
+Doeberitz, the camp commander gave me his schedule of food for
+the week. This provided that soup with pieces of meat was to be
+given on the day of my visit, but on visiting the camp kitchen I
+found that the contractor was serving fish instead of meat. Some
+of the camp commanders not only treated their prisoners kindly but
+introduced manufactures of furniture, etc., to help the prisoners
+to pass their time. The camps of Krossen and Gottingen deserve
+special mention. At Giessen, the camp commander had permitted
+the erection of a barrack in which certain prisoners who were
+electrical experts gave lessons in electrical fitting, etc.,
+to their fellow prisoners. There was also a studio in this camp
+where prisoners with artistic talent were furnished with paints
+and allowed to work. As more and more people were called to the
+front in Germany, greater use was made of the prisoners, and in
+the summer of 1916 practically all the prisoners were compelled
+to work outside of the camps. They were paid a small extra sum
+for this, a few cents a day, and as a rule were benefited by the
+change of scene and occupation. The Russians especially became
+very useful to the Germans as agricultural laborers.
+
+Professor Alonzo E. Taylor of the University of Pennsylvania,
+a food expert, and Dr. D. J. McCarthy, also of Philadelphia,
+joined my staff in 1916 and proved most efficient and fearless
+inspectors of prison camps. Dr. Taylor could use the terms calories,
+proteins, etc., as readily as German experts and at a greater
+rate of speed. His report showing that the official diet of the
+prisoners in Ruhleben was a starvation diet incensed the German
+authorities to such fury that they forbade him to revisit Ruhleben.
+Professor Buckhaus, the German expert, agreed with him in some of
+his findings. I do not know what will happen to the Professor,
+who seemed willing to do his best for the prisoners. He wrote a
+booklet on the prison camps which he asked permission to dedicate
+to me, but the War Office, which published the book, refused
+to allow him to make this dedication. It was a real pleasure
+to see the way in which Dr. Taylor carried on his work of food
+inspection; and his work, as well as that of the other doctors
+sent from America to join my staff, Drs. Furbush, McCarthy, Roler,
+Harns, Webster and Luginbuhl, did much to better camp conditions.
+
+Dr. Caldwell, the sanitary expert, known for his great work in
+Serbia, now I believe head of the hospital at Pittsburgh, reported
+in regard to the prison diet: "While of good quality and perhaps
+sufficient in quantity by weight, it is lacking in the essential
+elements which contribute to the making of a well-balanced and
+satisfactory diet. It is lacking particularly in fat and protein
+content which is especially desirable during the colder months
+of the year. There is considerable doubt whether this diet alone
+without being supplemented by the articles of food received by
+the prisoners from their homes would in any way be sufficient
+to maintain the prisoners in health and strength."
+
+Dr. Caldwell also visited Wittenberg and found the commander by
+temperament, and so on, unfitted for such a position.
+
+The Germans, as Dr. Taylor has pointed out, tried to feed prisoners
+on schedule like horses. There is, however, a nervous discrimination
+in eating so far as man is concerned; and a diet, scientifically
+fitted to keep him alive, may fail because of its mere monotony.
+
+Think of living as the prisoners of war in Germany have for years,
+without ever having anything (except black bread) which cannot
+be eaten with a spoon.
+
+Officer prisoners were, after matters had settled down and after
+several bitter contests which I had with the German authorities,
+fairly well treated. There was, as in the case of the camps for
+the privates, a great difference between camps, and a great
+difference between camp commanders. Mr. Jackson did most of the
+visiting of the officers' camps. In many camps the officers were
+allowed a tennis court and other amusements, as well as light
+wine or beer at meals, but the length of the war had a bad effect
+on the mental condition of many of the officers.
+
+A great step forward was made when arrangements were entered
+into between Germany and Great Britain whereby wounded and sick
+officers and men, when passed by the Swiss Commission which visited
+both countries, were sent to Switzerland; sent still as prisoners
+of war, subject to return to Germany or England respectively, but
+the opportunity afforded by change of food and scene, as well as
+reunion of families, saved many a life. By arrangements between
+the two countries, also, the severely wounded prisoners were set
+free. I believe that this exchange of the heavily wounded between
+the Germans and the Russians was the factor which prevented the
+entrance of Sweden into the war. These wounded men traversed the
+whole length of Sweden in the railway, and the spectacle afforded
+to the Swedish population of these poor stumps of humanity, victims
+of war, has quite effectually kept the Swedish population from
+an attack of unnecessary war fever.
+
+Officers and men who tried to escape were not very severely punished
+in Germany unless they had broken or stolen something in their
+attempt. Officers were usually subjected to a jail confinement
+for a period and then often sent to a sort of punitive camp.
+Such a camp was situated in one of the Ring forts surrounding
+the city of Kustrin which I visited in September, 1916. There
+the officers had no opportunity for exercise except in a very
+small courtyard or on the roof, which was covered with grass, of
+the building in which they were confined. I arranged, however,
+on my visit for the construction of a tennis court outside. The
+British officers in Germany practically subsisted on their parcels
+received from home, and during the end of my stay a much better
+tea could be had with the prison officers than with the camp
+commander. The prisoners had real tea and marmalade and white
+bread to offer, luxuries which had long since disappeared from all
+German tables. On the whole, the quarters given to the officers'
+prisons in Germany were not satisfactory, and were not of the
+kind that should have been offered to officer prisoners of war.
+
+At the time I left Germany there were nearly two million prisoners
+of war in the Empire, of whom about ten thousand were Russian
+officers, nine thousand French officers and about one thousand
+British officers.
+
+As a rule our inspectors found the hospitals, where the prisoners
+of war were, in as good condition as could be expected.
+
+I think this was largely due to the fact that so many doctors
+in Germany are Jews. The people who are of the Jewish race are
+people of gentle instincts. In these hospitals a better diet
+was given to the prisoners. There were, of course, in addition
+to the regular hospitals, hospitals where the severely wounded
+prisoners were sent. Almost uniformly these hospitals were clean
+and the prisoners were well taken care of.
+
+[Illustration: IN RUHLEBEN CAMP. A SPECIMEN BOTH OF THE
+PRISONER-ARTIST'S WORK AND OF THE TYPES ABOUT HIM.]
+
+At Ruhleben there was a hospital which in spite of many
+representations was never in proper shape. In addition, there
+was in the camp a special barrack established by the prisoners
+themselves for the care of those who were so ill or so weak as
+to require special attention but who were not ill enough to be
+sent to the hospital. This barrack was for a long time in charge
+of a devoted gentleman, a prisoner, whose name I have unfortunately
+forgotten, but whose self-sacrifice deserves special mention.
+
+I arranged with the camp authorities and the German authorities
+for permission to enter into a contract with Dr. Weiler. Under
+this contract Dr. Weiler, who had a sanatorium in the West of
+Berlin, received patients from Ruhleben. Those who were able paid
+for themselves, the poorer ones being paid for by the British
+Government. This sanatorium, occupied several villas. I had many
+disputes with Dr. Weiler, but finally managed to get this sanatorium
+in such condition that the prisoners who resided there were fairly
+well taken care of.
+
+An arrangement was made between Great Britain and Germany by
+which civilians unfit for military service were sent to their
+respective countries, and just before I left I effected an
+arrangement by which all civilians over forty-five years old,
+with the exception of twenty who might be held by each country
+for military reasons, were to be released. I do not know whether
+this arrangement was actually carried out in full. With the lapse
+of time the mental condition of the older prisoners in Ruhleben
+had become quite alarming. Soldier prisoners, when they enter the
+army, are always in good physical condition and enter with the
+expectation of either being killed or wounded or taken prisoner,
+and have made their arrangements accordingly. But these unfortunate
+civilian prisoners were often men in delicate health, and all
+were in a constant state of great mental anxiety as to the fate
+of their business and their enterprises and their families. In
+1916, not only Mr. Grafton Minot, who for some time had devoted
+himself exclusively to the Ruhleben prisoners, but also Mr. Ellis
+Dresel, a distinguished lawyer of Boston, who had joined the
+Embassy as a volunteer, took up the work. Mr. Dresel visited
+Ruhleben almost daily and by listening to the stories and complaints
+of the prisoners materially helped their mental condition.
+
+The Germans collected all the soldier prisoners of Irish nationality
+in one camp at Limburg not far from Frankfurt a. M. These efforts
+were made to induce them to join the German army. The men were
+well treated and were often visited by Sir Roger Casement who,
+working with the German authorities, tried to get these Irishmen
+to desert their flag and join the Germans. A few weaklings were
+persuaded by Sir Roger who finally discontinued his visits, after
+obtaining about thirty recruits, because the remaining Irishmen
+chased him out of the camp.
+
+I received information of the shooting of one prisoner, and although
+the camp authorities had told Dr. McCarthy that the investigation
+had been closed and the guard who did the shooting exonerated,
+nevertheless, when I visited the camp in order to investigate, I
+was told that I could not do so because the matter of the shooting
+was still under investigation. Nor was I allowed to speak to those
+prisoners who had been witnesses at the time of the shooting.
+I afterwards learned that another Irishman had been shot by a
+guard on the day before my visit, and the same obstacles to my
+investigation were drawn about this case.
+
+The Irishmen did not bear confinement well, and at the time of
+my visit among them many of them were suffering from tuberculosis
+in the camp hospital. They seemed also peculiarly subject to
+mental breakdowns. Two devoted Catholic priests, Father Crotty
+and a Brother Warren from a religious house in Belgium, were
+doing wonderful work among these prisoners.
+
+The sending out of the prisoners of war to work throughout Germany
+has had one very evil effect. It has made it to the financial
+advantage of certain farmers and manufacturers to have the war
+continued. The Prussian land owners or Junkers obtain four or
+five times as much for their agricultural products as they did
+before the war and have the work on their farms performed by
+prisoners of war to whom they are required to pay only six cents
+a day. When the _Tageblatt_ called attention to this it was
+suppressed for several days.
+
+At many of these so-called working camps our inspectors were
+refused admission on the ground that they might learn trade or
+war secrets. They succeeded, however, in having the men sent
+outside in order that they might inspect them and hear their
+complaints. There were in Germany about one hundred central camps
+and perhaps ten thousand or more so-called working camps, in
+summer time, throughout the country. Some of the British prisoners
+were put to work on the sewage farm of Berlin but we succeeded
+in getting them sent back to their parent camp.
+
+The prisoners of war were often accused of various breaches of
+discipline and crimes. Members of the Embassy would attend these
+trials, and we endeavoured to see that the prisoners were properly
+represented. But the Germans often refused us an opportunity
+to see the prisoners before their trial, or even before their
+execution. The case of Captain Fryatt is in point.
+
+Captain Fryatt who commanded a British merchant ship was captured
+and taken to the civilian camp at Ruhleben. In searching him the
+Germans claimed that he wore a watch presented to him for an
+attempt to ram a German submarine. They, therefore, took Fryatt
+from the Ruhleben camp and sent him to Bruges for trial. When I
+heard of this I immediately sent two formal notes to the German
+Foreign Office demanding the right to see Fryatt and hire counsel
+to represent him, inquiring what sort of counsel would be permitted
+to attend the trial and asking for postponement of the trial
+until these matters could be arranged. The German Foreign Office
+had informed me that they had backed up these requests and I
+believe them, but the answer of the German admiralty to my notes
+was to cause the trial to proceed the morning after the day on
+which my notes were delivered and to shoot Fryatt before noon
+of the same day.
+
+As to the evidence regarding the watch, the British Foreign Office
+learned that, when captured, Captain Fryatt had neither a watch
+nor any letter to indicate that he had tried to ram a submarine!
+
+This cruel and high-handed outrage caused great indignation in
+England, and even in certain circles in Germany; and the manner
+in which my request was treated was certainly a direct insult
+to the country which I represented. In conversation with me,
+Zimmermann and the Chancellor and von Jagow all expressed the
+greatest regret over this incident, which shows how little control
+the civilian branch of the government has over the military in
+time of war. Later on, when similar charges were made against
+another British sea captain, the Foreign Office, I think through
+the influence of the Emperor, was able to prevent a recurrence
+of the Fryatt outrage.
+
+As I have said, many of the camp commanders in Germany were men,
+excellent and efficient and kind hearted, who did what they could
+for the prisoners. It is a pity that these men should bear the
+odium which attaches to Germany because of the general bad treatment
+of prisoners of war in the first days of the war, and because
+certain commanders of prison camps were not fitted for their
+positions.
+
+The commander at the camp at Wittenberg was replaced, but the
+Germans have never acknowledged that bad conditions had existed
+in that camp. Shortly before we left Germany the war department
+seemed to gain more control of the prisoners of war situation,
+and on our representations at least one camp commander was
+permanently relieved. If examples had been made early in the
+war of the camp commanders who were not fit for their places
+and of those who had in any way mishandled prisoners of war, the
+German people as a whole would not have had to bear the burden
+of this odium. The many prisoners will return to their homes
+with a deep and bitter hatred of all things German.
+
+The British Government took a great interest in the British prisoners
+in Germany. Nothing was omitted and every suggestion made by me
+was immediately acted on; while many most valuable hints were
+given me from London as to prisoners' affairs. Their Majesties,
+the King and Queen, showed a deep personal concern in the welfare
+of the unfortunate British in German hands; and this concern
+never flagged during the period of my stay in Berlin. Lord Robert
+Cecil and Lord Newton were continually working for the benefit
+of British prisoners.
+
+At a time when the British prisoners were without proper clothing,
+the British Government sent me uniforms, overcoats, etc., and I
+hired a warehouse in Berlin as a distributing point; but, after
+some months, the German authorities refused to allow me to continue
+this method of distribution on the ground that it was the duty
+of Germany to provide the prisoners with clothes. But Germany
+was not performing this duty and the British prisoners had to
+suffer because of this German official woodenheadedness.
+
+In the spring of 1916, quite characteristically, the Germans
+broke their "treaty" concerning visits to prisoners, and refused
+to permit us to speak to prisoners out of hearing. Von Jagow
+told me that this was because of the trouble made among Russian
+prisoners by the visits of Madam Sazonoff, but this had nothing
+to do with the arrangement between Great Britain and Germany.
+
+I think that the Germans suspected that I had learned from fellow
+prisoners of the cruel and unnecessary shooting of two Irish
+prisoners at Limburg. It was not from prisoners, however, that
+I obtained this information. but from Germans who wrote to me.
+
+In addition to the English and Japanese, I had the protection
+of the Serbian and Roumanian subjects and the protection of the
+interests of a very small country, the Republic of San Marino.
+Soon after the Serbians and Roumanians appeared in the prison
+camps of Germany we made reports on the condition and treatment
+of these prisoners, as well as reports concerning the British.
+
+I was able to converse with some Serbians, in the first days
+of the war, in their native tongue, which, curiously enough,
+was Spanish. Immediately after the persecution of the Jews in
+Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella and other monarchs, a number of
+Spanish Jews emigrated to Serbia where they have remained ever
+since, keeping their old customs and speaking the old Spanish
+of the time of Cervantes.
+
+The German authorities, in the most petty manner, often concealed
+from me the presence of British prisoners, especially civilians,
+in prison camps. For a long time I was not informed of the presence
+of British civilians in Sennelager and it was only by paying
+a surprise visit by motor to the camp at Brandenburg that I
+discovered a few British, the crew of a trawler, there. It was
+on information contained in an anonymous letter, evidently from
+the wife of some German officer, that I visited Brandenburg where
+the crew of this trawler, deprived of money, were without any of
+the little comforts or packages that mitigate life in a German
+prison camp.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC
+
+At the commencement of the war for some days I was cut off from
+communication with the United States; but we soon established a
+chain of communication, at first through Italy and later by way
+of Denmark. At all times cables from Washington to Berlin, or
+_vice_versa_, took, on the average, two days in transmission.
+
+After the fall of Liege, von Jagow sent for me and asked me if
+I would transmit through the American Legation a proposition
+offering Belgium peace and indemnity if no further opposition
+were made to the passage of German troops through Belgium. As the
+proposition was a proposition for peace, I took the responsibility
+of forwarding it and sent the note of the German Government to
+our Minister at the Hague for transmission to our Minister in
+Belgium.
+
+Dr. Van Dyke, our Minister at the Hague, refused to have anything
+to do with the transmission of this proposition and turned the
+German note over to the Holland Minister for Foreign Affairs,
+and through this channel the proposition reached the Belgian
+Government.
+
+The State Department cabled me a message from the President to
+the Emperor which stated that the United States stood ready at
+any time to mediate between the warring powers, and directed
+me to present this proposition direct to the Emperor.
+
+I, therefore, asked for an audience with the Emperor and received
+word from the chief Court Marshal that the Emperor would receive
+me at the palace in Berlin on the morning of August tenth. I
+drove in a motor into the courtyard of the palace and was there
+escorted to the door which opened on a flight of steps leading
+to a little garden about fifty yards square, directly on the
+embankment of the River Spree, which flows past the Royal Palace.
+As I went down the steps, the Empress and her only daughter,
+the Duchess of Brunswick, came up. Both stopped and shook hands
+with me, speaking a few words. I found the Emperor seated at a
+green iron table under a large canvas garden umbrella. Telegraph
+forms were scattered on the table in front of him and basking in
+the gravel were two small dachshunds. I explained to the Emperor
+the object of my visit and we had a general conversation about
+the war and the state of affairs. The Emperor took some of the
+large telegraph blanks and wrote out in pencil his reply to the
+President's offer, This reply, of course, I cabled immediately
+to the State Department.
+
+  _For_the_President_of_the_
+      _United_States_personally:_
+
+                                                     10/VIII 14.
+
+  1. H. R. H. Prince Henry was received by his Majesty King George
+  V in London, who empowered him to transmit to me verbally, that
+  England would remain neutral if war broke out on the Continent
+  involving Germany and France, Austria and Russia. This message
+  was telegraphed to me by my brother from London after his
+  conversation with H. M. the King, and repeated verbally on the
+  twenty-ninth of July.
+
+  2. My Ambassador in London transmitted a message from Sir E.
+  Grey to Berlin saying that only in case France was likely to
+  be crushed England would interfere.
+
+  3. On the thirtieth my Ambassador in London reported that Sir
+  Edward Grey in course of a "private" conversation told him that
+  if the conflict remained localized between _Russia_--not
+  Serbia--and _Austria_, England would not move, but if we
+  "mixed" in the fray she would take quick decisions and grave
+  measures; i. e., if I left my ally Austria in the lurch to
+  fight alone England would not touch me.
+
+  4. This communication being directly counter to the King's
+  message to me, I telegraphed to H. M. on the twenty-ninth or
+  thirtieth, thanking him for kind messages through my brother
+  and begging him to use all his power to keep France and
+  Russia--his Allies--from making any war-like preparations
+  calculated to disturb my work of mediation, stating that I
+  was in constant communication with H. M. the Czar. In the
+  evening the King kindly answered that he had ordered his
+  Government to use every possible influence with his Allies
+  to refrain from taking any provocative military measures. At
+  the same time H. M. asked me if I would transmit to Vienna
+  the British proposal that Austria was to take Belgrade and a
+  few other Serbian towns and a strip of country as a "main-mise"
+  to make sure that the Serbian promises on paper should be
+  fulfilled in reality. This proposal was in the same moment
+  telegraphed to me from Vienna for London, quite in conjunction
+  with the British proposal; besides, I had telegraphed to H. M.
+  the Czar the same as an idea of mine, before I received the two
+  communications from Vienna and London, as both were of the same
+  opinion.
+
+  5. I immediately transmitted the telegrams _vice_versa_ to
+  Vienna and London. I felt that I was able to tide the question
+  over and was happy at the peaceful outlook.
+
+  6. While I was preparing a note to H. M. the Czar the next
+  morning, to inform him that Vienna, London and Berlin were agreed
+  about the treatment of affairs, I received the telephones from
+  H. E. the Chancellor that in the night before the Czar had given
+  the order to mobilize the whole of the Russian army, which was,
+  of course, also meant against Germany; whereas up till then the
+  southern armies had been mobilized against Austria.
+
+  7. In a telegram from London my Ambassador informed me he
+  understood the British Government would guarantee neutrality
+  of France and wished to know whether Germany would refrain from
+  attack. I telegraphed to H. M. the King personally that
+  mobilization being already carried out could not be stopped, but
+  if H. M. could guarantee with his armed forces the neutrality of
+  France I would refrain _from_attacking_her_, _leave_her_alone_
+  and employ my troops elsewhere. H. M. answered that he thought my
+  offer was based on a misunderstanding; and, as far as I can make
+  out, Sir E. Grey never took my offer into serious consideration.
+  He never answered it. Instead, he declared England had to defend
+  Belgian neutrality, which had to be violated by Germany on
+  strategical grounds, news having been received that France was
+  already preparing to enter Belgium, and the King of Belgians
+  having refused my petition for a free passage under guarantee
+  of his country's freedom. I am most grateful for the President's
+  message.
+
+                                                  WILLIAM, H. R.
+
+When the German Emperor in my presence indited his letter to
+President Wilson of August tenth, 1914, he asked that I cable
+it immediately to the State Department and that I simultaneously
+give it to the press. As I have already stated, I cabled the
+document immediately to the State Department at Washington, but
+I withheld it from publication.
+
+My interview with the Emperor was in the morning. That afternoon
+a man holding a high position in Germany sent for me. I do not
+give his name because I do not wish to involve him in any way
+with the Emperor, so I shall not even indicate whether he is a
+royalty or an official. He said:
+
+"You had an interview today with the Emperor. What happened?"
+
+I told of the message given me for the President which was intended
+for publication by the Emperor. He said:
+
+"I think you ought to show that message to me; you know the Emperor
+is a constitutional Emperor and there was once a great row about
+such a message."
+
+I showed him the message, and when he had read it he said: "I
+think it would be inadvisable for us to have this message published,
+and in the interest of good feeling between Germany and America.
+If you cable it ask that publication be withheld."
+
+I complied with his request and it is characteristic of the
+President's desire to preserve good relations that publication
+was withheld. Now, when the two countries are at war; when the
+whole world, and especially our own country, has an interest in
+knowing how this great calamity of universal war came to the
+earth, the time has come when this message should be given out
+and I have published it by permission.
+
+This most interesting document in the first place clears up one
+issue never really obscure in the eyes of the world--the deliberate
+violation of the neutrality of Belgium, whose territory "had to
+be violated by Germany on strategical grounds." The very weak
+excuse is added that "news had been received that France was
+already preparing to enter Belgium,"--not even a pretense that
+there had ever been any actual violation of Belgium's frontier
+by the French prior to the German invasion of that unfortunate
+country. Of course the second excuse that the King of the Belgians
+had refused entrance to the Emperor's troops under guarantee of
+his country's freedom is even weaker than the first. It would
+indeed inaugurate a new era in the intercourse of nations if a
+small nation could only preserve its freedom by at all times,
+on request, granting free passage to the troops of a powerful
+neighbour on the march to attack an adjoining country.
+
+And aside from the violation of Belgian neutrality, what would
+have become of England and of the world if the Prussian autocracy
+had been left free to defeat--one by one--the nations of the
+earth? First, the defeat of Russia and Serbia by Austria and
+Germany, the incorporation of a large part of Russia in the German
+Empire, German influence predominant in Russia and all the vast
+resources of that great Empire at the command of Germany. All the
+fleets in the world could uselessly blockade the German coasts
+if Germany possessed the limitless riches of the Empire of the
+Romanoffs.
+
+[Illustration: ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS, WHICH THE GERMANS DECLARED
+HAD BEEN FOUND IN LONGWY.]
+
+The German army drawing for reserves on the teeming populations
+of Russia and Siberia would never know defeat. And this is not
+idle conjecture, mere dreaming in the realm of possibilities,
+because the Russian revolution has shown us how weak and tottering
+in reality was the dreaded power of the Czar.
+
+Russia, beaten and half digested, France would have been an easy
+prey, and England, even if then joining France in war, would
+have a far different problem to face if the V-boats were now
+sailing from Cherbourg and Calais and Brest and Bordeaux on the
+mission of piracy and murder, and then would come our turn and
+that of Latin America. The first attack would come not on us,
+but on South or Central America--at some point to which it would
+be as difficult for us to send troops to help our neighbor as
+it would be for Germany to attack.
+
+Remember that in Southern Brazil nearly four hundred thousand
+Germans are sustained, as I found out, in their devotion to the
+Fatherland by annual grants of money for educational purposes
+from the Imperial treasury in Berlin.
+
+It was not without reason that at this interview, when the Kaiser
+wrote this message to the President, he said that the coming
+in of England had changed the whole situation and would make
+the war a long one. The Kaiser talked rather despondently about
+the war. I tried to cheer him up by saying the German troops
+would soon enter Paris, but he answered, "The English change
+the whole situation--an obstinate nation--they will keep up the
+war. It cannot end soon."
+
+It was the entry of England into the war, in defence of the rights
+of small nations, in defence of the guaranteed neutrality of
+Belgium, which saved the world from the harsh dominion of the
+conquest-hungry Prussians and therefore saved as well the two
+Americas and their protecting doctrine of President Monroe.
+
+The document, which is dated August tenth, 1914, supersedes the
+statement made by the German Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg in
+his speech before the Reichstag on August fourth, 1914, in which
+he gave the then official account of the entrance into the war of
+the Central Empires. It will be noted that von Bethmann-Hollweg
+insisted that France began the war in the sentence reading: "There
+were bomb-throwing fliers, cavalry patrols, invading companies
+in the Reichsland (Alsace-Lorraine). Thereby France, although
+the condition of war had not yet been declared, had attacked our
+territory." But the Emperor makes no mention of this fact, of
+supreme importance if true, in his writing to President Wilson
+six days later.
+
+Quite curiously, at this time there was a belief on the part
+of the Germans that Japan would declare war on the Allies and
+range herself on the side of the Central Powers. In fact on one
+night there was a friendly demonstration in front of the Japanese
+Embassy, but these hopes were soon dispelled by the ultimatum
+of Japan sent on the sixteenth of August, and, finally, by the
+declaration of war on August twenty-third.
+
+During the first days of the war the warring powers indulged in
+mutual recriminations as to the use of dumdum bullets and I was
+given several packages of cartridges containing bullets bored out
+at the top which the Germans said had been found in the French
+fortress of Longwy, with a request that I send an account of them
+to President Wilson and ask for his intervention in the matter.
+Very wisely President Wilson refused to do anything of the kind,
+as otherwise he would have been deluged with constant complaints
+from both sides as to the violations of the rules of war.
+
+The cartridges given to me were in packages marked on the outside
+"_Cartouches_de_Stand_" and from this I took it that possibly
+these cartridges had been used on some shooting range near the
+fort and the bullets bored out in order that they might not go
+too far, if carelessly fired over the targets.
+
+On August fifth, with our Naval Attache, Commander Walter Gherardi,
+I called upon von Tirpitz, to learn from him which ports be
+considered safest for the ships to be sent from America with gold
+for stranded Americans. He recommended Rotterdam.
+
+I also had a conversation on this day with Geheimrat Letze of
+the Foreign Office with reference to the proposition that English
+and German ships respectively should have a delay of until the
+fourteenth of August in which to leave the English or German
+ports in which they chanced to be.
+
+The second week in August, my wife's sister and her husband,
+Count Sigray, arrived in Berlin. Count Sigray is a reserve officer
+of the Hungarian Hussars and was in Montana when the first rumours
+of war came. He and his wife immediately started for New York and
+sailed on the fourth of August. They landed in England, and as
+England had not yet declared war on Austria, they were able to
+proceed on their journey. With them were Count George Festetics
+and Count Cziraki, the former from the Austrian Embassy in London
+and the latter from that in Washington. They were all naturally
+very much excited about war and the events of their trip. The
+Hungarians as a people are quite like Americans. They have agreeable
+manners and are able to laugh in a natural way, something which
+seems to be a lost art in Prussia. Nearly all the members of
+Hungarian noble families speak English perfectly and model their
+clothes, sports and country life, as far as possible, after the
+English.
+
+The thirteenth saw the departure of our first special train
+containing Americans bound for Holland. I saw the Americans off
+at the Charlottenburg station. They all departed in great spirits
+and very glad of an opportunity to leave Germany.
+
+I had some negotiations about the purchase by America or Americans
+of the ships of the North German Lloyd, but nothing came of these
+negotiations. Trainloads of Americans continued to leave, but
+there seemed to be no end to the Americans coming into Berlin
+from all directions.
+
+On August twenty-ninth, Count Szoegyeny, the Austrian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. He had been Ambassador there for twenty-two years and
+I suppose because of his advancing years the Austrian Government
+thought that he had outlived his usefulness. Quite a crowd of
+Germans and diplomats were at the station to witness the rather
+sad farewell. His successor was Prince Hohenlohe, married to a
+daughter of Archduke Frederick. She expressly waived her right
+to precedence as a royal highness, and agreed to take only the
+precedence given to her as the wife of the Ambassador, in order not
+to cause feeling in Berlin. Prince Hohenlohe, a rather easy-going
+man, who had been most popular in Russia and Austria, immediately
+made a favourable impression in Berlin and successfully occupied
+the difficult position of mediator between the governments of
+Berlin and Vienna.
+
+On September fourth the Chancellor gave me a statement to give
+to the reporters in which he attacked England, claiming that
+England did not desire the friendship of Germany but was moved by
+commercial jealousy and a desire to crush her; that the efforts
+made for peace had failed because Russia, under all circumstances,
+was resolved upon war; and that Germany had entered Belgium in
+order to forestall the planned French advance. He also claimed
+that England, regardless of consequences to the white race, had
+excited Japan to a pillaging expedition, and claimed that Belgian
+girls and women had gouged out the eyes of the wounded; that
+officers had been invited to dinner and shot across the table;
+and Belgian women had cut the throats of soldiers quartered in
+their houses while they were asleep. The Chancellor concluded by
+saying, in this statement, that everyone knows that the German
+people is not capable of unnecessary cruelty or of any brutality.
+
+We were fully occupied with taking care of the English prisoners
+and interests, the Americans, and negotiations relating to commercial
+questions, and to getting goods required in the United States out
+of Germany, when, on October seventh, a most unpleasant incident,
+and one which for some time caused the members of our Embassy
+to feel rather bitterly toward the German Foreign Office, took
+place.
+
+A great number of British civilians, men and women, were stranded
+in Berlin. To many of these were paid sums of money in the form
+of small allowances on behalf of the British Government. In order
+to facilitate this work, we placed the clerks employed in this
+distribution in the building formerly occupied by the British Consul
+in Berlin. Of course, the great crowds of Americans resorting to
+our Embassy, when combined with the crowds of British, made it
+almost impossible even to enter the Embassy, and establishment
+of this outlying relief station materially helped this situation.
+I occupied it, and employed English men and English women in this
+relief work by the express permission of the Imperial Foreign
+Office, which I thought it wise to obtain in view of the fact
+that the Germans seemed daily to become more irritable and
+suspicious, especially after the Battle of the Marne.
+
+On the night of October second, our Second Secretary, Harvey, went
+to this relief headquarters at about twelve o'clock at night, and
+was witness to a raid made by the Berlin police on this establishment
+of ours. The men and women working were arrested, and all books
+and papers which the police could get at were seized by them.
+The next morning I went around to the place and on talking with
+the criminal detectives in charge, was told by them that they had
+made the raid by the orders of the Foreign Office. When I spoke
+to the Foreign Office about this, they denied that they had given
+directions for the raid and made a sort of half apology. The raid
+was all the more unjustified because only the day before I had had
+a conversation with the Adjutant of the Berlin Kommandantur and
+told him that, although I had permission from the Foreign Office,
+I thought it would be better to dismiss the English employed and
+employ only Americans or Germans; and I sent round to my friend,
+Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and asked him to
+recommend some German accountants to me.
+
+The Kommandantur is the direct office of military control. When
+the Adjutant heard of the raid he was almost as indignant as I
+was, and on the tenth of October informed me that he had learned
+that the raid had been made on the joint orders of the Foreign
+Office and von Tirpitz's department.
+
+The books and papers of an Embassy, including those relating
+to the affairs of foreign nations temporarily in the Embassy's
+care, are universally recognised in international law as not,
+subject to seizure, nor did the fact that I was carrying on this
+work outside the actual Embassy building have any bearing on
+this point so long as the building was directly under my control
+and, especially, as the only work carried on was work properly
+in my hands in my official capacity. The Foreign Office saw that
+they had made a mistake, but at Zimmermann's earnest request
+I agreed, as it were, to forget the incident. Later on, this
+precedent might have been used by our government had they desired
+to press the matter of the seizure of von Igel's papers. Von Igel,
+it will be remembered, was carrying on business of a private
+nature in a private office hired by him. Nevertheless, as he
+had been employed in some capacity in the German Embassy at
+Washington, Count von Bernstorff claimed immunity from seizure
+for the papers found in that office.
+
+On August sixteenth the Kaiser left Berlin for the front. I wrote
+to his master of the household, saying that I should like an
+opportunity to be at the railway station to say good-bye to the
+Emperor, but was put off on various excuses. Thereafter the Emperor
+practically abandoned Berlin and lived either in Silesia, at
+Pless, or at some place near the Western front.
+
+At first, following the precedent of the war of 1870, the more
+important members of the government followed the Kaiser to the
+front, even the Chancellor and the Minister of Foreign Affairs
+abandoning their offices in Berlin. Not long afterwards, when it
+was apparent that the war must be carried on on several fronts
+and that it was not going to be the matter of a few weeks which
+the Germans had first supposed, these officials returned to their
+offices in Berlin. In the meantime, however, much confusion had
+been caused by this rather ridiculous effort to follow the customs
+of the war of 1870.
+
+When von Jagow, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent at the
+Great General Headquarters, the diplomats remaining behind conducted
+their negotiations with Zimmermann, who in turn had to transmit
+everything to the great general headquarters.
+
+In August, there were apparently rumours afloat in countries
+outside of Germany that prominent Socialists at the outbreak of
+the war had been shot. The State Department cabled me to find
+out whether there was any truth in these rumours, with particular
+reference to Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg.
+
+Liebknecht is a lawyer practicing in Berlin and so I telephoned
+him, asking him to come and see me. He did so, and of course, by
+his presence verified the fact that he had not been executed.
+He told me that the rumours as to the treatment of the Socialists
+were entirely unfounded and said that he had no objection to my
+cabling a statement that the Socialists were opposed to Czarismus
+and that he personally had confidence in the German army and the
+cause of the German people.
+
+Many people confuse Liebknecht with his father, now dead. Liebknecht,
+the son, is a man of perhaps forty-three years, with dark bushy
+hair and moustache and wearing eye-glasses, a man of medium height
+and not at all of strong build. In the numerous interruptions
+made by him during the debates in the Reichstag, during the first
+year of the war, his voice sounded high and shrill. Of course,
+anyone who defies the heavy hand of autocracy must suffer from
+nervousness. We all knew that sooner or later autocracy would
+"get" Liebknecht, and its opportunity came when he appeared in
+citizen's clothes at an attempted mass-meeting at the Potsdamerplatz.
+For the offence of appearing out of uniform after being called
+and mobilized, and for alleged incitement of the people, he was
+condemned for a long term of imprisonment. One can but admire
+his courage. I believe that he earns his living by the practice
+of law before one of the minor courts. It is hard to say just
+what _role_ he will play in the future. It is probable that
+when the Socialists settle down after the war and think things
+over, they will consider that the leadership of Scheidemann has
+been too conservative; that he submitted too readily to the powers
+of autocracy and too easily abandoned the program of the Socialists.
+In this case, Liebknecht perhaps will be made leader of the
+Socialists, and it is within the bounds of probability that
+Scheidemann and certain of his party may become Liberals rather
+than Socialists.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS
+
+In the autumn of 1914, the rush of getting the Americans out
+of Germany was over. The care of the British civilians was on a
+business basis and there were comparatively few camps of prisoners
+of war. Absolutely tired by working every day and until twelve
+at night, I went to Munich for a two weeks' rest.
+
+On February fourth, 1915, Germany announced that on February
+eighteenth the blockade of England through submarines would commence.
+
+Some very peculiar and mysterious negotiations thereafter ensued.
+About February eighth, an American who was very intimate with
+the members of the General Staff came to me with a statement
+that Germany desired peace and was ready to open negotiations
+to that end. It was, however, to be made a condition of these
+peace negotiations that this particular American should go to
+Paris and to Petrograd and inform the governments there of the
+overwhelming strength of the German armies and of their positions,
+which knowledge, it was said, he had obtained by personally visiting
+both the fronts. it was further intimated that von Tirpitz himself
+was anxious that peace should be concluded, possibly because of
+his fear that the proposed blockade would not be successful.
+
+Of course, I informed the State Department of these mysterious
+manoeuvres.
+
+I was taken by back stairways to a mysterious meeting with von
+Tirpitz at night in his rooms in the Navy Department. When I was
+alone with him, however, he had nothing definite to say or to
+offer; if there was any opportunity at that time to make peace
+nothing came of it. It looked somewhat to me as if the whole
+idea had been to get this American to go to Paris and Petrograd,
+certify from his personal observation to the strength of the
+German armies and position, and thereby to assist in enticing
+one or both of these countries to desert the allied cause. All of
+this took place about ten days before the eighteenth of February,
+the time named for the announcement of the blockade of England.
+
+Medals were struck having the head of von Tirpitz on one side
+and on the other the words "Gott strafe England," and a picture
+of a sort of Neptune assisted by a submarine rising from the
+sea to blockade the distant English coast.
+
+The Ambassador is supposed to have the right to demand an audience
+with the Kaiser at any time, and as there were matters connected
+with the treatment of prisoners as well as this coming submarine
+warfare which I wished to take up with him, I had on various
+occasions asked for an audience with him; on each occasion my
+request had been refused on some excuse or other, and I was not
+even permitted to go to the railway station to bid him good-bye
+on one occasion when he left for the front.
+
+When our Military Attache, Major Langhorne, left in March, 1915,
+he had a farewell audience with the Kaiser and I then asked him
+to say to the Kaiser that I had not seen him for so long a time
+that I had forgotten what he looked like. Langhorne reported
+to me that he had given his message to the Kaiser and that the
+Kaiser said, "I have nothing against Mr. Gerard personally, but
+I will not see the Ambassador of a country which furnishes arms
+and ammunition to the enemies of Germany."
+
+Before the departure of Langhorne, I had succeeded in getting
+Germany to agree that six American army officers might visit
+Germany as military observers. When they arrived, I presented
+them at the Foreign Office, etc., and they were taken on trips
+to the East and West fronts.
+
+They were not allowed to see much, and their request to be attached
+to a particular unit was refused. Nearly everywhere they were
+subject to insulting remarks or treatment because of the shipment
+of munitions of war to the Allies from America; and finally after
+they had been subjected to deliberate insults at the hands of
+several German generals, Mackensen particularly distinguishing
+himself, the United States Government withdrew them from Germany.
+
+Colonel (now General) Kuhn, however, who was of these observers,
+was appointed Military Attache in place of Major Langhorne. Speaking
+German fluently and acting with great tact, he managed for a long
+time to keep sufficiently in the good graces of the Germans to
+be allowed to see something of the operations of the various
+fronts. There came a period in 1916 when he was no longer invited
+to go on the various excursions made by the foreign military
+attaches and finally Major Nicolai, the general intelligence
+officer of the Great General Headquarters, sent for him early in
+the autumn of 1916, and informed him that he could no longer go
+to any of the fronts. Colonel Kuhn answered that he was aware of
+this already. Major Nicolai said that he gave him this information
+by direct order of General Ludendorf, that General Ludendorf had
+stated that he did not believe America could do more damage to
+Germany than she had done if the two countries were actually
+at war, and that he considered that, practically, America and
+Germany were engaged in hostilities. On this being reported to
+Washington, Colonel Kuhn was quite naturally recalled.
+
+I cannot praise too highly the patience and tact shown by Colonel
+Kuhn in dealing with the Germans. Although accused in the German
+newspapers of being a spy, and otherwise attacked, he kept his
+temper and observed all that he could for the benefit of his own
+country. As he had had an opportunity to observe the Russian-Japanese
+war, his experiences at that time, coupled with his experiences
+in Germany, make him, perhaps, our greatest American expert on
+modern war.
+
+It was with the greatest pleasure that I heard from Secretary
+Baker that he had determined to promote Colonel Kuhn to the rank
+of General and make him head of our War College, where his teachings
+will prove of the greatest value to the armies of the United States.
+
+Colonel House and his wife arrived to pay us a visit on March 19,
+1915, and remained until the twenty-eighth. During this period the
+Colonel met all the principal members of the German Government and
+many men of influence and prominence in the world of affairs, such
+as Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and Dr. Walter
+Rathenau, who succeeded his father as head of the Allgemeine
+Elektricitats Gesellschaft and hundreds of other corporations. The
+Colonel dined at the house of Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister,
+and lunched with von Gwinner.
+
+In April, negotiations were continued about the sinking of the
+_William_P._Fry_, an American boat loaded with food and
+destined for Ireland. The American Government on behalf of the
+owners of the _William_P._Fry_ claimed damages for the boat.
+Nothing was said about the cargo, but in the German answer it was
+stated that the cargo of the _William_P._Fry_ consisting of
+foodstuffs destined for an armed port of the enemy and, therefore,
+presumed to be destined for the armed forces of the enemy was,
+because of this, contraband. I spoke to von Jagow about this and
+told him that I thought that possibly this would seem to amount
+to a German justification of the British blockade of Germany.
+He said that this note had been drawn by Director Kriege who
+was their expert on international law, and that he would not
+interfere with Kriege's work. Of course, as a matter of fact,
+all foodstuffs shipped to Germany would have to be landed at
+some armed port, and, therefore, according to the contentions
+of Germany, these would be supposed to be destined to the armed
+forces of the enemy and become contraband of war.
+
+At international law, it had always been recognised that private
+individuals and corporations have the right to sell arms and
+ammunitions of war to any belligerent and, in the Hague Convention
+held in 1907, this right was expressly ratified and confirmed.
+This same Director Kriege who represented Germany at this Hague
+Conference in 1907, in the debates on this point said: "The neutral
+boats which engage in such a trade, commit a violation of the
+duties of neutrality. However, according to a principle generally
+recognised, the State of which the boat flies the flag is not
+responsible for this violation. The neutral States are not called
+upon to forbid their subjects a commerce which, from the point of
+view of the belligerents, ought to be considered as unlawful."
+(Conference International de la Paix, La Haye, 15 Juin-18 Octobre
+1907. Vol. III, p. 859.)
+
+During our trouble with General Huerta, arms and ammunition for
+Huerta's forces from Germany were landed from German ships in
+Mexico. During the Boer war the Germans, who openly sympathised
+with the Boers, nevertheless furnished to England great quantities
+of arms and munitions, expressly destined to be used against
+the Boers; and this, although it was manifest that there was
+no possibility whatever that the Boers could obtain arms and
+munitions from German sources during the war. For instance, the
+firm of Eberhardt in Dusseldorf furnished one hundred and nine
+cannon, complete, with wagons, caissons and munitions, etc., to
+the English which were expressly designed for use against the
+Boers.
+
+At one time the Imperial Foreign Office sent me a formal note
+making reference to a paragraph in former Ambassador Andrew D.
+White's autobiography with reference to the alleged stoppage
+in a German port of a boat laden with arms and ammunition, for
+use against the Americans in Cuba during the Spanish War. Of
+course, former Ambassador White wrote without having the Embassy
+records at hand and those records show that the position he took
+at the time of this alleged stoppage was eminently correct.
+
+The files show that he wrote the letter to the State Department
+in which he stated that knowledge came to him of the proposed
+sailing of this ship, but he did not protest because he had been
+advised by a Naval Attache that the United States did not have
+the right to interfere. The Department of State wrote to him
+commending his action in not filing any protest and otherwise
+interfering.
+
+It seemed as if the German Government expressly desired to stir
+up hatred against America on this issue in order to force the
+American Government through fear of either the German Government,
+or the German-American propagandists at home, to put an immediate
+embargo on the export of these supplies.
+
+In the autumn of 1914 Zimmermann showed me a long list sent him
+by Bernstorff showing quantities of saddles, automobiles, motor
+trucks, tires, explosives, foodstuffs and so on, exported from
+America to the Allies and intimated that this traffic had reached
+such proportions that it should be stopped.
+
+In February, 1915, in the official _Communique_ of the day
+appeared the following statement: "Heavy artillery fire in certain
+sections of the West front, mostly with American ammunition;"
+and in April in the official _Communique_ something to this
+effect: "Captured French artillery officers say that they have
+great stores of American ammunition." I obtained through the State
+Department in Washington a statement from the French Ambassador
+certifying that up to that time, the end of April, 1915, no shells
+whatever of the French artillery had been furnished from America.
+
+Nothing, however, would satisfy the Germans. They seemed determined
+that the export of every article, whether of food or munitions
+which might prove of use to the Allies in the war, should be
+stopped. Newspapers were filled with bitter attacks upon America
+and upon President Wilson, and with caricatures referring to
+the sale of munitions.
+
+It never seemed to occur to the Germans that we could not violate
+the Hague Convention in order to change the rules of the game
+because one party, after the commencement of hostilities, found
+that the rule worked to his disadvantage. Nor did the Germans
+consider that America could not vary its international law with
+the changing fortunes of war and make one ruling when the Germans
+lost control of the sea and another ruling if they regained it.
+
+From early in 1915 until I left Germany, I do not think I ever
+had a conversation with a German without his alluding to this
+question. Shortly before leaving Germany, in January, 1917, and
+after I had learned of the probability of the resumption of ruthless
+submarine war, at an evening party at the house of Dr. Solf, the
+Colonial Minister, a large German who turned out to be one of
+the Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, planted himself some
+distance away from me and addressed me in German saying, "You are
+the American Ambassador and I want to tell you that the conduct
+of America in furnishing arms and ammunition to the enemies of
+Germany is stamped deep on the German heart, that we will never
+forget it and will some day have our revenge." He spoke in a
+voice so loud and slapped his chest so hard that everyone in
+the room stopped their conversation in order to hear. He wore
+on his breast the orders of the Black Eagle, the Red Eagle, the
+Elephant and the Seraphim, and when he struck all this menagerie
+the rattle alone was quite loud. I reminded him politely of the
+Hague Convention, of the fact that we could not change international
+law from time to time with the change in the situation of the war,
+and that Germany had furnished arms to England to use against the
+Boers. But he simply answered, "We care nothing for treaties,"
+and my answer, "That is what they all say," was a retort too
+obvious to be omitted.
+
+The German press continually published articles to the effect
+that the war would be finished if it were not for the shipment
+of supplies from America. All public opinion was with the German
+Government when the warning was issued on February fourth, 1915,
+stating that the blockade of England would commence on the eighteenth
+and warning neutral ships to keep out of the war zone. From then
+on we had constant cases and crises with reference to the sinking
+of American boats by the German submarine. There were the cases
+of the _Gulfflight_ and the _Cushing_ and the _Falaba_, an English
+boat sunk without warning on which Americans were killed. On May
+sixth, 1915, Director Kriege of the Foreign Office asked Mr. Jackson
+to call and see him, and told him that he would like to have the
+following three points brought to the attention of the American
+public:
+
+  "1. As the result of the English effort to stop all foreign
+  commerce with Germany, Germany would do everything in her power
+  to destroy English commerce and merchant shipping. There was,
+  however, never at any time an intention to destroy or interfere
+  with neutral commerce or to attack neutral shipping unless
+  engaged in contraband trade. In view of the action of the
+  British Government in arming merchant vessels and causing
+  them to disguise their national character, the occasional
+  destruction of a neutral ship was unavoidable. Naval officers
+  in command of submarines had been instructed originally, and
+  new and more stringent instructions had been issued repeatedly,
+  to use the utmost care, consistent with their own safety, to
+  avoid attacks on neutral vessels.
+
+  "2. In case a neutral ship should be destroyed by a submarine
+  the German Government is prepared to make an immediate and
+  formal expression of its regret and to pay an indemnity, without
+  having recourse to a prize court.
+
+  "3. All reports with regard to the destruction of a neutral
+  vessel by a German submarine are investigated at once by both
+  the German Foreign Office and Admiralty and the result is
+  communicated to the Government concerned, which is requested in
+  return to communicate to the German Government the result of its
+  own independent investigation. Where there is any material
+  divergence in the two reports as to the presumed cause of
+  destruction (torpedo or mine), the question is to be submitted
+  to investigation by a commission composed of representatives of
+  the two nations concerned, with a neutral arbiter whose decision
+  will be final. This course has already been adopted in two cases,
+  in which a Dutch and a Norwegian vessel, respectively, were
+  concerned. The German Government reserves its right to refuse
+  this international arbitration in exceptional cases where for
+  military reasons the German Admiralty are opposed to its taking
+  place."
+
+Director Kriege told Mr. Jackson that a written communication in
+which the substance of the foregoing would be contained, would
+soon to be made to the Embassy.
+
+Mr. Jackson put this conversation down in the form above given
+and showed Director Kriege a copy of it. Later in the day Geheimrat
+Simon called on Mr. Jackson at the Embassy and said that Dr.
+Kriege would like to have point two read as follows:
+
+  "In case _through_any_unfortunate_mistake_a_neutral_ship_,"
+  and continuing to the end; and that Dr. Kriege would like to
+  change what was written on point three beginning with "Where
+  there is" so that it should read, as follows:--"Where there is
+  any material divergence in the two reports as to the presumed
+  cause of destruction (torpedo or mine), the German Government has
+  already in several instances declared its readiness to submit
+  the question to the decision of an international commission in
+  accordance with the Hague Convention for the friendly settlement
+  of international disputes."
+
+This had been suggested by Director Kriege in case it should
+be decided to make a communication to the American Press. Mr.
+Jackson told Geheimrat Simon that he would report the subject of
+his conversation to me, but that it would depend upon me whether
+any communication should be made to the American Government or
+to the press upon the subject.
+
+Of course, the news of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ on
+May seventh and of the great loss of American lives brought
+about a very critical situation, and naturally nothing was done
+with Kriege's propositions.
+
+It is unnecessary here for me to go into the notes which were
+exchanged between the two governments because all that is already
+public property.
+
+Sometime after I had delivered our first _Lusitania_ Note of
+May 11th, 1915, Zimmermann was lunching with us. A good looking
+American woman, married to a German, was also of the party and
+after lunch although I was talking to some one else I overheard
+part of her conversation with Zimmermann. When Zimmermann left
+I asked her what it was that he had said about America, Germany,
+Mr. Bryan and the _Lusitania_. She then told me that she
+had said to Zimmermann that it was a great pity that we were
+to leave Berlin as it looked as if diplomatic relations between
+the two countries would be broken, and that Zimmermann told her
+not to worry about that because they had just received word from
+the Austrian Government that Dr. Dumba, the Austrian Ambassador
+in Washington, had cabled that the _Lusitania_ Note from
+America to Germany was only sent as a sop to public opinion in
+America and that the government did not really mean what was
+said in that note. I then called on Zimmermann at the Foreign
+Office and he showed me Dumba's telegram which was substantially
+as stated above. Of course, I immediately cabled to the State
+Department and also got word to President Wilson. The rest of
+the incident is public property. I, of course, did not know what
+actually occurred between Mr. Bryan and Dr. Dumba, but I am sure
+that Dr. Dumba must have misunderstood friendly statements made
+by Mr. Bryan.
+
+It was very lucky that I discovered the existence of this Dumba
+cablegram in this manner which savours almost of diplomacy as
+represented on the stage. If the Germans had gone on in the belief
+that the _Lusitania_ Note was not really meant, war would
+have inevitably resulted at that time between Germany and America,
+and it shows how great events may be shaped by heavy luncheons
+and a pretty woman.
+
+Before this time much indignation had been caused in Germany
+by the fact that the _Lusitania_ on her eastward voyage
+from New York early in February, 1915, had raised the American
+flag when nearing British waters.
+
+Shortly after this incident had become known, I was at the
+Wintergarten, a large concert hall in Berlin, with Grant Smith,
+First Secretary of the Embassy at Vienna and other members of
+my staff. We naturally spoke English among ourselves, a fact
+which aroused the ire of a German who had been drinking heavily
+and who was seated in the next box. He immediately began to call
+out that some one was speaking English and when told by one of
+the attendants that it was the American Ambassador, he immediately
+cried in a loud voice that Americans were even worse than English
+and that the _Lusitania_ had been flying the American flag as
+protection in British waters.
+
+The audience, however, took sides against him and told him to
+shut up and as I left the house at the close of the performance,
+some Germans spoke to me and apologised for his conduct. The
+next day the manager of the Wintergarten called on me also to
+express his regret for the occurrence.
+
+About a year afterwards I was at the races one day and saw this
+man and asked him what he meant by making such a noise at the
+Wintergarten. He immediately apologised and said that he had
+been drinking and hoped that I would forget the incident. This
+was the only incident of the kind which occurred to me during
+all the time that I was in Germany.
+
+Both before and after the sinking of the _Lusitania_, the
+German Foreign Office put forward all kinds of proposals with
+reference to American ships in the war zone. On one afternoon,
+Zimmermann, who had a number of these proposals drafted in German,
+showed them to me and I wrote down the English translation for him
+to see how it would look in English. These proposals were about
+the sailing from America of what might be called certified ships,
+the ships to be painted and striped in a distinctive way, to come
+from certified ports at certain certified times, America to agree
+that these ships should carry no contraband whatever. All these
+proposals were sternly rejected by the President.
+
+On February sixteenth, the German answer to our note of February
+tenth had announced that Germany declined all responsibility for
+what might happen to neutral ships and, in addition, announced
+that mines would be allowed in waters surrounding Great Britain
+and Ireland. This note also contained one of Zimmermann's proposed
+solutions, namely, that American warships should convoy American
+merchantmen.
+
+The German note of the sixteenth also spoke about the great traffic
+in munitions from the United States to the Allies, and contained
+a suggestion that the United States should induce the Allies to
+adopt the Declaration of London and omit the importation not
+only of food but also of all raw materials into Germany.
+
+February twentieth was the date of the conciliatory note addressed
+by President Wilson to both Great Britain and Germany; and contained
+the suggestion that submarines should not be employed against
+merchant vessels of any nationality and that food should be allowed
+to go through for the civil population of Germany consigned to
+the agencies named by the United States in Germany, which were
+to see that the food was received and distributed to the civil
+population.
+
+In the meantime the mines on the German coast had destroyed two
+American ships, both loaded with cotton for Germany; one called
+the _Carib_ and the other the _Evelyn_.
+
+In America, Congress refused to pass a law to put it in the power
+of the President to place an embargo on the export of munitions
+of war.
+
+In April, Count Bernstorff delivered his note concerning the
+alleged want of neutrality of the United States, referring to
+the numerous new industries in war materials being built up in
+the United States, stating, "In reality the United States is
+supplying only Germany's enemies, a fact which is not in any
+way modified by the theoretical willingness to furnish Germany
+as well."
+
+To this note, Secretary Bryan in a note replied that it was
+impossible, in view of the indisputable doctrines of accepted
+international law, to make any change in our own laws of neutrality
+which meant unequally affecting, during the progress of the war,
+the relations of the United States with the various nations at
+war; and that the placing of embargoes on the trade in arms which
+constituted such a change would be a direct violation of the
+neutrality of the United States.
+
+But all these negotiations, reproaches and recriminations were
+put an end to by the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_, with the
+killing of American women and civilians who were passengers on
+that vessel.
+
+I believed myself that we would immediately break diplomatic
+relations, and prepared to leave Germany. On May eleventh, I
+delivered to von Jagow the _Lusitania_ Note, which after
+calling attention to the cases of the sinking of American boats,
+ending with the _Lusitania_, contained the statement, "The
+Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of
+the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the
+sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and
+its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercises and
+enjoyments."
+
+During this period I had constant conversations with von Jagow
+and Zimmermann, and it was during the conversations about this
+submarine warfare that Zimmermann on one occasion said to me:
+"The United States does not dare to do anything against Germany
+because we have five hundred thousand German reservists in America
+who will rise in arms against your government if your government
+should dare to take any action against Germany." As he said this,
+he worked himself up to a passion and repeatedly struck the table
+with his fist. I told him that we had five hundred and one thousand
+lamp posts in America, and that was where the German reservists
+would find themselves if they tried any uprising; and I also
+called his attention to the fact that no German-Americans making
+use of the American passports which they could easily obtain,
+were sailing for Germany by way of Scandinavian countries in
+order to enlist in the German army. I told him that if he could
+show me one person with an American passport who had come to
+fight in the German army I might more readily believe what he
+said about the Germans in America rising in revolution.
+
+As a matter of fact, during the whole course of the war, I knew
+of only one man with American citizenship who enlisted in the
+German army. This was an American student then in Germany who
+enlisted in a German regiment. His father, a business man in New
+York, cabled me asking me to have his son released from the German
+army; so I procured the discharge of the young man who immediately
+wrote to me and informed me that he was over twenty-one, and
+that he could not see what business his father had to interfere
+with his military ambitions. I thereupon withdrew my request
+with reference to him, but he had already been discharged from
+the army. When his regiment went to the West front he stowed
+away on the cars with it, was present at the attack on Ypres,
+and was shot through the body. He recovered in a German hospital,
+received the Iron Cross, was discharged and sailed for America.
+What has since become of him I do not know.
+
+I do not intend to go in great detail into this exchange of notes
+and the public history of the submarine controversy, as all that
+properly belongs to the history of the war rather than to an
+account of my personal experiences; and besides, as Victor Hugo
+said, "History is not written with a microscope." All will remember
+the answer of Germany to the American _Lusitania_ Note, which
+answer, delivered on May twenty-ninth, contained the charge that
+the _Lusitania_ was armed and carried munitions, and had been
+used in the transport of Canadian troops. In the meantime, however,
+the American ship, _Nebraskan_, had been torpedoed off the coast
+of Ireland on the twenty-sixth; and, on May twenty-eighth, Germany
+stated that the American steamer, _Gulfflight_, had been torpedoed
+by mistake, and apologised for this act.
+
+Von Jagow gave me, about the same time, a Note requesting that
+American vessels should be more plainly marked and should illuminate
+their marking at night.
+
+The second American _Lusitania_ Note was published on June
+eleventh, 1915; and its delivery was coincident with the resignation
+of Mr. Bryan as Secretary of State. In this last Note President
+Wilson (for, of course, it is an open secret that he was the
+author of these Notes) made the issue perfectly plain, referring
+to the torpedoing of enemy passenger ships. "Only her actual
+resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so
+for the purpose of visit could have afforded the commander of the
+submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of
+those on board the ship in jeopardy." On July eighth the German
+answer to this American _Lusitania_ Note was delivered, and
+again stated that "we have been obliged to adopt a submarine war
+to meet the declared intentions of our enemies and the method of
+warfare adopted by them in contravention of international law".
+Again referring to the alleged fact of the _Lusitania's_
+carrying munitions they said: "If the _Lusitania_ had been
+spared, thousands of cases of munitions would have been sent to
+Germany's enemies and thereby thousands of German mothers and
+children robbed of breadwinners." The note then contained some
+of Zimmermann's favourite proposals, to the effect that German
+submarine commanders would be instructed to permit the passage of
+American steamers marked in a special way and of whose sailing
+they had been notified in advance, provided that the American
+Government guaranteed that these vessels did not carry contraband
+of war. It was also suggested that a number of neutral vessels
+should be added to those sailing under the American flag, to
+give greater opportunity for those Americans who were compelled
+to travel abroad, and the Note's most important part continued:
+"In particular the Imperial Government is unable to admit that
+the American citizens can protect an enemy ship by mere fact
+of their presence on board."
+
+July twenty-first, the American Government rejected the proposals
+of Germany saying, "The lives of noncombatants may in no case
+be put in jeopardy unless the vessel resists or seeks to escape
+after being summoned to submit to examination," and disposed
+of the claim that the acts of England gave Germany the right
+to retaliate, even though American citizens should be deprived
+of their lives in the course of retaliation by stating: "For a
+belligerent act of retaliation is _per_se_ an act beyond the
+law, and the defense, of an act as retaliatory, is an admission
+that it is illegal." Continuing it said: "If a belligerent cannot
+retaliate against an enemy without injuring the lives of neutrals,
+as well as their property, humanity, as well as justice and a
+due regard for the dignity of neutral powers, should dictate
+that the practice be discontinued."
+
+It was also said: "The United States cannot believe that the
+Imperial Government will longer refrain from disavowing the wanton
+act of its naval commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or
+from offering reparation for the American lives lost, so far
+as reparation can be made for the needless destruction of human
+life by an illegal act." And the meat of the Note was contained
+in the following sentence: "Friendship itself prompts it (the
+United States) to say to the Imperial Government that repetition
+by the commanders of German naval vessels of acts in contravention
+of those rights must be regarded by the Government of the United
+States, when they affect American citizens, as being deliberately
+unfriendly."
+
+There the matter has remained so far as the Lusitania was concerned
+until now. In the meantime, the attack of the American ship,
+_Nebraskan_, was disavowed; the German Note stating that
+"the torpedo was not meant for the American flag and is to be
+considered an unfortunate accident."
+
+The diplomatic situation with regard to the use of the submarine
+and the attack on many merchant ships without notice and without
+putting the passengers in safety was still unsettled when on
+August nineteenth, 1915, the British ship _Arabic_, was
+torpedoed, without warning, not far from the place where the
+_Lusitania_ had gone down. Two Americans were among the
+passengers killed.
+
+The German Government, after the usual quibbling, at length,
+in its Note of September seventh, claimed that the Captain of
+the German submarine, while engaged in preparing to sink the
+_Dunsley_, became convinced that the approaching _Arabic_
+was trying to ram him and, therefore, fired his torpedo. The
+Imperial Government refused to admit any liability but offered
+to arbitrate.
+
+There followed almost immediately the case of the _Ancona_,
+sunk by a submarine flying the Austrian flag. This case was naturally
+out of my jurisdiction, but formed a link in the chain, and then
+came the sinking of the _Persia_ in the Mediterranean. On this
+boat our consul to Aden lost his life.
+
+In the Note of Count Bernstorff to Secretary Lansing, dated September
+first, 1915, Count Bernstorff said that liners would not be sunk
+by German submarines without warning, and without putting the
+passengers in safety, provided that the liners did not try to
+escape or offer resistance; and it was further stated that this
+policy was in effect before the sinking of the _Arabic_.
+
+There were long negotiations during this period concerning the
+_Arabic_. At one time it looked as if diplomatic relations
+would be broken; but finally the Imperial Government consented
+to acknowledge that the submarine commander had been wrong in
+assuming that the _Arabic_ intended to ram his boat, offered
+to pay an indemnity and disavowed the act of the commander. It
+was stated that orders so precise had been given to the submarine
+commanders that a "recurrence of incidents similar to the
+_Arabic_ is considered out of the question."
+
+In the same way the Austrian Government gave way to the demands
+of America in the _Ancona_ case at the end of December, 1915.
+Ambassador Penfield, in Austria, won great praise by his admirable
+handling of this case.
+
+The negotiations as to the still pending _Lusitania_ case
+were carried on in Washington by Count Bernstorff and Secretary
+Lansing, and finally Germany offered to pay an indemnity for
+the death of the Americans on the _Lusitania_ whose deaths
+Germany "greatly regretted," but refused to disavow the act of
+the submarine commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or to admit
+that such act was illegal.
+
+About this time our State Department sent out a Note proposing
+in effect that submarines should conform to "cruiser" warfare,
+only sinking a vessel which defended itself or tried to escape,
+and that before sinking a vessel its passengers and crew should
+be placed in safety; and that, on the other hand, merchant vessels
+of belligerent nationality should be prohibited from carrying
+any armaments whatever. This suggestion was not followed up.
+
+Zimmermann (not the one in the Foreign Office) wrote an article
+in the _Lokal_Anzeiger_ of which he is an editor, saying
+that the United States had something on their side in the question
+of the export of munitions. I heard that von Kessel, commander of
+the _Mark_of_Brandenburg_ said that he, Zimmermann, ought to be
+shot as a traitor. Zimmermann hearing of this made von Kessel
+apologise, but was shortly afterwards mobilised.
+
+Colonel House had arrived in Germany at the end of January, 1916,
+and remained only three days. He was quite worried by the situation
+and by an interview he had had with Zimmermann in which Zimmermann
+expressed the readiness of Germany to go to war with the United
+States.
+
+In February, 1916, the Junkers in the Prussian Lower House started
+a fight against the Chancellor and discussed submarine war, a
+matter out of their province. The Chancellor hit back at them hard
+and had the best of the exchange. At this period it was reported
+that the Emperor went to Wilhelmshafen to warn the submarine
+commanders to be careful.
+
+About March first it was reported that a grand council of war
+was held at Charleville and that in spite of the support of von
+Tirpitz by Falkenhayn, the Chief of Staff, the Chancellor was
+supported by the Emperor, and once more beat the propositions
+to recommence ruthless submarine war.
+
+In March too, the "illness" of von Tirpitz was announced, followed
+shortly by his resignation. On March nineteenth, his birthday,
+a demonstration was looked for and I saw many police near his
+dwelling, but nothing unusual occurred. I contemplated a trip
+to America, but both the Chancellor and von Jagow begged me not
+to go.
+
+From the time of the _Lusitania_ sinking to that of the _Sussex_
+all Germany was divided into two camps. The party of the Chancellor
+tried to keep peace with America and did not want to have Germany
+branded as an outlaw among nations. Von Tirpitz and his party of
+naval and military officers called for ruthless submarine war, and
+the Conservatives, angry with Bethmann-Hollweg because of his
+proposed concession as to the extension of the suffrage, joined
+the opposition. The reception of our last _Lusitania_ Note in
+July, 1915, was hostile and I was accused of being against Germany,
+although, of course, I had nothing to do with the preparation of
+this Note.
+
+In August, 1915, the deputies representing the great industrials
+of Germany joined in the attack on the Chancellor. These men
+wished to keep Northern France and Belgium, because they hoped
+to get possession of the coal and iron deposits there and so
+obtain a monopoly of the iron and steel trade of the continent.
+Accelerators of public opinion, undoubtedly hired by the Krupp
+firm, were hard at work. These Annexationists were opposed by the
+more reasonable men who signed a petition against the annexation
+of Belgium. Among the signers of this reasonable men's petition
+were Prince Hatzfeld (Duke of Trachenberg) head of the Red Cross,
+Dernburg, Prince Henkel Donnersmarck, Professor Delbruck, von
+Harnack and many others.
+
+The rage of the Conservatives at the _Arabic_ settlement
+knew no bounds, and after a bitter article had appeared in the
+_Tageszeitung_ about the _Arabic_ affair, that newspaper was
+suppressed for some days,--a rather unexpected showing of backbone
+on the part of the Chancellor. Reventlow who wrote for this newspaper
+is one of the ablest editorial writers in Germany. An ex-naval
+officer, he is bitter in his hatred of America. It was said that
+he once lived in America and lost a small fortune in a Florida
+orange grove, but I never succeeded in having this verified.
+
+In November, 1915, after the _Arabic_ settlement there followed
+a moment for us of comparative calm. Mrs. Gerard was given the
+Red Cross Orders of the first and third classes, and Jackson
+and Rives of the Embassy Staff the second and third class. The
+third class is always given because one cannot have the first
+and second unless one has the third or lowest.
+
+There were rumours at this time of the formation of a new party;
+really the Socialists and Liberals, as the Socialists as such were
+too unfashionable, in too bad odour, to open a campaign against
+the military under their own name. This talk came to nothing.
+
+The Chancellor always complained bitterly that he could not
+communicate in cipher _via_ wireless with von Bernstorff.
+On one occasion he said to me, "How can I arrange as I wish to
+in a friendly way the _Ancona_ and _Lusitania_ cases
+if I cannot communicate with my Ambassador? Why does the United
+States Government not allow me to communicate in cipher?" I said,
+"The Foreign Office tried to get me to procure a safe-conduct for
+the notorious von Rintelen on the pretense that he was going to do
+charitable work for Belgium in America; perhaps Washington thinks
+you want to communicate with people like that." The Chancellor then
+changed the subject and said that there would be bad feeling in
+Germany against America after the war. I answered that that idea
+had been expressed by a great many Germans and German newspapers,
+and that I had had private letters from a great many Americans
+who wrote that if Germany intended to make war on America, after
+this war, perhaps we had better go in now. He then very amiably
+said that war with America would be ridiculous. He asked me why
+public opinion in America was against Germany, and I answered
+that matters like the Cavell case had made a bad impression in
+America and that I knew personally that even the Kaiser did not
+approve of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_. The Chancellor
+said, "How about the _Baralong_?" I replied that I did not
+know the details and that there seemed much doubt and confusion
+about that affair, but that there was no doubt about the fact
+that Miss Cavell was shot and that she was a woman. I then took
+up in detail with him the treatment of British prisoners and
+said that this bad treatment could not go on. This was only one
+of the many times when I complained to the Chancellor about the
+condition of prisoners. I am sure that he did not approve of the
+manner in which prisoners of war in Germany were treated; but
+he always complained that he was powerless where the military
+were concerned, and always referred me to Bismarck's memoirs.
+
+During this winter of submarine controversy an interview with
+von Tirpitz, thinly veiled as an interview with a "high naval
+authority," was published in that usually most conservative of
+newspapers, the _Frankfurter_Zeitung_. In this interview the
+"high naval authority" advocated ruthless submarine war with
+England, and promised to bring about thereby the speedy surrender
+of that country. After the surrender, which was to include the
+whole British fleet, the German fleet with the surrendered British
+fleet added to its force, was to sail for America, and exact from
+that country indemnities enough to pay the whole cost of the war.
+
+After his fall, von Tirpitz, in a letter to some admirers who
+had sent him verses and a wreath, advocated holding the coast of
+Flanders as a necessity for the war against England and America.
+
+The successor of von Tirpitz was Admiral von Holtzendorff, whose
+brother is Ballin's right hand man in the management of the Hamburg
+American Line. Because of the more reasonable influence and
+surroundings of von Holtzendorff, I regarded his appointment as
+a help towards peaceful relations between Germany and America.
+
+I have told in another chapter how the Emperor had refused to
+receive me as Ambassador of a country which was supplying munitions
+to the Allies.
+
+From time to time since I learned of this in March, 1915, I kept
+insisting upon my right as Ambassador to be received by the Emperor;
+and finally early in October, 1915, wrote the following letter
+to the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Some time ago I requested you to arrange an audience for me
+  with his majesty.
+
+  Please take no further trouble about this matter.
+
+  Sincerely yours,
+
+  JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+This seemed to have the desired effect. I was informed that I
+would be received by the Emperor in the new palace at Potsdam
+on October twenty-second. He was then to pay a flying visit to
+Berlin to receive the new Peruvian Minister and one or two others.
+We went down in the train to Potsdam, von Jagow accompanying us,
+in the morning; and it was arranged that we should return on
+the train leaving Potsdam a little after one o'clock. I think
+that the authorities of the palace expected that I would be with
+the Emperor for a few minutes only, as when I was shown into the
+room where he was, a large room opening from the famous shell
+hall of the palace, the Peruvian Minister and the others to be
+received were standing waiting in that hall.
+
+The Emperor was alone in the room and no one was present at our
+interview. He was dressed in a Hussar uniform of the new field
+grey, the parade uniform of which the frogs and trimmings were
+of gold. A large table in the corner of the room was covered
+with maps, compasses, scales and rulers; and looked as if the
+Emperor there, in company with some of his aides, or possibly
+the chief of staff, had been working out the plan of campaign
+of the German armies.
+
+The Emperor was standing; so, naturally, I stood also; and, according
+to his habit, which is quite Rooseveltian, he stood very close to
+me and talked very earnestly. I was fortunately able to clear
+up two distinct points which he had against America.
+
+The Emperor said that he had read in a German paper that a number
+of submarines built in America for England had crossed the Atlantic
+to England, escorted by ships of the American Navy. I was, of
+course, able to deny this ridiculous story at the time and furnish
+definite proofs later. The Emperor complained because a loan to
+England and France had been floated in America. I said that the
+first loan to a belligerent floated in America was a loan to
+Germany. The Emperor sent for some of his staff and immediately
+inquired into the matter. The members of the staff confirmed my
+statement. The Emperor said that he would not have permitted
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ if he had known, and that
+no gentleman would kill so many women and children. He showed,
+however, great bitterness against the United States and repeatedly
+said, "America had better look out after this war:" and "I shall
+stand no nonsense from America after the war."
+
+The interview lasted about an hour and a quarter, and when I finally
+emerged from the room the officers of the Emperor's household were
+in such a state of agitation that I feel sure they must have
+thought that something fearful had occurred. As I walked rapidly
+towards the door of the palace in order to take the carriage which
+was to drive me to the train, one of them walked along beside
+me saying, "Is it all right? Is it all right?"
+
+The unfortunate diplomats who were to have been received and
+who had been standing all this time outside the door waiting for
+an audience missed their train and their luncheon.
+
+At this interview, the Emperor looked very careworn and seemed
+nervous. When I next saw him, however, which was not until the
+end of April, 1916, he was in much better condition.
+
+I was so fearful in reporting the dangerous part of this interview,
+on account of the many spies not only in my own Embassy but also
+in the State Department, that I sent but a very few words in a
+roundabout way by courier direct to the President.
+
+The year, 1916, opened with this great question still unsettled
+and, in effect, Germany gave notice that after March first, 1916,
+the German submarines would sink all armed merchantmen of the
+enemies of Germany without warning. It is not my place here to
+go into the agitation of this question in America or into the
+history of the votes in Congress, which in fact upheld the policy
+of the President. A proposal as to armed merchantmen was issued by
+our State Department and the position taken in this was apparently
+abandoned at the time of the settlement of the _Sussex_ case
+to which I now refer.
+
+In the latter half of March, 1916, a number of boats having Americans
+on board were torpedoed without warning. These boats were the
+_Eaglejoint_, the _Englishman_, the _Manchester_Engineer_ and the
+_Sussex_. One American was killed or drowned on the _Englishman_,
+but the issue finally came to a head over the torpedoing of the
+channel passenger boat, _Sussex_ which carried passengers between
+Folkstone and Dieppe, France.
+
+On March twenty-fourth the _Sussex_ was torpedoed near the
+coast of France. Four hundred and thirty-six persons, of whom
+seventy-five were Americans, were on board. The captain and a
+number of the passengers saw the torpedo and an endeavour was
+made to avoid it. After the boat was struck the many passengers
+took to the boats. Three Americans were injured and over forty
+persons lost their lives, although the boat was not sunk but
+was towed to Boulogne.
+
+I was instructed to inquire from the German Government as to
+whether a German submarine had sunk the _Sussex_. The Foreign
+Office finally, at my repeated request, called on the Admiralty
+for a report of the torpedoing of the _Sussex_; and finally
+on the tenth of April the German Note was delivered to me. In the
+meantime, and before the delivery of this Note I had been assured
+again and again that the _Sussex_ had not been torpedoed by
+a German submarine. In this Note a rough sketch was enclosed,
+said to have been made by the officer commanding the submarine, of
+a vessel which he admitted he had torpedoed, in the same locality
+where the _Sussex_ had been attacked and at about the same
+time of day. It was said that this boat which was torpedoed was
+a mine layer of the recently built _Arabic_ class and that a
+great explosion which was observed to occur in the torpedoed ship
+warranted the certain conclusion that great amounts of munitions
+were on board. The Note concluded: "The German Government must
+therefore assume that injury to the _Sussex_ was attributable
+to another cause than attack by a German submarine." The Note
+contained an offer to submit any difference of opinion that might
+develop to be investigated by a mixed commission in accordance
+with the Hague Convention of 1907. The _Englishman_ and
+the _Eaglepoint_, it was claimed, were attacked by German
+submarines only after they had attempted to escape, and an
+explanation was given as to the _Manchester_Engineer_. With
+reference to the _Sussex_, the note continued: "Should the
+American Government have at its disposal other material at the
+conclusion of the case of the _Sussex_, the German Government
+would ask that it be communicated, in order to subject this material
+also to investigation."
+
+In the meantime, American naval officers, etc., had been engaged
+in collecting facts as to the sinking of the _Sussex_, and
+this evidence, which seemed overwhelming and, in connection with
+the admissions in the German note, absolutely conclusive, was
+incorporated in the note sent to Germany in which Germany was
+notified: "Unless the Imperial Government should now immediately
+declare and effect abandonment of this present method of submarine
+warfare against passenger and freight carrying vessels, the
+Government of the United States can have no choice but to sever
+diplomatic relations with the German Empire altogether."
+
+The issue was now clearly defined.
+
+I have already spoken of the fact that for a long time there had
+been growing up two parties in Germany. One party headed by von
+Tirpitz in favour of what the Germans called _rucksichtloser_,
+or ruthless submarine war, in which all enemy merchant ships
+were to be sunk without warning, and the party then headed by
+the Chancellor which desired to avoid a conflict with America
+on this issue.
+
+As I have explained in a former chapter, the military have always
+claimed to take a hand in shaping the destinies and foreign policies
+of Germany. When the Germans began to turn their attention to the
+creation of a fleet, von Tirpitz was the man who, in a sense,
+became the leader of the movement and, therefore, the creator of
+the modern navy of Germany. A skilful politician, he for years
+dominated the Reichstag and on the question of submarine warfare
+was most efficiently seconded by the efforts of the Navy League,
+an organization having perhaps one million members throughout
+Germany. Although only one of the three heads of the navy (he
+was Secretary of the Navy), by the force of his personality, by
+the political position which he had created for himself, and by
+the backing of his friends in the Navy League he really dominated
+the other two departments of the navy, the Marine Staff and the
+Marine Cabinet.
+
+Like most Germans of the ruling class, ambition is his only passion.
+These Spartans do not care either for money or for the luxury
+which it brings. Their life is on very simple lines, both in
+the Army and Navy, in order that the officers shall not vie with
+one another in expenditure, and in order that the poorer officers
+and their wives shall not be subject to the humiliation which
+would be caused if they had to live in constant contact with
+brother officers living on a more luxurious footing.
+
+Von Tirpitz' ambition undoubtedly led him to consider himself
+as a promising candidate for Bethmann-Hollweg's shoes. The whole
+submarine issue, therefore, became not only a question of military
+expediency and a question for the Foreign Office to decide in
+connection with the relations of America to Germany, but also a
+question of internal politics, a means of forcing the Chancellor
+out of office. The advocates for the ruthless war were drawn from
+the Navy and from the Army, and those who believed in the use
+of any means of offence against their enemies and particularly
+in the use of any means that would stop the shipment of munitions
+of war to the Allies. The Army and the Navy were joined by the
+Conservatives and by all those who hoped for the fall of the
+Chancellor. The conservative newspapers, and even the Roman Catholic
+newspapers were violent in their call for ruthless submarine war
+as well as violent in their denunciations of the United States
+of America.
+
+American passengers on merchant ships of the enemy were called
+_Schutzengel_ (guardian angels), and caricatures were published,
+such as one which showed the mate reporting to the Captain of
+an English boat that everything was in readiness for sailing
+and the Captain's inquiry, "Are you sure that the American
+_Schutzengel_ is on board?" The numerous notes sent by America
+to Germany also formed a frequent subject of caricature and I
+remember particularly one quite clever one in the paper called
+_Brummer_, representing the celebrations in a German port
+on the arrival of the one hundredth note from America when the
+Mayor of the town and the military, flower girls and singing
+societies and _Turnverein_ were drawn up in welcoming array.
+
+The liberal papers were inclined to support the Chancellor in
+his apparent intention to avoid an open break with America. But
+even the liberal papers were not very strong in their stand.
+
+The military, of course, absolutely despised America and claimed
+that America could do no more harm by declaring war than it was
+doing then to Germany; and that possibly the war preparations
+of America might cut down the amount of the munitions available
+for export to the enemies of the Empire. As to anything that
+America could do in a military way, the Navy and the Army were
+unanimous in saying that as a military or naval factor the United
+States might be considered as less than nothing. This was the
+situation when the last _Sussex_ Note of America brought
+matters to a crisis, and even the crisis itself was considered
+a farce as it had been simmering for so long a period.
+
+I arranged that Colonel House should have an interview with the
+Chancellor at this time, and after dinner one night he had a long
+talk with the Chancellor in which the dangers of the situation
+were pointed out.
+
+With this arrival of the last American _Sussex_ Note, I
+felt that the situation was almost hopeless; that this question
+which had dragged along for so long must now inevitably lead
+to a break of relations and possibly to war. Von Jagow had the
+same idea and said that it was "fate," and that there was nothing
+more to be done. I myself felt that nothing could alter public
+opinion in Germany; that in spite of von Tirpitz' fall, which had
+taken place some time before, the advocates of ruthless submarine
+warfare would win, and that to satisfy them Germany would risk
+a break with America.
+
+I was sitting in my office in a rather dazed and despairing state
+when Professor Ludwig Stein, proprietor of a magazine called
+_North_and_South_ and a writer of special articles on Germany's
+foreign relations for the _Vossische_Zeitung_, under the
+name of "Diplomaticus," called to see me.
+
+He informed me that he thought the situation was not yet hopeless,
+that there was still a large party of reasonable men in Germany
+and that he thought much good could be done if I should go to
+the great general headquarters and have a talk with the Kaiser,
+who, he informed me, was reported to be against a break.
+
+I told Dr. Stein that, of course, I was perfectly willing to
+go if there was the slightest chance of preventing war; and I
+also told the Chancellor that if he was going to decide this
+question in favor of peace it would be possibly easier for him
+if the decision was arrived at under the protection, as it were,
+of the Emperor; or that, if the decision lay with the Emperor,
+I might possibly be able to help in convincing him if I had an
+opportunity to lay the American side of the case before him. I
+said, moreover, that I was ready at any time on short notice
+to proceed to the Emperor's headquarters.
+
+Dr. Hecksher, a member of the Reichstag, who must be classed
+among the reasonable men of Germany, also advocated my speaking
+directly to the Kaiser.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MAINLY COMMERCIAL
+
+Nothing surprised me more, as the war developed, than the discovery
+of the great variety and amount of goods exported from Germany to
+the United States.
+
+Goods sent from the United States to Germany are mainly prime
+materials: approximately one hundred and sixty million dollars a
+year of cotton; seventy-five million dollars of copper; fifteen
+millions of wheat; twenty millions of animal fats; ten millions
+of mineral oil and a large amount of vegetable oil. Of course,
+the amount of wheat is especially variable. Some manufactured
+goods from America also find their way to Germany to the extent
+of perhaps seventy millions a year, comprising machinery such as
+typewriters and a miscellaneous line of machinery and manufactures.
+The principal exports from Germany to America consist of dye
+stuffs and chemical dyes, toys, underwear, surgical instruments,
+cutlery, stockings, knit goods, etc., and a raw material called
+potash, also known as kali. The last is a mineral found nowhere
+in the world except in Germany and a few places in Austria. Potash
+is essential to the manufacture of many fertilizers, fertilizer
+being composed as a rule of potash, phosphates and nitrates.
+The nitrates in past years have been exported to all countries
+from Chile. Phosphate rock is mined in South Carolina and Florida
+and several other places in the world. Curiously enough, both
+nitrates and potash are essential ingredients also of explosives
+used in war. Since the war, the German supply from Chile was
+cut off; but the Germans, following a system used in Norway for
+many years before the war, established great electrical plants
+for the extraction of nitrates from the atmosphere. Since the
+war, American agriculture has suffered for want of potash and
+German agriculture has suffered for want of phosphates, possibly
+of nitrates also; because I doubt whether sufficient nitrogen
+is extracted from the air in Germany to provide for more than
+the needs of the explosive industry.
+
+The dyestuff industry had been developed to such a point in Germany
+that Germany supplied the whole world. In the first months of the
+war some enterprising Americans, headed by Herman Metz, chartered
+a boat, called _The_Matanzas_, and sent it to Rotterdam
+where it was loaded with a cargo of German dyestuffs. Th boat
+sailed under the American flag and was not interfered with by
+the English. Later on the German Department of the Interior,
+at whose head was Delbruck, refused to allow dyestuffs to leave
+Germany except in exchange for cotton, and, finally, the export of
+dyestuffs from Germany ceased and other countries were compelled
+to take up the question of manufacture. This state of affairs
+may lead to the establishment of the industry permanently in the
+United States, although that industry will require protection
+for some years, as, undoubtedly, Germany in her desperate effort
+to regain a monopoly of this trade will be ready to spend enormous
+sums in order to undersell the American manufacturers and drive
+them out of business.
+
+The commercial submarines, _Deutschland_ and _Bremen_,
+were to a great extent built with money furnished by the dyestuff
+manufacturers, who hoped that by sending dyestuffs in this way to
+America they could prevent the development of the industry there.
+I had many negotiations with the Foreign Office with reference
+to this question of dyestuffs.
+
+The export of toys from Germany to the United States forms a
+large item in the bill which we pay annually to Germany. Many
+of these toys are manufactured by the people in their own homes
+in the picturesque district known as the Black Forest. Of course,
+the war cut off, after a time, the export of toys from Germany;
+and the American child, having in the meantime learned to be
+satisfied with some other article, his little brother will demand
+this very article next Christmas, and thus, after the war, Germany
+will find that much of this trade has been permanently lost.
+
+Just as the textile trade of the United States was dependent upon
+the German dyestuffs for colours, so the sugar beet growers of
+America were dependent upon Germany for their seed. I succeeded,
+with the able assistance of the consul at Magdeburg and Mr. Winslow
+of my staff, in getting shipments of beet seed out of Germany. I
+have heard since that these industries too, are being developed
+in America, and seed obtained from other countries, such as Russia.
+
+Another commodity upon which a great industry in the United States
+and Mexico depends is cyanide. The discovery of the cyanide process
+of treating gold and silver ores permitted the exploitation of
+many mines which could not be worked under the older methods.
+At the beginning of the war there was a small manufactory of
+cyanide owned by Germans at Perth Amboy and Niagara Falls, but
+most of the cyanide used was imported from Germany. The American
+German Company and the companies manufacturing in Germany and
+in England all operated under the same patents, the English and
+German companies having working agreements as to the distribution
+of business throughout the world.
+
+The German Vice-Chancellor and head of the Department of the
+Interior, Delbruck, put an export prohibition on cyanide early in
+the war; and most pigheadedly and obstinately claimed that cyanide
+was manufactured nowhere but in Germany, and that, therefore, if
+he allowed cyanide to leave Germany for the United States or
+Mexico the English would capture it and would use it to work
+South African mines, thus adding to the stock of gold and power
+in war of the British Empire. It was a long time before the German
+manufacturers and I could convince this gentleman that cyanide
+sufficient to supply all the British mines was manufactured near
+Glasgow, Scotland. He then reluctantly gave a permit for the
+export of a thousand tons of cyanide; and its arrival in the
+United States permitted many mines there and in Mexico to continue
+operations, and saved many persons from being thrown out of
+employment. When Delbruck finally gave a permit for the export
+of four thousand tons more of cyanide, the psychological moment
+had passed and we could not obtain through our State Department
+a pass from the British.
+
+I am convinced that Delbruck made a great tactical mistake on
+behalf of the German Government when he imposed this prohibition
+against export of goods to America. Many manufacturers of textiles,
+the users of dyestuffs, medicines, seeds and chemicals in all forms,
+were clamouring for certain goods and chemicals from Germany. But it
+was the prohibition against export by the Germans which prevented
+their receiving these goods. If it had been the British blockade
+alone a cry might have arisen in the United States against this
+blockade which might have materially changed the international
+situation.
+
+The Germans also refused permission for the export of potash
+from Germany. They hoped thereby to induce the United States
+to break the British blockade, and offered cargoes of potash
+in exchange for cargoes of cotton or cargoes of foodstuffs. The
+Germans claimed that potash was used in the manufacture of munitions
+and that, therefore, in no event would they permit the export
+unless the potash was consigned to the American Government, with
+guarantees against its use except in the manufacture of fertilizer,
+this to be checked up by Germans appointed as inspectors. All
+these negotiations, however, fell through and no potash has been
+exported from Germany to the United States since the commencement
+of the war. Enough potash, however, is obtained in the United
+States for munition purposes from the burning of seaweed on the
+Pacific Coast, from the brines in a lake in Southern California
+and from a rock called alunite in Utah. Potash is also obtainable
+from feldspar, but I do not know whether any plant has been
+established for its production from this rock. I recently heard
+of the arrival of some potash from a newly discovered field in
+Brazil, and there have been rumours of its discovery in Spain.
+I do not know how good this Spanish and Brazilian potash is, and
+I suppose the German potash syndicate will immediately endeavour
+to control these fields in order to hold the potash trade of the
+world in its grip.
+
+It was a long time after the commencement of the war before England
+declared cotton a contraband. I think this was because of the fear
+of irritating the United States; but, in the meantime, Germany
+secured a great quantity of cotton, which, of course, was used or
+stored for the manufacture of powder. Since the cotton imports
+have been cut off the Germans claim that they are manufacturing
+a powder equally good by using wood pulp. Of course, I have not
+been able to verify this, absolutely.
+
+Germany had endeavoured before the war in every way to keep American
+goods out of the German markets, and even the Prussian state
+railways are used, as I have shown in the article where I speak
+of the attempt to establish an oil monopoly in Germany, in order
+to discriminate against American mineral oils. This same method
+has been applied to other articles such as wood, which otherwise
+might be imported from America and in some cases regulations
+as to the inspection of meat, etc., have proved more effective
+in keeping American goods out of the market than a prohibitive
+tariff.
+
+The meat regulation is that each individual package of meat must
+be opened and inspected; and, of course, when a sausage has been
+individually made to sit up and bark no one desires it as an
+article of food thereafter. American apples were also discriminated
+against in the custom regulations of Germany. Nor could I induce
+the German Government to change their tariff on canned salmon,
+an article which would prove a welcome addition to the German diet.
+
+The German workingman, undoubtedly the most exploited and fooled
+workingman in the world, is compelled not only to work for low
+wages and for long hours, but to purchase his food at rates fixed
+by the German tariff made for the benefit of the Prussian Junkers
+and landowners.
+
+Of course, the Prussian Junkers excuse the imposition of the
+tariff on food and the regulations made to prevent the entry
+of foodstuffs on the ground that German agriculture must be
+encouraged, first, in order to enable the population to subsist
+in time of war and blockade; and, secondly, in order to encourage
+the peasant class which furnishes the most solid soldiers to
+the Imperial armies.
+
+The nations and business men of the world will have to face after
+the war a new condition which we may call socialized buying and
+socialized selling.
+
+Not long after the commencement of the war the Germans placed a
+prohibitive tariff upon the import of certain articles of luxury
+such as perfumes; their object, of course, being to keep the
+German people from sending money out of the country and wasting
+their money in useless expenditures. At the same time a great
+institution was formed called the Central Einkauf Gesellschaft.
+This body, formed under government auspices of men appointed from
+civil life, is somewhat similar to one of our national defence
+boards. Every import of raw material into Germany falls into the
+hands of this central buying company, and if a German desires
+to buy any raw material for use in his factory he must buy it
+through this central board.
+
+I have talked with members of this board and they all unite in
+the belief that this system will be continued after the war.
+
+For instance, if a man in Germany wishes to buy an automobile
+or a pearl necklace or a case of perfumery, he will be told,
+"You can buy this if you can buy it in Germany. But if you have
+to send to America for the automobile, if you have to send to
+Paris for the pearls or the perfumery, you cannot buy them."
+In this way the gold supply of Germany will be husbanded and
+the people will either be prevented from making comparatively
+useless expenditures or compelled to spend money to benefit home
+industry.
+
+On the other hand, when a man desires to buy some raw material,
+for example, copper, cotton, leather, wheat or something of that
+kind, he will not be allowed to buy abroad on his own hook. The
+Central Einkauf Gesellschaft will see that all those desiring to
+buy cotton or copper put in their orders on or before a certain
+date. When the orders are all in, the quantities called for will
+be added up by this central board; and then one man, representing
+the board, will be in a position to go to America to purchase
+the four million bales of cotton or two hundred million pounds
+of copper.
+
+The German idea is that this one board will be able to force the
+sellers abroad to compete against each other in their eagerness
+to sell. The one German buyer will know about the lowest price at
+which the sellers can sell their product. By the buyer's standing
+out alone with this great order the Germans believe that the
+sellers, one by one, will fall into his hands and sell their
+product at a price below that which they could obtain if the
+individual sellers of America were meeting the individual buyers
+of Germany in the open market.
+
+When the total amount of the commodity ordered has been purchased,
+it will be divided up among the German buyers who put in their
+orders with the central company, each order being charged with
+its proportionate share of the expenses of the commission and,
+possibly, an additional sum for the benefit of the treasury of
+the Empire.
+
+Before the war a German manufacturer took me over his great factory
+where fifteen thousand men and women were employed, showed me
+great quantities of articles made from copper, and said: "We buy
+this copper in America and we get it a cent and a half a pound
+less than we should pay for it because our government permits us
+to combine for the purpose of buying, but your government does
+not allow your people to combine for the purpose of selling.
+You have got lots of silly people who become envious of the rich
+and pass laws to prevent combination, which is the logical
+development of all industry."
+
+The government handling of exchange during the war was another
+example of the use of the centralised power of the Government
+for the benefit of the whole nation.
+
+In the first year of the war, when I desired money to spend in
+Germany, I drew a check on my bank in New York in triplicate
+and sent a clerk with it to the different banks in Berlin, to
+obtain bids in marks, selling it then, naturally, to the highest
+bidder. But soon the Government stepped in. The Imperial Bank
+was to fix a daily rate of exchange, and banks and individuals
+were forbidden to buy or sell at a different rate. That this
+fixed rate was a false one, fixed to the advantage of Germany, I
+proved at the time when the German official rate was 5.52 marks
+for a dollar, by sending my American checks to Holland, buying
+Holland money with them and German money with the Holland money,
+in this manner obtaining 5.74 marks for each dollar. And just
+before leaving Germany I sold a lot of American gold to a German
+bank at the rate of 6.42 marks per dollar, although on that day
+the official rate was 5.52 and although the buyer of the gold,
+because the export of gold was forbidden, would have to lose
+interest on the money paid me or on the gold purchased, until
+the end of the war. What the Germans thought of the value of
+the mark is shown by this transaction.
+
+The only thing that can maintain a fair price after the war for
+the products of American firms, miners and manufacturers is
+permission to combine for selling abroad. There is before Congress
+a bill called the Webb Bill permitting those engaged in export
+trade to combine, and this bill, which is manifestly for the
+benefit of the American producer of raw materials and foods and
+manufactured articles, should be passed.
+
+It was also part of our commercial work to secure permits for
+the exportation from Belgium of American owned goods seized by
+Germany. We succeeded in a number of cases in getting these goods
+released. In other cases, the American owned property was taken
+over by the government, but the American owners were compensated
+for the loss.
+
+Germany took over belligerent property and put it in the hands
+of receivers. In all cases where the majority of the stock of a
+German corporation was owned by another corporation or individuals
+of belligerent nationality, the German corporation was placed in
+the hands of a receiver. The German Government, however, would
+not allow the inquiry into the stock ownership to go further than
+the first holding corporation. There were many cases where the
+majority of the stock of a German corporation was owned by an
+English corporation and the majority of the stock of the English
+corporation, in turn, owned by an American corporation or by
+Americans. In this case the German Government refused to consider
+the American ownership of the English stock, and put the German
+company under government control.
+
+With the low wages paid to very efficient workingmen who worked
+for long hours and with no laws against combination, it was always
+a matter of surprise to me that the Germans who were in the process
+of getting all the money in the world should have allowed their
+military autocracy to drive them into war.
+
+I am afraid that, after this war, if we expect to keep a place for
+our trade in the world, we may have to revise some of our ideas as
+to so-called trusts and the Sherman Law. Trusts or combinations
+are not only permitted, but even encouraged in Germany. They are
+known there as "cartels" and the difference between the American
+trust and the German cartel is that the American trust has, as
+it were, a centralised government permanently taking over and
+combining the competing elements in any given business, while in
+Germany the competing elements form a combination by contract for
+a limited number of years. This combination is called a cartel
+and during these years each member of the cartel is assigned a
+given amount of the total production and given a definite share
+of the profits of the combination. The German cartel, therefore,
+as Consul General Skinner aptly said, may be likened to a
+confederation existing by contract for a limited period of time
+and subject to renewal only at the will of its members.
+
+It may be that competition is a relic of barbarism and that one
+of the first signs of a higher civilisation is an effort to modify
+the stress of competition. The debates of Congress tend to show
+that, in enacting the Sherman Law, Congress did not intend to forbid
+the restraint of competition among those in the same business but
+only intended to prohibit the forming of a combination by those
+who, combined, would have a monopoly of a particular business or
+product. It is easy to see why all the coal mines in the country
+should be prohibited from combining; but it is not easy to see
+why certain people engaged in the tobacco business should be
+prohibited from taking their competitors into their combination,
+because tobacco is a product which could be raised upon millions
+of acres of our land and cannot be made the subject of a monopoly.
+
+The German courts have expressly said that if prices are so low
+that the manufacturers of a particular article see financial
+ruin ahead, a formation of a cartel by them must be looked upon
+as a justified means of self-preservation. The German laws are
+directed to the end to which it seems to be such laws should
+logically be directed; namely, to the prevention of unfair
+competition.
+
+So long as the question of monopoly is not involved, competition
+can always be looked for when a combination is making too great
+profits; and the new and competing corporation and individuals
+should be protected by law against the danger of price cutting
+for the express purpose of driving the new competitor out of
+business. However, it must be remembered that a combination acting
+unfairly in competition may be more oppressive than a monopoly.
+I myself am not convinced by the arguments of either side. It
+is a matter for the most serious study.
+
+The object of the American trust has been to destroy its competitors.
+The object of the German cartel to force its competitors to join the
+cartel.
+
+In fact the government in Germany becomes part of these cartels
+and takes an active hand in them, as witness the participation
+of the German Government in the potash syndicate, when contracts
+made by certain American buyers with German mines were cancelled
+and all the potash producing mines of Germany and Austria forced
+into one confederation; and witness the attempt by the government,
+which I have described in another chapter, to take over and
+make a monopoly of the wholesale and retail oil business of the
+country.
+
+The recent closer combination of dyestuff industries of Germany,
+with the express purpose of meeting and destroying American
+competition after the war, is interesting as showing German methods.
+For a number of years the dye-stuff industry of Germany was
+practically controlled by six great companies, some of these
+companies employing as high as five hundred chemists in research
+work. In 1916 these six companies made an agreement looking to a
+still closer alliance not only for the distribution of the product
+but also for the distribution of ideas and trade secrets. For
+years, these great commercial companies supplied all the countries
+of the world not only with dyestuffs and other chemical products
+but also with medicines discovered by their chemists and made
+from coal tar; which, although really nothing more than patent
+medicines, were put upon the market as new and great and beneficial
+discoveries in medicine. The Badische Anilin and Soda Fabrik,
+with a capital of fifty-four million marks has paid dividends
+in the ten years from 1903 to 1913, averaging over twenty-six
+per cent.
+
+The Farbwerke Meister Lucius und Bruning at Hoeckst, near Frankfort,
+during the same period, with a capital of fifty million marks,
+has paid dividends averaging over twenty-seven per cent; and
+the chemical works of Bayer and Company, near Cologne, during
+the same period with a capital of fifty-four millions of marks
+has paid dividends averaging over thirty per cent.
+
+Much of the commercial success of the Germans during the last
+forty years is due to the fact that each manufacturer, each
+discoverer in Germany, each exporter knew that the whole weight
+and power of the Government was behind him in his efforts to
+increase his business. On the other hand, in America, business
+men have been terrorized, almost into inaction, by constant
+prosecutions. What was a crime in one part of the United States,
+under one Circuit Court of Appeals, was a perfectly legitimate
+act in another.
+
+If we have to meet the intense competition of Germany after the
+war, we have got to view all these problems from new angles. For
+instance, there is the question of free ports. Representative
+Murray Hulbert has introduced, in the House of Representatives, a
+resolution directing the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary
+of War and the Secretary of Commerce to report to Congress as
+to the advisability of the establishment of free ports within
+the limits of the established customs of the United States.
+Free ports exist in Germany and have existed for a long time,
+although Germany is a country with a protective tariff. In a
+free port raw goods are manufactured and then exported, of course
+to the advantage of the country permitting the establishment of
+free ports, because by this manufacture of raw materials and
+their re-export, without being subject to duty, money is earned
+by the manufacturers to the benefit of their own country and
+employment is given to many workingmen. This, of course, improves
+the condition of these workingmen and of all others in the country;
+as it is self-evident that the employment of each workingman in
+an industry, which would not exist except for the existence of
+the free port, withdraws that workingman from the general labour
+market and, therefore, benefits the position of his remaining
+fellow labourers.
+
+Although free ports do not exist in the United States, an attempt
+has been made to give certain industries, by means of what are
+known as "drawbacks," the same benefit that they would enjoy
+were free ports existant in our country.
+
+Thus the refiners of raw sugar from Cuba pay a duty on this sugar
+when it enters the United States, but receive this duty back when
+a corresponding amount of refined sugar is exported to other
+countries.
+
+There has lately been an attack made upon this system in the
+case, however, of the sugar refiners only, and the question has
+been treated in some newspapers as if these refiners were obtaining
+some unfair advantage from the government, whereas, as a matter
+of fact, the allowance of these "drawbacks" enables the sugar
+refiners to carry on the refining of the sugar for export much
+as they would if their refineries existed in free ports modelled
+on the German system.
+
+The repeal of the provision of allowing "drawbacks" in this and
+other industries will probably send the industries to Canada or
+some other territory where this system, equivalent to the free
+port, is permitted to exist.
+
+A few days before I left Germany I had a conversation with a
+manufacturer of munitions who employs about eighteen thousand
+people in his factories, which, before the war, manufactured
+articles other than munitions. I asked him how the government
+treated the manufacturers of munitions, and he said that they
+were allowed to make good profits, although they had to pay out
+a great proportion of these profits in the form of taxes on their
+excess or war profits; that the government desired to encourage
+manufacturers to turn their factories into factories for the
+manufacture of all articles in the war and required by the nation
+in sustaining war; and that the manufacturers would do this provided
+that it were only a question as to how much of their profits
+they would be allowed to keep, but that if the Government had
+attempted to fix prices so low that there would have been a doubt
+as to whether the manufacturer could make a profit or not, the
+production of articles required for war would never have reached
+the high mark that it had in Germany.
+
+As a matter of fact, about the only tax imposed in Germany since
+the outbreak of the war has been the tax upon cost or war profits.
+It has been the policy of Germany to pay for the war by great
+loans raised by popular subscription, after authorisation by the
+Reichstag. I calculate that the amounts thus raised, together
+with the floating indebtedness, amount to date to about eighty
+billions of marks.
+
+For a long time the Germans expected that the expenses of the
+war would be paid from the indemnities to be recovered by Germany
+from the nations at war with it.
+
+Helfferich shadowed this forth in his speech in the Reichstag,
+on August 20, 1915, when he said: "If we wish to have the power
+to settle the terms of peace according to our interests and our
+requirements, then we must not forget the question of cost. We
+must have in view that the whole future activity of our people,
+so far as this is at all possible, shall be free from burdens.
+The leaden weight of billions has been earned by the instigators
+of this war, and in the future they, rather than we, will drag
+it about after them."
+
+Of course, by "instigators of the war" Helfferich meant the opponents
+of Germany, but I think that unconsciously he was a true prophet
+and that the "leaden weight of the billions" which this war has
+cost Germany will be dragged about after the war by Germany,
+the real instigator of this world calamity.
+
+In December, 1915, Helfferich voiced the comfortable plea that,
+because the Germans were spending their money raised by the war
+loans in Germany, the weight of these loans was not a real weight
+upon the German people. He said: "We are paying the money almost
+exclusively to ourselves; while the enemy is paying its loans
+abroad--a guarantee that in the future we shall maintain the
+advantage."
+
+This belief of the Germans and Helfferich is one of the notable
+fallacies of the war. The German war loans have been subscribed
+mainly by the great companies of Germany; by the Savings Banks,
+the Banks, the Life and Fire Insurance and Accident Insurance
+Companies, etc.
+
+Furthermore, these loans have been pyramided; that is to say,
+a man who subscribed and paid for one hundred thousand marks
+of loan number one could, when loan number two was called for,
+take the bonds he had bought of loan number one to his bank and
+on his agreement to spend the proceeds in subscribing to loan
+number two, borrow from the bank eighty thousand marks on the
+security of his first loan bonds, and so on.
+
+There is an annual increment, not easily ascertainable with
+exactness, but approximately ascertainable to the wealth of every
+country in the world. Just as when a man is working a farm there
+is in normal years an increment or accretion of wealth or income
+to him above the cost of the production of the products of the
+soil which he sells, there is such an annual increment to the
+wealth of each country taken as a whole. Some experts have told
+me they calculated that, at the outside, in prosperous peace times
+the annual increment of German wealth is ten billion marks.
+
+Now when we have the annual interest to be paid by Germany exceeding
+the annual increment of the country, the social and even moral
+bankruptcy of the country must ensue. If repudiation of the loan
+or any part of it is then forced, the loss naturally falls upon
+those who have taken the loan. The working-man or small capitalist,
+who put all his savings in the war loan, is without support for his
+old age, and so with the man who took insurance in the Insurance
+Companies or put his savings in a bank. If that bank becomes
+bankrupt through repudiation of the war loan, you then have the
+country in a position where the able-bodied are all working to
+pay what they can towards the interest of the government loan,
+after earning enough to keep themselves and their families alive;
+and the old and the young, without support and deprived of their
+savings, become mere poor-house burdens on the community.
+
+Already the mere interest of the war loan of Germany amounts to
+four billions of marks a year; to this must be added, of course,
+the interest of the previous indebtedness of the country and
+of each political subdivision thereof, including cities, all
+of which have added to their before-the-war debt, by incurring
+great debts to help the destitute in this war; and, of course,
+to all this must be added the expenses of the administration
+of the government and the maintenance of the army and navy.
+
+It is the contemplation of this state of affairs, when he is
+convinced that indemnities are not to be exacted from other
+countries, that will do most to persuade the average intelligent
+German business man that peace must be had at any cost.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+WORK FOR THE GERMANS
+
+The interests of Germany in France, England and Russia were placed
+with our American Ambassadors in these countries. This, of course,
+entailed much work upon our Embassy, because we were the medium of
+communication between the German Government and these Ambassadors.
+I found it necessary to establish a special department to look
+after these matters. At its head was Barclay Rives who had been
+for many years in our diplomatic service and who joined my Embassy
+at the beginning of the war. First Secretary of our Embassy in
+Vienna for ten or twelve years, he spoke German perfectly and
+was acquainted with many Germans and Austrians. Inquiries about
+Germans who were prisoners, negotiations relative to the treatment
+of German prisoners, and so on, came under this department.
+
+One example will show the nature of this work. When the Germans
+invaded France, a German cavalry patrol with two officers, von
+Schierstaedt and Count Schwerin, and several men penetrated as
+far as the forest of Fontainebleau, south of Paris. There they got
+out of touch with the German forces and wandered about for days in
+the forest. In the course of their wanderings they requisitioned
+some food from the inhabitants, and took, I believe, an old coat
+for one of the officers who had lost his, and requisitioned a
+wagon to carry a wounded man. After their surrender to the French,
+the two officers were tried by a French court martial, charged
+with pillaging and sentenced to be degraded from their rank and
+transported to Cayenne (the Devil's Island of the Dreyfus case).
+The Germans made strong representations, and our very skilled
+Ambassador in Paris, the Honourable William C. Sharp, took up
+the matter with the Foreign Office and succeeded in preventing
+the transportation of the officers. The sending of the officers
+and men, however, into a military prison where they were treated
+as convicts caused great indignation throughout Germany. The
+officers had many and powerful connections in their own country
+who took up their cause. There were bitter articles in the German
+press and caricatures and cartoons were published.
+
+I sent Mr. Rives to Paris and told him not to leave until he
+had seen these officers. He remained in Paris some weeks and
+finally through Mr. Sharp obtained permission to visit the officers
+in the military prison. Later the French showed a tendency to
+be lenient in this case, but it was hard to find a way for the
+French Government to back down gracefully. Schierstaedt having
+become insane in the meantime, a very clever way out of the
+difficulty was suggested, I believe by Mr. Sharp. Schierstaedt
+having been found to be insane was presumably insane at the time
+of the patrol's wandering in the forest of Fontainebleau. As he
+was the senior officer, the other officer and the men under him
+were not responsible for obeying his commands. The result was
+that Schwerin and the men of the patrol were put in a regular
+prison camp and Schierstaedt was very kindly sent by the French
+back to Germany, where he recovered his reason sufficiently to
+be able to come and thank me for the efforts made on his behalf.
+
+I made every endeavour so far as it lay in my power to oblige
+the Germans. We helped them in the exchange of prisoners and
+the care of German property in enemy countries.
+
+There were rumours in Berlin that Germans taken as prisoners in
+German African Colonies were forced to work in the sun, watched
+and beaten by coloured guards. This was taken up by one of the
+Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg who had been Governor of Togoland
+and who also took great interest in sending clothes, etc., to
+these prisoners. Germany demanded that the prisoners in Africa
+be sent to a more temperate climate.
+
+Another royalty who was busied with prisoners' affairs was Prince
+Max of Baden. He is heir to the throne of Baden, although not a
+son of the reigning Duke. He is very popular and, for my part,
+I admire him greatly. He travels with Emerson's essays in his
+pocket and keeps up with the thought and progress of all countries.
+Baden will be indeed happy in having such a ruler. Prince Max was
+a man so reasonable, so human, that I understand that von Jagow
+was in favour of putting him at the head of a central department
+for prisoners of war. I agreed with von Jagow that in such case
+all would go smoothly and humanely. Naturally, von Jagow could
+only mildly hint at the desirability of this appointment. A prince,
+heir to one of the thrones of Germany, with the rank of General
+in the army, he seemed ideally fitted for such a position, but
+unfortunately the opposition of the army and, particularly, of
+the representative corps commanders was so great that von Jagow
+told me the plan was impossible of realisation. I am sure if
+Prince Max had been at the head of such a department, Germany
+would not now be suffering from the odium of mistreating its
+prisoners and that the two million prisoners of war in Germany
+would not return to their homes imbued with an undying hate.
+
+Prince Max was very helpful in connection with the American mission
+to Russia for German prisoners which I had organised and which I
+have described in the chapter on war charities.
+
+All complaints made by the Imperial Government with reference
+to the treatment of German prisoners, and so forth, in enemy
+countries were first given to me and transmitted by our Embassy
+to the American Ambassadors having charge of German interests
+in enemy countries. All this, with the correspondence ensuing,
+made a great amount of clerical work.
+
+I think that every day I received one or more Germans, who were
+anxious about prisoner friends, making inquiries, and wishing
+to consult me on business matters in the United States, etc.
+All of these people showed gratitude for what we were able to
+do for them, but their gratitude was only a drop in the ocean
+of officially inspired hatred of America.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WAR CHARITIES
+
+As soon as the war was declared and millions of men marched forward
+intent upon killing, hundreds of men and women immediately took up
+the problem of helping the soldiers, the wounded and the prisoners
+and of caring for those left behind by the men who had gone to
+the front.
+
+The first war charity to come under my observation was the American
+Red Cross. Two units containing three doctors and about twelve
+nurses, each, were sent to Germany by the American National Red
+Cross. Before their arrival I took up with the German authorities
+the questions as to whether these would be accepted and where
+they would be placed. The German authorities accepted the units
+and at first decided to send one to each front. The young man
+assigned to the West front was Goldschmidt Rothschild, one of the
+last descendants of the great Frankfort family of Rothschild. He
+had been attached to the German Embassy in London before the war.
+The one assigned to the unit for the East front was Count Helie
+de Talleyrand. Both of these young men spoke English perfectly
+and were chosen for that reason, and both have many friends in
+England and America.
+
+Talleyrand was of a branch of the celebrated Talleyrand family and
+possessed German citizenship. During the Napoleonic era the great
+Talleyrand married one of his nephews to a Princess of Courland
+who, with her sister, was joint heiress of the principality of
+Sagan in Germany. The share of the other sister was bought by
+the sister who married young Talleyrand, and the descendants of
+that union became princes of Sagan and held the Italian title
+of Duke de Dino and the French title of Duke de Valencay.
+
+Some of the descendants of this nephew of the great Talleyrand
+remained in Germany, and this young Talleyrand, assigned to the
+Red Cross unit, belonged to that branch. Others settled in France,
+and among these was the last holder of the title and the Duke
+de Dino, who married, successively, two Americans, Miss Curtis
+and Mrs. Sampson. It was a custom in this family that the holder
+of the principal title, that of the Prince of Sagan, allowed
+the next two members in succession to bear the titles of Duke
+de Dino and Duke de Valencay. Before the last Prince of Sagan
+died in France, his son Helie married the American, Anna Gould,
+who had divorced the Count Castellane. On the death of his father
+and in accordance with the statutes of the House of Sagan the
+members of the family who were German citizens held a family
+council and, with the approval of the Emperor of Germany, passed
+over the succession from Anna Gould's husband to her son, so
+that her son has now the right to the title and not his father,
+but the son must become a German citizen at his majority.
+
+The younger brother of the husband of Anna Gould bears the title
+of Duke de Valencay and is the divorced husband of the daughter
+of Levi P. Morton, formerly Vice-President of the United States.
+This young Talleyrand to whom I have referred and who was assigned
+to the American Red Cross unit, although he was a German by
+nationality, did not wish to fight in this war against France in
+which country he had so many friends and relations and, therefore,
+this assignment to the American Red Cross was most welcome to
+him.
+
+On the arrival of the American doctors and nurses in Berlin,
+it was decided to send both units to the East front and to put
+one in the small Silesian town of Gleiwitz and the other in
+the neighbouring town of Kosel. Count Talleyrand went with these
+two units, Goldschmidt Rothschild being attached to the Prussian
+Legation in Munich.
+
+We had a reception in the Embassy for these doctors and nurses
+which was attended by Prince Hatzfeld, Duke of Trachenberg, who
+was head of the German Red Cross, and other Germans interested
+in this line of work. The Gleiwitz and Kosel units remained in
+these towns for about a year until the American Red Cross withdrew
+its units from Europe.
+
+At about the time of the withdrawal of these units, I had heard
+much of the sufferings of German prisoners in Russia. I had many
+conversations with Zimmermann of the German Foreign Office and
+Prince Hatzfeld on this question, as well as with Prince Max
+of Baden, the heir presumptive to the throne of that country;
+and I finally arranged that such of these American doctors and
+nurses as volunteered should be sent to Russia to do what they
+could for the German prisoners of war there. Nine doctors and
+thirty-eight nurses volunteered. They were given a great reception
+in Berlin, the German authorities placed a large credit in the
+hands of this mission, and, after I had obtained through our
+State Department the consent of the Russian Government for the
+admission of the mission, it started from Berlin for Petrograd.
+The German authorities and the Germans, as a whole, were very
+much pleased with this arrangement. Officers of the Prussian army
+were present at the departure of the trains and gave flowers to
+all the nurses. It is very unfortunate that after their arrival
+in Russia this mission was hampered in every way, and had the
+greatest difficulty in obtaining permission to do any work at
+all. Many of them, however, managed to get in positions where
+they assisted the German prisoners. For instance, in one town
+where there were about five thousand Germans who had been sent
+there to live one of our doctors managed to get appointed as
+city physician and, aided by several of the American nurses,
+was able to do a great work for the German population. Others of
+our nurses managed to get as far as Tomsk in Siberia and others
+were scattered through the Russian Empire.
+
+Had this mission under Dr. Snoddy been able to carry out its
+work as originally planned, it would not only have done much
+good to the German prisoners of war, but would have helped a
+great deal to do away with the bitter feeling entertained by
+Germans towards Americans. Even with the limited opportunity given
+this mission, it undoubtedly materially helped the prisoners.
+
+On arriving in Berlin on their way home to America from Gleiwitz
+and Kosel, the doctors and nurses of these American units were
+all awarded the German Red Cross Order of the second class and
+those who had been in Austria were similarly decorated by the
+Austro-Hungarian Government.
+
+Among those who devoted themselves to works of charity during
+this war no one stands higher than Herbert C. Hoover.
+
+I cannot find words to express my admiration for this man whose
+great talents for organisation were placed at the service of
+humanity. Every one knows of what he accomplished in feeding the
+inhabitants of Belgium and Northern France. Mr. Hoover asked me
+to become one of the chairmen of the International Commission for
+the Relief of Belgium and I was happy to have the opportunity in
+Berlin to second his efforts. There was considerable business in
+connection with the work of the commission. I had many interviews
+with those in authority with reference to getting their ships
+through, etc. Mr. Hoover and I called on the Chancellor and
+endeavoured to get him to remit the fine of forty million francs
+a month which the Germans had imposed upon Belgium. This, however,
+the Chancellor refused to do. Later on in April, 1915, I was
+able as an eye-witness to see how efficiently Mr. Hoover's
+organisation fed, in addition to the people of Belgium, the French
+population in that part of Northern France in the occupation of
+the Germans.
+
+Mr. Hoover surrounded himself with an able staff, Mr. Vernon
+Kellogg and others, and in America men like Mr. A. J. Hemphill
+were his devoted supporters.
+
+Early in 1915, Mr. Ernest P. Bicknell, who had first come to
+Germany representing the American Red Cross, returned representing
+not only that organisation but also the Rockefeller Foundation. With
+him was Mr. Wickliffe Rose, also of the Rockefeller Foundation;
+and with these two gentlemen I took up the question of the relief
+of Poland. Mr. Rose and Mr. Bicknell together visited Poland and
+saw with their own eyes the necessity for relief. A meeting was
+held in the Reichstag attended by Prince Hatzfeld of the German
+Red Cross, Director Guttmann, of the Dresdener Bank, Geheimrat
+Lewald, of the Imperial Ministry of the Interior, representing the
+German Government, and many others connected with the government,
+military and financial interests of Germany.
+
+The Commission for the Relief in Poland, of which I was to be
+chairman, was organised and included the Spanish Ambassador,
+His Excellency the Bishop of Posen, the Prince Bishop of Cracow,
+Jacob H. Schiff of New York, and others. Messrs. Warwick, Greene
+and Wadsworth were to take up the actual executive work.
+
+In conjunction with Messrs. Rose and Bicknell, I drew up a sort
+of treaty, having particularly in mind certain difficulties
+encountered by the American Relief Commission in Belgium. The
+main point in this treaty was that the German Government agreed
+not to requisition either food or money within the limits of the
+territory to be relieved, which territory comprised that part
+of Poland within German occupation up to within, as I recall it,
+fifty kilometres of the firing line. The one exception was that
+a fine might be levied on a community where all the inhabitants
+had made themselves jointly and severally liable according to the
+provisions of the Hague Convention. The Rockefeller Foundation
+on its part agreed to pay all the expenses of the executive work
+of the commission. This treaty, after being submitted to General
+Hindenburg and approved by him, was signed by Dr. Lewald,
+representing the German Government, by Mr. Bicknell, representing
+the Rockefeller Foundation, and by me, representing the new
+commission for the relief of Poland.
+
+Work was immediately commenced under this arrangement and, so
+far as possible, food was purchased in Holland and Denmark, but
+there was little to be had in these countries. The Allies, however,
+refused to allow food to enter Germany for the purpose of this
+commission, and so the matter fell through. Later, when the Allies
+were willing to permit the food to enter, it was the German
+Government that refused to reaffirm this treaty and refused to
+agree that the German army of occupation should not requisition
+food in occupied Poland. Of course, under these circumstances, no
+one could expect the Allies to consent to the entry of food; because
+the obvious result would be that the Germans would immediately,
+following the precedent established by them in Northern France,
+take all the food produced in the country for their army and
+the civil population of Germany, and allow the Poles to be fed
+with food sent in from outside, while perhaps their labour was
+utilised in the very fields the products of which were destined
+for German consumption.
+
+There is no question that the sufferings of the people of Poland
+have been very great, and when the history of Poland during the
+war comes to be written the world will stand aghast at the story
+of her sufferings. It is a great pity that these various schemes
+for relief did not succeed. The Rockefeller Commission, however,
+up to the time I left Germany did continue to carryon some measure
+of relief and succeeded in getting in condensed milk, to some
+extent, for the children of that unfortunate country. These
+negotiations brought me in contact with a number of Poles resident
+in Berlin, whom I found most eager to do what they could to relieve
+the situation. I wish here to express my admiration for the work
+of the Rockefeller Commission in Europe. Not only were the ideas
+of the Commission excellent and businesslike but the men selected
+to carry them into effect were without exception men of high
+character and possessed of rare executive ability.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, I was ridiculed in the
+American newspapers because I had suggested, in answer to a cable
+of the League of Mercy, that some work should be done for the
+prisoners of war. I do not know whether the great work undertaken
+by Dr. John R. Mott and his associates was suggested by my answer or
+not; that does not matter. But this work undertaken by the American
+Y. M. C. A. certainly mattered a great deal to the prisoners of
+war in Europe. Dr. Mott after serving on the Mexican Commission,
+has gone to Russia as a member of the Commission to that country.
+
+The Y. M. C. A. organisation headed by Dr. Mott, who was most
+ably assisted by the Reverend Archibald C. Harte, took up this
+work, which was financed, I have been told, by the McCormick
+family of Chicago, Cleveland H. Dodge, John D. Rockefeller and
+others. Mr. Harte obtained permission from the German authorities
+for the erection of meeting halls and for work in German camps.
+When he had obtained this authorisation from Germany he went
+to Russia, where he was able to get a similar authorisation.
+
+At first in Russia, I have heard, the prisoners of war were allowed
+great liberty and lived unguarded in Siberian villages where they
+obtained milk, bread, butter, eggs and honey at very reasonable
+rates. As the war went on they were more and more confined to
+barracks and there their situation was sad indeed. In the winter
+season, it is dark at three in the afternoon and remains dark
+until ten the following morning. Of course, I did not see the
+Russian prison camps. The work carried on there was similar to
+that carried on in the German camps by Mr. Harte and his band
+of devoted assistants.
+
+I was particularly interested in this work because I hoped that
+the aid given to the German prisoners of war in Russia would help
+to do away with the great hate and prejudice against Americans in
+Germany. So I did all I could, not only to forward Mr. Harte's
+work, but to suggest and organise the sending of the expedition
+of nurses and doctors, which I have already described, to the
+Russian camps.
+
+Of course, Mr. Harte in this work did not attempt to cover all
+the prison camps in Germany. He did much to help the mental and
+physical conditions of the prisoners in Ruhleben, the English
+civilian camp near Berlin. The American Y. M. C. A. built a great
+hall where religious exercises were held, plays and lectures
+given, and where prisoners had a good place to read and write
+in during the day. A library was established in this building.
+
+The work carried on by the Y. M. C. A. may be briefly described
+as coming under the following heads: religious activities;
+educational activities; work shops, and gardens; physical exercises
+and out-door sports; diet kitchens for convalescents; libraries
+and music, including orchestra, choruses, and so on.
+
+When I left Germany on the breaking of diplomatic relations, a
+number of these Y. M. C. A. workers left with me.
+
+The German women exhibited notable qualities in war. They engaged
+in the Red Cross work, including the preparation of supplies and
+bandages for the hospitals, and the first day of mobilisation saw
+a number of young girls at every railway station in the country
+with food and drink for the passing soldiers. At railway junctions
+and terminals in the large cities, stations were established
+where these Red Cross workers gave a warm meal to the soldiers
+passing through. In these terminal stations there were also women
+workers possessed of sufficient skill to change the dressings
+of the lightly wounded.
+
+On the Bellevuestrasse, Frau von Ihne, wife of the great architect,
+founded a home for blinded soldiers. In this home soldiers were
+taught to make brooms, brushes, baskets, etc.
+
+German women who had country places turned these into homes for
+the convalescent wounded. But perhaps the most noteworthy was
+the National Frauendienst or Service for Women, organised the
+first day of the war. The relief given by the State to the wives
+and children of soldiers was distributed from stations in Berlin,
+and in the neighbourhood of each of these stations the Frauendienst
+established an office where women were always in attendance,
+ready to give help and advice to the soldiers' wives. There there
+were card-indexes of all the people within the district and of
+their needs. At the time I left Germany I believe that there
+were upwards of seven thousand women engaged in Berlin in social
+service, in instructing the women in the new art of cooking without
+milk, eggs or fat and seeing to it that the children had their
+fair share of milk. It is due to the efforts of these social
+workers that the rate of infant mortality in Berlin decreased
+during the war.
+
+A war always causes a great unsettling in business and trade;
+people no longer buy as many articles of luxury and the workers
+engaged in the production of these articles are thrown out of
+employment. In Germany, the National Women's Service, acting
+with the labour exchanges, did its best to find new positions
+for those thrown out of work. Women were helped over a period
+of poverty until they could find new places and were instructed
+in new trades.
+
+Many women engaged in the work of sending packages containing
+food and comforts to the soldiers at the front and to the German
+prisoners of war in other countries.
+
+Through the efforts of the American Association of Commerce and
+Trade, and the Embassy, a free restaurant was established in
+Berlin in one of the poorer districts. About two hundred people
+were fed here daily in a hall decorated with flags and plants.
+This was continued even after we left Germany.
+
+At Christmas, 1916, Mrs. Gerard and I visited this kitchen with
+Mr. and Mrs. Wolf and General von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, and one of his daughters. Presents were distributed
+to the children and the mothers received an order for goods in
+one of the department stores. The German Christmas songs were
+sung and when a little German child offered a prayer for peace,
+I do not think there was any one present who could refrain from
+weeping.
+
+Many of the German women of title, princesses, etc., established
+base hospitals of their own and seemed to manage these hospitals
+with success.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+HATE
+
+On my way from Berlin to America, in February, 1917, at a dinner
+in Paris, I met the celebrated Italian historian, Ferrero. In a
+conversation with him after dinner, I reminded him of the fact
+that both he and a Frenchman, named Huret, who had written on
+America, had stated in their books that the thing which struck
+them most in the study of the American people was the absence
+of hate.
+
+Ferrero recalled this and in the discussion which followed and
+in which the French novelist, Marcel Prevost, took part, all
+agreed that there was more hate in Europe than in America; first,
+because the peoples of Europe were confined in small space and,
+secondly, because the European, whatever his rank or station,
+lacked the opportunities for advancement and consequently the
+eagerness to press on ahead, and that fixing of the thought on
+the future, instead of the past, which formed part of the American
+character.
+
+In a few hours in Europe it is possible to travel in an automobile
+across countries where the people differ violently from the countries
+surrounding them, not only in language, customs and costumes,
+but also in methods of thought and physical appearance.
+
+The day I left Berlin I went to see Herr von Gwinner, head of
+the Deutsche Bank, with reference to a charitable fund which
+had been collected for widows and orphans in Germany. In our
+talk, von Gwinner said that Europeans envied America because we
+seemed to be able to assimilate all those people who, as soon
+as they landed on our shores, sought to forget their old race
+hatreds and endeavoured, as speedily as possible, to adopt American
+clothes, language and thought. I told him I thought it was because
+in our country we did not try to force anyone; that there was
+nothing to prevent a Pole speaking Polish and wearing Polish
+dress, if he chose; that the only weapon we used against those
+who desired to uphold the customs of Europe was that of ridicule;
+and that it was the repressive measures such as, for example,
+the repressive action taken by Prussia against the Poles and
+the Danes, the Alsatians and the Lorrainers, that had aroused
+a combative instinct in these peoples and made them cling to
+every vestige of their former nationality.
+
+At first, with the coming of war, the concentrated hate of the
+German people seemed to be turned upon the Russians. Even Liebknecht,
+when he called upon me in order to show that he had not been
+shot, as reported in America, spoke of the perils of Czarismus
+and the hatred of the German people for the Russians. But later,
+and directed by the master hand of the governing class, all the
+hatred of the Germans was concentrated upon England.
+
+The cartoon in _Punch_ representing a Prussian family having
+its morning "Hate" was, in some aspects, not at all exaggerated.
+Hate in Germany is cultivated as a noble passion, and, during the
+war, divines and generals vied with each other in its praise.
+Early in 1917, the Prussian General in command at Limburg made a
+speech in which he extolled the advantages of hate and said that
+there was nothing like getting up in the morning after having
+passed a night in thought and dreams of hate.
+
+[Illustration: THIS PAGE FROM THE SCURRILOUS PUBLICATION OF MARTEN
+AND HIS COLLEAGUES SHOWS THE PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WREATH AND THE
+CRAPE-DRAPED AMERICAN FLAG.]
+
+The phrase "Gott strafe England" seemed to be all over Germany.
+It was printed on stamps to be affixed to the back of letters
+like our Red Cross stamps. I even found my German body servant
+in the Embassy affixing these stamps to the back of all letters,
+official and otherwise, that were sent out. He was stopped when
+discovered. Paper money was stamped with the words: "Gott strafe
+England," "und America" being often added as the war progressed
+and America refused to change the rules of the game and stop
+the shipment of supplies to the Allies.
+
+Everyone is familiar with Lissauer's "Hymn of Hate." It is not
+extraordinary that one man in a country at war should produce a
+composition of this kind; but it is extraordinary as showing the
+state of mind of the whole country, that the Emperor should have
+given him the high order of the Red Eagle of the Second Class as
+a reward for having composed this extraordinary document.
+
+Undoubtedly at first the British prisoners of war were treated
+very roughly and were starved and beaten by their guards on the
+way from the front to the concentration camps. Officers, objects
+usually considered more than sacred in Germany, even when wounded
+were subjected to brutal treatment and in the majority of their
+prisons were treated more like convicts than officers and gentlemen.
+
+As the Germans gradually awoke to the fact that President Wilson
+was not afraid of the German vote and that the export of supplies
+from America would not be stopped, this stream of hate was turned
+on America. There was a belief in Germany that President Wilson
+was opposed by a majority of people of the United States, that
+he did not represent the real sentiment of America, and that the
+sentiment there was favourable to Germany.
+
+Unfortunately many Americans in Germany encouraged the German
+people and the German Government in this belief. Americans used
+to travel about, giving lectures and making speeches attacking
+their own country and their own President, and the newspapers
+published many letters of similar import from Americans resident
+in Germany.
+
+One of the most active of these was a man named Maurice Somborn,
+a German American, who represented in Germany an American business
+house. He made it a practice to go about in Berlin and other
+cities and stand up in cafes and beer halls in order to make
+addresses attacking the President and the United States. So bold
+did he become that he even, in the presence of a number of people
+in my room, one day said that he would like to hang Secretary
+Bryan as high as Haman and President Wilson one foot higher.
+The American newspapers stated that I called a servant and had
+him thrown out of the Embassy. This statement is not entirely
+true: I selfishly kept that pleasure for myself.
+
+The case of Somborn gave me an idea and I cabled to the Department
+of State asking authority to take up the passports of all Americans
+who abused their own country on the ground that they had violated
+the right, by their abuse, to the protection of a passport. The
+Department of State sustained my view and, by my direction, the
+consul in Dresden took up the passports of a singer named Rains
+and a gentleman of leisure named Recknagel who had united in
+addressing a letter to the Dresden newspapers abusing the President.
+It was sometime before I got Somborn's passport and I later on
+received from him the apologies of a broken and contrite man
+and obtained permission from Washington to issue him a passport
+in order to enable him to return to America.
+
+Of course, these vilifiers of their own country were loud in their
+denunciations of me, but the prospect of losing the protection of
+their passports kept many of these men from open and treasonable
+denunciation of their own country.
+
+The Government actually encouraged the formation of societies which
+had for their very object the scattering of literature attacking
+the President and the United States. The most conspicuous of these
+organisations was the so-called League of Truth. Permanently
+connected with it was an American dentist who had been in jail
+in America and who had been expelled from Dresden by the police
+authorities there. The secretary was a German woman who posed as
+an American, and had been on the stage as a snake dancer. The
+principal organiser was a German named Marten who had won the
+favour of the German authorities by writing a book on Belgium
+denying that any atrocities had taken place there. Marten secured
+subscriptions from many Germans and Americans resident in Germany,
+opened headquarters in rooms on the Potsdamerstrasse and engaged
+in the business of sending out pamphlets and leaflets attacking
+America. One of his principal supporters was a man named Stoddard
+who had made a fortune by giving travel lectures in America and
+who had retired to his handsome villa, in Meran, in Austria.
+Stoddard issued a pamphlet entitled, "What shall we do with Wilson?"
+and some atrocious attempts at verse, all of which were sent
+broadcast by the League of Truth.
+
+This was done with the express permission of the German authorities
+because during the war no societies or associations of any kind
+could meet, be formed or act without the express permission and
+superintendence of both the military and police authorities.
+Anyone who has lived in Germany knows that it would be impossible
+even in peace times to hang a sign or a wreath on a public statue
+without the permission of the local authorities; and yet on the
+Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, 1916, this League
+of Truth was permitted to place an enormous wreath, over four
+feet high, on the statue of Frederick the Great, with an American
+flag draped in mourning attached, and a silk banner on which was
+printed in large letters of gold, "Wilson and his press are not
+America." The League of Truth then had a photograph taken of this
+wreath which was sent all over Germany, again, of course, with
+the permission of the authorities. The wreath and attachments,
+in spite of frequent protests on my part to Zimmermann and von
+Jagow, remained in this conspicuous position until the sixth of
+May, 1916. After the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note, I again
+called von Jagow's attention to the presence of this wreath,
+and I told him that if this continuing insult to our flag and
+President was not taken away that I would go the next day with
+a cinematograph operator and take it away myself. The next day
+the wreath had disappeared.
+
+This League, in circulars, occasionally attacked me, and in a
+circular which they distributed shortly after my return to Germany
+at the end of December, 1916, it was stated, "What do you think
+of the American Ambassador? When he came to Germany after his
+trip to America he brought a French woman with him." And the
+worst of this statement was that it was true. But the League,
+of course, did not state that my wife came with me bringing her
+French maid by the express permission of the German Foreign Office.
+
+I have had occasion many times to wonder at the curious twists
+of the German mind, but I have never been able to understand on
+what possible theory the German Government permitted and even
+encouraged the existence of this League of Truth. Certainly the
+actions of the League, headed by a snake dancer and a dentist,
+would not terrorise the American Congress, President Wilson or me
+into falling in with all the views of the German Government, and
+if the German Government was desirous of either the President's
+friendship or mine why was this gang of good-for-nothings allowed
+to insult indiscriminately their country, their President and
+their Ambassador?
+
+One of the friends of Marten, head of this League, was (------)
+(---------), a man who at the time he was an officer of the National
+Guard of the State of New York, accepted a large sum of money
+"for expenses" from Bernstorff. Of course, in any country abroad
+acceptance by an officer of money from a foreign Ambassador could
+not be explained and could have only one result--a blank wall and
+firing party for the receiver of foreign pay. Perhaps we have
+grown so indulgent, so soft and so forgetful of the obligations
+which officers owe to their flag and country that on (---------)'s
+return from Germany he will be able to go on a triumphant lecture
+tour through the United States.
+
+There was published in Berlin in English a rather ridiculous
+paper called the _Continental_Times_, owned by an Austrian
+Jewess who had been married to an Englishman. The Foreign Office,
+after the outbreak of the war, practically took over this sheet by
+buying monthly many thousand copies. News coloured hysterically
+to favour the Central Empires was printed in this paper, which
+was headed "A Paper for Americans," under the editorship of an
+Englishman of decent family named Stanhope, who, of course, in
+consequence did not have to inhabit the prison camp of Ruhleben.
+(--------) was a contributor to this newspaper, and scurrilous
+articles attacking President Wilson appeared. Finally (---------)
+wrote a lying article for this paper in which he charged that
+Conger of the Associated Press had learned of Sir Roger Casement's
+proposed expedition; that Conger told me; that I cabled the news to
+Washington to the State Department; and that a member of President
+Wilson's Cabinet then gave the information to the British Ambassador.
+Later in a wireless which the Foreign Office permitted (---------)
+to send Senator O'Gorman of New York, (---------) varied his
+lie and charged that I had sent the information direct to Great
+Britain.
+
+_The_Continental_Times_ was distributed in the prison camps
+and after (---------)'s article I said to von Jagow, "I have
+had enough of this nonsense which is supported by the Foreign
+Office and if articles of the nature of (---------)'s appear
+again I shall make a public statement that the prisoners of war
+in Germany are subjected to a cruel and unusual punishment by
+having the lying _Continental_Times_ placed in their hands,
+a paper which purports to be published for Americans but which
+is supported by the Foreign Office, owned by an Austrian and
+edited by a renegade Englishman!"
+
+This _Continental_Times_ business again caused one to wonder
+at the German psychology which seems to think that the best way
+to make friends is to attack them. The author of "The Gentle
+Art of Making Enemies" must have attended a German school.
+
+An Ambassador is supposed to be protected but not even when I
+filed affidavits in the Foreign Office, in 1916, made by the
+ex-secretary of the "League of Truth" and by a man who was constantly
+with Marten and the dentist, that Marten had threatened to shoot
+me, did the Foreign Office dare or wish to do anything against
+this ridiculous League. These affidavits were corroborated by
+a respectable restaurant keeper in Berlin and his assistants
+who testified that Marten with several ferocious looking German
+officers had come to his restaurant "looking" for me. I never
+took any precaution against these lunatics whom I knew to be
+a bunch of cowardly swindlers.
+
+Marten and his friends were also engaged in a propaganda against
+the Jews.
+
+The activities of Marten were caused by the fact that he made
+money out of his propaganda; as numerous fool Germans and traitorous
+Americans contributed to his war chest, and by the fact that
+his work was so favourably received by the military that this
+husky coward was excused from all military service.
+
+It seemed, too, as if the Government was anxious to cultivate
+the hate against America. Long before American ammunition was
+delivered in any quantity to England and long before any at all
+was delivered to France, not only did the Government influence
+newspapers and official gazettes, but the official _Communiques_
+alleged that quantities of American ammunition were being used
+on the West front.
+
+The Government seemed to think that if it could stir up enough
+hate against America in Germany on this ammunition question the
+Americans would become terrorised and stop the shipment.
+
+The Government allowed medals to be struck in honour of each
+little general who conquered a town--"von Emmich, conqueror of
+Liege," etc., a pernicious practice as each general and princeling
+wanted to continue the war until he could get his face on a
+medal--even if no one bought it. But the climax was reached when
+medals celebrating the sinking of the _Lusitania_ were sold
+throughout Germany. Even if the sinking of the _Lusitania_
+had been justified only one who has lived in Germany since the
+war can understand the disgustingly bad taste which can gloat
+over the death of women and babies.
+
+I can recall now but two writers in all Germany who dared to say
+a good word for America. One of these, Regierungsrat Paul Krause,
+son-in-law of Field Marshal Von der Goltz, wrote an article in
+January, 1917, in the _Lokal_Anzeiger_ pointing out the
+American side of the question of this munition shipment; and
+that bold and fearless speaker and writer, Maximilian Harden,
+dared to make a defence of the American standpoint. The principal
+article in one of the issues of his paper, _Die_Zukunft_,
+was headed "If I were Wilson." After some copies had been sold
+the issue was confiscated by the police, whether at the instance
+of the military or at the instance of the Chancellor, I do not
+know. Everyone had the impression in Berlin that this confiscation
+was by order of General von Kessel, the War Governor of the Mark
+of Brandenburg.
+
+I met Harden before the war and occasionally conversed with him
+thereafter. Once in a while he gave a lecture in the great hall
+of the Philharmonic, always filling the hall to overflowing.
+In his lectures, which, of course, were carefully passed on by
+the police, he said nothing startling. His newspaper is a weekly
+publication; a little book about seven inches by four and a half,
+but wielding an influence not at all commensurate with its size.
+
+The liberal papers, like the largest paper of Berlin, the
+_Tageblatt_, edited by Theodor Wolff, while not violently
+against America, were not favourable. But the articles in the
+Conservative papers and even some of the organs of the Catholic
+Party invariably breathed hatred against everything American.
+
+In the Reichstag, America and President Wilson were often attacked
+and never defended. On May thirtieth, 1916, in the course of a
+debate on the censorship, Strasemann, of the National Liberal
+Party and of the branch of that party with Conservative leanings,
+violently opposed President Wilson and said that he was not wanted
+as a peacemaker.
+
+Government, newspapers and politicians all united in opposing
+America.
+
+I believe that to-day all the bitterness of the hate formerly
+concentrated on Great Britain has now been concentrated on the
+United States. The German-Americans are hated worse than the
+native Americans. They have deeply disappointed the Germans:
+first, because although German-Americans contributed enormously
+towards German war charities the fact of this contribution was
+not known to the recipients in Germany. Money sent to the German
+Red Cross from America was acknowledged by the Red Cross; but no
+publicity was given in Germany to the fact that any of the money
+given was from German-Americans. Secondly, the German-Americans
+did not go, as they might have done, to Germany, through neutral
+countries, with American passports, and enter the German army;
+and, thirdly, the most bitter disappointment of all, the
+German-Americans have not yet risked their property and their
+necks, their children's future and their own tranquillity, by
+taking arms against the government of America in the interest
+of the Hohenzollerns.
+
+For years, a clever propaganda had been carried on in America
+to make all Germans there feel that they were Germans of one
+united nation, to make those who had come from Hesse and Bavaria,
+or Saxony and Wurttemberg, forget that as late as 1866 these
+countries had been overrun and conquered by Prussian militarism.
+When Prince Henry, the Kaiser's brother, visited America, he
+spent most of his time with German-Americans and German-American
+societies in order to assist this propaganda.
+
+Even in peace time, the German-American who returns to the village
+in which he lived as a boy and who walks down the village street
+exploiting himself and his property, does not help good relations
+between the two countries. Envy is the mother of hate and the
+envied and returned German-American receives only a lip welcome
+in the village of his ancestors.
+
+Caricatures of Uncle Sam, and of President Wilson were published
+in all German papers. A caricature representing our President
+releasing the dove of peace with one hand while he poured out
+munitions for the Allies with the other was the least unpleasant.
+
+As I have said, from the tenth of August, 1914, to the twenty-fifth
+of September, 1915, the Emperor continually refused to receive
+me on the ground that he would not receive the Ambassador of a
+country which furnished munitions to the enemies of Germany; and
+we were thoroughly black-listed by all the German royalties. I did
+not see one, however humble, after the outbreak of the war, with
+the exception of Prince Max of Baden, who had to do with prisoners
+of war in Germany and in other countries. On one occasion I sent
+one of my secretaries to the palace of Princess August Wilhelm,
+wife of one of the Kaiser's sons, with a contribution of money
+for her hospital, she having announced that she would personally
+receive contributions on that day. She took the money from the
+secretary and spoke bitterly against America on account of the
+shipment of arms.
+
+Even some boxes of cigarettes we sent another royalty at the front
+at Christmas time, 1914, were not acknowledged.
+
+Dr. Jacobs, who was the correspondent in Berlin of _Musical_America_,
+and who remained there until about the twenty-sixth of April, 1917,
+was called on about the sixteenth of April, 1917, to the Kommandantur
+and subjected to a cross-examination. During this cross-examination
+he was asked if he knew about the "League of Truth," and why he
+did not join that organisation. Whether it was a result of his
+non-joining or not, I do not know, but during the remainder of his
+stay in Berlin he was compelled to report twice a day to the police
+and was not allowed to leave his house after eight o'clock in the
+evening. The question, however, put to him shows the direct interest
+that the German authorities took in the existence of this malodorous
+organisation.
+
+It appears in some of the circulars issued by the League of Truth
+that I was accused of giving American passports to Englishmen
+in order to enable them to leave the country.
+
+After I left Germany there was an interpellation in the Reichstag
+about this, and Zimmermann was asked about the charge which he
+said he had investigated and found untrue.
+
+In another chapter I have spoken of the subject of the selling
+of arms and supplies by America to the Allies. No German ever
+forgets this. The question of legality or treaties never enters
+his mind: he only knows that American supplies and munitions
+killed his brother, son or father. It is a hate we must meet for
+long years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS (_Continued_)
+
+A few days after the events narrated in Chapter XII, von Jagow
+called to see me at the Embassy and invited me to visit the Emperor
+at the Great General Headquarters; but he did not state why I
+was asked, and I do not know to this day whether the Chancellor
+and those surrounding the Emperor had determined on a temporary
+settlement of the submarine question with the United States and
+wished to put that settlement out, as it were, under the protection
+of the Emperor, or whether the Emperor was undecided and those
+in favour of peace wished me to present to him the American side
+of the question. I incline to the latter view. Von Jagow informed
+me that an officer from the Foreign Office would accompany me and
+that I should be allowed to take a secretary and the huntsman
+(_Leibjaeger_), without whom no Ambassador ever travels in
+Germany.
+
+Mr. Grew, our counsellor, was very anxious to go and I felt on
+account of his excellent work, as well as his seniority, that
+he was entitled to be chosen. Lieutenant von Prittwitz, who was
+attached to the Foreign Office as a sort of special aide to von
+Jagow, was detailed to accompany us. We were given a special
+salon car and left on the evening of Friday, April twenty-eighth.
+As we neared the front by way of the line running through Saar
+Brucken, our train was often halted because of long trains of
+hospital cars on their way from the front to the base hospitals
+in the rear; and as we entered France there were many evidences of
+the obstinate fights which had raged in this part of the country
+in August, 1914. Parts of the towns and villages which we passed
+were in ruins, and rough trench lines were to be discerned on
+some of the hillsides. At the stations, weeping French women
+dressed in black were not uncommon sights, having just heard
+perhaps of the death, months before, of a husband, sweetheart
+or son who had been mobilised with the French army.
+
+The fortress city of Metz through which we passed seemed to be as
+animated as a beehive. Trains were continuously passing. Artillery
+was to be seen on the roads and automobiles were hurrying to and
+fro.
+
+The Great General Headquarters of the Kaiser for the Western
+Front is in the town of Charleville-Mezieres, situated on the
+Meuse in the Department of the Ardennes, which Department at that
+time was the only French Department wholly in the possession of
+the Germans. We were received at the railway station by several
+officers and escorted in one of the Kaiser's automobiles, which had
+been set apart for my use, to a villa in the town of Charleville,
+owned by a French manufacturer named Perin. This pretty little red
+brick villa had been christened by the Germans, "Sachsen Villa,"
+because it had been occupied by the King of Saxony when he had
+visited the Kaiser. A French family servant and an old gardener
+had been left in the villa, but for the few meals which we took
+there two of the Emperor's body huntsmen had been assigned, and
+they brought with them some of the Emperor's silver and china.
+
+The Emperor had been occupying a large villa in the town of
+Charleville until a few days before our arrival. After the engineer
+of his private train had been killed in the railway station by
+a bomb dropped from a French aeroplane, and after another bomb
+had dropped within a hundred yards of the villa occupied by the
+Kaiser, he moved to a red brick chateau situated on a hill outside
+of Charleville, known as either the Chateau Bellevue or Bellaire.
+
+Nearly every day during our stay, we lunched and dined with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the villa of a French banker, which he occupied.
+About ten people were present at these dinners, the Chancellor's
+son-in-law, Zech, Prittwitz, two experts in international law,
+both attached to the Foreign Office, and, at two dinners, von
+Treutler, the Prussian Minister to Bavaria, who had been assigned
+to represent the Foreign Office near the person of the Kaiser and
+Helfferich who, towards the end of our stay, had been summoned
+from Berlin.
+
+I had been working hard at German and as von Bethmann-Hollweg
+does not like to talk English and as some of these persons did not
+speak that language we tried to carry on the table conversation
+in German, but I know that when I tried to explain, in German,
+to Helfferich the various tax systems of America, I swam out
+far beyond my linguistic depth.
+
+During our stay here I received cables from the Department of
+State which were transmitted from Berlin in cipher, and which
+Grew was able to decipher as he had brought a code book with
+him. In one of these it was expressly intimated that in any
+settlement of the submarine controversy America would make no
+distinction between armed and unarmed merchant ships.
+
+We formed for a while quite a happy family. The French owners
+of the villa seemed to have had a fondness for mechanical toys.
+After dinner every night these toys were set going, much to the
+amusement of von Bethmann-Hollweg. One of these toys, about two
+feet high, was a Hoochi-Koochi dancer and another successful one
+was a clown and a trained pig, both climbing a step ladder and
+performing marvellous feats thereon. Grew, who is an excellent
+musician, played the piano for the Chancellor and at his special
+request played pieces by Bach, the favourite composer of von
+Bethmann-Hollweg's deceased wife. One day we had tea in the garden
+of the villa formerly occupied by the Emperor, with the Prince
+of Pless (who is always with the Kaiser, and who seemed to be a
+prime favourite with him), von Treutler and others, and motored
+with Prince Pless to see some marvellous Himalayan pheasants
+reared by an old Frenchman, an ex-jailer, who seemed to have a
+strong instinct to keep something in captivity,
+
+The Kaiser's automobile, which he had placed at my disposal,
+had two loaded rifles standing upright in racks at the right
+and left sides of the car, ready for instant use. On one day we
+motored, always, of course, in charge of the officers detailed
+to take care of us, to the ancient walled city of Rocroy and
+through the beautiful part of the Ardennes forest lying to the
+east of it, returning to Charleville along the heights above
+the valley of the Meuse.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS PARTY IN SEDAN.]
+
+[Illustration: WITH GERMAN OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE FRENCH
+FOOD COMMISSION BEFORE THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES, WHERE NAPOLEON
+III AND BISMARCK MET AFTER THE BATTLE OF SEDAN.]
+
+The feeding of the French population, which is carried on by
+the American Relief Commission, was a very interesting thing
+to see and, in company with one of the members of the French
+committee, we saw the workings of this system of American Relief.
+We first visited a storehouse in Charleville, the headquarters
+for the relief district of which Charleville may be called the
+capital.
+
+For relief purposes Northern France is divided into six districts.
+From the central distribution point in each district, food is
+sent to the commune within the district, the commune being the
+ultimate unit of distribution and each commune containing on
+the average about five hundred souls. We then motored to one
+of the communes where the distribution of food for the week was
+to take place that afternoon. Here in a factory, closed since the
+war, the people of the commune were lined up with their baskets
+waiting for their share of the rations. On entering a large room
+of the factory, each stopped first at a desk and there either paid
+in cash for the week's allowance of rations or signed an agreement
+to pay at some future date. The individuals who had no prospect
+of being able to pay received the rations for nothing. About
+one-third were in each class. The money used was not always French,
+or real money, but was, as a rule, the paper money issued in
+that part of Northern France by each town and redeemable after
+the war.
+
+Signs were hung up showing the quantity that each person was
+entitled to receive for the next fifteen days and the sale price
+per kilo to each inhabitant. For instance, in this particular
+period for the first fifteen days of the month of May, 1916,
+each inhabitant could, in this district, receive the following
+allowances at the following rates:
+
+  ARTICLE           AMOUNT PER HEAD               PRICE
+  Flour                4 K. 500   The Kilogram   0 fr. 48
+  Rice                   K. 500                  0 fr. 55
+  Beans                  K. 500                  0 fr. 90
+  Bacon                  K. 500                  2 fr. 80
+  Lard                   K. 250                  2 fr. 30
+  Green Coffee           K. 250                  1 fr. 70
+  Crystallized Sugar     K. 150                  0 fr. 90
+  Salt                   K. 200                  0 fr. 10
+  Soap (hard)            K. 250                  1 fr. 00
+
+In addition to these articles each inhabitant of the commune
+which we visited, also received on the day of our visit a small
+quantity of carrot seed to plant in the small plot of ground
+which each was permitted to retain out of his own land by the
+German authorities.
+
+The unfortunate people who received this allowance looked very
+poor and very hungry and very miserable. Many of them spoke to
+me, not only here but also in Charleville, and expressed their
+great gratitude to the American people for what was being done
+for them. Those in Charleville said that they had heard that I
+was in their town because of trouble pending between America
+and Germany. They said they hoped that there would be no war
+between the two countries because if war came they did not know
+what would become of them and that, in the confusion of war,
+they would surely be left to starve.
+
+In Charleville notices were posted directing the inhabitants
+not to go out on the streets after, I think, eight o'clock in
+the evening, and also notices informing the population that they
+would be allowed a small quantity of their own land for the purpose
+of growing potatoes.
+
+After visiting the factory building where the distribution of
+rations was taking place, we motored to Sedan, stopping on the
+way at the hamlet of Bazeilles, and visiting the cottage where
+Bismarck and Emperor Napoleon the Third had their historic interview
+after the battle of Sedan.
+
+The old lady who owns this house received us and showed us bullet
+marks made on her house in the war of 1870, as well as in the
+present war. She apologised because she had had the window-pane,
+broken by a rifle shot in this war, replaced on account of the
+cold. As a girl, she had received Bismarck and Napoleon and had
+shown them to the room upstairs where they had held their
+consultation. I asked her which chair in this room Bismarck had
+sat in, and sat in it myself, for luck. I also contributed to the
+collection of gold pieces given to her by those who had visited
+her cottage.
+
+In Sedan we visited an old mill where stores of the relief commission
+were kept, and in the mayor's office were present at a sort of
+consultation between the Prussian officers and members of the
+French Committee of Sedan in which certain details relative to
+the feeding of the population were discussed.
+
+The relief work is not, of course, carried on right up to the
+battle line but we visited a small village not many kilometres in
+the rear of the German line. In this village we were, as before,
+shown the stores kept for distribution by the relief commission.
+As there were many soldiers in this village I said I thought that
+these soldiers must have stores of their own but, in order to
+be sure that they were not living on the supplies of the relief
+commission, I thought it only fair that I should see where the
+soldiers' stores were kept. I was taken across the railroad track
+to where their stores were kept and, judging from the labels on
+the barrels and boxes, I should say that a great many of these
+stores had come from Holland.
+
+During this trip about the country, I saw a number of women and
+girls working, or attempting to work, in the fields. Their appearance
+was so different from that of the usual peasant that I spoke to
+the accompanying officers about it. I was told, however, that
+these were the peasants of the locality who dressed unusually
+well in that part of France. Later on in Charleville, at the
+lodging of an officer and with Count Wengersky, who was detailed
+to act as sort of interpreter and guide to the American Relief
+Commission workers, I met the members of the American Relief
+Commission who were working in Northern France and who had been
+brought on a special train for the purpose of seeing me to
+Charleville. This Count Wengersky spoke English well. Having
+been for a number of years agent of the Hamburg American Line in
+London, he was used to dealing with Americans and was possessed
+of more tact than usually falls to the lot of the average Prussian
+officer. We had tea and cakes in these lodgings, and then some
+of the Americans drew me aside and told me the secret of the
+peculiar looking peasants whom I had seen at work in the fields
+surrounding Charleville.
+
+It seems that the Germans had endeavoured to get volunteers from
+the great industrial town of Lille, Roubeix and Tourcoing to
+work these fields; that after the posting of the notices calling
+for volunteers only fourteen had appeared. The Germans then gave
+orders to seize a certain number of inhabitants and send them
+out to farms in the outlying districts to engage in agricultural
+work. The Americans told me that this order was carried out with
+the greatest barbarity; that a man would come home at night and
+find that his wife or children had disappeared and no one could
+tell him where they had gone except that the neighbours would
+relate that the German non-commissioned officers and a file of
+soldiers had carried them off. For instance, in a house of a
+well-to-do merchant who had perhaps two daughters of fifteen and
+seventeen, and a man servant, the two daughters and the servant
+would be seized and sent off together to work for the Germans
+in some little farm house whose location was not disclosed to
+the parents. The Americans told me that this sort of thing was
+causing such indignation among the population of these towns
+that they feared a great uprising and a consequent slaughter and
+burning by the Germans.
+
+That night at dinner I spoke to von Bethmann-Hollweg about this
+and told him that it seemed to me absolutely outrageous; and that,
+without consulting with my government, I was prepared to protest
+in the name of humanity against a continuance of this treatment
+of the civil population of occupied France. The Chancellor told
+me that he had not known of it, that it was the result of orders
+given by the military, that he would speak to the Emperor about
+it and that he hoped to be able to stop further deportations.
+I believe that they were stopped, but twenty thousand or more who
+had been taken from their homes were not returned until months
+afterwards. I said in a speech which I made in May on my return to
+America that it required the joint efforts of the Pope, the King
+of Spain and our President to cause the return of these people to
+their homes; and I then saw that some German press agency had
+come out with an article that I had made false statements about
+this matter because these people were not returned to their homes
+as a result of the representations of the Pope, the King of Spain
+and our President, but were sent back because the Germans had
+no further use for them. It seems to me that this denial makes
+the case rather worse than before.
+
+At the Chancellor's house in the evenings we had discussions
+on the submarine situation and I had several long talks with
+von Bethmann-Hollweg alone in a corner of the room while the
+others listened to music or set the mechanical toys in motion.
+These discussions, without doubt, were reported to the Emperor
+either by the Chancellor or by von Treutler who at that time
+was high in favor with his Majesty.
+
+I remember on one evening I was asked the question as to what
+America could do, supposing the almost impossible, that America
+should resent the recommencement of ruthless submarine warfare
+by the Germans and declare war. I said that nearly all of the
+great inventions used in this war had been made by Americans;
+that the very submarine which formed the basis of our discussion
+was an American invention, and so were the barbed wire and the
+aeroplane, the ironclad, the telephone and the telegraph, so
+necessary to trench warfare; that even that method of warfare
+had been first developed on something of the present scale in our
+Civil War; and that I believed that, if forced to it, American
+genius could produce some invention which might have a decisive
+effect in this war. My German auditors seemed inclined to believe
+that there was something in my contentions. But they said, "While
+possibly you might invent something in America, while possibly
+you will furnish money and supplies to the Allies, you have no
+men; and the public sentiment of your country is such that you
+will not be able to raise an army large enough to make any
+impression." I said that possibly if hostilities once broke out
+with the Germans, the Germans might force us by the commission
+of such acts as had aroused England, to pass a law for universal
+military service. This proposition of mine was branded by the
+Germans as absolutely impossible; and, therefore, I am sure that
+the adoption by the United States of universal service in the
+first round of the war struck a very severe blow at the morale
+of Germany.
+
+The Chancellor always desired to make any settlement of the submarine
+question contingent upon our doing something against England;
+but I again and again insisted that we could not agree to do
+anything against some other power as a condition of obtaining
+a recognition of our rights from the German Empire.
+
+During my stay at the General Headquarters, General Falkenhayn,
+although he was there at the time, carefully avoided me, which
+I took to be a sign that he was in favour of war with America.
+In fact, I heard afterwards that he had insisted on giving his
+views on the subject, but that a very high authority had told
+him to confine himself to military operations.
+
+After we had been a day or so at Charleville, the Vice-Chancellor,
+Helfferich, arrived. I have always believed that he was sent for
+to add his weight to the arguments in favour of peace and to
+point out that it was necessary for Germany to hate the friendship
+of America after the war, so as to have markets where she could
+place her goods. And I am convinced that at this time, at any rate,
+the influence of Helfferich was cast in the scale in favour of
+peace.
+
+Finally, I was told that on the next day, which was Monday, May
+first, I was to lunch with the Emperor. Grew was invited to accompany
+me, and the Chancellor said that he would call for me about an
+hour before the time set for lunch as the Emperor desired to
+have a talk with me before lunch. In the afternoon an extract
+from the log of a German submarine commander was sent to me in
+which the submarine commander had stated that he had sighted a
+vessel which he could easily have torpedoed, but as the vessel
+was one hundred and twenty miles from land, he had not done so
+because the crew might not be able from that distance to reach a
+harbour. When the Chancellor called for me the following morning,
+he asked me if I had read this extract from the submarine officer's
+log, and noted how he had refrained from torpedoing a boat one
+hundred and twenty miles from land. I told the Chancellor that I
+had read the extract, but that I had also read in the newspaper
+that very morning that a ship had been torpedoed in stormy weather
+at exactly the same distance from land and the crew compelled
+to seek safety in the ship's boats; that, anyway, "one swallow
+did not make a summer," and that reports were continually being
+received of boats being torpedoed at great distances from land.
+
+We then got in the motor and motored to the chateau about a mile
+off, where the Kaiser resided. We got out of the motor before
+going into the courtyard of the chateau, and immediately I was
+taken by the Chancellor into a garden on the gently sloping hillside
+below the chateau. Here the Emperor, dressed in uniform, was
+walking.
+
+As I drew near the Emperor, he said immediately, "Do you come
+like the great pro-consul bearing peace or war in either hand?"
+By this he referred, of course, to the episode in which Quintus
+Fabius Maximus, chief of the Roman envoys sent to Hannibal in
+the Second Punic War, doubled his toga in his hand, held it up
+and said: "In this fold I carry peace and war: choose which you
+will have." "Give us which you prefer," was the reply. "Then
+take war," answered the Roman, letting the toga fall. "We accept
+the gift," cried the Carthaginian Senator, "and welcome."
+
+I said, "No, your Majesty, only hoping that the differences between
+two friendly nations may be adjusted." The Emperor then spoke of
+what he termed the uncourteous tone of our notes, saying that
+we charged the Germans with barbarism in warfare and that, as
+Emperor and head of the Church, he had wished to carry on the
+war in a knightly manner. He referred to his own speech to the
+members of the Reichstag at the commencement of the war and said
+that the nations opposed to Germany had used unfair methods and
+means, that the French especially were not like the French of
+'70, but that their officers, instead of being nobles, came from
+no one knew where. He then referred to the efforts to starve out
+Germany and keep out milk and said that before he would allow
+his family and grand-children to starve he would blow up Windsor
+Castle and the whole Royal family of England. We then had a long
+discussion in detail of the whole submarine question, in the
+course of which the Emperor said that the submarine had come
+to stay, that it was a weapon recognised by all countries, and
+that he had seen a picture of a proposed giant submarine in an
+American paper, the _Scientific_American_. He stated that,
+anyway, there was no longer any international law. To this last
+statement the Chancellor agreed. He further said that a person
+on an enemy merchant ship was like a man travelling on a cart
+behind the battle lines--he had no just cause of complaint if
+injured. He asked me why we had done nothing to England because
+of her alleged violations of international law,--why we had not
+broken the British blockade.
+
+In addition to the technical arguments based on international
+law, I answered that no note of the United States had made any
+general charge of barbarism against Germany; that we complained
+of the manner of the use of submarines and nothing more; that we
+could never promise to do anything to England or to any other
+country in return for a promise from Germany or any third country
+to keep the rules of international law and respect the rights and
+lives of our citizens; that we were only demanding our rights
+under the recognised rules of international law and it was for
+us to decide which rights we would enforce first; that, as I
+had already told the Chancellor, if two men entered my grounds
+and one stepped on my flower beds and the other killed my sister,
+I should probably first pursue the murderer of my sister; that
+those travelling on the seas in enemy merchant ships were in a
+different position from those travelling in a cart behind the
+enemy's battle lines on land because the land travellers were
+on enemy's territory, while those on the sea were on territory
+which, beyond the three-mile limit, was free and in no sense
+enemy's territory. We also discussed the position taken by the
+German Government in one of the _Frye_ Notes, in which the
+German expert had taken the position that a cargo of food destined
+for an armed enemy port was presumed to be for the armies of
+the enemy, and therefore contraband. The Emperor spoke of the
+case of the _Dacia_ with some bitterness, but when I went
+into an explanation the Chancellor joined in the conversation
+and said that our position was undoubtedly correct. I said that
+it was not our business to break the blockade--that there were
+plenty of German agents in the United States who could send food
+ships and test the question; that one ship I knew of, the
+_Wilhelmina_, laden with food, had been seized by the British,
+who then compromised with the owners, paying them, I believed, a
+large sum for the disputed cargo. And in taking up the doctrine
+of ultimate destination of goods, i.e., goods sent to a neutral
+country but really destined for a belligerent, I said I thought
+that during our Civil War we had taken against England exactly
+the same stand which England now took; and I said I thought that
+one of the decisions of our Supreme Court was based on a shipment
+to Matamoras, Mexico, but which the Supreme Court had decided
+was really for the Confederacy.
+
+Discussing the submarine question, the Emperor and Chancellor
+spoke of the warning given in the _Lusitania_ case; and
+I said: "If the Chancellor warns me not to go out on the
+Wilhelmplatz, where I have a perfect right to go, the fact that
+he gave the warning does not justify him in killing me if I
+disregarded his warning and go where I have a right to go." The
+conversation then became more general and we finally left the
+garden and went into the chateau, where the Emperor's aides and
+guests were impatiently waiting for lunch.
+
+This conversation lasted far beyond lunch time. Anxious heads
+were seen appearing from the windows and terraces of the chateau
+to which we finally adjourned. I sat between the Emperor and
+Prince Pless. Conversation was general for the most of the time,
+and subjects such as the suffragettes and the peace expedition
+of Henry Ford were amusingly discussed.
+
+After lunch, I again had a long talk with the Emperor but of a
+more general nature than the conversation in the garden.
+
+That night about eleven o'clock, after again dining with the
+Chancellor, we left Charleville in the same special salon car,
+arriving at Berlin about four P. M. the next day, where at the
+station were a crowd of German and American newspaper correspondents,
+all anxious to know what had happened.
+
+At this last dinner at the Chancellor's he took me off in a corner
+and said, "As I understand it, what America wants is cruiser
+warfare on the part of the submarines." And I said, "Yes, that
+is it exactly. They may exercise the right of visit and search,
+must not torpedo or sink vessels without warning, and must not
+sink any vessel unless the passengers and crew are put in a place
+of safety."
+
+On the morning of the third of May, I heard that the German note
+had been drafted, but that it would contain a clause to the
+effect that while the German submarines would not go beyond cruiser
+warfare, this rule, nevertheless, would not apply to armed
+merchantmen.
+
+As such a proposition as this would, of course, only bring up
+the subject again, I immediately ordered my automobile and called
+on the Spanish Ambassador, stating to him what I had heard about
+the contents of the note; that this would mean, without doubt, a
+break with America; and that, as I had been instructed to hand
+the Embassy over to him, I had come to tell him of that fact. I
+gave the same information to other colleagues, of course hoping
+that what I said would directly or indirectly reach the ears
+of the German Foreign Office. Whether it did or not, I do not
+know, but the _Sussex_ Note when received did not contain
+any exception with reference to armed merchantmen.
+
+With the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note and the President's
+answer thereto, which declined assent to the claim of Germany
+to define its attitude toward our rights in accordance with what
+we might do in regard to the enforcement of our rights against
+England, the submarine question seemed, at least for the moment,
+settled. I, however, immediately warned the Department that I
+believed that the rulers of Germany would at some future date,
+forced by public opinion, and by the von Tirpitz and Conservative
+parties, take up ruthless submarine war again, possibly in the
+autumn but at any rate about February or March, 1917.
+
+In my last conversation with the Chancellor before leaving the
+Great General Headquarters, when he referred to the cruiser warfare
+of the submarines, he also said, "I hope now that if we settle this
+matter your President will be great enough to take up the question
+of peace." It was as a result of intimations from government
+circles that, after my return to Berlin, I gave an interview to
+a representative of a Munich newspaper, expressing my faith in
+the coming of peace, although I was careful to say that it might
+be a matter of months or even years.
+
+Thereafter, on many occasions the Chancellor impressed upon me
+the fact that America must do something towards arranging a peace
+and that if nothing was done to this end, public opinion in Germany
+would undoubtedly force a resumption of a ruthless submarine war.
+
+In September of 1916, I having mentioned that Mrs. Gerard was
+going to the United States on a short visit, von Jagow insistently
+urged me to go also in order to make every effort to induce the
+President to do something towards peace; and, as a result of his
+urging and as a result of my own desire to make the situation
+clear in America, I sailed from Copenhagen on the twenty-eighth
+of September with Mrs. Gerard, on the Danish ship, _Frederick_VIII_,
+bound for New York. I had spent almost three years in Berlin,
+having been absent during that time from the city only five or
+six days at Kiel and two week-ends in Silesia in 1914, with two
+weeks at Munich in the autumn, two days at Munich and two days at
+Parten-Kirchen in 1916, and two week-ends at Heringsdorf, in the
+summer of the same year, with visits to British prison camps
+scattered through the two and a half years of war.
+
+On the _Frederick_VIII_ were Messrs. Herbert Swope of the
+_New_York_World_ and William C. Bullitt of the _Philadelphia_Ledger_,
+who had been spending some time in Germany. I impressed upon each
+of these gentlemen my fixed belief that Germany intended shortly,
+unless some definite move was made toward peace, to commence
+ruthless submarine war; and they made this view clear in the
+articles which they wrote for their respective newspapers.
+
+Mr. Swope's articles which appeared in the _New_York_World_
+were immediately republished by him in a book called "Inside the
+German Empire." In Mr. Swope's book on page ninety-four, he says,
+"The campaign for the ruthless U-boat warfare is regarded by one
+man in this country who speaks with the highest German authority,
+as being in the nature of a threat intended to accelerate and
+force upon us a movement toward peace. Ambassador Gerard had
+his attention drawn to this just before he left Berlin but he
+declined to accept the interpretation."
+
+On page eighty-eight he writes, "Our Embassy in Berlin expected
+just such a demonstration as was given by the U-53 in October
+when she sank six vessels off Nantucket, as a lesson of what
+Germany could do in our waters if war came."
+
+On page seventy-four he says further, "Throughout Germany the
+objection for the resumption of ruthless U-boat warfare of the
+_Lusitania_ type grows stronger day by day. The Chancellor
+is holding out against it, but how long he can restrain it no one
+can say. I left Germany convinced that only peace could prevent
+its resumption. And the same opinion is held by every German
+with whom I spoke, and it is held also by Ambassador Gerard.
+The possibility was so menacing that the principal cause of the
+Ambassador's return in October was that he might report to
+Washington. The point was set out in press despatches at that
+time."
+
+I wrote a preface to Mr. Swope's book for the express purpose
+of informing the American public in this way that I believed
+that Germany intended at an early date to resume the ruthless
+V-boat warfare.
+
+Our trip home on the _Frederick_VIII_ was without incident
+except for the fact that on the ninth day of October, Swope came to
+the door of my stateroom about twelve o'clock at night and informed
+me that the captain had told him to tell me that the wireless had
+brought the news that German submarines were operating directly
+ahead of us and had just sunk six ships in the neighbourhood
+of Nantucket. I imagine that the captain slightly changed the
+course of our ship, but next day the odour of burning oil was
+quite noticeable for hours.
+
+These Danish ships in making the trip from Copenhagen to New
+York were compelled to put in at the port of Kirkwall in the
+Orkney Islands, north of Scotland, where the ship was searched by
+the British authorities. On the occasion of our visit to Kirkwall,
+on this trip, a Swede, who had been so foolish as to make a sketch
+of the harbour and defences of Kirkwall from the top deck of the
+_Frederick_VIII_, was taken off the boat by the British. The
+British had very cleverly spotted him doing this from the shore
+or a neighbouring boat, through a telescope.
+
+Ships can enter Kirkwall only by daylight and at six o'clock
+every evening trawlers draw a net across the entrance to the
+harbour as a protection against submarines. A passage through
+this net is not opened until daylight the following morning.
+
+Captain Thomson of the _Frederick_VIII_, the ship which
+carried us to America and back to Copenhagen, by his evident
+mastery of his profession gave to all of his passengers a feeling
+of confidence on the somewhat perilous voyage in those dangerous
+waters.
+
+When I reached America, on October eleventh, I was given a most
+flattering reception and the freedom of the City of New York.
+Within a few days after my arrival, the President sent for me
+to visit him at Shadow Lawn, at Long Branch, and I was with him
+for over four hours and a quarter in our first conference. I saw
+him, of course, after the election, before returning to Germany,
+and in fact sailed on the fourth of December at his special request.
+
+Before I left I was impressed with the idea that he desired above
+all things both to keep and to make peace. Of course, this question
+of making peace is a very delicate one. A direct offer on our part
+might have subjected us to the same treatment which we gave Great
+Britain during our Civil War when Great Britain made overtures
+looking towards the establishment of peace, and the North answered,
+practically telling the British Government that it could attend
+to its own business, that it would brook no interference and would
+regard further overtures as unfriendly acts.
+
+The Germans started this war without any consultation with the
+United States, and then seemed to think that they had a right
+to demand that the United States make peace for them on such
+terms and at such time as they chose; and that the failure to
+do so gave them a vested right to break all the laws of warfare
+against their enemies and to murder the citizens of the United
+States on the high seas, in violation of the declared principles
+of international law.
+
+Nevertheless, I think that the inclination of the President was
+to go very far towards the forcing of peace.
+
+Our trip from New York to Copenhagen was uneventful, cold and
+dark. We were captured by a British cruiser west of the Orkneys
+and taken in for the usual search to the port of Kirkwall where
+we remained two days.
+
+The President impressed upon me his great interest in the Belgians
+deported to Germany. The action of Germany in thus carrying a
+great part of the male population of Belgium into virtual slavery
+had roused great indignation in America. As the revered Cardinal
+Farley said to me a few days before my departure, "You have to
+go back to the times of the Medes and the Persians to find a
+like example of a whole people carried into bondage."
+
+Mr. Grew had made representations about this to the Chancellor
+and, on my return, I immediately took up the question.
+
+I was informed that it was a military measure, that Ludendorf had
+feared that the British would break through and overrun Belgium
+and that the military did not propose to have a hostile population
+at their backs who might cut the rail lines of communication,
+telephones and telegraphs; and that for this reason the deportation
+had been decided on. I was, however, told that I would be given
+permission to visit these Belgians. The passes, nevertheless,
+which alone made such visiting possible were not delivered until
+a few days before I left Germany.
+
+Several of these Belgians who were put at work in Berlin managed
+to get away and come to see me. They gave me a harrowing account
+of how they had been seized in Belgium and made to work in Germany
+at making munitions to be used probably against their own friends.
+I said to the Chancellor, "There are Belgians employed in making
+shells contrary to all rules of war and the Hague conventions."
+He said, "I do not believe it." I said, "My automobile is at the
+door. I can take you, in four minutes, to where thirty Belgians
+are working on the manufacture of shells." But he did not find
+time to go.
+
+Americans must understand that the Germans will stop at nothing
+to win this war, and that the only thing they respect is force.
+
+While I was in America von Jagow, as had been predicted by his
+enemies in Berlin, had fallen and Zimmermann had been given his
+place.
+
+I remained a day in Copenhagen, in order to arrange for the
+transportation to Germany of the three tons of food which I had
+brought from New York, and, also, in order to lunch with Count
+Rantzau, the German Minister, a most able diplomat.
+
+Therefore, the President's peace note arrived in Berlin just
+ahead of me and was delivered by Mr. Grew a few hours before my
+arrival. Joseph C. Grew, of Boston, was next in command during
+all my stay in Berlin. He most ably carried on the work of the
+Embassy during my absence on the trip to America, in the autumn
+of 1916; and at all times was of the greatest assistance to me. I
+hope to see him go far in his career. This note was dated December
+eighteenth, 1916, and was addressed by the Secretary of State
+to the American Ambassadors at the capitals of the belligerent
+powers. It commenced as follows: "The President directs me to
+send you the following communication to be presented immediately
+to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the government to which
+you are accredited.
+
+"The President of the United States has instructed me to suggest
+to the (here is inserted a designation of the government addressed)
+a course of action in regard to the present war which he hopes
+that the government will take under consideration as suggested
+in the most friendly spirit, etc."
+
+In the note which was sent to the Central Powers it was stated:
+"The suggestion which I am instructed to make, the President
+has long had it in mind to offer. He is somewhat embarrassed
+to offer it at this particular time because it may now seem to
+have been prompted by a desire to play a part in connection with
+the recent overtures of the Central Powers."
+
+Of course, the President thus referred to the address made by
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the Reichstag in December, in which, after
+reviewing generally the military situation, the Chancellor said:
+"In a deep moral and religious sense of duty towards this nation
+and beyond it towards humanity, the Emperor now considers that the
+moment has come for official action towards peace. His Majesty,
+therefore, in complete harmony and in common with our Allies decided
+to propose to the hostile powers to enter peace negotiations."
+And the Chancellor continued, saying that a note to this effect
+had been transmitted that morning to all hostile powers, through
+the representatives of these powers to whom the interests and
+rights of Germany in the enemy States had been entrusted; and
+that, therefore, the representatives of Spain, the United States
+and Switzerland had been asked to forward the note.
+
+Coincidently with this speech of the Chancellor's, which was
+December twelfth, 1916, the Emperor sent a message to the commanding
+generals reading as follows: "Soldiers! In agreement with the
+sovereigns of my Allies and with the consciousness of victory,
+I have made an offer of peace to the enemy. Whether it will be
+accepted is still uncertain. Until that moment arrives you will
+fight on."
+
+I return to the President's note.
+
+The President suggested that early occasion be sought to callout
+from all the nations now at war an avowal of their respective
+views as to the terms upon which the war might be concluded,
+and the arrangements which would be deemed satisfactory as a
+guarantee against its renewal.
+
+He called the attention of the world to the fact that according
+to the statements of the statesmen of the belligerent powers,
+the objects which all sides had in mind seemed to be the same.
+And the President finally said that he was not proposing peace,
+not even offering mediation; but merely proposing that soundings
+be taken in order that all nations might know how near might
+be the haven of peace for which all mankind longed.
+
+Shortly after the publication of this note Secretary Lansing
+gave an interview to the representatives of the American press
+in which he stated that America was very near war. This interview
+he later explained.
+
+As soon as possible after my return to Berlin I had interviews
+with Zimmermann and the Chancellor. Zimmermann said that we were
+such personal friends that he was sure we could continue to work,
+as we had in the past, in a frank and open manner, putting all
+the cards upon the table and working together in the interests of
+peace. I, of course, agreed to this and it seemed, on the surface,
+as if everything would go smoothly.
+
+Although the torpedoing without warning of the _Marina_,
+while I was in the United States, had resulted in the death of a
+number of Americans on board, nevertheless there seemed to be an
+inclination on the part of the government and people of the United
+States to forget this incident provided Germany would continue to
+keep her pledges given in the _Sussex_ Note. During all
+the period of the war in Germany I had been on good terms with
+the members of the government, namely, the Chancellor, von Jagow,
+Zimmermann and the other officials of the Foreign Office, as well
+as with Helfferich, Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister, Kaempf, the
+President of the Reichstag and a number of the influential men
+of Germany such as von Gwinner, of the Deutsche Bank, Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank, Dr. Walter Rathenau, who for a long time was
+at the head of the department for the supply and conservation of
+raw materials, General von Kessel, Over-Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, in spite of many tiffs with him over the treatment
+of prisoners, Theodor Wolff, editor of the _Tageblatt_, Professor
+Stein, Maximilian Harden and many others.
+
+For a long time the fight waged by the Chancellor was America's
+fight and a fight for peace, so much so that the newspapers which
+attacked the Chancellor were the same ones which had attacked
+President Wilson, America and Americans in general, and which had
+very often included me in their attacks. During every crisis between
+America and Germany I had acted with von Jagow and Zimmermann in
+a most confidential way, looking forward always to one object,
+namely, the preservation of peace between our respective countries.
+Many suggestions were made which, I think, materially aided up
+to that time in the preservation of peace.
+
+The Chancellor and the Foreign Office, however, through sheer
+weakness did nothing to prevent the insults to our flag and President
+perpetrated by the "League of Truth"; although both under the law
+and the regulations of the "State of Siege" this gang could not
+operate without the consent of the authorities. So far as I was
+concerned personally, a few extra attacks from tooth carpenters
+and snake dancers meant nothing, but certainly aroused my interest
+in the workings of the Teutonic official brain.
+
+On my return everyone in official life,--the Chancellor, Zimmermann,
+von Stumm who succeeded Zimmermann, von der Busche, formerly
+German Minister in the Argentine, who had equal rank with Stumm
+in the Foreign Office--all without exception and in the most
+convincing language assured me that cases like that of the
+_Marina_, for example, were only accidents and that there
+was every desire on the part of Germany to maintain the pledges
+given in the _Sussex_ Note.
+
+And the great question to be solved is whether the Germans in
+making their offers of peace, in begging me to go to America to
+talk peace to the President, were sincerely anxious for peace,
+or were only making these general offers of peace in order to
+excuse in the eyes of the world a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare and to win to their side public opinion in the United
+States, in case such warfare should be resumed.
+
+Had the decision rested with the Chancellor and with the Foreign
+Office, instead of with the military, I am sure that the decision
+would have been against the resumption of this ruthless war.
+But Germany is not ruled in war time by the civilian power.
+Hindenburg at the time I left for America was at the head of
+the General Staff and Ludendorf, who had been Chief of Staff,
+had been made the Quartermaster General in order that he might
+follow Hindenburg to General Headquarters.
+
+Hindenburg, shortly before his battle of the Masurian Lakes,
+was a General living in retirement at Hanover. Because he had
+for years specialised in the study of this region he was suddenly
+called to the command of the German army which was opposing the
+Russian invasions. Ludendorf, who had been Colonel of a regiment
+at the attack on Liege, was sent with him as his Chief of Staff.
+The success of Hindenburg in his campaigns is too well known
+to require recapitulation here. He became the popular idol of
+Germany, the one general-in fact the one man--whom the people felt
+that they could idolise. But shortly before my trip to America an
+idea was creeping through the mind of the German people leading
+them to believe that Hindenburg was but the front, and that the
+brains of the combination had been furnished by Ludendorf. Many
+Germans in a position to know told me that the real dictator
+of Germany was Ludendorf.
+
+My trip to America was made principally at the instance of von
+Jagow and the Chancellor, and, in my farewell talk with the
+Chancellor a few days before leaving, I asked if it could not
+be arranged, since he was always saying that the civilian power
+was inferior to that of the military, that I should see Hindenburg
+and Ludendorf before I left. This proposed meeting he either
+could not or would not arrange, and shortly after my return I
+again asked the Chancellor if I could not see, if not the Emperor,
+at least Hindenburg and Ludendorf, who the Chancellor himself
+had said were the leaders of the military, and, therefore, the
+leaders of Germany. Again I was put off.
+
+In the meantime and in spite of the official assurance given
+to me certain men in Germany, in a position to know, warned me
+that the government intended to resume ruthless submarine war.
+Ludendorf, they said, had declared in favour of this war and,
+according to them, that meant its adoption.
+
+At first I thought that Germany would approach the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war _via_ the armed merchantman issue.
+
+The case of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners seemed to bear out
+this theory. A German raider captured and sunk a number of enemy
+vessels and sent one of the captured boats, the _Yarrowdale_,
+with a prize crew to Swinemunde. On board, held as prisoners,
+were a number of the crews of the captured vessels; and among
+those men I learned "under the rose," were some Americans. The
+arrival of the _Yarrowdale_ was kept secret for some time,
+but as soon as I received information of its arrival, I sent
+note after note to the Foreign Office demanding to know if there
+were any Americans among the prisoner crews.
+
+For a long time I received no answer, but finally Germany admitted
+what I knew already, that Americans taken with the crews of captured
+ships were being held as prisoners of war, the theory of the
+Germans being that all employed on armed enemy merchant ships
+were enemy combatants. I supposed that possibly Germany might
+therefore approach the submarine controversy by this route and
+claim that armed merchantmen were liable to be sunk without notice.
+
+Instructed by the State Department, I demanded the immediate
+release of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners. This was accorded
+by Germany, but, after the breaking of relations, the prisoners
+were held back; and it was not until after we left Germany that
+they were finally released.
+
+I asked permission to visit these prisoners and sent Mr. Ayrault
+and Mr. Osborne to the place where I knew they were interned.
+The permission to visit them arrived, but on the same day orders
+were given to remove the prisoners to other camps. Mr. Osborne
+and Mr. Ayrault, however, being on the ground, saw the prisoners
+before their removal and reported on their conditions.
+
+On January sixth the American Association of Commerce and Trade
+gave me a dinner at the Hotel Adlon. This was made the occasion
+of a sort of German-American love-feast. Zimmermann, although
+he had to go early in the evening to meet the Foreign Minister
+of Austria-Hungary, was present; Helfferich, Vice-Chancellor
+and Secretary of the Interior; Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister;
+Sydow, Minister of Commerce; Dernburg; von Gwinner of the Deutsche
+Bank; Gutmann of the Dresdener Bank; Under Secretary von der
+Busche of the Foreign Office; the Mayor and the Police President
+of Berlin; the President of the Berlin Chamber of Commerce; Under
+Secretary von Stumm of the Foreign Office; and many others of
+that office. There were present also Under Secretary Richter
+of the Interior Department; Lieutenant Colonel Doeutelmoser of
+the General Staff; the editors and proprietors of the principal
+newspapers in Berlin; Count Montgelas, who had charge of American
+affairs in the Foreign Office; naval officers like Captain Lans;
+the American correspondents in Germany; and Prince Isenburg;
+rubbing shoulders with the brewers, George Ehret and Krueger,
+of New York and Newark. There were literary lights like Ludwig
+Fulda, Captain Persius, Professor Hans Delbruck, Dr. Paasche,
+Vice-President of the Reichstag, and many others equally celebrated
+as the ones that I have named. Speeches were made by Mr. Wolf,
+President of the American Association of Commerce and Trade,
+Helfferich, Zimmermann, von Gwinner and me. A tone of the greatest
+friendliness prevailed. Zimmermann referred to our personal
+friendship and said that he was sure that we should be able to
+manage everything together. Helfferich in his speech said that
+I, by learning German and studying the life of the German people,
+was one of the few diplomats that had come to Germany who had
+learned something of the real life and psychology of the Germans.
+Von Gwinner made a speech in English that would have done credit
+to any American after-dinner speaker; and I, in my short address,
+said that the relations between the two countries had never been
+better and that so long as my personal friends like Zimmermann
+and other members of the government, who I named, were in office,
+I was sure that the good relations between the two countries
+would be maintained. I spoke also of the sums of money that I had
+brought back with me for the benefit of the widows and orphans
+of Germany.
+
+The majority of the German newspapers spoke in a very kindly
+way about this dinner and about what was said at it. Of course,
+they all took what I said as an expression of friendliness, and
+only Reventlow claimed that, by referring to the members of the
+government, I was interfering in the internal affairs of Germany.
+
+The speeches and, in fact, this dinner constituted a last desperate
+attempt to preserve friendly relations. Both the reasonable men
+present and I knew, almost to a certainty, that return to ruthless
+submarine war had been decided on and that only some lucky chance
+could prevent the military, backed by the made public opinion, from
+insisting on a defiance of international law and the laws of humanity.
+
+The day after the dinner the Chancellor sent for me and expressed
+approval of what I said and thanked me for it and on the surface
+it seemed as if everything was "as merry as a marriage bell."
+Unfortunately, I am afraid that all this was only on the surface,
+and that perhaps the orders to the submarine commanders to recommence
+ruthless war had been given the day preceding this love-feast.
+
+The Germans believed that President Wilson had been elected with
+a mandate to keep out of war at any cost, and that America could
+be insulted, flouted and humiliated with impunity. Even before
+this dinner we had begun to get rumours of the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war and within a few days I was cabling to
+the Department information based not upon absolute facts but upon
+reports which seemed reliable and which had been collected through
+the able efforts of our very capable naval attache, Commander
+Gherardi.
+
+And this information was confirmed by the hints given to me by
+various influential Germans. Again and again after the sixth of
+January, I was assured by Zimmermann and others in the Foreign
+Office that nothing of the kind was contemplated.
+
+Now were the German moves in the direction of peace sincere or not?
+
+From the time when the Chancellor first spoke of peace, I asked
+him and others what the peace terms of Germany were. I could
+never get any one to state any definite terms of peace and on
+several occasions when I asked the Chancellor whether Germany
+was willing to withdraw from Belgium, he always said, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." Finally in January, 1917, when he was again
+talking of peace, I said, "What are these peace terms to which
+you refer continually? Will you allow me to ask a few questions
+as to the specific terms of peace? First are the Germans willing
+to withdraw from Belgium?" The Chancellor answered, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." I said, "What are these guarantees?" He said,
+"We must possibly have the forts of Liege and Namur; we must
+have other forts and garrisons throughout Belgium. We must have
+possession of the railroad lines. We must have possession of the
+ports and other means of communication. The Belgians will not
+be allowed to maintain an army, but we must be allowed to retain
+a large army in Belgium. We must have the commercial control of
+Belgium." I said, "I do not see that you have left much for the
+Belgians except that King Albert will have the right to reside in
+Brussels with an honor guard." And the Chancellor said, "We cannot
+allow Belgium to be an outpost (_Vorwerk_) of England"; and
+I said, "I do not suppose the English, on the other hand, wish
+it to become an outpost of Germany, especially as von Tirpitz
+has said that the coast of Flanders should be retained in order
+to make war on England and America." I continued, "How about
+Northern France?" He said, "We are willing to leave Northern
+France, but there must be a rectification of the frontier." I
+said, "How about the Eastern frontier?" He said, "We must have
+a very substantial rectification of our frontier." I said, "How
+about Roumania?" He said, "We shall leave Bulgaria to deal with
+Roumania." I said, "How about Serbia?" He said, "A very small
+Serbia may be allowed to exist, but that is a question for Austria.
+Austria must be left to do what she wishes to Italy, and we must
+have indemnities from all countries and all our ships and colonies
+back."
+
+Of course, "rectification of the frontier" is a polite term for
+"annexation."
+
+On the twenty-second of January, 1917, our President addressed
+the Senate; and in his address he referred to his Note of the
+eighteenth of December, sent to all belligerent governments. In
+this address he stated, referring to the reply of the Entente
+Powers to his Peace Note of the eighteenth of December, "We are
+that much nearer to the definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war."
+
+He referred to the willingness of both contestants to discuss
+terms of peace, as follows: "The Central Powers united in reply
+which stated merely that they were ready to meet their antagonists
+in conference to discuss terms of peace. The Entente Powers have
+replied much more definitely and have stated, in general terms,
+indeed, but with sufficient definiteness to imply details, the
+arrangements, guarantees and acts of reparation which they deem
+to be the indispensable conditions of a satisfactory settlement.
+We are that much nearer a definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war." The President further referred to a
+world concert to guarantee peace in the future and said, "The
+present war must first be ended, but we owe it to candour and
+to a just regard for the opinion of mankind to say that so far
+as our participation in guarantees of future peace is concerned,
+it makes a great deal of difference in what way and upon what
+terms it is ended." He said that the statesmen of both of the
+groups of nations at war had stated that it was not part of the
+purpose they had in mind to crush their antagonists, and he said
+that it must be implied from these assurances that the peace
+to come must be "a peace without victory."
+
+In the course of his address he said: "Statesmen everywhere are
+agreed that there should be a united, independent and autonomous
+Poland." In another place he said: "So far as practicable, moreover,
+every great people now struggling toward a full development of
+its resources and its powers should be assured a direct outlet
+to the highways of the sea." Where this cannot be done by cession
+of territory it can no doubt be arranged by the neutralisation
+of direct rights of way; and he closed by proposing in effect
+that the nations of the world should adopt the Monroe Doctrine
+and that no nation should seek to explain its policy for any
+other nation or people.
+
+After the receipt of the Ultimatum of January thirty-first from
+Germany, the Chancellor, in a conversation I had with him, referred
+to this Peace Note of December eighteenth and to the speech of
+January twenty-second.
+
+[Illustration: A POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT, SHOWING
+THE ALLOTMENT OF FOOD TO EACH PERSON FOR THE FIRST FIFTEEN DAYS
+OF MAY, 1916.]
+
+I must say here that on my return to Germany I went very far
+in assuring the Chancellor and other members of the Government
+of the President's desire to see peace established in the world;
+and I told them that I believed that the President was ready
+to go very far in the way of coercing any nation which refused
+a reasonable peace; but I also impressed on all the members of
+the Government with whom I came in contact my belief that the
+election had not in any way altered the policy of the President,
+and I warned them of the danger to our good relations if ruthless
+submarine warfare should be resumed.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg, however, at this interview after the
+thirty-first of January, said that he had been compelled to take
+up ruthless submarine war because it was evident that President
+Wilson could do nothing towards peace. He spoke particularly of
+the President's speech of January twenty-second and said that
+in that speech the President had made it plain that he considered
+that the answer of the Entente Powers to his Peace Note formed a
+basis for peace, which was a thing impossible for Germany even
+to consider; and said further (and this was a criticism I heard
+not only from him, but also from many Germans), that when the
+President spoke of a united and independent Poland he evidently
+meant to take away from Germany that part of Poland which had been
+incorporated in the Kingdom of Prussia and give it to this new
+and independent Kingdom, thereby bringing the Eastern frontier of
+Germany within two hours by motor from Berlin; and that, further,
+when the President spoke of giving each nation a highway to the
+sea, he meant that the German port of Dantzig should be turned over
+to this new State of Poland, thereby not only taking a Prussian
+port but cutting the extreme Eastern part of Prussia from the
+remainder of the country. I said that these objections appeared
+to me very frivolous; that the President, of course, like a clever
+lawyer endeavouring to gain his end, which was peace, had said
+that all parties were apparently agreed that there should be a
+peace; that if Germany were fighting a merely defensive war,
+as she had always claimed, she should be greatly delighted when
+the President declared that all the weight of America was in
+favor of a peace without victory, which meant, of course, that
+Germany should be secured from that crushing and dismemberment
+which Germany's statesmen had stated so often that they feared.
+I said, further, that I was sure that when the President spoke
+of the united and independent State of Poland he had not, of
+course, had reference to Poland at any particular period of its
+history, but undoubtedly to Poland as constituted by Germany
+and Austria themselves; and that, in referring to the right of
+a nation to have access to the sea, he had in mind Russia and
+the Dardanelles rather than to any attempt to take a Prussian
+port for the benefit of Poland.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg said that one of the principal reasons why
+Germany had determined upon a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare was because of this speech of the President to the American
+Senate. Of course, the trouble with this feeling and the criticism
+of the President's speech made by the Chancellor is that the
+orders for the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare had been
+given long before the news of the speech came to Germany.
+
+I had cabled the information collected by Commander Gherardi
+as to the orders given to submarines long before the date of
+the President's speech, and it happened that on the night after
+I had received the German note announcing this resumption I was
+taking a walk after dinner about the snow-covered streets of
+Berlin. In the course of this walk I met a young German woman of
+my acquaintance who was on intimate terms with the Crown Princess.
+She was on her way on foot from the opera house, where she had
+been with the Crown Princess, to the underground station, for
+by this time, of course, taxis had become an unknown luxury in
+Berlin, and I joined her. I told her of the Ultimatum which, I
+had received at six o'clock that evening from Zimmermann and I
+told her that I was sure that it meant the breaking of diplomatic
+relations and our departure from Germany. She expressed great
+surprise that the submarine warfare was set to commence on the
+thirty-first of January and said that weeks before they had been
+talking over the matter at the Crown Princess's and that she
+had heard then that the orders had been given to commence it on
+the fifteenth. In any event it is certain that the orders to the
+submarine commanders had been given long prior to the thirty-first
+and probably as early as the fifteenth.
+
+I sincerely believe that the only object of the Germans in making
+these peace offers was first to get the Allies, if possible, in
+a conference and there detach some or one of them by the offer
+of separate terms; or, if this scheme failed, then it was believed
+that the general offer and talk about peace would create a sentiment
+so favourable to the Germans that they might, without fear of
+action by the United States, resume ruthless submarine warfare
+against England.
+
+A week or two before the thirty-first of January, Dr. Solf asked
+me if I did not think that it would be possible for the United
+States to permit the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare
+against Great Britain. He said that three months time was all
+that would be required to bring Great Britain to her knees and end
+the war. And in fact so cleverly did von Tirpitz, Grand Admiral
+von Meuster, the Conservatives and the enemies of the Chancellor
+and other advocates of submarine war carry on their propaganda
+that the belief was ingrained in the whole of the German nation
+that a resumption of this ruthless war would lead within three
+months to what all Germans so ardently desired--peace. It was
+impossible for any government to resist the popular demand for
+the use of this illegal means of warfare, because army and navy
+and people were convinced that ruthless submarine war spelled
+success and a glorious peace.
+
+But this peace, of course, meant only a German peace, a peace
+as outlined to me by the Chancellor; a peace impossible for the
+Allies and even for the world to accept; a peace which would
+leave Germany immensely powerful and ready immediately after
+the war to take up a campaign against the nations of the Western
+hemisphere; a peace which would compel every nation, so long
+as German autocracy remained in the saddle, to devote its best
+energies, the most fruitful period of each man's life, to
+preparations for war.
+
+On January thirtieth, I received a definite intimation of the
+coming Ultimatum the next day and, judging that the hint meant
+the resumption of ruthless submarine war, I telegraphed a warning
+to the American Ambassadors and Ministers as well as to the State
+Department. On January thirty-first at about four o'clock in the
+afternoon I received from Zimmermann a short letter of which
+the following is a copy:
+
+  "The Secretary of State of the Foreign Office, Zimmermann,
+  requests the honor of the visit of his Excellency, the
+  Ambassador of the United States of America, this afternoon
+  at six o'clock in the Foreign Office, Wilhelmstrasse 75/76.
+
+  "Berlin, the 31st January, 1917."
+
+Pursuant to this letter, I went to the Foreign Office at six
+o'clock. Zimmermann then read to me in German a note from the
+Imperial Government, announcing the creation of the war zones
+about Great Britain and France and the commencement of ruthless
+submarine warfare at twelve P. M. that night. I made no comment,
+put the note in my pocket and went back to the Embassy. It was
+then about seven P. M. and, of course, the note was immediately
+translated and despatched with all speed to America.
+
+After the despatch of the note I had an interview with the Chancellor
+in which he, as I have stated above, criticised both the Peace
+Note of December eighteenth as not being definite enough and
+the speech to the Senate of January twenty-second; and further
+said that he believed that the situation had changed, that, in
+spite of what the President had said in the note before the
+_Sussex_ settlement, he was now for peace, that he had been
+elected on a peace platform, and that nothing would happen.
+Zimmermann at the time he delivered the note told me that this
+submarine warfare was a necessity for Germany, and that Germany
+could not hold out a year on the question of food. He further
+said, "Give us only two months of this kind of warfare and we
+shall end the war and make peace within three months."
+
+Saturday, February third, the President announced to Congress
+the breaking of diplomatic relations with Germany. The news of
+this, of course, did not reach Berlin until the next day; and on
+this Saturday afternoon Mrs. Gerard and I had an engagement to go
+to the theatre with Zimmermann and Mrs. Friedlaender-Fuld-Mitford,
+a young lady whose father is considered the richest man in Berlin,
+and who had been married to a young Englishman, named Mitford, a
+son of Lord Redesdale. Through no fault on the lady's part, there
+had been an annulment of this marriage; and she was occupying a
+floor of her own in the handsome house of her father and mother
+on the Pariser-Platz in Berlin. We stopped for Mrs. Mitford and
+took her to the theatre where we saw a very clever play, I think
+by Thoma, called "Die Verlorene Tochter" (The Prodigal Daughter).
+Zimmermann did not come to the play but joined us later at the
+Friedlaender-Fuld House where we had a supper of four in Mrs.
+Miiford's apartments. After supper, while I was talking to
+Zimmermann, he spoke of the note to America and said: "During
+the past month, this is what I have been doing so often at the
+General Headquarters with the Emperor. I often thought of telling
+you what was going on as I used to tell you in the old days,
+but I thought that you would only say that such a course would
+mean a break of diplomatic relations, and so I thought there was
+no use in telling you. But as you will see, everything will be
+all right. America will do nothing, for President Wilson is for
+peace and nothing else. Everything will go on as before. I have
+arranged for you to go to the Great General Headquarters and see
+the Kaiser next week and everything will be all right."
+
+The next day, Sunday, we had a German who is connected with the
+Foreign Office and his American wife to lunch, and another German
+who had been in America, also connected with the Foreign Office.
+Just as we were going in to lunch some one produced a copy of the
+"_B._Z._", the noon paper published in Berlin, which contained what
+seemed to be an authentic account of the breaking of diplomatic
+relations by America. The lunch was far from cheerful. The Germans
+looked very sad and said practically nothing, while I tried to
+make polite conversation at my end of the table.
+
+The next day I went over to see Zimmermann, having that morning
+received the official despatch from Washington, and told him
+that I had come to demand my passports.
+
+Of course, Zimmermann by that time had received the news and
+had had time to compose himself. The American correspondents
+told me that when he saw them on the day before, he had at first
+refused to say anything and then had been rather violent in his
+language and had finally shown great emotion. I am sure, from
+everything I observed, that the break of diplomatic relations
+came as an intense surprise to him and to the other members of
+the government, and yet I cannot imagine why intelligent men
+should think that the United States of America had fallen so low
+as to bear without murmur this sudden kick in the face.
+
+The police who had always been about our Embassy since the
+commencement of the war, were now greatly increased in numbers;
+and guarded not only the front of the house, but also the rear and
+the surrounding streets; but there was no demonstration whatever
+on the part of the people of Berlin. On Tuesday afternoon I went
+out for a walk, walking through most of the principal streets
+of Berlin, absolutely alone, and on my return to the Embassy
+I found Count Montgelas, who, with the rank of Minister, was
+at the head of the department which included American affairs
+in the Foreign Office. I asked Montgelas why I had not received
+my passports, and he said that I was being kept back because
+the Imperial Government did not know what had happened to Count
+Bernstorff and that there had been rumours that the German ships
+in America had been confiscated by our government. I said that
+I was quite sure that Bernstorff was being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. I
+said, moreover, "I do not see why I have to disprove your idea that
+Bernstorff is being maltreated and the German ships confiscated. It
+seems to me it is for you to prove this; and, at any event, why
+don't you have the Swiss Government, which now represents you,
+cable to its Minister in Washington and get the exact facts?" He
+said, "Well, you know, the Swiss are not used to cabling."
+
+He then produced a paper which was a re-affirmation of the treaty
+between Prussia and the United States of 1799, with some very
+extraordinary clauses added to it. He asked me to read this over
+and either to sign it or to get authority to sign it, and said
+that if it was not signed it would be very difficult for Americans
+to leave the country, particularly the American correspondents.
+I read this treaty over and then said, "Of course I cannot sign
+this on my own responsibility and I will not cable to my government
+unless I can cable in cipher and give them my opinion of this
+document." He said, "That is impossible." This treaty was as
+follows:
+
+  Agreement between Germany and the United States of America
+  concerning the treatment of each other's citizens and their
+  private property after the severance of diplomatic relations.
+
+  _Article_1._
+
+  After the severance of diplomatic relations between Germany and
+  the United States of America and in the event of the outbreak of
+  war between the two Powers the citizens of either party and their
+  private property in the territory of the other party shall be
+  treated according to Article 23 of the treaty of amity and
+  commerce between Prussia and the United States of 11 July, 1799,
+  with the following explanatory and supplementary clauses.
+
+  _Article_2._
+
+  German merchants in the United States and American merchants
+  in Germany shall so far as the treatment of their persons and
+  their property is concerned be held in every respect on a par
+  with the other persons mentioned in Article 23. Accordingly
+  they shall even after the period provided for in Article 23 has
+  elapsed be entitled to remain and continue their profession in
+  the country of their residence.
+
+  Merchants as well as the other persons mentioned in Article 23
+  may be excluded from fortified places or other places of military
+  importance.
+
+  _Article_3._
+
+  Germans in the United States and Americans in Germany shall
+  be free to leave the country of their residence within the
+  times and by the routes that shall be assigned to them by the
+  proper authorities.
+
+  The persons departing shall be entitled to take along their
+  personal property including money, valuables and bank accounts
+  excepting such property the exportation of which is prohibited
+  according to general provisions.
+
+  _Article_4._
+
+  The protection of Germans in the United States and of Americans
+  in Germany and of their property shall be guaranteed in accordance
+  with the laws existing in the countries of either party. They
+  shall be under no other restrictions concerning the enjoyment of
+  their private rights and the judicial enforcement of their rights
+  than neutral residents; they may accordingly not be transferred
+  to concentration camps nor shall their private property be subject
+  to sequestration or liquidation or other compulsory alienation
+  except in cases that under the existing laws apply also to neutrals.
+
+  As a general rule, German property in the United States and
+  American property in Germany shall not be subject to sequestration
+  or liquidation or other compulsory alienation under other
+  conditions than neutral property.
+
+  _Article_5._
+
+  Patent rights or other protected rights held by Germans in the
+  United States or Americans in Germany shall not be declared
+  void; nor shall the exercise of such rights be impeded nor shall
+  such rights be transferred to others without the consent of the
+  person entitled thereto; provided that regulations made exclusively
+  in the interest of the State shall apply.
+
+  _Article_6._
+
+  Contracts made between Germans and Americans either before or
+  after the severance of diplomatic relations, also obligations
+  of all kinds between Germans and Americans shall not be declared
+  cancelled, void or in suspension except under provisions applicable
+  to neutrals.
+
+  Likewise the citizens of either party shall not be impeded in
+  fulfilling their liabilities arising from such obligations either
+  by injunctions or by other provisions unless these apply also to
+  neutrals.
+
+  _Article_7._
+
+  The provisions of the sixth Hague Convention relative to the
+  treatment of enemy merchant ships at outbreak of hostilities
+  shall apply to the merchant vessels of either party and their
+  cargo.
+
+  The aforesaid ships may not be forced to leave port unless at
+  the same time they be given a pass recognised as binding by all
+  the enemy sea powers to a home port or a port of an allied country
+  or to another port of the country in which the ship happens to be.
+
+  _Article_8._
+
+  The regulations of chapter 3 of the eleventh Hague Convention
+  relative to certain restrictions in the exercise of the right
+  of capture in maritime war shall apply to the captains, officers
+  and members of the crews of merchant ships specified in Article
+  7 and of such merchant ships that may be captured in the course
+  of a possible war.
+
+  _Article_9._
+
+  This agreement shall apply also to the colonies and other
+  foreign possessions of either party.
+
+  Berlin, February, 1917.
+
+I then said, "I shall not cable at all. Why do you come to me with
+a proposed treaty after we have broken diplomatic relations and
+ask an Ambassador who is held as a prisoner to sign it? Prisoners
+do not sign treaties and treaties signed by them would not be
+worth anything." And I also said, "After your threat to keep
+Americans here and after reading this document, even if I had
+authority to sign it I would stay here until hell freezes over
+before I would put my name to such a paper."
+
+Montgelas seemed rather rattled, and in his confusion left the
+paper with me--something, I am sure, he did not intend to do
+in case of a refusal. Montgelas was an extremely agreeable man
+and I think at all times had correctly predicted the attitude
+of America and had been against acts of frightfulness, such as
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ and the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war. I am sure that a gentleman like Montgelas
+undertook with great reluctance to carry out his orders in the
+matter of getting me to sign this treaty.
+
+I must cheerfully certify that even the most pro-German American
+correspondents in Berlin, when I told them of Montgelas' threat,
+showed the same fine spirit as their colleagues. All begged me
+not to consider them or their liberty where the interests of
+America were involved.
+
+As soon as diplomatic relations were broken, and I broke them
+formally not only in my conversation with Zimmermann of Monday
+morning but also by sending over a formal written request for my
+passports on the evening of that day, our telegraph privileges were
+cut off. I was not even allowed to send telegrams to the American
+consuls throughout Germany giving them their instructions. Mail
+also was cut off, and the telephone. My servants were not even
+permitted to go to the nearby hotel to telephone. In the meantime
+we completed our preparations for departure. We arranged to turn
+over American interests, and the interests of Roumania and Serbia
+and Japan, to the Spanish Embassy; and the interests of Great
+Britain to the Dutch. I have said already that I believe that
+Ambassador Polo de Bernabe will faithfully protect the interests
+of America, and I believe that Baron Gevers will fearlessly fight
+the cause of the British prisoners.
+
+We sold our automobiles; and two beautiful prize winning saddle
+horses, one from Kentucky and one from Virginia, which I had
+brought with me from America, went on the stage, that is, I sold
+them to the proprietor of the circus in Berlin!
+
+The three tons of food which we had brought with us from America
+we gave to our colleagues in the diplomatic corps,--the Spaniards,
+Greeks, Dutch and the Central and South Americans. I had many
+friends among the diplomats of the two Americas who were all
+men of great ability and position in their own country. I think
+that most of them know only too well the designs against Central
+and South America cherished by the Pan-Germans.
+
+Finally, I think on the morning of Friday, Mr. Oscar King Davis,
+correspondent of the _New_York_Times_, received a wireless
+from Mr. Van Anda, editor of the _New_York_Times_, telling
+him that Bernstorff and his staff were being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. In
+the evening our telephone was reconnected, and we were allowed to
+receive some telegrams and to send open telegrams to the consuls,
+etc. throughout Germany; and we were notified that we would probably
+be allowed to leave the next day in the evening.
+
+Always followed by spies, I paid as many farewell visits to my
+diplomatic colleagues as I was able to see; and on Saturday I
+thought that, in spite of the ridiculous treatment accorded us in
+cutting off the mail and telephone and in holding me for nearly
+a week, I would leave in a sporting spirit: I therefore, had
+my servant telephone and ask whether Zimmermann and von
+Bethmann-Hollweg would receive me. I had a pleasant farewell
+talk of about half an hour with each of them and I expressly told
+the Chancellor that I had come to bid him a personal farewell,
+not to make a record for any White Book, and that anything he
+said would remain confidential. I also stopped in to thank Dr.
+Zahn, of the Foreign Office, who had arranged the details of our
+departure and gave him a gold cigarette case as a souvenir of
+the occasion. At the last moment, the Germans allowed a number
+of the consuls and clerks who had been working in the Embassy,
+and the American residents in Berlin, to leave on the train with
+us; so that we were about one hundred and twenty persons in all
+on this train, which left the Potsdamer station at eight-ten in
+the evening. The time of our departure had not been publicly
+announced, but although the automobiles, etc. in front of the
+Embassy might have attracted a crowd, there was no demonstration
+whatever; and, in fact, during this week that I was detained in
+Berlin I walked allover the city every afternoon and evening,
+went into shops, and so on, without encountering any hostile
+demonstration.
+
+There was a large crowd in the station to see us off. All the
+Spanish Embassy, Dutch, Greeks and many of our colleagues from
+Central and South America were there. There were, from the Foreign
+Office, Montgelas, Dr. Roediger, Prittwitz and Horstmann. As the
+train pulled out, a number of the Americans left in Berlin who
+were on the station platform raised quite a vigorous cheer.
+
+Two officers had been sent by the Imperial Government to accompany
+us on this train; one, a Major von der Hagen, sent by the General
+Staff and the other, a representative of the Foreign Office, Baron
+Wernher von Ow-Wachendorf. It was quite thoughtful of the Foreign
+Office to send this last officer, as it was by our efforts that
+he had secured his exchange when he was a prisoner in England;
+and he, therefore, would be supposed to entertain kindly feelings
+for our Embassy.
+
+I had ordered plenty of champagne and cigars to be put on the
+train and we were first invited to drink champagne with the officers
+in the dining car; then they joined us in the private salon car
+which we occupied in the end of the train. The journey was
+uneventful. Outside some of the stations a number of people were
+drawn up who stared at the train in a bovine way, but who made
+no demonstration of any kind.
+
+We went through Wurttemburg and entered Switzerland by way of
+Schaffhausen. The two officers left us at the last stop on the
+German side. I had taken the precaution before we left Berlin to
+find out their names, and, as they left us, I gave each of them
+a gold cigarette case inscribed with his name and the date.
+
+At the first station on the Swiss side a body of Swiss troops
+were drawn up, presenting arms, and the Colonel commanding the
+Swiss army (there are no generals in Switzerland), attended by
+several staff officers, came on the train and travelled with
+us nearly to Zurich.
+
+I started to speak French to one of these staff officers, but
+he interrupted me by saying in perfect English, "You do not have
+to speak French to me. My name is Iselin, many of my relations
+live in New York and I lived there myself some years."
+
+At Zurich we left the German special train, and were met on the
+platform by some grateful Japanese, the American Consul and a
+number of French and Swiss newspaper reporters, thus ending our
+exodus from Germany.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN
+
+I have already expressed a belief that Germany will not be forced
+to make peace because of a revolution, and that sufficient food
+will be somehow found to carry the population during at least
+another year of war.
+
+What then offers a prospect of reasonable peace, supposing, of
+course, that the Germans fail in the submarine blockade of England
+and that the crumbling up of Russia does not release from the
+East frontier soldiers enough to break the lines of the British
+and French in France?
+
+I think that it is only by an evolution of Germany herself toward
+liberalism that the world will be given such guarantees of future
+peace as will justify the termination of this war.
+
+There is, properly speaking, no great liberal party in the political
+arena in Germany. As I have said, the Reichstag is divided roughly
+into Conservatives, Roman Catholics, or Centrum, and Social
+Democrats. The so-called National Liberal party has in this war
+shown itself a branch of the Conservative party, and on some issues
+as bitter, as conservative, as the Junkers themselves. Herr
+Bassermann and Herr Stresemann have not shown themselves leaders of
+liberal thought, nor has their leadership been such as to inspire
+confidence in their political sagacity.
+
+It was Stresemann who on May thirtieth, 1916, said in the Reichstag
+referring to President Wilson as a peacemaker, "We thrust the
+hand of Wilson aside." On the day following, the day on which
+the President announced to Congress the breaking of diplomatic
+relations, news of that break had not yet arrived in Berlin and
+Herr Stresemann on that peaceful Sunday morning was engaged in
+making a speech to the members of the National Liberal party
+in which he told them that as a result of his careful study of
+the American situation, of his careful researches into American
+character and politics, he could assure them that America would
+never break with Germany. As he concluded his speech and sat
+down amid the applause of his admirers, a German who had been
+sitting in the back of the room rose and read from the noon paper,
+the "_B._Z._", a despatch from Holland giving the news that
+America had broken relations with Germany. The political skill
+and foresight of Herr Stresemann may be judged from the above
+incident.
+
+The Socialists, or Social Democrats, more properly speaking,
+have shown themselves in opposition to the monarchical form of
+government in Germany. This has put them politically, militarily
+and socially beyond the pale.
+
+After a successful French attack in the Champagne, I heard it
+said of a German woman, whose husband was thought to be killed,
+that her rage and despair had been so great that she had said she
+would become a Social Democrat; and her expression was repeated
+as showing to what lengths grief had driven her. This girl was
+the wife of an ordinary clerk working in Berlin.
+
+The Social Democrats are not given offices, are not given titles:
+they never join the class of "_Rat_," and they cannot hope
+to become officers of the army. Did not Lieutenant Forstner,
+the notorious centre of the Zabern Affair, promise a reward to
+the first one of his men who in case of trouble should shoot
+one "of those damn Social Democrats"?
+
+There is, therefore, no refuge at present politically, for the
+reasonable men of liberal inclinations; and it is these liberal
+men who must themselves create a liberal party: a party, membership
+in which will not entail a loss of business, a loss of prospects
+of promotion and social degradation.
+
+There are many such men in Germany to-day; perhaps some of the
+conservative Socialists will join such a party, and there are
+men in the government itself whose habits of mind and thought
+are not incompatible with membership in a liberal organisation.
+The Chancellor himself is, perhaps, at heart a Liberal. He comes
+of a banking family in Frankfort and while there stands before
+his name the "von" which means nobility, and while he owns a
+country estate, the whole turn of his thought is towards a
+philosophical liberalism. Zimmermann, the Foreign Secretary,
+although the mental excitement caused by his elevation to the
+Foreign Office at a time of stress, made him go over to the advocates
+of ruthless submarine war, lock, stock and barrel, is nevertheless
+at heart a Liberal and violently opposed to a system which draws
+the leaders of the country from only one aristocratic class.
+Dr. Solf, the Imperial Colonial Minister, while devoted to the
+Emperor and his family is a man so reasonable in his views, so
+indulgent of the views of others, and indulgent without weakness,
+that he would make an ideal leader of a liberalised Germany.
+The great bankers, merchants and manufacturers, although they
+appreciate the luscious dividends that they have received during
+the peaceful years since 1870, nevertheless feel under their
+skins the ignominy of living in a country where a class exists
+by birth, a class not even tactful enough to conceal its ancient
+contempt for all those who soil their hands business or trade.
+
+In fact such a party is a necessity for Germany as a buffer against
+the extreme Social Democrats.
+
+At the close of the war the soldiers who have fought in the mud
+of the trenches for three years will most insistently demand a
+redistricting of the Reichstag and an abolition of the inadequate
+circle voting of Prussia. And when manhood suffrage comes in
+Prussia and when the industrial population of Germany gets that
+representation in the Reichstag out of which they have been brazenly
+cheated for so many years, it may well be that a great liberal
+party will be the only defence of private property against the
+assault of an enraged and justly revengeful social democracy.
+
+The workingmen of Germany have been fooled for a long time. They
+constitute that class of which President Lincoln spoke, "You
+can fool some of the people all of the time"; and the middle
+class of manufacturers, merchants, etc. have acquiesced in the
+system because of the profits that they have made.
+
+The difficulty of making peace with Germany, as at present
+constituted, is that the whole world feels that peace made with
+its present government would not be lasting; that such a peace
+would mean the detachment of some of the Allies from the present
+world alliance against Germany; preparation by Germany, in the
+light of her needs as disclosed by this war; and the declaration
+of a new war in which there would be no battle of the Marne to
+turn back the tide of German world conquest.
+
+For a long time before this war, radicals in Great Britain pinned
+a great faith to the Socialist party of Germany. How little that
+faith was justified appeared in July and August of 1914 when the
+Socialist party tamely voted credits for the war; a war declared
+by the Emperor on the mere statement that it was a defensive
+war; declared because it was alleged that certain invasions of
+German territory, never since substantiated, had taken place.
+
+The Socialist party is divided. It is a great pity that the world
+cannot deal with men of the type of Scheidemann, who, in other
+democracies, would appear so conservative as to be almost
+reactionary. But Scheidemann and his friends, while they have,
+in their attempted negotiations with the Socialists of other
+countries, the present protection of the Imperial Government,
+will have no hand in dictating terms of peace so long as that
+government is in existence. They are being used in an effort
+to divide the Allies.
+
+As President Wilson said in his message to Russia of May
+twenty-sixth, 1917: "The war has begun to go against Germany,
+and, in their desperate desire to escape the inevitable ultimate
+defeat, those who are in authority in Germany are using every
+possible instrumentality, are making use even of the influence of
+the groups and parties among their own subjects to whom they have
+never been just or fair or even tolerant to promote a propaganda on
+both sides of the sea which will preserve for them their influence
+at home and their power abroad, to the undoing of the very men
+they are using."
+
+There is an impression abroad that the Social Democratic party
+of Germany, usually known abroad as the Socialist party, partakes
+of at least some of the characteristics of a great liberal party.
+This is far from being the case. By their acts, if not by their
+express declarations, they have shown themselves as opposed to
+the monarchical form of government and their leaders are charged
+with having declared themselves openly in favour of free love
+and against religion. The Roman Catholic Church recognises in
+Social Democracy its greatest enemy, and has made great efforts
+to counteract its advance by fostering a sort of Roman Catholic
+trades-union for a religious body of Socialists. The Social Democrat
+in Germany is almost an outcast. Although one third of the members
+of the Reichstag belong to this party, its members are never
+called to hold office in the government; and the attitude of
+the whole of the governing class, of all the professors,
+school-teachers, priests of both Protestant and Roman Catholic
+religions of the prosperous middle classes, is that of violent
+opposition to the doctrines of Social Democracy. The world must
+entertain no illusion that the Social Democratic leaders speak
+for Germany.
+
+If the industrial populations had their fair share of representation
+in the Reichstag they might perhaps even control that body. But,
+as I have time and again reiterated, the Reichstag has only the
+power of public opinion; and the Germany of to-day is ruled by
+officials appointed from above downwards. All of these officials in
+Germany must be added to the other classes that I have mentioned.
+There are more officials there than in any other country in the
+world. As they owe their very existence to the government, they
+must not only serve that government, but also make the enemies
+of that government their own. Therefore, they and the circle
+of their connections are opponents of the Social Democrats.
+
+All this shows how difficult it is at present for the men of
+reasonable and liberal views, who do not wish to declare themselves
+against both religion and morality, to find a political refuge.
+
+The Chancellor, himself a liberal at heart, as I have said, has
+declared that there must be changes in Germany. It is perhaps
+within the bounds of probability that a great new liberal party
+will be formed to which I have referred, composed of the more
+conservative Social Democrats, of the remains of the National
+Liberal and Progressive parties and of the more liberal of the
+Conservatives. The important question is then whether the Roman
+Catholic party or Centrum will voluntarily dissolve and its members
+cease to seek election merely as representatives of the Roman
+Catholic Church.
+
+It is perhaps too much to expect that the Centrum party, as a
+whole and as at present constituted, will declare for liberalism
+and parliamentary government and for a fair redistricting of
+the divisions in Germany which elect members to the Reichstag,
+but there are many wise and farseeing men in this party; and
+its leaders, Dr. Spahn and Erzberger, are fearless and able men.
+
+For some years a movement has been going on in the Centrum party
+looking to this end. Many members believed that the time had
+come when it was no longer necessary that the Roman Catholics
+in order to safeguard their religious liberties continue the
+political existence of the Centrum, and attempts were made to
+bring about this change. It was decided adversely, however, by
+the Roman Catholics. But the question is not dead. Voluntary
+dissolution of the Centrum as a Roman Catholic party would
+immediately bring about a creation of a true liberal party to
+which all Germans could belong without a loss of social prestige,
+without becoming declared enemies of the monarchy and without
+declaring themselves against religion and morality.
+
+At the Congress which will meet after the war it will be easy
+for the nations of the world to deal with the representatives
+of a liberal Germany, with representatives of a government still
+monarchical in form, but possessed of either a constitution like
+that of the United States or ruled by a parliamentary government.
+I believe that the tendency of German liberalism is towards the
+easiest transition, that of making the Chancellor and his ministers
+responsible to the Reichstag and bound to resign after a vote
+of want of confidence by that body.
+
+At the time of the Zabern Affair, Scheidemann claimed that the
+resignation of the Chancellor must logically follow a vote of
+want of confidence; and it was von Bethmann-Hollweg who refused
+to resign, saying that he was responsible to the Emperor alone.
+It requires no violent change to bring about this establishment
+of parliamentary government, and, if the members of the Reichstag
+should be elected from districts fairly constituted, the world
+would then be dealing with a liberalised Germany, and a Germany
+which has become liberalised without any violent change in the
+form of its government.
+
+Of course, coincident with this parliamentary reform, the vicious
+circle system of voting in Prussia must end.
+
+This change to a government by a responsible ministry can be
+accomplished under the constitution of the German Empire by a
+mere majority vote of the Reichstag and a vote in the Bundesrat,
+in which less than fourteen votes are against the proposed change
+in the constitution. This means that the consent of the Emperor
+as Prussian King must be obtained, and that of a number of the
+rulers of the German States.
+
+In the reasonable liberalisation of Germany, if it comes, Theodor
+Wolff and his father-in-law, Mosse, will play leading parts.
+The great newspaper, the _Tageblatt_, which Mosse owns and
+Wolff edits, has throughout the war been a beacon light at once
+of reason and of patriotism. And other great newspapers will
+take the same enlightened course.
+
+I am truly sorry for Georg Bernhard, the talented editor of the
+_Vossiche_Zeitung_, who, a Liberal and a Jew, wears the
+livery of Junkerdom, I am sure to his great distaste.
+
+After I left Germany the _Vossiche_Zeitung_ made the most
+ridiculous charges against me, such as that I issued American
+passports to British subjects. The newspaper might as well have
+solemnly charged that I sent notes to the Foreign Office in sealed
+envelopes. Having charge of British interests, I could not issue
+British passports to British citizens allowed to leave Germany,
+but, according to universal custom in similar cases and the express
+consent of the Imperial Foreign Office, I gave these returning
+British, American passports superstamped with the words "British
+subject." A mare's nest, truly!
+
+The fall of von Bethmann-Hollweg was a triumph of kitchen intrigue
+and of Junkerism. I believe that he is a liberal at heart, that
+it was against his best judgment that the ruthless submarine
+war was resumed, the pledges of the _Sussex_ Note broken
+and Germany involved in war with America. If he had resigned,
+rather than consent to the resumption of V-boat war, he would
+have stood out as a great Liberal rallying point and probably
+have returned to a more real power than he ever possessed. But
+half because of a desire to retain office, half because of a
+mistaken loyalty to the Emperor, he remained in office at the
+sacrifice of his opinions; and when he laid down that office no
+title of Prince or even of Count waited him as a parting gift.
+In his retirement he will read the lines of Schiller--a favourite
+quotation in Germany--"Der Mohr hat seine Schuldigkeit gethan,
+der Mohr kann gehen." "The Moor has done his work, the Moor can
+go." And in his old age he will exclaim, as Shakespeare makes
+the great Chancellor of Henry the Eighth exclaim, "Oh Cromwell,
+Cromwell! Had I but served my God with half the zeal I served
+my King, He would not, in mine age, have left me naked to mine
+enemies." But this God is not the private War God of the Prussians
+with whom they believe they have a gentlemen's working agreement,
+but the God of Christianity, of humanity and of all mankind.
+
+It would have been easier for Germany to make peace with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg at the helm. The whole world knows him and honours
+him for his honesty.
+
+Helfferich remained as Vice-Chancellor and Minister of the Interior:
+a powerful, and agile intellect, a man, I am sure, opposed to
+militarism. Reasonable in his views, one can sit at the council
+table with him and arrive at compromises and results, but his
+intense patriotism and surpassing ability make him an opponent
+to be feared.
+
+Kuhlmann has the Foreign Office. Far more wily than Zimmermann,
+he will continue to strive to embroil us with Japan and Mexico,
+but he will not be caught. Second in command in London, he reported
+then that England would enter the war. The rumours scattered
+broadcast, as he took office, to the effect that he was opposed
+to ruthless V-boat war were but evidences of a more skilful hand
+in a campaign to predispose the world in his favour and, therefore,
+to assist him in any negotiations he might have on the carpet.
+Beware of the wily Kuhlmann!
+
+Baiting the Chancellor is the favourite sport of German political
+life. No sooner does the Kaiser name a Chancellor than hundreds
+of little politicians, Reichstag members, editors, reporters
+and female intriguers try to drive him from office. When von
+Bethmann-Hollweg showed an inclination towards Liberalism, and
+advocated a juster electoral system for Prussia, the Junkers, the
+military and the upholders of the caste system joined their forces
+to those of the usual intriguers; and it was only a question of
+time until the Chancellor's official head fell in the basket.
+
+His successor is a Prussian bureaucrat. No further description
+is necessary.
+
+Of course no nation will permit itself to be reformed from without.
+The position of the world in arms with reference to Germany is
+simply this. It is impossible to make peace with Germany as at
+present constituted, because that peace will be but a truce,
+a short breathing space before the German military autocrats
+again send the sons of Germany to death in the trenches for the
+advancement of the System and the personal glory and advantage
+of stuffy old generals and prancing princes.
+
+The world does not believe that a free Germany will needlessly
+make war, believe in war for war's sake or take up the profession
+of arms as a national industry.
+
+The choice lies with the German people. And how admirably has
+our great President shown that people that we war not with them
+but with the autocracy which has led them into the shambles of
+dishonour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR
+
+With the declaration of war the ultimate power in Germany was
+transferred from the civil to the military authorities.
+
+At five o'clock on the afternoon of Friday, and immediately after
+the declaration of a State of War, the Guard of the Grenadier
+Regiment Kaiser Alexander, under the command of a Lieutenant with
+four drummers, took its place before the monument of Frederick
+the Great in the middle of the Unter den Linden. The drummers
+sounded a ruffle on their drums and the Lieutenant read an order
+beginning with the words "By all highest order: A State of War
+is proclaimed in Berlin and in the Province of Brandenburg."
+This order was signed by General von Kessel as Over-Commander
+of the Mark of Brandenburg; and stated that the complete power
+was transferred to him; that the civil officials might remain
+in office, but must obey the orders and regulations of the
+Over-Commander; that house-searchings and arrests by officials
+thereto empowered could take place at any time; that strangers
+who could not show good reason for remaining in Berlin, had
+twenty-four hours in which to leave; that the sale of weapons,
+powder and explosives to civilians was forbidden; and that civilians
+were forbidden to carry weapons without permission of the proper
+authorities.
+
+The same transfer of authority took place in each army
+corps--_Bezirk_, or province or district in Germany; and
+in each army corps district or province the commanding general
+took over the ultimate power. In Berlin it was necessary to create
+a new officer, the Over-Commander of the Mark, because two army
+corps, the third and the army corps of the guards, had their
+head-quarters in Berlin. These army corps commanders were not
+at all bashful about the use of the power thus transferred to
+them. Some of them even prescribed the length of the dresses
+to be worn by the women; and many women, having followed the
+German sport custom of wearing knickerbockers in the winter sports
+resorts of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the Generalkommando, or
+Headquarters for Bavaria issued in January, 1917, the following
+order: "The appearance of many women in Garmisch-Partenkirchen
+has excited lively anger and indignation in the population there.
+This bitterness is directed particularly against certain women,
+frequently of ripe age, who do not engage in sports, but nevertheless
+show themselves in public continually clad in knickerbockers. It
+has even happened that women so dressed have visited churches
+during the service. Such behaviour is a cruelty to the earnest
+minds of the mountain population and, in consequence, there are
+often many disagreeable occurrences in the streets. Officials,
+priests and private citizens have turned to the Generalkommando
+with the request for help; and the Generalkommando has, therefore,
+empowered the district officials in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to
+take energetic measures against this misconduct; if necessary
+with the aid of the police."
+
+I spent two days at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in February, 1916.
+Some of the German girls looked very well in their "knickers,"
+but I agree with the Generalkommando that the appearance of some
+of the older women was "cruelty" not only to the "earnest mountain
+population" but to any observer.
+
+These corps commanders are apparently responsible direct to the
+Emperor; and therefore much of the difficulty that I had concerning
+the treatment of prisoners was due to this system, as each corps
+commander considered himself supreme in his own district not
+only over the civil and military population but over the prison
+camps within his jurisdiction.
+
+On the fourth of August, 1914, a number of laws were passed,
+which had been evidently prepared long in advance, making various
+changes made necessary by war, such as alteration of the Coinage
+Law, the Bank Law, and the Law of Maximum Prices. Laws as to
+the high prices were made from time to time. For instance, the
+law of the twenty-eighth of October, 1914, provided in detail
+the maximum prices for rye in different parts of Germany. The
+maximum price at wholesale per German ton of native rye must
+not exceed 220 marks in Berlin, 236 marks in Cologne, 209 marks
+in Koenigsberg, 228 marks in Hamburg, 235 marks in Frankfort a/M.
+
+The maximum price for the German ton of native wheat was set at
+forty marks per ton higher than the above rates for rye. This
+maximum price was made with reference to deliveries without sacks
+and for cash payments.
+
+The law as to the maximum prices applied to all objects of daily
+necessity, not only to food and fodder but to oil, coal and wood.
+Of course, these maximum prices were changed from time to time,
+but I think I can safely state that at no time in the war, while
+I was in Berlin, were the simple foods more expensive than in
+New York.
+
+The so-called "war bread," the staple food of the population,
+which was made soon after the commencement of the war, was composed
+partially of rye and potato flour. It was not at all unpalatable,
+especially when toasted; and when it was seen that the war would
+not be as short as the Germans had expected, the bread cards
+were issued. That is, every Monday morning each person was given
+a card which had annexed to it a number of little perforated
+sections about the size of a quarter of a postage stamp, each
+marked with twenty-five, fifty or one hundred. The total of these
+figures constituted the allowance of each person in grammes per
+week. The person desiring to buy bread either at a baker's or in
+a restaurant must turn in these little stamped sections for an
+amount equivalent to the weight of bread purchased. Each baker
+was given a certain amount of meal at the commencement of each
+week, and he had to account for this meal at the end of the week
+by turning in its equivalent in bread cards.
+
+As food became scarce, the card system was applied to meat, potatoes,
+milk, sugar, butter and soap. Green vegetables and fruits were
+exempt from the card system, as were for a long time chickens,
+ducks, geese, turkeys and game. Because of these exemptions the
+rich usually managed to live well, although the price of a goose
+rose to ridiculous heights. There was, of course, much underground
+traffic in cards and sales of illicit or smuggled butter, etc.
+The police were very stern in their enforcement of the law and
+the manager of one of the largest hotels in Berlin was taken to
+prison because he had made the servants give him their allowance
+of butter, which he in turn sold to the rich guests of the hotel.
+
+No one over six years of age at the time I left could get milk
+without a doctor's certificate. One result of this was that the
+children of the poor were surer of obtaining milk than before
+the war, as the women of the Frauendienst and social workers
+saw to it that each child had its share.
+
+The third winter of the war, owing to a breakdown of means of
+transportation and want of laborers, coal became very scarce.
+All public places, such as theatres, picture galleries, museums,
+and cinematograph shows, were closed in Munich for want of coal.
+In Berlin the suffering was not as great but even the elephants
+from Hagenbeck's Show were pressed into service to draw the coal
+carts from the railway stations.
+
+Light was economized. All the apartment houses (and all Berlin
+lives in apartment houses) were closed at nine o'clock. Stores
+were forbidden to illuminate their show windows and all theatres
+were closed at ten. Only every other street electric light was
+lit; of the three lights in each lamp, only one.
+
+As more and more men were called to the front, women were employed
+in unusual work. The new underground road in Berlin is being
+built largely by woman labour. This is not so difficult a matter
+in Berlin as in New York, because Berlin is built upon a bed
+of sand and the difficulties of rock excavation do not exist.
+Women are employed on the railroads, working with pickaxes on
+the road-bed. Women drive the great yellow post carts of Berlin.
+There were women guards on the underground road, women conductors
+on the tramways and women even become motor men on the tramcars.
+Banks, insurance companies and other large business institutions
+were filled with women workers who invaded the sacred precincts
+of many military and governmental offices.
+
+A curious development of the hate of all things foreign was the
+hunt led by the Police President of Berlin, von Jagow (a cousin
+of the Foreign Minister), for foreign words. Von Jagow and his
+fellow cranks decided that all words of foreign origin must be
+expunged from the German language. The title of the Hotel Bristol
+on the Unter den Linden disappeared. The Hotel Westminster on
+the same street became Lindenhof. There is a large hotel called
+"The Cumberland," with a pastry department over which there was
+a sign, the French word, _Confisserie_. The management was
+compelled to take this sign down, but the hotel was allowed to
+retain the name of Cumberland, because the father-in-law of the
+Kaiser's only daughter is the Duke of Cumberland. The word
+"chauffeur" was eliminated, and there, were many discussions as
+to what should be substituted. Many declared for Kraftwagenfuhrer
+or "power wagon driver."
+
+But finally the word was Germanised as "Schauffoer." Prussians
+took down the sign, _Confektion_, but the climax came when
+the General in command of the town of Breslau wrote a confectioner
+telling him to stop the use of the word "_bonbon_" in selling
+his candy. The confectioner, with a sense of humour and a nerve
+unusual in Germany, wrote back to the General that he would gladly
+discontinue the use of the word "_bonbon_" when the General
+ceased to call himself "General," and called the attention of
+this high military authority to the fact that "General" was as
+much a French word as "_bonbon_."
+
+Unusual means were adopted in order to get all the gold coins
+in the country into the Imperial Bank. There were signs in every
+surface and underground car which read, "Whoever keeps back a
+gold coin injures the Fatherland." And if a soldier presented
+to his superiors a twenty mark gold piece, he received in return
+twenty marks in paper money and two days leave of absence. In
+like manner a school boy who turned in ten marks in gold received
+ten marks in paper and was given a half holiday. Cinematograph
+shows gave these patrons who paid in gold an extra ticket, good
+for another day. An American woman residing at Berlin was awakened
+one morning at eight o'clock by two police detectives who told
+her that they had heard that she had some gold coins in her
+possession, and that if she did not turn them in for paper money
+they would wreck her apartment in their search for them. She,
+therefore, gave them the gold which I afterwards succeeded in
+getting the German Government to return to her. Later, the export
+of gold was forbidden, and even travellers arriving with gold
+were compelled to give it up in return for paper money.
+
+While, of course, I cannot ascertain the exact amounts, I found,
+nevertheless, that great quantities of food and other supplies
+came into Germany from Holland and the Scandinavian countries,
+particularly from Sweden. Now that we are in the war we should
+take strong measures and cut off exports to these countries which
+export food, raw material, etc. to Germany. Sweden is particularly
+active in this traffic, but I understand that sulphur pyrites
+are sent from Norway, and sulphuric acid made therefrom is an
+absolute essential to the manufacture of munitions of war.
+
+Potash, which is found as a mineral only in Germany and Austria,
+was used in exchange of commodities with Sweden and in this way
+much copper, lard, etc. reached Germany.
+
+Early in the summer of 1915, the first demonstration took place
+in Berlin. About five hundred women collected in front of the
+Reichstag building. They were promptly suppressed by the police
+and no newspaper printed an account of the occurrence. These
+women were rather vague in their demands. They called von Buelow
+an old fat-head for his failure in Italy and complained that the
+whipped cream was not so good as before the war. There was some
+talk of high prices for food, and the women all said that they
+wanted their men back from the trenches.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early summer brought also a number of cranks to Berlin. Miss Jane
+Addams and her fellow suffragists, after holding a convention
+in Holland, moved on Berlin. I succeeded in getting both the
+Chancellor and von Jagow to consent to receive them, a meeting to
+which they looked forward with unconcealed perturbation. However,
+one of them seems to have impressed Miss Addams, for, as I write
+this, I read in the papers that she is complaining that we should
+not have gone to war because we thereby risk hurting somebody's
+feelings.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On July twenty-seventh, 1915, I reported that I had learned that
+the Germans were picking out the Revolutionists and Liberals
+from the many Russian prisoners of war, furnishing them with
+money and false passports and papers, and sending them back to
+Russia to stir up a revolution.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A German friend of mine told me that a friend of his who manufactured
+field glasses had received a large order from the Bulgarian
+Government. This manufacturer went to the Foreign Office and
+asked whether he should deliver the goods. He was told not only
+to deliver them but to do it as quickly as possible. By learning
+of this I was able to predict long in advance the entry of Bulgaria
+on the side of the Central Powers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Even a year after the commencement of the war there were reasonable
+people in Germany. I met Ballin, head of the great Hamburg American
+Line, on August ninth. I said to him, "When are you going to
+stop this crazy fighting?" The next day Ballin called on me and
+said that the sensible people of Germany wanted peace and that
+without annexation. He told me that every one was afraid to talk
+peace, that each country thought it a sign of weakness, and that
+he had advised the Chancellor to put a statement in an official
+paper to say that Germany fought only to defend herself and was
+ready to make an honourable peace. He told me that the Emperor at
+that time was against the annexation of Belgium.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In calculating the great war debt built up by Germany, it must
+not be forgotten that German municipalities and other political
+districts have incurred large debts for war purposes, such as
+extra relief given to the wives and children of soldiers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In November, 1915, there were food disturbances and a serious
+agitation against a continuance of the war; and, in Leipzig,
+a Socialist paper was suppressed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The greatest efforts were made at all times to get in gold; and
+some time before I left Germany an advertisement was published
+in the newspapers requesting Germans to give up their jewelry for
+the Fatherland. Many did so: among them, I believe, the Empress
+and other royalties.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, 1915, a prominent banker in Berlin said to me that
+the Germans were sick of the war; that the Krupps and other big
+industries were making great sums of money and were prolonging
+the war by insisting upon the annexation of Belgium; and that
+the Junkers were also in favour of the continuance of the war
+because of the fact that they were getting four or five times
+the money for their products while their work was being done by
+prisoners. He said that the _Kaufleute_ (merchant middle class)
+will have to pay the cost of the war and that the Junkers will
+not be taxed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, butter became very scarce and the women waiting
+in long lines before the shops often rushed the shops. In this
+month many copper roofs were removed from buildings in Berlin.
+I was told by a friend in the Foreign Office that the notorious
+von Rintelen was sent to America to buy up the entire product of
+the Dupont powder factories, and that he exceeded his authority
+if he did anything else.
+
+In December, on the night of the day of the peace interpellation
+in the Reichstag a call was issued by placards for a meeting
+on the Unter den Linden. I went out on the streets during the
+afternoon and found that the police had so carefully divided
+the city into districts that it was impossible for a crowd of
+any size to gather on the Unter den Linden. There was quite a
+row at the session in the Reichstag. Scheidemann, the Socialist,
+made a speech very moderate in tone; but he was answered by the
+Chancellor and then an endeavour was made to close the debate.
+The Socialists made such a noise, however, that the majority gave
+way and another prominent Socialist, Landsberger, was allowed
+to speak for the Socialists. He also made a reasonable speech
+in the course of which he said that even Socialists would not
+allow Alsace-Lorraine to go back to France. He made use of a
+rather good phrase, saying that the "Dis-United States of Europe
+were making war to make a place for the United States of America."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The banks sent out circulars to all holders of safe deposit boxes,
+asking them to disclose the contents. This was part of the campaign
+to get in hoarded gold.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, we had many visitors. S. S. McClure, Hermann
+Bernstein, Inez Milholland Boissevain--all of the Ford Peace
+Ship--appeared in Berlin. I introduced Mrs. Boissevain to Zimmermann
+who admired her extremely.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, I visited Munich and from there a Bavarian
+officer prison camp and the prison camp for private soldiers,
+both at Ingolstadt. I also conferred with Archdeacon Nies of
+the American Episcopal Church who carried on a much needed work
+in visiting the prison camps in Bavaria.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The American Colony in Munich maintained with the help of friends
+in America, a Red Cross hospital under the able charge of Dr.
+Jung, a Washington doctor, and his wife. The nursing was done by
+American and German girls. The American Colony at Munich also fed
+a number of school children every day. I regret to say, however,
+that many of the Americans in Munich were loud in their abuse of
+President Wilson and their native country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In March, 1916, I was sounded on the question of Germany's sending
+an unofficial envoy, like Colonel House, to America to talk
+informally to the President and prominent people. I was told that
+Solf would probably be named.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In 1916, the importation of many articles of luxury into Germany
+was forbidden. This move was naturally made in order to keep
+money in the country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A Dane who had a quantity of manganese in Brazil sold it to a
+Philadelphia firm for delivery to the United States Steel Company.
+The German Government in some way learned of this and the Dane
+was arrested and put in jail. His Minister had great difficulty
+in getting him out.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Liebknecht, in April of 1916, made matters lively at the Reichstag
+sessions. During the Chancellor's speech, Liebknecht interrupted
+him and said that the Germans were not free; next he denied that
+the Germans had not wished war; and, another time, he called
+attention to the attempts of the Germans to induce the Mohammedan
+and Irish prisoners of war to desert to the German side. Liebknecht
+finally enraged the government supporters by calling out that
+the subscription to the loan was a swindle.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+After the _Sussex_ settlement I think that the Germans wished
+to inaugurate an era of better feeling between Germany and the
+United States. At any rate, and in answer to many anonymous attacks
+made against me, the _North_German_Gazette_, the official
+newspaper, published a sort of certificate from the government
+to the effect that I was a good boy and that the rumours of my
+bitter hostility to Germany were unfounded.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In May, 1916, Wertheim, head of the great department store in
+Berlin, told me that they had more business than in peace times.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early in June 1 had two long talks with Prince von Buelow. He
+speaks English well and is suspected by his enemies of having
+been polishing it up lately in order to make ready for possible
+peace conferences. He is a man of a more active brain than the
+present Chancellor, and is very restless and anxious in some
+way to break into the present political situation.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In June, the anonymous attacks on the Chancellor by pamphlet
+and otherwise, incensed him to such a degree that he made an
+open answer in the Reichstag and had rather the best of the
+situation. Many anonymous lies and rumours were flying about
+Berlin at this period, and even Helfferich had to deny publicly
+the anonymous charges that he had been anonymously attacking
+the Chancellor.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In July, the committee called the National Committee for an
+Honourable Peace was formed with Prince Wedel at its head. Most
+of the people in this League were friends of the Chancellor, and
+one of the three real heads was the editor of the
+_Frankfurter_Zeitung_, the Chancellor's organ. It was planned that
+fifty speakers from this committee would begin to speak all over
+Germany on August first, but when they began to speak their views
+were so dissimilar and the speeches of most of them so ridiculous
+that the movement failed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In August, I spent two Saturdays and Sundays at Heringsdorf,
+a summer resort on the Baltic. Before going there I had to get
+special permission from the military authorities through the
+Foreign Office, as foreigners are not allowed to reside on the
+coast of Germany. Regulations that all windows must be darkened
+at night and no lights shown which could be seen from the sea
+were strictly enforced by the authorities.
+
+There are three bathing places. In each of them the bath houses,
+etc. surround three sides of a square, the sea forming the fourth
+side. Bathing is allowed only on this fourth side for a space
+of sixty-five yards long. One of these bathing places is for
+women and one for men, and the third is the so-called Familienbad
+(family bath) where mixed bathing is allowed. German women are
+very sensible in the matter of their bathing costumes and do
+not wear the extraordinary creations seen in America. They wear
+bathing sandals but no stockings, and, as most of them have fine
+figures but dress badly, they appear at their best at Heringsdorf.
+Both sea and air seemed somewhat cold for bathing. On account
+of their sensible dress, most of the German women are expert
+swimmers.
+
+I noticed one very handsome blonde girl who sat on her bathing
+mantle exciting the admiration of the beach because of her fine
+figure. She suddenly dived into the pockets of the bathing mantle
+and produced an enormous black bread sandwich which she proceeded
+to consume quite unconsciously, after which she swam out to sea.
+No healthy German can remain long separated from food; and I
+noticed in the prospectus of the different boarding-houses at
+Heringsdorf that patrons were offered, in addition to about four
+meals or more a day, an extra sandwich to take to the beach to
+be consumed during the bathing hour.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There is a beautiful little English church in Berlin which was
+especially favoured by the Kaiser's mother during her life. Because
+of this, the Kaiser permitted this church to remain open, and
+the services were continued during the war. The pastor, Rev. Mr.
+Williams, obtained permission to visit the British prisoners,
+and most devotedly travelled from one prison camp to another.
+Both he and his sister, whose charitable work for the British
+deserves mention, were at one time thrown into jail, charged
+with spying.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I at first attended the hybrid American church, but when, in
+1915, I think, the committee hired a German _woman_ preacher
+I ceased to attend. The American, the Reverend Dr. Crosser, who
+was in charge when I arrived in Berlin left, to my everlasting
+regret, in the spring before the war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Poor Creelman, the celebrated newspaper correspondent, died in
+Berlin. We got him in to a good hospital and some one from the
+Embassy visited him every day.
+
+The funeral services were conducted in the American Church by
+the Rev. Dr. Dickie, long a resident of Berlin, whose wife had
+presented the library to the American church. The Foreign Office
+sent Herr Horstmann as its representative.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+While to-day all royalties and public men pose for the movies,
+Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria and his family are probably the first
+royalties to act in a cinematograph. In 1916, there was released
+in Berlin a play in which Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria, his wife
+and two daughters by a former wife appeared, acting as Bulgarian
+royalties in the development of the plot.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The difference between von Jagow and Zimmermann was that von
+Jagow had lived abroad, had met people from all countries and
+knew that there was much to learn about the psychology of the
+inhabitants of countries other than Germany. Zimmermann, in the
+early part of his career, had been consul at Shanghai; and, on
+his way back, had passed through America, spending two days in
+San Francisco and three in New York. He seemed to think that
+this transcontinental trip had given him an intimate knowledge
+of American character. Von Jagow, on the other hand, almost as
+soon as war began, spent many hours talking to me about America
+and borrowed from me books and novels on that country. The novel
+in which he took the greatest interest was "Turmoil," by Booth
+Tarkington.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I think there must have been a period quite recently when the
+German Government tried to imbue the people with a greater degree
+of frightfulness, because all of us in visiting camps, etc. observed
+that the _landsturm_ men or older soldiers were much more merciful
+than the younger ones.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Alexander Cochran, a New York yachtsman, volunteered to become a
+courier between the London Embassy and ours. On his first trip,
+although he had two passports (his regular passport and a special
+courier's passport), he was arrested and compelled to spend the
+night on the floor of the guard-room at the frontier town of
+Bentheim. This ended his aspirations to be a courier. He is now
+a commander in the British Navy, having joined it with his large
+steam yacht, the _Warrior_ some time before the United States
+entered the war. In the piping times of peace he had been the
+guest of the Emperor at Kiel.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A British prisoner, who escaped from Ruhleben, was caught in a
+curious manner. Prisoners in Ruhleben received bread from outside,
+as I have explained in the chapter on prisoners of war. This bread
+is white, something unknown in Germany since the war. The escaped
+prisoner took with him some sandwiches made of the bread he had
+received in Ruhleben and most incautiously ate one of these
+sandwiches in a railway station. He was immediately surrounded
+by a crowd of Germans anxious to know where he had obtained the
+white bread, and, in this way, was detected and returned to prison.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On our way out in September, 1916, we were given a large dinner
+in Copenhagen by our skilful minister there, the Hon. Maurice
+F. Egan, who has devoted many years of his life to the task of
+adding the three beautiful Danish islands to the dominions of the
+United States. He is an able diplomat, very popular in Copenhagen,
+where he is dean of the diplomatic corps. At this dinner we met
+Countess Hegerman-Lindencron, whose interesting books, "The Sunny
+Side of Diplomatic Life" and "The Courts of Memory," have had
+a large circulation in America. In Copenhagen, too, both on the
+way out and in, we lunched with Count Rantzau-Brockedorff, then
+German Minister there. Count Rantzau is skilful and wily, and not
+at all military in his instincts; and, I should say, far more
+inclined to arrive at a reasonable compromise than the average
+German diplomat. He is a charming International, with none of the
+rough points and aggressive manners which characterise so many
+Prussian officials.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In judging the German people, we must remember that, while they
+have made great progress in the last forty years in commerce
+and chemistry, the very little liberty they possess is a plant
+of very recent growth. About the year 1780, Frederick the Great
+having sent some money to restore the burned city of Greiffenberg,
+in Silesia, the magistrates of that town called upon him to thank
+him. They kneeled and their spokesman said, "We render unto your
+Majesty in the name of the inhabitants of Greiffenberg, our humble
+thanks for the most gracious gift which your Majesty deigned to
+bestow in aid and to assist us in rebuilding our homes.
+
+"The gratitude of such dust as we, is, as we are aware, of no
+moment or value to you. We shall, however, implore God to grant
+your Majesty His divine favours in return for your royal bounty."
+
+Too many Germans, to-day, feel that they are mere dust before
+the almost countless royalties of the German Empire. And these
+royalties are too prone to feel that the kingdoms, dukedoms and
+principalities of Germany and their inhabitants are their private
+property. The Princes of Nassau and Anspach and Hesse, at the
+time of our Revolution, sold their unfortunate subjects to the
+British Government to be exported to fight the Americans. Our
+American soil covers the bones of many a poor German peasant
+who gave up his life in a war from which he gained nothing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Frederick the Great, the model and exemplar of all German
+royalties; died in 1786, he disposed of the Kingdom of Prussia
+in his will as if it had been one of his horses. "I bequeath
+unto my dear nephew, Frederick William, as unto my immediate
+successor, the Kingdom of Prussia, the provinces, towns, palaces,
+forts, fortresses, all ammunition and arsenals, all lands mine
+by inheritance or right of conquest, the crown jewels, gold and
+silver service of plate in Berlin, country houses, collections
+of coins, picture galleries, gardens, and so forth." Contrast
+this will with the utterances of Washington and Hamilton made
+at the same time!
+
+In the Grand Duchies of Mecklenburg, serfdom was not abolished
+until 1819.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The spies and the influencers of American correspondents made
+their headquarters at a large Berlin hotel. A sketch of their
+activities is given by de Beaufort in his book, "Behind the German
+Veil."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Among the American correspondents in Berlin during the war great
+credit should be given to Carl W. Ackerman and Seymour B. Conger,
+correspondents of the United and Associated Presses respectively,
+who at all times and in spite of their surroundings and in the
+face of real difficulties preserved their Americanism unimpaired
+and refused to succumb to the alluring temptations held out to
+them. I do not mean to imply that the other correspondents were
+not loyal, but the pro-Germanism of many of them unfortunately
+gave the Imperial Foreign Office and the great general staff a
+wrong impression of Americans. It is the splendid patriotism
+under fire of Ackerman and Conger that deserves special mention.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+LAST
+
+I was credited by the Germans with having hoodwinked and jollied
+the Foreign Office and the Government into refraining for two
+years from using illegally their most effective weapon.
+
+This, of course, is not so. I always told the Foreign Office the
+plain simple truth and the event showed that I correctly predicted
+the attitude of America.
+
+Our American national game, poker, has given us abroad an unfair
+reputation. We are always supposed to be bluffing. A book was
+published in Germany about the President called, "President Bluff."
+
+I only regret that those high in authority in Germany should
+have preferred to listen to pro-German correspondents who posed
+as amateur super-Ambassadors rather than to the authorised
+representatives of America. I left Germany with a clear conscience
+and the knowledge that I had done everything possible to keep
+the peace.
+
+An Ambassador, of course, does not determine the policy of his
+own country. One of his principal duties, if not the principal
+one, is to keep his own country informed--to know beforehand what
+the country to which he is accredited will do, and I think that
+I managed to give the State Department advance information of
+the moves of the rulers of Germany.
+
+I had the support of a loyal and devoted staff of competent
+secretaries and assistants, and both Secretaries Bryan and Lansing
+were most kind in the backing given by their very ably organised
+department.
+
+I sent Secretary Lansing a confidential letter every week and, of
+course, received most valuable hints from him. Secretary Lansing
+was very successful in his tactful handling of the American
+Ambassadors abroad and in getting them to work together as cheerful
+members of the same team.
+
+When I returned to America, after living for two and a half years
+in the centre of this world calamity, everything seemed petty
+and small. I was surprised that people could still seek little
+advantages, still be actuated by little jealousies and revenges.
+Freed from the round of daily work I felt for the first time the
+utter horror and uselessness of all the misery these Prussian
+military autocrats had brought upon the world; and what a reckoning
+there will be in Germany some day when the plain people realise
+the truth, when they learn what base motives actuated their rulers
+in condemning a whole generation of the earth to war and death!
+
+Is it not a shame that the world should have been so disturbed;
+that peaceful men are compelled to lie out in the mud and filth
+in the depth of raw winter, shot at and stormed at and shelled,
+waiting for a chance to murder some other inoffensive fellow
+creature? Why must the people in old Poland die of hunger, not
+finding dogs enough to eat in the streets of Lemberg? The long
+lines of broken peasants in Serbia and in Roumania; the population
+of Belgium and Northern France torn from their homes to work
+as slaves for the Germans; the poor prisoners of war starving
+in their huts or working in factories and mines; the cries of
+the old and the children, wounded by bombs from Zeppelins; the
+wails of the mothers for their sons; the very rustling of the air
+as the souls of the ten million dead sweep to another world,--why
+must all these horrors come upon a fair green earth, where we
+believed that love and help and friendship, genius and science
+and commerce, religion and civilisation, once ruled?
+
+It is because in the dark, cold Northern plains of Germany there
+exists an autocracy, deceiving a great people, poisoning their
+minds from one generation to another and preaching the virtue
+and necessity of war; and until that autocracy is either wiped
+out or made powerless, there can be no peace on earth.
+
+The golden dream of conquest was almost accomplished. A little
+more advance, a few more wagon loads of ammunition, and there
+would have been no battle of the Marne, no Joffre, a modern Martel,
+to hammer back the invading hordes of barbarism.
+
+I have always stated that Germany is possessed yet of immense
+military power; and, to win, the nations opposed to Germany must
+learn to think in a military way. The mere entrance, even of
+a great nation like our own, into the war, means nothing in a
+military way unless backed by military power.
+
+And there must be no German peace. The old _regime_, left
+in control of Germany, of Bulgaria, of Turkey, would only seek
+a favourable moment to renew the war, to strive again for the
+mastery of the world.
+
+Fortunately America bars the way,--America led by a fighting
+President who win allow no compromise with brutal autocracy.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+[Illustration: THIS AND THE FOLLOWING FIVE PAGES ARE A FAC-SIMILE
+REPRODUCTION OF THE TELEGRAM IN THE KAISER'S OWN HANDWRITING
+WHICH HE GAVE AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CABLE TO PRESIDENT WILSON.]
+
+[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE ZIMMERMAN'S REQUEST
+TO AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE THE ANNOUNCEMENT
+OF RUTHLESS SUBMARINE WARFARE AGAINST THE ALLIES.]
+
+[Illustration: THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799 BETWEEN
+THE UNITED STATES AND PRUSSIA, WHICH AMBASSADOR GERARD WAS ASKED
+TO SIGN WHEN LEAVING GERMANY AFTER DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS HAD BEEN
+SEVERED.]
+
+[Illustration: A FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF A MULTIGRAPH SET OF
+INSTRUCTIONS SENT OUT BY THE GERMAN PRESS BUREAU TO THE NEWSPAPERS
+FOR THE PURPOSE OF ENABLING THEM TO WRITE UP THE LATEST ZEPPELIN
+RAID ON LONDON. THE INSTRUCTIONS WARN THEM THAT THEIR ACCOUNTS
+MUST NOT READ LIKE A REPRINT, BUT MUST SEEM TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN
+INDEPENDENTLY.]
+
+[Illustration: A PETITION TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES,
+CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURES AMONG THE AMERICANS IN EUROPE, OSTENSIBLY
+TO PROTEST AGAINST THE AMERICAN MANUFACTURE OF MUNITIONS OF WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF A PAMPHLET FOR PROPAGANDA PURPOSES,
+IN WHICH WIDE PUBLICITY WAS GIVEN TO LISSAUER'S FAMOUS "HYMN
+OF HATE".]
+
+[Illustration: AN EXCELLENT EXAMPLE OF TEUTONIC EFFICIENCY. MINUTE
+REGULATIONS IN REGARD TO PRESENTATION AT COURT.]
+
+[Illustration: A BERLIN EXTRA. GERMANY DISCLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY
+FOR THE WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO SAIL ON S. M. J. "METEOR".]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO DINE ON THE KAISER'S YACHT,
+"HOHENZOLLERN," AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO THE GARDEN PARTY AT KIEL OF PRINCE
+HENRY OF PRUSSIA, WHICH WAS GIVEN UP BECAUSE OF THE NEWS OF THE
+MURDERS AT SARAJEVO.]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
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+Title: My Four Years in Germany
+
+Author: James W. Gerard
+
+Release Date: January, 2005 [EBook #7238]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on March 30, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-Latin-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert J. Hall
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO ATTEND THE OPENING OF THE ROYAL
+ACADEMY.]
+
+[Illustration: AN INVITATION TO A COURT BALL.]
+
+[Illustration: SAFE CONDUCT FOR AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS FAMILY,
+UNDER THE SIGNATURE OF SECRETARY ZIMMERMANN, FEBRUARY, 5, 1917.]
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS
+LEAVING ON A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+
+
+
+MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY
+
+BY JAMES W. GERARD
+
+LATE AMBASSADOR TO THE GERMAN IMPERIAL COURT
+
+
+
+
+TO MY SMALL BUT TACTFUL FAMILY OF ONE
+
+MY WIFE
+
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+I am writing what should have been the last chapter of this book
+as a foreword because I want to bring home to our people the
+gravity of the situation; because I want to tell them that the
+military and naval power of the German Empire is unbroken; that of
+the twelve million men whom the Kaiser has called to the colours
+but one million, five hundred thousand have been killed, five
+hundred thousand permanently disabled, not more than five hundred
+thousand are prisoners of war, and about five hundred thousand
+constitute the number of wounded or those on the sick list of
+each day, leaving at all times about nine million effectives
+under arms.
+
+I state these figures because Americans do not grasp either the
+magnitude or the importance of this war. Perhaps the statement
+that over five million prisoners of war are held in the various
+countries will bring home to Americans the enormous mass of men
+engaged.
+
+There have been no great losses in the German navy, and any losses
+of ships have been compensated for by the building of new ones.
+The nine million men, and more, for at least four hundred thousand
+come of military age in Germany every year, because of their
+experience in two and a half years of war are better and more
+efficient soldiers than at the time when they were called to
+the colours. Their officers know far more of the science of this
+war and the men themselves now have the skill and bearing of
+veterans.
+
+Nor should anyone believe that Germany will break under starvation
+or make peace because of revolution.
+
+The German nation is not one which makes revolutions. There will
+be scattered riots in Germany, but no simultaneous rising of the
+whole people. The officers of the army are all of one class,
+and of a class devoted to the ideals of autocracy. A revolution
+of the army is impossible; and at home there are only the boys
+and old men easily kept in subjection by the police.
+
+There is far greater danger of the starvation of our Allies than
+of the starvation of the Germans. Every available inch of ground
+in Germany is cultivated, and cultivated by the aid of the old
+men, the boys and the women, and the two million prisoners of
+war.
+
+The arable lands of Northern France and of Roumania are being
+cultivated by the German army with an efficiency never before
+known in these countries, and most of that food will be added
+to the food supplies of Germany. Certainly the people suffer;
+but still more certainly this war will not be ended because of
+the starvation of Germany.
+
+Although thinking Germans know that if they do not win the war
+the financial day of reckoning will come, nevertheless, owing to
+the clever financial handling of the country by the government
+and the great banks, there is at present no financial distress in
+Germany; and the knowledge that, unless indemnities are obtained
+from other countries, the weight of the great war debt will fall
+upon the people, perhaps makes them readier to risk all in a
+final attempt to win the war and impose indemnities upon not
+only the nations of Europe but also upon the United States of
+America.
+
+We are engaged in a war against the greatest military power the
+world has ever seen; against a people whose country was for so
+many centuries a theatre of devastating wars that fear is bred
+in the very marrow of their souls, making them ready to submit
+their lives and fortunes to an autocracy which for centuries has
+ground their faces, but which has promised them, as a result of
+the war, not only security but riches untold and the dominion of
+the world; a people which, as from a high mountain, has looked
+upon the cities of the world and the glories of them, and has
+been promised these cities and these glories by the devils of
+autocracy and of war.
+
+We are warring against a nation whose poets and professors, whose
+pedagogues and whose parsons have united in stirring its people
+to a white pitch of hatred, first against Russia, then against
+England and now against America.
+
+The U-Boat peril is a very real one for England. Russia may either
+break up into civil wars or become so ineffective that the millions
+of German troops engaged on the Russian front may be withdrawn
+and hurled against the Western lines. We stand in great peril,
+and only the exercise of ruthless realism can win this war for us.
+If Germany wins this war it means the triumph of the autocratic
+system. It means the triumph of those who believe not only in
+war as a national industry, not only in war for itself but also
+in war as a high and noble occupation. Unless Germany is beaten
+the whole world will be compelled to turn itself into an armed
+camp, until the German autocracy either brings every nation under
+its dominion or is forever wiped out as a form of government.
+
+We are in this war because we were forced into it: because Germany
+not only murdered our citizens on the high seas, but also filled
+our country with spies and sought to incite our people to civil
+war. We were given no opportunity to discuss or negotiate. The
+forty-eight hour ultimatum given by Austria to Serbia was not,
+as Bernard Shaw said, "A decent time in which to ask a man to
+pay his hotel bill." What of the six-hour ultimatum given to
+me in Berlin on the evening of January thirty-first, 1917, when
+I was notified at six that ruthless warfare would commence at
+twelve? Why the German government, which up to that moment had
+professed amity and a desire to stand by the _Sussex_ pledges,
+knew that it took almost two days to send a cable to America! I
+believe that we are not only justly in this war, but prudently
+in this war. If we had stayed out and the war had been drawn
+or won by Germany we should have been attacked, and that while
+Europe stood grinning by: not directly at first, but through an
+attack on some Central or South American State to which it would
+be at least as difficult for us to send troops as for Germany.
+And what if this powerful nation, vowed to war, were once firmly
+established in South or Central America? What of our boasted
+isolation then?
+
+It is only because I believe that our people should be informed
+that I have consented to write this book. There are too many
+thinkers, writers and speakers in the United States; from now
+on we need the doers, the organisers, and the realists who alone
+can win this contest for us, for democracy and for permanent
+peace!
+
+Writing of events so new, I am, of course, compelled to exercise
+a great discretion, to keep silent on many things of which I
+would speak, to suspend many judgments and to hold for future
+disclosure many things, the relation of which now would perhaps
+only serve to increase bitterness or to cause internal dissension
+in our own land.
+
+The American who travels through Germany in summer time or who
+spends a month having his liver tickled at Homburg or Carlsbad,
+who has his digestion restored by Dr. Dapper at Kissingen or
+who relearns the lost art of eating meat at Dr. Dengler's in
+Baden, learns little of the real Germany and its rulers; and in
+this book I tell something of the real Germany, not only that
+my readers may understand the events of the last three years
+but also that they may judge of what is likely to happen in our
+future relations with that country.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+       FOREWORD.
+     I MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY.
+    II POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL.
+   III DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN.
+    IV MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR.
+     V PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR.
+    VI AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR.
+   VII THE SYSTEM.
+  VIII THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR.
+    IX THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES.
+     X PRISONERS OF WAR.
+    XI FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC.
+   XII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS.
+  XIII MAINLY COMMERCIAL.
+   XIV WORK FOR THE GERMANS.
+    XV WAR CHARITIES.
+   XVI HATE.
+  XVII DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS. (Continued).
+ XVIII LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN.
+   XIX THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR.
+    XX LAST.
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THE AMERICANS LEAVING ON
+    A SPECIAL TRAIN, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS OF CREDENCE
+    TO THE EMPEROR.
+  THE HOUSE RENTED FOR USE AS EMBASSY.
+  A SALON IN THE EMBASSY.
+  THE BALL-ROOM OF THE EMBASSY.
+  PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER AT THE ROYAL PALACE.
+  THE ROYAL PALACE AT POTSDAM.
+  DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS AT THE TOWN HALL,
+    AUGUST, 1914.
+  RACING YACHTS AT KIEL.
+  THE KAISER'S YACHT, "HOHENZOLLERN".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO HIS SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+  CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY, AUGUST, 1914.
+  OUTSIDE THE EMBASSY IN THE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.
+  AT WORK IN THE EMBASSY BALL-ROOM, AUGUST, 1914.
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.
+  COVER OF THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  SPECIMEN PAGE OF DRAWINGS FROM THE RUHLEBEN MONTHLY.
+  ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS.
+  THE "LUSITANIA" MEDAL.
+  PAGE FROM "FOR LIGHT AND TRUTH".
+  AMBASSADOR GERARD AND PARTY IN SEDAN.
+  IN FRONT OF THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES.
+  FOOD ALLOTMENT POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT.
+  FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF THE KAISER'S PERSONAL TELEGRAM TO
+    PRESIDENT WILSON.
+  FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE'S REQUEST TO AMBASSADOR GERARD
+    TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE SUBMARINE ANNOUNCEMENT.
+  THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799.
+  INSTRUCTIONS SENT TO THE GERMAN PRESS ON WRITING UP A ZEPPELIN
+    RAID.
+  PETITION CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURE AMONG AMERICANS IN EUROPE.
+  PAGE FROM LISSAUER'S PAMPHLET SHOWING "HYMN OF HATE".
+  INSTRUCTIONS REGULATING APPEARANCE AT COURT.
+  A BERLIN EXTRA.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MY FIRST YEAR IN GERMANY
+
+The second day out on the _Imperator_, headed for a summer's
+vacation, a loud knocking woke me at seven A. M. The radio, handed
+in from a friend in New York, told me of my appointment as Ambassador
+to Germany.
+
+Many friends were on the ship. Henry Morgenthau, later Ambassador
+to Turkey, Colonel George Harvey, Adolph Ochs and Louis Wiley
+of the _New_York_Times_, Clarence Mackay, and others.
+
+The _Imperator_ is a marvellous ship of fifty-four thousand
+tons or more, and at times it is hard to believe that one is
+on the sea. In addition to the regular dining saloon, there is
+a grill room and Ritz restaurant with its palm garden, and, of
+course, an Hungarian Band. There are also a gymnasium and swimming
+pool, and, nightly, in the enormous ballroom dances are given,
+the women dressing in their best just as they do on shore.
+
+Colonel Harvey and Clarence Mackay gave me a dinner of twenty-four
+covers, something of a record at sea. For long afterwards in
+Germany, I saw everywhere pictures of the _Imperator_ including
+one of the tables set for this dinner. These were sent out over
+Germany as a sort of propaganda to induce the Germans to patronise
+their own ships and indulge in ocean travel. I wish that the
+propaganda had been earlier and more successful, because it is
+by travel that peoples learn to know each other, and consequently
+to abstain from war.
+
+On the night of the usual ship concert, Henry Morgenthau translated
+a little speech for me into German, which I managed to get through
+after painfully learning it by heart. Now that I have a better
+knowledge of German, a cold sweat breaks out when I think of
+the awful German accent with which I delivered that address.
+
+A flying trip to Berlin early in August to look into the house
+question followed, and then I returned to the United States.
+
+In September I went to Washington to be "instructed," talked
+with the President and Secretary, and sat at the feet of the
+Assistant Secretary of State, Alvey A. Adee, the revered Sage
+of the Department of State.
+
+On September ninth, 1913, having resigned as Justice of the Supreme
+Court of the State of New York, I sailed for Germany, stopping on
+the way in London in order to make the acquaintance of Ambassador
+Page, certain wise people in Washington having expressed the
+belief that a personal acquaintance of our Ambassadors made it
+easier for them to work together.
+
+Two cares assail a newly appointed Ambassador. He must first
+take thought of what he shall wear and where he shall live. All
+other nations have beautiful Embassies or Legations in Berlin,
+but I found that my two immediate predecessors had occupied a
+villa originally built as a two-family house, pleasantly enough
+situated, but two miles from the centre of Berlin and entirely
+unsuitable for an Embassy.
+
+There are few private houses in Berlin, most of the people living
+in apartments. After some trouble I found a handsome house on
+the Wilhelm Platz immediately opposite the Chancellor's palace
+and the Foreign Office, in the very centre of Berlin. This house
+had been built as a palace for the Princes Hatzfeld and had later
+passed into the possession of a banking family named von Schwabach.
+
+The United States Government, unlike other nations, does not
+own or pay the rent of a suitable Embassy, but gives allowance
+for offices, if the house is large enough to afford office room
+for the office force of the Embassy. The von Schwabach palace
+was nothing but a shell. Even the gas and electric light fixtures
+had been removed; and when the hot water and heating system,
+bath-rooms, electric lights and fixtures, etc., had been put
+in, and the house furnished from top to bottom, my first year's
+salary had far passed the minus point.
+
+The palace was not ready for occupancy until the end of January,
+1914, and, in the meantime, we lived at the Hotel Esplanade,
+and I transacted business at the old, two-family villa.
+
+There are more diplomats in Berlin than in any other capital in
+the world, because each of the twenty-five States constituting
+the German Empire sends a legation to Berlin; even the free cities
+of Hamburg, Lübeck and Bremen have a resident minister at the
+Empire's capital.
+
+Invariable custom requires a new Ambassador in Berlin to give
+two receptions, one to the Diplomatic Corps and the other to
+all those people who have the right to go to court. These are
+the officials, nobles and officers of the army and navy, and
+such other persons as have been presented at court. Such people
+are called _hoffähig_, meaning that they are fit for court.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON HIS WAY TO PRESENT HIS LETTERS
+OF CREDENCE TO THE EMPEROR.]
+
+[Illustration: THE HOUSE ON THE WILHELM PLATZ, RENTED FOR USE
+AS THE EMBASSY.]
+
+It is interesting here to note that Jews are not admitted to
+court. Such Jews as have been ennobled and allowed to put the
+coveted "von" before their names have first of all been required
+to submit to baptism in some Christian church. Examples are the
+von Schwabach family, whose ancestral house I occupied in Berlin,
+and Friedlaender-Fuld, officially rated as the richest man in
+Berlin, who made a large fortune in coke and its by-products.
+
+These two receptions are really introductions of an Ambassador
+to official and court society.
+
+Before these receptions, however, and in the month of November,
+I presented my letters of credence as Ambassador to the Emperor.
+This presentation is quite a ceremony. Three coaches were sent
+for me and my staff, coaches like that in which Cinderella goes
+to her ball, mostly glass, with white wigged coachmen, outriders
+in white wigs and standing footmen holding on to the back part
+of the coach. Baron von Roeder, introducer of Ambassadors, came
+for me and accompanied me in the first coach; the men of the
+Embassy staff sat in the other two coaches. Our little procession
+progressed solemnly through the streets of Berlin, passing on
+the way through the centre division of the arch known as the
+Brandenburger Thor, the gateway that stands at the head of the
+Unter den Linden, a privilege given only on this occasion.
+
+We mounted long stairs in the palace, and in a large room were
+received by the aides and the officers of the Emperor's household,
+of course all in uniform. Then I was ushered alone into the adjoining
+room where the Emperor, very erect and dressed in the black uniform
+of the Death's Head Hussars, stood by a table. I made him a little
+speech, and presented my letters of credence and the letters
+of recall of my predecessor. The Emperor then unbent from his
+very erect and impressive attitude and talked with me in a very
+friendly manner, especially impressing me with his interest in
+business and commercial affairs. I then, in accordance with custom,
+asked leave to present my staff. The doors were opened. The staff
+came in and were presented to the Emperor, who talked in a very
+jolly and agreeable way to all of us, saying that he hoped above
+all to see the whole of the Embassy staff riding in the Tier
+Garten in the mornings.
+
+The Emperor is a most impressive figure, and, in his black uniform
+surrounded by his officers, certainly looked every inch a king.
+Although my predecessors, on occasions of this kind, had worn a
+sort of fancy diplomatic uniform designed by themselves, I decided
+to abandon this and return to the democratic, if unattractive and
+uncomfortable, dress-suit, simply because the newspapers of America
+and certain congressmen, while they have had no objection to the
+wearing of uniforms by the army and navy, police and postmen,
+and do not expect officers to lead their troops into battle in
+dress-suits, have, nevertheless, had a most extraordinary prejudice
+against American diplomats following the usual custom of adopting
+a diplomatic uniform.
+
+Some days after my presentation to the Emperor, I was taken to
+Potsdam, which is situated about half an hour's train journey from
+Berlin, and, from the station there, driven to the new palace and
+presented to the Empress. The Empress was most charming and affable,
+and presented a very distinguished appearance. Accompanied by Mrs.
+Gerard, and always, either by night or by day, in the infernal
+dress-suit, I was received by the Crown Prince and Princess, and
+others of the royal princes and their wives. On these occasions
+we sat down and did not stand, as when received by the Emperor
+and Empress, and simply made "polite conversation" for about
+twenty minutes, being received first by the ladies-in-waiting
+and aides. These princes were always in uniform of some kind.
+
+At the reception for the _hoffähig_ people Mrs. Gerard stood
+in one room and I in another, and with each of us was a
+representative of the Emperor's household to introduce the people
+of the court, and an army officer to introduce the people of the
+army. The officer assigned to me had the extraordinary name of
+der Pfortner von der Hoelle, which means the "porter of Hell."
+I have often wondered since by what prophetic instinct he was
+sent to introduce me to the two years and a half of world war
+which I experienced in Berlin. This unfortunate officer, a most
+charming gentleman, was killed early in the war.
+
+The Berlin season lasts from about the twentieth of January for
+about six weeks. It is short in duration because, if the
+_hoffähig_ people stay longer than six weeks in Berlin, they
+become liable to pay their local income tax in Berlin, where
+the rate is higher than in those parts of Germany where they
+have their country estates.
+
+The first great court ceremonial is the _Schleppencour_,
+so-called from the long trains or _Schleppen_ worn by the
+women. On this night we "presented" Mr. and Mrs. Robert K. Cassatt
+of Philadelphia, Mrs. Ernest Wiltsee, Mrs. and Miss Luce and
+Mrs. Norman Whitehouse. On the arrival at the palace with these
+and all the members of the Embassy Staff and their wives, we
+were shown up a long stair-case, at the top of which a guard of
+honour, dressed in costume of the time of Frederick the Great,
+presented arms to all Ambassadors, and ruffled kettle-drums.
+Through long lines of cadets from the military schools, dressed
+as pages, in white, with short breeches and powdered wigs, we
+passed through several rooms where all the people to pass in
+review were gathered. Behind these, in a room about sixty feet by
+fifty, on a throne facing the door were the Emperor and Empress,
+and on the broad steps of this throne were the princes and their
+wives, the court ladies-in-waiting and all the other members of
+the court. The wives of the Ambassadors entered the room first,
+followed at intervals of about twenty feet by the ladies of the
+Embassy and the ladies to be presented. As they entered the room
+and made a change of direction toward the throne, pages in white
+straightened out the ladies' trains with long sticks. Arrived
+opposite the throne and about twenty feet from it, each Ambassador's
+wife made a low curtsey and then stood on the foot of the throne,
+to the left of the Emperor and Empress, and as each lady of the
+Embassy, not before presented, and each lady to be presented
+stopped beside the throne and made a low curtsey, the Ambassadress
+had to call out the name of each one in a loud voice; and when
+the last one had passed she followed her out of the room, walking
+sideways so as not to turn her back on the royalties,--something
+of a feat when towing a train about fifteen feet long. When all the
+Ambassadresses had so passed, it was the turn of the Ambassadors,
+who carried out substantially the same programme, substituting low
+bows for curtsies. The Ambassadors were followed by the Ministers'
+wives, these by the Ministers and these by the dignitaries of
+the German Court. All passed into the adjoining hall, and there
+a buffet supper was served. The whole affair began at about eight
+o'clock and was over in an hour.
+
+At the court balls, which also began early in the evening, a
+different procedure was followed. There the guests were required
+to assemble before eight-twenty in the ball-room. As in the
+_Schleppencour_, on one side of the room was the throne with
+seats for the Emperor and Empress, and to the right of this throne
+were the chairs for the Ambassadors' wives who were seated in the
+order of their husbands' rank, with the ladies of their Embassy,
+and any ladies they had brought to the ball standing behind them.
+After them came the Ministers' wives, sitting in similar fashion;
+then the Ambassadors, standing with their staffs behind them on
+raised steps, with any men that they had asked invitations for,
+and the Ministers in similar order. To the left of the throne
+stood the wives of the Dukes and dignitaries of Germany and then
+their husbands. When all were assembled, promptly at the time
+announced, the orchestra, which was dressed in mediæval costume
+and sat in a gallery, sounded trumpets and then the Emperor and
+Empress entered the room, the Emperor, of course, in uniform,
+followed by the ladies and gentlemen of the household all in
+brilliant uniforms, and one or two officers of the court regiment,
+picked out for their great height and dressed in the kind of
+uniform Rupert of Hentzau wears on the stage,--a silver helmet
+surmounted by an eagle, a steel breast-plate, white breeches
+and coat, and enormous high boots coming half way up the thigh.
+The Grand Huntsman wore a white wig, three-cornered hat and a
+long green coat.
+
+On entering the room, the Empress usually commenced on one side
+and the Emperor on the other, going around the room and speaking
+to the Ambassadors' wives and Ambassadors, etc., in turn, and
+the Empress in similar fashion, chatting for a moment with the
+German dignitaries and their wives lined up on the opposite side
+of the room. After going perhaps half way around each side, the
+Emperor and Empress would then change sides. This going around
+the room and chatting with people in turn is called "making the
+circle", and young royalties are practised in "making the circle"
+by being made to go up to the trees in a garden and address a
+few pleasant words to each tree, in this manner learning one
+of the principal duties of royalty.
+
+The dancing is only by young women and young officers of noble
+families who have practised the dances before. They are under
+the superintendence of several young officers who are known as
+_Vortänzer_ and when anyone in Berlin in court society gives
+a ball these _Vortänzer_ are the ones who see that all dancing
+is conducted strictly according to rule and manage the affairs
+of the ball-room with true Prussian efficiency. Supper is about
+ten-thirty at a court ball and is at small tables. Each royalty
+has a table holding about eight people and to these people are
+invited without particular rule as to precedence. The younger
+guests and lower dignitaries are not placed at supper but find
+places at tables to suit themselves. After supper all go back
+to the ball-room and there the young ladies and officers, led
+by the _Vortänzer_ execute a sort of lancers, in the final
+figure of which long lines are formed of dancers radiating from
+the throne; and all the dancers make bows and curtsies to the
+Emperor and Empress who are either standing or sitting at this
+time on the throne. At about eleven-thirty the ball is over,
+and as the guests pass out through the long hall, they are given
+glasses of hot punch and a peculiar sort of local Berlin bun, in
+order to ward off the lurking dangers of the villainous winter
+climate.
+
+At the court balls the diplomats are, of course, in their best
+diplomatic uniform. All Germans are in uniform of some kind, but the
+women do not wear the long trains worn at the _Schleppencour_.
+They wear ordinary ball dresses. In connection with court dancing
+it is rather interesting to note that when the tango and turkey
+trot made their way over the frontiers of Germany in the autumn
+of 1913, the Emperor issued a special order that no officers of
+the army or navy should dance any of these dances or should go
+to the house of any person who, at any time, whether officers
+were present or not, had allowed any of these new dances to be
+danced. This effectually extinguished the turkey trot, the bunny
+hug and the tango, and maintained the waltz and the polka in their
+old estate. It may seem ridiculous that such a decree should
+be so solemnly issued, but I believe that the higher authorities
+in Germany earnestly desired that the people, and, especially,
+the officers of the army and navy, should learn not to enjoy
+themselves too much. A great endeavour was always made to keep
+them in a life, so far as possible, of Spartan simplicity. For
+instance, the army officers were forbidden to play polo, not
+because of anything against the game, which, of course, is splendid
+practice for riding, but because it would make a distinction in
+the army between rich and poor.
+
+[Illustration: A SALON IN THE AMERICAN EMBASSY.]
+
+[Illustration: THE BALLROOM OF THE EMBASSY. THIS WAS AFTERWARD
+TURNED INTO A WORKROOM FOR THE RELIEF OF AMERICANS IN WAR DAYS.]
+
+The Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, is a day of great
+celebration. At nine-thirty in the morning the Ambassadors, Ministers
+and all the dignitaries of the court attend Divine Service in the
+chapel of the palace. On this day in 1914, the Queen of Greece and
+many of the reigning princes of the German States were present.
+In the evening there was a gala performance in the opera house,
+the entire house being occupied by members of the court. Between
+the acts in the large foyer, royalties "made the circle," and I
+had quite a long conversation with both the Emperor and Empress
+and was "caught" by the King of Saxony. Many of the Ambassadors
+have letters of credence not only to the court at Berlin but
+also to the rulers of the minor German States. For instance,
+the Belgian Minister was accredited to thirteen countries in
+Germany and the Spanish Ambassador to eleven. For some reason
+or other, the American and Turkish Ambassadors are accredited
+only to the court at Berlin. Some of the German rulers feel this
+quite keenly, and the King of Saxony, especially. I had been
+warned that he was very anxious to show his resentment of this
+distinction by refusing to shake hands with the American Ambassador.
+He was in the foyer on the occasion of this gala performance
+and said that he would like to have me presented to him. I, of
+course, could not refuse, but forgot the warning of my predecessors
+and put out my hand, which the King ostentatiously neglected to
+take. A few moments later the wife of the Turkish Ambassador was
+presented to the King of Saxony and received a similar rebuff;
+but, as she was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and therefore
+a Royal Highness in her own right, she went around the King of
+Saxony, seized his hand, which he had put behind him, brought
+it around to the front and shook it warmly, a fine example of
+great presence of mind.
+
+Writing of all these things and looking out from a sky-scraper
+in New York, these details of court life seem very frivolous
+and far away. But an Ambassador is compelled to become part of
+this system. The most important conversations with the Emperor
+sometimes take place at court functions, and the Ambassador and
+his secretaries often gather their most useful bits of information
+over tea cups or with the cigars after dinner.
+
+Aside from the short season, Berlin is rather dull; Bismarck
+characterised it as a "desert of bricks and newspapers."
+
+In addition to making visits to the royalties, custom required
+me to call first upon the Imperial Chancellor and the Minister
+of Foreign Affairs. The other ministers are supposed to call
+first, although I believe the redoubtable von Tirpitz claimed
+a different rule. So, during the first winter I gradually made
+the acquaintance of those people who sway the destinies of the
+German Empire and its seventy millions.
+
+I dined with the Emperor and had long conversations with him on
+New Year's Day and at the two court balls.
+
+All during this winter Germans from the highest down tried to
+impress me with the great danger which they said threatened America
+from Japan. The military and naval attachés and I were told that
+the German information system sent news that Mexico was full
+of Japanese colonels and America of Japanese spies. Possibly
+much of the prejudice in America against the Japanese was cooked
+up by the German propagandists whom we later learned to know
+so well.
+
+It is noteworthy that during the whole of my first winter in
+Berlin I was not officially or semi-officially afforded an
+opportunity to meet any of the members of the Reichstag or any
+of the leaders in the business world. The great merchants, whose
+acquaintance I made, as well as the literary and artistic people,
+I had to seek out; because most of them were not _hoffähig_
+and I did not come in contact with them at any court functions,
+official dinners or even in the houses of the court nobles or
+those connected with the government.
+
+A very interesting character whom I met during the first winter
+and often conversed with, was Prince Henkel-Donnersmarck. Prince
+Donnersmarck, who died December, 1916, at the age of eighty-six
+years, was the richest male subject in Germany, the richest subject
+being Frau von Krupp-Böhlen, the heiress of the Krupp cannon
+foundry. He was the first governor of Lorraine during the war of
+1870 and had had a finger in all of the political and commercial
+activities of Germany for more than half a century. He told me, on
+one occasion, that he had advocated exacting a war indemnity of
+thirty milliards from France after the war of 1870, and said that
+France could easily pay it--and that that sum or much more should
+be exacted as an indemnity at the conclusion of the World War of
+1914. He said that he had always advocated a protective tariff
+for agricultural products in Germany as well as encouragement of
+the German manufacturing interests: that agriculture was necessary
+to the country in order to provide strong soldiers for war, and
+manufacturing industries to provide money to pay for the army and
+navy and their equipment. He made me promise to take his second
+son to America in order that he might see American life, and the
+great iron and coal districts of Pennsylvania. Of course, most
+of these conversations took place before the World War. After
+two years of that war and, as prospects of paying the expenses
+of the war from the indemnities to be exacted from the enemies
+of Germany gradually melted away, the Prince quite naturally
+developed a great anxiety as to how the expenses of the war should
+be paid by Germany; and I am sure that this anxiety had much to
+do with his death at the end of the year, 1916.
+
+Custom demanded that I should ask for an appointment and call on
+each of the Ambassadors on arrival. The British Ambassador was
+Sir Edward Goschen, a man of perhaps sixty-eight years, a widower.
+He spoke French, of course, and German; and, accompanied by his
+dog, was a frequent visitor at our house. I am very grateful
+for the help and advice he so generously gave me--doubly valuable
+as coming from a man of his fame and experience. Jules Cambon was
+the Ambassador of France. His brother, Paul, is Ambassador to
+the Court of St. James. Jules Cambon is well-known to Americans,
+having passed five years in this country. He was Ambassador to
+Spain for five years, and, at the time of my arrival, had been
+about the same period at Berlin. In spite of his long residence
+in each of these countries, he spoke only French; but he possessed
+a really marvellous insight into the political life of each of
+these nations. Bollati, the Italian Ambassador, was a great admirer
+of Germany; he spoke German well and did everything possible
+to keep Italy out of war with her former Allies in the Triple
+Alliance.
+
+Spain was represented by Polo de Bernabe, who now represents
+the interests of the United States in Germany, as well as those
+of France, Russia, Belgium, Serbia and Roumania. It is a curious
+commentary on the absurdity of war that, on leaving Berlin, I
+handed over the interests of the United States to this Ambassador,
+who, as Spanish minister to the United States, was handed his
+passports at the outbreak of the Spanish-American war! I am sure
+that not only he, but all his Embassy, will devotedly represent
+our interests in Germany. Sverbeeu represented the interests
+of Russia; Soughimoura, Japan; and Mouktar Pascha, Turkey. The
+wife of the latter was a daughter of the Khedive of Egypt, and
+Mouktar Pascha himself a general of distinction in the Turkish
+army.
+
+An Ambassador must keep on intimate terms with his colleagues.
+It is often through them that he learns of important matters
+affecting his own country or others. All of these Ambassadors
+and most of the Ministers occupied handsome houses furnished
+by their government. They had large salaries and a fund for
+entertaining.
+
+During this first winter before the war, I saw a great deal of
+the German Crown Prince as well as of several of his brothers.
+
+I cannot subscribe to the general opinion of the Crown Prince. I
+found him a most agreeable man, a sharp observer and the possessor
+of intellectual attainments of no mean order. He is undoubtedly
+popular in Germany, excelling in all sports, a fearless rider
+and a good shot. He is ably seconded by the Crown Princess. The
+mother of the Crown Princess is a Russian Grand Duchess, and
+her father was a Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. She is a very
+beautiful woman made popular by her affable manners. The one
+defect of the Crown Prince has been his eagerness for war; but,
+as he has characterised this war as the most stupid ever waged
+in history, perhaps he will be satisfied, if he comes to the
+throne, with what all Germany has suffered in this conflict.
+
+The Crown Prince was very anxious, before the war, to visit the
+United States; and we had practically arranged to make a trip
+to Alaska in search of some of the big game there, with stops
+at the principal cities of America.
+
+The second son of the Kaiser, Prince Eitel Fritz, is considered
+by the Germans to have distinguished himself most in this war.
+He is given credit for great personal bravery.
+
+Prince Adalbert, the sailor prince, is quite American in his
+manners. In February, 1914, the Crown Prince and Princes Eitel
+Fritz and Adalbert came to our Embassy for a very small dance to
+which were asked all the pretty American girls then in Berlin.
+
+It is never the custom to invite royalties to an entertainment.
+They invite themselves to a dance or a dinner, and the list of
+proposed guests is always submitted to them. When a royalty arrives
+at the house, the host (and the hostess, if the royalty be a
+woman) always waits at the front door and escorts the royalties
+up-stairs. Allison Armour also gave a dance at which the Crown
+Prince was present, following a dinner at the Automobile Club.
+Armour has been a constant visitor to Germany for many years,
+usually going in his yacht to Kiel in summer and to Corfu, where
+the Emperor goes, in winter. As he has never tried to obtain
+anything from the Emperor, he has become quite intimate with him
+and with all the members of the royal family.
+
+The Chancellor, von Bethmann-Hollweg, is an enormous man of perhaps
+six feet five or six. He comes of a banking family in Frankfort.
+It is too soon to give a just estimate of his acts in this war.
+When I arrived in Berlin and until November, 1916, von Jagow
+was Minister of Foreign Affairs. In past years he had occupied
+the post of Ambassador to Italy, and with great reluctance took
+his place at the head of the Foreign Office. Zimmermann was
+an Under Secretary, succeeding von Jagow when the latter was
+practically forced out of office. Zimmermann, on account of his
+plain and hearty manners and democratic air, was more of a favourite
+with the Ambassadors and members of the Reichstag than von Jagow,
+who, in appearance and manner, was the ideal old-style diplomat
+of the stage.
+
+Von Jagow was not a good speaker and the agitation against him
+was started by those who claimed that, in answering questions
+in the Reichstag, he did not make a forceful enough appearance
+on behalf of the government. Von Jagow did not cultivate the
+members of the Reichstag and his delicate health prevented him
+from undertaking more than the duties of his office.
+
+As a matter of fact, I believe that von Jagow had a juster estimate
+of foreign nations than Zimmermann, and more correctly divined the
+thoughts of the American people in this war than did his successor.
+I thought that I enjoyed the personal friendship of both von
+Jagow and Zimmermann and, therefore, was rather unpleasantly
+surprised when I saw in the papers that Zimmermann had stated in
+the Reichstag that he had been compelled, from motives of policy,
+to keep on friendly terms with me. I sincerely hope that what he
+said on this occasion was incorrectly reported. Von Jagow, after
+his fall, took charge of a hospital at Libau in the occupied
+portion of Russia. This shows the devotion to duty of the Prussian
+noble class, and their readiness to take up any task, however
+humble, that may help their country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+POLITICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL
+
+My commission read, "Ambassador to Germany."
+
+It is characteristic of our deep ignorance of all foreign affairs
+that I was appointed Ambassador to a place which does not exist.
+Politically, there is no such place as "Germany." There are the
+twenty-five States, Prussia, Bavaria, Württemberg, Saxony, etc.,
+which make up the "German Empire," but there is no such political
+entity as "Germany."
+
+These twenty-five States have votes in the Bundesrat, a body
+which may be said to correspond remotely to our United States
+Senate. But each State has a different number of votes. Prussia
+has seventeen, Bavaria six, Württemberg and Saxony four each,
+Baden and Hesse three each, Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Brunswick
+two each, and the rest one each. Prussia controls Brunswick.
+
+The Reichstag, or Imperial Parliament, corresponds to our House
+of Representatives. The members are elected by manhood suffrage of
+those over twenty-five. But in practice the Reichstag is nothing
+but a debating society because of the preponderating power of the
+Bundesrat, or upper chamber. At the head of the ministry is the
+Chancellor, appointed by the Emperor; and the other Ministers, such
+as Colonies, Interior, Education, Justice and Foreign Affairs,
+are but underlings of the Chancellor and appointed by him. The
+Chancellor is not responsible to the Reichstag, as Bethmann-Hollweg
+clearly stated at the time of the Zabern affair, but only to the
+Emperor.
+
+It is true that an innovation properly belonging only to a
+parliamentary government was introduced some seven years ago,
+viz., that the ministers must answer questions (as in Great Britain)
+put them by the members of the Reichstag. But there the likeness
+to a parliamentary government begins and ends.
+
+The members of the Bundesrat are named by the Princes of the
+twenty-five States making up the German Empire. Prussia, which
+has seventeen votes, may name seventeen members of the Bundesrat
+or one member, who, however, when he votes casts seventeen votes.
+The votes of a State must always be cast as a unit. In the usual
+procedure bills are prepared and adopted in the Bundesrat and
+then sent to the Reichstag whence, if passed, they return to the
+Bundesrat where the final approval must take place. Therefore,
+in practice, the Bundesrat makes the laws with the assent of
+the Reichstag. The members of the Bundesrat have the right to
+appear and make speeches in the Reichstag. The fundamental
+constitution of the German Empire is not changed, as with us, by
+a separate body but is changed in the same way that an ordinary
+law is passed; except that if there are fourteen votes against
+the proposed change in the Bundesrat the proposition is defeated,
+and, further, the constitution cannot be changed with respect
+to rights expressly granted by it to anyone of the twenty-five
+States without the assent of that State.
+
+In order to pass a law a majority vote in the Bundesrat and Reichstag
+is sufficient if there is a quorum present, and a quorum is a
+majority of the members elected in the Reichstag: in the Bundesrat
+the quorum consists of such members as are present at a regularly
+called meeting, providing the Chancellor or the Vice-Chancellor
+attends.
+
+The boundaries of the districts sending members to the Reichstag
+have not been changed since 1872, while, in the meantime, a great
+shifting of population, as well as great increase of population
+has taken place. And because of this, the Reichstag to-day does
+not represent the people of Germany in the sense intended by the
+framers of the Imperial Constitution.
+
+Much of the legislation that affects the everyday life of a German
+emanates from the parliaments of Prussia, Bavaria and Saxony,
+etc., as with us in our State Legislatures. The purely legislative
+power of the ministers and Bundesrat is, however, large. These
+German States have constitutions of some sort. The Grand Duchies
+of Mecklenburg have no constitution whatever. It is understood
+that the people themselves do not want one, on financial grounds,
+fearing that many expenses now borne by the Grand Duke out of
+his large private income, would be saddled on the people. The
+other States have Constitutions varying in form. In Prussia there
+are a House of Lords and a House of Deputies. The members of
+the latter are elected by a system of circle votes, by which
+the vote of one rich man voting in circle number one counts as
+much as thousands voting in circle number three. It is the
+recognition by Bethmann-Hollweg that this vicious system must
+be changed that brought down on him the wrath of the Prussian
+country squires, who for so long have ruled the German Empire,
+filling places, civil and military, with their children and
+relatives.
+
+In considering Germany, the immense influence of the military
+party must not be left out of account; and, with the developments
+of the navy, that branch of the service also claimed a share in
+guiding the policy of the Government.
+
+The administrative, executive and judicial officers of Prussia
+are not elected. The country is governed and judged by men who
+enter this branch of the government service exactly as others
+enter the army or navy. These are gradually promoted through
+the various grades. This applies to judges, clerks of courts,
+district attorneys and the officials who govern the political
+divisions of Prussia, for Prussia is divided into circles,
+presidencies and provinces. For instance, a young man may enter
+the government service as assistant to the clerk of some court.
+He may then become district attorney in a small town, then clerk
+of a larger court, possibly attached to the police presidency
+of a large city; he may then become a minor judge, etc., until
+finally he becomes a judge of one of the higher courts or an
+over-president of a province. Practically the only elective officers
+who have any power are members of the Reichstag and the Prussian
+Legislature, and there, as I have shown, the power is very small.
+Mayors and City Councillors are elected in Prussia, but have
+little power; and are elected by the vicious system of circle
+voting.
+
+Time and again during the course of the Great War when I made
+some complaint or request affecting the interests of one of the
+various nations I represented, I was met in the Foreign Office
+by the statement, "We can do nothing with the military. Please
+read Bismarck's memoirs and you will see what difficulty he had
+with the military." Undoubtedly, owing to the fact that the
+Chancellor seldom took strong ground, the influence which both
+the army and navy claimed in dictating the policy of the Empire
+was greatly increased.
+
+Roughly speaking there are three great political divisions or
+parties in the German Reichstag. To the right of the presiding
+officer sit the Conservatives. Most of these are members from the
+Prussian Junker or squire class. They are strong for the rights
+of the crown and against any extension of the suffrage in Prussia
+or anywhere else. They form probably the most important body of
+conservatives now existing in any country in the world. Their
+leader, Heydebrand, is known as the uncrowned king of Prussia. On
+the left side the Social Democrats sit. As they evidently oppose
+the kingship and favour a republic, no Social Democratic member
+has ever been called into the government. They represent the great
+industrial populations of Germany. Roughly, they constitute about
+one-third of the Reichstag, and would sit there in greater numbers
+if Germany were again redistricted so that proper representation
+were given to the cities, to which there has been a great rush
+of population since the time when the Reichstag districts were
+originally constituted.
+
+In the centre, and holding the balance of power, sit the members
+of the Centrum or Catholic body. Among them are many priests. It
+is noteworthy that in this war Roman Catholic opinion in neutral
+countries, like Spain, inclines to the side of Germany; while
+in Germany, to protect their religious liberties, the Catholic
+population vote as Catholics to send Catholic members to the
+Reichstag, and these sit and vote as Catholics alone.
+
+Germans high in rank in the government often told me that no part
+of conquered Poland would ever be incorporated in Prussia or the
+Empire, because it was not desirable to add to the Roman Catholic
+population; that they had troubles enough with the Catholics now
+in Germany and had no desire to add to their numbers. This, and
+the desire to lure the Poles into the creation of a national
+army which could be utilised by the German machine, were the
+reasons for the creation by Germany (with the assent of Austria)
+of the new country of Poland.
+
+This Catholic party is the result in Germany of the
+_Kulturkampf_ or War for Civilisation, as it was called by
+Bismarck, a contest dating from 1870 between the State in Germany
+and the Roman Catholic Church.
+
+Prussia has always been the centre of Protestantism in Germany,
+although there are many Roman Catholics in the Rhine Provinces
+of Prussia, and in that part of Prussia inhabited principally
+by Poles, originally part of the Kingdom of Poland.
+
+Baden and Bavaria, the two principal South German States, and
+others are Catholic. In 1870, on the withdrawal of the French
+garrison from Rome, the Temporal Power of the Pope ended, and
+Bismarck, though appealed to by Catholics, took no interest in the
+defence of the Papacy. The conflict between the Roman Catholics
+and the Government in Germany was precipitated by the promulgation
+by the Vatican Council, in 1870, of the Dogma of the Infallibility
+of the Pope.
+
+A certain number of German pastors and bishops refused to subscribe
+to the new dogma. In the conflict that ensued these pastors and
+bishops were backed by the government. The religious orders were
+suppressed, civil marriage made compulsory and the State assumed
+new powers not only in the appointment but even in the education
+of the Catholic priests. The Jesuits were expelled from Germany
+in 1872. These measures, generally known as the May Laws, because
+passed in May, 1873, 1874 and 1875, led to the creation and
+strengthening of the Centrum or Catholic party. For a long period
+many churches were vacant in Prussia. Finally, owing to the growth
+of the Centrum, Bismarck gave in. The May Laws were rescinded
+in 1886 and the religious orders, the Jesuits excepted, were
+permitted to return in 1887. Civil marriage, however, remained
+obligatory in Prussia.
+
+Ever since the _Kulturkampf_ the Centrum has held the balance
+of power in Germany, acting sometimes with the Conservatives
+and sometimes with the Social Democrats.
+
+In addition to these three great parties, there are minor parties
+and groups which sometimes act with one party and sometimes with
+another, the National Liberals, for example, and the Progressives.
+Since the war certain members of the National Liberal party were
+most bitter in assailing President Wilson and the United States.
+In the demand for ruthless submarine war they acted with the
+Conservatives. There are also Polish, Hanoverian, Danish and
+Alsatian members of the Reichstag.
+
+There are three great race questions in Germany. First of all,
+that of Alsace-Lorraine. It is unnecessary to go at length into
+this well-known question. In the chapter on the affair at Zabern,
+something will be seen of the attitude of the troops toward the
+civil population. At the outbreak of the war several of the deputies,
+sitting in the Reichstag as members from Alsace-Lorraine, crossed
+the frontier and joined the French army.
+
+If there is one talent which the Germans superlatively lack, it
+is that of ruling over other peoples and inducing other people
+to become part of their nation.
+
+It is now a long time since portions of the Kingdom of Poland,
+by various partitions of that kingdom, were incorporated with
+Prussia, but the Polish question is more alive to-day than at
+the time of the last partition.
+
+The Poles are of a livelier race than the Germans, are Roman
+Catholics and always retain their dream of a reconstituted and
+independent Kingdom of Poland.
+
+It is hard to conceive that Poland was at one time perhaps the
+most powerful kingdom of Europe, with a population numbering
+twenty millions and extending from the Baltic to the Carpathians
+and the Black Sea, including in its territory the basins of the
+Warta, Vistula, Dwina, Dnieper and Upper Dniester, and that it
+had under its dominion besides Poles proper and the Baltic Slavs,
+the Lithuanians, the White Russians and the Little Russians or
+Ruthenians.
+
+The Polish aristocracy was absolutely incapable of governing its
+own country, which fell an easy prey to the intrigues of Frederick
+the Great and the two Empresses, Maria Theresa of Austria and
+Catherine of Russia. The last partition of Poland was in the
+year 1795.
+
+Posen, at one time one of the capitals of the old kingdom of
+Poland, is the intellectual centre of that part of Poland which has
+been incorporated into Prussia. For years Prussia has alternately
+cajoled and oppressed the Poles, and has made every endeavour to
+replace the Polish inhabitants with German colonists. A commission
+has been established which buys estates from Poles and sells
+them to Germans. This commission has the power of condemning
+the lands of Poles, taking these lands from them by force,
+compensating them at a rate determined by the commission and
+settling Germans on the lands so seized. This commission has
+its headquarters in Posen. The result has not been successful.
+All the country side surrounding Posen and the city itself are
+divided into two factions. By going to one hotel or the other
+you announce that you are pro-German or pro-Polish. Poles will
+not deal in shops kept by Germans or in shops unless the signs
+are in Polish.
+
+The sons of Germans who have settled in Poland under the protection
+of the commission often marry Polish women. The invariable result
+of these mixed marriages is that the children are Catholics and
+Poles. Polish deputies voting as Poles sit in the Prussian
+legislature and in the Reichstag, and if a portion of the old
+Kingdom of Poland is made a separate country at the end of this
+war, it will have the effect of making the Poles in Prussia more
+restless and more aggressive than ever.
+
+In order to win the sympathies of the Poles, the Emperor caused
+a royal castle to be built within recent years in the city of
+Posen, and appointed a popular Polish gentleman who had served
+in the Prussian army and was attached to the Emperor, the Count
+Hutten-Czapski, as its lord-warden. In this castle was a very
+beautiful Byzantine chapel built from designs especially selected
+by the Emperor. In January, 1914, we went with Allison Armour
+and the Cassatts, Mrs. Wiltsee and Mrs. Whitehouse on a trip
+to Posen to see this chapel.
+
+Some of our German friends tried to play a joke on us by telling
+us that the best hotel was the hotel patronised by the Poles. To
+have gone there would have been to declare ourselves anti-German
+and pro-Polish, but we were warned in time. The castle has a
+large throne room and ball-room; in the hall is a stuffed aurochs
+killed by the Emperor. The aurochs is a species of buffalo greatly
+resembling those which used to roam our western prairies. The
+breed has been preserved on certain great estates in eastern
+Germany and in the hunting forests of the Czar in the neighbourhood
+of Warsaw.
+
+Some of the Poles told me that at the first attempt to give a
+court ball in this new castle the Polish population in the streets
+threw ink through the carriage windows on the dresses of the
+ladies going to the ball and thus made it a failure. The chapel
+of the castle is very beautiful and is a great credit to the
+Emperor's taste as an architect.
+
+While being shown through the Emperor's private apartments in
+this castle, I noticed a saddle on a sort of elevated stool in
+front of a desk. I asked the guide what this was for: he told
+me that the Emperor, when working, always sits in a saddle.
+
+In Posen, in a book-store, the proprietor brought out for me a
+number of books caricaturing the German rule of Alsace-Lorraine.
+It is curious that a community of interests should make a market
+for these books in Polish Posen.
+
+Although not so well advertised, the Polish question is as acute
+as that of Alsace-Lorraine.
+
+After its successful war in 1866 against Austria, Bavaria, Saxony,
+Baden, Hanover, etc., Prussia became possessed of the two duchies
+of Schleswig-Holstein, which are to the south of Denmark on the
+Jutland Peninsula. Here, strangely enough, there is a Danish
+question. A number of Danes inhabit these duchies and have been
+irritated by the Prussian officials and officers into preserving
+their national feeling intact ever since 1866. Galling restrictions
+have been made, the very existence of which intensifies the hatred
+and prevents the assimilation of these Danes. For instance, Amundsen,
+the Arctic explorer, was forbidden to lecture in Danish in these
+duchies during the winter of 1913-14, and there were regulations
+enforced preventing more than a certain number of these Danish
+people from assembling in a hotel, as well as regulations against
+the employment of Danish servants.
+
+In 1866, after its successful war, Prussia wiped out the old
+kingdom of Hanover and drove its king into exile in Austria.
+To-day there is still a party of protest against this aggression.
+The Kaiser believes, however, that the ghost of the claim of
+the Kings of Hanover was laid when he married his only daughter
+to the heir of the House of Hanover and gave the young pair the
+vacant Duchy of Brunswick. That this young man will inherit the
+great Guelph treasure was no drawback to the match in the eyes
+of those in Berlin.
+
+There is a hatred of Prussia in other parts of Germany, but coupled
+with so much fear that it will never take practical shape. In
+Bavaria, for example, even the comic newspapers have for years
+ridiculed the Prussians and the House of Hohenzollern. The smashing
+defeat by Prussia of Austria and the allied German States, Bavaria,
+Saxony, Hesse, Hanover, etc., in 1866, and the growth of Prussianism
+since then in all of these countries, keep the people from any
+overt act. It is a question, perhaps, as to how these countries,
+especially Bavaria, would act in case of the utter defeat of
+Germany. But at present they must be counted on only as faithful
+servants, in a military way, of the German Emperor.
+
+Montesquieu, the author of the "Esprit des Lois," says, "All law
+comes from the soil," and it has been claimed that residence in
+the hot climate of the tropics in some measure changes Anglo-Saxon
+character. It is, therefore, always well in judging national
+character to know something of the physical characteristics and
+climate of the country which a nation inhabits.
+
+The heart of modern Germany is the great north central plain which
+comprises practically all of the original kingdom of Prussia,
+stretching northward from the Saxon and Hartz mountains to the
+North and Baltic seas. It is from this dreary and infertile plain
+that for many centuries conquering military races have poured
+over Europe. The climate is not so cold in winter as that of
+the northern part of the United States. There is much rain and
+the winter skies are so dark that the absence of the sun must
+have some effect upon the character of the people. The Saxons
+inhabit a more mountainous country; Württemberg and Baden are
+hilly; Bavaria is a land of beauty, diversified with lovely lakes
+and mountains. The soft outlines of the vine-covered hills of
+the Rhine Valley have long been the admiration of travellers.
+
+The inhabitants of Prussia were originally not Germanic, but
+rather Slavish in type; and, indeed, to-day in the forest of
+the River Spree, on which Berlin is situated, and only about
+fifty miles from that city, there still dwell descendants of
+the original Wendish inhabitants of the country who speak the
+Wendish language. The wet-nurses, whose picturesque dress is so
+noticeable on the streets of Berlin, all come from this Wendish
+colony, which has been preserved through the many wars that have
+swept over this part of Germany because of the refuge afforded
+in the swamps and forests of this district.
+
+The inhabitants of the Rhine Valley drink wine instead of beer.
+They are more lively in their disposition than the Prussians,
+Saxons and Bavarians, who are of a heavy and phlegmatic nature.
+The Bavarians are noted for their prowess as beer drinkers, and
+it is not at all unusual for prosperous burghers of Munich to
+dispose of thirty large glasses of beer in a day; hence the cures
+which exist all over Germany and where the average German business
+man spends part, at least, of his annual vacation.
+
+In peace times the Germans are heavy eaters. As some one says,
+"It is not true that the Germans eat all the time, but they eat
+all the time except during seven periods of the day when they
+take their meals." And it is a fact that prosperous merchants of
+Berlin, before the war, had seven meals a day; first breakfast
+at a comfortably early hour; second breakfast at about eleven, of
+perhaps a glass of milk or perhaps a glass of beer and sandwiches;
+a very heavy lunch of four or five courses with wine and beer;
+coffee and cakes at three; tea and sandwiches or sandwiches and
+beer at about five; a strong dinner with several kinds of wines
+at about seven or seven-thirty; and a substantial supper before
+going to bed.
+
+The Germans are wonderful judges of wines, and, at any formal
+dinner, use as many as eight varieties. The best wine is passed
+in glasses on trays, and the guests are not expected, of course,
+to take this wine unless they actually desire to drink it. I
+know one American woman who was stopping at a Prince's castle
+in Hungary and who, on the first night, allowed the butler to
+fill her glasses with wine which she did not drink. The second
+evening the butler passed her sternly by, and she was offered
+no more wine during her stay in the castle.
+
+Many of the doctors who were with me thought that the heavy eating
+and large consumption of wine and beer had unfavourably affected the
+German national character, and had made the people more aggressive
+and irritable and consequently readier for war. The influence of diet
+on national character should not be under-estimated. Meat-eating
+nations have always ruled vegetarians.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+DIPLOMATIC WORK OF FIRST WINTER IN BERLIN
+
+During this first winter in Berlin, I spent each morning in the
+Embassy office, and, if I had any business at the Foreign Office,
+called there about five o'clock in the afternoon. It was the
+custom that all Ambassadors should call on Tuesday afternoons
+at the Foreign Office, going in to see the Foreign Minister in
+the order of their arrival in the waiting-room, and to have a
+short talk with him about current diplomatic affairs.
+
+In the previous chapter I have given a detailed account of the
+ceremonies of court life, because a knowledge of this life is
+essential to a grasp of the spirit which animates those ruling
+the destinies of the German Empire.
+
+My first winter, however, was not all cakes and ale. There were
+several interesting bits of diplomatic work. First, we were then
+engaged in our conflict with Huerta, the Dictator of Mexico,
+and it was part of my work to secure from Germany promises that
+she would not recognise this Mexican President.
+
+I also spent a great deal of time in endeavouring to get the
+German Government to take part officially in the San Francisco
+Fair, but, so far as I could make out, Great Britain, probably
+at the instance of Germany, seemed to have entered into some
+sort of agreement, or at any rate a tacit understanding, that
+neither country would participate officially in this Exposition.
+
+After the lamentable failure of the Jamestown Exposition, the
+countries of Europe were certainly not to be blamed for not spending
+their money in aid of a similar enterprise. But I believe that the
+attitude of Germany had a deeper significance, and that certain,
+at least, of the German statesmen had contemplated a
+_rapprochement_ with Great Britain and a mutual spanking
+of America and its Monroe Doctrine by these two great powers.
+Later I was informed, by a man high in the German Foreign Office,
+that Germany had proposed to Great Britain a joint intervention
+in Mexico, an invasion which would have put an end forever to
+the Monroe Doctrine, of course to be followed by the forceful
+colonisation of Central and South America by European Powers. I
+was told that Great Britain refused. But whether this proposition
+and refusal in fact were made, can be learned from the archives
+of the British Foreign Office.
+
+During this period of trouble with Mexico, the German Press,
+almost without exception, and especially that part of it controlled
+by the Government and by the Conservatives or Junkers, was most
+bitter in its attitude towards America.
+
+The reason for this was the underlying hatred of an autocracy
+for a successful democracy, envy of the wealth, liberty and
+commercial success of America, and a deep and strong resentment
+against the Monroe Doctrine which prevented Germany from using
+her powerful fleet and great military force to seize a foothold
+in the Western hemisphere.
+
+Germany came late into the field of colonisation in her endeavour
+to find "a place in the sun." The colonies secured were not habitable
+by white men. Togo, Kameroons, German East Africa, are too tropical
+in climate, too subject to tropical diseases, ever to become
+successful German colonies. German Southwest Africa has a more
+healthy climate but is a barren land. About the only successful
+industry there has been that of gathering the small diamonds that
+were discovered in the sands of the beaches and of the deserts
+running back from the sea.
+
+On the earnest request of Secretary Bryan, I endeavoured to persuade
+the German authorities to have Germany become a signatory to the
+so-called Bryan Peace Treaties. After many efforts and long
+interviews, von Jagow, the Foreign Minister, finally told me
+that Germany would not sign these treaties because the greatest
+asset of Germany in war was her readiness for a sudden assault,
+that they had no objection to signing the treaty with America,
+but that they feared they would then be immediately asked to
+sign similar treaties with Great Britain, France and Russia,
+that if they refused to sign with these countries the refusal
+would almost be equivalent to a declaration of war, and, if they
+did sign, intending in good faith to stand by the treaty, that
+Germany would be deprived of her greatest asset in war, namely,
+her readiness for a sudden and overpowering attack.
+
+I also, during this first winter, studied and made reports on
+the commercial situation of Germany and especially the German
+discriminations against American goods. To these matters I shall
+refer in more detail in another chapter.
+
+Opposition and attention to the oil monopoly project also occupied
+a great part of my working hours. Petroleum is used very extensively
+in Germany for illuminating purposes by the poorer part of the
+population, especially in the farming villages and industrial
+towns. This oil used in Germany comes from two sources of supply,
+from America and from the oil wells of Galicia and Roumania. The
+German American Oil Company there, through which the American
+oil was distributed, although a German company, was controlled by
+American capital, and German capital was largely interested in
+the Galician and Roumanian oil fields. The oil from Galicia and
+Roumania is not so good a quality as that imported from America.
+
+[Illustration: PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC AFTER DINNER WITH THE KAISER
+AT THE ROYAL PALACE, BERLIN.]
+
+Before my arrival in Germany the government had proposed a law
+creating the oil monopoly; that is to say, a company was to be
+created, controlled by the government for the purpose of carrying
+on the entire oil business of Germany, and no other person or
+company, by its provisions, was to be allowed to sell any
+illuminating oil or similar products in the Empire. The bill
+provided that the business of those engaged in the wholesale
+selling of oil, and their plants, etc., should be taken over
+by this government company, condemned and paid for. The German
+American Company, however, had also a retail business and plant
+throughout Germany for which it was proposed that no compensation
+should be given. The government bill also contained certain curious
+"jokers"; for instance, it provided for the taking over of all
+plants "within the customs limit of the German Empire," thus
+leaving out of the compensation a refinery which was situated
+in the free part of Hamburg, although, of course, by operation
+of this monopoly bill the refinery was rendered useless to the
+American controlled company which owned it.
+
+In the course of this investigation it came to light that the
+Prussian state railways were used as a means of discriminating
+against the American oil. American oil came to Germany through
+the port of Hamburg, and the Galician and Roumanian oil through
+the frontier town of Oderberg. Taking a delivery point equally
+distant between Oderberg and Hamburg, the rate charged on oil
+from Hamburg to this point was twice as great as that charged
+for a similar quantity of oil from Oderberg.
+
+I took up this fight on the line that the company must be compensated
+for all of its property, that used in retail as well as in wholesale
+business, and, second, that it must be compensated for the good-will
+of its business, which it had built up through a number of years
+by the expenditure of very large sums of money. Of course where
+a company has been in operation for years and is continually
+advertising its business, its good-will often is its greatest
+asset and has often been built up by the greatest expenditure
+of money. For instance, in buying a successful newspaper, the
+value does not lie in the real-estate, presses, etc., but in
+the good-will of the newspaper, the result of years of work and
+expensive advertising.
+
+I made no objection that the German government did not have a
+perfect right to create this monopoly and to put the American
+controlled company entirely out of the field, but insisted upon
+a fair compensation for all their property and good-will. Even a
+fair compensation for the property and good-will would have started
+the government monopoly company with a large debt upon which it
+would have been required to pay interest, and this interest, of
+course, would have been added to the cost of oil to the German
+consumers. In my final conversation on the subject with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg, he said, "You don't mean to say that President
+Wilson and Secretary Bryan will do anything for the Standard
+Oil Company?" I answered that everyone in America knew that
+the Standard Oil Company had neither influence with nor control
+over President Wilson and Secretary Bryan, but that they both
+could and would give the Standard Oil Company the same measure
+of protection which any American citizen doing business abroad
+had a right to expect from his government. I also said that I
+thought they had done enough for the Germans interested in the
+Galician and Roumanian oil fields when they had used the Prussian
+state railways to give these oil producers an unfair advantage
+over those importing American oil.
+
+Shortly after this the question of the creation of this oil monopoly
+was dropped and naturally has not been revived during the war,
+and I very much doubt whether, after the war, the people of
+liberalised Germany will consent to pay more for inferior oil in
+order to make good the investments of certain German banks and
+financiers in Galicia and Roumania. I doubt whether a more liberal
+Germany will wish to put the control of a great business in the
+hands of the government, thereby greatly increasing the number
+of government officials and the weight of government influence
+in the country. Heaven knows there are officials enough to-day
+in Germany, without turning over a great department of private
+industry to the government for the sole purpose of making good
+bad investments of certain financiers and adding to the political
+influence of the central government.
+
+In May, 1914, Colonel House and his beautiful wife arrived to pay
+us a visit in Berlin. He was, of course, anxious to have a talk
+with the Emperor, and this was arranged by the Emperor inviting
+the Colonel and me to what is called the _Schrippenfest_,
+at the new palace at Potsdam.
+
+For many years, in fact since the days of Frederick the Great,
+the learning (_Lehr_) battalion, composed of picked soldiers
+from all the regiments of Prussia, has been quartered at Potsdam,
+and on a certain day in April this battalion has been given a
+dinner at which they eat white rolls (_Schrippen_) instead
+of the usual black bread. This feast has been carried on from
+these older days and has become quite a ceremony.
+
+The Colonel and I motored to Potsdam, arrayed in dress-suits, and
+waited in one of the salons of the ground floor of the new palace.
+Finally the Emperor and the Empress and several of the Princes and
+their wives and the usual dignitaries of the Emperor's household
+arrived. The Colonel was presented to the royalties and then a
+Divine Service was held in the open air at one end of the palace.
+The Empress and Princesses occupied large chairs and the Emperor
+stood with his sons behind him and then the various dignitaries
+of the court. The Lehr Battalion was drawn up behind. There were
+a large band and the choir boys from the Berlin cathedral. The
+service was very impressive and not less so because of a great
+Zeppelin which hovered over our heads during the whole of the
+service.
+
+After Divine Service, the Lehr Battalion marched in review and
+then was given food and beer in long arbours constructed in front
+of the palace. While the men were eating, the Emperor and Empress
+and Princes passed among the tables, speaking to the soldiers.
+We then went to the new palace where in the extraordinary hall
+studded with curious specimens of minerals from all countries,
+a long table forming three sides of a square was set for about
+sixty people. Colonel House and I sat directly across the table
+from the Emperor, with General Falkenhayn between us. The Emperor
+was in a very good mood and at one time, talking across the table,
+said to me that the Colonel and I, in our black dress-suits,
+looked like a couple of crows, that we were like two undertakers
+at a feast and spoiled the picture. After luncheon the Emperor
+had a long talk with Colonel House, and then called me into the
+conversation.
+
+On May twenty-sixth, I arranged that the Colonel should meet
+von Tirpitz at dinner in our house. We did not guess then what
+a central figure in this war the great admiral was going to be.
+At that time and until his fall, he was Minister of Marine, which
+corresponds to our Secretary of the Navy Department, and what
+is called in German _Reichsmarineamt_. The Colonel also
+met the Chancellor, von Jagow, Zimmermann and many others.
+
+There are two other heads of departments, connected with the
+navy, of equal rank with the Secretary of the Naval Department
+and not reporting to him. These are the heads of the naval staff
+and the head of what is known as the Marine Cabinet. The head
+of the naval staff is supposed to direct the actual operations
+of warfare in the navy, and the head of the Marine Cabinet is
+charged with the personnel of the navy, with determining what
+officers are to be promoted and what officers are to take over
+ships or commands.
+
+While von Tirpitz was Secretary of the Navy, by the force of
+his personality, he dominated the two other departments, but
+since his fall the heads of these two other departments have
+held positions as important, if not more important, than that
+of Secretary of the Navy.
+
+On May thirty-first, we took Colonel and Mrs. House to the aviation
+field of Joachimsthal. Here the Dutch aviator Fokker was flying and
+after being introduced to us he did some stunts for our benefit.
+Fokker was employed by the German army and later became a naturalised
+German. The machines designed by him, and named after him, for
+a long time held the mastery of the air on the West front.
+
+The advice of Colonel House, a most wise and prudent counsellor,
+was at all times of the greatest value to me during my stay in
+Berlin. We exchanged letters weekly, I sending him a weekly bulletin
+of the situation in Berlin and much news and gossip too personal
+or too indefinite to be placed in official reports.
+
+War with Germany seemed a thing not even to be considered when
+in this month of May, 1914, I called on the Foreign Office, by
+direction, to thank the Imperial Government for the aid given
+the Americans at Tampico by German ships of war.
+
+Early in February, Mr. S. Bergmann, a German who had made a fortune
+in America and who had returned to Germany to take up again his
+German citizenship, invited me to go over the great electrical
+works which he had established. Prince Henry of Prussia, the
+brother of the Emperor, was the only other guest and together
+we inspected the vast works, afterwards having lunch in Mr.
+Bergmann's office. Prince Henry has always been interested in
+America since his visit here. On that visit he spent most of
+his time with German societies, etc. Of course, now we know he
+came as a propagandist with the object of welding together the
+Germans in America and keeping up their interest in the Fatherland.
+He made a similar trip to the Argentine just before the Great
+War, with a similar purpose, but I understand his excursion was
+not considered a great success, from any standpoint. A man of
+affable manners, no one is better qualified to go abroad as a
+German propagandist than he. If all Germans had been like him
+there would have been no World War in 1914.
+
+On March eighteenth, we were invited to a fancy-dress ball at
+the palace of the Crown Prince. The guests were mostly young
+people and officers. The Crown Princess wore a beautiful Russian
+dress with its characteristic high front piece on the head. The
+Crown Prince and all the officers present were in the picturesque
+uniforms of their respective regiments of a period of one hundred
+years ago. Prince Oscar, the fifth son of the Kaiser, looked
+particularly well.
+
+The hours for balls in Berlin, where officers attended, were a
+good example for hostesses in this country. The invitations read
+for eight o'clock and that meant eight o'clock. A cold dinner
+of perhaps four courses is immediately served on the arrival of
+the guests, who, with the exception of a very few distinguished
+ones, are not given any particular places. At a quarter to nine
+the dancing begins, supper is at about eleven and the guests go
+home at twelve, at an hour which enables the officers to get
+to bed early. During the season there were balls at the British
+and French Embassy and performances by the Russian Ballet, then
+in Berlin, at the Russian Embassy.
+
+The wonderful new Royal Library, designed by Ihne, was opened
+on March twenty-second. The Emperor attended, coming in with
+the beautiful Queen of Roumania walking by his side. She is an
+exceedingly handsome woman, half English and half Russian. Some
+days later I was presented to her at a reception held at the
+Roumanian Minister's and found her as pleasant to talk to as good
+to look upon.
+
+At the end of March there was a Horse Show. The horses did not
+get prizes for mere looks and manners in trotting and cantering,
+as here. They must all do something, for the horse is considered
+primarily as a war horse; such, for instance, as stopping suddenly
+and turning at a word of command. The jumping was excellent,
+officers riding in all the events. It was not a function of
+"society," but all "society" was there and most keenly interested;
+for in a warlike country, just as in the Middle Ages, the master's
+life may depend upon the qualities of his horse.
+
+I have always been fond of horses and horse-racing, and the
+race-tracks about Berlin were always an attraction for me.
+
+Many of the drivers and jockeys were Americans. Taral was a
+successful jockey for my father-in-law, Marcus Daly. He is the
+trainer of one of the best racing stables in Germany, that of
+the brothers Weinberg, who made a fortune in dye-stuffs. "Pop"
+Campbell, who trained Mr. Daly's Ogden, a Futurity winner, is
+also a Berlin trainer. The top notch jockey was Archibald of
+California. McCreery, who once trained for one of my brothers,
+had the stable which rivalled the Weinbergs', that of Baron
+Oppenheim, a rich banker of Cologne.
+
+The German officers are splendid riders and take part in many
+races. The Crown Prince himself is a successful jockey and racing
+stable owner.
+
+On June fifth, at the annual hunt race, the big steeplechase of
+the year, the Emperor himself appeared at the Grünewald track,
+occupying his private box, a sort of little house beyond the
+finish.
+
+Bookmakers are not allowed in Germany. The betting is in mutual
+pools. About seventeen per cent of the money paid is taken by the
+Jockey Club, the State and charities, so that the bettor, with
+this percentage running always against him, has little chance
+of ultimate success.
+
+Many of the races are confined to horses bred in Denmark and the
+Central Empires.
+
+All of us in the Embassy joined the Red White Tennis Club situated
+in the Grünewald about five miles from the centre of Berlin.
+The Crown Prince was a member and often played there. He is an
+excellent player, not quite up to championship form, but he can
+give a good account of himself in any company short of the top
+class. He has the advantage of always finding that the best players
+are only too glad to have an opportunity to play with him. At
+this Tennis Club during all the period of the feeling of hatred
+against America we were treated with, extreme courtesy by all
+our German fellow members.
+
+We saw a great deal of the two exchange professors in the winter
+of 1913-14, Professor Paul Shorey of the University of Chicago
+and Professor Archibald Coolidge of Harvard. These exchange
+professors give courses and lectures in the universities and
+their first appearance is quite an event. On this first day in
+1913, they each delivered a lecture in the University of Berlin,
+and on this lecture day Prince August Wilhelm, representing the
+Kaiser, attended. The Kaiser used invariably to attend, but of
+late years I am afraid has rather lost interest in this enterprise
+at first so much favoured by him.
+
+The _Cologne_Gazette_ at one time after the commencement
+of the war, in an article, expressed great surprise that America
+should permit the export of munitions of war to the Allies and
+said, quite seriously, that Germany had done everything possible
+to win the favour of America, that Roosevelt had been offered a
+review of German troops, that the Emperor had invited Americans
+who came to Kiel on their yachts to dine with him, and that he
+had even sat through the lectures given by American exchange
+professors.
+
+Before the war there was but one cable direct from Germany to
+America. This cable was owned by a German company and reached
+America via the Azore Islands. I endeavoured to obtain permission
+for the Western Union Company to land a cable in Germany, but
+the opposition of the German company, which did not desire to
+have its monopoly interfered with, caused the applications of
+the Western Union to be definitely pigeon-holed. In August, 1914,
+after the outbreak of the war, when I told this to Ballin of
+the Hamburg American Line and von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche
+Bank, and when they thought of how much they could have saved
+for themselves and Germany and their companies if there had been
+an American owned cable landing in Germany, their anger at the
+delay on the part of official Germany knew no bounds. Within a
+very short time I received an answer from the Foreign Office
+granting the application of the Western Union Company, providing
+the cable went direct to America. This concession, however, came
+too late and, naturally, the Western Union did not take up the
+matter during the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+MILITARISM IN GERMANY AND THE ZABERN AFFAIR
+
+In 1913-1914 occurred a series of events known as the "Zabern
+Affair," which to my mind decided the "system"--the military
+autocracy--for a speedy war. In this affair the German people
+appeared at last to be opening their eyes, to recover in some
+degree from the panic fear of their neighbours which had made them
+submit to the arrogance and exactions of the military caste and to
+be almost ready to demilitarise themselves, a thing abhorrent to
+the upholders of caste, the system, the army and the Hohenzollerns.
+
+This writing on the wall--these letters forming the word
+"Zabern"--the actions of the Social Democrats and their growing
+boldness, all were warnings to the autocracy of its waning power,
+and impelled that autocracy towards war as a bloodletting cure
+for popular discontent.
+
+Prussia, which has imposed its will, as well as its methods of
+thought and life on all the rest of Germany, is undoubtedly a
+military nation.
+
+More than one hundred and twenty-five years ago Mirabeau, the great
+French orator at the commencement of the Revolution, said, "War is
+the national industry of Prussia." Later, Napoleon remarked that
+Prussia "was hatched from a cannon ball," and shortly before the
+Franco-Prussian war of 1870 the French military _attaché_, in
+reporting to his government, wrote that "other countries possessed
+an army, but in Prussia the army possessed the country."
+
+In practice the class of nobles in Prussia owns the army. Officers
+may enter the army in two ways, either by enlisting in the regiment,
+first as private and then being rapidly promoted to the position
+of non-commissioned officer, and then probationary ensign, or
+_avantageur_; or the young aspirant may come directly from
+a two years' course in one of the cadet schools and enter the
+regiment as probationary ensign. In both cases the young officer
+is observed by the officers during a period of probation and
+can become an officer of that regiment only by the consent of
+the regimental officers. In other words, each regiment is like
+a club, the officers having the right of black-ball.
+
+This system has practically confined the professional officers to
+a class of nobles. It is not at all unusual to find in a regiment
+officers whose ancestors were officers of the same regiment two
+hundred years or more ago.
+
+In addition to these officers who make the army their career,
+a certain number of Germans, after undergoing an enlistment in
+the army of one year and two periods of training thereafter,
+are made reserve officers. These reserve officers are called to
+the colours for manoeuvres and also, of course, when the whole
+nation is arrayed in war. These reserve officers seldom attain
+a rank higher than that of captain. They may, however, while
+exercising civil functions, be promoted, and in this manner the
+Chancellor, while occupying civil positions, has gradually been
+promoted to the rank of General and von Jagow, during the war, to
+the rank of Major. As a rule reserve officers are the one-yearers,
+or _Einjähriger_, who, because they have attained a certain
+standard of education, serve only one year with the army instead
+of the two required from others. The Bavarian army is in a sense
+independent of Prussia, but is modelled on the same system.
+
+For years officers of the army, both in the discharge of their
+duties and outside, have behaved in a very arrogant way toward
+the civil population. Time and again, while I was in Germany
+waiting in line at some ticket office, an officer has shoved
+himself ahead of all others without even a protest from those
+waiting. On one occasion, I went to the races in Berlin with my
+brother-in-law and bought a box. While we were out looking at
+the horses between the races, a Prussian officer and his wife
+seated themselves in our box. I called the attention of one of
+the ushers to this, but the usher said that he did not dare ask
+a Prussian officer to leave, and it was only after sending for
+the head usher and showing him my Jockey Club badge and my pass
+as Ambassador, that I was able to secure possession of my own
+box.
+
+There have been many instances in Germany where officers having
+a slight dispute with civilians have instantly cut the civilian
+down. Instances of this kind and the harsh treatment of the Germans
+by officers and under-officers, while serving in the army,
+undoubtedly created in Germany a spirit of antagonism not only
+to the army itself but to the whole military system of Prussia.
+Affairs were brought to a head by the so-called Zabern Affair. In
+this affair the internal antagonism between the civil population
+and professional soldiers, which had assumed great proportions
+in a period of long peace, seemed to reach its climax. Of course
+this antagonism had increased with the increase in 1913-14 of
+the effective strength of the standing army, bringing a material
+increase in the numbers of officers and non-commissioned officers
+who represent military professionalism.
+
+The Imperial Provinces or Reichsland, as Alsace and Lorraine are
+called, had been in a peculiar position within the body politic
+of Germany since their annexation in 1870. The Reichsland, as
+indicated by its name, was to be considered as common property
+of the German Empire and was not annexed to any one German State.
+Its government is by an Imperial Viceroy, with a kind of cabinet
+consisting of one Secretary of State, Civil and Under Secretaries
+and Department heads, assisted by a legislative body of two chambers,
+one elected by popular vote and the other consisting of members
+partly elected by municipal bodies, universities, churches and so
+forth, and partly appointed by the Imperial Government. The Viceroy
+and his cabinet are appointed by the Emperor in his capacity of
+the sovereign of the Reichsland. Until the thirty-first of May,
+1911, the Reichsland had no constitution of its own, the form
+of its government being regulated by the Reichstag and Federal
+Council (Bundesrat) in about the same way as the territories
+of the United States are ruled by Congress and the President.
+In 1911, Alsace-Lorraine received a constitution which gave it
+representation in the Federal Council, representation in the
+Reichstag having already been granted as early as 1871. The sympathy
+of Alsace-Lorraine for France had been increased by the policy of
+several of the German viceroys,--von Manteuffel, Prince Hohenlohe,
+Prince Münster and Count Wedel, who had, in their administrations,
+alternated severe measures with great leniency and had not improved
+conditions, so that the population, essentially South German,
+was undoubtedly irritated by the tone and manner of the North
+German officials.
+
+Great industries had been developed by the Imperial Government,
+especially textile and coal mining, and the industrial population
+centering in Mülhausen was hotly and thoroughly Social Democratic.
+The upper or well-to-do classes were tied to France by family
+connections and by religion. The bourgeois remained mildly
+anti-German, more properly speaking, anti-government, for similar
+reasons, and the working men were opposed to the government on
+social and economic grounds. The farming population, not troubling
+much about the politics, but being affected by the campaign of
+the nationalistic press, were in sympathy with France; so the
+atmosphere was well prepared for the coming storm.
+
+Zabern, or in French, Saverne, is a little town of between eight
+and nine thousand inhabitants, beautifully situated at the foot
+of the Vosges Mountains on the banks of the Rhine-Marne Canal.
+Its garrison comprised the staff and two battalions of Infantry
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, commanded by von Reuter, and among
+its officers was a Lieutenant von Forstner, a young man only
+twenty years old, whose boyish appearance had excited the school
+children and boys working in nearby iron factories to ridicule
+him. It became known that this young officer, while instructing
+his men, had insulted the French flag and had called the Alsatian
+recruits _Wackes_, a nick-name meaning "square-head," and
+frequently used by the people of Alsace-Lorraine in a jocular
+way, but hotly resented by them if used towards them by others.
+It was further reported that he had promised his men a reward
+of ten marks if one of them, in case of trouble, should bring
+down a Social Democrat. Forstner had told his men to beware,
+and warned them against listening to French foreign agents, whom
+the Germans claimed were inducing French soldiers to desert in
+order to join the French legion. It is probable that Forstner,
+in talking to his men of the French Foreign Legion, used language
+offensive to French ears. He admitted that he had used the word
+_Wackes_ in defiance of an order of the commanding general,
+and for this he had been punished with several days' confinement
+in a military prison. Lieutenant von Forstner, who was ordered
+to instruct his squad about the regulations in case of trouble
+with the civil population, claimed that he had only added to the
+usual instructions a statement that every true soldier should
+do his best to suppress any disturbances and that he, Forstner,
+would give a special reward to any of his men who would arrest
+one of "those damned Social Democrats."
+
+Reports of the acts of Forstner and other officers were rapidly
+spread among the population. The two newspapers of Zabern published
+articles. The excitement grew, and there were demonstrations
+against the officials and especially against Forstner. Finally,
+conditions became so bad that Colonel von Reuter requested the
+head of the local civil administration, Director Mahler, to restore
+order, stating that he would take the matter into his own hands
+if order was not restored. The director, a native of a small
+village near Zabern, replied coolly that he saw no necessity
+for interfering with peace loving and law abiding people. On
+November twenty-ninth, 1913, a large crowd assembled in front
+of the barracks. Colonel von Reuter ordered Lieutenant Schad,
+commanding the Guard as officer of the day, to disperse the crowd.
+Accordingly Lieutenant Schad called the Guard to arms and three
+times summoned the crowd to disperse and go home. The soldiers
+charged and drove the multitude across the Square and into a
+side street and arrested about fifteen persons, among them the
+President, two Judges and the State Attorney of the Zabern Supreme
+Court, who had just come out from the court building and who were
+caught in the crowd. They were subsequently released. The rest
+of the persons arrested were kept in the cellar of the barracks
+over night.
+
+The report of these occurrences caused immense excitement throughout
+Germany. A great outcry went up against militarism, even in quarters
+where no socialistic tendencies existed. This feeling was not
+helped by the fact that the General commanding the fifteenth
+army to which the Zabern regiment belonged was an exponent of
+extreme militaristic ideas; a man, who several years before, as
+Colonel of the Colonial troops, representing the war ministry
+before the Reichstag and debating there the question of the number
+of troops to be kept in German South West Africa, had most clearly
+shown his contempt for the Reichstag.
+
+Colonel von Reuter and Lieutenant Schad, when court-martialled
+for their acts in ordering the troops to move against the civil
+population, claimed the benefit of a Prussian law of 1820, which
+provided that in any city, town or village, the highest military
+officer in command must assume the authority, usually vested
+in the civil government, whenever for any reason the civil
+administration neglects to keep order. The Colonel and Lieutenant
+were subsequently acquitted on the ground that they had acted
+under the provisions of this law.
+
+The excitement throughout Germany was further increased by other
+circumstances. The Emperor remained during these critical days at
+Donaueschingen, the princely estate of his friend and favourite,
+Prince Fürstenberg, enjoying himself with fox-hunting, torch-light
+processions and cabaret performances. Of course, all this had been
+arranged long before anyone dreamed of any trouble in Zabern, and
+the Emperor could scarcely be expected to realise the gravity of
+the situation which suddenly arose. But this very fact created a
+bad impression. It was even rumoured that the Empress, alarmed by
+the situation, had ordered a train to be made ready in order to
+go to him and try to convince him of the necessity of returning
+to Berlin.
+
+[Illustration: THE GLORY WHICH IS POTSDAM. SUMMER RESIDENCE OF
+THE KAISER IN THE PARK OF SANS SOUCI.]
+
+[Illustration: DEMONSTRATION OF SYMPATHY FOR THE AMERICANS, AT
+THE TOWN HALL, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+The newly appointed minister of war, Falkenhayn, went to
+Donaueschingen, where he was joined by von Deimling. This action
+aggravated the situation, because the public concluded that the
+Emperor would hear the advice and report of military officers
+only. The sudden death, by heart failure, of the Emperor's closest
+friend, von Hulsen, chief of the Emperor's Military Cabinet,
+during a banquet at Donaueschingen, gave the rapidly developing
+events a tragic and mysterious colouring, and these conferences
+in Donaueschingen resulted in the tendering of their resignations
+by the Viceroy, von Wedel, and Secretary of State Zorn von Bulach,
+Viceroy and Secretary of State of Alsace-Lorraine, who felt that
+the military party had gained an upper hand in the conflict with the
+civil authorities. The Chancellor then hurried to Donaueschingen,
+arriving a few hours before the departure of the Emperor; and a
+subsequent order of the Emperor to General von Deimling to see
+to it that the military officers did not overstep their authority
+and directing him to investigate the occurrences and take measures
+to punish all guilty parties, somewhat quieted the nation and
+caused the two highest civil officials of Alsace-Lorraine to
+withdraw their resignations.
+
+Zabern, where a brigadier-general had been sent by von Deimling
+to restore civil government, had begun to quiet down. But the
+Chancellor had hardly returned to Berlin when another incident
+stirred Germany. While practising field service in the neighbourhood
+of Zabern and marching through a village, Lieutenant von Forstner
+had an altercation with a lame shoemaker and cut him down. This
+brutal act of militarism caused a new outburst throughout Germany.
+Forstner was tried by a court-martial for hitting and wounding
+an unarmed civilian, and sentenced by the lower court to one
+year's imprisonment, but acquitted by the higher court as having
+acted in "supposed self-defence."
+
+No less than three parties, the Centrum, the Progressives and
+the Social Democrats, addressed interpellations to the Chancellor
+about this occurrence at Zabern. I was present at the debate in
+the Reichstag, which took place on the fourth, fifth and sixth
+of December, 1913. Three South Germans, a member of the Centrum,
+Hauss, a Progressive named Roser, and the Socialist deputy from
+Mülhausen in Alsace, Peirotes, commenced by moving and seconding
+the interpellation and related in vehement language the occurrences
+at Zabern. The Chancellor replied in defence of the government.
+Unfortunately he had that morning received family news of a most
+unpleasant character, which added to his nervousness. He spoke
+with a low voice and looked like a downhearted and sick man. It
+was whispered afterwards in the lobbies that he had forgotten
+the most important part of his speech. The unfavourable impression
+which he made was increased by von Falkenhayn, appearing for the
+first time before the Reichstag. If the Reichstag members had
+been disappointed by the Chancellor, they were stirred to the
+highest pitch of bitterness by the speech of the War Minister. In
+a sharp, commanding voice he told them that the military officers
+had only done their duty, that they would not be swerved from their
+path by press agents or hysterical individuals, that Forstner
+was a very young officer who had been severely punished, but
+that this kind of courageous young officer was the kind that
+the country needed, etc. Immediately after this speech the
+Progressive party moved that the attitude of the Chancellor did
+not meet the approval of the representatives of the people, and
+it became evident that, for the first time in the history of the
+German Empire, a vote of censure directed against the government
+would be debated. The debate was continued all the next day, the
+Chancellor making another speech and saying what he probably had
+intended to say the day before. He related what he had achieved
+at Donaueschingen; that the Emperor had issued a cabinet order
+saying that the military authorities should be kept within legal
+bounds, that all the guilty persons would be punished, that the
+Regiment, Number Ninety-nine, had been removed from Zabern, that
+the absolute law of 1820 had been abolished for Alsace-Lorraine,
+and that no Chancellor should for one moment tolerate disregard
+of law by any government officials, civil or military, and remain
+in his position.
+
+This second speech of the Chancellor made a better impression
+and somewhat affected the more extreme members of the Reichstag,
+but it came too late to prevent the passage of the vote of censure
+by the remarkable majority of two hundred and ninety-three to
+fifty-four. Only the Conservatives voted against it. A few days
+later, when the Social Democrats demanded that the Chancellor
+take the consequence of the vote of distrust and resign, the
+attitude of the members of all the other parties, who had been
+favourably impressed by the second speech of the Chancellor,
+showed that they were not yet prepared to go the length of holding
+that a vote of distrust in the Reichstag must necessarily mean
+the resignation of the Chancellor.
+
+Public excitement gradually calmed down, and a complete change of
+the officials at Zabern helped to bring about a normal condition
+of affairs. The Viceroy, Count Wedel, and Secretary of State
+Zorn von Bulach, resigned and were replaced by von Dallwitz and
+Count Rödern.
+
+However, the everlasting question came up again a little later
+during the regular budget debate of the Reichstag. The Chancellor
+made his speech, giving a review of the political international
+situation. He was followed by Herr Scheidemann, leader of the
+Social Democrats, who mercilessly attacked the. Chancellor and
+stated that if the Chancellor still thought that he was the right
+man at the helm, he, Scheidemann, would show that the contrary was
+the case. He then enumerated what he called the many political
+failures of the Chancellor, the failure of the bill to amend
+the Prussian franchise law, and stated that the few bills which
+had been passed, such as the bill giving Alsace-Lorraine a real
+constitution, had been carried only with the help of the Social
+Democratic party. The speaker then once more rehashed the incidents
+of the Zabern matter, referred to the attitude of the Emperor,
+who, he said, had evidently been too busy with hunting and
+festivities to devote time to such trivial matters as the Zabern
+Affair, and also said that, if the Chancellor had refused to
+withdraw, the only possible conclusion from the vote of the two
+hundred and ninety-three Reichstag members, who were certainly
+not influenced by personal feelings against the Chancellor, was
+that the Chancellor must be sticking to his post only because
+of the mistaken idea of the Emperor's authority and because he
+must believe in the fetish of personal government. Scheidemann
+begged that the same majority which had passed the vote of censure
+should now follow it up by voting down the Chancellor's salary
+and thus force him out of office.
+
+The Chancellor immediately replied, saying that he needed no
+advice from Herr Scheidemann, and that when the government had
+consented to change the rules of the Reichstag he had expressly
+reserved the authority either to regard or disregard any resolution
+passed after an interpellation, and that formerly, after discussing
+an interpellation and the answer of the government, no vote could
+be taken to approve or reject a resolution expressing its opinion
+of such course of action. Such resolutions might be considered as
+valuable material, but it had been agreed that they could have
+no binding effect either upon the government or any member of it,
+and that nobody had ever dreamed that by a mere change of business
+rules the whole constitution of the Empire was being changed and
+authority given to the Reichstag to dismiss ministers at will;
+that in France and Great Britain conditions were different, but
+that parliamentary government did not exist in Germany; that it
+was the constitutional privilege of the Emperor to appoint the
+Chancellor without any assistance or advice from the Reichstag;
+that he, the Chancellor, would resist with all his might every
+attempt to change this system; and that he, therefore, refused
+to resign because the resolution had no other effect than to
+make it evident that a difference of opinion existed between the
+Reichstag and the government.
+
+This debate took place on December ninth, 1913, and, with the
+exception of the Social Democrats and the Polish deputies, the
+leaders of all parties supported the view of the Chancellor.
+The motion to strike out the Chancellor's salary was voted down,
+only the Social Democrats and Poles voting in favour of it.
+
+It is unquestioned, however, that this Zabern Affair and the
+consequent attitude of the whole nation, as well as the extraordinary
+vote in the Reichstag, greatly alarmed the military party.
+
+It was perhaps the final factor which decided the advocates of
+the old military system of Germany in favour of a European war.
+Usually in past years when the Reichstag in adjournments had risen
+and cheered the name of the Emperor, the Social Democrats absented
+themselves from the Chamber, but when the Reichstag adjourned on
+May twentieth, 1914, these members remained in the Chamber and
+refused either to rise or to cheer the Emperor. The President
+of the Reichstag immediately called attention to this breach
+of respect to the Emperor, upon which the Socialists shouted,
+"That is our affair," and tried to drown the cheers with hoots
+and hisses at which the other parties applauded tumultuously
+
+This occurrence I know greatly incensed the Emperor and did much,
+I believe, to win his consent to the war.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+PSYCHOLOGY AND CAUSES WHICH PREPARED THE NATION FOR WAR
+
+To the outsider, the Germans seem a fierce and martial nation.
+But, in reality, the mass of the Germans, in consenting to the
+great sacrifice entailed by their enormous preparations for war,
+have been actuated by fear.
+
+This fear dates from the Thirty Years' War, the war which commenced
+in 1618 and was terminated in 1648. In 1648, when the Treaty
+of Westphalia was concluded, Germany was almost a desert. Its
+population had fallen from twenty millions to four millions.
+The few remaining people were so starved that cannibalism was
+openly practised. In the German States polygamy was legalised,
+and was a recognised institution for many years thereafter.
+
+Of thirty-five thousand Bohemian villages, only six thousand
+were left standing. In the lower Palatinate only one-tenth of the
+population survived; in Württemberg, only one-sixth. Hundreds of
+square miles of once fertile country were overgrown with forests
+inhabited only by wolves.
+
+A picture of this horrible period is found in the curious novel,
+"The Adventurous Simplicissimus," written by Grimmelshausen, and
+published in 1669, which describes the adventures of a wise peasant
+who finally leaves his native Germany and betakes himself to a desert
+island which he refuses to leave when offered an opportunity to
+go back to the Fatherland. He answers those who wish to persuade
+him to go back with words which seem quite appropriate to-day:
+"My God, where do you want to carry me? Here is peace. There is
+war. Here I know nothing of the arts of the court, ambitions,
+anger, envy, deceit, nor have I cares concerning my clothing and
+nourishment.... While I still lived in Europe everything was
+(O, woe that I must appear witness to such acts of Christians!)
+filled with war, burning, murder, robbery, plundering and the
+shame of women and virgins." The Munich weekly, "Simplicissimus,"
+whose powerful political cartoons have often startled Europe,
+takes its name from this character.
+
+After the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War, Germany was again
+and again ravaged by smaller wars, culminating in the Seven Years'
+War of Frederick the Great and the humbling of Germany under
+the heel of Napoleon. In the wars Of Frederick the Great, one
+tenth of the population was killed. Even the great Battle of
+the Nations at Leipsic in 1813 did not free Germany from wars,
+and in 1866 Prussia and the smaller North German States, with
+Italy, defeated Austria, assisted by Bavaria, Hesse-Cassel,
+Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, Saxony, Baden, Württemberg and Hanover.
+
+I am convinced that the fear of war induced by a hereditary instinct,
+caused the mass of the Germans to become the tools and dupes of
+those who played upon this very fear in order to create a military
+autocracy. On the other hand, and, especially, in the noble class,
+we have in Germany a great number of people who believe in war for
+its own sake. In part, these nobles are the descendants of the
+Teutonic Knights who conquered the Slav population of Prussia,
+and have ever since bound that population to their will.
+
+The Prussian army was created by the father of Frederick the
+Great, who went to the most ridiculous extremes in obtaining tall
+men at all costs for his force.
+
+The father of Frederick the Great gave the following written
+instructions to the two tutors of his son. "Above all let both
+tutors exert themselves to the utmost to inspire him with a love
+of soldiery and carefully impress upon his mind that, as nothing
+can confer honour and fame upon a prince except the sword, the
+monarch who seeks not his sole satisfaction in it must ever appear
+a contemptible character in the eyes of the world."
+
+Frederick the Great left, by the death of that father who had
+once threatened to execute him, at the head of a marvellous army
+with a full treasury, finally decided upon war, as he admits in
+his own letters, "in order to be talked about," and his desire
+to be talked about led to the Seven Years' War.
+
+The short war against Denmark in 1864, against Austria, Bavaria,
+etc., in 1866 and against France in 1870, enormously increased
+both the pride and prestige of the Prussian army. It must not
+be forgotten that at all periods of history it seems as if some
+blind instinct had driven the inhabitants of the inhospitable
+plains of North Germany to war and to conquest. The Cimbri and
+Teutones--the tribes defeated by Marius; Ariovistus, who was
+defeated by Julius Caesar; the Goths and the Visi-Goths; the
+Franks and the Saxons; all have poured forth from this infertile
+country, for the conquest of other lands. The Germans of to-day
+express this longing of the North Germans for pleasanter climes
+in the phrase in which they demand "a place in the sun."
+
+The nobles of Prussia are always for war. The business men and
+manufacturers and shipowners desire an increasing field for their
+activities. The German colonies were uninhabitable by Europeans.
+All his life the glittering Emperor and his generals had planned
+and thought of war; and the Crown Prince, surrounded by his
+remarkable collection of relics and reminders of Napoleon, dreamed
+only of taking the lead in a successful war of conquest. Early in
+the winter of 1913-14, the Crown Prince showed his collection of
+Napoleana to a beautiful American woman of my acquaintance, and
+said that he hoped war would occur while his father was alive,
+but, if not, he would start a war the moment he came to the throne.
+
+Since writing the above, the American woman who had this conversation
+with the Crown Prince wrote out for me the exact conversation
+in her own words, as follows: "I had given him Norman Angell's
+book, 'The Great Illusion,' which seeks to prove that war is
+unprofitable. He (the Crown Prince) said that whether war was
+profitable or not, when he came to the throne there would be war,
+if not before, just for the fun of it. On a previous occasion
+he had said that the plan was to attack and conquer France, then
+England, and after that my country (the United States of America);
+Russia was also to be conquered, and Germany would be master of
+the world."
+
+The extraordinary collection of relics, statues, busts, souvenirs,
+etc., of the first Napoleon, collected by the Crown Prince, which
+he was showing at the time of the first of these conversations
+to this American lady, shows the trend of his mind and that all
+his admiration is centred upon Napoleon, the man who sought the
+mastery of the world, and who is thought by admirers like the
+Crown Prince to have failed only because of slight mistakes which
+they feel, in his place, they would not have made.
+
+If the Germans' long preparations for war were to bear any fruit,
+countless facts pointed to the summer of 1914 as the time when the
+army should strike that great and sudden blow at the liberties
+of the world.
+
+It was in June, 1914, that the improved Kiel Canal was reopened,
+enabling the greatest warships to pass from the Baltic to the
+North Sea.
+
+In the Zeppelins the Germans had arms not possessed by any other
+country and with which they undoubtedly believed that they could
+do much more damage to England than was the case after the actual
+outbreak of hostilities. They had paid great attention to the
+development of the submarine. Their aeroplanes were superior to
+those of other nations. They believed that in the use of poison
+gas, which was prepared before the outbreak of the war, they had
+a prize that would absolutely demoralise their enemy. They had
+their flame throwers and the heavy artillery and howitzers which
+reduced the redoubtable forts of Liege and Namur to fragments
+within a few hours, and which made the holding of any fortresses
+impossible.
+
+On their side, by the imposition of a heavy tax called the
+_Wehrbeitrag_ or supplementary defence tax, they had, in
+1913, increased their army by a number of army corps. On the
+other hand, the law for three years' military service voted in
+France had not yet gone into effect, nor had the law for universal
+military service voted by the Belgian Chambers. Undoubtedly the
+Germans based great hopes upon the Bagdad railway which was to
+carry their influence to the East, and even threatened the rule
+of England in Egypt and India. Undoubtedly there was talk, too,
+of a Slav railroad to run from the Danube to the Adriatic which
+would cut off Germany from access to the Southern Sea. Francis
+Deloisi, the Frenchman, in his book published before the great
+war, called "De la Guerre des Balkans à la Guerre Européenne,"
+says, "In a word, the present war (Balkan) is the work of Russia,
+and the Danube Asiatic railway is a Russian project. If it succeeds,
+a continuous barrier of Slav peoples will bar the way to the
+Mediterranean of the path of Austro-German expansion from the
+Black Sea to the Adriatic. But here again the Romanoffs confront
+the Hapsburgs, the Austro-Serb conflict becomes the Austro-Russian
+conflict, two great groups are formed, and the Balkan conflict
+becomes the European conflict."
+
+Another reason for an immediate war was the loan by France to
+Russia made on condition that additional strategic railways were
+to be constructed by the Russians in Poland. Although this money
+had been received, the railways had not been constructed at the
+time of the opening of the Great War. Speaking of this situation,
+the Russian General Kuropatkin, in his report for the year 1900,
+said, "We must cherish no illusions as to the possibility of an
+easy victory over the Austrian army," and he then went on to say,
+"Austria had eight railways to transport troops to the Russian
+frontier while Russia had only four; and, while Germany had seventeen
+such railways running to the German-Russian frontier, the Russians
+had only five." Kuropatkin further said, "The differences are too
+enormous and leave our neighbours a superiority which cannot be
+overcome by the numbers of our troops, or their courage."
+
+Comparing the two armies, he said, "The invasion of Russia by
+German troops is more probable than the invasion of Germany by
+Russian troops"; and, "Our Western frontier, in the event of
+a European war, would be in such danger as it never has known
+in all the history of Russia."
+
+Agitation by workmen in Russia was believed in Germany to be
+the beginning of a revolution. Illuminating figures may be seen
+in the gold purchase of the German Imperial Bank: in 1911,
+174,000,000 marks; in 1912, 173,000,000 marks; but in 1913,
+317,000,000 marks.
+
+There was a belief in Germany that the French nation was degenerate
+and corrupt and unprepared for war. This belief became conviction
+when, in the debates of the French Senate, Senator Humbert, early
+in 1914, publicly exposed what he claimed to be the weakness
+and unpreparedness of France.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador in London, certainly
+reported to his government that England did not wish to enter
+the war. He claims now that he did not mean that England would
+not fight at all events, but undoubtedly the German Foreign Office
+believed that England would remain out of the war. The raising of
+the Ulster army by Sir Edward Carson, one of the most gigantic
+political bluffs in all history, which had no more revolutionary
+or military significance than a torchlight parade during one of
+our presidential campaigns, was reported by the German spies
+as a real and serious revolutionary movement; and, of course, it
+was believed by the Germans that Ireland would rise in general
+rebellion the moment that war was declared. In the summer of
+1914 Russia was believed to be on the edge of revolution.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, the movement against
+militarism, culminating in the extraordinary vote in the Reichstag
+against the government at the time of the Zabern Affair, warned
+the government and military people that the mass of Germans were
+coming to their senses and were preparing to shake off the bogy of
+militarism and fear, which had roosted so long on their shoulders
+like a Prussian old-man-of-the-sea. The Pan-Germans and the
+Annexationists were hot for war. The people alive could recall
+only three wars, the war against Denmark in 1864, which was settled
+in a few days and added the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein to
+the Prussian crown, and the war of 1866 in which Bavaria, Baden,
+Württemberg, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Saxony were defeated, when the
+Austrian kingdom of Hanover disappeared and the territories of
+Hesse-Cassel and Nassau, and the free city of Frankfort were
+added to Prussia. This war, from its declaration to the battle
+of Königgratz in which the Austrians were completely defeated,
+lasted only two weeks. In 1870 France was defeated within a month
+and a half after the opening of hostilities; so that the Kaiser
+was implicitly believed when, on the first day of the war, he
+appeared on the balcony of the palace and told the crowds who
+were keen for war, that "before the leaves have fallen from the
+trees you will be back in your homes." The army and all Germany
+believed him and believed, too, that a few short weeks would
+see the destruction of France and the consequent seizure of her
+rich colonies; that Russia could then be struck a good quick
+blow before she could concentrate her army and resources; that
+England would remain neutral; and that Germany would consequently
+become, if not the actual owner, at least the dictator of the
+world. Some one has since said that the Emperor must have meant
+pine trees.
+
+Working ever in the dark, either owning or influencing newspapers,
+the great munition and arms factory of the Krupp's insidiously
+poisoned the minds of the people with the microbe of war.
+
+Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador to London, called upon
+me often after the outbreak of the war, and insisted that he
+had correctly reported the sentiments of England in saying that
+England did not want war. After his return to Germany the Germans
+quite unfairly treated him as a man who had failed and seemed
+to blame him because England had taken the only possible course
+open to her and ranged herself on the side of France and Russia.
+
+The dedication at Leipzig, in the year 1913, of the great monument
+to celebrate what is called the "War of Liberation," and the
+victory of Leipzig in the War of the Nations, 1813, had undoubtedly
+kindled a martial spirit in Germany. To my mind, the course which
+really determined the Emperor and the ruling class for war was
+the attitude of the whole people in the Zabern Affair and their
+evident and growing dislike of militarism. The fact that the
+Socialists, at the close of the session of the Reichstag, boldly
+remained in the Chamber and refused to rise or to cheer the name
+of the Emperor indicated a new spirit of resistance to autocracy;
+and autocracy saw that if it was to keep its hold upon Germany
+it must lead the nation into a short and successful war.
+
+This is no new trick of a ruling and aristocratic class. From
+the days when the patricians of Rome forced the people into war
+whenever the people showed a disposition to demand their rights,
+autocracies have always turned to war as the best antidote against
+the spirit of democracy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+AT KIEL JUST BEFORE THE WAR
+
+Kiel, situated on the Baltic, on the eastern side of the peninsula
+of Jutland near the Baltic entrance of the Kiel Canal, is the
+principal naval centre of Germany.
+
+When the Germans decided to build up a great fleet the Emperor
+used every means to encourage a love of yachting and of the sea,
+and endeavoured to make the Kiel Week a rival of the week at
+Cowes, the English yachting centre.
+
+With this end in view, the rich Germans were encouraged and almost
+commanded to build and race yachts; and Americans and others who
+visited Kiel in their yachts were entertained by the Emperor
+in an intimacy impossible if they had come to Berlin merely as
+tourists, residing in a hotel.
+
+In June, 1914, we went to Kiel as guests of Allison Armour of
+Chicago, on his yacht, the _Utowana_. I was detained by
+business in Berlin and Mrs. Gerard preceded me to Kiel. I arrived
+there on Saturday, the twenty-seventh of June, and that night
+went with Armour to dine with the Emperor on board the Emperor's
+yacht, _Hohenzollern_.
+
+In the harbour were a fair number of German yachts, mostly sailing
+yachts, taking part in the races; the fine old yacht of Lord
+Brassey, _The_Sunbeam_, and the yacht of the Prince of Monaco,
+in which he conducts his scientific voyages. A great English
+fleet, comprising some of the most powerful dreadnoughts, had
+also arrived, sent as an earnest of the good will and kindly
+feeling then supposed to exist between Great Britain and Germany.
+The redoubtable von Tirpitz was present on a German battleship,
+and the Hamburg American Line had an old transatlantic steamer,
+the _Deutschland_, rechristened the _Victoria_Luise_,
+filled with guests, most of whom were invited on a hint from
+the Emperor.
+
+At dinner on the _Hohenzollern_ a number of English people
+were present. The Kaiser had on one side of him the wife of the
+British Admiral, Lady Maud Warrender, and on the other side, the
+Countess of March, whose husband is heir to the Duke of Richmond.
+I sat between Princess Münster and the Countess of March, and
+after dinner the Emperor drew me over to the rail of the ship,
+and talked to me for some time. I wish that diplomatic etiquette
+would permit me to reveal what he said, but even in war time I
+do not think I ought to violate the confidence that hospitality
+seals. However important and interesting, especially to the tame
+Socialists of Germany, I do not give this conversation with the
+Emperor, nor the conversation with him and Colonel House at the
+_Schrippenfest_, because I was his guest. Conversations
+with the Emperor which I had on later occasions were at official
+audiences and to these the same rule does not apply. He also
+invited me to sail with him in his yacht, the _Meteor_, in
+the races from Kiel to Eckernfjord on the coming Tuesday.
+
+[Illustration: THE EMPEROR'S RACING YACHT, AND OTHERS, AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: THE "HOHENZOLLERN".]
+
+Sunday afternoon Prince Henry and his wife, who reside in the
+castle at Kiel, were to give an afternoon reception and garden
+party; but on arriving at the gates we were told that the party
+would not take place. After going on board the _Utowana_,
+Frederick W. Wile, the celebrated correspondent of the
+_London_Daily_Mail_, ranged up alongside in a small launch and
+informed us that the Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the
+Austrian throne, and his wife had been assassinated at Sarajevo.
+There was much rushing to and fro in fast launches, the Emperor
+himself being summoned from the race which was in progress. That
+night we dined on board the yacht of the Prince of Monaco. All the
+diplomats and notables whom I met during the afternoon and evening
+seemed to think that there was no chance that the tragedy at
+Sarajevo would lead to war. The next morning the Emperor left
+early for Berlin, but expressly directed that the festivities
+and races at Kiel should be carried out as arranged.
+
+Monday afternoon there was a _Bierabend_ in the large hall
+of the yacht club at Kiel. The Emperor was to have presided at
+this dinner, but his place was taken by his brother, Prince Henry.
+Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador, who was living on one
+of the British battleships, sat on his right and I sat on his
+left. During the evening a curious incident happened. The Prince
+and I were talking of the dangers of after-dinner speaking and what
+a dangerous sport it was. In the midst of our conversation some
+one whispered to the Prince and he rose to his feet, proposed the
+health of the visiting British Admiral and fleet, and made a little
+speech. As he concluded, he said, addressing the officers of the
+British fleet: "We are sorry you are going and we are sorry you
+came." It is remarkable as showing the discipline of the German
+nation and their respect for authority that thereafter no German
+ever referred to this curious slip of the tongue. The night was
+rather mild and after dinner we walked about the gardens of the
+yacht club. I had a long and interesting conversation with the
+Prince of Monaco. That Prince, who receives such a large income
+from the company which carries on the gambling rooms at Monte
+Carlo, is a man of the world intensely interested in scientific
+research: there is practically no corner of the seven seas into
+which his yacht has not poked her nose in the search for material
+for the Sea Museum which he has established at Monaco.
+
+On Tuesday Armour and I boarded the Emperor's sailing yacht,
+the new _Meteor_. The race was a beautiful run from Kiel
+to Eckernfjord and was won by the _Meteor_. As the Emperor
+was not on board, I did not get one of the souvenir scarf-pins
+always given to guests who sail with him on a winning race. Among
+our crew was Grand Admiral von Köster, subsequently an advocate
+of the ruthless submarine war.
+
+Eckernfjord is a little fishing and bathing town. Near by is
+the country residence of Prince Henry, a rather modest house,
+built in brick in English Elizabethan style. The wife of Prince
+Henry was a Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt and is the sister of the
+Czarina of Russia. We had tea with Prince and Princess Henry,
+their family, the Duke of Sonderburg-Glücksburg and several others
+of his family. The billiard room of the house is decorated with
+the large original caricatures made by McCutcheon of the Prince's
+stay in America. Prince and Princess Henry came out to dine on
+the _Utowana_, and Armour and the Prince went ashore to
+attend another _Bierabend_, but I dodged the smoke and beer
+and remained on board. Before he left the yacht, I had a talk
+with Prince Henry. He seemed most exercised over the dislike of
+the Germans by all other peoples and asked me why I thought it
+existed. I politely told him that I thought it existed because of
+the success which the Germans had had in all fields of endeavour,
+particularly in manufacturing and commerce. He said, with great
+truth, that he believed a great deal of it came from the bad
+manners of the travelling Germans. Prince Henry is an able and
+reasonable man with a most delightful manner. He speaks English
+with a perfect English accent, and I think would be far happier
+as an English country gentleman than as the Grand Admiral of the
+German Baltic Fleet. He has been devoted to automobiling and
+has greatly encouraged that industry in Germany. The Automobile
+Club of Berlin is his particular pet.
+
+On returning to Kiel next day we spent several days longer there.
+I lunched on board his battleship with Grand Admiral von Tirpitz,
+sitting next to him at the table. He struck me then as an amiable
+sea dog, combining much political and worldly wisdom with his
+knowledge of the sea. From Kiel we motored one night to dine
+with a Count and Countess in their country house. This house
+had been built perhaps two hundred years, and was on one side of
+a square, the other three sides being formed by the great stone
+barns in which the produce of the estate was stored. Although
+the first floor of the house was elevated about eight feet above
+the ground, the family, on account of the dampness of that part
+of the world, lived in the second story, and the dining room
+was on this story. An ancestor of the Count had, at a time when
+this part of the country was part of Denmark and about the year
+1700, lent all his available money to the King of Denmark. A
+crude painting in the hall showed him sitting in the hall of
+this particular house, smoking a long pipe and surrounded by
+three or four sisters who were all spinning. Our hostess told us
+that this picture represented the lending ancestor being supported
+by his sisters while waiting the return of the loan which he
+had made to the Danish king, an early example of the situation
+disclosed by the popular song which runs: "Everybody works but
+father." Of course, no one ever expected a Prussian nobleman to
+do any work except in the line of war or in governing the inferior
+classes of the country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE SYSTEM
+
+People of other countries have been wondering why it is that
+the German government is able so easily to impose its will upon
+the German people. I have set out in another chapter, in detail,
+the political system from which you have seen that the Reichstag
+is nothing but a debating society; that the Prussians do not
+really have universal suffrage but, by reason of the vicious
+circle system of voting, the elective franchise remains in the
+hands of the few; and that the government of the country through the
+_Landräte_, _Regierungspräsidenten_ and _Oberpräsidenten_
+is a central system from above downwards and not the election
+of the rulers by the people; and, in the chapter on militarism
+and Zabern, I have told by what means the control of the army
+is kept in the hands of the class of nobles.
+
+These are not the only means by which the system controls the
+country. These alone would not suffice. From the time when he
+is four years old, the German is disciplined and taught that
+his government is the only good and effective form. The teachers
+in the schools are all government paid and teach the children
+only the principles desired by the rulers of the German people.
+There are no Saturday holidays in the German schools and their
+summer holidays are for only three to five weeks. You never see
+gangs of small boys in Germany. Their games and their walks are
+superintended by their teachers who are always inculcating in
+them reverence and awe for the military heroes of the past and
+present. On Saturday night the German boy is turned over by the
+State paid school teacher to the State paid pastor who adds divine
+authority to the principles of reverence for the German system.
+
+There is a real system of caste in Germany. For instance, I was
+playing tennis one day with a man and, while dressing afterwards,
+I asked him what he was. He answered that he was a _Kaufmann_,
+or merchant. For the German this answer was enough. It placed him
+in the merchant class. I asked him what sort of a _Kaufmann_
+he was. He then told me he was president of a large electrical
+company. Of course, with us he would have answered first that
+he was president of the electrical company, but being a German
+he simply disclosed his caste without going into details. It is
+a curious thing on the registers of guests in a German summer
+resort to see Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze registered
+with Mrs. Landrat Schwartz and Mrs. Second Lieutenant von Bing.
+Of course, there is no doubt as to the relative social positions
+of Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze and Mrs. Second Lieutenant
+von Bing. Mrs. Manufactory-Proprietor Schultze may have a steam
+yacht and a tiara, an opera box and ten million marks. She may
+be an old lady noted for her works of charity. Her husband may
+have made discoveries of enormous value to the human race, but
+she will always be compelled to take her place behind Mrs. Second
+Lieutenant von Bing, even if the latter is only seventeen years
+old.
+
+Of course, occasionally, officers of the army and navy condescend
+to marry into the merchant caste, and if a girl has a choice
+of three equally attractive young men, one a doctor, earning
+ten thousand dollars a year; one a manufacturer, earning the
+same amount; and one an army officer with a "von" before his
+name and three thousand dollars a year, there is no hesitation
+on her part: she takes the noble and the army officer.
+
+For years all the highest official positions of the government
+have been held by members of the Prussian noble class, and when
+Zimmermann, of a substantial family in East Prussia, but not of
+noble birth, was made Foreign Minister, the most intense surprise
+was exhibited all over Germany at this innovation.
+
+One of the most successful ways of disciplining the people is
+by the _Rat_ system. _Rat_ means councillor, and is
+a title of honour given to any one who has attained a certain
+measure of success or standing in his chosen business or profession.
+For instance, a business man is made a commerce _Rat_; a
+lawyer, a justice _Rat_; a doctor, a sanitary _Rat_;
+an architect or builder, a building _Rat_; a keeper of the
+archives, an archive _Rat_; and so on. They are created in
+this way: first, a man becomes a plain _Rat_, then, later on,
+he becomes a secret _Rat_ or privy councillor; still later,
+a court secret _Rat_ and, later still, a _wirklicher_,
+or really and truly secret court _Rat_ to which may be added
+the title of Excellency, which puts the man who has attained
+this absolutely at the head of the _Rat_ ladder.
+
+But see the insidious working of the system. By German custom
+the woman always carries the husband's title. The wife of a
+successful builder is known as Mrs. Really Truly Secret Court
+Building _Rat_ and her social precedence over the other women
+depends entirely upon her husband's position in the _Rat_
+class. Titles of nobility alone do not count when they come in
+contact with a high government position. Now if a lawyer gets to
+be about forty years old and is not some sort of a _Rat_,
+his wife begins to nag him and his friends and relations look at
+him with suspicion. There must be something in his life which
+prevents his obtaining the coveted distinction and if there is
+anything in a man's past, if he has shown at any time any spirit of
+opposition to the government, as disclosed by the police registers,
+which are kept written up to date about every German citizen,
+then he has no chance of obtaining any of these distinctions
+which make up so much of the social life of Germany. It is a
+means by which the government keeps a far tighter hold on the
+intellectual part of its population than if they were threatened
+with torture and the stake. The Social Democrats, who, of course,
+have declared themselves against the existing system of government
+and in favour of a republic, can receive no distinctions from
+the government because they dared to lift their voices and their
+pens in criticism of the existing order. For them there is the
+fear of the law. Convictions for the crime of _Lèse-Majesté_
+are of almost daily occurrence and, at the opening of the war, an
+amnesty was granted in many of these cases, the ministry of war
+withdrawing many prosecutions against poor devils waiting their
+trial in jail because they had dared to speak disrespectfully of
+the army. The following quotation from a German book, written
+since the war, shows very clearly that this state of affairs
+existed: "In the beneficent atmosphere of general amnesty came the
+news that the Minister of War had withdrawn pending prosecutions
+against newspapers on account of their insults to the army or
+its members." (Dr. J. Jastrow, "Im Kriegszustand.")
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system and the military system, there
+exists the enormous mass of Prussian officials. In a country
+where so many things are under government control these officials
+are almost immeasurably more numerous than in other countries.
+In Prussia, for example, all the railways are government-owned,
+with the exception of one road about sixty miles long and a few
+small branch roads. This army of officials are retainers of the
+government, and not only, of course, themselves refrain from
+criticising the system, but also use their influence upon the
+members of their own family and all with whom they come in contact.
+They are subject to trial in special secret courts and one of
+them who dared in any way to criticise the existing system would
+not for long remain a member of it. Of course, the members of the
+Reichstag have the privilege of free speech without responsibility,
+and there are occasional Socialists, who know that they have
+nothing to expect from the government, who dare to speak in
+criticism.
+
+All the newspapers are subject to control as in no other country.
+In the first place their proprietors are subject to the influence
+of the _Rat_ system as is every other German, and the newspaper
+proprietor, whose sons perhaps enter the army, whose daughters
+may be married to naval officers or officials, and who seeks
+for his sons promotion as judge, state's attorney, etc., has
+to be very careful that the utterances of his newspaper do not
+prevent his promotion in the social scale or interfere with the
+career of his family and relations.
+
+Since the war while a preventive censure does not exist in Germany
+nevertheless a newspaper may be suppressed at will; a fearful
+punishment for a newspaper, which, by being suppressed for, say,
+five days or a week, has its business affairs thrown into the utmost
+confusion and suffers an enormous direct loss.
+
+Many of the larger newspapers are either owned or influenced by
+concerns like the Krupps'. For instance, during this war, all
+news coming from Germany to other countries has been furnished
+by either the Over-Seas Or Trans-Ocean service, both news agencies
+in which the Krupps are large stockholders. The smaller newspapers
+are influenced directly by the government.
+
+In the Middle Ages there was often declared a sort of truce to
+prevent fighting in a city, which was called the _Burgfrieden_
+or "peace of the city," and, at the beginning of this war, all
+political parties were supposed to declare a sort of
+_Burgfrieden_ and not try to obtain any political advantage.
+
+There was, therefore, intense indignation among the Social Democrats
+of Germany when it was discovered, in the spring of 1916, that
+the Minister of the Interior was making arrangements to send out
+news service to be furnished free to the smaller newspapers, and
+that he was engaged in instructing the various _Landräte_
+and other officials of the Interior Department how effectively to
+use this machinery in order to gull the people to the advantage
+of the government, and to keep them in ignorance of anything
+which might tend to turn them against the system.
+
+Besides the _Rat_ system there is, of course, the system
+of decorations. Countless orders and decorations are given in
+Germany. At the head is the Order of the Black Eagle; there are
+the Order of the Red Eagle, the Prussian Order of the Crown,
+the orders, "_Pour_le_Mérite_," the Order of the House of
+Hohenzollern, and many others, and in each of the twenty-five
+States there are also orders, distinctions and decorations. These
+orders in turn are divided into numerous classes. For instance, a
+man can have the Red Eagle order of the first, second, third or
+fourth class, and these may be complicated with a laurel crown,
+with an oak crown, with swords and with stars, etc. Even domestic
+servants, who have served a long time in one family, receive
+orders; and faithful postmen and other officials who have never
+appeared on the police books for having made statements against
+the government or the army are sure of receiving some sort of
+order.
+
+Once a year in Berlin a great festival is held called the
+_Ordensfest_, when all who hold orders or decorations of any
+kind are invited to a great banquet. The butler, who has served
+for twenty-five years, there rubs shoulders with the diplomat who
+has received a Black Eagle for adding a colony to the German
+Empire, and the faithful cook may be seated near an officer who
+has obtained "_Pour_le_Mérite_" for sinking an enemy warship.
+All this in one sense is democratic, but in its effect it tends
+to induce the plain people to be satisfied with a piece of ribbon
+instead of the right to vote, and to make them upholders of a
+system by which they are deprived of any opportunity to make
+a real advance in life.
+
+This system is the most complete that has ever existed in any
+country, because it has drawn so many of the inhabitants of the
+country into its meshes. Practically, the industrial workers
+of the great towns and the stupid peasants in the country are
+the only people in Germany left out of its net.
+
+I had a shooting place very near Berlin, in fact I could reach
+it in three quarters of an hour by motor from the Embassy door,
+and there I had an opportunity of studying the conditions of
+life of the peasant class.
+
+Germany is still a country of great proprietors. Lands may be held
+there by a tenure which was abolished in Great Britain hundreds of
+years ago. In Great Britain, property may only be tied up under
+fixed conditions during the lives of certain chosen people, in
+being at the death of the testator. In the State of New York,
+property may only be tied up during the lives of two persons,
+in being at the death of the person making the will, and for
+twenty-one years (the minority of an infant) thereafter. But
+in the Central Empires, property still may be tied up for an
+indefinite period under the feudal system, so that great estates,
+no matter how extravagant the life tenant may be, are not sold
+and do not come into the market for division among the people.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD ON THE WAY TO HIS SHOOTING
+PRESERVE.]
+
+[Illustration: A KEEPER AND BEATERS ON THE SHOOTING PRESERVE.
+IT SHOWS THE EARLY INNOCULATION OF DISCIPLINE INTO THE GERMAN
+SMALL BOY.]
+
+For instance, to-day there exist estates in the Central Empires
+which must pass from oldest son to oldest son indefinitely and,
+failing that, to the next in line, and so on; and conditions
+have even been annexed by which children cannot inherit if their
+father has married a woman not of a stated number of quarterings
+of nobility. There is a Prince holding great estates in Hungary.
+He is a bachelor and if he desires his children to inherit these
+estates there are only thirteen girls in the world whom he can
+marry, according to the terms of the instrument by which some
+distant ancestor founded this inheritance.
+
+This vicious system has prevented extensive peasant proprietorship.
+The government, however, to a certain extent, has encouraged peasant
+proprietorship, but only with very small parcels of land; and it
+would be an unusual thing in Germany, especially in Prussia,
+to find a peasant owning more than twenty or thirty acres of
+land, most of the land being held by the peasants in such small
+quantities that after working their own lands they have time
+left to work the lands of the adjoining landed proprietor at a
+very small wage.
+
+All the titles, of the nobility are not confined to the oldest
+son. The "Pocketbook of Counts," published by the same firm which
+publishes the "Almanac de Gotha," contains the counts of Austria,
+Germany and Hungary together, showing in this way the intimate
+personal relation between the noble families of these three
+countries. All the sons of a count are counts, and so on, ad
+infinitum. Thus in Hungary there are probably seventy Counts
+Szecheny and about the same number of Zichy, etc. Some of the
+German noble families are not far behind. In fact it may be said
+that almost any person, in what is known as "society" in the
+Central Empires, has a title of some sort. The prefix "von" shows
+that the person is a noble and is often coupled with names of
+people who have no title. By custom in Germany, a "von" when
+he goes abroad is allowed to call himself Baron. But in Germany
+he could not do so. These noble families in the Central Empires,
+by the system of _Majorat_ which I have described, hold
+large landed estates, and naturally exert a great influence upon
+their labourers. As a rule the system of tenant farming does not
+exist; that is, estates are not leased to small farmers as was
+the custom in Ireland and is still in Great Britain, but estates
+are worked as great agricultural enterprises under superintendents
+appointed by the proprietor. This system, impossible in America or
+even in Great Britain, is possible in the Central Empires where
+the villages are full of peasants who, not so many generations
+ago, were serfs attached to the land and who lived in wholesome
+fear of the landed proprietors.
+
+This is the first method by which influence is exercised on the
+population. There is also the restricted franchise or "circle
+voting" which gives the control of the franchise to a few rich
+proprietors.
+
+As a rule, the oldest son enters the army as an officer and may
+continue, but if he has not displayed any special aptitude for
+the military profession he retires and manages his estate. These
+estates are calculated by their proprietors to give at least four
+per cent interest income on the value of the land. Many younger
+sons after a short term of service in the army, usually as officers
+and not as _Einjähriger_ leave the army and enter diplomacy
+or some other branch of the government service. The offices of
+judge, district attorney, etc., not being elective, this career
+as well as that leading to the position of _Landrat_ and
+over-president of a province is open to those who, because they
+belong to old Prussian landed families, find favour in the eyes
+of the government. Much is heard in Germany and out of Germany
+of the Prussian Squire or Junker.
+
+There is no leisure class among the, Junkers. They are all workers,
+patriotic, honest and devoted to the Emperor and the Fatherland.
+If it is possible that government by one class is to be suffered,
+then the Prussian Junkers have proved themselves more fit for rule
+than any class in all history. Their virtues are Spartan, their
+minds narrow but incorruptible, and their bravery and patriotism
+undoubted. One can but admire them and their stern virtues. This
+class, largely because of its poverty and its constant occupation,
+does not travel; nor does the casual tourist or health seeker in
+Germany come in contact with these men. The Junkers will fight
+hard to keep their privileges, and the throne will fight hard
+for the Junkers because they are the greatest supporters of the
+Hohenzollerns.
+
+The workingmen in the cities are hard workers and probably work
+longer and get less out of life than any workingmen in the world.
+The laws so much admired and made ostensibly for their protection,
+such as insurance against unemployment, sickness, injury, old
+age, etc., are in reality skilful measures which bind them to
+the soil as effectively as the serfs of the Middle Ages were
+bound to their masters' estates.
+
+I have had letters from workingmen who have worked in America
+begging me for a steerage fare to America, saying that their
+insurance payments were so large that they could not save money
+out of their wages. Of course, after having made these payments
+for some years, the workingman naturally hesitates to emigrate
+and so lose all the premiums he has paid to the State. In peace
+times a skilled mechanic in Germany received less than two dollars
+a day, for which he was compelled to work at least ten hours.
+Agricultural labourers in the Central Empires are poorly paid.
+The women do much of the work done here by men. For instance,
+once when staying at a nobleman's estate in Hungary, I noticed
+that the gardeners were all women, and, on inquiring how much they
+received, I was told they were paid about twenty cents a day. The
+women in the farming districts of Germany are worked harder than
+the cattle. In summer time they are out in the fields at five or
+six in the morning and do not return until eight or later at night.
+For this work they are sometimes paid as high as forty-eight
+cents a day in harvest time. Nevertheless, these small wages
+tempt many Russians to Germany during the harvest season. At the
+outbreak of the war there were perhaps fifty thousand Russians
+employed in Germany; men, women and girls. These the Germans
+retained in a sort of slavery to work the fields. I spoke to
+one Polish girl who was working on an estate over which I had
+shooting rights, near Berlin. She told me that at the commencement
+of the war she and her family were working in Germany and that
+since the war they all desired to return to Poland but that the
+Germans would not permit it.
+
+This hard working of women in agricultural pursuits tends to
+stupefy and brutalise the rural population and keeps them in a
+condition of subjection to the Prussian Church and the Prussian
+system, and in readiness for war. Both Prussian Junkers and the
+German manufacturers look with favour upon the employment of
+so many women in farm work because the greater the number of
+the labourers, the smaller their wages throughout the country.
+
+When I first came to Germany I, of course, was filled with the
+ideas that prevailed in America that the German workingman had
+an easy time. My mind was filled with pictures of the German
+workingmen sitting with their families at tables, drinking beer
+and listening to classical music. After I had spent some time in
+Germany, I found that the reason that the German workingmen sat
+about the tables was because they were too tired to do anything
+else.
+
+I sincerely hope that after the war the workingmen of this country
+will induce delegates of their German brothers to make a tour
+of America. For when the German workingmen see how much better
+off the Americans are, they will return to Germany and demand
+shorter hours and higher wages; and the American will not be
+brought into competition with labour slaves such as the German
+workingmen of the period before the war.
+
+As one goes through the streets of Berlin there are no evidences
+of poverty to be seen; but over fifty-five per cent of the families
+in Berlin are families living in one room.
+
+The Germans are taken care of and educated very much in the same
+way that the authorities here look after the inmates of a poor-house
+or penitentiary. Such a thing as a German railway conductor rising
+to be president of the road is an impossibility in Germany; and
+the list of self-made men is small indeed,--by that I mean men
+who have risen from the ranks of the working-men.
+
+The Socialists, representing the element opposed to the
+Conservatives, elect a few members to the Prussian Lower House
+and about one-third of the members to the Reichstag, but otherwise
+have no part whatever in the government. No Socialist would have
+any chance whatever if he set out to enter the government service
+with the ambition of becoming a district attorney or judge. Jews
+have not much chance in the government service. A few exceptions
+have been made. At one time Dernburg, who carried on the propaganda
+in America during the first year of the war, and who is a Jew, was
+appointed Colonial Minister of the Empire.
+
+In my opinion, the liberalisation of Prussia has been halted
+by the fact that there has been no party of protest except that
+of the Socialists, and the Socialists, because they have, in
+effect, demanded abolition of the monarchy and the establishment
+of a republic as part of their programme, have been unable to
+do anything in the obtaining of the reforms.
+
+Up to the beginning of the war there was great dissatisfaction.
+The people were irritated by certain direct taxes such as the
+tax upon matches, and because every Protestant in Prussia was
+compelled to pay a tax for the support of the church, unless
+he made a declaration that he was an atheist.
+
+The only class in Germany which knows something of the outside
+world is the _Kaufmann_ class. Prussian nobles of the ruling
+class are not travellers. They are always busy with the army and
+navy, government employments or their estates; and, as a rule,
+too poor to travel. The poor, of course, do not travel, and the
+_Kaufmann_, although he learns much in his travels in other
+countries to make him dissatisfied with the small opportunity
+which he has in a political way in Germany, is satisfied to let
+things stand because of the enormous profits which he makes
+through the low wages and long hours of the German workingman.
+
+Lawyers and judges amount to little in Germany and we do not
+find there a class of political lawyers who, in republics, always
+seem to get the management of affairs in their own hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DAYS BEFORE THE WAR
+
+After my return from Kiel to Berlin a period of calm ensued.
+No one seemed to think that the murders at Sarajevo would have
+any effect upon the world.
+
+The Emperor had gone North on his yacht, but, as I believe, not
+until a certain line of action had been agreed upon.
+
+Most of the diplomats started on their vacations. Sir Edward
+Goschen, British Ambassador, as well as the Russian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. This shows, of course, how little war was expected
+in diplomatic circles.
+
+I went on two visits to German country-houses in Silesia, where
+the richest estates are situated. One of these visits was to the
+country-house of a Count, one of the wealthiest men in Germany,
+possessed of a fortune of about twenty to thirty million dollars.
+He has a great estate in Silesia, farmed, as I explained, not by
+tenant farmers, but by his own superintendents. In the centre is
+a beautiful country house or castle. We were thirty-two guests in
+the house-party. This Count and his charming wife had travelled
+much and evidently desired to model their country life on that
+of England. Our amusements were tennis, swimming and clay-pigeon
+shooting, with dancing and music at night. Life such as this,
+and especially, the lavish entertainment of so many guests, is
+something very exceptional in Prussian country life and quite
+a seven months' wonder for the country side.
+
+Some days after my return to Berlin the ultimatum of Austria
+was sent to Serbia. Even then there was very little excitement,
+and, when the Serbian answer was published, it was believed that
+this would end the incident, and that matters would be adjusted
+by dilatory diplomats in the usual way.
+
+On the twenty-sixth of July, matters began to boil. The Emperor
+returned on this day and, from the morning of the twenty-seventh,
+took charge. On the twenty-seventh, also, Sir Edward Goschen
+returned to Berlin. I kept in touch, so far as possible, with
+the other diplomats, as the German officials were exceedingly
+uncommunicative, although I called on von Jagow every day and tried
+to get something out of him. On the night of the twenty-ninth,
+the Chancellor and Sir Edward had their memorable conversation in
+which the Chancellor, while making no promises about the French
+colonies, agreed, if Great Britain remained neutral, to make
+"no territorial aggressions at the expense of France."
+
+The Chancellor further stated to Sir Edward, that ever since he
+had been Chancellor the object of his policy had been to bring
+about an understanding with England and that he had in mind a
+general neutrality agreement between Germany and England.
+
+On the thirtieth, Sir Edward Grey refused the bargain proposed,
+namely that Great Britain should engage to stand by while the
+French colonies were taken and France beaten, so long as French
+territory was not taken. Sir Edward Grey said that the so-called
+bargain at the expense of France would constitute a disgrace
+from which the good name of Great Britain would never recover.
+He also refused to bargain with reference to the neutrality of
+Belgium.
+
+Peace talk continued, however, on both the thirtieth and
+thirty-first, and many diplomats were still optimistic. On the
+thirty-first I was lunching at the Hotel Bristol with Mrs. Gerard
+and Thomas H. Birch, our minister to Portugal, and his wife.
+I left the table and went over and talked to Mouktar Pascha,
+the Turkish Ambassador, who assured me that there was no danger
+whatever of war. But in spite of his assurances and judging by
+the situation and what I learned from other diplomats, I had
+cabled to the State Department on the morning of that day saying
+that a general European war was inevitable. On the thirty-first,
+_Kriegsgefahrzustand_ or "condition of danger of war" was
+proclaimed at seven P. M., and at seven P. M. the demand was made
+by Germany that Russia should demobilise within twelve hours. On
+the thirtieth, I had a talk with Baron Beyens, the Minister of
+Belgium, and Jules Cambon, the French Ambassador, in the garden
+of the French Embassy in the afternoon. They both agreed that
+nothing could prevent war except the intervention of America.
+
+Both Ambassador Cambon and Minister Beyens were very sad and
+depressed. After leaving them I met Sir Edward Grey upon the
+street and had a short conversation with him. He also was very
+depressed.
+
+Acting on my own responsibility, I sent the following letter to
+the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Is there nothing that my country can do? Nothing that I can
+  do towards stopping this dreadful war?
+
+  I am sure that the President would approve any act of mine
+  looking towards peace.
+
+               Yours ever,
+      (Signed) JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+To this letter I never had any reply.
+
+On the first of August at five P. M. the order for mobilisation
+was given, and at seven-ten P. M. war was declared by Germany on
+Russia, the Kaiser proclaiming from the balcony of the palace
+that "he knew no parties more."
+
+Of course, during these days the population of Berlin was greatly
+excited. Every night great crowds of people paraded the streets
+singing "Deutschland Ueber Alles" and demanding war. Extras,
+distributed free, were issued at frequent intervals by the
+newspapers, and there was a general feeling among the Germans
+that their years of preparation would now bear fruit, that Germany
+would conquer the world and impose its _Kultur_ upon all nations.
+
+On the second of August, I called in the morning to say good-bye
+to the Russian Ambassador. His Embassy was filled with unfortunate
+Russians who had gone there to seek protection and help. Right
+and left, men and women were weeping and the whole atmosphere
+seemed that of despair.
+
+On the day the Russian Ambassador left, I sent him my automobile
+to take him to the station. The chauffeur and footman reported to
+me that the police protection was inadequate, that the automobile
+was nearly overturned by the crowd, and that men jumped on the
+running board and struck the Ambassador and the ladies with him
+in the face with sticks. His train was due to leave at one-fifteen
+P. M. At about ten minutes of one, while I was standing in my
+room in the Embassy surrounded by a crowd of Americans, Mrs.
+James, wife of the Senator from Kentucky and Mrs. Post Wheeler,
+wife of our Secretary to the Embassy in Japan, came to me and
+said that they were anxious to get through to Japan via Siberia
+and did not know what to do. I immediately scribbled a note to
+the Russian Ambassador asking him to take them on the train with
+him. This, and the ladies, I confided to the care of a red-headed
+page boy of the Embassy who spoke German. By some miracle he
+managed to get them to the railroad station before the Ambassador's
+train left, the Ambassador kindly agreeing to take them with
+him. His train, however, instead of going to Russia, was headed
+for Denmark; and from there the two ladies crossed to Sweden,
+thence to England, and so home, it being perhaps as well for them
+that they did not have an opportunity to attempt the Siberian
+journey during this period of mobilisation.
+
+The Russian Ambassador reciprocated by confiding to me a Russian
+Princess who had intended to go out with him but who, intimidated,
+perhaps, by the scenes on the way to the station, had lost her
+nerve at the railway station and refused to depart with the
+Ambassador. She remained for a while in Berlin, and after some
+weeks recovered sufficient courage to make the trip to Denmark.
+
+On the morning of August fourth, having received an invitation
+the day before, I "attended" at the Palace in Berlin. In the room
+where the court balls had been held in peace times, a certain
+number of the members of the Reichstag were assembled. The diplomats
+were in a gallery on the west side of the room. Soon the Emperor,
+dressed in field grey uniform and attended by several members of
+his staff and a number of ladies, entered the room. He walked
+with a martial stride and glanced toward the gallery where the
+diplomats were assembled, as if to see how many were there. Taking
+his place upon the throne and standing, he read an address to
+the members of the Reichstag. The members cheered him and then
+adjourned to the Reichstag where the Chancellor addressed them,
+making his famous declaration about Belgium, stating that "necessity
+knew no law," and that the German troops were perhaps at that
+moment crossing the Belgian frontier. Certain laws which had
+been prepared with reference to the government of the country,
+and which I will give in more detail in another place, as well as
+the war credit, were voted upon by the Reichstag. The Socialists
+had not been present in the Palace, but joined now in voting the
+necessary credits.
+
+On the afternoon of August fourth, I went to see von Jagow to
+try and pick up any news. The British Ambassador sat in the
+waiting-room of the Foreign Office. Sir Edward told me that he
+was there for the purpose of asking for his passports. He spoke
+in English, of course, and I am sure that he was overheard by a
+man sitting in the room who looked to me like a German newspaper
+man, so that I was not surprised when, late in the afternoon,
+extra sheets appeared upon the street announcing that the British
+Ambassador had asked for his passports and that Great Britain
+had declared war.
+
+At this news the rage of the population of Berlin was indescribable.
+The Foreign Office had believed, and this belief had percolated
+through all classes in the capital, that the English were so
+occupied with the Ulster rebellion and unrest in Ireland that
+they would not declare war.
+
+[Illustration: CROWDS IN FRONT OF THE EMBASSY AWAITING BULLETINS,
+AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: THE AMERICAN EMBASSY WAS THE CENTRE OF INTEREST
+TO MANY IN THOSE EARLY DAYS OF THE WAR.]
+
+After dinner I went to the station to say good bye to the French
+Ambassador, Jules Cambon. The route from the French Embassy by
+the Branderburg Thor to the Lehrter railway station was lined
+with troops and police, so that no accident whatever occurred.
+There was no one at the station except a very inferior official
+from the German Foreign Office. Cambon was in excellent spirits
+and kept his nerve and composure admirably. His family, luckily,
+were not in Berlin at the time of the outbreak of the war. Cambon
+instead of being sent out by way of Switzerland, whence of course
+the road to France was easy, was sent North to Denmark. He was
+very badly treated on the train, and payment for the special
+train, in gold, was exacted from him by the German government.
+
+Then I went for a walk about Berlin, soon becoming involved in
+the great crowd in front of the British Embassy on the Wilhelm
+Strasse. The crowd threw stones, etc., and managed to break all
+the windows of the Embassy. The Germans charged afterwards that
+people in the Embassy had infuriated the crowd by throwing pennies
+to them. I did not see any occurrences of this kind. As the Unter
+den Linden and the Wilhelm Platz are paved with asphalt the crowd
+must have brought with them the missiles which they used, with
+the premeditated design of smashing the Embassy windows. A few
+mounted police made their appearance but were at no time in
+sufficient numbers to hold the crowd in check.
+
+Afterwards I went around to the Unter den Linden where there was
+a great crowd in front of the Hotel Adlon. A man standing on the
+outskirts of the crowd begged me not to go into the hotel, as he
+said the people were looking for English newspaper correspondents.
+
+So threatening was the crowd towards the English correspondents
+that Wile rang up the porter of the Embassy after we had gone
+to bed and, not wishing to disturb us, he occupied the lounge in
+the porter's rooms.
+
+Believing that possibly the British Embassy might be in such
+a condition that Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador,
+might not care to spend the night there, I ordered an automobile
+and went up through the crowd which still choked the Wilhelm
+Strasse, with Holand Harvey, the Second Secretary to the British
+Embassy. Sir Edward and his secretaries were perfectly calm and
+politely declined the refuge which I offered them in our Embassy.
+I chatted with them for a while, and, as I was starting to leave, a
+servant told me that the crowds in the street had greatly increased
+and were watching my automobile. I sent out word by the servant
+to open the automobile, as it was a landau, and to tell the
+chauffeur, when I got in, to drive very slowly.
+
+I drove slowly through the crowd, assailed only by the peculiar
+hissing word that the Germans use when they are especially angry
+and which is supposed to convey the utmost contempt. This word
+is "_Pfui_" and has a peculiar effect when hissed out from
+thousands of Teutonic throats.
+
+As we left the outskirts of the crowd, a man of respectable
+appearance jumped on the running board of the automobile, spit
+at me, saying "_Pfui_," and struck Harvey in the face with
+his hat. I stopped the automobile, jumped out and chased this man
+down the street and caught him. My German footman came running
+up and explained that I was the American Ambassador and not an
+Englishman. The man who struck Harvey thereupon apologised and
+gave his card. He was a Berlin lawyer who came to the Embassy
+next morning and apologised again for his "mistake."
+
+The following day, August fifth, I spent part of the time taking
+over from Sir Edward the British interests. Joseph C. Grew, our
+First Secretary, and I went to the British Embassy; seals were
+placed upon the archives, and we received such instructions and
+information as could be given us, with reference to the British
+subjects in Germany and their interests. The British correspondents
+were collected in the Embassy and permission was obtained for
+them to leave on the Embassy train.
+
+During the day British subjects, without distinction as to age
+or sex, were seized, wherever found, and sent to the fortress
+of Spandau. I remonstrated with von Jagow and told him that that
+was a measure taken only in the Middle Ages, and I believe that
+he remonstrated with the authorities and arranged for a cessation
+of the arbitrary arrests of women.
+
+Frederick W. Wile, the well-known American correspondent of the
+_London_Daily_Mail_, was to go out also with the British
+party, on the ground that he had been a correspondent of a British
+newspaper. In the evening I went to the Foreign Office to get his
+passport, and, while one of the department chiefs was signing
+the passport, he stopped in the middle of his signature, threw
+down the pen on the table, and said he absolutely refused to
+sign a passport for Wile because he hated him so and because
+he believed he had been largely instrumental in the bringing
+about of the war. Of course this latter statement was quite
+ridiculous, but it took me some time before I could persuade
+this German official to calm his hate and complete his signature.
+
+I have heard a few people say that Wile was unduly fearful of
+what the Germans might do to him, but the foregoing incident
+shows that his fears were well grounded, and knowing of this
+incident, which I did not tell him, I was very glad to have him
+accept the hospitality of the Embassy for the night preceding
+his departure. He was perfectly cool, although naturally much
+pleased when I informed him that his departure had been arranged.
+
+Sir Edward and his staff and the British correspondents left next
+morning early, about six A. M. No untoward incidents occurred
+at the time of their departure which was, of course, unknown to
+the populace of Berlin.
+
+During these first days there was a great spy excitement in Germany.
+People were seized by the crowds in the streets and, in some
+instances, on the theory that they were French or Russian spies,
+were shot. Foreigners were in a very dangerous situation throughout
+Germany, and many Americans were subjected to arrest and indignities.
+
+A curious rumour spread all over Germany to the effect that
+automobiles loaded with French gold were being rushed across the
+country to Russia. Peasants and gamekeepers and others turned
+out on the roads with guns, and travelling by automobile became
+exceedingly dangerous. A German Countess was shot, an officer
+wounded and the Duchess of Ratibor was shot in the arm. It was
+sometime before this excitement was allayed, and many notices
+were published in the newspapers before this mania was driven
+from the popular brain.
+
+There were rumours also that Russians had poisoned the Muggelsee,
+the lake from whence Berlin draws part of its water supply. There
+were constant rumours of the arrest of Russian spies disguised as
+women throughout Germany.
+
+Many Americans were detained under a sort of arrest in their
+hotels; among these were Archer Huntington and his wife; Charles
+H. Sherrill, formerly our minister to the Argentine and many
+others.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE AMERICANS AT THE OUTBREAK OF HOSTILITIES
+
+Of course, as soon as there was a prospect of war, the Embassy
+was overrun with Americans. Few Americans had taken the precaution
+of travelling with passports, and passports had become a necessity.
+All of the Embassy force and all the volunteers that I could
+prevail upon to serve, even a child of eleven years old, who
+was stopping in the house with us, were taking applications of
+the Americans who literally in thousands crowded the Wilhelm
+Platz in front of the Embassy.
+
+The question of money became acute. Travellers who had letters
+of credit and bank checks for large sums could not get a cent
+of money in Germany. The American Express Company, I believe,
+paid all holders of its checks. When, with Mr. Wolf, President
+of the American Association of Commerce and Trade in Berlin, I
+called upon the director of the Imperial Bank and begged him
+to arrange something for the relief of American travellers in
+Germany, he refused to do anything; and I then suggested to him
+that he might give paper money, which they were then printing
+in Germany, to the Americans for good American credits such as
+letters of credit and bank checks, and that they would then have a
+credit in America which might become very valuable in the future.
+He, however, refused to see this. Director Herbert Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank was the far-seeing banker who relieved the
+situation. Gutmann arranged with me that the Dresdener Bank,
+the second largest bank in Germany, would cash the bank checks,
+letters of credit and the American Express Company's drafts and
+international business checks, etc., of Americans for reasonable
+amounts, provided the Embassy seal was put on the letter of credit
+or check to show that the holder was an American, and, outside
+of Berlin, the seal of the American Consulate. This immediately
+relieved the situation.
+
+With the exception of Mr. Wolf who was, however, quite busy with
+his own affairs, I had no American Committees such as were organised
+in London and Paris to help me in Berlin. In Munich, however, the
+Americans there organised themselves into an efficient committee.
+Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Pulitzer were in Berlin and immediately went
+to work in our Embassy. Mr. Pulitzer busied himself at giving
+out passports and Mrs. Pulitzer proved herself a very efficient
+worker. She and Mrs. Ruddock, wife of our Third Secretary, and
+Mrs. Gherhardi, wife of the Naval Attaché, with Mrs. Gerard formed
+a sort of relief committee to look after the Americans who were
+without help or resources.
+
+I arranged, with the very efficient help of Lanier Winslow, for
+special trains to carry the Americans in Germany to Holland.
+Trains were run from Switzerland, Munich and Carlsbad across
+Germany to Holland, and from Berlin were run a number of trains
+to Holland.
+
+The first room on entering the Embassy was the ticket-office,
+and there, first Mr. Winslow, and afterwards Captain Fenton,
+sold tickets, giving tickets free to those who were certified
+to be without funds by the committee of Mrs. Pulitzer and Mrs.
+Gerard. This committee worked on the second floor of the Embassy
+in the ballroom, part of it being roped off to keep the crowds
+back from the ladies.
+
+Each week I bought a number of steerage passages from the Holland
+American Line and the ladies resold them in the ballroom. We had
+to do this because the Holland American Line had no licence to sell
+steerage tickets in Germany; but by buying two or three hundred
+at a time direct from the Company, I was enabled to peddle them
+out in our ballroom to those Americans who, in their eagerness to
+reach their own country, were willing to endure the discomforts
+of travel in the steerage.
+
+Winslow accompanied one special train to Holland, and I must
+say that I sympathised with him when I learned of what he had
+to do in the way of chasing lost hand-baggage and finding milk
+for crying babies.
+
+These special trains were started from the Charlottenburg station,
+in a quiet part of Berlin so that no crowd was attracted by the
+departure of the Americans. The Carlsbad train went through very
+successfully, taking the Americans who had been shut up in Carlsbad
+since the commencement of the war.
+
+One of the curious developments of this time was a meeting of
+sympathy for the Americans stranded in Germany, held in the town
+hall of Berlin on the eleventh of August. This meeting was commenced
+in one of the meeting rooms of the town hall, but so many people
+attended that we were compelled to adjourn to the great hall.
+There speeches were made by the over-Burgomaster, von Gwinner,
+Professor von Harnack and me. Another professor, who spoke excellent
+English, with an English accent, made a bitter attack upon Great
+Britain. In the pamphlet in which the speeches of Harnack and
+the over-Burgomaster were published this professor's speech was
+left out. In his speech stating the object of the meeting, the
+over-Burgomaster said: "Since we hear that a large number of
+American citizens in the German Empire, and, especially, in Berlin,
+find themselves in embarrassments due to the shutting off of
+means of return to their own country, we here solemnly declare
+it to be our duty to care for them as brethren to the limit of
+our ability, and we appeal to all citizens of Berlin and the
+whole of the German Empire to co-operate with us to this end."
+
+Professor von Harnack, head of the Royal Library in Berlin, is
+one of the ablest of the German professors. In his speech he gave
+expression to the feeling that was prevalent in the first days
+of the war that Germany was defending itself against a Russian
+invasion which threatened to blot out the German _Kultur_. He
+said, after referring to Western civilisation: "But in the face
+of this civilisation, there arises now before my eyes another
+civilisation, the civilisation of the tribe, with its patriarchal
+organisation, the civilisation of the horde that is gathered and
+kept together by despots,--the Mongolian Muscovite civilisation.
+This civilisation could not endure the light of the eighteenth
+century, still less the light of the nineteenth century, and
+now in the twentieth century it breaks loose and threatens us.
+This unorganised Asiatic mass, like the desert with its sands,
+wants to gather up our fields of grain."
+
+Nothing was done for the Americans stranded in Germany by the
+Germans with the exception of the arrangements for the payment
+of funds by the Dresdener Bank on the letters of credit and the
+dispatching of special trains by the railroad department of the
+German government. As a matter of fact, nothing more could have
+been required of the Germans, as it was naturally the duty of
+the American government to take care of its citizens stranded
+abroad.
+
+Almost the instant that war was declared, I cabled to our government
+suggesting that a ship should be sent over with gold because,
+of course, with gold, no matter what the country, necessaries
+can always be bought. Rumours of the dispatch of the Tennessee
+and other ships from America, reached Berlin and a great number
+of the more ignorant of the Americans got to believe that these
+ships were being sent over to take Americans home.
+
+[Illustration: WORKING IN THE EMBASSY BALLROOM AT THE OUTBREAK
+OF HOSTILITIES, AUGUST, 1914.]
+
+[Illustration: WAR DAYS IN BERLIN. AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS STAFF.]
+
+One morning an American woman spoke to me and said she would
+consent to go home on one of these ships provided she was given
+a state-room with a bath and Walker-Gordon milk for her children,
+while another woman of German extraction used to sit for hours
+in a corner of the ballroom, occasionally exclaiming aloud with
+much feeling, "O God, will them ships never come?"
+
+In these first days of the war we also made a card index of all
+the Americans in Berlin, and, so far as possible, in Germany;
+in order to weed out those who had received the passports in
+the first days when possibly some people not entitled to them
+received them, and to find the deserving cases. All Americans
+were required to present themselves at the Embassy and answer
+a few questions, after which, if everything seemed all right,
+their passports were marked "recommended for transportation to
+America."
+
+I sent out circulars from time to time to the consuls throughout
+Germany giving general instructions with regard to the treatment
+of Americans. The following circular sent out on August twelfth
+is a sample:
+
+                "AMERICAN EMBASSY,
+                   BERLIN, August 12, 1914.
+
+  "_To_the_Consular_Representatives_
+    _of_the_United_States_in_Germany,_
+      _and_for_the_general_information_of_
+        _American_Citizens._
+
+  "A communication will to-morrow be published in the _Berlin_
+  _Lokal_Anzeiger_ regarding the sending of a special train to
+  the Dutch frontier for the special conveyance of Americans.
+  Other trains will probably be arranged for from time to time.
+  No further news has been received regarding the sending of
+  transports from the United States, but applications for
+  repatriation are being considered by the Embassy and the
+  various consular offices throughout Germany according to the
+  Embassy's last circular and the announcements published in
+  the _Lokal_Anzeiger_.
+
+  "All Americans leaving Berlin must have their passports stamped
+  by the Foreign Office, for which purpose they should apply to
+  _Geheimer_Legationsrat_ Dr. Eckhardt at Wilhelmstrasse
+  76. Americans residing outside of Berlin should ascertain from
+  their respective consular representatives what steps they should
+  take in this regard.
+
+  "Letters for the United States may be sent to the Embassy and
+  will be forwarded at the first opportunity.
+
+  "German subjects who desire to communicate with friends in
+  Great Britain, Russia, France or Belgium, or who desire to
+  send money, should make their requests to the Imperial Foreign
+  Office. Americans are permitted to enter Italy. The steamers
+  of the Italian lines are running at present, but are full for
+  some time in advance. The Embassy is also informed that the
+  steamer from Vlissingen, Holland, runs daily at 11 A. M. The
+  Ambassador cannot, however, recommend Americans to try to
+  reach Holland by the ordinary schedule trains, as he has
+  received reports of delays _en_route_, owing to the fact
+  that all civil travellers are ejected from trains when troops
+  require accommodations. It is better to wait for special trains
+  arranged for by the Embassy.
+
+  "The Dresdener Bank and its branches throughout Germany will
+  cash _for_Americans_only_ letters of credit and checks
+  issued by good American banks in limited amounts. Included
+  in this category are the checks of the Bankers' Association,
+  Bankers' Trust Company, International Mercantile Marine Company,
+  and American Express Company. All checks and letters of credit
+  must, however, be stamped by American consuls, and consuls must
+  see that the consular stamp is affixed to those checks and
+  letters of credit only as are the bona fide property of American
+  citizens. The Commerz & Disconto Bank makes the same offer and
+  the Deutsche Bank will cash checks and letters of credit drawn
+  by its correspondents.
+
+  "American consular officers may also draw later on the Dresdener
+  Bank for their salaries and the official expenses of their
+  consulates. Before drawing such funds from the bank, however,
+  all consular officers should submit their expense accounts to me
+  for approval. These expense accounts should be transmitted to
+  the Embassy at the earliest opportunity.
+
+                         "THE AMBASSADOR."
+
+It will be noticed from the above circular that all Americans
+were required to have their passports stamped at the Foreign
+Office. One American did not receive back his passport, although
+he had left it at the Foreign Office. The Foreign Office claimed
+that it had delivered the passport to some one from the Embassy,
+but we were not very much surprised when this identical passport
+turned up later in the possession of Lodi, the confessed German
+spy, who was shot in the Tower of London.
+
+After a time the American Government cabled me to advance money
+to destitute Americans; and the ladies in the ballroom, with
+their assistants, attended to this branch, advancing money where
+needed or so much as a person needed to make up the balance of
+passage on steerage tickets from Holland to the United States.
+At the same time we gradually built up a banking system. Those
+in the United States who had friends or relatives in Germany
+sent them money by giving the money to our State Department,
+and the State Department in turn cabled me to make a payment.
+This payment was made by my drawing a draft for the amount stated
+on the State Department, the recipient selling this draft at a
+fixed rate to the Deutsche Bank in Berlin. This business assumed
+great proportions, and after the Americans who were in a hurry to
+go home had disappeared, the ones remaining were kept in funds
+by their friends and relatives through this sort of bank under
+our management.
+
+On August twenty-third, Assistant Secretary of War Breckenridge,
+who had come from America on the warship _Tennessee_, bringing
+gold with him, and a certain number of army officers, arrived
+in Berlin and took over our relief organisation in so far as it
+applied to the repatriation of Americans, housing it in rooms
+hired in a nearby hotel, the Kaiserhoff. This commission: was
+composed of Majors J. A. Ryan, J. H. Ford and G. W. Martin and
+Captains Miller and Fenton, but the relief committee and the
+banking office were still continued in the Embassy ballroom.
+
+A bulletin was published under the auspices of the American
+Association of Commerce and Trade and the advice there given was
+that all Americans having the means to leave should do so when
+the opportunity for leaving by special trains was presented, and
+proceed direct to London whence they could obtain transportation
+to the United States. All Americans without means were directed
+to apply to the relief commission which was authorized to pay
+for the transportation and subsistence of stranded Americans
+in order to enable them to return home.
+
+The enormous quantity of baggage left behind by Americans in
+Germany was a problem requiring solution.
+
+In spite of repeated advice to leave, many Americans insisted
+on remaining in Germany. Few of them were business people; there
+were many song-birds, piano players, and students. We had much
+trouble with these belated Americans. For example, one woman
+and her daughter refused to leave when advised, but stayed on
+and ran up bills for over ten thousand marks; and as arrest for
+debt exists in Germany, they could not leave when they finally
+decided to go. All of us in the Embassy had to subscribe the
+money necessary to pay their most pressing debts and they finally
+left the country, leaving an added prejudice against Americans.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PRISONERS OF WAR
+
+During the period of the first months of the war, in addition
+to other work, it became necessary to look after those subjects
+of other nations who had been confided to my care.
+
+At first the British were allowed considerable liberty, although
+none were permitted to leave the country. They were required to
+report to the police at stated times during the day and could
+not remain out late at night.
+
+The Japanese had received warning from their Embassy as to the
+turn that events might take and, before sending its ultimatum,
+the Japanese government had warned its citizens, so that a great
+number of them had left Germany. After the declaration of war by
+Japan, all the Japanese in Germany were immediately imprisoned.
+This was stated to be in order to save them from the fury of
+the population and certainly the people seemed to be greatly
+incensed against the Japanese. When I finally obtained permission
+for their release and departure from Germany I had to send some
+one with the parties of Japanese to the Swiss frontier in order
+to protect them from injury. They were permitted to leave only
+through Switzerland and, therefore, had to change cars at Munich.
+Before sending any of them to Munich I invariably telegraphed
+our Consul there to notify the Munich police so that proper
+protection could be provided at the railway station.
+
+On one occasion a number of Japanese were waiting in the Embassy
+in order to take the night train for Munich. I sent a servant
+to take them out in order that they might get something to eat
+in a restaurant, but as no restaurant in Berlin would sell them
+food, arrangements were made to give them meals in the Embassy.
+
+The members of the Siamese Legation, who in appearance greatly
+resemble the Japanese, were often subjected to indignities, and
+for a long time did not dare move about freely in Berlin, or
+even leave their houses.
+
+The Japanese were marvels of courtesy. After I visited some of
+them at the civilian camp of Ruhleben, they wrote me a letter
+thanking me for the visit. Nearly every Japanese leaving Germany
+on his arrival in Switzerland wrote me a grateful letter.
+
+When I finally left Germany, as I stepped from the special train
+at Zürich, a Japanese woman, who had been imprisoned in Germany
+and whose husband I had visited in a prison, came forward to thank
+me. A Japanese man was waiting in the hotel office in Berne when
+I arrived there, for a similar purpose, and the next morning
+early the Japanese Minister called and left a beautiful clock for
+Mrs. Gerard as an expression of his gratitude for the attention
+shown to his countrymen. It was really a pleasure to be able to
+do something for these polite and charming people.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to a German prison
+camp. This was to the camp at Doeberitz situated about eight
+miles west of Berlin, a sort of military camp with permanent
+barracks. Some of these barracks were used for the confinement
+of such British civilians as the Germans had arrested in the
+first days of the war. There were only a few British among the
+prisoners, with a number of Russian and French. I was allowed
+to converse freely with the prisoners and found that they had
+no complaints. As the war went on, however, a number of British
+prisoners of war were taken by the Germans during the course of
+the great retreat of the British in Northern France. Then officers
+and privates began to come into Germany and were distributed
+in various camps. Finally, in the autumn of 1914, the British
+Government decided on interning a great number of Germans in
+Great Britain; and the German government immediately, and as
+a reprisal, interned all the British civilian men who, up to
+this time, had enjoyed comparative freedom in Berlin and other
+cities of the Empire. The British civilians were shut up in a
+race track about five miles from the centre of Berlin, called
+Ruhleben. This race track in peace times was used for contests
+of trotting horses and on it were the usual grandstands and brick
+stable buildings containing box stalls with hay lofts above,
+where the race horses were kept.
+
+On August twentieth I paid my first visit to the police presidency
+in Berlin where political prisoners, when arrested, were confined. A
+small number of British prisoners subject to especial investigation
+were there interned. This prison, which I often subsequently
+visited, was clean and well kept, and I never had any particular
+complaints from the prisoners confined there, except, of course,
+as the war progressed, concerning the inadequacy of the food.
+
+I had organised a special department immediately on the breaking
+out of the war to care for the interests of the British. At first
+Mr. Boylston Beal, a lawyer of Boston, assisted by Mr. Rivington
+Pyne of New York, was at the head of this department, of which
+later the Honourable John B. Jackson, formerly our Minister to
+the Balkan States, Greece and Cuba, took charge. He volunteered
+to give his assistance at the commencement of the war and I was
+glad of his help, especially as he had been twelve years secretary
+in the Berlin Embassy and, therefore, was well acquainted not
+only with Germany but with German official life and customs. Mr.
+Jackson was most ably assisted by Charles H. Russell, Jr., of
+New York, and Lithgow Osborne. Of course, others in the Embassy
+had much to do with this department.
+
+The first privates, prisoners of war, came to the camp of Doeberitz
+near Berlin. Early in the war Mr. Grew, our First Secretary, and
+Consul General Lay visited the camp for officers at Torgau. The
+question of the inspection of prisoners of the camps and the rights
+of Ambassadors charged with the interests of hostile powers was
+quite in the clouds. So many reports came to Germany about the
+bad treatment in England of German prisoners of war that I finally
+arranged to have Mr. Jackson visit them and report. This was arranged
+by my colleague, our Ambassador to Great Britain, and in the first
+winter Mr. Jackson made his trip there. His report of conditions
+there did much to allay the German belief as to the ill-treatment
+of their subjects who were prisoners in Great Britain and helped
+me greatly in bringing about better conditions in Germany. After
+vainly endeavouring to get the German government to agree to some
+definite plan for the inspection of the prisoners, after my notes
+to the Foreign Office had remained unanswered for a long period of
+time, and after sending a personal letter to von Jagow calling his
+attention to the fact that the delay was injuring German prisoners
+in other countries, I finally called on von Bethmann-Hollweg
+and told him that my notes concerning prisoners were sent by
+the Foreign Office to the military authorities: that, while I
+could talk with officials of the Foreign Office, I never came into
+contact with the people who really passed upon the notes sent by
+me, and who made the decisions as to the treatment of prisoners
+of war and inspection of their camps; and I begged the Chancellor
+to break down diplomatic precedent and allow me to speak with
+the military authorities who decided these questions. I said,
+"If I cannot get an answer to my proposition about prisoners, I
+will take a chair and sit in front of your palace in the street
+until I receive an answer."
+
+The result was a meeting in my office.
+
+I discussed the question involved with two representatives from
+the Foreign Office, two from the General Staff, two from the War
+Department and with Count Schwerin who commanded the civilian camp
+at the Ruhleben race track. In twenty minutes we managed to reach
+an agreement which I then and there drew up: the substance of
+which, as between Great Britain and Germany, was that the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Germany and the American
+Ambassador and his representatives in Great Britain should have
+the right to visit the prison camps on giving reasonable notice,
+which was to be twenty-four hours where possible, and should have
+the right to converse with the prisoners, within sight but out
+of hearing, of the camp officials; that an endeavour should be
+made to adjust matters complained of with the camp authorities
+before bringing them to the notice of higher authorities; that
+ten representatives should be named by our Ambassador and that
+these should receive passes enabling them to visit the camps
+under the conditions above stated. This agreement was ratified
+by the British and German Governments and thereafter for a long
+time we worked under its provisions and in most questions dealt
+direct with the War Department.
+
+Of course, before this meeting I had managed to get permission
+to visit the camps of Ruhleben and Doeberitz near Berlin; and
+Mr. Michaelson, our consul at Cologne, and Mr. Jackson and others
+at the Embassy had been permitted to visit certain camps. But
+immediately preceding the meeting on the fourth of March and
+while matters were still being discussed we were compelled to
+a certain extent to suspend our visits.
+
+In the first days of the war it was undoubtedly and unfortunately
+true that prisoners of war taken by the Germans, both at the time
+of their capture and in transit to the prison camps, were often
+badly treated by the soldiers, guards or the civil population.
+
+The instances were too numerous, the evidence too overwhelming,
+to be denied. In the prison camps themselves, owing to the peculiar
+system of military government in Germany, the treatment of the
+prisoners varied greatly. As I have, I think, stated in another
+place, Germany is divided into army corps districts. Over each
+of these districts is, in time of war, a representative corps
+commander who is clothed with absolute power in that district,
+his orders superseding those of all civilian officials. These
+corps commanders do not report to the war department but are
+in a measure independent and very jealous of their rights. For
+instance, to show the difficulty of dealing with these corps
+commanders, after my arrangements concerning the inspection of
+prisoners of war had been ratified by both the Imperial and British
+governments, I went to Halle to inspect the place of detention
+for officers there. Halle is some hours from Berlin and when
+I had driven out to the camp, I was met by the commander who
+told me that I might visit the camp but that I could not speak
+to the prisoners out of hearing. I told him that our arrangement
+was otherwise, but, as he remained firm I returned to Berlin.
+I complained to the Foreign Office and was told there that the
+matter would be arranged and so I again, some days later, returned
+to Halle. My experience on the second trip was exactly the same
+as the first. I spoke to von Jagow who explained the situation to
+me, and advised me to visit first the corps commander at Magdeburg
+and try and arrange the matter with him. I did so and was finally
+permitted to visit this camp and to talk to the officers out of
+ear-shot.
+
+This camp of Halle was continued during the war, although not at
+all a fit place for the detention of officers, who were lodged in
+the old factory buildings surrounded by a sort of courtyard covered
+with cinders. This building was situated in the industrial part
+of the town of Halle. There was no opportunity for recreation
+or games, although several enterprising officers had tried to
+arrange a place where they could knock, a tennis ball against
+the wall.
+
+It was the policy of the Germans to put some prisoners of each
+nation in each camp. This was probably so that no claim could
+be made that the prisoners from one nation among the Allies were
+treated better or worse than the prisoners from another nation.
+
+In the beginning of the war the Germans were surprised by the great
+number of prisoners taken and had made no adequate preparations
+for their reception. Clothing and blankets were woefully wanting,
+so I immediately bought what I could in the way of underclothes
+and blankets at the large department stores of Berlin and the
+wholesalers and sent these to the camps where the British prisoners
+were confined. I also sent to the Doeberitz camp articles such
+as sticks for wounded men who were recovering, and crutches,
+and even eggs and other nourishing delicacies for the sick.
+
+At first the prisoners were not compelled to work to any extent,
+but at the time I left Germany the two million prisoners of war
+were materially assisting the carrying on of the agriculture
+and industries of the Empire.
+
+The League of Mercy of New York having telegraphed me in 1914,
+asking in what way funds could best be used in the war, I suggested
+in answer that funds for the prisoners of war were urgently needed.
+Many newspapers poked fun at me for this suggestion, and one bright
+editor said that if the Germans did not treat their prisoners
+properly they should be made to! Of course, unless this particular
+editor had sailed up the Spree in a canoe and bombarded the royal
+palace, I know of no other way of "making" the Germans do anything.
+The idea, however, of doing some work for the prisoners of war was
+taken up by the Young Men's Christian Association. Dr. John R.
+Mott was at the head of this work and was most ably and devotedly
+assisted by the Rev. Archibald C. Harte. I shall give an account
+of their splendid work in a chapter devoted to the charitable
+work of the war.
+
+At only one town in Germany was any interest in the fate of the
+prisoners of war evinced. This was, I am glad to say, in the
+quaint university town of Göttingen. I visited this camp with
+Mr. Harte, in April, 1915, to attend the opening of the first
+Y. M. C. A. camp building in Germany. The camp was commanded by
+Colonel Bogen, an officer strict in his discipline, but, as all
+the prisoners admitted, just in his dealings with them. There
+were, as I recall, about seven thousand prisoners in this camp,
+Russian, French, Belgian and British. It is a pity that the methods
+of Colonel Bogen and his arrangements for camp buildings, etc.,
+were not copied in other camps in Germany. Here, as I have said,
+the civil population took some interest in the fate of the
+unfortunate prisoners within their gates, led in this by several
+professors in the University. The most active of these professors
+was Professor Stange who, working with a French lawyer who had been
+captured near Arras while in the Red Cross, provided a library
+for the prisoners and otherwise helped them. Of course, these
+charitable acts of Professor Stange did not find favor with many
+of his fellow townsmen of Göttingen, and he was not surprised
+when he awoke one morning to find that during the night his house
+had been painted red, white and blue, the colours of France,
+England and America.
+
+I heard of so many instances of the annoyance of prisoners by
+the civil population that I was quite pleased one day to read
+a paragraph in the official newspaper, the _North_German
+_Gazette_, which ran somewhat as follows: "The following
+inhabitants of (naming a small town near the borders of Denmark),
+having been guilty of improper conduct towards prisoners of war,
+have been sentenced to the following terms of imprisonment and
+the following fines and their names are printed here in order
+that they may be held up to the contempt of all future generations
+of Germans." And then followed a list of names and terms of
+imprisonment and fines. I thought that this was splendid, that
+the German government had at last been aroused to the necessity
+of protecting their prisoners of war from the annoyances of the
+civil population, and I wrote to our consul in Kiel and asked him
+to investigate the case. From him I learned that some unfortunate
+prisoners passing through the town (in a part of Germany inhabited
+by Scandinavians) had made signs that they were suffering from
+hunger and thirst, that some of the kind-hearted people among
+the Scandinavian population had given them something to eat and
+drink and for this they were condemned to fines, to prison and
+to have their names held up to the contempt of Germans for all
+time.
+
+I do not know of anyone thing that can give a better idea of
+the official hate for the nations with which Germany was at war
+than this.
+
+The day after visiting the camp at Göttingen, I visited the
+officers' camp situated at the town of Hanover Münden. Here
+about eight hundred officers, of whom only thirteen were British,
+were confined in an old factory building situated on the bank of
+the river below the town. The Russian officers handed me some
+arrows tipped with nails which had been shot at them by the
+kind-hearted little town boys, and the British pointed out to me
+the filthy conditions of the camp. In this, as in unfortunately
+many other officer camps, the inclination seemed to be to treat the
+officers not as captured officers and gentlemen, but as convicts.
+I had quite a sharp talk with the commander of this camp before
+leaving and he afterwards took violent exception to the report
+which I made upon his camp. However, I am pleased to say that
+he reformed, as it were, and I was informed by my inspectors
+that he had finally made his camp one of the best in Germany.
+
+Much as I should have liked to, I could not spend much time myself
+in visiting the prison camps; many duties and frequent crises kept
+me in Berlin, but members of the Embassy were always travelling
+in this work of camp inspection.
+
+For some time my reports were published in parliamentary "White
+Papers," but in the end our government found that the publication
+of these reports irritated the Germans to such a degree that the
+British Government was requested not to publish them any more.
+Copies of the reports were always sent by me both to Washington
+and to London, and handed to the Berlin Foreign Office.
+
+[Illustration: A COVER OF THE MONTHLY ISSUED BY THE RUHLEBEN
+PRISONERS.]
+
+While Winston Churchill was at the head of the British Admiralty,
+it was stated that the German submarine prisoners would not be
+treated as ordinary prisoners of war; but would be put in a place
+by themselves on the ground that they were pirates and murderers,
+and not entitled to the treatment accorded in general to prisoners
+of war. Great indignation was excited by this in Germany; the
+German government immediately seized thirty-seven officers, picking
+those whom they supposed related to the most prominent families
+in Great Britain, and placed them in solitary confinement. A
+few were confined in this way in Cologne, but the majority were
+put in the ordinary jails of Magdeburg and Burg.
+
+As soon as I heard of this, accompanied by Mr. Charles H. Russell,
+Jr., of my staff, I went to Magdeburg, using my ordinary pass
+for the visiting of prisoners. The German authorities told me
+afterwards that if they had known I was going to make this visit
+they would not have permitted it, but on this occasion the corps
+commander system worked for me. Accompanied by an adjutant, in
+peace times a local lawyer from the corps commander's office in
+Magdeburg, and other officers, I visited these British officers
+in their cells in the common jail at Magdeburg. They were in
+absolutely solitary confinement, each in a small cell about eleven
+feet long and four feet wide. Some cells were a little larger,
+and the prisoners were allowed only one hour's exercise a day in
+the courtyard of the prison. The food given them was not bad, but
+the close confinement was very trying, especially to Lieutenant
+Goschen, son of the former Ambassador to Germany, who had been
+wounded and in the hospital at Douai. Among them I found an old
+acquaintance, Captain Robin Grey, who had been often in New York.
+The German authorities agreed to correct several minor matters of
+which the officers complained and then we went to the neighbouring
+town of Burg, where other officers were confined in the same manner
+and under similar conditions in the ordinary jail. After visiting
+these prisoners and obtaining for them from the authorities some
+modifications of the rules which had been established we visited
+the regular officers' camp at Burg.
+
+This was at that time what I should call a bad camp, crowded and
+with no space for recreation. Later, conditions were improved
+and more ground allowed to the prisoners for games, etc. At the
+time of my first visit I found that the commander, a polite but
+peppery officer, was in civil life a judge of the Supreme Court
+at Leipzig, the highest court in the Empire. As I had been a
+judge in the State of New York, we foregathered and adjourned
+for lunch with his staff to the hotel in Burg.
+
+After Churchill left the British Admiralty, his successor reversed
+his ruling and the submarine prisoners were placed in the ordinary
+confinement of prisoners of war. When the Germans were assured of
+this, the thirty-seven officers who had been in reprisal placed
+in solitary confinement were sent back to ordinary prison camps.
+In fact in most cases I managed to get the Germans to send them
+to what were called "good" camps.
+
+Lieutenant Goschen, however, became quite in and was taken to the
+hospital in Magdeburg. At the time of his capture, the Germans
+had told me, in answer to my inquiries, that he was suffering
+from a blow on the head with the butt end of a rifle, but an
+X-ray examination at Magdeburg showed that fragments of a bullet
+had penetrated his brain and that he was, therefore, hardly a
+fit subject to be chosen as one of the reprisal prisoners. I
+told von Jagow that I thought it in the first place a violation
+of all diplomatic courtesy to pick out the son of the former
+Ambassador to Germany as a subject for reprisals and secondly
+that, in picking him, they had taken a wounded man; that the
+fact that they did not know that he had fragments of a bullet in
+his brain made the situation even worse because that ignorance
+was the result of the want of a proper examination in the German
+hospitals; and I insisted that, because of this manifestly unfair
+treatment which had undoubtedly caused the very serious condition
+of Lieutenant Goschen, he should be returned to England in the
+exchange of those who were badly wounded. I am pleased to say
+that von Jagow saw my point of view and finally secured permission
+for Lieutenant Goschen to leave for England.
+
+Dr. Ohnesorg, one of our assistant Naval Attachés, went with
+him to England on account of the seriousness of his condition,
+and I was very glad to hear from his father that he had arrived
+safely in London.
+
+Undoubtedly the worst camp which I visited in Germany was that
+of Wittenberg. Wittenberg is the ancient town where Luther lived
+and nailed his theses to the church door. The camp is situated
+just outside the city in a very unattractive spot next to the
+railway. An outbreak of typhus fever prevented us from visiting
+the camp, although Mr. Jackson conversed with some of the prisoners
+from outside the barrier of barbed wire. When the typhus was
+finally driven out, Mr. Lithgow Osborne visited the camp and his
+report of conditions there was such that I visited it myself,
+in the meantime holding up his report until I had verified it.
+
+With Mr. Charles H. Russell, Jr., I visited the camp. Typhus
+fever seems to be continually present in Russia. It is carried by
+the body louse and it is transmitted from one person to another.
+Russian soldiers seem to carry this disease with them without
+apparently suffering much from it themselves. The Russian soldiers
+arriving at Wittenberg were not properly disinfected and, in
+consequence, typhus fever broke out in camp. Several British
+medical officers were there with their prisoners, because, by the
+provisions of the Hague conventions, captured medical officers
+may be kept with the troops of their nation, if prisoners have
+need of their services. These medical officers protested with
+the camp commander against the herding together of the French
+and British prisoners with the Russians, who, as I have said,
+were suffering from typhus fever. But the camp commander said,
+"You will have to know your Allies;" and kept all of his prisoners
+together, and thus as surely condemned to death a number of French
+and British prisoners of war as though he had stood them against
+the wall and ordered them shot by a firing squad. Conditions in
+the camp during the period of this epidemic were frightful. The
+camp was practically deserted by the Germans and I understand
+that the German doctor did not make as many visits to the camp
+as the situation required.
+
+At the time I visited the camp the typhus epidemic, of course,
+had been stamped out. The Germans employed a large number of
+police dogs in this camp and these dogs not only were used in
+watching the outside of the camp in order to prevent the escape
+of prisoners but also were used within the camp. Many complaints
+were made to me by prisoners concerning these dogs, stating that
+men had been bitten by them. It seemed undoubtedly true that the
+prisoners there had been knocked about and beaten in a terrible
+manner by their guards, and one guard went so far as to strike one
+of the British medical officers. There were about thirty-seven
+civilian prisoners in the camp who had been there all through
+the typhus epidemic. I secured the removal of these civilian
+prisoners to the general civilian camp at Ruhleben, and the
+conditions at Wittenberg may be judged by the fact that when
+it was announced to these civilians that they were to be taken
+from Wittenberg to another camp one of them was so excited by
+the news of release that he fell dead upon the spot.
+
+In talking over conditions at Wittenberg with von Jagow I said,
+"Suppose I go back to Wittenberg and shoot some of these dogs,
+what can you do to me?" Soon after the dogs disappeared from
+the camp.
+
+The food in all these camps for civilians and for private soldiers
+was about the same. It consisted of an allowance of bread of
+the same weight as that given the civilian population. This was
+given out in the morning with a cup of something called coffee,
+but which in reality was an extract of acorns or something of the
+kind without milk or sugar; in the middle of the day, a bowl of
+thick soup in which the quantity of meat was gradually diminished
+as war went on, as well as the amount of potatoes for which at
+a later period turnips and carrots were, to a large extent,
+substituted; and in the evening in good camps there was some sort
+of thick soup given out or an apple, or an almost infinitesimal
+piece of cheese or sausage.
+
+In the war department at Berlin there was a Prisoners of War
+Department in charge of Colonel, later General, Friedrich. This
+department, however, did not seem to be in a position to issue
+orders to the corps commanders commanding the army corps districts
+of Germany, who had absolute control of the prison camps within
+their districts. Colonel Friedrich, however, and his assistants
+endeavoured to standardise the treatment of prisoners of war in
+the different corps districts, and were able to exert a certain
+amount of pressure on the corps commanders. They determined on
+the general reprisals to be taken in connection with prisoners
+of war. For instance, when some of the Germans, who had been
+taken prisoners by the British and who were in England, were
+sent to work in the harbour of Havre, the Germans retaliated
+by sending about four times the number of British prisoners to
+work at Libau in the part of Russia then occupied by the Germans.
+But while the British permitted our Embassy in Paris to inspect
+the prisoners of war at Havre, the Germans for months refused
+to allow me permission to send anyone to inspect those British
+prisoners at Libau.
+
+Cases came to my attention where individual corps commanders
+on their own initiative directed punitive measures against the
+prisoners of war in their districts, on account of the rumours
+of the bad treatment of German citizens in England. Thus the
+commander in the district where the camp of Doeberitz was situated
+issued an order directing reprisals against prisoners under his
+command on account of what he claimed to be the bad treatment
+of German women in England. It required constant vigilance to
+seek out instances of this kind and cause them to be remedied.
+
+I did not find the Germans at all efficient in the handling of
+prisoners of war. The authority was so divided that it was hard
+to find who was responsible for any given bad conditions. For
+instance, for a long period of time I contended with the German
+authorities for better living conditions at the civilian camp of
+Ruhleben. I was promised time and again by Colonel Friedrich,
+by the camp commander and by the Foreign
+
+Office that these conditions would be remedied. In that camp men
+of education, men in delicate health, were compelled to sleep
+and live six in a box stall or so closely that the beds touched
+each other in hay-lofts, the outside walls of which were only
+four feet high.
+
+I finally almost in despair wrote identical personal letters,
+after having exhausted all ordinary diplomatic steps, to General
+von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of Brandenburg, to the commander
+of the corps district in which the Ruhleben camp was situated,
+and to the Minister of War: and the only result was that each
+of the officers addressed claimed that he had been personally
+insulted by me because I had presumed to call his attention to
+the inhuman conditions under which the prisoners were compelled
+to live in the Ruhleben camp.
+
+The commander of this civilian camp of Ruhleben was a very handsome
+old gentleman, named Count Schwerin. His second in command for
+a long time was a Baron Taube. Both of these officers had been
+long retired from the army and were given these prison commands
+at the commencement of the war. Both of them were naturally
+kind-hearted but curiously sensitive and not always of even temper.
+On the whole I think that they sympathised with the prisoners
+and did their best to obtain a bettering of the conditions of
+their confinement. The prisoners organised themselves in their
+various barracks, each barrack having a captain of the barrack,
+the captains electing one of their number as a camp captain or
+_Obmann_.
+
+The man who finally appeared as head man of the camp was an
+ex-cinematograph proprietor, named Powell. In my mind he, assisted
+by Beaumont and other captains, conducted the affairs of the camp
+as well as possible, given the difficulty of dealing with the
+prisoners on one hand and the prison authorities on the other
+hand. Naturally he was always subject to opposition from many
+prisoners, among whom those of aristocratic tendencies objected
+to being under the control of one not of the highest caste in
+Great Britain; and there were others who either envied him his
+authority or desired his place. The camp authorities allowed
+Powell to visit the Embassy at least once a week and in that
+way I was enabled, to keep in direct touch with the camp. At
+two periods during my stay in Berlin I spent enough days at the
+camp to enable every prisoner who had a complaint of any kind
+to present it personally to me.
+
+The organisation of this camp was quite extraordinary. I found
+it impossible to get British prisoners to perform the ordinary
+work of cleaning up the camp, and so forth, always expected of
+prisoners themselves; and so, with the funds furnished me from
+the British Government, the camp captain was compelled to pay a
+number of the poorer prisoners to perform this work. Secretaries
+Ruddock and Kirk of our Embassy undertook the uninteresting and
+arduous work of superintending these payments as well as of our
+other financial affairs. This work was most trying and they deserve
+great credit for their self-denial. By arrangement with the British
+Government, I was also enabled to pay the poorer prisoners an
+allowance of five marks a week, thus permitting them to buy little
+luxuries and necessities and extra food at the camp canteen which
+was early established in the camp. I also furnished the capital to
+the camp canteen, enabling it to make its purchases and carry on
+its business. In this establishment everything could be purchased
+which was purchasable in Germany, and for months after the
+commencement of the war articles of luxury were sold at a profit
+and articles of food sold at a loss for the benefit of those
+who required an addition to the camp diet. There was a street
+in the camp of little barracks or booths which the prisoners
+christened Bond Street, and where many stores were in operation
+such as a tailor shop, shoe-maker's, watch-maker's, etc. Acting
+with Powell, I succeeded in getting the German authorities to
+turn over the kitchens to the prisoners. Four of the prisoners
+who did most excellent self-denying work in these kitchens deserve
+to be specially mentioned. They were Ernest L. Pyke, Herbert.
+Kasmer, Richard H. Carrad and George Fergusson.
+
+The men in this camp subsisted to a great extent upon the packages
+of food sent to them from England. Credit must be given to the
+German authorities for the fairly prompt and efficient delivery
+of the packages of food sent from England, Denmark and Switzerland
+to prisoners of war in all camps.
+
+In Ruhleben the educated prisoners volunteered to teach the ignorant:
+two hundred and ninety-seven different educational courses were
+offered to those who desired to improve their minds. A splendid
+orchestra was organised, a dramatic society which gave plays in
+French and one which gave plays in English and another one which
+gave operas. On New Year's day, 1916, I attended at Ruhleben do
+really wonderful performance of the pantomime of "Cinderella";
+and, in January, 1917, a performance of "The Mikado" in a theatre
+under one of the grand stands. In these productions, of course,
+the female parts were taken by young men and the scenery, costumes
+and accessories were all made by the prisoners. There was a camp
+library of over five thousand volumes sent over by the British
+Government and a reading and meeting hall, erected by the American
+Y. M. C. A. There was even a system of postal service with special
+stamps so that a prisoner in one barrack could write to a friend in
+another and have a letter delivered by the camp postal authorities.
+The German authorities had not hired the entire race track from
+the Race Track Association so that I made a special contract
+with the race track owners and hired from them the in-field and
+other portions not taken over by German authorities. Here the
+prisoners had tennis courts and played hockey, foot-ball and
+cricket and held athletic games. Expert dentists in the camp
+took care of the poorer prisoners as did an oculist hired by me
+with British funds, and glasses were given them from the same
+funds.
+
+The prisoners who needed a little better nourishment than that
+afforded by the camp diet and their parcels from England, could
+obtain cards giving them the right to eat in the Casino or camp
+official restaurant where they were allowed a certain indicated
+amount of wine or beer with their meals, and finally arrangements
+were arrived at by which the German guards left the camp, simply
+guarding it from the outside; and the policing was taken over
+by the camp police department, under the charge of the prison
+camp commander and committee. The worst features, of course,
+were the food and housing. Human nature seems always to be the
+same. Establishment of clubs seems inherent to the Anglo-Saxon
+nature. Ten or more persons would combine together and erect a
+sort of wooden shed against the brick walls of a barrack, hire
+some poorer person to put on a white jacket and be addressed as
+"steward," put in the shed a few deck chairs and a table and
+enjoy the sensation of exclusiveness and club life thereby given.
+
+Owing to the failure of Germany and Great Britain to come to an
+agreement for a long time as to the release of captured crews
+of ships, there were in Ruhleben men as old as seventy-five years
+and boys as young as fifteen. There were in all between fifty and
+sixty of these ships' boys. They lived in a barrack by themselves
+and under the supervision of a ship's officer who volunteered to
+look after them as sort of a monitor. They were taught navigation
+by the older prisoners and I imagine were rather benefited by their
+stay in the camp. I finally made arrangements by which these boys
+were released from England and Germany. With the exception of
+the officers and crews of the ships, prisoners were not interned
+who were over fifty-five.
+
+The British Government was generous in the allowance of money for
+Ruhleben prisoners. The amount allowed by the German Government to
+the camp commanders for feeding the prisoners was extremely small,
+only sixty pfennigs a day. At first many of the camp commanders
+made contracts with caterers for the feeding of the prisoners
+and as the caterers' profit had to come out of this very small
+sum the amount of food which the remainder purchased for the
+prisoners was small indeed. As the war went on the prisoners'
+department of the war office tried to induce the camp commanders to
+abandon the contractors' system and purchase supplies themselves.
+A sort of convention of camp commanders was held in Berlin which I
+attended. Lectures were there given on food and its purchase, and
+methods of disinfecting prisoners, on providing against typhus,
+and on housing and other subjects. A daily lunch was served,
+supposed to be composed of the exact rations given at the prison
+camps.
+
+The schedules of food, etc., made out by the camp commanders
+and furnished to foreign correspondents were often not followed
+in practice. I know on one occasion when I was at the camp at
+Doeberitz, the camp commander gave me his schedule of food for
+the week. This provided that soup with pieces of meat was to be
+given on the day of my visit, but on visiting the camp kitchen I
+found that the contractor was serving fish instead of meat. Some
+of the camp commanders not only treated their prisoners kindly but
+introduced manufactures of furniture, etc., to help the prisoners
+to pass their time. The camps of Krossen and Göttingen deserve
+special mention. At Giessen, the camp commander had permitted
+the erection of a barrack in which certain prisoners who were
+electrical experts gave lessons in electrical fitting, etc.,
+to their fellow prisoners. There was also a studio in this camp
+where prisoners with artistic talent were furnished with paints
+and allowed to work. As more and more people were called to the
+front in Germany, greater use was made of the prisoners, and in
+the summer of 1916 practically all the prisoners were compelled
+to work outside of the camps. They were paid a small extra sum
+for this, a few cents a day, and as a rule were benefited by the
+change of scene and occupation. The Russians especially became
+very useful to the Germans as agricultural laborers.
+
+Professor Alonzo E. Taylor of the University of Pennsylvania,
+a food expert, and Dr. D. J. McCarthy, also of Philadelphia,
+joined my staff in 1916 and proved most efficient and fearless
+inspectors of prison camps. Dr. Taylor could use the terms calories,
+proteins, etc., as readily as German experts and at a greater
+rate of speed. His report showing that the official diet of the
+prisoners in Ruhleben was a starvation diet incensed the German
+authorities to such fury that they forbade him to revisit Ruhleben.
+Professor Buckhaus, the German expert, agreed with him in some of
+his findings. I do not know what will happen to the Professor,
+who seemed willing to do his best for the prisoners. He wrote a
+booklet on the prison camps which he asked permission to dedicate
+to me, but the War Office, which published the book, refused
+to allow him to make this dedication. It was a real pleasure
+to see the way in which Dr. Taylor carried on his work of food
+inspection; and his work, as well as that of the other doctors
+sent from America to join my staff, Drs. Furbush, McCarthy, Roler,
+Harns, Webster and Luginbuhl, did much to better camp conditions.
+
+Dr. Caldwell, the sanitary expert, known for his great work in
+Serbia, now I believe head of the hospital at Pittsburgh, reported
+in regard to the prison diet: "While of good quality and perhaps
+sufficient in quantity by weight, it is lacking in the essential
+elements which contribute to the making of a well-balanced and
+satisfactory diet. It is lacking particularly in fat and protein
+content which is especially desirable during the colder months
+of the year. There is considerable doubt whether this diet alone
+without being supplemented by the articles of food received by
+the prisoners from their homes would in any way be sufficient
+to maintain the prisoners in health and strength."
+
+Dr. Caldwell also visited Wittenberg and found the commander by
+temperament, and so on, unfitted for such a position.
+
+The Germans, as Dr. Taylor has pointed out, tried to feed prisoners
+on schedule like horses. There is, however, a nervous discrimination
+in eating so far as man is concerned; and a diet, scientifically
+fitted to keep him alive, may fail because of its mere monotony.
+
+Think of living as the prisoners of war in Germany have for years,
+without ever having anything (except black bread) which cannot
+be eaten with a spoon.
+
+Officer prisoners were, after matters had settled down and after
+several bitter contests which I had with the German authorities,
+fairly well treated. There was, as in the case of the camps for
+the privates, a great difference between camps, and a great
+difference between camp commanders. Mr. Jackson did most of the
+visiting of the officers' camps. In many camps the officers were
+allowed a tennis court and other amusements, as well as light
+wine or beer at meals, but the length of the war had a bad effect
+on the mental condition of many of the officers.
+
+A great step forward was made when arrangements were entered
+into between Germany and Great Britain whereby wounded and sick
+officers and men, when passed by the Swiss Commission which visited
+both countries, were sent to Switzerland; sent still as prisoners
+of war, subject to return to Germany or England respectively, but
+the opportunity afforded by change of food and scene, as well as
+reunion of families, saved many a life. By arrangements between
+the two countries, also, the severely wounded prisoners were set
+free. I believe that this exchange of the heavily wounded between
+the Germans and the Russians was the factor which prevented the
+entrance of Sweden into the war. These wounded men traversed the
+whole length of Sweden in the railway, and the spectacle afforded
+to the Swedish population of these poor stumps of humanity, victims
+of war, has quite effectually kept the Swedish population from
+an attack of unnecessary war fever.
+
+Officers and men who tried to escape were not very severely punished
+in Germany unless they had broken or stolen something in their
+attempt. Officers were usually subjected to a jail confinement
+for a period and then often sent to a sort of punitive camp.
+Such a camp was situated in one of the Ring forts surrounding
+the city of Kustrin which I visited in September, 1916. There
+the officers had no opportunity for exercise except in a very
+small courtyard or on the roof, which was covered with grass, of
+the building in which they were confined. I arranged, however,
+on my visit for the construction of a tennis court outside. The
+British officers in Germany practically subsisted on their parcels
+received from home, and during the end of my stay a much better
+tea could be had with the prison officers than with the camp
+commander. The prisoners had real tea and marmalade and white
+bread to offer, luxuries which had long since disappeared from all
+German tables. On the whole, the quarters given to the officers'
+prisons in Germany were not satisfactory, and were not of the
+kind that should have been offered to officer prisoners of war.
+
+At the time I left Germany there were nearly two million prisoners
+of war in the Empire, of whom about ten thousand were Russian
+officers, nine thousand French officers and about one thousand
+British officers.
+
+As a rule our inspectors found the hospitals, where the prisoners
+of war were, in as good condition as could be expected.
+
+I think this was largely due to the fact that so many doctors
+in Germany are Jews. The people who are of the Jewish race are
+people of gentle instincts. In these hospitals a better diet
+was given to the prisoners. There were, of course, in addition
+to the regular hospitals, hospitals where the severely wounded
+prisoners were sent. Almost uniformly these hospitals were clean
+and the prisoners were well taken care of.
+
+[Illustration: IN RUHLEBEN CAMP. A SPECIMEN BOTH OF THE
+PRISONER-ARTIST'S WORK AND OF THE TYPES ABOUT HIM.]
+
+At Ruhleben there was a hospital which in spite of many
+representations was never in proper shape. In addition, there
+was in the camp a special barrack established by the prisoners
+themselves for the care of those who were so ill or so weak as
+to require special attention but who were not ill enough to be
+sent to the hospital. This barrack was for a long time in charge
+of a devoted gentleman, a prisoner, whose name I have unfortunately
+forgotten, but whose self-sacrifice deserves special mention.
+
+I arranged with the camp authorities and the German authorities
+for permission to enter into a contract with Dr. Weiler. Under
+this contract Dr. Weiler, who had a sanatorium in the West of
+Berlin, received patients from Ruhleben. Those who were able paid
+for themselves, the poorer ones being paid for by the British
+Government. This sanatorium, occupied several villas. I had many
+disputes with Dr. Weiler, but finally managed to get this sanatorium
+in such condition that the prisoners who resided there were fairly
+well taken care of.
+
+An arrangement was made between Great Britain and Germany by
+which civilians unfit for military service were sent to their
+respective countries, and just before I left I effected an
+arrangement by which all civilians over forty-five years old,
+with the exception of twenty who might be held by each country
+for military reasons, were to be released. I do not know whether
+this arrangement was actually carried out in full. With the lapse
+of time the mental condition of the older prisoners in Ruhleben
+had become quite alarming. Soldier prisoners, when they enter the
+army, are always in good physical condition and enter with the
+expectation of either being killed or wounded or taken prisoner,
+and have made their arrangements accordingly. But these unfortunate
+civilian prisoners were often men in delicate health, and all
+were in a constant state of great mental anxiety as to the fate
+of their business and their enterprises and their families. In
+1916, not only Mr. Grafton Minot, who for some time had devoted
+himself exclusively to the Ruhleben prisoners, but also Mr. Ellis
+Dresel, a distinguished lawyer of Boston, who had joined the
+Embassy as a volunteer, took up the work. Mr. Dresel visited
+Ruhleben almost daily and by listening to the stories and complaints
+of the prisoners materially helped their mental condition.
+
+The Germans collected all the soldier prisoners of Irish nationality
+in one camp at Limburg not far from Frankfurt a. M. These efforts
+were made to induce them to join the German army. The men were
+well treated and were often visited by Sir Roger Casement who,
+working with the German authorities, tried to get these Irishmen
+to desert their flag and join the Germans. A few weaklings were
+persuaded by Sir Roger who finally discontinued his visits, after
+obtaining about thirty recruits, because the remaining Irishmen
+chased him out of the camp.
+
+I received information of the shooting of one prisoner, and although
+the camp authorities had told Dr. McCarthy that the investigation
+had been closed and the guard who did the shooting exonerated,
+nevertheless, when I visited the camp in order to investigate, I
+was told that I could not do so because the matter of the shooting
+was still under investigation. Nor was I allowed to speak to those
+prisoners who had been witnesses at the time of the shooting.
+I afterwards learned that another Irishman had been shot by a
+guard on the day before my visit, and the same obstacles to my
+investigation were drawn about this case.
+
+The Irishmen did not bear confinement well, and at the time of
+my visit among them many of them were suffering from tuberculosis
+in the camp hospital. They seemed also peculiarly subject to
+mental breakdowns. Two devoted Catholic priests, Father Crotty
+and a Brother Warren from a religious house in Belgium, were
+doing wonderful work among these prisoners.
+
+The sending out of the prisoners of war to work throughout Germany
+has had one very evil effect. It has made it to the financial
+advantage of certain farmers and manufacturers to have the war
+continued. The Prussian land owners or Junkers obtain four or
+five times as much for their agricultural products as they did
+before the war and have the work on their farms performed by
+prisoners of war to whom they are required to pay only six cents
+a day. When the _Tageblatt_ called attention to this it was
+suppressed for several days.
+
+At many of these so-called working camps our inspectors were
+refused admission on the ground that they might learn trade or
+war secrets. They succeeded, however, in having the men sent
+outside in order that they might inspect them and hear their
+complaints. There were in Germany about one hundred central camps
+and perhaps ten thousand or more so-called working camps, in
+summer time, throughout the country. Some of the British prisoners
+were put to work on the sewage farm of Berlin but we succeeded
+in getting them sent back to their parent camp.
+
+The prisoners of war were often accused of various breaches of
+discipline and crimes. Members of the Embassy would attend these
+trials, and we endeavoured to see that the prisoners were properly
+represented. But the Germans often refused us an opportunity
+to see the prisoners before their trial, or even before their
+execution. The case of Captain Fryatt is in point.
+
+Captain Fryatt who commanded a British merchant ship was captured
+and taken to the civilian camp at Ruhleben. In searching him the
+Germans claimed that he wore a watch presented to him for an
+attempt to ram a German submarine. They, therefore, took Fryatt
+from the Ruhleben camp and sent him to Bruges for trial. When I
+heard of this I immediately sent two formal notes to the German
+Foreign Office demanding the right to see Fryatt and hire counsel
+to represent him, inquiring what sort of counsel would be permitted
+to attend the trial and asking for postponement of the trial
+until these matters could be arranged. The German Foreign Office
+had informed me that they had backed up these requests and I
+believe them, but the answer of the German admiralty to my notes
+was to cause the trial to proceed the morning after the day on
+which my notes were delivered and to shoot Fryatt before noon
+of the same day.
+
+As to the evidence regarding the watch, the British Foreign Office
+learned that, when captured, Captain Fryatt had neither a watch
+nor any letter to indicate that he had tried to ram a submarine!
+
+This cruel and high-handed outrage caused great indignation in
+England, and even in certain circles in Germany; and the manner
+in which my request was treated was certainly a direct insult
+to the country which I represented. In conversation with me,
+Zimmermann and the Chancellor and von Jagow all expressed the
+greatest regret over this incident, which shows how little control
+the civilian branch of the government has over the military in
+time of war. Later on, when similar charges were made against
+another British sea captain, the Foreign Office, I think through
+the influence of the Emperor, was able to prevent a recurrence
+of the Fryatt outrage.
+
+As I have said, many of the camp commanders in Germany were men,
+excellent and efficient and kind hearted, who did what they could
+for the prisoners. It is a pity that these men should bear the
+odium which attaches to Germany because of the general bad treatment
+of prisoners of war in the first days of the war, and because
+certain commanders of prison camps were not fitted for their
+positions.
+
+The commander at the camp at Wittenberg was replaced, but the
+Germans have never acknowledged that bad conditions had existed
+in that camp. Shortly before we left Germany the war department
+seemed to gain more control of the prisoners of war situation,
+and on our representations at least one camp commander was
+permanently relieved. If examples had been made early in the
+war of the camp commanders who were not fit for their places
+and of those who had in any way mishandled prisoners of war, the
+German people as a whole would not have had to bear the burden
+of this odium. The many prisoners will return to their homes
+with a deep and bitter hatred of all things German.
+
+The British Government took a great interest in the British prisoners
+in Germany. Nothing was omitted and every suggestion made by me
+was immediately acted on; while many most valuable hints were
+given me from London as to prisoners' affairs. Their Majesties,
+the King and Queen, showed a deep personal concern in the welfare
+of the unfortunate British in German hands; and this concern
+never flagged during the period of my stay in Berlin. Lord Robert
+Cecil and Lord Newton were continually working for the benefit
+of British prisoners.
+
+At a time when the British prisoners were without proper clothing,
+the British Government sent me uniforms, overcoats, etc., and I
+hired a warehouse in Berlin as a distributing point; but, after
+some months, the German authorities refused to allow me to continue
+this method of distribution on the ground that it was the duty
+of Germany to provide the prisoners with clothes. But Germany
+was not performing this duty and the British prisoners had to
+suffer because of this German official woodenheadedness.
+
+In the spring of 1916, quite characteristically, the Germans
+broke their "treaty" concerning visits to prisoners, and refused
+to permit us to speak to prisoners out of hearing. Von Jagow
+told me that this was because of the trouble made among Russian
+prisoners by the visits of Madam Sazonoff, but this had nothing
+to do with the arrangement between Great Britain and Germany.
+
+I think that the Germans suspected that I had learned from fellow
+prisoners of the cruel and unnecessary shooting of two Irish
+prisoners at Limburg. It was not from prisoners, however, that
+I obtained this information. but from Germans who wrote to me.
+
+In addition to the English and Japanese, I had the protection
+of the Serbian and Roumanian subjects and the protection of the
+interests of a very small country, the Republic of San Marino.
+Soon after the Serbians and Roumanians appeared in the prison
+camps of Germany we made reports on the condition and treatment
+of these prisoners, as well as reports concerning the British.
+
+I was able to converse with some Serbians, in the first days
+of the war, in their native tongue, which, curiously enough,
+was Spanish. Immediately after the persecution of the Jews in
+Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella and other monarchs, a number of
+Spanish Jews emigrated to Serbia where they have remained ever
+since, keeping their old customs and speaking the old Spanish
+of the time of Cervantes.
+
+The German authorities, in the most petty manner, often concealed
+from me the presence of British prisoners, especially civilians,
+in prison camps. For a long time I was not informed of the presence
+of British civilians in Sennelager and it was only by paying
+a surprise visit by motor to the camp at Brandenburg that I
+discovered a few British, the crew of a trawler, there. It was
+on information contained in an anonymous letter, evidently from
+the wife of some German officer, that I visited Brandenburg where
+the crew of this trawler, deprived of money, were without any of
+the little comforts or packages that mitigate life in a German
+prison camp.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC
+
+At the commencement of the war for some days I was cut off from
+communication with the United States; but we soon established a
+chain of communication, at first through Italy and later by way
+of Denmark. At all times cables from Washington to Berlin, or
+_vice_versa_, took, on the average, two days in transmission.
+
+After the fall of Liège, von Jagow sent for me and asked me if
+I would transmit through the American Legation a proposition
+offering Belgium peace and indemnity if no further opposition
+were made to the passage of German troops through Belgium. As the
+proposition was a proposition for peace, I took the responsibility
+of forwarding it and sent the note of the German Government to
+our Minister at the Hague for transmission to our Minister in
+Belgium.
+
+Dr. Van Dyke, our Minister at the Hague, refused to have anything
+to do with the transmission of this proposition and turned the
+German note over to the Holland Minister for Foreign Affairs,
+and through this channel the proposition reached the Belgian
+Government.
+
+The State Department cabled me a message from the President to
+the Emperor which stated that the United States stood ready at
+any time to mediate between the warring powers, and directed
+me to present this proposition direct to the Emperor.
+
+I, therefore, asked for an audience with the Emperor and received
+word from the chief Court Marshal that the Emperor would receive
+me at the palace in Berlin on the morning of August tenth. I
+drove in a motor into the courtyard of the palace and was there
+escorted to the door which opened on a flight of steps leading
+to a little garden about fifty yards square, directly on the
+embankment of the River Spree, which flows past the Royal Palace.
+As I went down the steps, the Empress and her only daughter,
+the Duchess of Brunswick, came up. Both stopped and shook hands
+with me, speaking a few words. I found the Emperor seated at a
+green iron table under a large canvas garden umbrella. Telegraph
+forms were scattered on the table in front of him and basking in
+the gravel were two small dachshunds. I explained to the Emperor
+the object of my visit and we had a general conversation about
+the war and the state of affairs. The Emperor took some of the
+large telegraph blanks and wrote out in pencil his reply to the
+President's offer, This reply, of course, I cabled immediately
+to the State Department.
+
+  _For_the_President_of_the_
+      _United_States_personally:_
+
+                                                     10/VIII 14.
+
+  1. H. R. H. Prince Henry was received by his Majesty King George
+  V in London, who empowered him to transmit to me verbally, that
+  England would remain neutral if war broke out on the Continent
+  involving Germany and France, Austria and Russia. This message
+  was telegraphed to me by my brother from London after his
+  conversation with H. M. the King, and repeated verbally on the
+  twenty-ninth of July.
+
+  2. My Ambassador in London transmitted a message from Sir E.
+  Grey to Berlin saying that only in case France was likely to
+  be crushed England would interfere.
+
+  3. On the thirtieth my Ambassador in London reported that Sir
+  Edward Grey in course of a "private" conversation told him that
+  if the conflict remained localized between _Russia_--not
+  Serbia--and _Austria_, England would not move, but if we
+  "mixed" in the fray she would take quick decisions and grave
+  measures; i. e., if I left my ally Austria in the lurch to
+  fight alone England would not touch me.
+
+  4. This communication being directly counter to the King's
+  message to me, I telegraphed to H. M. on the twenty-ninth or
+  thirtieth, thanking him for kind messages through my brother
+  and begging him to use all his power to keep France and
+  Russia--his Allies--from making any war-like preparations
+  calculated to disturb my work of mediation, stating that I
+  was in constant communication with H. M. the Czar. In the
+  evening the King kindly answered that he had ordered his
+  Government to use every possible influence with his Allies
+  to refrain from taking any provocative military measures. At
+  the same time H. M. asked me if I would transmit to Vienna
+  the British proposal that Austria was to take Belgrade and a
+  few other Serbian towns and a strip of country as a "main-mise"
+  to make sure that the Serbian promises on paper should be
+  fulfilled in reality. This proposal was in the same moment
+  telegraphed to me from Vienna for London, quite in conjunction
+  with the British proposal; besides, I had telegraphed to H. M.
+  the Czar the same as an idea of mine, before I received the two
+  communications from Vienna and London, as both were of the same
+  opinion.
+
+  5. I immediately transmitted the telegrams _vice_versa_ to
+  Vienna and London. I felt that I was able to tide the question
+  over and was happy at the peaceful outlook.
+
+  6. While I was preparing a note to H. M. the Czar the next
+  morning, to inform him that Vienna, London and Berlin were agreed
+  about the treatment of affairs, I received the telephones from
+  H. E. the Chancellor that in the night before the Czar had given
+  the order to mobilize the whole of the Russian army, which was,
+  of course, also meant against Germany; whereas up till then the
+  southern armies had been mobilized against Austria.
+
+  7. In a telegram from London my Ambassador informed me he
+  understood the British Government would guarantee neutrality
+  of France and wished to know whether Germany would refrain from
+  attack. I telegraphed to H. M. the King personally that
+  mobilization being already carried out could not be stopped, but
+  if H. M. could guarantee with his armed forces the neutrality of
+  France I would refrain _from_attacking_her_, _leave_her_alone_
+  and employ my troops elsewhere. H. M. answered that he thought my
+  offer was based on a misunderstanding; and, as far as I can make
+  out, Sir E. Grey never took my offer into serious consideration.
+  He never answered it. Instead, he declared England had to defend
+  Belgian neutrality, which had to be violated by Germany on
+  strategical grounds, news having been received that France was
+  already preparing to enter Belgium, and the King of Belgians
+  having refused my petition for a free passage under guarantee
+  of his country's freedom. I am most grateful for the President's
+  message.
+
+                                                  WILLIAM, H. R.
+
+When the German Emperor in my presence indited his letter to
+President Wilson of August tenth, 1914, he asked that I cable
+it immediately to the State Department and that I simultaneously
+give it to the press. As I have already stated, I cabled the
+document immediately to the State Department at Washington, but
+I withheld it from publication.
+
+My interview with the Emperor was in the morning. That afternoon
+a man holding a high position in Germany sent for me. I do not
+give his name because I do not wish to involve him in any way
+with the Emperor, so I shall not even indicate whether he is a
+royalty or an official. He said:
+
+"You had an interview today with the Emperor. What happened?"
+
+I told of the message given me for the President which was intended
+for publication by the Emperor. He said:
+
+"I think you ought to show that message to me; you know the Emperor
+is a constitutional Emperor and there was once a great row about
+such a message."
+
+I showed him the message, and when he had read it he said: "I
+think it would be inadvisable for us to have this message published,
+and in the interest of good feeling between Germany and America.
+If you cable it ask that publication be withheld."
+
+I complied with his request and it is characteristic of the
+President's desire to preserve good relations that publication
+was withheld. Now, when the two countries are at war; when the
+whole world, and especially our own country, has an interest in
+knowing how this great calamity of universal war came to the
+earth, the time has come when this message should be given out
+and I have published it by permission.
+
+This most interesting document in the first place clears up one
+issue never really obscure in the eyes of the world--the deliberate
+violation of the neutrality of Belgium, whose territory "had to
+be violated by Germany on strategical grounds." The very weak
+excuse is added that "news had been received that France was
+already preparing to enter Belgium,"--not even a pretense that
+there had ever been any actual violation of Belgium's frontier
+by the French prior to the German invasion of that unfortunate
+country. Of course the second excuse that the King of the Belgians
+had refused entrance to the Emperor's troops under guarantee of
+his country's freedom is even weaker than the first. It would
+indeed inaugurate a new era in the intercourse of nations if a
+small nation could only preserve its freedom by at all times,
+on request, granting free passage to the troops of a powerful
+neighbour on the march to attack an adjoining country.
+
+And aside from the violation of Belgian neutrality, what would
+have become of England and of the world if the Prussian autocracy
+had been left free to defeat--one by one--the nations of the
+earth? First, the defeat of Russia and Serbia by Austria and
+Germany, the incorporation of a large part of Russia in the German
+Empire, German influence predominant in Russia and all the vast
+resources of that great Empire at the command of Germany. All the
+fleets in the world could uselessly blockade the German coasts
+if Germany possessed the limitless riches of the Empire of the
+Romanoffs.
+
+[Illustration: ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS, WHICH THE GERMANS DECLARED
+HAD BEEN FOUND IN LONGWY.]
+
+The German army drawing for reserves on the teeming populations
+of Russia and Siberia would never know defeat. And this is not
+idle conjecture, mere dreaming in the realm of possibilities,
+because the Russian revolution has shown us how weak and tottering
+in reality was the dreaded power of the Czar.
+
+Russia, beaten and half digested, France would have been an easy
+prey, and England, even if then joining France in war, would
+have a far different problem to face if the V-boats were now
+sailing from Cherbourg and Calais and Brest and Bordeaux on the
+mission of piracy and murder, and then would come our turn and
+that of Latin America. The first attack would come not on us,
+but on South or Central America--at some point to which it would
+be as difficult for us to send troops to help our neighbor as
+it would be for Germany to attack.
+
+Remember that in Southern Brazil nearly four hundred thousand
+Germans are sustained, as I found out, in their devotion to the
+Fatherland by annual grants of money for educational purposes
+from the Imperial treasury in Berlin.
+
+It was not without reason that at this interview, when the Kaiser
+wrote this message to the President, he said that the coming
+in of England had changed the whole situation and would make
+the war a long one. The Kaiser talked rather despondently about
+the war. I tried to cheer him up by saying the German troops
+would soon enter Paris, but he answered, "The English change
+the whole situation--an obstinate nation--they will keep up the
+war. It cannot end soon."
+
+It was the entry of England into the war, in defence of the rights
+of small nations, in defence of the guaranteed neutrality of
+Belgium, which saved the world from the harsh dominion of the
+conquest-hungry Prussians and therefore saved as well the two
+Americas and their protecting doctrine of President Monroe.
+
+The document, which is dated August tenth, 1914, supersedes the
+statement made by the German Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg in
+his speech before the Reichstag on August fourth, 1914, in which
+he gave the then official account of the entrance into the war of
+the Central Empires. It will be noted that von Bethmann-Hollweg
+insisted that France began the war in the sentence reading: "There
+were bomb-throwing fliers, cavalry patrols, invading companies
+in the Reichsland (Alsace-Lorraine). Thereby France, although
+the condition of war had not yet been declared, had attacked our
+territory." But the Emperor makes no mention of this fact, of
+supreme importance if true, in his writing to President Wilson
+six days later.
+
+Quite curiously, at this time there was a belief on the part
+of the Germans that Japan would declare war on the Allies and
+range herself on the side of the Central Powers. In fact on one
+night there was a friendly demonstration in front of the Japanese
+Embassy, but these hopes were soon dispelled by the ultimatum
+of Japan sent on the sixteenth of August, and, finally, by the
+declaration of war on August twenty-third.
+
+During the first days of the war the warring powers indulged in
+mutual recriminations as to the use of dumdum bullets and I was
+given several packages of cartridges containing bullets bored out
+at the top which the Germans said had been found in the French
+fortress of Longwy, with a request that I send an account of them
+to President Wilson and ask for his intervention in the matter.
+Very wisely President Wilson refused to do anything of the kind,
+as otherwise he would have been deluged with constant complaints
+from both sides as to the violations of the rules of war.
+
+The cartridges given to me were in packages marked on the outside
+"_Cartouches_de_Stand_" and from this I took it that possibly
+these cartridges had been used on some shooting range near the
+fort and the bullets bored out in order that they might not go
+too far, if carelessly fired over the targets.
+
+On August fifth, with our Naval Attaché, Commander Walter Gherardi,
+I called upon von Tirpitz, to learn from him which ports be
+considered safest for the ships to be sent from America with gold
+for stranded Americans. He recommended Rotterdam.
+
+I also had a conversation on this day with Geheimrat Letze of
+the Foreign Office with reference to the proposition that English
+and German ships respectively should have a delay of until the
+fourteenth of August in which to leave the English or German
+ports in which they chanced to be.
+
+The second week in August, my wife's sister and her husband,
+Count Sigray, arrived in Berlin. Count Sigray is a reserve officer
+of the Hungarian Hussars and was in Montana when the first rumours
+of war came. He and his wife immediately started for New York and
+sailed on the fourth of August. They landed in England, and as
+England had not yet declared war on Austria, they were able to
+proceed on their journey. With them were Count George Festetics
+and Count Cziraki, the former from the Austrian Embassy in London
+and the latter from that in Washington. They were all naturally
+very much excited about war and the events of their trip. The
+Hungarians as a people are quite like Americans. They have agreeable
+manners and are able to laugh in a natural way, something which
+seems to be a lost art in Prussia. Nearly all the members of
+Hungarian noble families speak English perfectly and model their
+clothes, sports and country life, as far as possible, after the
+English.
+
+The thirteenth saw the departure of our first special train
+containing Americans bound for Holland. I saw the Americans off
+at the Charlottenburg station. They all departed in great spirits
+and very glad of an opportunity to leave Germany.
+
+I had some negotiations about the purchase by America or Americans
+of the ships of the North German Lloyd, but nothing came of these
+negotiations. Trainloads of Americans continued to leave, but
+there seemed to be no end to the Americans coming into Berlin
+from all directions.
+
+On August twenty-ninth, Count Szoegyeny, the Austrian Ambassador,
+left Berlin. He had been Ambassador there for twenty-two years and
+I suppose because of his advancing years the Austrian Government
+thought that he had outlived his usefulness. Quite a crowd of
+Germans and diplomats were at the station to witness the rather
+sad farewell. His successor was Prince Hohenlohe, married to a
+daughter of Archduke Frederick. She expressly waived her right
+to precedence as a royal highness, and agreed to take only the
+precedence given to her as the wife of the Ambassador, in order not
+to cause feeling in Berlin. Prince Hohenlohe, a rather easy-going
+man, who had been most popular in Russia and Austria, immediately
+made a favourable impression in Berlin and successfully occupied
+the difficult position of mediator between the governments of
+Berlin and Vienna.
+
+On September fourth the Chancellor gave me a statement to give
+to the reporters in which he attacked England, claiming that
+England did not desire the friendship of Germany but was moved by
+commercial jealousy and a desire to crush her; that the efforts
+made for peace had failed because Russia, under all circumstances,
+was resolved upon war; and that Germany had entered Belgium in
+order to forestall the planned French advance. He also claimed
+that England, regardless of consequences to the white race, had
+excited Japan to a pillaging expedition, and claimed that Belgian
+girls and women had gouged out the eyes of the wounded; that
+officers had been invited to dinner and shot across the table;
+and Belgian women had cut the throats of soldiers quartered in
+their houses while they were asleep. The Chancellor concluded by
+saying, in this statement, that everyone knows that the German
+people is not capable of unnecessary cruelty or of any brutality.
+
+We were fully occupied with taking care of the English prisoners
+and interests, the Americans, and negotiations relating to commercial
+questions, and to getting goods required in the United States out
+of Germany, when, on October seventh, a most unpleasant incident,
+and one which for some time caused the members of our Embassy
+to feel rather bitterly toward the German Foreign Office, took
+place.
+
+A great number of British civilians, men and women, were stranded
+in Berlin. To many of these were paid sums of money in the form
+of small allowances on behalf of the British Government. In order
+to facilitate this work, we placed the clerks employed in this
+distribution in the building formerly occupied by the British Consul
+in Berlin. Of course, the great crowds of Americans resorting to
+our Embassy, when combined with the crowds of British, made it
+almost impossible even to enter the Embassy, and establishment
+of this outlying relief station materially helped this situation.
+I occupied it, and employed English men and English women in this
+relief work by the express permission of the Imperial Foreign
+Office, which I thought it wise to obtain in view of the fact
+that the Germans seemed daily to become more irritable and
+suspicious, especially after the Battle of the Marne.
+
+On the night of October second, our Second Secretary, Harvey, went
+to this relief headquarters at about twelve o'clock at night, and
+was witness to a raid made by the Berlin police on this establishment
+of ours. The men and women working were arrested, and all books
+and papers which the police could get at were seized by them.
+The next morning I went around to the place and on talking with
+the criminal detectives in charge, was told by them that they had
+made the raid by the orders of the Foreign Office. When I spoke
+to the Foreign Office about this, they denied that they had given
+directions for the raid and made a sort of half apology. The raid
+was all the more unjustified because only the day before I had had
+a conversation with the Adjutant of the Berlin Kommandantur and
+told him that, although I had permission from the Foreign Office,
+I thought it would be better to dismiss the English employed and
+employ only Americans or Germans; and I sent round to my friend,
+Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and asked him to
+recommend some German accountants to me.
+
+The Kommandantur is the direct office of military control. When
+the Adjutant heard of the raid he was almost as indignant as I
+was, and on the tenth of October informed me that he had learned
+that the raid had been made on the joint orders of the Foreign
+Office and von Tirpitz's department.
+
+The books and papers of an Embassy, including those relating
+to the affairs of foreign nations temporarily in the Embassy's
+care, are universally recognised in international law as not,
+subject to seizure, nor did the fact that I was carrying on this
+work outside the actual Embassy building have any bearing on
+this point so long as the building was directly under my control
+and, especially, as the only work carried on was work properly
+in my hands in my official capacity. The Foreign Office saw that
+they had made a mistake, but at Zimmermann's earnest request
+I agreed, as it were, to forget the incident. Later on, this
+precedent might have been used by our government had they desired
+to press the matter of the seizure of von Igel's papers. Von Igel,
+it will be remembered, was carrying on business of a private
+nature in a private office hired by him. Nevertheless, as he
+had been employed in some capacity in the German Embassy at
+Washington, Count von Bernstorff claimed immunity from seizure
+for the papers found in that office.
+
+On August sixteenth the Kaiser left Berlin for the front. I wrote
+to his master of the household, saying that I should like an
+opportunity to be at the railway station to say good-bye to the
+Emperor, but was put off on various excuses. Thereafter the Emperor
+practically abandoned Berlin and lived either in Silesia, at
+Pless, or at some place near the Western front.
+
+At first, following the precedent of the war of 1870, the more
+important members of the government followed the Kaiser to the
+front, even the Chancellor and the Minister of Foreign Affairs
+abandoning their offices in Berlin. Not long afterwards, when it
+was apparent that the war must be carried on on several fronts
+and that it was not going to be the matter of a few weeks which
+the Germans had first supposed, these officials returned to their
+offices in Berlin. In the meantime, however, much confusion had
+been caused by this rather ridiculous effort to follow the customs
+of the war of 1870.
+
+When von Jagow, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent at the
+Great General Headquarters, the diplomats remaining behind conducted
+their negotiations with Zimmermann, who in turn had to transmit
+everything to the great general headquarters.
+
+In August, there were apparently rumours afloat in countries
+outside of Germany that prominent Socialists at the outbreak of
+the war had been shot. The State Department cabled me to find
+out whether there was any truth in these rumours, with particular
+reference to Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg.
+
+Liebknecht is a lawyer practicing in Berlin and so I telephoned
+him, asking him to come and see me. He did so, and of course, by
+his presence verified the fact that he had not been executed.
+He told me that the rumours as to the treatment of the Socialists
+were entirely unfounded and said that he had no objection to my
+cabling a statement that the Socialists were opposed to Czarismus
+and that he personally had confidence in the German army and the
+cause of the German people.
+
+Many people confuse Liebknecht with his father, now dead. Liebknecht,
+the son, is a man of perhaps forty-three years, with dark bushy
+hair and moustache and wearing eye-glasses, a man of medium height
+and not at all of strong build. In the numerous interruptions
+made by him during the debates in the Reichstag, during the first
+year of the war, his voice sounded high and shrill. Of course,
+anyone who defies the heavy hand of autocracy must suffer from
+nervousness. We all knew that sooner or later autocracy would
+"get" Liebknecht, and its opportunity came when he appeared in
+citizen's clothes at an attempted mass-meeting at the Potsdamerplatz.
+For the offence of appearing out of uniform after being called
+and mobilized, and for alleged incitement of the people, he was
+condemned for a long term of imprisonment. One can but admire
+his courage. I believe that he earns his living by the practice
+of law before one of the minor courts. It is hard to say just
+what _rôle_ he will play in the future. It is probable that
+when the Socialists settle down after the war and think things
+over, they will consider that the leadership of Scheidemann has
+been too conservative; that he submitted too readily to the powers
+of autocracy and too easily abandoned the program of the Socialists.
+In this case, Liebknecht perhaps will be made leader of the
+Socialists, and it is within the bounds of probability that
+Scheidemann and certain of his party may become Liberals rather
+than Socialists.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS
+
+In the autumn of 1914, the rush of getting the Americans out
+of Germany was over. The care of the British civilians was on a
+business basis and there were comparatively few camps of prisoners
+of war. Absolutely tired by working every day and until twelve
+at night, I went to Munich for a two weeks' rest.
+
+On February fourth, 1915, Germany announced that on February
+eighteenth the blockade of England through submarines would commence.
+
+Some very peculiar and mysterious negotiations thereafter ensued.
+About February eighth, an American who was very intimate with
+the members of the General Staff came to me with a statement
+that Germany desired peace and was ready to open negotiations
+to that end. It was, however, to be made a condition of these
+peace negotiations that this particular American should go to
+Paris and to Petrograd and inform the governments there of the
+overwhelming strength of the German armies and of their positions,
+which knowledge, it was said, he had obtained by personally visiting
+both the fronts. it was further intimated that von Tirpitz himself
+was anxious that peace should be concluded, possibly because of
+his fear that the proposed blockade would not be successful.
+
+Of course, I informed the State Department of these mysterious
+manoeuvres.
+
+I was taken by back stairways to a mysterious meeting with von
+Tirpitz at night in his rooms in the Navy Department. When I was
+alone with him, however, he had nothing definite to say or to
+offer; if there was any opportunity at that time to make peace
+nothing came of it. It looked somewhat to me as if the whole
+idea had been to get this American to go to Paris and Petrograd,
+certify from his personal observation to the strength of the
+German armies and position, and thereby to assist in enticing
+one or both of these countries to desert the allied cause. All of
+this took place about ten days before the eighteenth of February,
+the time named for the announcement of the blockade of England.
+
+Medals were struck having the head of von Tirpitz on one side
+and on the other the words "Gott strafe England," and a picture
+of a sort of Neptune assisted by a submarine rising from the
+sea to blockade the distant English coast.
+
+The Ambassador is supposed to have the right to demand an audience
+with the Kaiser at any time, and as there were matters connected
+with the treatment of prisoners as well as this coming submarine
+warfare which I wished to take up with him, I had on various
+occasions asked for an audience with him; on each occasion my
+request had been refused on some excuse or other, and I was not
+even permitted to go to the railway station to bid him good-bye
+on one occasion when he left for the front.
+
+When our Military Attaché, Major Langhorne, left in March, 1915,
+he had a farewell audience with the Kaiser and I then asked him
+to say to the Kaiser that I had not seen him for so long a time
+that I had forgotten what he looked like. Langhorne reported
+to me that he had given his message to the Kaiser and that the
+Kaiser said, "I have nothing against Mr. Gerard personally, but
+I will not see the Ambassador of a country which furnishes arms
+and ammunition to the enemies of Germany."
+
+Before the departure of Langhorne, I had succeeded in getting
+Germany to agree that six American army officers might visit
+Germany as military observers. When they arrived, I presented
+them at the Foreign Office, etc., and they were taken on trips
+to the East and West fronts.
+
+They were not allowed to see much, and their request to be attached
+to a particular unit was refused. Nearly everywhere they were
+subject to insulting remarks or treatment because of the shipment
+of munitions of war to the Allies from America; and finally after
+they had been subjected to deliberate insults at the hands of
+several German generals, Mackensen particularly distinguishing
+himself, the United States Government withdrew them from Germany.
+
+Colonel (now General) Kuhn, however, who was of these observers,
+was appointed Military Attaché in place of Major Langhorne. Speaking
+German fluently and acting with great tact, he managed for a long
+time to keep sufficiently in the good graces of the Germans to
+be allowed to see something of the operations of the various
+fronts. There came a period in 1916 when he was no longer invited
+to go on the various excursions made by the foreign military
+attachés and finally Major Nicolai, the general intelligence
+officer of the Great General Headquarters, sent for him early in
+the autumn of 1916, and informed him that he could no longer go
+to any of the fronts. Colonel Kuhn answered that he was aware of
+this already. Major Nicolai said that he gave him this information
+by direct order of General Ludendorf, that General Ludendorf had
+stated that he did not believe America could do more damage to
+Germany than she had done if the two countries were actually
+at war, and that he considered that, practically, America and
+Germany were engaged in hostilities. On this being reported to
+Washington, Colonel Kuhn was quite naturally recalled.
+
+I cannot praise too highly the patience and tact shown by Colonel
+Kuhn in dealing with the Germans. Although accused in the German
+newspapers of being a spy, and otherwise attacked, he kept his
+temper and observed all that he could for the benefit of his own
+country. As he had had an opportunity to observe the Russian-Japanese
+war, his experiences at that time, coupled with his experiences
+in Germany, make him, perhaps, our greatest American expert on
+modern war.
+
+It was with the greatest pleasure that I heard from Secretary
+Baker that he had determined to promote Colonel Kuhn to the rank
+of General and make him head of our War College, where his teachings
+will prove of the greatest value to the armies of the United States.
+
+Colonel House and his wife arrived to pay us a visit on March 19,
+1915, and remained until the twenty-eighth. During this period the
+Colonel met all the principal members of the German Government and
+many men of influence and prominence in the world of affairs, such
+as Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and Dr. Walter
+Rathenau, who succeeded his father as head of the Allgemeine
+Elektricitats Gesellschaft and hundreds of other corporations. The
+Colonel dined at the house of Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister,
+and lunched with von Gwinner.
+
+In April, negotiations were continued about the sinking of the
+_William_P._Fry_, an American boat loaded with food and
+destined for Ireland. The American Government on behalf of the
+owners of the _William_P._Fry_ claimed damages for the boat.
+Nothing was said about the cargo, but in the German answer it was
+stated that the cargo of the _William_P._Fry_ consisting of
+foodstuffs destined for an armed port of the enemy and, therefore,
+presumed to be destined for the armed forces of the enemy was,
+because of this, contraband. I spoke to von Jagow about this and
+told him that I thought that possibly this would seem to amount
+to a German justification of the British blockade of Germany.
+He said that this note had been drawn by Director Kriege who
+was their expert on international law, and that he would not
+interfere with Kriege's work. Of course, as a matter of fact,
+all foodstuffs shipped to Germany would have to be landed at
+some armed port, and, therefore, according to the contentions
+of Germany, these would be supposed to be destined to the armed
+forces of the enemy and become contraband of war.
+
+At international law, it had always been recognised that private
+individuals and corporations have the right to sell arms and
+ammunitions of war to any belligerent and, in the Hague Convention
+held in 1907, this right was expressly ratified and confirmed.
+This same Director Kriege who represented Germany at this Hague
+Conference in 1907, in the debates on this point said: "The neutral
+boats which engage in such a trade, commit a violation of the
+duties of neutrality. However, according to a principle generally
+recognised, the State of which the boat flies the flag is not
+responsible for this violation. The neutral States are not called
+upon to forbid their subjects a commerce which, from the point of
+view of the belligerents, ought to be considered as unlawful."
+(Conférence International de la Paix, La Haye, 15 Juin-18 Octobre
+1907. Vol. III, p. 859.)
+
+During our trouble with General Huerta, arms and ammunition for
+Huerta's forces from Germany were landed from German ships in
+Mexico. During the Boer war the Germans, who openly sympathised
+with the Boers, nevertheless furnished to England great quantities
+of arms and munitions, expressly destined to be used against
+the Boers; and this, although it was manifest that there was
+no possibility whatever that the Boers could obtain arms and
+munitions from German sources during the war. For instance, the
+firm of Eberhardt in Dusseldorf furnished one hundred and nine
+cannon, complete, with wagons, caissons and munitions, etc., to
+the English which were expressly designed for use against the
+Boers.
+
+At one time the Imperial Foreign Office sent me a formal note
+making reference to a paragraph in former Ambassador Andrew D.
+White's autobiography with reference to the alleged stoppage
+in a German port of a boat laden with arms and ammunition, for
+use against the Americans in Cuba during the Spanish War. Of
+course, former Ambassador White wrote without having the Embassy
+records at hand and those records show that the position he took
+at the time of this alleged stoppage was eminently correct.
+
+The files show that he wrote the letter to the State Department
+in which he stated that knowledge came to him of the proposed
+sailing of this ship, but he did not protest because he had been
+advised by a Naval Attaché that the United States did not have
+the right to interfere. The Department of State wrote to him
+commending his action in not filing any protest and otherwise
+interfering.
+
+It seemed as if the German Government expressly desired to stir
+up hatred against America on this issue in order to force the
+American Government through fear of either the German Government,
+or the German-American propagandists at home, to put an immediate
+embargo on the export of these supplies.
+
+In the autumn of 1914 Zimmermann showed me a long list sent him
+by Bernstorff showing quantities of saddles, automobiles, motor
+trucks, tires, explosives, foodstuffs and so on, exported from
+America to the Allies and intimated that this traffic had reached
+such proportions that it should be stopped.
+
+In February, 1915, in the official _Communiqué_ of the day
+appeared the following statement: "Heavy artillery fire in certain
+sections of the West front, mostly with American ammunition;"
+and in April in the official _Communiqué_ something to this
+effect: "Captured French artillery officers say that they have
+great stores of American ammunition." I obtained through the State
+Department in Washington a statement from the French Ambassador
+certifying that up to that time, the end of April, 1915, no shells
+whatever of the French artillery had been furnished from America.
+
+Nothing, however, would satisfy the Germans. They seemed determined
+that the export of every article, whether of food or munitions
+which might prove of use to the Allies in the war, should be
+stopped. Newspapers were filled with bitter attacks upon America
+and upon President Wilson, and with caricatures referring to
+the sale of munitions.
+
+It never seemed to occur to the Germans that we could not violate
+the Hague Convention in order to change the rules of the game
+because one party, after the commencement of hostilities, found
+that the rule worked to his disadvantage. Nor did the Germans
+consider that America could not vary its international law with
+the changing fortunes of war and make one ruling when the Germans
+lost control of the sea and another ruling if they regained it.
+
+From early in 1915 until I left Germany, I do not think I ever
+had a conversation with a German without his alluding to this
+question. Shortly before leaving Germany, in January, 1917, and
+after I had learned of the probability of the resumption of ruthless
+submarine war, at an evening party at the house of Dr. Solf, the
+Colonial Minister, a large German who turned out to be one of
+the Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, planted himself some
+distance away from me and addressed me in German saying, "You are
+the American Ambassador and I want to tell you that the conduct
+of America in furnishing arms and ammunition to the enemies of
+Germany is stamped deep on the German heart, that we will never
+forget it and will some day have our revenge." He spoke in a
+voice so loud and slapped his chest so hard that everyone in
+the room stopped their conversation in order to hear. He wore
+on his breast the orders of the Black Eagle, the Red Eagle, the
+Elephant and the Seraphim, and when he struck all this menagerie
+the rattle alone was quite loud. I reminded him politely of the
+Hague Convention, of the fact that we could not change international
+law from time to time with the change in the situation of the war,
+and that Germany had furnished arms to England to use against the
+Boers. But he simply answered, "We care nothing for treaties,"
+and my answer, "That is what they all say," was a retort too
+obvious to be omitted.
+
+The German press continually published articles to the effect
+that the war would be finished if it were not for the shipment
+of supplies from America. All public opinion was with the German
+Government when the warning was issued on February fourth, 1915,
+stating that the blockade of England would commence on the eighteenth
+and warning neutral ships to keep out of the war zone. From then
+on we had constant cases and crises with reference to the sinking
+of American boats by the German submarine. There were the cases
+of the _Gulfflight_ and the _Cushing_ and the _Falaba_, an English
+boat sunk without warning on which Americans were killed. On May
+sixth, 1915, Director Kriege of the Foreign Office asked Mr. Jackson
+to call and see him, and told him that he would like to have the
+following three points brought to the attention of the American
+public:
+
+  "1. As the result of the English effort to stop all foreign
+  commerce with Germany, Germany would do everything in her power
+  to destroy English commerce and merchant shipping. There was,
+  however, never at any time an intention to destroy or interfere
+  with neutral commerce or to attack neutral shipping unless
+  engaged in contraband trade. In view of the action of the
+  British Government in arming merchant vessels and causing
+  them to disguise their national character, the occasional
+  destruction of a neutral ship was unavoidable. Naval officers
+  in command of submarines had been instructed originally, and
+  new and more stringent instructions had been issued repeatedly,
+  to use the utmost care, consistent with their own safety, to
+  avoid attacks on neutral vessels.
+
+  "2. In case a neutral ship should be destroyed by a submarine
+  the German Government is prepared to make an immediate and
+  formal expression of its regret and to pay an indemnity, without
+  having recourse to a prize court.
+
+  "3. All reports with regard to the destruction of a neutral
+  vessel by a German submarine are investigated at once by both
+  the German Foreign Office and Admiralty and the result is
+  communicated to the Government concerned, which is requested in
+  return to communicate to the German Government the result of its
+  own independent investigation. Where there is any material
+  divergence in the two reports as to the presumed cause of
+  destruction (torpedo or mine), the question is to be submitted
+  to investigation by a commission composed of representatives of
+  the two nations concerned, with a neutral arbiter whose decision
+  will be final. This course has already been adopted in two cases,
+  in which a Dutch and a Norwegian vessel, respectively, were
+  concerned. The German Government reserves its right to refuse
+  this international arbitration in exceptional cases where for
+  military reasons the German Admiralty are opposed to its taking
+  place."
+
+Director Kriege told Mr. Jackson that a written communication in
+which the substance of the foregoing would be contained, would
+soon to be made to the Embassy.
+
+Mr. Jackson put this conversation down in the form above given
+and showed Director Kriege a copy of it. Later in the day Geheimrat
+Simon called on Mr. Jackson at the Embassy and said that Dr.
+Kriege would like to have point two read as follows:
+
+  "In case _through_any_unfortunate_mistake_a_neutral_ship_,"
+  and continuing to the end; and that Dr. Kriege would like to
+  change what was written on point three beginning with "Where
+  there is" so that it should read, as follows:--"Where there is
+  any material divergence in the two reports as to the presumed
+  cause of destruction (torpedo or mine), the German Government has
+  already in several instances declared its readiness to submit
+  the question to the decision of an international commission in
+  accordance with the Hague Convention for the friendly settlement
+  of international disputes."
+
+This had been suggested by Director Kriege in case it should
+be decided to make a communication to the American Press. Mr.
+Jackson told Geheimrat Simon that he would report the subject of
+his conversation to me, but that it would depend upon me whether
+any communication should be made to the American Government or
+to the press upon the subject.
+
+Of course, the news of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ on
+May seventh and of the great loss of American lives brought
+about a very critical situation, and naturally nothing was done
+with Kriege's propositions.
+
+It is unnecessary here for me to go into the notes which were
+exchanged between the two governments because all that is already
+public property.
+
+Sometime after I had delivered our first _Lusitania_ Note of
+May 11th, 1915, Zimmermann was lunching with us. A good looking
+American woman, married to a German, was also of the party and
+after lunch although I was talking to some one else I overheard
+part of her conversation with Zimmermann. When Zimmermann left
+I asked her what it was that he had said about America, Germany,
+Mr. Bryan and the _Lusitania_. She then told me that she
+had said to Zimmermann that it was a great pity that we were
+to leave Berlin as it looked as if diplomatic relations between
+the two countries would be broken, and that Zimmermann told her
+not to worry about that because they had just received word from
+the Austrian Government that Dr. Dumba, the Austrian Ambassador
+in Washington, had cabled that the _Lusitania_ Note from
+America to Germany was only sent as a sop to public opinion in
+America and that the government did not really mean what was
+said in that note. I then called on Zimmermann at the Foreign
+Office and he showed me Dumba's telegram which was substantially
+as stated above. Of course, I immediately cabled to the State
+Department and also got word to President Wilson. The rest of
+the incident is public property. I, of course, did not know what
+actually occurred between Mr. Bryan and Dr. Dumba, but I am sure
+that Dr. Dumba must have misunderstood friendly statements made
+by Mr. Bryan.
+
+It was very lucky that I discovered the existence of this Dumba
+cablegram in this manner which savours almost of diplomacy as
+represented on the stage. If the Germans had gone on in the belief
+that the _Lusitania_ Note was not really meant, war would
+have inevitably resulted at that time between Germany and America,
+and it shows how great events may be shaped by heavy luncheons
+and a pretty woman.
+
+Before this time much indignation had been caused in Germany
+by the fact that the _Lusitania_ on her eastward voyage
+from New York early in February, 1915, had raised the American
+flag when nearing British waters.
+
+Shortly after this incident had become known, I was at the
+Wintergarten, a large concert hall in Berlin, with Grant Smith,
+First Secretary of the Embassy at Vienna and other members of
+my staff. We naturally spoke English among ourselves, a fact
+which aroused the ire of a German who had been drinking heavily
+and who was seated in the next box. He immediately began to call
+out that some one was speaking English and when told by one of
+the attendants that it was the American Ambassador, he immediately
+cried in a loud voice that Americans were even worse than English
+and that the _Lusitania_ had been flying the American flag as
+protection in British waters.
+
+The audience, however, took sides against him and told him to
+shut up and as I left the house at the close of the performance,
+some Germans spoke to me and apologised for his conduct. The
+next day the manager of the Wintergarten called on me also to
+express his regret for the occurrence.
+
+About a year afterwards I was at the races one day and saw this
+man and asked him what he meant by making such a noise at the
+Wintergarten. He immediately apologised and said that he had
+been drinking and hoped that I would forget the incident. This
+was the only incident of the kind which occurred to me during
+all the time that I was in Germany.
+
+Both before and after the sinking of the _Lusitania_, the
+German Foreign Office put forward all kinds of proposals with
+reference to American ships in the war zone. On one afternoon,
+Zimmermann, who had a number of these proposals drafted in German,
+showed them to me and I wrote down the English translation for him
+to see how it would look in English. These proposals were about
+the sailing from America of what might be called certified ships,
+the ships to be painted and striped in a distinctive way, to come
+from certified ports at certain certified times, America to agree
+that these ships should carry no contraband whatever. All these
+proposals were sternly rejected by the President.
+
+On February sixteenth, the German answer to our note of February
+tenth had announced that Germany declined all responsibility for
+what might happen to neutral ships and, in addition, announced
+that mines would be allowed in waters surrounding Great Britain
+and Ireland. This note also contained one of Zimmermann's proposed
+solutions, namely, that American warships should convoy American
+merchantmen.
+
+The German note of the sixteenth also spoke about the great traffic
+in munitions from the United States to the Allies, and contained
+a suggestion that the United States should induce the Allies to
+adopt the Declaration of London and omit the importation not
+only of food but also of all raw materials into Germany.
+
+February twentieth was the date of the conciliatory note addressed
+by President Wilson to both Great Britain and Germany; and contained
+the suggestion that submarines should not be employed against
+merchant vessels of any nationality and that food should be allowed
+to go through for the civil population of Germany consigned to
+the agencies named by the United States in Germany, which were
+to see that the food was received and distributed to the civil
+population.
+
+In the meantime the mines on the German coast had destroyed two
+American ships, both loaded with cotton for Germany; one called
+the _Carib_ and the other the _Evelyn_.
+
+In America, Congress refused to pass a law to put it in the power
+of the President to place an embargo on the export of munitions
+of war.
+
+In April, Count Bernstorff delivered his note concerning the
+alleged want of neutrality of the United States, referring to
+the numerous new industries in war materials being built up in
+the United States, stating, "In reality the United States is
+supplying only Germany's enemies, a fact which is not in any
+way modified by the theoretical willingness to furnish Germany
+as well."
+
+To this note, Secretary Bryan in a note replied that it was
+impossible, in view of the indisputable doctrines of accepted
+international law, to make any change in our own laws of neutrality
+which meant unequally affecting, during the progress of the war,
+the relations of the United States with the various nations at
+war; and that the placing of embargoes on the trade in arms which
+constituted such a change would be a direct violation of the
+neutrality of the United States.
+
+But all these negotiations, reproaches and recriminations were
+put an end to by the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_, with the
+killing of American women and civilians who were passengers on
+that vessel.
+
+I believed myself that we would immediately break diplomatic
+relations, and prepared to leave Germany. On May eleventh, I
+delivered to von Jagow the _Lusitania_ Note, which after
+calling attention to the cases of the sinking of American boats,
+ending with the _Lusitania_, contained the statement, "The
+Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of
+the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the
+sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and
+its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercises and
+enjoyments."
+
+During this period I had constant conversations with von Jagow
+and Zimmermann, and it was during the conversations about this
+submarine warfare that Zimmermann on one occasion said to me:
+"The United States does not dare to do anything against Germany
+because we have five hundred thousand German reservists in America
+who will rise in arms against your government if your government
+should dare to take any action against Germany." As he said this,
+he worked himself up to a passion and repeatedly struck the table
+with his fist. I told him that we had five hundred and one thousand
+lamp posts in America, and that was where the German reservists
+would find themselves if they tried any uprising; and I also
+called his attention to the fact that no German-Americans making
+use of the American passports which they could easily obtain,
+were sailing for Germany by way of Scandinavian countries in
+order to enlist in the German army. I told him that if he could
+show me one person with an American passport who had come to
+fight in the German army I might more readily believe what he
+said about the Germans in America rising in revolution.
+
+As a matter of fact, during the whole course of the war, I knew
+of only one man with American citizenship who enlisted in the
+German army. This was an American student then in Germany who
+enlisted in a German regiment. His father, a business man in New
+York, cabled me asking me to have his son released from the German
+army; so I procured the discharge of the young man who immediately
+wrote to me and informed me that he was over twenty-one, and
+that he could not see what business his father had to interfere
+with his military ambitions. I thereupon withdrew my request
+with reference to him, but he had already been discharged from
+the army. When his regiment went to the West front he stowed
+away on the cars with it, was present at the attack on Ypres,
+and was shot through the body. He recovered in a German hospital,
+received the Iron Cross, was discharged and sailed for America.
+What has since become of him I do not know.
+
+I do not intend to go in great detail into this exchange of notes
+and the public history of the submarine controversy, as all that
+properly belongs to the history of the war rather than to an
+account of my personal experiences; and besides, as Victor Hugo
+said, "History is not written with a microscope." All will remember
+the answer of Germany to the American _Lusitania_ Note, which
+answer, delivered on May twenty-ninth, contained the charge that
+the _Lusitania_ was armed and carried munitions, and had been
+used in the transport of Canadian troops. In the meantime, however,
+the American ship, _Nebraskan_, had been torpedoed off the coast
+of Ireland on the twenty-sixth; and, on May twenty-eighth, Germany
+stated that the American steamer, _Gulfflight_, had been torpedoed
+by mistake, and apologised for this act.
+
+Von Jagow gave me, about the same time, a Note requesting that
+American vessels should be more plainly marked and should illuminate
+their marking at night.
+
+The second American _Lusitania_ Note was published on June
+eleventh, 1915; and its delivery was coincident with the resignation
+of Mr. Bryan as Secretary of State. In this last Note President
+Wilson (for, of course, it is an open secret that he was the
+author of these Notes) made the issue perfectly plain, referring
+to the torpedoing of enemy passenger ships. "Only her actual
+resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so
+for the purpose of visit could have afforded the commander of the
+submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of
+those on board the ship in jeopardy." On July eighth the German
+answer to this American _Lusitania_ Note was delivered, and
+again stated that "we have been obliged to adopt a submarine war
+to meet the declared intentions of our enemies and the method of
+warfare adopted by them in contravention of international law".
+Again referring to the alleged fact of the _Lusitania's_
+carrying munitions they said: "If the _Lusitania_ had been
+spared, thousands of cases of munitions would have been sent to
+Germany's enemies and thereby thousands of German mothers and
+children robbed of breadwinners." The note then contained some
+of Zimmermann's favourite proposals, to the effect that German
+submarine commanders would be instructed to permit the passage of
+American steamers marked in a special way and of whose sailing
+they had been notified in advance, provided that the American
+Government guaranteed that these vessels did not carry contraband
+of war. It was also suggested that a number of neutral vessels
+should be added to those sailing under the American flag, to
+give greater opportunity for those Americans who were compelled
+to travel abroad, and the Note's most important part continued:
+"In particular the Imperial Government is unable to admit that
+the American citizens can protect an enemy ship by mere fact
+of their presence on board."
+
+July twenty-first, the American Government rejected the proposals
+of Germany saying, "The lives of noncombatants may in no case
+be put in jeopardy unless the vessel resists or seeks to escape
+after being summoned to submit to examination," and disposed
+of the claim that the acts of England gave Germany the right
+to retaliate, even though American citizens should be deprived
+of their lives in the course of retaliation by stating: "For a
+belligerent act of retaliation is _per_se_ an act beyond the
+law, and the defense, of an act as retaliatory, is an admission
+that it is illegal." Continuing it said: "If a belligerent cannot
+retaliate against an enemy without injuring the lives of neutrals,
+as well as their property, humanity, as well as justice and a
+due regard for the dignity of neutral powers, should dictate
+that the practice be discontinued."
+
+It was also said: "The United States cannot believe that the
+Imperial Government will longer refrain from disavowing the wanton
+act of its naval commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or
+from offering reparation for the American lives lost, so far
+as reparation can be made for the needless destruction of human
+life by an illegal act." And the meat of the Note was contained
+in the following sentence: "Friendship itself prompts it (the
+United States) to say to the Imperial Government that repetition
+by the commanders of German naval vessels of acts in contravention
+of those rights must be regarded by the Government of the United
+States, when they affect American citizens, as being deliberately
+unfriendly."
+
+There the matter has remained so far as the Lusitania was concerned
+until now. In the meantime, the attack of the American ship,
+_Nebraskan_, was disavowed; the German Note stating that
+"the torpedo was not meant for the American flag and is to be
+considered an unfortunate accident."
+
+The diplomatic situation with regard to the use of the submarine
+and the attack on many merchant ships without notice and without
+putting the passengers in safety was still unsettled when on
+August nineteenth, 1915, the British ship _Arabic_, was
+torpedoed, without warning, not far from the place where the
+_Lusitania_ had gone down. Two Americans were among the
+passengers killed.
+
+The German Government, after the usual quibbling, at length,
+in its Note of September seventh, claimed that the Captain of
+the German submarine, while engaged in preparing to sink the
+_Dunsley_, became convinced that the approaching _Arabic_
+was trying to ram him and, therefore, fired his torpedo. The
+Imperial Government refused to admit any liability but offered
+to arbitrate.
+
+There followed almost immediately the case of the _Ancona_,
+sunk by a submarine flying the Austrian flag. This case was naturally
+out of my jurisdiction, but formed a link in the chain, and then
+came the sinking of the _Persia_ in the Mediterranean. On this
+boat our consul to Aden lost his life.
+
+In the Note of Count Bernstorff to Secretary Lansing, dated September
+first, 1915, Count Bernstorff said that liners would not be sunk
+by German submarines without warning, and without putting the
+passengers in safety, provided that the liners did not try to
+escape or offer resistance; and it was further stated that this
+policy was in effect before the sinking of the _Arabic_.
+
+There were long negotiations during this period concerning the
+_Arabic_. At one time it looked as if diplomatic relations
+would be broken; but finally the Imperial Government consented
+to acknowledge that the submarine commander had been wrong in
+assuming that the _Arabic_ intended to ram his boat, offered
+to pay an indemnity and disavowed the act of the commander. It
+was stated that orders so precise had been given to the submarine
+commanders that a "recurrence of incidents similar to the
+_Arabic_ is considered out of the question."
+
+In the same way the Austrian Government gave way to the demands
+of America in the _Ancona_ case at the end of December, 1915.
+Ambassador Penfield, in Austria, won great praise by his admirable
+handling of this case.
+
+The negotiations as to the still pending _Lusitania_ case
+were carried on in Washington by Count Bernstorff and Secretary
+Lansing, and finally Germany offered to pay an indemnity for
+the death of the Americans on the _Lusitania_ whose deaths
+Germany "greatly regretted," but refused to disavow the act of
+the submarine commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or to admit
+that such act was illegal.
+
+About this time our State Department sent out a Note proposing
+in effect that submarines should conform to "cruiser" warfare,
+only sinking a vessel which defended itself or tried to escape,
+and that before sinking a vessel its passengers and crew should
+be placed in safety; and that, on the other hand, merchant vessels
+of belligerent nationality should be prohibited from carrying
+any armaments whatever. This suggestion was not followed up.
+
+Zimmermann (not the one in the Foreign Office) wrote an article
+in the _Lokal_Anzeiger_ of which he is an editor, saying
+that the United States had something on their side in the question
+of the export of munitions. I heard that von Kessel, commander of
+the _Mark_of_Brandenburg_ said that he, Zimmermann, ought to be
+shot as a traitor. Zimmermann hearing of this made von Kessel
+apologise, but was shortly afterwards mobilised.
+
+Colonel House had arrived in Germany at the end of January, 1916,
+and remained only three days. He was quite worried by the situation
+and by an interview he had had with Zimmermann in which Zimmermann
+expressed the readiness of Germany to go to war with the United
+States.
+
+In February, 1916, the Junkers in the Prussian Lower House started
+a fight against the Chancellor and discussed submarine war, a
+matter out of their province. The Chancellor hit back at them hard
+and had the best of the exchange. At this period it was reported
+that the Emperor went to Wilhelmshafen to warn the submarine
+commanders to be careful.
+
+About March first it was reported that a grand council of war
+was held at Charleville and that in spite of the support of von
+Tirpitz by Falkenhayn, the Chief of Staff, the Chancellor was
+supported by the Emperor, and once more beat the propositions
+to recommence ruthless submarine war.
+
+In March too, the "illness" of von Tirpitz was announced, followed
+shortly by his resignation. On March nineteenth, his birthday,
+a demonstration was looked for and I saw many police near his
+dwelling, but nothing unusual occurred. I contemplated a trip
+to America, but both the Chancellor and von Jagow begged me not
+to go.
+
+From the time of the _Lusitania_ sinking to that of the _Sussex_
+all Germany was divided into two camps. The party of the Chancellor
+tried to keep peace with America and did not want to have Germany
+branded as an outlaw among nations. Von Tirpitz and his party of
+naval and military officers called for ruthless submarine war, and
+the Conservatives, angry with Bethmann-Hollweg because of his
+proposed concession as to the extension of the suffrage, joined
+the opposition. The reception of our last _Lusitania_ Note in
+July, 1915, was hostile and I was accused of being against Germany,
+although, of course, I had nothing to do with the preparation of
+this Note.
+
+In August, 1915, the deputies representing the great industrials
+of Germany joined in the attack on the Chancellor. These men
+wished to keep Northern France and Belgium, because they hoped
+to get possession of the coal and iron deposits there and so
+obtain a monopoly of the iron and steel trade of the continent.
+Accelerators of public opinion, undoubtedly hired by the Krupp
+firm, were hard at work. These Annexationists were opposed by the
+more reasonable men who signed a petition against the annexation
+of Belgium. Among the signers of this reasonable men's petition
+were Prince Hatzfeld (Duke of Trachenberg) head of the Red Cross,
+Dernburg, Prince Henkel Donnersmarck, Professor Delbrück, von
+Harnack and many others.
+
+The rage of the Conservatives at the _Arabic_ settlement
+knew no bounds, and after a bitter article had appeared in the
+_Tageszeitung_ about the _Arabic_ affair, that newspaper was
+suppressed for some days,--a rather unexpected showing of backbone
+on the part of the Chancellor. Reventlow who wrote for this newspaper
+is one of the ablest editorial writers in Germany. An ex-naval
+officer, he is bitter in his hatred of America. It was said that
+he once lived in America and lost a small fortune in a Florida
+orange grove, but I never succeeded in having this verified.
+
+In November, 1915, after the _Arabic_ settlement there followed
+a moment for us of comparative calm. Mrs. Gerard was given the
+Red Cross Orders of the first and third classes, and Jackson
+and Rives of the Embassy Staff the second and third class. The
+third class is always given because one cannot have the first
+and second unless one has the third or lowest.
+
+There were rumours at this time of the formation of a new party;
+really the Socialists and Liberals, as the Socialists as such were
+too unfashionable, in too bad odour, to open a campaign against
+the military under their own name. This talk came to nothing.
+
+The Chancellor always complained bitterly that he could not
+communicate in cipher _via_ wireless with von Bernstorff.
+On one occasion he said to me, "How can I arrange as I wish to
+in a friendly way the _Ancona_ and _Lusitania_ cases
+if I cannot communicate with my Ambassador? Why does the United
+States Government not allow me to communicate in cipher?" I said,
+"The Foreign Office tried to get me to procure a safe-conduct for
+the notorious von Rintelen on the pretense that he was going to do
+charitable work for Belgium in America; perhaps Washington thinks
+you want to communicate with people like that." The Chancellor then
+changed the subject and said that there would be bad feeling in
+Germany against America after the war. I answered that that idea
+had been expressed by a great many Germans and German newspapers,
+and that I had had private letters from a great many Americans
+who wrote that if Germany intended to make war on America, after
+this war, perhaps we had better go in now. He then very amiably
+said that war with America would be ridiculous. He asked me why
+public opinion in America was against Germany, and I answered
+that matters like the Cavell case had made a bad impression in
+America and that I knew personally that even the Kaiser did not
+approve of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_. The Chancellor
+said, "How about the _Baralong_?" I replied that I did not
+know the details and that there seemed much doubt and confusion
+about that affair, but that there was no doubt about the fact
+that Miss Cavell was shot and that she was a woman. I then took
+up in detail with him the treatment of British prisoners and
+said that this bad treatment could not go on. This was only one
+of the many times when I complained to the Chancellor about the
+condition of prisoners. I am sure that he did not approve of the
+manner in which prisoners of war in Germany were treated; but
+he always complained that he was powerless where the military
+were concerned, and always referred me to Bismarck's memoirs.
+
+During this winter of submarine controversy an interview with
+von Tirpitz, thinly veiled as an interview with a "high naval
+authority," was published in that usually most conservative of
+newspapers, the _Frankfurter_Zeitung_. In this interview the
+"high naval authority" advocated ruthless submarine war with
+England, and promised to bring about thereby the speedy surrender
+of that country. After the surrender, which was to include the
+whole British fleet, the German fleet with the surrendered British
+fleet added to its force, was to sail for America, and exact from
+that country indemnities enough to pay the whole cost of the war.
+
+After his fall, von Tirpitz, in a letter to some admirers who
+had sent him verses and a wreath, advocated holding the coast of
+Flanders as a necessity for the war against England and America.
+
+The successor of von Tirpitz was Admiral von Holtzendorff, whose
+brother is Ballin's right hand man in the management of the Hamburg
+American Line. Because of the more reasonable influence and
+surroundings of von Holtzendorff, I regarded his appointment as
+a help towards peaceful relations between Germany and America.
+
+I have told in another chapter how the Emperor had refused to
+receive me as Ambassador of a country which was supplying munitions
+to the Allies.
+
+From time to time since I learned of this in March, 1915, I kept
+insisting upon my right as Ambassador to be received by the Emperor;
+and finally early in October, 1915, wrote the following letter
+to the Chancellor:
+
+  "Your Excellency:
+
+  Some time ago I requested you to arrange an audience for me
+  with his majesty.
+
+  Please take no further trouble about this matter.
+
+  Sincerely yours,
+
+  JAMES W. GERARD."
+
+This seemed to have the desired effect. I was informed that I
+would be received by the Emperor in the new palace at Potsdam
+on October twenty-second. He was then to pay a flying visit to
+Berlin to receive the new Peruvian Minister and one or two others.
+We went down in the train to Potsdam, von Jagow accompanying us,
+in the morning; and it was arranged that we should return on
+the train leaving Potsdam a little after one o'clock. I think
+that the authorities of the palace expected that I would be with
+the Emperor for a few minutes only, as when I was shown into the
+room where he was, a large room opening from the famous shell
+hall of the palace, the Peruvian Minister and the others to be
+received were standing waiting in that hall.
+
+The Emperor was alone in the room and no one was present at our
+interview. He was dressed in a Hussar uniform of the new field
+grey, the parade uniform of which the frogs and trimmings were
+of gold. A large table in the corner of the room was covered
+with maps, compasses, scales and rulers; and looked as if the
+Emperor there, in company with some of his aides, or possibly
+the chief of staff, had been working out the plan of campaign
+of the German armies.
+
+The Emperor was standing; so, naturally, I stood also; and, according
+to his habit, which is quite Rooseveltian, he stood very close to
+me and talked very earnestly. I was fortunately able to clear
+up two distinct points which he had against America.
+
+The Emperor said that he had read in a German paper that a number
+of submarines built in America for England had crossed the Atlantic
+to England, escorted by ships of the American Navy. I was, of
+course, able to deny this ridiculous story at the time and furnish
+definite proofs later. The Emperor complained because a loan to
+England and France had been floated in America. I said that the
+first loan to a belligerent floated in America was a loan to
+Germany. The Emperor sent for some of his staff and immediately
+inquired into the matter. The members of the staff confirmed my
+statement. The Emperor said that he would not have permitted
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ if he had known, and that
+no gentleman would kill so many women and children. He showed,
+however, great bitterness against the United States and repeatedly
+said, "America had better look out after this war:" and "I shall
+stand no nonsense from America after the war."
+
+The interview lasted about an hour and a quarter, and when I finally
+emerged from the room the officers of the Emperor's household were
+in such a state of agitation that I feel sure they must have
+thought that something fearful had occurred. As I walked rapidly
+towards the door of the palace in order to take the carriage which
+was to drive me to the train, one of them walked along beside
+me saying, "Is it all right? Is it all right?"
+
+The unfortunate diplomats who were to have been received and
+who had been standing all this time outside the door waiting for
+an audience missed their train and their luncheon.
+
+At this interview, the Emperor looked very careworn and seemed
+nervous. When I next saw him, however, which was not until the
+end of April, 1916, he was in much better condition.
+
+I was so fearful in reporting the dangerous part of this interview,
+on account of the many spies not only in my own Embassy but also
+in the State Department, that I sent but a very few words in a
+roundabout way by courier direct to the President.
+
+The year, 1916, opened with this great question still unsettled
+and, in effect, Germany gave notice that after March first, 1916,
+the German submarines would sink all armed merchantmen of the
+enemies of Germany without warning. It is not my place here to
+go into the agitation of this question in America or into the
+history of the votes in Congress, which in fact upheld the policy
+of the President. A proposal as to armed merchantmen was issued by
+our State Department and the position taken in this was apparently
+abandoned at the time of the settlement of the _Sussex_ case
+to which I now refer.
+
+In the latter half of March, 1916, a number of boats having Americans
+on board were torpedoed without warning. These boats were the
+_Eaglejoint_, the _Englishman_, the _Manchester_Engineer_ and the
+_Sussex_. One American was killed or drowned on the _Englishman_,
+but the issue finally came to a head over the torpedoing of the
+channel passenger boat, _Sussex_ which carried passengers between
+Folkstone and Dieppe, France.
+
+On March twenty-fourth the _Sussex_ was torpedoed near the
+coast of France. Four hundred and thirty-six persons, of whom
+seventy-five were Americans, were on board. The captain and a
+number of the passengers saw the torpedo and an endeavour was
+made to avoid it. After the boat was struck the many passengers
+took to the boats. Three Americans were injured and over forty
+persons lost their lives, although the boat was not sunk but
+was towed to Boulogne.
+
+I was instructed to inquire from the German Government as to
+whether a German submarine had sunk the _Sussex_. The Foreign
+Office finally, at my repeated request, called on the Admiralty
+for a report of the torpedoing of the _Sussex_; and finally
+on the tenth of April the German Note was delivered to me. In the
+meantime, and before the delivery of this Note I had been assured
+again and again that the _Sussex_ had not been torpedoed by
+a German submarine. In this Note a rough sketch was enclosed,
+said to have been made by the officer commanding the submarine, of
+a vessel which he admitted he had torpedoed, in the same locality
+where the _Sussex_ had been attacked and at about the same
+time of day. It was said that this boat which was torpedoed was
+a mine layer of the recently built _Arabic_ class and that a
+great explosion which was observed to occur in the torpedoed ship
+warranted the certain conclusion that great amounts of munitions
+were on board. The Note concluded: "The German Government must
+therefore assume that injury to the _Sussex_ was attributable
+to another cause than attack by a German submarine." The Note
+contained an offer to submit any difference of opinion that might
+develop to be investigated by a mixed commission in accordance
+with the Hague Convention of 1907. The _Englishman_ and
+the _Eaglepoint_, it was claimed, were attacked by German
+submarines only after they had attempted to escape, and an
+explanation was given as to the _Manchester_Engineer_. With
+reference to the _Sussex_, the note continued: "Should the
+American Government have at its disposal other material at the
+conclusion of the case of the _Sussex_, the German Government
+would ask that it be communicated, in order to subject this material
+also to investigation."
+
+In the meantime, American naval officers, etc., had been engaged
+in collecting facts as to the sinking of the _Sussex_, and
+this evidence, which seemed overwhelming and, in connection with
+the admissions in the German note, absolutely conclusive, was
+incorporated in the note sent to Germany in which Germany was
+notified: "Unless the Imperial Government should now immediately
+declare and effect abandonment of this present method of submarine
+warfare against passenger and freight carrying vessels, the
+Government of the United States can have no choice but to sever
+diplomatic relations with the German Empire altogether."
+
+The issue was now clearly defined.
+
+I have already spoken of the fact that for a long time there had
+been growing up two parties in Germany. One party headed by von
+Tirpitz in favour of what the Germans called _rücksichtloser_,
+or ruthless submarine war, in which all enemy merchant ships
+were to be sunk without warning, and the party then headed by
+the Chancellor which desired to avoid a conflict with America
+on this issue.
+
+As I have explained in a former chapter, the military have always
+claimed to take a hand in shaping the destinies and foreign policies
+of Germany. When the Germans began to turn their attention to the
+creation of a fleet, von Tirpitz was the man who, in a sense,
+became the leader of the movement and, therefore, the creator of
+the modern navy of Germany. A skilful politician, he for years
+dominated the Reichstag and on the question of submarine warfare
+was most efficiently seconded by the efforts of the Navy League,
+an organization having perhaps one million members throughout
+Germany. Although only one of the three heads of the navy (he
+was Secretary of the Navy), by the force of his personality, by
+the political position which he had created for himself, and by
+the backing of his friends in the Navy League he really dominated
+the other two departments of the navy, the Marine Staff and the
+Marine Cabinet.
+
+Like most Germans of the ruling class, ambition is his only passion.
+These Spartans do not care either for money or for the luxury
+which it brings. Their life is on very simple lines, both in
+the Army and Navy, in order that the officers shall not vie with
+one another in expenditure, and in order that the poorer officers
+and their wives shall not be subject to the humiliation which
+would be caused if they had to live in constant contact with
+brother officers living on a more luxurious footing.
+
+Von Tirpitz' ambition undoubtedly led him to consider himself
+as a promising candidate for Bethmann-Hollweg's shoes. The whole
+submarine issue, therefore, became not only a question of military
+expediency and a question for the Foreign Office to decide in
+connection with the relations of America to Germany, but also a
+question of internal politics, a means of forcing the Chancellor
+out of office. The advocates for the ruthless war were drawn from
+the Navy and from the Army, and those who believed in the use
+of any means of offence against their enemies and particularly
+in the use of any means that would stop the shipment of munitions
+of war to the Allies. The Army and the Navy were joined by the
+Conservatives and by all those who hoped for the fall of the
+Chancellor. The conservative newspapers, and even the Roman Catholic
+newspapers were violent in their call for ruthless submarine war
+as well as violent in their denunciations of the United States
+of America.
+
+American passengers on merchant ships of the enemy were called
+_Schutzengel_ (guardian angels), and caricatures were published,
+such as one which showed the mate reporting to the Captain of
+an English boat that everything was in readiness for sailing
+and the Captain's inquiry, "Are you sure that the American
+_Schutzengel_ is on board?" The numerous notes sent by America
+to Germany also formed a frequent subject of caricature and I
+remember particularly one quite clever one in the paper called
+_Brummer_, representing the celebrations in a German port
+on the arrival of the one hundredth note from America when the
+Mayor of the town and the military, flower girls and singing
+societies and _Turnverein_ were drawn up in welcoming array.
+
+The liberal papers were inclined to support the Chancellor in
+his apparent intention to avoid an open break with America. But
+even the liberal papers were not very strong in their stand.
+
+The military, of course, absolutely despised America and claimed
+that America could do no more harm by declaring war than it was
+doing then to Germany; and that possibly the war preparations
+of America might cut down the amount of the munitions available
+for export to the enemies of the Empire. As to anything that
+America could do in a military way, the Navy and the Army were
+unanimous in saying that as a military or naval factor the United
+States might be considered as less than nothing. This was the
+situation when the last _Sussex_ Note of America brought
+matters to a crisis, and even the crisis itself was considered
+a farce as it had been simmering for so long a period.
+
+I arranged that Colonel House should have an interview with the
+Chancellor at this time, and after dinner one night he had a long
+talk with the Chancellor in which the dangers of the situation
+were pointed out.
+
+With this arrival of the last American _Sussex_ Note, I
+felt that the situation was almost hopeless; that this question
+which had dragged along for so long must now inevitably lead
+to a break of relations and possibly to war. Von Jagow had the
+same idea and said that it was "fate," and that there was nothing
+more to be done. I myself felt that nothing could alter public
+opinion in Germany; that in spite of von Tirpitz' fall, which had
+taken place some time before, the advocates of ruthless submarine
+warfare would win, and that to satisfy them Germany would risk
+a break with America.
+
+I was sitting in my office in a rather dazed and despairing state
+when Professor Ludwig Stein, proprietor of a magazine called
+_North_and_South_ and a writer of special articles on Germany's
+foreign relations for the _Vossische_Zeitung_, under the
+name of "Diplomaticus," called to see me.
+
+He informed me that he thought the situation was not yet hopeless,
+that there was still a large party of reasonable men in Germany
+and that he thought much good could be done if I should go to
+the great general headquarters and have a talk with the Kaiser,
+who, he informed me, was reported to be against a break.
+
+I told Dr. Stein that, of course, I was perfectly willing to
+go if there was the slightest chance of preventing war; and I
+also told the Chancellor that if he was going to decide this
+question in favor of peace it would be possibly easier for him
+if the decision was arrived at under the protection, as it were,
+of the Emperor; or that, if the decision lay with the Emperor,
+I might possibly be able to help in convincing him if I had an
+opportunity to lay the American side of the case before him. I
+said, moreover, that I was ready at any time on short notice
+to proceed to the Emperor's headquarters.
+
+Dr. Hecksher, a member of the Reichstag, who must be classed
+among the reasonable men of Germany, also advocated my speaking
+directly to the Kaiser.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MAINLY COMMERCIAL
+
+Nothing surprised me more, as the war developed, than the discovery
+of the great variety and amount of goods exported from Germany to
+the United States.
+
+Goods sent from the United States to Germany are mainly prime
+materials: approximately one hundred and sixty million dollars a
+year of cotton; seventy-five million dollars of copper; fifteen
+millions of wheat; twenty millions of animal fats; ten millions
+of mineral oil and a large amount of vegetable oil. Of course,
+the amount of wheat is especially variable. Some manufactured
+goods from America also find their way to Germany to the extent
+of perhaps seventy millions a year, comprising machinery such as
+typewriters and a miscellaneous line of machinery and manufactures.
+The principal exports from Germany to America consist of dye
+stuffs and chemical dyes, toys, underwear, surgical instruments,
+cutlery, stockings, knit goods, etc., and a raw material called
+potash, also known as kali. The last is a mineral found nowhere
+in the world except in Germany and a few places in Austria. Potash
+is essential to the manufacture of many fertilizers, fertilizer
+being composed as a rule of potash, phosphates and nitrates.
+The nitrates in past years have been exported to all countries
+from Chile. Phosphate rock is mined in South Carolina and Florida
+and several other places in the world. Curiously enough, both
+nitrates and potash are essential ingredients also of explosives
+used in war. Since the war, the German supply from Chile was
+cut off; but the Germans, following a system used in Norway for
+many years before the war, established great electrical plants
+for the extraction of nitrates from the atmosphere. Since the
+war, American agriculture has suffered for want of potash and
+German agriculture has suffered for want of phosphates, possibly
+of nitrates also; because I doubt whether sufficient nitrogen
+is extracted from the air in Germany to provide for more than
+the needs of the explosive industry.
+
+The dyestuff industry had been developed to such a point in Germany
+that Germany supplied the whole world. In the first months of the
+war some enterprising Americans, headed by Herman Metz, chartered
+a boat, called _The_Matanzas_, and sent it to Rotterdam
+where it was loaded with a cargo of German dyestuffs. Th boat
+sailed under the American flag and was not interfered with by
+the English. Later on the German Department of the Interior,
+at whose head was Delbrück, refused to allow dyestuffs to leave
+Germany except in exchange for cotton, and, finally, the export of
+dyestuffs from Germany ceased and other countries were compelled
+to take up the question of manufacture. This state of affairs
+may lead to the establishment of the industry permanently in the
+United States, although that industry will require protection
+for some years, as, undoubtedly, Germany in her desperate effort
+to regain a monopoly of this trade will be ready to spend enormous
+sums in order to undersell the American manufacturers and drive
+them out of business.
+
+The commercial submarines, _Deutschland_ and _Bremen_,
+were to a great extent built with money furnished by the dyestuff
+manufacturers, who hoped that by sending dyestuffs in this way to
+America they could prevent the development of the industry there.
+I had many negotiations with the Foreign Office with reference
+to this question of dyestuffs.
+
+The export of toys from Germany to the United States forms a
+large item in the bill which we pay annually to Germany. Many
+of these toys are manufactured by the people in their own homes
+in the picturesque district known as the Black Forest. Of course,
+the war cut off, after a time, the export of toys from Germany;
+and the American child, having in the meantime learned to be
+satisfied with some other article, his little brother will demand
+this very article next Christmas, and thus, after the war, Germany
+will find that much of this trade has been permanently lost.
+
+Just as the textile trade of the United States was dependent upon
+the German dyestuffs for colours, so the sugar beet growers of
+America were dependent upon Germany for their seed. I succeeded,
+with the able assistance of the consul at Magdeburg and Mr. Winslow
+of my staff, in getting shipments of beet seed out of Germany. I
+have heard since that these industries too, are being developed
+in America, and seed obtained from other countries, such as Russia.
+
+Another commodity upon which a great industry in the United States
+and Mexico depends is cyanide. The discovery of the cyanide process
+of treating gold and silver ores permitted the exploitation of
+many mines which could not be worked under the older methods.
+At the beginning of the war there was a small manufactory of
+cyanide owned by Germans at Perth Amboy and Niagara Falls, but
+most of the cyanide used was imported from Germany. The American
+German Company and the companies manufacturing in Germany and
+in England all operated under the same patents, the English and
+German companies having working agreements as to the distribution
+of business throughout the world.
+
+The German Vice-Chancellor and head of the Department of the
+Interior, Delbrück, put an export prohibition on cyanide early in
+the war; and most pigheadedly and obstinately claimed that cyanide
+was manufactured nowhere but in Germany, and that, therefore, if
+he allowed cyanide to leave Germany for the United States or
+Mexico the English would capture it and would use it to work
+South African mines, thus adding to the stock of gold and power
+in war of the British Empire. It was a long time before the German
+manufacturers and I could convince this gentleman that cyanide
+sufficient to supply all the British mines was manufactured near
+Glasgow, Scotland. He then reluctantly gave a permit for the
+export of a thousand tons of cyanide; and its arrival in the
+United States permitted many mines there and in Mexico to continue
+operations, and saved many persons from being thrown out of
+employment. When Delbrück finally gave a permit for the export
+of four thousand tons more of cyanide, the psychological moment
+had passed and we could not obtain through our State Department
+a pass from the British.
+
+I am convinced that Delbrück made a great tactical mistake on
+behalf of the German Government when he imposed this prohibition
+against export of goods to America. Many manufacturers of textiles,
+the users of dyestuffs, medicines, seeds and chemicals in all forms,
+were clamouring for certain goods and chemicals from Germany. But it
+was the prohibition against export by the Germans which prevented
+their receiving these goods. If it had been the British blockade
+alone a cry might have arisen in the United States against this
+blockade which might have materially changed the international
+situation.
+
+The Germans also refused permission for the export of potash
+from Germany. They hoped thereby to induce the United States
+to break the British blockade, and offered cargoes of potash
+in exchange for cargoes of cotton or cargoes of foodstuffs. The
+Germans claimed that potash was used in the manufacture of munitions
+and that, therefore, in no event would they permit the export
+unless the potash was consigned to the American Government, with
+guarantees against its use except in the manufacture of fertilizer,
+this to be checked up by Germans appointed as inspectors. All
+these negotiations, however, fell through and no potash has been
+exported from Germany to the United States since the commencement
+of the war. Enough potash, however, is obtained in the United
+States for munition purposes from the burning of seaweed on the
+Pacific Coast, from the brines in a lake in Southern California
+and from a rock called alunite in Utah. Potash is also obtainable
+from feldspar, but I do not know whether any plant has been
+established for its production from this rock. I recently heard
+of the arrival of some potash from a newly discovered field in
+Brazil, and there have been rumours of its discovery in Spain.
+I do not know how good this Spanish and Brazilian potash is, and
+I suppose the German potash syndicate will immediately endeavour
+to control these fields in order to hold the potash trade of the
+world in its grip.
+
+It was a long time after the commencement of the war before England
+declared cotton a contraband. I think this was because of the fear
+of irritating the United States; but, in the meantime, Germany
+secured a great quantity of cotton, which, of course, was used or
+stored for the manufacture of powder. Since the cotton imports
+have been cut off the Germans claim that they are manufacturing
+a powder equally good by using wood pulp. Of course, I have not
+been able to verify this, absolutely.
+
+Germany had endeavoured before the war in every way to keep American
+goods out of the German markets, and even the Prussian state
+railways are used, as I have shown in the article where I speak
+of the attempt to establish an oil monopoly in Germany, in order
+to discriminate against American mineral oils. This same method
+has been applied to other articles such as wood, which otherwise
+might be imported from America and in some cases regulations
+as to the inspection of meat, etc., have proved more effective
+in keeping American goods out of the market than a prohibitive
+tariff.
+
+The meat regulation is that each individual package of meat must
+be opened and inspected; and, of course, when a sausage has been
+individually made to sit up and bark no one desires it as an
+article of food thereafter. American apples were also discriminated
+against in the custom regulations of Germany. Nor could I induce
+the German Government to change their tariff on canned salmon,
+an article which would prove a welcome addition to the German diet.
+
+The German workingman, undoubtedly the most exploited and fooled
+workingman in the world, is compelled not only to work for low
+wages and for long hours, but to purchase his food at rates fixed
+by the German tariff made for the benefit of the Prussian Junkers
+and landowners.
+
+Of course, the Prussian Junkers excuse the imposition of the
+tariff on food and the regulations made to prevent the entry
+of foodstuffs on the ground that German agriculture must be
+encouraged, first, in order to enable the population to subsist
+in time of war and blockade; and, secondly, in order to encourage
+the peasant class which furnishes the most solid soldiers to
+the Imperial armies.
+
+The nations and business men of the world will have to face after
+the war a new condition which we may call socialized buying and
+socialized selling.
+
+Not long after the commencement of the war the Germans placed a
+prohibitive tariff upon the import of certain articles of luxury
+such as perfumes; their object, of course, being to keep the
+German people from sending money out of the country and wasting
+their money in useless expenditures. At the same time a great
+institution was formed called the Central Einkauf Gesellschaft.
+This body, formed under government auspices of men appointed from
+civil life, is somewhat similar to one of our national defence
+boards. Every import of raw material into Germany falls into the
+hands of this central buying company, and if a German desires
+to buy any raw material for use in his factory he must buy it
+through this central board.
+
+I have talked with members of this board and they all unite in
+the belief that this system will be continued after the war.
+
+For instance, if a man in Germany wishes to buy an automobile
+or a pearl necklace or a case of perfumery, he will be told,
+"You can buy this if you can buy it in Germany. But if you have
+to send to America for the automobile, if you have to send to
+Paris for the pearls or the perfumery, you cannot buy them."
+In this way the gold supply of Germany will be husbanded and
+the people will either be prevented from making comparatively
+useless expenditures or compelled to spend money to benefit home
+industry.
+
+On the other hand, when a man desires to buy some raw material,
+for example, copper, cotton, leather, wheat or something of that
+kind, he will not be allowed to buy abroad on his own hook. The
+Central Einkauf Gesellschaft will see that all those desiring to
+buy cotton or copper put in their orders on or before a certain
+date. When the orders are all in, the quantities called for will
+be added up by this central board; and then one man, representing
+the board, will be in a position to go to America to purchase
+the four million bales of cotton or two hundred million pounds
+of copper.
+
+The German idea is that this one board will be able to force the
+sellers abroad to compete against each other in their eagerness
+to sell. The one German buyer will know about the lowest price at
+which the sellers can sell their product. By the buyer's standing
+out alone with this great order the Germans believe that the
+sellers, one by one, will fall into his hands and sell their
+product at a price below that which they could obtain if the
+individual sellers of America were meeting the individual buyers
+of Germany in the open market.
+
+When the total amount of the commodity ordered has been purchased,
+it will be divided up among the German buyers who put in their
+orders with the central company, each order being charged with
+its proportionate share of the expenses of the commission and,
+possibly, an additional sum for the benefit of the treasury of
+the Empire.
+
+Before the war a German manufacturer took me over his great factory
+where fifteen thousand men and women were employed, showed me
+great quantities of articles made from copper, and said: "We buy
+this copper in America and we get it a cent and a half a pound
+less than we should pay for it because our government permits us
+to combine for the purpose of buying, but your government does
+not allow your people to combine for the purpose of selling.
+You have got lots of silly people who become envious of the rich
+and pass laws to prevent combination, which is the logical
+development of all industry."
+
+The government handling of exchange during the war was another
+example of the use of the centralised power of the Government
+for the benefit of the whole nation.
+
+In the first year of the war, when I desired money to spend in
+Germany, I drew a check on my bank in New York in triplicate
+and sent a clerk with it to the different banks in Berlin, to
+obtain bids in marks, selling it then, naturally, to the highest
+bidder. But soon the Government stepped in. The Imperial Bank
+was to fix a daily rate of exchange, and banks and individuals
+were forbidden to buy or sell at a different rate. That this
+fixed rate was a false one, fixed to the advantage of Germany, I
+proved at the time when the German official rate was 5.52 marks
+for a dollar, by sending my American checks to Holland, buying
+Holland money with them and German money with the Holland money,
+in this manner obtaining 5.74 marks for each dollar. And just
+before leaving Germany I sold a lot of American gold to a German
+bank at the rate of 6.42 marks per dollar, although on that day
+the official rate was 5.52 and although the buyer of the gold,
+because the export of gold was forbidden, would have to lose
+interest on the money paid me or on the gold purchased, until
+the end of the war. What the Germans thought of the value of
+the mark is shown by this transaction.
+
+The only thing that can maintain a fair price after the war for
+the products of American firms, miners and manufacturers is
+permission to combine for selling abroad. There is before Congress
+a bill called the Webb Bill permitting those engaged in export
+trade to combine, and this bill, which is manifestly for the
+benefit of the American producer of raw materials and foods and
+manufactured articles, should be passed.
+
+It was also part of our commercial work to secure permits for
+the exportation from Belgium of American owned goods seized by
+Germany. We succeeded in a number of cases in getting these goods
+released. In other cases, the American owned property was taken
+over by the government, but the American owners were compensated
+for the loss.
+
+Germany took over belligerent property and put it in the hands
+of receivers. In all cases where the majority of the stock of a
+German corporation was owned by another corporation or individuals
+of belligerent nationality, the German corporation was placed in
+the hands of a receiver. The German Government, however, would
+not allow the inquiry into the stock ownership to go further than
+the first holding corporation. There were many cases where the
+majority of the stock of a German corporation was owned by an
+English corporation and the majority of the stock of the English
+corporation, in turn, owned by an American corporation or by
+Americans. In this case the German Government refused to consider
+the American ownership of the English stock, and put the German
+company under government control.
+
+With the low wages paid to very efficient workingmen who worked
+for long hours and with no laws against combination, it was always
+a matter of surprise to me that the Germans who were in the process
+of getting all the money in the world should have allowed their
+military autocracy to drive them into war.
+
+I am afraid that, after this war, if we expect to keep a place for
+our trade in the world, we may have to revise some of our ideas as
+to so-called trusts and the Sherman Law. Trusts or combinations
+are not only permitted, but even encouraged in Germany. They are
+known there as "cartels" and the difference between the American
+trust and the German cartel is that the American trust has, as
+it were, a centralised government permanently taking over and
+combining the competing elements in any given business, while in
+Germany the competing elements form a combination by contract for
+a limited number of years. This combination is called a cartel
+and during these years each member of the cartel is assigned a
+given amount of the total production and given a definite share
+of the profits of the combination. The German cartel, therefore,
+as Consul General Skinner aptly said, may be likened to a
+confederation existing by contract for a limited period of time
+and subject to renewal only at the will of its members.
+
+It may be that competition is a relic of barbarism and that one
+of the first signs of a higher civilisation is an effort to modify
+the stress of competition. The debates of Congress tend to show
+that, in enacting the Sherman Law, Congress did not intend to forbid
+the restraint of competition among those in the same business but
+only intended to prohibit the forming of a combination by those
+who, combined, would have a monopoly of a particular business or
+product. It is easy to see why all the coal mines in the country
+should be prohibited from combining; but it is not easy to see
+why certain people engaged in the tobacco business should be
+prohibited from taking their competitors into their combination,
+because tobacco is a product which could be raised upon millions
+of acres of our land and cannot be made the subject of a monopoly.
+
+The German courts have expressly said that if prices are so low
+that the manufacturers of a particular article see financial
+ruin ahead, a formation of a cartel by them must be looked upon
+as a justified means of self-preservation. The German laws are
+directed to the end to which it seems to be such laws should
+logically be directed; namely, to the prevention of unfair
+competition.
+
+So long as the question of monopoly is not involved, competition
+can always be looked for when a combination is making too great
+profits; and the new and competing corporation and individuals
+should be protected by law against the danger of price cutting
+for the express purpose of driving the new competitor out of
+business. However, it must be remembered that a combination acting
+unfairly in competition may be more oppressive than a monopoly.
+I myself am not convinced by the arguments of either side. It
+is a matter for the most serious study.
+
+The object of the American trust has been to destroy its competitors.
+The object of the German cartel to force its competitors to join the
+cartel.
+
+In fact the government in Germany becomes part of these cartels
+and takes an active hand in them, as witness the participation
+of the German Government in the potash syndicate, when contracts
+made by certain American buyers with German mines were cancelled
+and all the potash producing mines of Germany and Austria forced
+into one confederation; and witness the attempt by the government,
+which I have described in another chapter, to take over and
+make a monopoly of the wholesale and retail oil business of the
+country.
+
+The recent closer combination of dyestuff industries of Germany,
+with the express purpose of meeting and destroying American
+competition after the war, is interesting as showing German methods.
+For a number of years the dye-stuff industry of Germany was
+practically controlled by six great companies, some of these
+companies employing as high as five hundred chemists in research
+work. In 1916 these six companies made an agreement looking to a
+still closer alliance not only for the distribution of the product
+but also for the distribution of ideas and trade secrets. For
+years, these great commercial companies supplied all the countries
+of the world not only with dyestuffs and other chemical products
+but also with medicines discovered by their chemists and made
+from coal tar; which, although really nothing more than patent
+medicines, were put upon the market as new and great and beneficial
+discoveries in medicine. The Badische Anilin and Soda Fabrik,
+with a capital of fifty-four million marks has paid dividends
+in the ten years from 1903 to 1913, averaging over twenty-six
+per cent.
+
+The Farbwerke Meister Lucius und Bruning at Hoeckst, near Frankfort,
+during the same period, with a capital of fifty million marks,
+has paid dividends averaging over twenty-seven per cent; and
+the chemical works of Bayer and Company, near Cologne, during
+the same period with a capital of fifty-four millions of marks
+has paid dividends averaging over thirty per cent.
+
+Much of the commercial success of the Germans during the last
+forty years is due to the fact that each manufacturer, each
+discoverer in Germany, each exporter knew that the whole weight
+and power of the Government was behind him in his efforts to
+increase his business. On the other hand, in America, business
+men have been terrorized, almost into inaction, by constant
+prosecutions. What was a crime in one part of the United States,
+under one Circuit Court of Appeals, was a perfectly legitimate
+act in another.
+
+If we have to meet the intense competition of Germany after the
+war, we have got to view all these problems from new angles. For
+instance, there is the question of free ports. Representative
+Murray Hulbert has introduced, in the House of Representatives, a
+resolution directing the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary
+of War and the Secretary of Commerce to report to Congress as
+to the advisability of the establishment of free ports within
+the limits of the established customs of the United States.
+Free ports exist in Germany and have existed for a long time,
+although Germany is a country with a protective tariff. In a
+free port raw goods are manufactured and then exported, of course
+to the advantage of the country permitting the establishment of
+free ports, because by this manufacture of raw materials and
+their re-export, without being subject to duty, money is earned
+by the manufacturers to the benefit of their own country and
+employment is given to many workingmen. This, of course, improves
+the condition of these workingmen and of all others in the country;
+as it is self-evident that the employment of each workingman in
+an industry, which would not exist except for the existence of
+the free port, withdraws that workingman from the general labour
+market and, therefore, benefits the position of his remaining
+fellow labourers.
+
+Although free ports do not exist in the United States, an attempt
+has been made to give certain industries, by means of what are
+known as "drawbacks," the same benefit that they would enjoy
+were free ports existant in our country.
+
+Thus the refiners of raw sugar from Cuba pay a duty on this sugar
+when it enters the United States, but receive this duty back when
+a corresponding amount of refined sugar is exported to other
+countries.
+
+There has lately been an attack made upon this system in the
+case, however, of the sugar refiners only, and the question has
+been treated in some newspapers as if these refiners were obtaining
+some unfair advantage from the government, whereas, as a matter
+of fact, the allowance of these "drawbacks" enables the sugar
+refiners to carry on the refining of the sugar for export much
+as they would if their refineries existed in free ports modelled
+on the German system.
+
+The repeal of the provision of allowing "drawbacks" in this and
+other industries will probably send the industries to Canada or
+some other territory where this system, equivalent to the free
+port, is permitted to exist.
+
+A few days before I left Germany I had a conversation with a
+manufacturer of munitions who employs about eighteen thousand
+people in his factories, which, before the war, manufactured
+articles other than munitions. I asked him how the government
+treated the manufacturers of munitions, and he said that they
+were allowed to make good profits, although they had to pay out
+a great proportion of these profits in the form of taxes on their
+excess or war profits; that the government desired to encourage
+manufacturers to turn their factories into factories for the
+manufacture of all articles in the war and required by the nation
+in sustaining war; and that the manufacturers would do this provided
+that it were only a question as to how much of their profits
+they would be allowed to keep, but that if the Government had
+attempted to fix prices so low that there would have been a doubt
+as to whether the manufacturer could make a profit or not, the
+production of articles required for war would never have reached
+the high mark that it had in Germany.
+
+As a matter of fact, about the only tax imposed in Germany since
+the outbreak of the war has been the tax upon cost or war profits.
+It has been the policy of Germany to pay for the war by great
+loans raised by popular subscription, after authorisation by the
+Reichstag. I calculate that the amounts thus raised, together
+with the floating indebtedness, amount to date to about eighty
+billions of marks.
+
+For a long time the Germans expected that the expenses of the
+war would be paid from the indemnities to be recovered by Germany
+from the nations at war with it.
+
+Helfferich shadowed this forth in his speech in the Reichstag,
+on August 20, 1915, when he said: "If we wish to have the power
+to settle the terms of peace according to our interests and our
+requirements, then we must not forget the question of cost. We
+must have in view that the whole future activity of our people,
+so far as this is at all possible, shall be free from burdens.
+The leaden weight of billions has been earned by the instigators
+of this war, and in the future they, rather than we, will drag
+it about after them."
+
+Of course, by "instigators of the war" Helfferich meant the opponents
+of Germany, but I think that unconsciously he was a true prophet
+and that the "leaden weight of the billions" which this war has
+cost Germany will be dragged about after the war by Germany,
+the real instigator of this world calamity.
+
+In December, 1915, Helfferich voiced the comfortable plea that,
+because the Germans were spending their money raised by the war
+loans in Germany, the weight of these loans was not a real weight
+upon the German people. He said: "We are paying the money almost
+exclusively to ourselves; while the enemy is paying its loans
+abroad--a guarantee that in the future we shall maintain the
+advantage."
+
+This belief of the Germans and Helfferich is one of the notable
+fallacies of the war. The German war loans have been subscribed
+mainly by the great companies of Germany; by the Savings Banks,
+the Banks, the Life and Fire Insurance and Accident Insurance
+Companies, etc.
+
+Furthermore, these loans have been pyramided; that is to say,
+a man who subscribed and paid for one hundred thousand marks
+of loan number one could, when loan number two was called for,
+take the bonds he had bought of loan number one to his bank and
+on his agreement to spend the proceeds in subscribing to loan
+number two, borrow from the bank eighty thousand marks on the
+security of his first loan bonds, and so on.
+
+There is an annual increment, not easily ascertainable with
+exactness, but approximately ascertainable to the wealth of every
+country in the world. Just as when a man is working a farm there
+is in normal years an increment or accretion of wealth or income
+to him above the cost of the production of the products of the
+soil which he sells, there is such an annual increment to the
+wealth of each country taken as a whole. Some experts have told
+me they calculated that, at the outside, in prosperous peace times
+the annual increment of German wealth is ten billion marks.
+
+Now when we have the annual interest to be paid by Germany exceeding
+the annual increment of the country, the social and even moral
+bankruptcy of the country must ensue. If repudiation of the loan
+or any part of it is then forced, the loss naturally falls upon
+those who have taken the loan. The working-man or small capitalist,
+who put all his savings in the war loan, is without support for his
+old age, and so with the man who took insurance in the Insurance
+Companies or put his savings in a bank. If that bank becomes
+bankrupt through repudiation of the war loan, you then have the
+country in a position where the able-bodied are all working to
+pay what they can towards the interest of the government loan,
+after earning enough to keep themselves and their families alive;
+and the old and the young, without support and deprived of their
+savings, become mere poor-house burdens on the community.
+
+Already the mere interest of the war loan of Germany amounts to
+four billions of marks a year; to this must be added, of course,
+the interest of the previous indebtedness of the country and
+of each political subdivision thereof, including cities, all
+of which have added to their before-the-war debt, by incurring
+great debts to help the destitute in this war; and, of course,
+to all this must be added the expenses of the administration
+of the government and the maintenance of the army and navy.
+
+It is the contemplation of this state of affairs, when he is
+convinced that indemnities are not to be exacted from other
+countries, that will do most to persuade the average intelligent
+German business man that peace must be had at any cost.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+WORK FOR THE GERMANS
+
+The interests of Germany in France, England and Russia were placed
+with our American Ambassadors in these countries. This, of course,
+entailed much work upon our Embassy, because we were the medium of
+communication between the German Government and these Ambassadors.
+I found it necessary to establish a special department to look
+after these matters. At its head was Barclay Rives who had been
+for many years in our diplomatic service and who joined my Embassy
+at the beginning of the war. First Secretary of our Embassy in
+Vienna for ten or twelve years, he spoke German perfectly and
+was acquainted with many Germans and Austrians. Inquiries about
+Germans who were prisoners, negotiations relative to the treatment
+of German prisoners, and so on, came under this department.
+
+One example will show the nature of this work. When the Germans
+invaded France, a German cavalry patrol with two officers, von
+Schierstaedt and Count Schwerin, and several men penetrated as
+far as the forest of Fontainebleau, south of Paris. There they got
+out of touch with the German forces and wandered about for days in
+the forest. In the course of their wanderings they requisitioned
+some food from the inhabitants, and took, I believe, an old coat
+for one of the officers who had lost his, and requisitioned a
+wagon to carry a wounded man. After their surrender to the French,
+the two officers were tried by a French court martial, charged
+with pillaging and sentenced to be degraded from their rank and
+transported to Cayenne (the Devil's Island of the Dreyfus case).
+The Germans made strong representations, and our very skilled
+Ambassador in Paris, the Honourable William C. Sharp, took up
+the matter with the Foreign Office and succeeded in preventing
+the transportation of the officers. The sending of the officers
+and men, however, into a military prison where they were treated
+as convicts caused great indignation throughout Germany. The
+officers had many and powerful connections in their own country
+who took up their cause. There were bitter articles in the German
+press and caricatures and cartoons were published.
+
+I sent Mr. Rives to Paris and told him not to leave until he
+had seen these officers. He remained in Paris some weeks and
+finally through Mr. Sharp obtained permission to visit the officers
+in the military prison. Later the French showed a tendency to
+be lenient in this case, but it was hard to find a way for the
+French Government to back down gracefully. Schierstaedt having
+become insane in the meantime, a very clever way out of the
+difficulty was suggested, I believe by Mr. Sharp. Schierstaedt
+having been found to be insane was presumably insane at the time
+of the patrol's wandering in the forest of Fontainebleau. As he
+was the senior officer, the other officer and the men under him
+were not responsible for obeying his commands. The result was
+that Schwerin and the men of the patrol were put in a regular
+prison camp and Schierstaedt was very kindly sent by the French
+back to Germany, where he recovered his reason sufficiently to
+be able to come and thank me for the efforts made on his behalf.
+
+I made every endeavour so far as it lay in my power to oblige
+the Germans. We helped them in the exchange of prisoners and
+the care of German property in enemy countries.
+
+There were rumours in Berlin that Germans taken as prisoners in
+German African Colonies were forced to work in the sun, watched
+and beaten by coloured guards. This was taken up by one of the
+Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg who had been Governor of Togoland
+and who also took great interest in sending clothes, etc., to
+these prisoners. Germany demanded that the prisoners in Africa
+be sent to a more temperate climate.
+
+Another royalty who was busied with prisoners' affairs was Prince
+Max of Baden. He is heir to the throne of Baden, although not a
+son of the reigning Duke. He is very popular and, for my part,
+I admire him greatly. He travels with Emerson's essays in his
+pocket and keeps up with the thought and progress of all countries.
+Baden will be indeed happy in having such a ruler. Prince Max was
+a man so reasonable, so human, that I understand that von Jagow
+was in favour of putting him at the head of a central department
+for prisoners of war. I agreed with von Jagow that in such case
+all would go smoothly and humanely. Naturally, von Jagow could
+only mildly hint at the desirability of this appointment. A prince,
+heir to one of the thrones of Germany, with the rank of General
+in the army, he seemed ideally fitted for such a position, but
+unfortunately the opposition of the army and, particularly, of
+the representative corps commanders was so great that von Jagow
+told me the plan was impossible of realisation. I am sure if
+Prince Max had been at the head of such a department, Germany
+would not now be suffering from the odium of mistreating its
+prisoners and that the two million prisoners of war in Germany
+would not return to their homes imbued with an undying hate.
+
+Prince Max was very helpful in connection with the American mission
+to Russia for German prisoners which I had organised and which I
+have described in the chapter on war charities.
+
+All complaints made by the Imperial Government with reference
+to the treatment of German prisoners, and so forth, in enemy
+countries were first given to me and transmitted by our Embassy
+to the American Ambassadors having charge of German interests
+in enemy countries. All this, with the correspondence ensuing,
+made a great amount of clerical work.
+
+I think that every day I received one or more Germans, who were
+anxious about prisoner friends, making inquiries, and wishing
+to consult me on business matters in the United States, etc.
+All of these people showed gratitude for what we were able to
+do for them, but their gratitude was only a drop in the ocean
+of officially inspired hatred of America.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WAR CHARITIES
+
+As soon as the war was declared and millions of men marched forward
+intent upon killing, hundreds of men and women immediately took up
+the problem of helping the soldiers, the wounded and the prisoners
+and of caring for those left behind by the men who had gone to
+the front.
+
+The first war charity to come under my observation was the American
+Red Cross. Two units containing three doctors and about twelve
+nurses, each, were sent to Germany by the American National Red
+Cross. Before their arrival I took up with the German authorities
+the questions as to whether these would be accepted and where
+they would be placed. The German authorities accepted the units
+and at first decided to send one to each front. The young man
+assigned to the West front was Goldschmidt Rothschild, one of the
+last descendants of the great Frankfort family of Rothschild. He
+had been attached to the German Embassy in London before the war.
+The one assigned to the unit for the East front was Count Hélie
+de Talleyrand. Both of these young men spoke English perfectly
+and were chosen for that reason, and both have many friends in
+England and America.
+
+Talleyrand was of a branch of the celebrated Talleyrand family and
+possessed German citizenship. During the Napoleonic era the great
+Talleyrand married one of his nephews to a Princess of Courland
+who, with her sister, was joint heiress of the principality of
+Sagan in Germany. The share of the other sister was bought by
+the sister who married young Talleyrand, and the descendants of
+that union became princes of Sagan and held the Italian title
+of Duke de Dino and the French title of Duke de Valençay.
+
+Some of the descendants of this nephew of the great Talleyrand
+remained in Germany, and this young Talleyrand, assigned to the
+Red Cross unit, belonged to that branch. Others settled in France,
+and among these was the last holder of the title and the Duke
+de Dino, who married, successively, two Americans, Miss Curtis
+and Mrs. Sampson. It was a custom in this family that the holder
+of the principal title, that of the Prince of Sagan, allowed
+the next two members in succession to bear the titles of Duke
+de Dino and Duke de Valençay. Before the last Prince of Sagan
+died in France, his son Hélie married the American, Anna Gould,
+who had divorced the Count Castellane. On the death of his father
+and in accordance with the statutes of the House of Sagan the
+members of the family who were German citizens held a family
+council and, with the approval of the Emperor of Germany, passed
+over the succession from Anna Gould's husband to her son, so
+that her son has now the right to the title and not his father,
+but the son must become a German citizen at his majority.
+
+The younger brother of the husband of Anna Gould bears the title
+of Duke de Valençay and is the divorced husband of the daughter
+of Levi P. Morton, formerly Vice-President of the United States.
+This young Talleyrand to whom I have referred and who was assigned
+to the American Red Cross unit, although he was a German by
+nationality, did not wish to fight in this war against France in
+which country he had so many friends and relations and, therefore,
+this assignment to the American Red Cross was most welcome to
+him.
+
+On the arrival of the American doctors and nurses in Berlin,
+it was decided to send both units to the East front and to put
+one in the small Silesian town of Gleiwitz and the other in
+the neighbouring town of Kosel. Count Talleyrand went with these
+two units, Goldschmidt Rothschild being attached to the Prussian
+Legation in Munich.
+
+We had a reception in the Embassy for these doctors and nurses
+which was attended by Prince Hatzfeld, Duke of Trachenberg, who
+was head of the German Red Cross, and other Germans interested
+in this line of work. The Gleiwitz and Kosel units remained in
+these towns for about a year until the American Red Cross withdrew
+its units from Europe.
+
+At about the time of the withdrawal of these units, I had heard
+much of the sufferings of German prisoners in Russia. I had many
+conversations with Zimmermann of the German Foreign Office and
+Prince Hatzfeld on this question, as well as with Prince Max
+of Baden, the heir presumptive to the throne of that country;
+and I finally arranged that such of these American doctors and
+nurses as volunteered should be sent to Russia to do what they
+could for the German prisoners of war there. Nine doctors and
+thirty-eight nurses volunteered. They were given a great reception
+in Berlin, the German authorities placed a large credit in the
+hands of this mission, and, after I had obtained through our
+State Department the consent of the Russian Government for the
+admission of the mission, it started from Berlin for Petrograd.
+The German authorities and the Germans, as a whole, were very
+much pleased with this arrangement. Officers of the Prussian army
+were present at the departure of the trains and gave flowers to
+all the nurses. It is very unfortunate that after their arrival
+in Russia this mission was hampered in every way, and had the
+greatest difficulty in obtaining permission to do any work at
+all. Many of them, however, managed to get in positions where
+they assisted the German prisoners. For instance, in one town
+where there were about five thousand Germans who had been sent
+there to live one of our doctors managed to get appointed as
+city physician and, aided by several of the American nurses,
+was able to do a great work for the German population. Others of
+our nurses managed to get as far as Tomsk in Siberia and others
+were scattered through the Russian Empire.
+
+Had this mission under Dr. Snoddy been able to carry out its
+work as originally planned, it would not only have done much
+good to the German prisoners of war, but would have helped a
+great deal to do away with the bitter feeling entertained by
+Germans towards Americans. Even with the limited opportunity given
+this mission, it undoubtedly materially helped the prisoners.
+
+On arriving in Berlin on their way home to America from Gleiwitz
+and Kosel, the doctors and nurses of these American units were
+all awarded the German Red Cross Order of the second class and
+those who had been in Austria were similarly decorated by the
+Austro-Hungarian Government.
+
+Among those who devoted themselves to works of charity during
+this war no one stands higher than Herbert C. Hoover.
+
+I cannot find words to express my admiration for this man whose
+great talents for organisation were placed at the service of
+humanity. Every one knows of what he accomplished in feeding the
+inhabitants of Belgium and Northern France. Mr. Hoover asked me
+to become one of the chairmen of the International Commission for
+the Relief of Belgium and I was happy to have the opportunity in
+Berlin to second his efforts. There was considerable business in
+connection with the work of the commission. I had many interviews
+with those in authority with reference to getting their ships
+through, etc. Mr. Hoover and I called on the Chancellor and
+endeavoured to get him to remit the fine of forty million francs
+a month which the Germans had imposed upon Belgium. This, however,
+the Chancellor refused to do. Later on in April, 1915, I was
+able as an eye-witness to see how efficiently Mr. Hoover's
+organisation fed, in addition to the people of Belgium, the French
+population in that part of Northern France in the occupation of
+the Germans.
+
+Mr. Hoover surrounded himself with an able staff, Mr. Vernon
+Kellogg and others, and in America men like Mr. A. J. Hemphill
+were his devoted supporters.
+
+Early in 1915, Mr. Ernest P. Bicknell, who had first come to
+Germany representing the American Red Cross, returned representing
+not only that organisation but also the Rockefeller Foundation. With
+him was Mr. Wickliffe Rose, also of the Rockefeller Foundation;
+and with these two gentlemen I took up the question of the relief
+of Poland. Mr. Rose and Mr. Bicknell together visited Poland and
+saw with their own eyes the necessity for relief. A meeting was
+held in the Reichstag attended by Prince Hatzfeld of the German
+Red Cross, Director Guttmann, of the Dresdener Bank, Geheimrat
+Lewald, of the Imperial Ministry of the Interior, representing the
+German Government, and many others connected with the government,
+military and financial interests of Germany.
+
+The Commission for the Relief in Poland, of which I was to be
+chairman, was organised and included the Spanish Ambassador,
+His Excellency the Bishop of Posen, the Prince Bishop of Cracow,
+Jacob H. Schiff of New York, and others. Messrs. Warwick, Greene
+and Wadsworth were to take up the actual executive work.
+
+In conjunction with Messrs. Rose and Bicknell, I drew up a sort
+of treaty, having particularly in mind certain difficulties
+encountered by the American Relief Commission in Belgium. The
+main point in this treaty was that the German Government agreed
+not to requisition either food or money within the limits of the
+territory to be relieved, which territory comprised that part
+of Poland within German occupation up to within, as I recall it,
+fifty kilometres of the firing line. The one exception was that
+a fine might be levied on a community where all the inhabitants
+had made themselves jointly and severally liable according to the
+provisions of the Hague Convention. The Rockefeller Foundation
+on its part agreed to pay all the expenses of the executive work
+of the commission. This treaty, after being submitted to General
+Hindenburg and approved by him, was signed by Dr. Lewald,
+representing the German Government, by Mr. Bicknell, representing
+the Rockefeller Foundation, and by me, representing the new
+commission for the relief of Poland.
+
+Work was immediately commenced under this arrangement and, so
+far as possible, food was purchased in Holland and Denmark, but
+there was little to be had in these countries. The Allies, however,
+refused to allow food to enter Germany for the purpose of this
+commission, and so the matter fell through. Later, when the Allies
+were willing to permit the food to enter, it was the German
+Government that refused to reaffirm this treaty and refused to
+agree that the German army of occupation should not requisition
+food in occupied Poland. Of course, under these circumstances, no
+one could expect the Allies to consent to the entry of food; because
+the obvious result would be that the Germans would immediately,
+following the precedent established by them in Northern France,
+take all the food produced in the country for their army and
+the civil population of Germany, and allow the Poles to be fed
+with food sent in from outside, while perhaps their labour was
+utilised in the very fields the products of which were destined
+for German consumption.
+
+There is no question that the sufferings of the people of Poland
+have been very great, and when the history of Poland during the
+war comes to be written the world will stand aghast at the story
+of her sufferings. It is a great pity that these various schemes
+for relief did not succeed. The Rockefeller Commission, however,
+up to the time I left Germany did continue to carryon some measure
+of relief and succeeded in getting in condensed milk, to some
+extent, for the children of that unfortunate country. These
+negotiations brought me in contact with a number of Poles resident
+in Berlin, whom I found most eager to do what they could to relieve
+the situation. I wish here to express my admiration for the work
+of the Rockefeller Commission in Europe. Not only were the ideas
+of the Commission excellent and businesslike but the men selected
+to carry them into effect were without exception men of high
+character and possessed of rare executive ability.
+
+As I have said in a previous chapter, I was ridiculed in the
+American newspapers because I had suggested, in answer to a cable
+of the League of Mercy, that some work should be done for the
+prisoners of war. I do not know whether the great work undertaken
+by Dr. John R. Mott and his associates was suggested by my answer or
+not; that does not matter. But this work undertaken by the American
+Y. M. C. A. certainly mattered a great deal to the prisoners of
+war in Europe. Dr. Mott after serving on the Mexican Commission,
+has gone to Russia as a member of the Commission to that country.
+
+The Y. M. C. A. organisation headed by Dr. Mott, who was most
+ably assisted by the Reverend Archibald C. Harte, took up this
+work, which was financed, I have been told, by the McCormick
+family of Chicago, Cleveland H. Dodge, John D. Rockefeller and
+others. Mr. Harte obtained permission from the German authorities
+for the erection of meeting halls and for work in German camps.
+When he had obtained this authorisation from Germany he went
+to Russia, where he was able to get a similar authorisation.
+
+At first in Russia, I have heard, the prisoners of war were allowed
+great liberty and lived unguarded in Siberian villages where they
+obtained milk, bread, butter, eggs and honey at very reasonable
+rates. As the war went on they were more and more confined to
+barracks and there their situation was sad indeed. In the winter
+season, it is dark at three in the afternoon and remains dark
+until ten the following morning. Of course, I did not see the
+Russian prison camps. The work carried on there was similar to
+that carried on in the German camps by Mr. Harte and his band
+of devoted assistants.
+
+I was particularly interested in this work because I hoped that
+the aid given to the German prisoners of war in Russia would help
+to do away with the great hate and prejudice against Americans in
+Germany. So I did all I could, not only to forward Mr. Harte's
+work, but to suggest and organise the sending of the expedition
+of nurses and doctors, which I have already described, to the
+Russian camps.
+
+Of course, Mr. Harte in this work did not attempt to cover all
+the prison camps in Germany. He did much to help the mental and
+physical conditions of the prisoners in Ruhleben, the English
+civilian camp near Berlin. The American Y. M. C. A. built a great
+hall where religious exercises were held, plays and lectures
+given, and where prisoners had a good place to read and write
+in during the day. A library was established in this building.
+
+The work carried on by the Y. M. C. A. may be briefly described
+as coming under the following heads: religious activities;
+educational activities; work shops, and gardens; physical exercises
+and out-door sports; diet kitchens for convalescents; libraries
+and music, including orchestra, choruses, and so on.
+
+When I left Germany on the breaking of diplomatic relations, a
+number of these Y. M. C. A. workers left with me.
+
+The German women exhibited notable qualities in war. They engaged
+in the Red Cross work, including the preparation of supplies and
+bandages for the hospitals, and the first day of mobilisation saw
+a number of young girls at every railway station in the country
+with food and drink for the passing soldiers. At railway junctions
+and terminals in the large cities, stations were established
+where these Red Cross workers gave a warm meal to the soldiers
+passing through. In these terminal stations there were also women
+workers possessed of sufficient skill to change the dressings
+of the lightly wounded.
+
+On the Bellevuestrasse, Frau von Ihne, wife of the great architect,
+founded a home for blinded soldiers. In this home soldiers were
+taught to make brooms, brushes, baskets, etc.
+
+German women who had country places turned these into homes for
+the convalescent wounded. But perhaps the most noteworthy was
+the National Frauendienst or Service for Women, organised the
+first day of the war. The relief given by the State to the wives
+and children of soldiers was distributed from stations in Berlin,
+and in the neighbourhood of each of these stations the Frauendienst
+established an office where women were always in attendance,
+ready to give help and advice to the soldiers' wives. There there
+were card-indexes of all the people within the district and of
+their needs. At the time I left Germany I believe that there
+were upwards of seven thousand women engaged in Berlin in social
+service, in instructing the women in the new art of cooking without
+milk, eggs or fat and seeing to it that the children had their
+fair share of milk. It is due to the efforts of these social
+workers that the rate of infant mortality in Berlin decreased
+during the war.
+
+A war always causes a great unsettling in business and trade;
+people no longer buy as many articles of luxury and the workers
+engaged in the production of these articles are thrown out of
+employment. In Germany, the National Women's Service, acting
+with the labour exchanges, did its best to find new positions
+for those thrown out of work. Women were helped over a period
+of poverty until they could find new places and were instructed
+in new trades.
+
+Many women engaged in the work of sending packages containing
+food and comforts to the soldiers at the front and to the German
+prisoners of war in other countries.
+
+Through the efforts of the American Association of Commerce and
+Trade, and the Embassy, a free restaurant was established in
+Berlin in one of the poorer districts. About two hundred people
+were fed here daily in a hall decorated with flags and plants.
+This was continued even after we left Germany.
+
+At Christmas, 1916, Mrs. Gerard and I visited this kitchen with
+Mr. and Mrs. Wolf and General von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, and one of his daughters. Presents were distributed
+to the children and the mothers received an order for goods in
+one of the department stores. The German Christmas songs were
+sung and when a little German child offered a prayer for peace,
+I do not think there was any one present who could refrain from
+weeping.
+
+Many of the German women of title, princesses, etc., established
+base hospitals of their own and seemed to manage these hospitals
+with success.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+HATE
+
+On my way from Berlin to America, in February, 1917, at a dinner
+in Paris, I met the celebrated Italian historian, Ferrero. In a
+conversation with him after dinner, I reminded him of the fact
+that both he and a Frenchman, named Huret, who had written on
+America, had stated in their books that the thing which struck
+them most in the study of the American people was the absence
+of hate.
+
+Ferrero recalled this and in the discussion which followed and
+in which the French novelist, Marcel Prevost, took part, all
+agreed that there was more hate in Europe than in America; first,
+because the peoples of Europe were confined in small space and,
+secondly, because the European, whatever his rank or station,
+lacked the opportunities for advancement and consequently the
+eagerness to press on ahead, and that fixing of the thought on
+the future, instead of the past, which formed part of the American
+character.
+
+In a few hours in Europe it is possible to travel in an automobile
+across countries where the people differ violently from the countries
+surrounding them, not only in language, customs and costumes,
+but also in methods of thought and physical appearance.
+
+The day I left Berlin I went to see Herr von Gwinner, head of
+the Deutsche Bank, with reference to a charitable fund which
+had been collected for widows and orphans in Germany. In our
+talk, von Gwinner said that Europeans envied America because we
+seemed to be able to assimilate all those people who, as soon
+as they landed on our shores, sought to forget their old race
+hatreds and endeavoured, as speedily as possible, to adopt American
+clothes, language and thought. I told him I thought it was because
+in our country we did not try to force anyone; that there was
+nothing to prevent a Pole speaking Polish and wearing Polish
+dress, if he chose; that the only weapon we used against those
+who desired to uphold the customs of Europe was that of ridicule;
+and that it was the repressive measures such as, for example,
+the repressive action taken by Prussia against the Poles and
+the Danes, the Alsatians and the Lorrainers, that had aroused
+a combative instinct in these peoples and made them cling to
+every vestige of their former nationality.
+
+At first, with the coming of war, the concentrated hate of the
+German people seemed to be turned upon the Russians. Even Liebknecht,
+when he called upon me in order to show that he had not been
+shot, as reported in America, spoke of the perils of Czarismus
+and the hatred of the German people for the Russians. But later,
+and directed by the master hand of the governing class, all the
+hatred of the Germans was concentrated upon England.
+
+The cartoon in _Punch_ representing a Prussian family having
+its morning "Hate" was, in some aspects, not at all exaggerated.
+Hate in Germany is cultivated as a noble passion, and, during the
+war, divines and generals vied with each other in its praise.
+Early in 1917, the Prussian General in command at Limburg made a
+speech in which he extolled the advantages of hate and said that
+there was nothing like getting up in the morning after having
+passed a night in thought and dreams of hate.
+
+[Illustration: THIS PAGE FROM THE SCURRILOUS PUBLICATION OF MARTEN
+AND HIS COLLEAGUES SHOWS THE PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WREATH AND THE
+CRAPE-DRAPED AMERICAN FLAG.]
+
+The phrase "Gott strafe England" seemed to be all over Germany.
+It was printed on stamps to be affixed to the back of letters
+like our Red Cross stamps. I even found my German body servant
+in the Embassy affixing these stamps to the back of all letters,
+official and otherwise, that were sent out. He was stopped when
+discovered. Paper money was stamped with the words: "Gott strafe
+England," "und America" being often added as the war progressed
+and America refused to change the rules of the game and stop
+the shipment of supplies to the Allies.
+
+Everyone is familiar with Lissauer's "Hymn of Hate." It is not
+extraordinary that one man in a country at war should produce a
+composition of this kind; but it is extraordinary as showing the
+state of mind of the whole country, that the Emperor should have
+given him the high order of the Red Eagle of the Second Class as
+a reward for having composed this extraordinary document.
+
+Undoubtedly at first the British prisoners of war were treated
+very roughly and were starved and beaten by their guards on the
+way from the front to the concentration camps. Officers, objects
+usually considered more than sacred in Germany, even when wounded
+were subjected to brutal treatment and in the majority of their
+prisons were treated more like convicts than officers and gentlemen.
+
+As the Germans gradually awoke to the fact that President Wilson
+was not afraid of the German vote and that the export of supplies
+from America would not be stopped, this stream of hate was turned
+on America. There was a belief in Germany that President Wilson
+was opposed by a majority of people of the United States, that
+he did not represent the real sentiment of America, and that the
+sentiment there was favourable to Germany.
+
+Unfortunately many Americans in Germany encouraged the German
+people and the German Government in this belief. Americans used
+to travel about, giving lectures and making speeches attacking
+their own country and their own President, and the newspapers
+published many letters of similar import from Americans resident
+in Germany.
+
+One of the most active of these was a man named Maurice Somborn,
+a German American, who represented in Germany an American business
+house. He made it a practice to go about in Berlin and other
+cities and stand up in cafes and beer halls in order to make
+addresses attacking the President and the United States. So bold
+did he become that he even, in the presence of a number of people
+in my room, one day said that he would like to hang Secretary
+Bryan as high as Haman and President Wilson one foot higher.
+The American newspapers stated that I called a servant and had
+him thrown out of the Embassy. This statement is not entirely
+true: I selfishly kept that pleasure for myself.
+
+The case of Somborn gave me an idea and I cabled to the Department
+of State asking authority to take up the passports of all Americans
+who abused their own country on the ground that they had violated
+the right, by their abuse, to the protection of a passport. The
+Department of State sustained my view and, by my direction, the
+consul in Dresden took up the passports of a singer named Rains
+and a gentleman of leisure named Recknagel who had united in
+addressing a letter to the Dresden newspapers abusing the President.
+It was sometime before I got Somborn's passport and I later on
+received from him the apologies of a broken and contrite man
+and obtained permission from Washington to issue him a passport
+in order to enable him to return to America.
+
+Of course, these vilifiers of their own country were loud in their
+denunciations of me, but the prospect of losing the protection of
+their passports kept many of these men from open and treasonable
+denunciation of their own country.
+
+The Government actually encouraged the formation of societies which
+had for their very object the scattering of literature attacking
+the President and the United States. The most conspicuous of these
+organisations was the so-called League of Truth. Permanently
+connected with it was an American dentist who had been in jail
+in America and who had been expelled from Dresden by the police
+authorities there. The secretary was a German woman who posed as
+an American, and had been on the stage as a snake dancer. The
+principal organiser was a German named Marten who had won the
+favour of the German authorities by writing a book on Belgium
+denying that any atrocities had taken place there. Marten secured
+subscriptions from many Germans and Americans resident in Germany,
+opened headquarters in rooms on the Potsdamerstrasse and engaged
+in the business of sending out pamphlets and leaflets attacking
+America. One of his principal supporters was a man named Stoddard
+who had made a fortune by giving travel lectures in America and
+who had retired to his handsome villa, in Meran, in Austria.
+Stoddard issued a pamphlet entitled, "What shall we do with Wilson?"
+and some atrocious attempts at verse, all of which were sent
+broadcast by the League of Truth.
+
+This was done with the express permission of the German authorities
+because during the war no societies or associations of any kind
+could meet, be formed or act without the express permission and
+superintendence of both the military and police authorities.
+Anyone who has lived in Germany knows that it would be impossible
+even in peace times to hang a sign or a wreath on a public statue
+without the permission of the local authorities; and yet on the
+Emperor's birthday, January twenty-seventh, 1916, this League
+of Truth was permitted to place an enormous wreath, over four
+feet high, on the statue of Frederick the Great, with an American
+flag draped in mourning attached, and a silk banner on which was
+printed in large letters of gold, "Wilson and his press are not
+America." The League of Truth then had a photograph taken of this
+wreath which was sent all over Germany, again, of course, with
+the permission of the authorities. The wreath and attachments,
+in spite of frequent protests on my part to Zimmermann and von
+Jagow, remained in this conspicuous position until the sixth of
+May, 1916. After the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note, I again
+called von Jagow's attention to the presence of this wreath,
+and I told him that if this continuing insult to our flag and
+President was not taken away that I would go the next day with
+a cinematograph operator and take it away myself. The next day
+the wreath had disappeared.
+
+This League, in circulars, occasionally attacked me, and in a
+circular which they distributed shortly after my return to Germany
+at the end of December, 1916, it was stated, "What do you think
+of the American Ambassador? When he came to Germany after his
+trip to America he brought a French woman with him." And the
+worst of this statement was that it was true. But the League,
+of course, did not state that my wife came with me bringing her
+French maid by the express permission of the German Foreign Office.
+
+I have had occasion many times to wonder at the curious twists
+of the German mind, but I have never been able to understand on
+what possible theory the German Government permitted and even
+encouraged the existence of this League of Truth. Certainly the
+actions of the League, headed by a snake dancer and a dentist,
+would not terrorise the American Congress, President Wilson or me
+into falling in with all the views of the German Government, and
+if the German Government was desirous of either the President's
+friendship or mine why was this gang of good-for-nothings allowed
+to insult indiscriminately their country, their President and
+their Ambassador?
+
+One of the friends of Marten, head of this League, was (------)
+(---------), a man who at the time he was an officer of the National
+Guard of the State of New York, accepted a large sum of money
+"for expenses" from Bernstorff. Of course, in any country abroad
+acceptance by an officer of money from a foreign Ambassador could
+not be explained and could have only one result--a blank wall and
+firing party for the receiver of foreign pay. Perhaps we have
+grown so indulgent, so soft and so forgetful of the obligations
+which officers owe to their flag and country that on (---------)'s
+return from Germany he will be able to go on a triumphant lecture
+tour through the United States.
+
+There was published in Berlin in English a rather ridiculous
+paper called the _Continental_Times_, owned by an Austrian
+Jewess who had been married to an Englishman. The Foreign Office,
+after the outbreak of the war, practically took over this sheet by
+buying monthly many thousand copies. News coloured hysterically
+to favour the Central Empires was printed in this paper, which
+was headed "A Paper for Americans," under the editorship of an
+Englishman of decent family named Stanhope, who, of course, in
+consequence did not have to inhabit the prison camp of Ruhleben.
+(--------) was a contributor to this newspaper, and scurrilous
+articles attacking President Wilson appeared. Finally (---------)
+wrote a lying article for this paper in which he charged that
+Conger of the Associated Press had learned of Sir Roger Casement's
+proposed expedition; that Conger told me; that I cabled the news to
+Washington to the State Department; and that a member of President
+Wilson's Cabinet then gave the information to the British Ambassador.
+Later in a wireless which the Foreign Office permitted (---------)
+to send Senator O'Gorman of New York, (---------) varied his
+lie and charged that I had sent the information direct to Great
+Britain.
+
+_The_Continental_Times_ was distributed in the prison camps
+and after (---------)'s article I said to von Jagow, "I have
+had enough of this nonsense which is supported by the Foreign
+Office and if articles of the nature of (---------)'s appear
+again I shall make a public statement that the prisoners of war
+in Germany are subjected to a cruel and unusual punishment by
+having the lying _Continental_Times_ placed in their hands,
+a paper which purports to be published for Americans but which
+is supported by the Foreign Office, owned by an Austrian and
+edited by a renegade Englishman!"
+
+This _Continental_Times_ business again caused one to wonder
+at the German psychology which seems to think that the best way
+to make friends is to attack them. The author of "The Gentle
+Art of Making Enemies" must have attended a German school.
+
+An Ambassador is supposed to be protected but not even when I
+filed affidavits in the Foreign Office, in 1916, made by the
+ex-secretary of the "League of Truth" and by a man who was constantly
+with Marten and the dentist, that Marten had threatened to shoot
+me, did the Foreign Office dare or wish to do anything against
+this ridiculous League. These affidavits were corroborated by
+a respectable restaurant keeper in Berlin and his assistants
+who testified that Marten with several ferocious looking German
+officers had come to his restaurant "looking" for me. I never
+took any precaution against these lunatics whom I knew to be
+a bunch of cowardly swindlers.
+
+Marten and his friends were also engaged in a propaganda against
+the Jews.
+
+The activities of Marten were caused by the fact that he made
+money out of his propaganda; as numerous fool Germans and traitorous
+Americans contributed to his war chest, and by the fact that
+his work was so favourably received by the military that this
+husky coward was excused from all military service.
+
+It seemed, too, as if the Government was anxious to cultivate
+the hate against America. Long before American ammunition was
+delivered in any quantity to England and long before any at all
+was delivered to France, not only did the Government influence
+newspapers and official gazettes, but the official _Communiqués_
+alleged that quantities of American ammunition were being used
+on the West front.
+
+The Government seemed to think that if it could stir up enough
+hate against America in Germany on this ammunition question the
+Americans would become terrorised and stop the shipment.
+
+The Government allowed medals to be struck in honour of each
+little general who conquered a town--"von Emmich, conqueror of
+Liege," etc., a pernicious practice as each general and princeling
+wanted to continue the war until he could get his face on a
+medal--even if no one bought it. But the climax was reached when
+medals celebrating the sinking of the _Lusitania_ were sold
+throughout Germany. Even if the sinking of the _Lusitania_
+had been justified only one who has lived in Germany since the
+war can understand the disgustingly bad taste which can gloat
+over the death of women and babies.
+
+I can recall now but two writers in all Germany who dared to say
+a good word for America. One of these, Regierungsrat Paul Krause,
+son-in-law of Field Marshal Von der Goltz, wrote an article in
+January, 1917, in the _Lokal_Anzeiger_ pointing out the
+American side of the question of this munition shipment; and
+that bold and fearless speaker and writer, Maximilian Harden,
+dared to make a defence of the American standpoint. The principal
+article in one of the issues of his paper, _Die_Zukunft_,
+was headed "If I were Wilson." After some copies had been sold
+the issue was confiscated by the police, whether at the instance
+of the military or at the instance of the Chancellor, I do not
+know. Everyone had the impression in Berlin that this confiscation
+was by order of General von Kessel, the War Governor of the Mark
+of Brandenburg.
+
+I met Harden before the war and occasionally conversed with him
+thereafter. Once in a while he gave a lecture in the great hall
+of the Philharmonic, always filling the hall to overflowing.
+In his lectures, which, of course, were carefully passed on by
+the police, he said nothing startling. His newspaper is a weekly
+publication; a little book about seven inches by four and a half,
+but wielding an influence not at all commensurate with its size.
+
+The liberal papers, like the largest paper of Berlin, the
+_Tageblatt_, edited by Theodor Wolff, while not violently
+against America, were not favourable. But the articles in the
+Conservative papers and even some of the organs of the Catholic
+Party invariably breathed hatred against everything American.
+
+In the Reichstag, America and President Wilson were often attacked
+and never defended. On May thirtieth, 1916, in the course of a
+debate on the censorship, Strasemann, of the National Liberal
+Party and of the branch of that party with Conservative leanings,
+violently opposed President Wilson and said that he was not wanted
+as a peacemaker.
+
+Government, newspapers and politicians all united in opposing
+America.
+
+I believe that to-day all the bitterness of the hate formerly
+concentrated on Great Britain has now been concentrated on the
+United States. The German-Americans are hated worse than the
+native Americans. They have deeply disappointed the Germans:
+first, because although German-Americans contributed enormously
+towards German war charities the fact of this contribution was
+not known to the recipients in Germany. Money sent to the German
+Red Cross from America was acknowledged by the Red Cross; but no
+publicity was given in Germany to the fact that any of the money
+given was from German-Americans. Secondly, the German-Americans
+did not go, as they might have done, to Germany, through neutral
+countries, with American passports, and enter the German army;
+and, thirdly, the most bitter disappointment of all, the
+German-Americans have not yet risked their property and their
+necks, their children's future and their own tranquillity, by
+taking arms against the government of America in the interest
+of the Hohenzollerns.
+
+For years, a clever propaganda had been carried on in America
+to make all Germans there feel that they were Germans of one
+united nation, to make those who had come from Hesse and Bavaria,
+or Saxony and Württemberg, forget that as late as 1866 these
+countries had been overrun and conquered by Prussian militarism.
+When Prince Henry, the Kaiser's brother, visited America, he
+spent most of his time with German-Americans and German-American
+societies in order to assist this propaganda.
+
+Even in peace time, the German-American who returns to the village
+in which he lived as a boy and who walks down the village street
+exploiting himself and his property, does not help good relations
+between the two countries. Envy is the mother of hate and the
+envied and returned German-American receives only a lip welcome
+in the village of his ancestors.
+
+Caricatures of Uncle Sam, and of President Wilson were published
+in all German papers. A caricature representing our President
+releasing the dove of peace with one hand while he poured out
+munitions for the Allies with the other was the least unpleasant.
+
+As I have said, from the tenth of August, 1914, to the twenty-fifth
+of September, 1915, the Emperor continually refused to receive
+me on the ground that he would not receive the Ambassador of a
+country which furnished munitions to the enemies of Germany; and
+we were thoroughly black-listed by all the German royalties. I did
+not see one, however humble, after the outbreak of the war, with
+the exception of Prince Max of Baden, who had to do with prisoners
+of war in Germany and in other countries. On one occasion I sent
+one of my secretaries to the palace of Princess August Wilhelm,
+wife of one of the Kaiser's sons, with a contribution of money
+for her hospital, she having announced that she would personally
+receive contributions on that day. She took the money from the
+secretary and spoke bitterly against America on account of the
+shipment of arms.
+
+Even some boxes of cigarettes we sent another royalty at the front
+at Christmas time, 1914, were not acknowledged.
+
+Dr. Jacobs, who was the correspondent in Berlin of _Musical_America_,
+and who remained there until about the twenty-sixth of April, 1917,
+was called on about the sixteenth of April, 1917, to the Kommandantur
+and subjected to a cross-examination. During this cross-examination
+he was asked if he knew about the "League of Truth," and why he
+did not join that organisation. Whether it was a result of his
+non-joining or not, I do not know, but during the remainder of his
+stay in Berlin he was compelled to report twice a day to the police
+and was not allowed to leave his house after eight o'clock in the
+evening. The question, however, put to him shows the direct interest
+that the German authorities took in the existence of this malodorous
+organisation.
+
+It appears in some of the circulars issued by the League of Truth
+that I was accused of giving American passports to Englishmen
+in order to enable them to leave the country.
+
+After I left Germany there was an interpellation in the Reichstag
+about this, and Zimmermann was asked about the charge which he
+said he had investigated and found untrue.
+
+In another chapter I have spoken of the subject of the selling
+of arms and supplies by America to the Allies. No German ever
+forgets this. The question of legality or treaties never enters
+his mind: he only knows that American supplies and munitions
+killed his brother, son or father. It is a hate we must meet for
+long years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS (_Continued_)
+
+A few days after the events narrated in Chapter XII, von Jagow
+called to see me at the Embassy and invited me to visit the Emperor
+at the Great General Headquarters; but he did not state why I
+was asked, and I do not know to this day whether the Chancellor
+and those surrounding the Emperor had determined on a temporary
+settlement of the submarine question with the United States and
+wished to put that settlement out, as it were, under the protection
+of the Emperor, or whether the Emperor was undecided and those
+in favour of peace wished me to present to him the American side
+of the question. I incline to the latter view. Von Jagow informed
+me that an officer from the Foreign Office would accompany me and
+that I should be allowed to take a secretary and the huntsman
+(_Leibjaeger_), without whom no Ambassador ever travels in
+Germany.
+
+Mr. Grew, our counsellor, was very anxious to go and I felt on
+account of his excellent work, as well as his seniority, that
+he was entitled to be chosen. Lieutenant von Prittwitz, who was
+attached to the Foreign Office as a sort of special aide to von
+Jagow, was detailed to accompany us. We were given a special
+salon car and left on the evening of Friday, April twenty-eighth.
+As we neared the front by way of the line running through Saar
+Brucken, our train was often halted because of long trains of
+hospital cars on their way from the front to the base hospitals
+in the rear; and as we entered France there were many evidences of
+the obstinate fights which had raged in this part of the country
+in August, 1914. Parts of the towns and villages which we passed
+were in ruins, and rough trench lines were to be discerned on
+some of the hillsides. At the stations, weeping French women
+dressed in black were not uncommon sights, having just heard
+perhaps of the death, months before, of a husband, sweetheart
+or son who had been mobilised with the French army.
+
+The fortress city of Metz through which we passed seemed to be as
+animated as a beehive. Trains were continuously passing. Artillery
+was to be seen on the roads and automobiles were hurrying to and
+fro.
+
+The Great General Headquarters of the Kaiser for the Western
+Front is in the town of Charleville-Mézières, situated on the
+Meuse in the Department of the Ardennes, which Department at that
+time was the only French Department wholly in the possession of
+the Germans. We were received at the railway station by several
+officers and escorted in one of the Kaiser's automobiles, which had
+been set apart for my use, to a villa in the town of Charleville,
+owned by a French manufacturer named Perin. This pretty little red
+brick villa had been christened by the Germans, "Sachsen Villa,"
+because it had been occupied by the King of Saxony when he had
+visited the Kaiser. A French family servant and an old gardener
+had been left in the villa, but for the few meals which we took
+there two of the Emperor's body huntsmen had been assigned, and
+they brought with them some of the Emperor's silver and china.
+
+The Emperor had been occupying a large villa in the town of
+Charleville until a few days before our arrival. After the engineer
+of his private train had been killed in the railway station by
+a bomb dropped from a French aeroplane, and after another bomb
+had dropped within a hundred yards of the villa occupied by the
+Kaiser, he moved to a red brick château situated on a hill outside
+of Charleville, known as either the Château Bellevue or Bellaire.
+
+Nearly every day during our stay, we lunched and dined with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the villa of a French banker, which he occupied.
+About ten people were present at these dinners, the Chancellor's
+son-in-law, Zech, Prittwitz, two experts in international law,
+both attached to the Foreign Office, and, at two dinners, von
+Treutler, the Prussian Minister to Bavaria, who had been assigned
+to represent the Foreign Office near the person of the Kaiser and
+Helfferich who, towards the end of our stay, had been summoned
+from Berlin.
+
+I had been working hard at German and as von Bethmann-Hollweg
+does not like to talk English and as some of these persons did not
+speak that language we tried to carry on the table conversation
+in German, but I know that when I tried to explain, in German,
+to Helfferich the various tax systems of America, I swam out
+far beyond my linguistic depth.
+
+During our stay here I received cables from the Department of
+State which were transmitted from Berlin in cipher, and which
+Grew was able to decipher as he had brought a code book with
+him. In one of these it was expressly intimated that in any
+settlement of the submarine controversy America would make no
+distinction between armed and unarmed merchant ships.
+
+We formed for a while quite a happy family. The French owners
+of the villa seemed to have had a fondness for mechanical toys.
+After dinner every night these toys were set going, much to the
+amusement of von Bethmann-Hollweg. One of these toys, about two
+feet high, was a Hoochi-Koochi dancer and another successful one
+was a clown and a trained pig, both climbing a step ladder and
+performing marvellous feats thereon. Grew, who is an excellent
+musician, played the piano for the Chancellor and at his special
+request played pieces by Bach, the favourite composer of von
+Bethmann-Hollweg's deceased wife. One day we had tea in the garden
+of the villa formerly occupied by the Emperor, with the Prince
+of Pless (who is always with the Kaiser, and who seemed to be a
+prime favourite with him), von Treutler and others, and motored
+with Prince Pless to see some marvellous Himalayan pheasants
+reared by an old Frenchman, an ex-jailer, who seemed to have a
+strong instinct to keep something in captivity,
+
+The Kaiser's automobile, which he had placed at my disposal,
+had two loaded rifles standing upright in racks at the right
+and left sides of the car, ready for instant use. On one day we
+motored, always, of course, in charge of the officers detailed
+to take care of us, to the ancient walled city of Rocroy and
+through the beautiful part of the Ardennes forest lying to the
+east of it, returning to Charleville along the heights above
+the valley of the Meuse.
+
+[Illustration: AMBASSADOR GERARD AND HIS PARTY IN SEDAN.]
+
+[Illustration: WITH GERMAN OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE FRENCH
+FOOD COMMISSION BEFORE THE COTTAGE AT BAZEILLES, WHERE NAPOLEON
+III AND BISMARCK MET AFTER THE BATTLE OF SEDAN.]
+
+The feeding of the French population, which is carried on by
+the American Relief Commission, was a very interesting thing
+to see and, in company with one of the members of the French
+committee, we saw the workings of this system of American Relief.
+We first visited a storehouse in Charleville, the headquarters
+for the relief district of which Charleville may be called the
+capital.
+
+For relief purposes Northern France is divided into six districts.
+From the central distribution point in each district, food is
+sent to the commune within the district, the commune being the
+ultimate unit of distribution and each commune containing on
+the average about five hundred souls. We then motored to one
+of the communes where the distribution of food for the week was
+to take place that afternoon. Here in a factory, closed since the
+war, the people of the commune were lined up with their baskets
+waiting for their share of the rations. On entering a large room
+of the factory, each stopped first at a desk and there either paid
+in cash for the week's allowance of rations or signed an agreement
+to pay at some future date. The individuals who had no prospect
+of being able to pay received the rations for nothing. About
+one-third were in each class. The money used was not always French,
+or real money, but was, as a rule, the paper money issued in
+that part of Northern France by each town and redeemable after
+the war.
+
+Signs were hung up showing the quantity that each person was
+entitled to receive for the next fifteen days and the sale price
+per kilo to each inhabitant. For instance, in this particular
+period for the first fifteen days of the month of May, 1916,
+each inhabitant could, in this district, receive the following
+allowances at the following rates:
+
+  ARTICLE           AMOUNT PER HEAD               PRICE
+  Flour                4 K. 500   The Kilogram   0 fr. 48
+  Rice                   K. 500                  0 fr. 55
+  Beans                  K. 500                  0 fr. 90
+  Bacon                  K. 500                  2 fr. 80
+  Lard                   K. 250                  2 fr. 30
+  Green Coffee           K. 250                  1 fr. 70
+  Crystallized Sugar     K. 150                  0 fr. 90
+  Salt                   K. 200                  0 fr. 10
+  Soap (hard)            K. 250                  1 fr. 00
+
+In addition to these articles each inhabitant of the commune
+which we visited, also received on the day of our visit a small
+quantity of carrot seed to plant in the small plot of ground
+which each was permitted to retain out of his own land by the
+German authorities.
+
+The unfortunate people who received this allowance looked very
+poor and very hungry and very miserable. Many of them spoke to
+me, not only here but also in Charleville, and expressed their
+great gratitude to the American people for what was being done
+for them. Those in Charleville said that they had heard that I
+was in their town because of trouble pending between America
+and Germany. They said they hoped that there would be no war
+between the two countries because if war came they did not know
+what would become of them and that, in the confusion of war,
+they would surely be left to starve.
+
+In Charleville notices were posted directing the inhabitants
+not to go out on the streets after, I think, eight o'clock in
+the evening, and also notices informing the population that they
+would be allowed a small quantity of their own land for the purpose
+of growing potatoes.
+
+After visiting the factory building where the distribution of
+rations was taking place, we motored to Sedan, stopping on the
+way at the hamlet of Bazeilles, and visiting the cottage where
+Bismarck and Emperor Napoleon the Third had their historic interview
+after the battle of Sedan.
+
+The old lady who owns this house received us and showed us bullet
+marks made on her house in the war of 1870, as well as in the
+present war. She apologised because she had had the window-pane,
+broken by a rifle shot in this war, replaced on account of the
+cold. As a girl, she had received Bismarck and Napoleon and had
+shown them to the room upstairs where they had held their
+consultation. I asked her which chair in this room Bismarck had
+sat in, and sat in it myself, for luck. I also contributed to the
+collection of gold pieces given to her by those who had visited
+her cottage.
+
+In Sedan we visited an old mill where stores of the relief commission
+were kept, and in the mayor's office were present at a sort of
+consultation between the Prussian officers and members of the
+French Committee of Sedan in which certain details relative to
+the feeding of the population were discussed.
+
+The relief work is not, of course, carried on right up to the
+battle line but we visited a small village not many kilometres in
+the rear of the German line. In this village we were, as before,
+shown the stores kept for distribution by the relief commission.
+As there were many soldiers in this village I said I thought that
+these soldiers must have stores of their own but, in order to
+be sure that they were not living on the supplies of the relief
+commission, I thought it only fair that I should see where the
+soldiers' stores were kept. I was taken across the railroad track
+to where their stores were kept and, judging from the labels on
+the barrels and boxes, I should say that a great many of these
+stores had come from Holland.
+
+During this trip about the country, I saw a number of women and
+girls working, or attempting to work, in the fields. Their appearance
+was so different from that of the usual peasant that I spoke to
+the accompanying officers about it. I was told, however, that
+these were the peasants of the locality who dressed unusually
+well in that part of France. Later on in Charleville, at the
+lodging of an officer and with Count Wengersky, who was detailed
+to act as sort of interpreter and guide to the American Relief
+Commission workers, I met the members of the American Relief
+Commission who were working in Northern France and who had been
+brought on a special train for the purpose of seeing me to
+Charleville. This Count Wengersky spoke English well. Having
+been for a number of years agent of the Hamburg American Line in
+London, he was used to dealing with Americans and was possessed
+of more tact than usually falls to the lot of the average Prussian
+officer. We had tea and cakes in these lodgings, and then some
+of the Americans drew me aside and told me the secret of the
+peculiar looking peasants whom I had seen at work in the fields
+surrounding Charleville.
+
+It seems that the Germans had endeavoured to get volunteers from
+the great industrial town of Lille, Roubeix and Tourcoing to
+work these fields; that after the posting of the notices calling
+for volunteers only fourteen had appeared. The Germans then gave
+orders to seize a certain number of inhabitants and send them
+out to farms in the outlying districts to engage in agricultural
+work. The Americans told me that this order was carried out with
+the greatest barbarity; that a man would come home at night and
+find that his wife or children had disappeared and no one could
+tell him where they had gone except that the neighbours would
+relate that the German non-commissioned officers and a file of
+soldiers had carried them off. For instance, in a house of a
+well-to-do merchant who had perhaps two daughters of fifteen and
+seventeen, and a man servant, the two daughters and the servant
+would be seized and sent off together to work for the Germans
+in some little farm house whose location was not disclosed to
+the parents. The Americans told me that this sort of thing was
+causing such indignation among the population of these towns
+that they feared a great uprising and a consequent slaughter and
+burning by the Germans.
+
+That night at dinner I spoke to von Bethmann-Hollweg about this
+and told him that it seemed to me absolutely outrageous; and that,
+without consulting with my government, I was prepared to protest
+in the name of humanity against a continuance of this treatment
+of the civil population of occupied France. The Chancellor told
+me that he had not known of it, that it was the result of orders
+given by the military, that he would speak to the Emperor about
+it and that he hoped to be able to stop further deportations.
+I believe that they were stopped, but twenty thousand or more who
+had been taken from their homes were not returned until months
+afterwards. I said in a speech which I made in May on my return to
+America that it required the joint efforts of the Pope, the King
+of Spain and our President to cause the return of these people to
+their homes; and I then saw that some German press agency had
+come out with an article that I had made false statements about
+this matter because these people were not returned to their homes
+as a result of the representations of the Pope, the King of Spain
+and our President, but were sent back because the Germans had
+no further use for them. It seems to me that this denial makes
+the case rather worse than before.
+
+At the Chancellor's house in the evenings we had discussions
+on the submarine situation and I had several long talks with
+von Bethmann-Hollweg alone in a corner of the room while the
+others listened to music or set the mechanical toys in motion.
+These discussions, without doubt, were reported to the Emperor
+either by the Chancellor or by von Treutler who at that time
+was high in favor with his Majesty.
+
+I remember on one evening I was asked the question as to what
+America could do, supposing the almost impossible, that America
+should resent the recommencement of ruthless submarine warfare
+by the Germans and declare war. I said that nearly all of the
+great inventions used in this war had been made by Americans;
+that the very submarine which formed the basis of our discussion
+was an American invention, and so were the barbed wire and the
+aeroplane, the ironclad, the telephone and the telegraph, so
+necessary to trench warfare; that even that method of warfare
+had been first developed on something of the present scale in our
+Civil War; and that I believed that, if forced to it, American
+genius could produce some invention which might have a decisive
+effect in this war. My German auditors seemed inclined to believe
+that there was something in my contentions. But they said, "While
+possibly you might invent something in America, while possibly
+you will furnish money and supplies to the Allies, you have no
+men; and the public sentiment of your country is such that you
+will not be able to raise an army large enough to make any
+impression." I said that possibly if hostilities once broke out
+with the Germans, the Germans might force us by the commission
+of such acts as had aroused England, to pass a law for universal
+military service. This proposition of mine was branded by the
+Germans as absolutely impossible; and, therefore, I am sure that
+the adoption by the United States of universal service in the
+first round of the war struck a very severe blow at the morale
+of Germany.
+
+The Chancellor always desired to make any settlement of the submarine
+question contingent upon our doing something against England;
+but I again and again insisted that we could not agree to do
+anything against some other power as a condition of obtaining
+a recognition of our rights from the German Empire.
+
+During my stay at the General Headquarters, General Falkenhayn,
+although he was there at the time, carefully avoided me, which
+I took to be a sign that he was in favour of war with America.
+In fact, I heard afterwards that he had insisted on giving his
+views on the subject, but that a very high authority had told
+him to confine himself to military operations.
+
+After we had been a day or so at Charleville, the Vice-Chancellor,
+Helfferich, arrived. I have always believed that he was sent for
+to add his weight to the arguments in favour of peace and to
+point out that it was necessary for Germany to hate the friendship
+of America after the war, so as to have markets where she could
+place her goods. And I am convinced that at this time, at any rate,
+the influence of Helfferich was cast in the scale in favour of
+peace.
+
+Finally, I was told that on the next day, which was Monday, May
+first, I was to lunch with the Emperor. Grew was invited to accompany
+me, and the Chancellor said that he would call for me about an
+hour before the time set for lunch as the Emperor desired to
+have a talk with me before lunch. In the afternoon an extract
+from the log of a German submarine commander was sent to me in
+which the submarine commander had stated that he had sighted a
+vessel which he could easily have torpedoed, but as the vessel
+was one hundred and twenty miles from land, he had not done so
+because the crew might not be able from that distance to reach a
+harbour. When the Chancellor called for me the following morning,
+he asked me if I had read this extract from the submarine officer's
+log, and noted how he had refrained from torpedoing a boat one
+hundred and twenty miles from land. I told the Chancellor that I
+had read the extract, but that I had also read in the newspaper
+that very morning that a ship had been torpedoed in stormy weather
+at exactly the same distance from land and the crew compelled
+to seek safety in the ship's boats; that, anyway, "one swallow
+did not make a summer," and that reports were continually being
+received of boats being torpedoed at great distances from land.
+
+We then got in the motor and motored to the château about a mile
+off, where the Kaiser resided. We got out of the motor before
+going into the courtyard of the château, and immediately I was
+taken by the Chancellor into a garden on the gently sloping hillside
+below the château. Here the Emperor, dressed in uniform, was
+walking.
+
+As I drew near the Emperor, he said immediately, "Do you come
+like the great pro-consul bearing peace or war in either hand?"
+By this he referred, of course, to the episode in which Quintus
+Fabius Maximus, chief of the Roman envoys sent to Hannibal in
+the Second Punic War, doubled his toga in his hand, held it up
+and said: "In this fold I carry peace and war: choose which you
+will have." "Give us which you prefer," was the reply. "Then
+take war," answered the Roman, letting the toga fall. "We accept
+the gift," cried the Carthaginian Senator, "and welcome."
+
+I said, "No, your Majesty, only hoping that the differences between
+two friendly nations may be adjusted." The Emperor then spoke of
+what he termed the uncourteous tone of our notes, saying that
+we charged the Germans with barbarism in warfare and that, as
+Emperor and head of the Church, he had wished to carry on the
+war in a knightly manner. He referred to his own speech to the
+members of the Reichstag at the commencement of the war and said
+that the nations opposed to Germany had used unfair methods and
+means, that the French especially were not like the French of
+'70, but that their officers, instead of being nobles, came from
+no one knew where. He then referred to the efforts to starve out
+Germany and keep out milk and said that before he would allow
+his family and grand-children to starve he would blow up Windsor
+Castle and the whole Royal family of England. We then had a long
+discussion in detail of the whole submarine question, in the
+course of which the Emperor said that the submarine had come
+to stay, that it was a weapon recognised by all countries, and
+that he had seen a picture of a proposed giant submarine in an
+American paper, the _Scientific_American_. He stated that,
+anyway, there was no longer any international law. To this last
+statement the Chancellor agreed. He further said that a person
+on an enemy merchant ship was like a man travelling on a cart
+behind the battle lines--he had no just cause of complaint if
+injured. He asked me why we had done nothing to England because
+of her alleged violations of international law,--why we had not
+broken the British blockade.
+
+In addition to the technical arguments based on international
+law, I answered that no note of the United States had made any
+general charge of barbarism against Germany; that we complained
+of the manner of the use of submarines and nothing more; that we
+could never promise to do anything to England or to any other
+country in return for a promise from Germany or any third country
+to keep the rules of international law and respect the rights and
+lives of our citizens; that we were only demanding our rights
+under the recognised rules of international law and it was for
+us to decide which rights we would enforce first; that, as I
+had already told the Chancellor, if two men entered my grounds
+and one stepped on my flower beds and the other killed my sister,
+I should probably first pursue the murderer of my sister; that
+those travelling on the seas in enemy merchant ships were in a
+different position from those travelling in a cart behind the
+enemy's battle lines on land because the land travellers were
+on enemy's territory, while those on the sea were on territory
+which, beyond the three-mile limit, was free and in no sense
+enemy's territory. We also discussed the position taken by the
+German Government in one of the _Frye_ Notes, in which the
+German expert had taken the position that a cargo of food destined
+for an armed enemy port was presumed to be for the armies of
+the enemy, and therefore contraband. The Emperor spoke of the
+case of the _Dacia_ with some bitterness, but when I went
+into an explanation the Chancellor joined in the conversation
+and said that our position was undoubtedly correct. I said that
+it was not our business to break the blockade--that there were
+plenty of German agents in the United States who could send food
+ships and test the question; that one ship I knew of, the
+_Wilhelmina_, laden with food, had been seized by the British,
+who then compromised with the owners, paying them, I believed, a
+large sum for the disputed cargo. And in taking up the doctrine
+of ultimate destination of goods, i.e., goods sent to a neutral
+country but really destined for a belligerent, I said I thought
+that during our Civil War we had taken against England exactly
+the same stand which England now took; and I said I thought that
+one of the decisions of our Supreme Court was based on a shipment
+to Matamoras, Mexico, but which the Supreme Court had decided
+was really for the Confederacy.
+
+Discussing the submarine question, the Emperor and Chancellor
+spoke of the warning given in the _Lusitania_ case; and
+I said: "If the Chancellor warns me not to go out on the
+Wilhelmplatz, where I have a perfect right to go, the fact that
+he gave the warning does not justify him in killing me if I
+disregarded his warning and go where I have a right to go." The
+conversation then became more general and we finally left the
+garden and went into the château, where the Emperor's aides and
+guests were impatiently waiting for lunch.
+
+This conversation lasted far beyond lunch time. Anxious heads
+were seen appearing from the windows and terraces of the château
+to which we finally adjourned. I sat between the Emperor and
+Prince Pless. Conversation was general for the most of the time,
+and subjects such as the suffragettes and the peace expedition
+of Henry Ford were amusingly discussed.
+
+After lunch, I again had a long talk with the Emperor but of a
+more general nature than the conversation in the garden.
+
+That night about eleven o'clock, after again dining with the
+Chancellor, we left Charleville in the same special salon car,
+arriving at Berlin about four P. M. the next day, where at the
+station were a crowd of German and American newspaper correspondents,
+all anxious to know what had happened.
+
+At this last dinner at the Chancellor's he took me off in a corner
+and said, "As I understand it, what America wants is cruiser
+warfare on the part of the submarines." And I said, "Yes, that
+is it exactly. They may exercise the right of visit and search,
+must not torpedo or sink vessels without warning, and must not
+sink any vessel unless the passengers and crew are put in a place
+of safety."
+
+On the morning of the third of May, I heard that the German note
+had been drafted, but that it would contain a clause to the
+effect that while the German submarines would not go beyond cruiser
+warfare, this rule, nevertheless, would not apply to armed
+merchantmen.
+
+As such a proposition as this would, of course, only bring up
+the subject again, I immediately ordered my automobile and called
+on the Spanish Ambassador, stating to him what I had heard about
+the contents of the note; that this would mean, without doubt, a
+break with America; and that, as I had been instructed to hand
+the Embassy over to him, I had come to tell him of that fact. I
+gave the same information to other colleagues, of course hoping
+that what I said would directly or indirectly reach the ears
+of the German Foreign Office. Whether it did or not, I do not
+know, but the _Sussex_ Note when received did not contain
+any exception with reference to armed merchantmen.
+
+With the receipt of the _Sussex_ Note and the President's
+answer thereto, which declined assent to the claim of Germany
+to define its attitude toward our rights in accordance with what
+we might do in regard to the enforcement of our rights against
+England, the submarine question seemed, at least for the moment,
+settled. I, however, immediately warned the Department that I
+believed that the rulers of Germany would at some future date,
+forced by public opinion, and by the von Tirpitz and Conservative
+parties, take up ruthless submarine war again, possibly in the
+autumn but at any rate about February or March, 1917.
+
+In my last conversation with the Chancellor before leaving the
+Great General Headquarters, when he referred to the cruiser warfare
+of the submarines, he also said, "I hope now that if we settle this
+matter your President will be great enough to take up the question
+of peace." It was as a result of intimations from government
+circles that, after my return to Berlin, I gave an interview to
+a representative of a Munich newspaper, expressing my faith in
+the coming of peace, although I was careful to say that it might
+be a matter of months or even years.
+
+Thereafter, on many occasions the Chancellor impressed upon me
+the fact that America must do something towards arranging a peace
+and that if nothing was done to this end, public opinion in Germany
+would undoubtedly force a resumption of a ruthless submarine war.
+
+In September of 1916, I having mentioned that Mrs. Gerard was
+going to the United States on a short visit, von Jagow insistently
+urged me to go also in order to make every effort to induce the
+President to do something towards peace; and, as a result of his
+urging and as a result of my own desire to make the situation
+clear in America, I sailed from Copenhagen on the twenty-eighth
+of September with Mrs. Gerard, on the Danish ship, _Frederick_VIII_,
+bound for New York. I had spent almost three years in Berlin,
+having been absent during that time from the city only five or
+six days at Kiel and two week-ends in Silesia in 1914, with two
+weeks at Munich in the autumn, two days at Munich and two days at
+Parten-Kirchen in 1916, and two week-ends at Heringsdorf, in the
+summer of the same year, with visits to British prison camps
+scattered through the two and a half years of war.
+
+On the _Frederick_VIII_ were Messrs. Herbert Swope of the
+_New_York_World_ and William C. Bullitt of the _Philadelphia_Ledger_,
+who had been spending some time in Germany. I impressed upon each
+of these gentlemen my fixed belief that Germany intended shortly,
+unless some definite move was made toward peace, to commence
+ruthless submarine war; and they made this view clear in the
+articles which they wrote for their respective newspapers.
+
+Mr. Swope's articles which appeared in the _New_York_World_
+were immediately republished by him in a book called "Inside the
+German Empire." In Mr. Swope's book on page ninety-four, he says,
+"The campaign for the ruthless U-boat warfare is regarded by one
+man in this country who speaks with the highest German authority,
+as being in the nature of a threat intended to accelerate and
+force upon us a movement toward peace. Ambassador Gerard had
+his attention drawn to this just before he left Berlin but he
+declined to accept the interpretation."
+
+On page eighty-eight he writes, "Our Embassy in Berlin expected
+just such a demonstration as was given by the U-53 in October
+when she sank six vessels off Nantucket, as a lesson of what
+Germany could do in our waters if war came."
+
+On page seventy-four he says further, "Throughout Germany the
+objection for the resumption of ruthless U-boat warfare of the
+_Lusitania_ type grows stronger day by day. The Chancellor
+is holding out against it, but how long he can restrain it no one
+can say. I left Germany convinced that only peace could prevent
+its resumption. And the same opinion is held by every German
+with whom I spoke, and it is held also by Ambassador Gerard.
+The possibility was so menacing that the principal cause of the
+Ambassador's return in October was that he might report to
+Washington. The point was set out in press despatches at that
+time."
+
+I wrote a preface to Mr. Swope's book for the express purpose
+of informing the American public in this way that I believed
+that Germany intended at an early date to resume the ruthless
+V-boat warfare.
+
+Our trip home on the _Frederick_VIII_ was without incident
+except for the fact that on the ninth day of October, Swope came to
+the door of my stateroom about twelve o'clock at night and informed
+me that the captain had told him to tell me that the wireless had
+brought the news that German submarines were operating directly
+ahead of us and had just sunk six ships in the neighbourhood
+of Nantucket. I imagine that the captain slightly changed the
+course of our ship, but next day the odour of burning oil was
+quite noticeable for hours.
+
+These Danish ships in making the trip from Copenhagen to New
+York were compelled to put in at the port of Kirkwall in the
+Orkney Islands, north of Scotland, where the ship was searched by
+the British authorities. On the occasion of our visit to Kirkwall,
+on this trip, a Swede, who had been so foolish as to make a sketch
+of the harbour and defences of Kirkwall from the top deck of the
+_Frederick_VIII_, was taken off the boat by the British. The
+British had very cleverly spotted him doing this from the shore
+or a neighbouring boat, through a telescope.
+
+Ships can enter Kirkwall only by daylight and at six o'clock
+every evening trawlers draw a net across the entrance to the
+harbour as a protection against submarines. A passage through
+this net is not opened until daylight the following morning.
+
+Captain Thomson of the _Frederick_VIII_, the ship which
+carried us to America and back to Copenhagen, by his evident
+mastery of his profession gave to all of his passengers a feeling
+of confidence on the somewhat perilous voyage in those dangerous
+waters.
+
+When I reached America, on October eleventh, I was given a most
+flattering reception and the freedom of the City of New York.
+Within a few days after my arrival, the President sent for me
+to visit him at Shadow Lawn, at Long Branch, and I was with him
+for over four hours and a quarter in our first conference. I saw
+him, of course, after the election, before returning to Germany,
+and in fact sailed on the fourth of December at his special request.
+
+Before I left I was impressed with the idea that he desired above
+all things both to keep and to make peace. Of course, this question
+of making peace is a very delicate one. A direct offer on our part
+might have subjected us to the same treatment which we gave Great
+Britain during our Civil War when Great Britain made overtures
+looking towards the establishment of peace, and the North answered,
+practically telling the British Government that it could attend
+to its own business, that it would brook no interference and would
+regard further overtures as unfriendly acts.
+
+The Germans started this war without any consultation with the
+United States, and then seemed to think that they had a right
+to demand that the United States make peace for them on such
+terms and at such time as they chose; and that the failure to
+do so gave them a vested right to break all the laws of warfare
+against their enemies and to murder the citizens of the United
+States on the high seas, in violation of the declared principles
+of international law.
+
+Nevertheless, I think that the inclination of the President was
+to go very far towards the forcing of peace.
+
+Our trip from New York to Copenhagen was uneventful, cold and
+dark. We were captured by a British cruiser west of the Orkneys
+and taken in for the usual search to the port of Kirkwall where
+we remained two days.
+
+The President impressed upon me his great interest in the Belgians
+deported to Germany. The action of Germany in thus carrying a
+great part of the male population of Belgium into virtual slavery
+had roused great indignation in America. As the revered Cardinal
+Farley said to me a few days before my departure, "You have to
+go back to the times of the Medes and the Persians to find a
+like example of a whole people carried into bondage."
+
+Mr. Grew had made representations about this to the Chancellor
+and, on my return, I immediately took up the question.
+
+I was informed that it was a military measure, that Ludendorf had
+feared that the British would break through and overrun Belgium
+and that the military did not propose to have a hostile population
+at their backs who might cut the rail lines of communication,
+telephones and telegraphs; and that for this reason the deportation
+had been decided on. I was, however, told that I would be given
+permission to visit these Belgians. The passes, nevertheless,
+which alone made such visiting possible were not delivered until
+a few days before I left Germany.
+
+Several of these Belgians who were put at work in Berlin managed
+to get away and come to see me. They gave me a harrowing account
+of how they had been seized in Belgium and made to work in Germany
+at making munitions to be used probably against their own friends.
+I said to the Chancellor, "There are Belgians employed in making
+shells contrary to all rules of war and the Hague conventions."
+He said, "I do not believe it." I said, "My automobile is at the
+door. I can take you, in four minutes, to where thirty Belgians
+are working on the manufacture of shells." But he did not find
+time to go.
+
+Americans must understand that the Germans will stop at nothing
+to win this war, and that the only thing they respect is force.
+
+While I was in America von Jagow, as had been predicted by his
+enemies in Berlin, had fallen and Zimmermann had been given his
+place.
+
+I remained a day in Copenhagen, in order to arrange for the
+transportation to Germany of the three tons of food which I had
+brought from New York, and, also, in order to lunch with Count
+Rantzau, the German Minister, a most able diplomat.
+
+Therefore, the President's peace note arrived in Berlin just
+ahead of me and was delivered by Mr. Grew a few hours before my
+arrival. Joseph C. Grew, of Boston, was next in command during
+all my stay in Berlin. He most ably carried on the work of the
+Embassy during my absence on the trip to America, in the autumn
+of 1916; and at all times was of the greatest assistance to me. I
+hope to see him go far in his career. This note was dated December
+eighteenth, 1916, and was addressed by the Secretary of State
+to the American Ambassadors at the capitals of the belligerent
+powers. It commenced as follows: "The President directs me to
+send you the following communication to be presented immediately
+to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the government to which
+you are accredited.
+
+"The President of the United States has instructed me to suggest
+to the (here is inserted a designation of the government addressed)
+a course of action in regard to the present war which he hopes
+that the government will take under consideration as suggested
+in the most friendly spirit, etc."
+
+In the note which was sent to the Central Powers it was stated:
+"The suggestion which I am instructed to make, the President
+has long had it in mind to offer. He is somewhat embarrassed
+to offer it at this particular time because it may now seem to
+have been prompted by a desire to play a part in connection with
+the recent overtures of the Central Powers."
+
+Of course, the President thus referred to the address made by
+Bethmann-Hollweg in the Reichstag in December, in which, after
+reviewing generally the military situation, the Chancellor said:
+"In a deep moral and religious sense of duty towards this nation
+and beyond it towards humanity, the Emperor now considers that the
+moment has come for official action towards peace. His Majesty,
+therefore, in complete harmony and in common with our Allies decided
+to propose to the hostile powers to enter peace negotiations."
+And the Chancellor continued, saying that a note to this effect
+had been transmitted that morning to all hostile powers, through
+the representatives of these powers to whom the interests and
+rights of Germany in the enemy States had been entrusted; and
+that, therefore, the representatives of Spain, the United States
+and Switzerland had been asked to forward the note.
+
+Coincidently with this speech of the Chancellor's, which was
+December twelfth, 1916, the Emperor sent a message to the commanding
+generals reading as follows: "Soldiers! In agreement with the
+sovereigns of my Allies and with the consciousness of victory,
+I have made an offer of peace to the enemy. Whether it will be
+accepted is still uncertain. Until that moment arrives you will
+fight on."
+
+I return to the President's note.
+
+The President suggested that early occasion be sought to callout
+from all the nations now at war an avowal of their respective
+views as to the terms upon which the war might be concluded,
+and the arrangements which would be deemed satisfactory as a
+guarantee against its renewal.
+
+He called the attention of the world to the fact that according
+to the statements of the statesmen of the belligerent powers,
+the objects which all sides had in mind seemed to be the same.
+And the President finally said that he was not proposing peace,
+not even offering mediation; but merely proposing that soundings
+be taken in order that all nations might know how near might
+be the haven of peace for which all mankind longed.
+
+Shortly after the publication of this note Secretary Lansing
+gave an interview to the representatives of the American press
+in which he stated that America was very near war. This interview
+he later explained.
+
+As soon as possible after my return to Berlin I had interviews
+with Zimmermann and the Chancellor. Zimmermann said that we were
+such personal friends that he was sure we could continue to work,
+as we had in the past, in a frank and open manner, putting all
+the cards upon the table and working together in the interests of
+peace. I, of course, agreed to this and it seemed, on the surface,
+as if everything would go smoothly.
+
+Although the torpedoing without warning of the _Marina_,
+while I was in the United States, had resulted in the death of a
+number of Americans on board, nevertheless there seemed to be an
+inclination on the part of the government and people of the United
+States to forget this incident provided Germany would continue to
+keep her pledges given in the _Sussex_ Note. During all
+the period of the war in Germany I had been on good terms with
+the members of the government, namely, the Chancellor, von Jagow,
+Zimmermann and the other officials of the Foreign Office, as well
+as with Helfferich, Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister, Kaempf, the
+President of the Reichstag and a number of the influential men
+of Germany such as von Gwinner, of the Deutsche Bank, Gutmann of
+the Dresdener Bank, Dr. Walter Rathenau, who for a long time was
+at the head of the department for the supply and conservation of
+raw materials, General von Kessel, Over-Commander of the Mark of
+Brandenburg, in spite of many tiffs with him over the treatment
+of prisoners, Theodor Wolff, editor of the _Tageblatt_, Professor
+Stein, Maximilian Harden and many others.
+
+For a long time the fight waged by the Chancellor was America's
+fight and a fight for peace, so much so that the newspapers which
+attacked the Chancellor were the same ones which had attacked
+President Wilson, America and Americans in general, and which had
+very often included me in their attacks. During every crisis between
+America and Germany I had acted with von Jagow and Zimmermann in
+a most confidential way, looking forward always to one object,
+namely, the preservation of peace between our respective countries.
+Many suggestions were made which, I think, materially aided up
+to that time in the preservation of peace.
+
+The Chancellor and the Foreign Office, however, through sheer
+weakness did nothing to prevent the insults to our flag and President
+perpetrated by the "League of Truth"; although both under the law
+and the regulations of the "State of Siege" this gang could not
+operate without the consent of the authorities. So far as I was
+concerned personally, a few extra attacks from tooth carpenters
+and snake dancers meant nothing, but certainly aroused my interest
+in the workings of the Teutonic official brain.
+
+On my return everyone in official life,--the Chancellor, Zimmermann,
+von Stumm who succeeded Zimmermann, von der Busche, formerly
+German Minister in the Argentine, who had equal rank with Stumm
+in the Foreign Office--all without exception and in the most
+convincing language assured me that cases like that of the
+_Marina_, for example, were only accidents and that there
+was every desire on the part of Germany to maintain the pledges
+given in the _Sussex_ Note.
+
+And the great question to be solved is whether the Germans in
+making their offers of peace, in begging me to go to America to
+talk peace to the President, were sincerely anxious for peace,
+or were only making these general offers of peace in order to
+excuse in the eyes of the world a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare and to win to their side public opinion in the United
+States, in case such warfare should be resumed.
+
+Had the decision rested with the Chancellor and with the Foreign
+Office, instead of with the military, I am sure that the decision
+would have been against the resumption of this ruthless war.
+But Germany is not ruled in war time by the civilian power.
+Hindenburg at the time I left for America was at the head of
+the General Staff and Ludendorf, who had been Chief of Staff,
+had been made the Quartermaster General in order that he might
+follow Hindenburg to General Headquarters.
+
+Hindenburg, shortly before his battle of the Masurian Lakes,
+was a General living in retirement at Hanover. Because he had
+for years specialised in the study of this region he was suddenly
+called to the command of the German army which was opposing the
+Russian invasions. Ludendorf, who had been Colonel of a regiment
+at the attack on Liège, was sent with him as his Chief of Staff.
+The success of Hindenburg in his campaigns is too well known
+to require recapitulation here. He became the popular idol of
+Germany, the one general-in fact the one man--whom the people felt
+that they could idolise. But shortly before my trip to America an
+idea was creeping through the mind of the German people leading
+them to believe that Hindenburg was but the front, and that the
+brains of the combination had been furnished by Ludendorf. Many
+Germans in a position to know told me that the real dictator
+of Germany was Ludendorf.
+
+My trip to America was made principally at the instance of von
+Jagow and the Chancellor, and, in my farewell talk with the
+Chancellor a few days before leaving, I asked if it could not
+be arranged, since he was always saying that the civilian power
+was inferior to that of the military, that I should see Hindenburg
+and Ludendorf before I left. This proposed meeting he either
+could not or would not arrange, and shortly after my return I
+again asked the Chancellor if I could not see, if not the Emperor,
+at least Hindenburg and Ludendorf, who the Chancellor himself
+had said were the leaders of the military, and, therefore, the
+leaders of Germany. Again I was put off.
+
+In the meantime and in spite of the official assurance given
+to me certain men in Germany, in a position to know, warned me
+that the government intended to resume ruthless submarine war.
+Ludendorf, they said, had declared in favour of this war and,
+according to them, that meant its adoption.
+
+At first I thought that Germany would approach the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war _via_ the armed merchantman issue.
+
+The case of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners seemed to bear out
+this theory. A German raider captured and sunk a number of enemy
+vessels and sent one of the captured boats, the _Yarrowdale_,
+with a prize crew to Swinemunde. On board, held as prisoners,
+were a number of the crews of the captured vessels; and among
+those men I learned "under the rose," were some Americans. The
+arrival of the _Yarrowdale_ was kept secret for some time,
+but as soon as I received information of its arrival, I sent
+note after note to the Foreign Office demanding to know if there
+were any Americans among the prisoner crews.
+
+For a long time I received no answer, but finally Germany admitted
+what I knew already, that Americans taken with the crews of captured
+ships were being held as prisoners of war, the theory of the
+Germans being that all employed on armed enemy merchant ships
+were enemy combatants. I supposed that possibly Germany might
+therefore approach the submarine controversy by this route and
+claim that armed merchantmen were liable to be sunk without notice.
+
+Instructed by the State Department, I demanded the immediate
+release of the _Yarrowdale_ prisoners. This was accorded
+by Germany, but, after the breaking of relations, the prisoners
+were held back; and it was not until after we left Germany that
+they were finally released.
+
+I asked permission to visit these prisoners and sent Mr. Ayrault
+and Mr. Osborne to the place where I knew they were interned.
+The permission to visit them arrived, but on the same day orders
+were given to remove the prisoners to other camps. Mr. Osborne
+and Mr. Ayrault, however, being on the ground, saw the prisoners
+before their removal and reported on their conditions.
+
+On January sixth the American Association of Commerce and Trade
+gave me a dinner at the Hotel Adlon. This was made the occasion
+of a sort of German-American love-feast. Zimmermann, although
+he had to go early in the evening to meet the Foreign Minister
+of Austria-Hungary, was present; Helfferich, Vice-Chancellor
+and Secretary of the Interior; Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister;
+Sydow, Minister of Commerce; Dernburg; von Gwinner of the Deutsche
+Bank; Gutmann of the Dresdener Bank; Under Secretary von der
+Busche of the Foreign Office; the Mayor and the Police President
+of Berlin; the President of the Berlin Chamber of Commerce; Under
+Secretary von Stumm of the Foreign Office; and many others of
+that office. There were present also Under Secretary Richter
+of the Interior Department; Lieutenant Colonel Doeutelmoser of
+the General Staff; the editors and proprietors of the principal
+newspapers in Berlin; Count Montgelas, who had charge of American
+affairs in the Foreign Office; naval officers like Captain Lans;
+the American correspondents in Germany; and Prince Isenburg;
+rubbing shoulders with the brewers, George Ehret and Krueger,
+of New York and Newark. There were literary lights like Ludwig
+Fulda, Captain Persius, Professor Hans Delbrück, Dr. Paasche,
+Vice-President of the Reichstag, and many others equally celebrated
+as the ones that I have named. Speeches were made by Mr. Wolf,
+President of the American Association of Commerce and Trade,
+Helfferich, Zimmermann, von Gwinner and me. A tone of the greatest
+friendliness prevailed. Zimmermann referred to our personal
+friendship and said that he was sure that we should be able to
+manage everything together. Helfferich in his speech said that
+I, by learning German and studying the life of the German people,
+was one of the few diplomats that had come to Germany who had
+learned something of the real life and psychology of the Germans.
+Von Gwinner made a speech in English that would have done credit
+to any American after-dinner speaker; and I, in my short address,
+said that the relations between the two countries had never been
+better and that so long as my personal friends like Zimmermann
+and other members of the government, who I named, were in office,
+I was sure that the good relations between the two countries
+would be maintained. I spoke also of the sums of money that I had
+brought back with me for the benefit of the widows and orphans
+of Germany.
+
+The majority of the German newspapers spoke in a very kindly
+way about this dinner and about what was said at it. Of course,
+they all took what I said as an expression of friendliness, and
+only Reventlow claimed that, by referring to the members of the
+government, I was interfering in the internal affairs of Germany.
+
+The speeches and, in fact, this dinner constituted a last desperate
+attempt to preserve friendly relations. Both the reasonable men
+present and I knew, almost to a certainty, that return to ruthless
+submarine war had been decided on and that only some lucky chance
+could prevent the military, backed by the made public opinion, from
+insisting on a defiance of international law and the laws of humanity.
+
+The day after the dinner the Chancellor sent for me and expressed
+approval of what I said and thanked me for it and on the surface
+it seemed as if everything was "as merry as a marriage bell."
+Unfortunately, I am afraid that all this was only on the surface,
+and that perhaps the orders to the submarine commanders to recommence
+ruthless war had been given the day preceding this love-feast.
+
+The Germans believed that President Wilson had been elected with
+a mandate to keep out of war at any cost, and that America could
+be insulted, flouted and humiliated with impunity. Even before
+this dinner we had begun to get rumours of the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war and within a few days I was cabling to
+the Department information based not upon absolute facts but upon
+reports which seemed reliable and which had been collected through
+the able efforts of our very capable naval attaché, Commander
+Gherardi.
+
+And this information was confirmed by the hints given to me by
+various influential Germans. Again and again after the sixth of
+January, I was assured by Zimmermann and others in the Foreign
+Office that nothing of the kind was contemplated.
+
+Now were the German moves in the direction of peace sincere or not?
+
+From the time when the Chancellor first spoke of peace, I asked
+him and others what the peace terms of Germany were. I could
+never get any one to state any definite terms of peace and on
+several occasions when I asked the Chancellor whether Germany
+was willing to withdraw from Belgium, he always said, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." Finally in January, 1917, when he was again
+talking of peace, I said, "What are these peace terms to which
+you refer continually? Will you allow me to ask a few questions
+as to the specific terms of peace? First are the Germans willing
+to withdraw from Belgium?" The Chancellor answered, "Yes, but
+with guarantees." I said, "What are these guarantees?" He said,
+"We must possibly have the forts of Liege and Namur; we must
+have other forts and garrisons throughout Belgium. We must have
+possession of the railroad lines. We must have possession of the
+ports and other means of communication. The Belgians will not
+be allowed to maintain an army, but we must be allowed to retain
+a large army in Belgium. We must have the commercial control of
+Belgium." I said, "I do not see that you have left much for the
+Belgians except that King Albert will have the right to reside in
+Brussels with an honor guard." And the Chancellor said, "We cannot
+allow Belgium to be an outpost (_Vorwerk_) of England"; and
+I said, "I do not suppose the English, on the other hand, wish
+it to become an outpost of Germany, especially as von Tirpitz
+has said that the coast of Flanders should be retained in order
+to make war on England and America." I continued, "How about
+Northern France?" He said, "We are willing to leave Northern
+France, but there must be a rectification of the frontier." I
+said, "How about the Eastern frontier?" He said, "We must have
+a very substantial rectification of our frontier." I said, "How
+about Roumania?" He said, "We shall leave Bulgaria to deal with
+Roumania." I said, "How about Serbia?" He said, "A very small
+Serbia may be allowed to exist, but that is a question for Austria.
+Austria must be left to do what she wishes to Italy, and we must
+have indemnities from all countries and all our ships and colonies
+back."
+
+Of course, "rectification of the frontier" is a polite term for
+"annexation."
+
+On the twenty-second of January, 1917, our President addressed
+the Senate; and in his address he referred to his Note of the
+eighteenth of December, sent to all belligerent governments. In
+this address he stated, referring to the reply of the Entente
+Powers to his Peace Note of the eighteenth of December, "We are
+that much nearer to the definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war."
+
+He referred to the willingness of both contestants to discuss
+terms of peace, as follows: "The Central Powers united in reply
+which stated merely that they were ready to meet their antagonists
+in conference to discuss terms of peace. The Entente Powers have
+replied much more definitely and have stated, in general terms,
+indeed, but with sufficient definiteness to imply details, the
+arrangements, guarantees and acts of reparation which they deem
+to be the indispensable conditions of a satisfactory settlement.
+We are that much nearer a definite discussion of the peace which
+shall end the present war." The President further referred to a
+world concert to guarantee peace in the future and said, "The
+present war must first be ended, but we owe it to candour and
+to a just regard for the opinion of mankind to say that so far
+as our participation in guarantees of future peace is concerned,
+it makes a great deal of difference in what way and upon what
+terms it is ended." He said that the statesmen of both of the
+groups of nations at war had stated that it was not part of the
+purpose they had in mind to crush their antagonists, and he said
+that it must be implied from these assurances that the peace
+to come must be "a peace without victory."
+
+In the course of his address he said: "Statesmen everywhere are
+agreed that there should be a united, independent and autonomous
+Poland." In another place he said: "So far as practicable, moreover,
+every great people now struggling toward a full development of
+its resources and its powers should be assured a direct outlet
+to the highways of the sea." Where this cannot be done by cession
+of territory it can no doubt be arranged by the neutralisation
+of direct rights of way; and he closed by proposing in effect
+that the nations of the world should adopt the Monroe Doctrine
+and that no nation should seek to explain its policy for any
+other nation or people.
+
+After the receipt of the Ultimatum of January thirty-first from
+Germany, the Chancellor, in a conversation I had with him, referred
+to this Peace Note of December eighteenth and to the speech of
+January twenty-second.
+
+[Illustration: A POSTER FROM THE CHARLEVILLE DISTRICT, SHOWING
+THE ALLOTMENT OF FOOD TO EACH PERSON FOR THE FIRST FIFTEEN DAYS
+OF MAY, 1916.]
+
+I must say here that on my return to Germany I went very far
+in assuring the Chancellor and other members of the Government
+of the President's desire to see peace established in the world;
+and I told them that I believed that the President was ready
+to go very far in the way of coercing any nation which refused
+a reasonable peace; but I also impressed on all the members of
+the Government with whom I came in contact my belief that the
+election had not in any way altered the policy of the President,
+and I warned them of the danger to our good relations if ruthless
+submarine warfare should be resumed.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg, however, at this interview after the
+thirty-first of January, said that he had been compelled to take
+up ruthless submarine war because it was evident that President
+Wilson could do nothing towards peace. He spoke particularly of
+the President's speech of January twenty-second and said that
+in that speech the President had made it plain that he considered
+that the answer of the Entente Powers to his Peace Note formed a
+basis for peace, which was a thing impossible for Germany even
+to consider; and said further (and this was a criticism I heard
+not only from him, but also from many Germans), that when the
+President spoke of a united and independent Poland he evidently
+meant to take away from Germany that part of Poland which had been
+incorporated in the Kingdom of Prussia and give it to this new
+and independent Kingdom, thereby bringing the Eastern frontier of
+Germany within two hours by motor from Berlin; and that, further,
+when the President spoke of giving each nation a highway to the
+sea, he meant that the German port of Dantzig should be turned over
+to this new State of Poland, thereby not only taking a Prussian
+port but cutting the extreme Eastern part of Prussia from the
+remainder of the country. I said that these objections appeared
+to me very frivolous; that the President, of course, like a clever
+lawyer endeavouring to gain his end, which was peace, had said
+that all parties were apparently agreed that there should be a
+peace; that if Germany were fighting a merely defensive war,
+as she had always claimed, she should be greatly delighted when
+the President declared that all the weight of America was in
+favor of a peace without victory, which meant, of course, that
+Germany should be secured from that crushing and dismemberment
+which Germany's statesmen had stated so often that they feared.
+I said, further, that I was sure that when the President spoke
+of the united and independent State of Poland he had not, of
+course, had reference to Poland at any particular period of its
+history, but undoubtedly to Poland as constituted by Germany
+and Austria themselves; and that, in referring to the right of
+a nation to have access to the sea, he had in mind Russia and
+the Dardanelles rather than to any attempt to take a Prussian
+port for the benefit of Poland.
+
+Von Bethmann-Hollweg said that one of the principal reasons why
+Germany had determined upon a resumption of ruthless submarine
+warfare was because of this speech of the President to the American
+Senate. Of course, the trouble with this feeling and the criticism
+of the President's speech made by the Chancellor is that the
+orders for the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare had been
+given long before the news of the speech came to Germany.
+
+I had cabled the information collected by Commander Gherardi
+as to the orders given to submarines long before the date of
+the President's speech, and it happened that on the night after
+I had received the German note announcing this resumption I was
+taking a walk after dinner about the snow-covered streets of
+Berlin. In the course of this walk I met a young German woman of
+my acquaintance who was on intimate terms with the Crown Princess.
+She was on her way on foot from the opera house, where she had
+been with the Crown Princess, to the underground station, for
+by this time, of course, taxis had become an unknown luxury in
+Berlin, and I joined her. I told her of the Ultimatum which, I
+had received at six o'clock that evening from Zimmermann and I
+told her that I was sure that it meant the breaking of diplomatic
+relations and our departure from Germany. She expressed great
+surprise that the submarine warfare was set to commence on the
+thirty-first of January and said that weeks before they had been
+talking over the matter at the Crown Princess's and that she
+had heard then that the orders had been given to commence it on
+the fifteenth. In any event it is certain that the orders to the
+submarine commanders had been given long prior to the thirty-first
+and probably as early as the fifteenth.
+
+I sincerely believe that the only object of the Germans in making
+these peace offers was first to get the Allies, if possible, in
+a conference and there detach some or one of them by the offer
+of separate terms; or, if this scheme failed, then it was believed
+that the general offer and talk about peace would create a sentiment
+so favourable to the Germans that they might, without fear of
+action by the United States, resume ruthless submarine warfare
+against England.
+
+A week or two before the thirty-first of January, Dr. Solf asked
+me if I did not think that it would be possible for the United
+States to permit the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare
+against Great Britain. He said that three months time was all
+that would be required to bring Great Britain to her knees and end
+the war. And in fact so cleverly did von Tirpitz, Grand Admiral
+von Meuster, the Conservatives and the enemies of the Chancellor
+and other advocates of submarine war carry on their propaganda
+that the belief was ingrained in the whole of the German nation
+that a resumption of this ruthless war would lead within three
+months to what all Germans so ardently desired--peace. It was
+impossible for any government to resist the popular demand for
+the use of this illegal means of warfare, because army and navy
+and people were convinced that ruthless submarine war spelled
+success and a glorious peace.
+
+But this peace, of course, meant only a German peace, a peace
+as outlined to me by the Chancellor; a peace impossible for the
+Allies and even for the world to accept; a peace which would
+leave Germany immensely powerful and ready immediately after
+the war to take up a campaign against the nations of the Western
+hemisphere; a peace which would compel every nation, so long
+as German autocracy remained in the saddle, to devote its best
+energies, the most fruitful period of each man's life, to
+preparations for war.
+
+On January thirtieth, I received a definite intimation of the
+coming Ultimatum the next day and, judging that the hint meant
+the resumption of ruthless submarine war, I telegraphed a warning
+to the American Ambassadors and Ministers as well as to the State
+Department. On January thirty-first at about four o'clock in the
+afternoon I received from Zimmermann a short letter of which
+the following is a copy:
+
+  "The Secretary of State of the Foreign Office, Zimmermann,
+  requests the honor of the visit of his Excellency, the
+  Ambassador of the United States of America, this afternoon
+  at six o'clock in the Foreign Office, Wilhelmstrasse 75/76.
+
+  "Berlin, the 31st January, 1917."
+
+Pursuant to this letter, I went to the Foreign Office at six
+o'clock. Zimmermann then read to me in German a note from the
+Imperial Government, announcing the creation of the war zones
+about Great Britain and France and the commencement of ruthless
+submarine warfare at twelve P. M. that night. I made no comment,
+put the note in my pocket and went back to the Embassy. It was
+then about seven P. M. and, of course, the note was immediately
+translated and despatched with all speed to America.
+
+After the despatch of the note I had an interview with the Chancellor
+in which he, as I have stated above, criticised both the Peace
+Note of December eighteenth as not being definite enough and
+the speech to the Senate of January twenty-second; and further
+said that he believed that the situation had changed, that, in
+spite of what the President had said in the note before the
+_Sussex_ settlement, he was now for peace, that he had been
+elected on a peace platform, and that nothing would happen.
+Zimmermann at the time he delivered the note told me that this
+submarine warfare was a necessity for Germany, and that Germany
+could not hold out a year on the question of food. He further
+said, "Give us only two months of this kind of warfare and we
+shall end the war and make peace within three months."
+
+Saturday, February third, the President announced to Congress
+the breaking of diplomatic relations with Germany. The news of
+this, of course, did not reach Berlin until the next day; and on
+this Saturday afternoon Mrs. Gerard and I had an engagement to go
+to the theatre with Zimmermann and Mrs. Friedlaender-Fuld-Mitford,
+a young lady whose father is considered the richest man in Berlin,
+and who had been married to a young Englishman, named Mitford, a
+son of Lord Redesdale. Through no fault on the lady's part, there
+had been an annulment of this marriage; and she was occupying a
+floor of her own in the handsome house of her father and mother
+on the Pariser-Platz in Berlin. We stopped for Mrs. Mitford and
+took her to the theatre where we saw a very clever play, I think
+by Thoma, called "Die Verlorene Tochter" (The Prodigal Daughter).
+Zimmermann did not come to the play but joined us later at the
+Friedlaender-Fuld House where we had a supper of four in Mrs.
+Miiford's apartments. After supper, while I was talking to
+Zimmermann, he spoke of the note to America and said: "During
+the past month, this is what I have been doing so often at the
+General Headquarters with the Emperor. I often thought of telling
+you what was going on as I used to tell you in the old days,
+but I thought that you would only say that such a course would
+mean a break of diplomatic relations, and so I thought there was
+no use in telling you. But as you will see, everything will be
+all right. America will do nothing, for President Wilson is for
+peace and nothing else. Everything will go on as before. I have
+arranged for you to go to the Great General Headquarters and see
+the Kaiser next week and everything will be all right."
+
+The next day, Sunday, we had a German who is connected with the
+Foreign Office and his American wife to lunch, and another German
+who had been in America, also connected with the Foreign Office.
+Just as we were going in to lunch some one produced a copy of the
+"_B._Z._", the noon paper published in Berlin, which contained what
+seemed to be an authentic account of the breaking of diplomatic
+relations by America. The lunch was far from cheerful. The Germans
+looked very sad and said practically nothing, while I tried to
+make polite conversation at my end of the table.
+
+The next day I went over to see Zimmermann, having that morning
+received the official despatch from Washington, and told him
+that I had come to demand my passports.
+
+Of course, Zimmermann by that time had received the news and
+had had time to compose himself. The American correspondents
+told me that when he saw them on the day before, he had at first
+refused to say anything and then had been rather violent in his
+language and had finally shown great emotion. I am sure, from
+everything I observed, that the break of diplomatic relations
+came as an intense surprise to him and to the other members of
+the government, and yet I cannot imagine why intelligent men
+should think that the United States of America had fallen so low
+as to bear without murmur this sudden kick in the face.
+
+The police who had always been about our Embassy since the
+commencement of the war, were now greatly increased in numbers;
+and guarded not only the front of the house, but also the rear and
+the surrounding streets; but there was no demonstration whatever
+on the part of the people of Berlin. On Tuesday afternoon I went
+out for a walk, walking through most of the principal streets
+of Berlin, absolutely alone, and on my return to the Embassy
+I found Count Montgelas, who, with the rank of Minister, was
+at the head of the department which included American affairs
+in the Foreign Office. I asked Montgelas why I had not received
+my passports, and he said that I was being kept back because
+the Imperial Government did not know what had happened to Count
+Bernstorff and that there had been rumours that the German ships
+in America had been confiscated by our government. I said that
+I was quite sure that Bernstorff was being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. I
+said, moreover, "I do not see why I have to disprove your idea that
+Bernstorff is being maltreated and the German ships confiscated. It
+seems to me it is for you to prove this; and, at any event, why
+don't you have the Swiss Government, which now represents you,
+cable to its Minister in Washington and get the exact facts?" He
+said, "Well, you know, the Swiss are not used to cabling."
+
+He then produced a paper which was a re-affirmation of the treaty
+between Prussia and the United States of 1799, with some very
+extraordinary clauses added to it. He asked me to read this over
+and either to sign it or to get authority to sign it, and said
+that if it was not signed it would be very difficult for Americans
+to leave the country, particularly the American correspondents.
+I read this treaty over and then said, "Of course I cannot sign
+this on my own responsibility and I will not cable to my government
+unless I can cable in cipher and give them my opinion of this
+document." He said, "That is impossible." This treaty was as
+follows:
+
+  Agreement between Germany and the United States of America
+  concerning the treatment of each other's citizens and their
+  private property after the severance of diplomatic relations.
+
+  _Article_1._
+
+  After the severance of diplomatic relations between Germany and
+  the United States of America and in the event of the outbreak of
+  war between the two Powers the citizens of either party and their
+  private property in the territory of the other party shall be
+  treated according to Article 23 of the treaty of amity and
+  commerce between Prussia and the United States of 11 July, 1799,
+  with the following explanatory and supplementary clauses.
+
+  _Article_2._
+
+  German merchants in the United States and American merchants
+  in Germany shall so far as the treatment of their persons and
+  their property is concerned be held in every respect on a par
+  with the other persons mentioned in Article 23. Accordingly
+  they shall even after the period provided for in Article 23 has
+  elapsed be entitled to remain and continue their profession in
+  the country of their residence.
+
+  Merchants as well as the other persons mentioned in Article 23
+  may be excluded from fortified places or other places of military
+  importance.
+
+  _Article_3._
+
+  Germans in the United States and Americans in Germany shall
+  be free to leave the country of their residence within the
+  times and by the routes that shall be assigned to them by the
+  proper authorities.
+
+  The persons departing shall be entitled to take along their
+  personal property including money, valuables and bank accounts
+  excepting such property the exportation of which is prohibited
+  according to general provisions.
+
+  _Article_4._
+
+  The protection of Germans in the United States and of Americans
+  in Germany and of their property shall be guaranteed in accordance
+  with the laws existing in the countries of either party. They
+  shall be under no other restrictions concerning the enjoyment of
+  their private rights and the judicial enforcement of their rights
+  than neutral residents; they may accordingly not be transferred
+  to concentration camps nor shall their private property be subject
+  to sequestration or liquidation or other compulsory alienation
+  except in cases that under the existing laws apply also to neutrals.
+
+  As a general rule, German property in the United States and
+  American property in Germany shall not be subject to sequestration
+  or liquidation or other compulsory alienation under other
+  conditions than neutral property.
+
+  _Article_5._
+
+  Patent rights or other protected rights held by Germans in the
+  United States or Americans in Germany shall not be declared
+  void; nor shall the exercise of such rights be impeded nor shall
+  such rights be transferred to others without the consent of the
+  person entitled thereto; provided that regulations made exclusively
+  in the interest of the State shall apply.
+
+  _Article_6._
+
+  Contracts made between Germans and Americans either before or
+  after the severance of diplomatic relations, also obligations
+  of all kinds between Germans and Americans shall not be declared
+  cancelled, void or in suspension except under provisions applicable
+  to neutrals.
+
+  Likewise the citizens of either party shall not be impeded in
+  fulfilling their liabilities arising from such obligations either
+  by injunctions or by other provisions unless these apply also to
+  neutrals.
+
+  _Article_7._
+
+  The provisions of the sixth Hague Convention relative to the
+  treatment of enemy merchant ships at outbreak of hostilities
+  shall apply to the merchant vessels of either party and their
+  cargo.
+
+  The aforesaid ships may not be forced to leave port unless at
+  the same time they be given a pass recognised as binding by all
+  the enemy sea powers to a home port or a port of an allied country
+  or to another port of the country in which the ship happens to be.
+
+  _Article_8._
+
+  The regulations of chapter 3 of the eleventh Hague Convention
+  relative to certain restrictions in the exercise of the right
+  of capture in maritime war shall apply to the captains, officers
+  and members of the crews of merchant ships specified in Article
+  7 and of such merchant ships that may be captured in the course
+  of a possible war.
+
+  _Article_9._
+
+  This agreement shall apply also to the colonies and other
+  foreign possessions of either party.
+
+  Berlin, February, 1917.
+
+I then said, "I shall not cable at all. Why do you come to me with
+a proposed treaty after we have broken diplomatic relations and
+ask an Ambassador who is held as a prisoner to sign it? Prisoners
+do not sign treaties and treaties signed by them would not be
+worth anything." And I also said, "After your threat to keep
+Americans here and after reading this document, even if I had
+authority to sign it I would stay here until hell freezes over
+before I would put my name to such a paper."
+
+Montgelas seemed rather rattled, and in his confusion left the
+paper with me--something, I am sure, he did not intend to do
+in case of a refusal. Montgelas was an extremely agreeable man
+and I think at all times had correctly predicted the attitude
+of America and had been against acts of frightfulness, such as
+the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ and the resumption of
+ruthless submarine war. I am sure that a gentleman like Montgelas
+undertook with great reluctance to carry out his orders in the
+matter of getting me to sign this treaty.
+
+I must cheerfully certify that even the most pro-German American
+correspondents in Berlin, when I told them of Montgelas' threat,
+showed the same fine spirit as their colleagues. All begged me
+not to consider them or their liberty where the interests of
+America were involved.
+
+As soon as diplomatic relations were broken, and I broke them
+formally not only in my conversation with Zimmermann of Monday
+morning but also by sending over a formal written request for my
+passports on the evening of that day, our telegraph privileges were
+cut off. I was not even allowed to send telegrams to the American
+consuls throughout Germany giving them their instructions. Mail
+also was cut off, and the telephone. My servants were not even
+permitted to go to the nearby hotel to telephone. In the meantime
+we completed our preparations for departure. We arranged to turn
+over American interests, and the interests of Roumania and Serbia
+and Japan, to the Spanish Embassy; and the interests of Great
+Britain to the Dutch. I have said already that I believe that
+Ambassador Polo de Bernabe will faithfully protect the interests
+of America, and I believe that Baron Gevers will fearlessly fight
+the cause of the British prisoners.
+
+We sold our automobiles; and two beautiful prize winning saddle
+horses, one from Kentucky and one from Virginia, which I had
+brought with me from America, went on the stage, that is, I sold
+them to the proprietor of the circus in Berlin!
+
+The three tons of food which we had brought with us from America
+we gave to our colleagues in the diplomatic corps,--the Spaniards,
+Greeks, Dutch and the Central and South Americans. I had many
+friends among the diplomats of the two Americas who were all
+men of great ability and position in their own country. I think
+that most of them know only too well the designs against Central
+and South America cherished by the Pan-Germans.
+
+Finally, I think on the morning of Friday, Mr. Oscar King Davis,
+correspondent of the _New_York_Times_, received a wireless
+from Mr. Van Anda, editor of the _New_York_Times_, telling
+him that Bernstorff and his staff were being treated with every
+courtesy and that the German ships had not been confiscated. In
+the evening our telephone was reconnected, and we were allowed to
+receive some telegrams and to send open telegrams to the consuls,
+etc. throughout Germany; and we were notified that we would probably
+be allowed to leave the next day in the evening.
+
+Always followed by spies, I paid as many farewell visits to my
+diplomatic colleagues as I was able to see; and on Saturday I
+thought that, in spite of the ridiculous treatment accorded us in
+cutting off the mail and telephone and in holding me for nearly
+a week, I would leave in a sporting spirit: I therefore, had
+my servant telephone and ask whether Zimmermann and von
+Bethmann-Hollweg would receive me. I had a pleasant farewell
+talk of about half an hour with each of them and I expressly told
+the Chancellor that I had come to bid him a personal farewell,
+not to make a record for any White Book, and that anything he
+said would remain confidential. I also stopped in to thank Dr.
+Zahn, of the Foreign Office, who had arranged the details of our
+departure and gave him a gold cigarette case as a souvenir of
+the occasion. At the last moment, the Germans allowed a number
+of the consuls and clerks who had been working in the Embassy,
+and the American residents in Berlin, to leave on the train with
+us; so that we were about one hundred and twenty persons in all
+on this train, which left the Potsdamer station at eight-ten in
+the evening. The time of our departure had not been publicly
+announced, but although the automobiles, etc. in front of the
+Embassy might have attracted a crowd, there was no demonstration
+whatever; and, in fact, during this week that I was detained in
+Berlin I walked allover the city every afternoon and evening,
+went into shops, and so on, without encountering any hostile
+demonstration.
+
+There was a large crowd in the station to see us off. All the
+Spanish Embassy, Dutch, Greeks and many of our colleagues from
+Central and South America were there. There were, from the Foreign
+Office, Montgelas, Dr. Roediger, Prittwitz and Horstmann. As the
+train pulled out, a number of the Americans left in Berlin who
+were on the station platform raised quite a vigorous cheer.
+
+Two officers had been sent by the Imperial Government to accompany
+us on this train; one, a Major von der Hagen, sent by the General
+Staff and the other, a representative of the Foreign Office, Baron
+Wernher von Ow-Wachendorf. It was quite thoughtful of the Foreign
+Office to send this last officer, as it was by our efforts that
+he had secured his exchange when he was a prisoner in England;
+and he, therefore, would be supposed to entertain kindly feelings
+for our Embassy.
+
+I had ordered plenty of champagne and cigars to be put on the
+train and we were first invited to drink champagne with the officers
+in the dining car; then they joined us in the private salon car
+which we occupied in the end of the train. The journey was
+uneventful. Outside some of the stations a number of people were
+drawn up who stared at the train in a bovine way, but who made
+no demonstration of any kind.
+
+We went through Württemburg and entered Switzerland by way of
+Schaffhausen. The two officers left us at the last stop on the
+German side. I had taken the precaution before we left Berlin to
+find out their names, and, as they left us, I gave each of them
+a gold cigarette case inscribed with his name and the date.
+
+At the first station on the Swiss side a body of Swiss troops
+were drawn up, presenting arms, and the Colonel commanding the
+Swiss army (there are no generals in Switzerland), attended by
+several staff officers, came on the train and travelled with
+us nearly to Zurich.
+
+I started to speak French to one of these staff officers, but
+he interrupted me by saying in perfect English, "You do not have
+to speak French to me. My name is Iselin, many of my relations
+live in New York and I lived there myself some years."
+
+At Zurich we left the German special train, and were met on the
+platform by some grateful Japanese, the American Consul and a
+number of French and Swiss newspaper reporters, thus ending our
+exodus from Germany.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+LIBERALS AND REASONABLE MEN
+
+I have already expressed a belief that Germany will not be forced
+to make peace because of a revolution, and that sufficient food
+will be somehow found to carry the population during at least
+another year of war.
+
+What then offers a prospect of reasonable peace, supposing, of
+course, that the Germans fail in the submarine blockade of England
+and that the crumbling up of Russia does not release from the
+East frontier soldiers enough to break the lines of the British
+and French in France?
+
+I think that it is only by an evolution of Germany herself toward
+liberalism that the world will be given such guarantees of future
+peace as will justify the termination of this war.
+
+There is, properly speaking, no great liberal party in the political
+arena in Germany. As I have said, the Reichstag is divided roughly
+into Conservatives, Roman Catholics, or Centrum, and Social
+Democrats. The so-called National Liberal party has in this war
+shown itself a branch of the Conservative party, and on some issues
+as bitter, as conservative, as the Junkers themselves. Herr
+Bassermann and Herr Stresemann have not shown themselves leaders of
+liberal thought, nor has their leadership been such as to inspire
+confidence in their political sagacity.
+
+It was Stresemann who on May thirtieth, 1916, said in the Reichstag
+referring to President Wilson as a peacemaker, "We thrust the
+hand of Wilson aside." On the day following, the day on which
+the President announced to Congress the breaking of diplomatic
+relations, news of that break had not yet arrived in Berlin and
+Herr Stresemann on that peaceful Sunday morning was engaged in
+making a speech to the members of the National Liberal party
+in which he told them that as a result of his careful study of
+the American situation, of his careful researches into American
+character and politics, he could assure them that America would
+never break with Germany. As he concluded his speech and sat
+down amid the applause of his admirers, a German who had been
+sitting in the back of the room rose and read from the noon paper,
+the "_B._Z._", a despatch from Holland giving the news that
+America had broken relations with Germany. The political skill
+and foresight of Herr Stresemann may be judged from the above
+incident.
+
+The Socialists, or Social Democrats, more properly speaking,
+have shown themselves in opposition to the monarchical form of
+government in Germany. This has put them politically, militarily
+and socially beyond the pale.
+
+After a successful French attack in the Champagne, I heard it
+said of a German woman, whose husband was thought to be killed,
+that her rage and despair had been so great that she had said she
+would become a Social Democrat; and her expression was repeated
+as showing to what lengths grief had driven her. This girl was
+the wife of an ordinary clerk working in Berlin.
+
+The Social Democrats are not given offices, are not given titles:
+they never join the class of "_Rat_," and they cannot hope
+to become officers of the army. Did not Lieutenant Forstner,
+the notorious centre of the Zabern Affair, promise a reward to
+the first one of his men who in case of trouble should shoot
+one "of those damn Social Democrats"?
+
+There is, therefore, no refuge at present politically, for the
+reasonable men of liberal inclinations; and it is these liberal
+men who must themselves create a liberal party: a party, membership
+in which will not entail a loss of business, a loss of prospects
+of promotion and social degradation.
+
+There are many such men in Germany to-day; perhaps some of the
+conservative Socialists will join such a party, and there are
+men in the government itself whose habits of mind and thought
+are not incompatible with membership in a liberal organisation.
+The Chancellor himself is, perhaps, at heart a Liberal. He comes
+of a banking family in Frankfort and while there stands before
+his name the "von" which means nobility, and while he owns a
+country estate, the whole turn of his thought is towards a
+philosophical liberalism. Zimmermann, the Foreign Secretary,
+although the mental excitement caused by his elevation to the
+Foreign Office at a time of stress, made him go over to the advocates
+of ruthless submarine war, lock, stock and barrel, is nevertheless
+at heart a Liberal and violently opposed to a system which draws
+the leaders of the country from only one aristocratic class.
+Dr. Solf, the Imperial Colonial Minister, while devoted to the
+Emperor and his family is a man so reasonable in his views, so
+indulgent of the views of others, and indulgent without weakness,
+that he would make an ideal leader of a liberalised Germany.
+The great bankers, merchants and manufacturers, although they
+appreciate the luscious dividends that they have received during
+the peaceful years since 1870, nevertheless feel under their
+skins the ignominy of living in a country where a class exists
+by birth, a class not even tactful enough to conceal its ancient
+contempt for all those who soil their hands business or trade.
+
+In fact such a party is a necessity for Germany as a buffer against
+the extreme Social Democrats.
+
+At the close of the war the soldiers who have fought in the mud
+of the trenches for three years will most insistently demand a
+redistricting of the Reichstag and an abolition of the inadequate
+circle voting of Prussia. And when manhood suffrage comes in
+Prussia and when the industrial population of Germany gets that
+representation in the Reichstag out of which they have been brazenly
+cheated for so many years, it may well be that a great liberal
+party will be the only defence of private property against the
+assault of an enraged and justly revengeful social democracy.
+
+The workingmen of Germany have been fooled for a long time. They
+constitute that class of which President Lincoln spoke, "You
+can fool some of the people all of the time"; and the middle
+class of manufacturers, merchants, etc. have acquiesced in the
+system because of the profits that they have made.
+
+The difficulty of making peace with Germany, as at present
+constituted, is that the whole world feels that peace made with
+its present government would not be lasting; that such a peace
+would mean the detachment of some of the Allies from the present
+world alliance against Germany; preparation by Germany, in the
+light of her needs as disclosed by this war; and the declaration
+of a new war in which there would be no battle of the Marne to
+turn back the tide of German world conquest.
+
+For a long time before this war, radicals in Great Britain pinned
+a great faith to the Socialist party of Germany. How little that
+faith was justified appeared in July and August of 1914 when the
+Socialist party tamely voted credits for the war; a war declared
+by the Emperor on the mere statement that it was a defensive
+war; declared because it was alleged that certain invasions of
+German territory, never since substantiated, had taken place.
+
+The Socialist party is divided. It is a great pity that the world
+cannot deal with men of the type of Scheidemann, who, in other
+democracies, would appear so conservative as to be almost
+reactionary. But Scheidemann and his friends, while they have,
+in their attempted negotiations with the Socialists of other
+countries, the present protection of the Imperial Government,
+will have no hand in dictating terms of peace so long as that
+government is in existence. They are being used in an effort
+to divide the Allies.
+
+As President Wilson said in his message to Russia of May
+twenty-sixth, 1917: "The war has begun to go against Germany,
+and, in their desperate desire to escape the inevitable ultimate
+defeat, those who are in authority in Germany are using every
+possible instrumentality, are making use even of the influence of
+the groups and parties among their own subjects to whom they have
+never been just or fair or even tolerant to promote a propaganda on
+both sides of the sea which will preserve for them their influence
+at home and their power abroad, to the undoing of the very men
+they are using."
+
+There is an impression abroad that the Social Democratic party
+of Germany, usually known abroad as the Socialist party, partakes
+of at least some of the characteristics of a great liberal party.
+This is far from being the case. By their acts, if not by their
+express declarations, they have shown themselves as opposed to
+the monarchical form of government and their leaders are charged
+with having declared themselves openly in favour of free love
+and against religion. The Roman Catholic Church recognises in
+Social Democracy its greatest enemy, and has made great efforts
+to counteract its advance by fostering a sort of Roman Catholic
+trades-union for a religious body of Socialists. The Social Democrat
+in Germany is almost an outcast. Although one third of the members
+of the Reichstag belong to this party, its members are never
+called to hold office in the government; and the attitude of
+the whole of the governing class, of all the professors,
+school-teachers, priests of both Protestant and Roman Catholic
+religions of the prosperous middle classes, is that of violent
+opposition to the doctrines of Social Democracy. The world must
+entertain no illusion that the Social Democratic leaders speak
+for Germany.
+
+If the industrial populations had their fair share of representation
+in the Reichstag they might perhaps even control that body. But,
+as I have time and again reiterated, the Reichstag has only the
+power of public opinion; and the Germany of to-day is ruled by
+officials appointed from above downwards. All of these officials in
+Germany must be added to the other classes that I have mentioned.
+There are more officials there than in any other country in the
+world. As they owe their very existence to the government, they
+must not only serve that government, but also make the enemies
+of that government their own. Therefore, they and the circle
+of their connections are opponents of the Social Democrats.
+
+All this shows how difficult it is at present for the men of
+reasonable and liberal views, who do not wish to declare themselves
+against both religion and morality, to find a political refuge.
+
+The Chancellor, himself a liberal at heart, as I have said, has
+declared that there must be changes in Germany. It is perhaps
+within the bounds of probability that a great new liberal party
+will be formed to which I have referred, composed of the more
+conservative Social Democrats, of the remains of the National
+Liberal and Progressive parties and of the more liberal of the
+Conservatives. The important question is then whether the Roman
+Catholic party or Centrum will voluntarily dissolve and its members
+cease to seek election merely as representatives of the Roman
+Catholic Church.
+
+It is perhaps too much to expect that the Centrum party, as a
+whole and as at present constituted, will declare for liberalism
+and parliamentary government and for a fair redistricting of
+the divisions in Germany which elect members to the Reichstag,
+but there are many wise and farseeing men in this party; and
+its leaders, Dr. Spahn and Erzberger, are fearless and able men.
+
+For some years a movement has been going on in the Centrum party
+looking to this end. Many members believed that the time had
+come when it was no longer necessary that the Roman Catholics
+in order to safeguard their religious liberties continue the
+political existence of the Centrum, and attempts were made to
+bring about this change. It was decided adversely, however, by
+the Roman Catholics. But the question is not dead. Voluntary
+dissolution of the Centrum as a Roman Catholic party would
+immediately bring about a creation of a true liberal party to
+which all Germans could belong without a loss of social prestige,
+without becoming declared enemies of the monarchy and without
+declaring themselves against religion and morality.
+
+At the Congress which will meet after the war it will be easy
+for the nations of the world to deal with the representatives
+of a liberal Germany, with representatives of a government still
+monarchical in form, but possessed of either a constitution like
+that of the United States or ruled by a parliamentary government.
+I believe that the tendency of German liberalism is towards the
+easiest transition, that of making the Chancellor and his ministers
+responsible to the Reichstag and bound to resign after a vote
+of want of confidence by that body.
+
+At the time of the Zabern Affair, Scheidemann claimed that the
+resignation of the Chancellor must logically follow a vote of
+want of confidence; and it was von Bethmann-Hollweg who refused
+to resign, saying that he was responsible to the Emperor alone.
+It requires no violent change to bring about this establishment
+of parliamentary government, and, if the members of the Reichstag
+should be elected from districts fairly constituted, the world
+would then be dealing with a liberalised Germany, and a Germany
+which has become liberalised without any violent change in the
+form of its government.
+
+Of course, coincident with this parliamentary reform, the vicious
+circle system of voting in Prussia must end.
+
+This change to a government by a responsible ministry can be
+accomplished under the constitution of the German Empire by a
+mere majority vote of the Reichstag and a vote in the Bundesrat,
+in which less than fourteen votes are against the proposed change
+in the constitution. This means that the consent of the Emperor
+as Prussian King must be obtained, and that of a number of the
+rulers of the German States.
+
+In the reasonable liberalisation of Germany, if it comes, Theodor
+Wolff and his father-in-law, Mosse, will play leading parts.
+The great newspaper, the _Tageblatt_, which Mosse owns and
+Wolff edits, has throughout the war been a beacon light at once
+of reason and of patriotism. And other great newspapers will
+take the same enlightened course.
+
+I am truly sorry for Georg Bernhard, the talented editor of the
+_Vossiche_Zeitung_, who, a Liberal and a Jew, wears the
+livery of Junkerdom, I am sure to his great distaste.
+
+After I left Germany the _Vossiche_Zeitung_ made the most
+ridiculous charges against me, such as that I issued American
+passports to British subjects. The newspaper might as well have
+solemnly charged that I sent notes to the Foreign Office in sealed
+envelopes. Having charge of British interests, I could not issue
+British passports to British citizens allowed to leave Germany,
+but, according to universal custom in similar cases and the express
+consent of the Imperial Foreign Office, I gave these returning
+British, American passports superstamped with the words "British
+subject." A mare's nest, truly!
+
+The fall of von Bethmann-Hollweg was a triumph of kitchen intrigue
+and of Junkerism. I believe that he is a liberal at heart, that
+it was against his best judgment that the ruthless submarine
+war was resumed, the pledges of the _Sussex_ Note broken
+and Germany involved in war with America. If he had resigned,
+rather than consent to the resumption of V-boat war, he would
+have stood out as a great Liberal rallying point and probably
+have returned to a more real power than he ever possessed. But
+half because of a desire to retain office, half because of a
+mistaken loyalty to the Emperor, he remained in office at the
+sacrifice of his opinions; and when he laid down that office no
+title of Prince or even of Count waited him as a parting gift.
+In his retirement he will read the lines of Schiller--a favourite
+quotation in Germany--"Der Mohr hat seine Schuldigkeit gethan,
+der Mohr kann gehen." "The Moor has done his work, the Moor can
+go." And in his old age he will exclaim, as Shakespeare makes
+the great Chancellor of Henry the Eighth exclaim, "Oh Cromwell,
+Cromwell! Had I but served my God with half the zeal I served
+my King, He would not, in mine age, have left me naked to mine
+enemies." But this God is not the private War God of the Prussians
+with whom they believe they have a gentlemen's working agreement,
+but the God of Christianity, of humanity and of all mankind.
+
+It would have been easier for Germany to make peace with von
+Bethmann-Hollweg at the helm. The whole world knows him and honours
+him for his honesty.
+
+Helfferich remained as Vice-Chancellor and Minister of the Interior:
+a powerful, and agile intellect, a man, I am sure, opposed to
+militarism. Reasonable in his views, one can sit at the council
+table with him and arrive at compromises and results, but his
+intense patriotism and surpassing ability make him an opponent
+to be feared.
+
+Kühlmann has the Foreign Office. Far more wily than Zimmermann,
+he will continue to strive to embroil us with Japan and Mexico,
+but he will not be caught. Second in command in London, he reported
+then that England would enter the war. The rumours scattered
+broadcast, as he took office, to the effect that he was opposed
+to ruthless V-boat war were but evidences of a more skilful hand
+in a campaign to predispose the world in his favour and, therefore,
+to assist him in any negotiations he might have on the carpet.
+Beware of the wily Kühlmann!
+
+Baiting the Chancellor is the favourite sport of German political
+life. No sooner does the Kaiser name a Chancellor than hundreds
+of little politicians, Reichstag members, editors, reporters
+and female intriguers try to drive him from office. When von
+Bethmann-Hollweg showed an inclination towards Liberalism, and
+advocated a juster electoral system for Prussia, the Junkers, the
+military and the upholders of the caste system joined their forces
+to those of the usual intriguers; and it was only a question of
+time until the Chancellor's official head fell in the basket.
+
+His successor is a Prussian bureaucrat. No further description
+is necessary.
+
+Of course no nation will permit itself to be reformed from without.
+The position of the world in arms with reference to Germany is
+simply this. It is impossible to make peace with Germany as at
+present constituted, because that peace will be but a truce,
+a short breathing space before the German military autocrats
+again send the sons of Germany to death in the trenches for the
+advancement of the System and the personal glory and advantage
+of stuffy old generals and prancing princes.
+
+The world does not believe that a free Germany will needlessly
+make war, believe in war for war's sake or take up the profession
+of arms as a national industry.
+
+The choice lies with the German people. And how admirably has
+our great President shown that people that we war not with them
+but with the autocracy which has led them into the shambles of
+dishonour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE GERMAN PEOPLE IN WAR
+
+With the declaration of war the ultimate power in Germany was
+transferred from the civil to the military authorities.
+
+At five o'clock on the afternoon of Friday, and immediately after
+the declaration of a State of War, the Guard of the Grenadier
+Regiment Kaiser Alexander, under the command of a Lieutenant with
+four drummers, took its place before the monument of Frederick
+the Great in the middle of the Unter den Linden. The drummers
+sounded a ruffle on their drums and the Lieutenant read an order
+beginning with the words "By all highest order: A State of War
+is proclaimed in Berlin and in the Province of Brandenburg."
+This order was signed by General von Kessel as Over-Commander
+of the Mark of Brandenburg; and stated that the complete power
+was transferred to him; that the civil officials might remain
+in office, but must obey the orders and regulations of the
+Over-Commander; that house-searchings and arrests by officials
+thereto empowered could take place at any time; that strangers
+who could not show good reason for remaining in Berlin, had
+twenty-four hours in which to leave; that the sale of weapons,
+powder and explosives to civilians was forbidden; and that civilians
+were forbidden to carry weapons without permission of the proper
+authorities.
+
+The same transfer of authority took place in each army
+corps--_Bezirk_, or province or district in Germany; and
+in each army corps district or province the commanding general
+took over the ultimate power. In Berlin it was necessary to create
+a new officer, the Over-Commander of the Mark, because two army
+corps, the third and the army corps of the guards, had their
+head-quarters in Berlin. These army corps commanders were not
+at all bashful about the use of the power thus transferred to
+them. Some of them even prescribed the length of the dresses
+to be worn by the women; and many women, having followed the
+German sport custom of wearing knickerbockers in the winter sports
+resorts of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the Generalkommando, or
+Headquarters for Bavaria issued in January, 1917, the following
+order: "The appearance of many women in Garmisch-Partenkirchen
+has excited lively anger and indignation in the population there.
+This bitterness is directed particularly against certain women,
+frequently of ripe age, who do not engage in sports, but nevertheless
+show themselves in public continually clad in knickerbockers. It
+has even happened that women so dressed have visited churches
+during the service. Such behaviour is a cruelty to the earnest
+minds of the mountain population and, in consequence, there are
+often many disagreeable occurrences in the streets. Officials,
+priests and private citizens have turned to the Generalkommando
+with the request for help; and the Generalkommando has, therefore,
+empowered the district officials in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to
+take energetic measures against this misconduct; if necessary
+with the aid of the police."
+
+I spent two days at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in February, 1916.
+Some of the German girls looked very well in their "knickers,"
+but I agree with the Generalkommando that the appearance of some
+of the older women was "cruelty" not only to the "earnest mountain
+population" but to any observer.
+
+These corps commanders are apparently responsible direct to the
+Emperor; and therefore much of the difficulty that I had concerning
+the treatment of prisoners was due to this system, as each corps
+commander considered himself supreme in his own district not
+only over the civil and military population but over the prison
+camps within his jurisdiction.
+
+On the fourth of August, 1914, a number of laws were passed,
+which had been evidently prepared long in advance, making various
+changes made necessary by war, such as alteration of the Coinage
+Law, the Bank Law, and the Law of Maximum Prices. Laws as to
+the high prices were made from time to time. For instance, the
+law of the twenty-eighth of October, 1914, provided in detail
+the maximum prices for rye in different parts of Germany. The
+maximum price at wholesale per German ton of native rye must
+not exceed 220 marks in Berlin, 236 marks in Cologne, 209 marks
+in Koenigsberg, 228 marks in Hamburg, 235 marks in Frankfort a/M.
+
+The maximum price for the German ton of native wheat was set at
+forty marks per ton higher than the above rates for rye. This
+maximum price was made with reference to deliveries without sacks
+and for cash payments.
+
+The law as to the maximum prices applied to all objects of daily
+necessity, not only to food and fodder but to oil, coal and wood.
+Of course, these maximum prices were changed from time to time,
+but I think I can safely state that at no time in the war, while
+I was in Berlin, were the simple foods more expensive than in
+New York.
+
+The so-called "war bread," the staple food of the population,
+which was made soon after the commencement of the war, was composed
+partially of rye and potato flour. It was not at all unpalatable,
+especially when toasted; and when it was seen that the war would
+not be as short as the Germans had expected, the bread cards
+were issued. That is, every Monday morning each person was given
+a card which had annexed to it a number of little perforated
+sections about the size of a quarter of a postage stamp, each
+marked with twenty-five, fifty or one hundred. The total of these
+figures constituted the allowance of each person in grammes per
+week. The person desiring to buy bread either at a baker's or in
+a restaurant must turn in these little stamped sections for an
+amount equivalent to the weight of bread purchased. Each baker
+was given a certain amount of meal at the commencement of each
+week, and he had to account for this meal at the end of the week
+by turning in its equivalent in bread cards.
+
+As food became scarce, the card system was applied to meat, potatoes,
+milk, sugar, butter and soap. Green vegetables and fruits were
+exempt from the card system, as were for a long time chickens,
+ducks, geese, turkeys and game. Because of these exemptions the
+rich usually managed to live well, although the price of a goose
+rose to ridiculous heights. There was, of course, much underground
+traffic in cards and sales of illicit or smuggled butter, etc.
+The police were very stern in their enforcement of the law and
+the manager of one of the largest hotels in Berlin was taken to
+prison because he had made the servants give him their allowance
+of butter, which he in turn sold to the rich guests of the hotel.
+
+No one over six years of age at the time I left could get milk
+without a doctor's certificate. One result of this was that the
+children of the poor were surer of obtaining milk than before
+the war, as the women of the Frauendienst and social workers
+saw to it that each child had its share.
+
+The third winter of the war, owing to a breakdown of means of
+transportation and want of laborers, coal became very scarce.
+All public places, such as theatres, picture galleries, museums,
+and cinematograph shows, were closed in Munich for want of coal.
+In Berlin the suffering was not as great but even the elephants
+from Hagenbeck's Show were pressed into service to draw the coal
+carts from the railway stations.
+
+Light was economized. All the apartment houses (and all Berlin
+lives in apartment houses) were closed at nine o'clock. Stores
+were forbidden to illuminate their show windows and all theatres
+were closed at ten. Only every other street electric light was
+lit; of the three lights in each lamp, only one.
+
+As more and more men were called to the front, women were employed
+in unusual work. The new underground road in Berlin is being
+built largely by woman labour. This is not so difficult a matter
+in Berlin as in New York, because Berlin is built upon a bed
+of sand and the difficulties of rock excavation do not exist.
+Women are employed on the railroads, working with pickaxes on
+the road-bed. Women drive the great yellow post carts of Berlin.
+There were women guards on the underground road, women conductors
+on the tramways and women even become motor men on the tramcars.
+Banks, insurance companies and other large business institutions
+were filled with women workers who invaded the sacred precincts
+of many military and governmental offices.
+
+A curious development of the hate of all things foreign was the
+hunt led by the Police President of Berlin, von Jagow (a cousin
+of the Foreign Minister), for foreign words. Von Jagow and his
+fellow cranks decided that all words of foreign origin must be
+expunged from the German language. The title of the Hotel Bristol
+on the Unter den Linden disappeared. The Hotel Westminster on
+the same street became Lindenhof. There is a large hotel called
+"The Cumberland," with a pastry department over which there was
+a sign, the French word, _Confissérie_. The management was
+compelled to take this sign down, but the hotel was allowed to
+retain the name of Cumberland, because the father-in-law of the
+Kaiser's only daughter is the Duke of Cumberland. The word
+"chauffeur" was eliminated, and there, were many discussions as
+to what should be substituted. Many declared for Kraftwagenfuhrer
+or "power wagon driver."
+
+But finally the word was Germanised as "Schauffoer." Prussians
+took down the sign, _Confektion_, but the climax came when
+the General in command of the town of Breslau wrote a confectioner
+telling him to stop the use of the word "_bonbon_" in selling
+his candy. The confectioner, with a sense of humour and a nerve
+unusual in Germany, wrote back to the General that he would gladly
+discontinue the use of the word "_bonbon_" when the General
+ceased to call himself "General," and called the attention of
+this high military authority to the fact that "General" was as
+much a French word as "_bonbon_."
+
+Unusual means were adopted in order to get all the gold coins
+in the country into the Imperial Bank. There were signs in every
+surface and underground car which read, "Whoever keeps back a
+gold coin injures the Fatherland." And if a soldier presented
+to his superiors a twenty mark gold piece, he received in return
+twenty marks in paper money and two days leave of absence. In
+like manner a school boy who turned in ten marks in gold received
+ten marks in paper and was given a half holiday. Cinematograph
+shows gave these patrons who paid in gold an extra ticket, good
+for another day. An American woman residing at Berlin was awakened
+one morning at eight o'clock by two police detectives who told
+her that they had heard that she had some gold coins in her
+possession, and that if she did not turn them in for paper money
+they would wreck her apartment in their search for them. She,
+therefore, gave them the gold which I afterwards succeeded in
+getting the German Government to return to her. Later, the export
+of gold was forbidden, and even travellers arriving with gold
+were compelled to give it up in return for paper money.
+
+While, of course, I cannot ascertain the exact amounts, I found,
+nevertheless, that great quantities of food and other supplies
+came into Germany from Holland and the Scandinavian countries,
+particularly from Sweden. Now that we are in the war we should
+take strong measures and cut off exports to these countries which
+export food, raw material, etc. to Germany. Sweden is particularly
+active in this traffic, but I understand that sulphur pyrites
+are sent from Norway, and sulphuric acid made therefrom is an
+absolute essential to the manufacture of munitions of war.
+
+Potash, which is found as a mineral only in Germany and Austria,
+was used in exchange of commodities with Sweden and in this way
+much copper, lard, etc. reached Germany.
+
+Early in the summer of 1915, the first demonstration took place
+in Berlin. About five hundred women collected in front of the
+Reichstag building. They were promptly suppressed by the police
+and no newspaper printed an account of the occurrence. These
+women were rather vague in their demands. They called von Buelow
+an old fat-head for his failure in Italy and complained that the
+whipped cream was not so good as before the war. There was some
+talk of high prices for food, and the women all said that they
+wanted their men back from the trenches.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early summer brought also a number of cranks to Berlin. Miss Jane
+Addams and her fellow suffragists, after holding a convention
+in Holland, moved on Berlin. I succeeded in getting both the
+Chancellor and von Jagow to consent to receive them, a meeting to
+which they looked forward with unconcealed perturbation. However,
+one of them seems to have impressed Miss Addams, for, as I write
+this, I read in the papers that she is complaining that we should
+not have gone to war because we thereby risk hurting somebody's
+feelings.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On July twenty-seventh, 1915, I reported that I had learned that
+the Germans were picking out the Revolutionists and Liberals
+from the many Russian prisoners of war, furnishing them with
+money and false passports and papers, and sending them back to
+Russia to stir up a revolution.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A German friend of mine told me that a friend of his who manufactured
+field glasses had received a large order from the Bulgarian
+Government. This manufacturer went to the Foreign Office and
+asked whether he should deliver the goods. He was told not only
+to deliver them but to do it as quickly as possible. By learning
+of this I was able to predict long in advance the entry of Bulgaria
+on the side of the Central Powers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Even a year after the commencement of the war there were reasonable
+people in Germany. I met Ballin, head of the great Hamburg American
+Line, on August ninth. I said to him, "When are you going to
+stop this crazy fighting?" The next day Ballin called on me and
+said that the sensible people of Germany wanted peace and that
+without annexation. He told me that every one was afraid to talk
+peace, that each country thought it a sign of weakness, and that
+he had advised the Chancellor to put a statement in an official
+paper to say that Germany fought only to defend herself and was
+ready to make an honourable peace. He told me that the Emperor at
+that time was against the annexation of Belgium.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In calculating the great war debt built up by Germany, it must
+not be forgotten that German municipalities and other political
+districts have incurred large debts for war purposes, such as
+extra relief given to the wives and children of soldiers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In November, 1915, there were food disturbances and a serious
+agitation against a continuance of the war; and, in Leipzig,
+a Socialist paper was suppressed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The greatest efforts were made at all times to get in gold; and
+some time before I left Germany an advertisement was published
+in the newspapers requesting Germans to give up their jewelry for
+the Fatherland. Many did so: among them, I believe, the Empress
+and other royalties.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, 1915, a prominent banker in Berlin said to me that
+the Germans were sick of the war; that the Krupps and other big
+industries were making great sums of money and were prolonging
+the war by insisting upon the annexation of Belgium; and that
+the Junkers were also in favour of the continuance of the war
+because of the fact that they were getting four or five times
+the money for their products while their work was being done by
+prisoners. He said that the _Kaufleute_ (merchant middle class)
+will have to pay the cost of the war and that the Junkers will
+not be taxed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In December, butter became very scarce and the women waiting
+in long lines before the shops often rushed the shops. In this
+month many copper roofs were removed from buildings in Berlin.
+I was told by a friend in the Foreign Office that the notorious
+von Rintelen was sent to America to buy up the entire product of
+the Dupont powder factories, and that he exceeded his authority
+if he did anything else.
+
+In December, on the night of the day of the peace interpellation
+in the Reichstag a call was issued by placards for a meeting
+on the Unter den Linden. I went out on the streets during the
+afternoon and found that the police had so carefully divided
+the city into districts that it was impossible for a crowd of
+any size to gather on the Unter den Linden. There was quite a
+row at the session in the Reichstag. Scheidemann, the Socialist,
+made a speech very moderate in tone; but he was answered by the
+Chancellor and then an endeavour was made to close the debate.
+The Socialists made such a noise, however, that the majority gave
+way and another prominent Socialist, Landsberger, was allowed
+to speak for the Socialists. He also made a reasonable speech
+in the course of which he said that even Socialists would not
+allow Alsace-Lorraine to go back to France. He made use of a
+rather good phrase, saying that the "Dis-United States of Europe
+were making war to make a place for the United States of America."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The banks sent out circulars to all holders of safe deposit boxes,
+asking them to disclose the contents. This was part of the campaign
+to get in hoarded gold.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, we had many visitors. S. S. McClure, Hermann
+Bernstein, Inez Milholland Boissevain--all of the Ford Peace
+Ship--appeared in Berlin. I introduced Mrs. Boissevain to Zimmermann
+who admired her extremely.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In January, 1916, I visited Munich and from there a Bavarian
+officer prison camp and the prison camp for private soldiers,
+both at Ingolstadt. I also conferred with Archdeacon Nies of
+the American Episcopal Church who carried on a much needed work
+in visiting the prison camps in Bavaria.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The American Colony in Munich maintained with the help of friends
+in America, a Red Cross hospital under the able charge of Dr.
+Jung, a Washington doctor, and his wife. The nursing was done by
+American and German girls. The American Colony at Munich also fed
+a number of school children every day. I regret to say, however,
+that many of the Americans in Munich were loud in their abuse of
+President Wilson and their native country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In March, 1916, I was sounded on the question of Germany's sending
+an unofficial envoy, like Colonel House, to America to talk
+informally to the President and prominent people. I was told that
+Solf would probably be named.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In 1916, the importation of many articles of luxury into Germany
+was forbidden. This move was naturally made in order to keep
+money in the country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A Dane who had a quantity of manganese in Brazil sold it to a
+Philadelphia firm for delivery to the United States Steel Company.
+The German Government in some way learned of this and the Dane
+was arrested and put in jail. His Minister had great difficulty
+in getting him out.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Liebknecht, in April of 1916, made matters lively at the Reichstag
+sessions. During the Chancellor's speech, Liebknecht interrupted
+him and said that the Germans were not free; next he denied that
+the Germans had not wished war; and, another time, he called
+attention to the attempts of the Germans to induce the Mohammedan
+and Irish prisoners of war to desert to the German side. Liebknecht
+finally enraged the government supporters by calling out that
+the subscription to the loan was a swindle.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+After the _Sussex_ settlement I think that the Germans wished
+to inaugurate an era of better feeling between Germany and the
+United States. At any rate, and in answer to many anonymous attacks
+made against me, the _North_German_Gazette_, the official
+newspaper, published a sort of certificate from the government
+to the effect that I was a good boy and that the rumours of my
+bitter hostility to Germany were unfounded.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In May, 1916, Wertheim, head of the great department store in
+Berlin, told me that they had more business than in peace times.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Early in June 1 had two long talks with Prince von Buelow. He
+speaks English well and is suspected by his enemies of having
+been polishing it up lately in order to make ready for possible
+peace conferences. He is a man of a more active brain than the
+present Chancellor, and is very restless and anxious in some
+way to break into the present political situation.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In June, the anonymous attacks on the Chancellor by pamphlet
+and otherwise, incensed him to such a degree that he made an
+open answer in the Reichstag and had rather the best of the
+situation. Many anonymous lies and rumours were flying about
+Berlin at this period, and even Helfferich had to deny publicly
+the anonymous charges that he had been anonymously attacking
+the Chancellor.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In July, the committee called the National Committee for an
+Honourable Peace was formed with Prince Wedel at its head. Most
+of the people in this League were friends of the Chancellor, and
+one of the three real heads was the editor of the
+_Frankfurter_Zeitung_, the Chancellor's organ. It was planned that
+fifty speakers from this committee would begin to speak all over
+Germany on August first, but when they began to speak their views
+were so dissimilar and the speeches of most of them so ridiculous
+that the movement failed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In August, I spent two Saturdays and Sundays at Heringsdorf,
+a summer resort on the Baltic. Before going there I had to get
+special permission from the military authorities through the
+Foreign Office, as foreigners are not allowed to reside on the
+coast of Germany. Regulations that all windows must be darkened
+at night and no lights shown which could be seen from the sea
+were strictly enforced by the authorities.
+
+There are three bathing places. In each of them the bath houses,
+etc. surround three sides of a square, the sea forming the fourth
+side. Bathing is allowed only on this fourth side for a space
+of sixty-five yards long. One of these bathing places is for
+women and one for men, and the third is the so-called Familienbad
+(family bath) where mixed bathing is allowed. German women are
+very sensible in the matter of their bathing costumes and do
+not wear the extraordinary creations seen in America. They wear
+bathing sandals but no stockings, and, as most of them have fine
+figures but dress badly, they appear at their best at Heringsdorf.
+Both sea and air seemed somewhat cold for bathing. On account
+of their sensible dress, most of the German women are expert
+swimmers.
+
+I noticed one very handsome blonde girl who sat on her bathing
+mantle exciting the admiration of the beach because of her fine
+figure. She suddenly dived into the pockets of the bathing mantle
+and produced an enormous black bread sandwich which she proceeded
+to consume quite unconsciously, after which she swam out to sea.
+No healthy German can remain long separated from food; and I
+noticed in the prospectus of the different boarding-houses at
+Heringsdorf that patrons were offered, in addition to about four
+meals or more a day, an extra sandwich to take to the beach to
+be consumed during the bathing hour.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There is a beautiful little English church in Berlin which was
+especially favoured by the Kaiser's mother during her life. Because
+of this, the Kaiser permitted this church to remain open, and
+the services were continued during the war. The pastor, Rev. Mr.
+Williams, obtained permission to visit the British prisoners,
+and most devotedly travelled from one prison camp to another.
+Both he and his sister, whose charitable work for the British
+deserves mention, were at one time thrown into jail, charged
+with spying.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I at first attended the hybrid American church, but when, in
+1915, I think, the committee hired a German _woman_ preacher
+I ceased to attend. The American, the Reverend Dr. Crosser, who
+was in charge when I arrived in Berlin left, to my everlasting
+regret, in the spring before the war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Poor Creelman, the celebrated newspaper correspondent, died in
+Berlin. We got him in to a good hospital and some one from the
+Embassy visited him every day.
+
+The funeral services were conducted in the American Church by
+the Rev. Dr. Dickie, long a resident of Berlin, whose wife had
+presented the library to the American church. The Foreign Office
+sent Herr Horstmann as its representative.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+While to-day all royalties and public men pose for the movies,
+Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria and his family are probably the first
+royalties to act in a cinematograph. In 1916, there was released
+in Berlin a play in which Czar Ferdinand of Bulgaria, his wife
+and two daughters by a former wife appeared, acting as Bulgarian
+royalties in the development of the plot.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The difference between von Jagow and Zimmermann was that von
+Jagow had lived abroad, had met people from all countries and
+knew that there was much to learn about the psychology of the
+inhabitants of countries other than Germany. Zimmermann, in the
+early part of his career, had been consul at Shanghai; and, on
+his way back, had passed through America, spending two days in
+San Francisco and three in New York. He seemed to think that
+this transcontinental trip had given him an intimate knowledge
+of American character. Von Jagow, on the other hand, almost as
+soon as war began, spent many hours talking to me about America
+and borrowed from me books and novels on that country. The novel
+in which he took the greatest interest was "Turmoil," by Booth
+Tarkington.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I think there must have been a period quite recently when the
+German Government tried to imbue the people with a greater degree
+of frightfulness, because all of us in visiting camps, etc. observed
+that the _landsturm_ men or older soldiers were much more merciful
+than the younger ones.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Alexander Cochran, a New York yachtsman, volunteered to become a
+courier between the London Embassy and ours. On his first trip,
+although he had two passports (his regular passport and a special
+courier's passport), he was arrested and compelled to spend the
+night on the floor of the guard-room at the frontier town of
+Bentheim. This ended his aspirations to be a courier. He is now
+a commander in the British Navy, having joined it with his large
+steam yacht, the _Warrior_ some time before the United States
+entered the war. In the piping times of peace he had been the
+guest of the Emperor at Kiel.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A British prisoner, who escaped from Ruhleben, was caught in a
+curious manner. Prisoners in Ruhleben received bread from outside,
+as I have explained in the chapter on prisoners of war. This bread
+is white, something unknown in Germany since the war. The escaped
+prisoner took with him some sandwiches made of the bread he had
+received in Ruhleben and most incautiously ate one of these
+sandwiches in a railway station. He was immediately surrounded
+by a crowd of Germans anxious to know where he had obtained the
+white bread, and, in this way, was detected and returned to prison.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On our way out in September, 1916, we were given a large dinner
+in Copenhagen by our skilful minister there, the Hon. Maurice
+F. Egan, who has devoted many years of his life to the task of
+adding the three beautiful Danish islands to the dominions of the
+United States. He is an able diplomat, very popular in Copenhagen,
+where he is dean of the diplomatic corps. At this dinner we met
+Countess Hegerman-Lindencron, whose interesting books, "The Sunny
+Side of Diplomatic Life" and "The Courts of Memory," have had
+a large circulation in America. In Copenhagen, too, both on the
+way out and in, we lunched with Count Rantzau-Brockedorff, then
+German Minister there. Count Rantzau is skilful and wily, and not
+at all military in his instincts; and, I should say, far more
+inclined to arrive at a reasonable compromise than the average
+German diplomat. He is a charming International, with none of the
+rough points and aggressive manners which characterise so many
+Prussian officials.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In judging the German people, we must remember that, while they
+have made great progress in the last forty years in commerce
+and chemistry, the very little liberty they possess is a plant
+of very recent growth. About the year 1780, Frederick the Great
+having sent some money to restore the burned city of Greiffenberg,
+in Silesia, the magistrates of that town called upon him to thank
+him. They kneeled and their spokesman said, "We render unto your
+Majesty in the name of the inhabitants of Greiffenberg, our humble
+thanks for the most gracious gift which your Majesty deigned to
+bestow in aid and to assist us in rebuilding our homes.
+
+"The gratitude of such dust as we, is, as we are aware, of no
+moment or value to you. We shall, however, implore God to grant
+your Majesty His divine favours in return for your royal bounty."
+
+Too many Germans, to-day, feel that they are mere dust before
+the almost countless royalties of the German Empire. And these
+royalties are too prone to feel that the kingdoms, dukedoms and
+principalities of Germany and their inhabitants are their private
+property. The Princes of Nassau and Anspach and Hesse, at the
+time of our Revolution, sold their unfortunate subjects to the
+British Government to be exported to fight the Americans. Our
+American soil covers the bones of many a poor German peasant
+who gave up his life in a war from which he gained nothing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Frederick the Great, the model and exemplar of all German
+royalties; died in 1786, he disposed of the Kingdom of Prussia
+in his will as if it had been one of his horses. "I bequeath
+unto my dear nephew, Frederick William, as unto my immediate
+successor, the Kingdom of Prussia, the provinces, towns, palaces,
+forts, fortresses, all ammunition and arsenals, all lands mine
+by inheritance or right of conquest, the crown jewels, gold and
+silver service of plate in Berlin, country houses, collections
+of coins, picture galleries, gardens, and so forth." Contrast
+this will with the utterances of Washington and Hamilton made
+at the same time!
+
+In the Grand Duchies of Mecklenburg, serfdom was not abolished
+until 1819.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The spies and the influencers of American correspondents made
+their headquarters at a large Berlin hotel. A sketch of their
+activities is given by de Beaufort in his book, "Behind the German
+Veil."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Among the American correspondents in Berlin during the war great
+credit should be given to Carl W. Ackerman and Seymour B. Conger,
+correspondents of the United and Associated Presses respectively,
+who at all times and in spite of their surroundings and in the
+face of real difficulties preserved their Americanism unimpaired
+and refused to succumb to the alluring temptations held out to
+them. I do not mean to imply that the other correspondents were
+not loyal, but the pro-Germanism of many of them unfortunately
+gave the Imperial Foreign Office and the great general staff a
+wrong impression of Americans. It is the splendid patriotism
+under fire of Ackerman and Conger that deserves special mention.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+LAST
+
+I was credited by the Germans with having hoodwinked and jollied
+the Foreign Office and the Government into refraining for two
+years from using illegally their most effective weapon.
+
+This, of course, is not so. I always told the Foreign Office the
+plain simple truth and the event showed that I correctly predicted
+the attitude of America.
+
+Our American national game, poker, has given us abroad an unfair
+reputation. We are always supposed to be bluffing. A book was
+published in Germany about the President called, "President Bluff."
+
+I only regret that those high in authority in Germany should
+have preferred to listen to pro-German correspondents who posed
+as amateur super-Ambassadors rather than to the authorised
+representatives of America. I left Germany with a clear conscience
+and the knowledge that I had done everything possible to keep
+the peace.
+
+An Ambassador, of course, does not determine the policy of his
+own country. One of his principal duties, if not the principal
+one, is to keep his own country informed--to know beforehand what
+the country to which he is accredited will do, and I think that
+I managed to give the State Department advance information of
+the moves of the rulers of Germany.
+
+I had the support of a loyal and devoted staff of competent
+secretaries and assistants, and both Secretaries Bryan and Lansing
+were most kind in the backing given by their very ably organised
+department.
+
+I sent Secretary Lansing a confidential letter every week and, of
+course, received most valuable hints from him. Secretary Lansing
+was very successful in his tactful handling of the American
+Ambassadors abroad and in getting them to work together as cheerful
+members of the same team.
+
+When I returned to America, after living for two and a half years
+in the centre of this world calamity, everything seemed petty
+and small. I was surprised that people could still seek little
+advantages, still be actuated by little jealousies and revenges.
+Freed from the round of daily work I felt for the first time the
+utter horror and uselessness of all the misery these Prussian
+military autocrats had brought upon the world; and what a reckoning
+there will be in Germany some day when the plain people realise
+the truth, when they learn what base motives actuated their rulers
+in condemning a whole generation of the earth to war and death!
+
+Is it not a shame that the world should have been so disturbed;
+that peaceful men are compelled to lie out in the mud and filth
+in the depth of raw winter, shot at and stormed at and shelled,
+waiting for a chance to murder some other inoffensive fellow
+creature? Why must the people in old Poland die of hunger, not
+finding dogs enough to eat in the streets of Lemberg? The long
+lines of broken peasants in Serbia and in Roumania; the population
+of Belgium and Northern France torn from their homes to work
+as slaves for the Germans; the poor prisoners of war starving
+in their huts or working in factories and mines; the cries of
+the old and the children, wounded by bombs from Zeppelins; the
+wails of the mothers for their sons; the very rustling of the air
+as the souls of the ten million dead sweep to another world,--why
+must all these horrors come upon a fair green earth, where we
+believed that love and help and friendship, genius and science
+and commerce, religion and civilisation, once ruled?
+
+It is because in the dark, cold Northern plains of Germany there
+exists an autocracy, deceiving a great people, poisoning their
+minds from one generation to another and preaching the virtue
+and necessity of war; and until that autocracy is either wiped
+out or made powerless, there can be no peace on earth.
+
+The golden dream of conquest was almost accomplished. A little
+more advance, a few more wagon loads of ammunition, and there
+would have been no battle of the Marne, no Joffre, a modern Martel,
+to hammer back the invading hordes of barbarism.
+
+I have always stated that Germany is possessed yet of immense
+military power; and, to win, the nations opposed to Germany must
+learn to think in a military way. The mere entrance, even of
+a great nation like our own, into the war, means nothing in a
+military way unless backed by military power.
+
+And there must be no German peace. The old _régime_, left
+in control of Germany, of Bulgaria, of Turkey, would only seek
+a favourable moment to renew the war, to strive again for the
+mastery of the world.
+
+Fortunately America bars the way,--America led by a fighting
+President who win allow no compromise with brutal autocracy.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+[Illustration: THIS AND THE FOLLOWING FIVE PAGES ARE A FAC-SIMILE
+REPRODUCTION OF THE TELEGRAM IN THE KAISER'S OWN HANDWRITING
+WHICH HE GAVE AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CABLE TO PRESIDENT WILSON.]
+
+[Illustration: FAC-SIMILE OF SECRETARY OF STATE ZIMMERMAN'S REQUEST
+TO AMBASSADOR GERARD TO CALL IN ORDER TO RECEIVE THE ANNOUNCEMENT
+OF RUTHLESS SUBMARINE WARFARE AGAINST THE ALLIES.]
+
+[Illustration: THE REMODELLED DRAFT OF THE TREATY OF 1799 BETWEEN
+THE UNITED STATES AND PRUSSIA, WHICH AMBASSADOR GERARD WAS ASKED
+TO SIGN WHEN LEAVING GERMANY AFTER DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS HAD BEEN
+SEVERED.]
+
+[Illustration: A FAC-SIMILE REPRODUCTION OF A MULTIGRAPH SET OF
+INSTRUCTIONS SENT OUT BY THE GERMAN PRESS BUREAU TO THE NEWSPAPERS
+FOR THE PURPOSE OF ENABLING THEM TO WRITE UP THE LATEST ZEPPELIN
+RAID ON LONDON. THE INSTRUCTIONS WARN THEM THAT THEIR ACCOUNTS
+MUST NOT READ LIKE A REPRINT, BUT MUST SEEM TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN
+INDEPENDENTLY.]
+
+[Illustration: A PETITION TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES,
+CIRCULATED FOR SIGNATURES AMONG THE AMERICANS IN EUROPE, OSTENSIBLY
+TO PROTEST AGAINST THE AMERICAN MANUFACTURE OF MUNITIONS OF WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF A PAMPHLET FOR PROPAGANDA PURPOSES,
+IN WHICH WIDE PUBLICITY WAS GIVEN TO LISSAUER'S FAMOUS "HYMN
+OF HATE".]
+
+[Illustration: AN EXCELLENT EXAMPLE OF TEUTONIC EFFICIENCY. MINUTE
+REGULATIONS IN REGARD TO PRESENTATION AT COURT.]
+
+[Illustration: A BERLIN EXTRA. GERMANY DISCLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY
+FOR THE WAR.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO SAIL ON S. M. J. "METEOR".]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO DINE ON THE KAISER'S YACHT,
+"HOHENZOLLERN," AT KIEL.]
+
+[Illustration: INVITATION TO THE GARDEN PARTY AT KIEL OF PRINCE
+HENRY OF PRUSSIA, WHICH WAS GIVEN UP BECAUSE OF THE NEWS OF THE
+MURDERS AT SARAJEVO.]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's My Four Years in Germany, by James W. Gerard
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY FOUR YEARS IN GERMANY ***
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