her own counsels and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is
honest and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the
world."

Many Americans believed even early in the war that the United States
should have protested against the invasion of Belgium.  Others thought
the government should prohibit the shipments of war supplies to the
belligerents.  America _was_ divided by the great issues in Europe, but
the great majority of Americans believed with the President, that the
best service Uncle Sam could render would be to help bring about peace.

Until February, 1915, when the von Tirpitz submarine blockade of
England was proclaimed, only American interests, not American lives,
had been drawn into the war.  But when the German Admiralty announced
that neutral as well as belligerent ships in British waters would be
sunk without warning, there was a new and unexpected obstacle to
neutrality.  The high seas were as much American as British.  The
oceans were no nation's property and they could not justly be used as
battlegrounds for ruthless warfare by either belligerent.

Germany, therefore, was the first to challenge American neutrality.
Germany was the first to threaten American lives.  Germany, which was
the first to show contempt for Wilson, forced the President, as well as
the people, to alter policies and adapt American neutrality to a new
and grave danger.




CHAPTER II

"PIRATES SINK ANOTHER NEUTRAL SHIP"

On February 4th, 1915, the _Reichsanzeiger_, the official newspaper of
Germany, published an announcement declaring that from the 18th of
February "all the waters surrounding Great Britain and Ireland as well
as the entire English channel are hereby declared to be a war area.
All ships of the enemy mercantile marine found in these waters will be
destroyed and it will not always be possible to avoid danger to the
crews and passengers thereon.

"_Neutral shipping is also in danger in the war area_, as owing to the
secret order issued by the British Admiralty January 31st, 1915,
regarding the misuse of neutral flags, and the chances of naval
warfare, it can happen that attacks directed against enemy ships may
damage neutral vessels.

"The shipping route around the north of The Shetlands in the east of
the North Sea and over a distance of thirty miles along the coast of
The Netherlands will not be dangerous."

Although the announcement was signed by Admiral von Pohl, Chief of the
Admiralty Staff, the real author of the blockade was Grand Admiral von
Tirpitz.  In explanation of the announcement the Teutonic-Allied,
neutral and hostile powers were sent a memorandum which contained the
following paragraph:


"The German Government announces its intention in good time so that
hostile _as well as neutral_ ships can take necessary precautions
accordingly.  Germany expects that the neutral powers will show the
same consideration for Germany's vital interests as for those of
England, and will aid in keeping their citizens and property from this
area.  This is the more to be expected, as it must be to the interests
of the neutral powers to see this destructive war end as soon as
possible."


On February 12th the American Ambassador, James W. Gerard, handed
Secretary of State von Jagow a note in which the United States said:


"This Government views these possibilities with such grave concern that
it feels it to be its privilege, and indeed its duty in the
circumstances, to request the Imperial German Government to consider
before action is taken the critical situation in respect of the
relations between this country and Germany which might arise were the
German naval officers, in carrying out the policy foreshadowed in the
Admiralty's proclamation, to destroy any merchant vessel of the United
States or cause the death of American citizens.

"It is of course unnecessary to remind the German Government that the
sole right of a belligerent in dealing with neutral vessels on the high
seas is limited to visit and search, unless a blockade is proclaimed
and effectively maintained, which the Government of the United States
does not understand to be proposed in this case.  To declare and
exercise the right to attack and destroy any vessel entering a
prescribed area of the high seas without first accurately determining
its belligerent nationality and the contraband character of its cargo,
would be an act so unprecedented in naval warfare that this Government
is reluctant to believe that the Imperial German Government in this
case contemplates it as possible."


I sailed from New York February 13th, 1915, on the first American
passenger liner to run the von Tirpitz blockade.  On February 20th we
passed Queenstown and entered the Irish Sea at night.  Although it was
moonlight and we could see for miles about us, every light on the ship,
except the green and red port and starboard lanterns, was extinguished.
As we sailed across the Irish Sea, silently and cautiously as a muskrat
swims on a moonlight night, we received a wireless message that a
submarine, operating off the mouth of the Mersey River, had sunk an
English freighter.  The captain was asked by the British Admiralty to
stop the engines and await orders.  Within an hour a patrol boat
approached and escorted us until the pilot came aboard early the next
morning.  No one aboard ship slept.  Few expected to reach Liverpool
alive, but the next afternoon we were safe in one of the numerous snug
wharves of that great port.

A few days later I arrived in London.  As I walked through Fleet street
newsboys were hurrying from the press rooms carrying orange-coloured
placards with the words in big black type: "Pirates Sink Another
Neutral Ship."

Until the middle of March I remained in London, where the wildest
rumours were afloat about the dangers off the coast of England, and
where every one was excited and expectant over the reports that Germany
was starving.  I was urged by friends and physicians not to go to
Germany because it was universally believed in Great Britain that the
war would be over in a very short time.  On the 15th of March I crossed
from Tilbury to Rotterdam.  At Tilbury I saw pontoon bridges across the
Thames, patrol boats and submarine chasers rushing back and forth
watching for U-boats, which might attempt to come up the river.  I
boarded the _Batavia IV_ late at night and left Gravesend at daylight
the next morning for Holland.  Every one was on deck looking for
submarines and mines.  The channel that day was as smooth as a small
lake, but the terrible expectation that submarines might sight the
Dutch ship made every passenger feel that the submarine war was as real
as it was horrible.

On the 17th of March, arriving at the little German border town of
Bentheim, I met for the first time the people who were already branded
as "Huns and Barbarians" by the British and French.  Officers and
people, however, were not what they had been pictured to be.  Neither
was Germany starving.  The officials and inspectors were courteous and
patient and permitted me to take into Germany not only British
newspapers, but placards which pictured the Germans as pirates.  Two
days later, while walking down Unter den Linden, poor old women, who
were already taking the places of newsboys, sold German extras with
streaming headlines: "British Ships Sunk.  Submarine War Successful."
In front of the _Lokal Anzeiger_ building stood a large crowd reading
the bulletins about the progress of the von Tirpitz blockade.

For luncheon that day I had the choice of as many foods as I had had in
London.  The only thing missing was white bread, for Germany, at the
beginning of the war, permitted only Kriegsbrot (war bread) to be baked.

All Berlin streets were crowded and busy.  Military automobiles,
auto-trucks, big moving vans, private automobiles, taxi-cabs and
carriages hurried hither and thither.  Soldiers and officers, seemingly
by the thousands, were parading up and down.  Stores were busy.  Berlin
appeared to be as normal as any other capital.  Even the confidence of
Germany in victory impressed me so that in one of my first despatches I
said:


"Germany to-day is more confident than ever that all efforts of her
enemies to crush her must prove in vain.  With a threefold offensive,
in Flanders, in Galicia and in northwest Russia, being successfully
prosecuted, there was a spirit of enthusiasm displayed here in both
military and civilian circles that exceeded even the stirring days
immediately following the outbreak of the war.

"Flags are flying everywhere to-day; the Imperial standards of Germany
and Austria predominate, although there is a goodly showing of the
Turkish Crescent.  Bands are playing as regiment after regiment passes
through the city to entrain for the front.  Through Wilhelmstrasse the
soldiers moved, their hats and guns decorated with fragrant flowers and
with mothers, sisters and sweethearts clinging to and encouraging them."


A few weeks before I arrived the Germans were excited over the shipment
of arms and ammunitions from the United States to the Allies, but by
the time I was in Berlin the situation seemed to have changed.  On
April 4th I telegraphed the following despatch which appeared in the
_Evening Sun_, New York:


"The spirit of animosity towards Americans which swept Germany a few
weeks ago seems to have disappeared.  The 1,400 Americans in Berlin and
those in the smaller cities of Germany have little cause to complain of
discourteous treatment.  Americans just arriving in Berlin in
particular comment upon the friendliness of their reception.  The
Germans have been especially courteous, they declare, on learning of
their nationality.  Feeling against the United States for permitting
arms to be shipped to the Allies still exists, but I have not found
this feeling extensive among the Germans.  Two American doctors
studying in German clinics declare that the wounded soldiers always
talk about 'Amerikanische keugel' (American bullets), but it is my
observation that the persons most outspoken against the sale of
ammunition to the Allies by American manufacturers are the American
residents of Berlin."


Two weeks later the situation had changed considerably.  On the 24th I
telegraphed: "Despite the bitter criticism of the United States by
German newspapers for refusing to end the traffic in munitions, it is
semi-officially explained that this does not represent the real views
of the German Government.  The censor has been instructed to permit the
newspapers to express themselves frankly on this subject and on
Secretary Bryan's reply to the von Bernstorff note, but it has been
emphasised that their views reflect popular opinion and the editorial
side of the matter and not the Government.

"The _Lokal Anzeiger_, following up its attack of yesterday, to-day
says:

"'The answer of the United States is no surprise to Germany and
naturally it fails to convince Germany that a flourishing trade in
munitions of war is in accord with strict neutrality.  The German
argument was based upon the practice of international law, but the
American reply was based upon the commercial advantages enjoyed by the
ammunition shippers.'"

April 24th was von Tirpitz day.  It was the anniversary of the entrance
of the Grand Admiral in the German Navy fifty years before, and the
eighteenth anniversary of his debut in the cabinet, a record for a
German Minister of Marine.  There was tremendous rejoicing throughout
the country, and the Admiral, who spent his Prussian birthday at the
Navy Department, was overwhelmed with congratulations.  Headed by the
Kaiser, telegrams came from every official in Germany.  The press paid
high tribute to his blockade, declaring that it was due to him alone
that England was so terror-stricken by submarines.

I was not in Germany very long until I was impressed by the remarkable
control the Government had on public opinion by censorship of the
press.  People believe, without exception, everything they read in the
newspapers.  And I soon discovered that the censor was so accustomed to
dealing with German editors that he applied the same standards to the
foreign correspondents.  A reporter could telegraph not what he
observed and heard, but what the censors desired American readers to
hear and know about Germany.

[Illustration: A Berlin "Extra"]

I was in St. Quentin, France (which the Germans on their 1917
withdrawal set on fire) at the headquarters of General von Below, when
news came May 8th that the _Lusitania_ was torpedoed.  I read the
bulletins as they arrived.  I heard the comments of the Germans who
were waging war in an enemy country.  I listened as they spoke of the
loss of American and other women and children.  I was amazed when I
heard them say that a woman had no more right on the _Lusitania_ than
she would have on an ammunition wagon on the Somme.  The day before I
was in the first line trenches on the German front which crossed the
road running from Peronne to Albert.  At that time this battlefield,
which a year and a half later was destined to be the scene of the
greatest slaughter in history, was as quiet and beautiful as this
picturesque country of northern France was in peace times.  Only a few
trenches and barbed wire entanglements marred the scene.

On May 9th I left St. Quentin for Brussels.  Here I was permitted by
the General Government to send a despatch reflecting the views of the
German army in France about the sinking of the _Lusitania_.  I wrote
what I thought was a fair article.  I told how the bulletin was posted
in front of the Hotel de Ville; how the officers and soldiers marching
to and away from the front stopped, read, smiled and congratulated each
other because the Navy was at last helping the Army "win the war."
There were no expressions of regret over the loss of life.  These
officers and soldiers had seen so many dead, soldiers and civilians,
men and women, in Belgium and France that neither death nor murder
shocked them.

The telegram was approved by the military censor and forwarded to
Berlin.  I stayed in Belgium two days longer, went to Louvain and Liege
and reached Berlin May 12th.  The next day I learned at the Foreign
Office that my despatch was stopped because it conflicted with the
opinions which the German Government was sending officially by wireless
to Washington and to the American newspapers.  I felt that this was
unfair, but I was subject to the censorship and had no appeal.

I did not forget this incident because it showed a striking difference
of opinion between the army, which was fighting for Germany, and the
Foreign Office, which was explaining and excusing what the Army and
Navy did.  The Army always justified the events in Belgium, but the
Foreign Office did not.  And this was the first incident which made me
feel that even in Germany, which was supposed to be united, there were
differences of opinion.

In September, 1915, while the German army was moving against Russia
like a surging sea, I was invited to go to the front near Vilna.
During the intervening months I had observed and recorded as much as
possible the growing indignation in Germany because the United States
permitted the shipment of arms and ammunition to the Allies.  In June I
had had an interview with Secretary of State von Jagow, in which he
protested against the attitude of the United States Government and said
that America was not acting as neutral as Germany did during the
Spanish-American war.  He cited page 168 of Andrew D. White's book in
which Ambassador White said he persuaded Germany not to permit a German
ship laden with ammunition and consigned for Spain to sail.  I thought
that if Germany had adopted such an attitude toward America, that in
justice to Germany Washington should adopt the same position.  After
von Jagow gave me the facts in possession of the Foreign Office and
after he had loaned me Mr. White's book, I looked up the data.  I found
to my astonishment that Mr. White reported to the State Department that
a ship of ammunition sailed from Hamburg, and that he had not
protested, although the Naval Attache had requested him to do so.  The
statements of von Jagow and Mr. White's in his autobiography did not
agree with the facts.  Germany did send ammunition to Spain, but
Wilhelmstrasse was using Mr. White's book as proof that the Krupp
interests did not supply our enemy in 1898.  The latter part of
September I entered Kovno, the important Russian fortress, eight days
after the army captured it.  I was escorted, together with other
foreign correspondents, from one fort to another and shown what the 42
cm. guns had destroyed.  I saw 400 machine guns which were captured and
1,300 pieces of heavy artillery.  The night before, at a dinner party,
the officers had argued against the United States because of the
shipment of supplies to Russia.  They said that if the United States
had not aided Russia, that country would not have been able to resist
the invaders.  I did not know the facts, but I accepted their
statements.  When I was shown the machine guns, I examined them and
discovered that every one of the 400 was made at Essen or Magdeburg,
Germany.  Of the 1,300 pieces of artillery every cannon was made in
Germany except a few English ship guns.  Kovno was fortified by
_German_ artillery, not American.

A few days later I entered Vilna; this time I was moving with the
advance column.  At dinner that night with General von Weber, the
commander of the city, the subject of American arms and ammunition was
again brought up.  The General said they had captured from the Russians
an American machine gun.  He added that they were bringing it in from
Smorgon to show the Americans.  When it reached us the stamp, written
in English, showed that it was manufactured by Vickers Limited,
England.  Being unable to read English, the officer who reported the
capture thought the gun was made in the United States.

In Roumania last December I followed General von Falkenhayn's armies to
the forts of Bucharest.  On Thanksgiving Day I crossed by automobile
the Schurduck Pass.  The Roumanians had defended, or attempted to
defend, this road by mounting armoured guns on the crest of one of the
mountain ranges in the Transylvanian Alps.  I examined a whole position
here and found all turrets were made in Germany.

I did not doubt that the shipment of arms and ammunition to the Allies
had been a great aid to them.  (I was told in Paris, later, on my way
to the United States that if it had not been for the American
ammunition factories France would have been defeated long ago.)  But
when Germany argued that the United States was not neutral in
permitting these shipments to leave American ports, Germany was
forgetting what her own arms and munition factories had done _for
Germany's enemies_.  When the Krupp works sold Russia the defences for
Kovno, the German Government knew these weapons would be used against
Germany some day, because no nation except Germany could attack Russia
by way of that city.  When Krupps sold war supplies to Roumania, the
German Government knew that if Roumania joined the Allies these
supplies would be used against German soldiers.  But the Government was
careful not to report these facts in German newspapers.  And, although
Secretary of State von Jagow acknowledged to Ambassador Gerard that
there was nothing in international law to justify a change in
Washington's position, von Jagow's statements were not permitted to be
published in Germany.

To understand Germany's resentment over Mr. Wilson's interference with
the submarine warfare, three things must be taken into consideration.

1. The Allies' charge that all Germans are "Huns and Barbarians."

2. The battle of the Marne and the shipment of arms and ammunition from
the United States.

3. The intrigue and widening breach between the Army and Navy and the
Foreign Office.


I

One weapon the Allies used against Germany, which was more effective
than all others, was the press.  When the English and French indicted
the Germans as "Barbarians and Huns," as "pirates," and "uncivilised"
Europeans, it cut the Germans to the quick; it affected men and women
so terribly that Germans feared these attacks more than they did the
combined military might of their enemies.  This is readily understood
when one realises that before the war the thing the Germans prided
themselves on was their commerce and their civilisation,--their Kultur.
Before the war, the world was told by every German what the nation had
done for the poor; what strides the scientists had made in research
work and what progress the business men had made in extending their
commerce at the expense of competitors.

While some government officials foresaw the disaster which would come
to Germany if this national vanity was paraded before the whole world,
their advice and counsel were ignored.  Consul General Kiliani, the
Chief German official in Australia before the war, told me he had
reported repeatedly to the Foreign Office that German business men were
injuring their own opportunities by bragging so much of what they had
done, and what they would do.  He said if it continued the whole world
would be leagued against Germany; that public opinion would be so
strong against German goods that they would lose their markets.
Germany made the whole world fear her commercial might by this foolish
bragging.

So when the war broke out and Germans were attacked for being
uncivilised in Belgium, for breaking treaties and for disregarding the
opinion of the world, it was but natural that German vanity should
resent it.  Germans feared nothing but God and public opinion.  They
had such exalted faith in their army they believed they could gain by
Might what they had lost in prestige throughout the world.  This is one
of the reasons the German people arose like one man when war was
declared.  They wished and were ready to show the world that they were
the greatest people ever created.


II

The German explanation of why they lost the battle of the Marne is
interesting, not alone because of the explanation of the defeat, but
because it shows why the shipment of arms and ammunition from the
United States was such a poisonous pill to the army.  Shortly after my
arrival in Berlin Dr. Alfred Zimmermann, then Under Secretary of State,
said the greatest scandal in Germany after the war would be the
investigation of the reasons for the shortage of ammunition in
September, 1914.  He did not deny that Germany was prepared for a great
war.  He must have known at the time what the Director of the Post and
Telegraph knew on the 2nd of August, 1914, when he wrote Announcement
No. 3.  The German Army must have known the same thing and if it had
prepared for war, as every German admits it had, then preparations were
made to fight nine nations.  But there was one thing which Germany
failed to take into consideration, Zimmermann said, and that was the
shipment of supplies from the United States.  Then, he added, there
were two reasons why the battle of the Marne was lost: one, because
there was not sufficient ammunition; and, two, because the reserves
were needed to stop the Russian invasion of East Prussia.  I asked him
whether Germany did not have enormous stores of ammunition on hand when
the war began.  He said there was sufficient ammunition for a short
campaign, but that the Ministry of War had not mobilised sufficient
ammunition factories to keep up the supplies.  He said this was the
reason for the downfall of General von Herringen, who was Minister of
War at the beginning of hostilities.

After General von Kluck was wounded and returned to his villa in
Wilmersdorf, a suburb of Berlin, I took a walk with him in his garden
and discussed the Marne.  He confirmed what Zimmermann stated about the
shortage of ammunition and added that he had to give up his reserves to
General von Hindenburg, who had been ordered by the Kaiser to drive the
Russians from East Prussia.


III

At the very beginning of the war, although no intimations were
permitted to reach the outside world, there was a bitter controversy
between the Foreign Office, as headed by the Chancellor von
Bethmann-Hollweg; the Navy Department, headed by Grand Admiral von
Tirpitz, and General von Moltke, Chief of the General Staff.  The
Chancellor delayed mobilisation of the German Army three days.  For
this he never has and never will be forgiven by the military
authorities.  During those stirring days of July and August, when
General von Moltke, von Tirpitz, von Falkenhayn, Krupps and the Rhine
Valley Industrial leaders were clamouring for war and for an invasion
of Belgium, the Kaiser was being urged by the Chancellor and the
Foreign Office to heed the proposals of Sir Edward Grey for a Peace
Conference.  But the Kaiser, who was more of a soldier than a
statesman, sided with his military friends.  The war was on, not only
between Germany and the Entente, but between the Foreign Office and the
Army and Navy.  This internal fight which began in July, 1914, became
Germany's bitterest struggle and from time to time the odds went from
one side to another.  The Army accused the diplomats of blundering in
starting the war.  The Foreign Office replied that it was the lust for
power and victory which poisoned the military leaders which caused the
war.  Belgium was invaded against the counsel of the Foreign Office.
But when the Chancellor was confronted with the actual invasion and the
violation of the treaty, he was compelled by force of circumstance, by
his position and responsibility to the Kaiser to make his famous speech
in the Reichstag in which he declared: "Emergency knows no law."

But when the allied fleet swept German ships from the high seas and
isolated a nation which had considered its international commerce one
of its greatest assets, considerable animosity developed between the
Army and Navy.  The Army accused the Navy of stagnation.  Von Tirpitz,
who had based his whole naval policy upon a great navy, especially upon
battleship and cruiser units, was confronted by his military friends
with the charge that he was not prepared.  As early as 1908 von Tirpitz
had opposed the construction of submarines.  Speaking in the Reichstag
when naval appropriations were debated, he said Germany should rely
upon a battleship fleet and not upon submarines.  But when he saw his
great inactive Navy in German waters, he switched to the submarine idea
of a blockade of England.  In February, 1915, he announced his
submarine blockade of England with the consent of the Kaiser, but
without the approval of the Foreign Office.

By this time the cry, "Gott strafe England," had become the most
popular battle shout in Germany.  The von Tirpitz blockade announcement
made this battlecry real.  It made him the national hero.  The German
press, which at that time was under three different censors, turned its
entire support over night to the von Tirpitz plan.  The Navy
Department, which even then was not only anti-British but
anti-American, wanted to sink every ship on the high seas.  When the
United States lodged its protests on February 12th the German Navy
wanted to ignore it.  The Foreign Office was inclined to listen to
President Wilson's arguments.  Even the people, while they were
enthusiastic for a submarine war, did not want to estrange America if
they could prevent it.  The von Tirpitz press bureau, which knew that
public opposition to its plan could be overcome by raising the cry that
America was not neutral in aiding the Allies with supplies, launched an
anti-American campaign.  It came to a climax one night when Ambassador
Gerard was attending a theatre party.  As he entered the box he was
recognised by a group of Germans who shouted insulting remarks because
he spoke English.  Then some one else remarked that America was not
neutral by shipping arms and ammunition.

The Foreign Office apologised the next day but the Navy did not.  And,
instead of listening to the advice of Secretary of State von Jagow, the
Navy sent columns of inspired articles to the newspapers attacking
President Wilson and telling the German people that the United States
had joined the Entente in spirit if not in action.




CHAPTER III

THE GULF BETWEEN KIEL AND BERLIN

At the beginning of the war, even the Socialist Party in the Reichstag
voted the Government credits.  The press and the people unanimously
supported the Government because there was a very terrorising fear that
Russia was about to invade Germany and that England and France were
leagued together to crush the Fatherland.  Until the question of the
submarine warfare came up, the division of opinion which had already
developed between the Army and Navy clique and the Foreign Office was
not general among the people.  Although the army had not taken Paris, a
great part of Belgium and eight provinces of Northern France were
occupied and the Russians had been driven from East Prussia.  The
German people believed they were successful.  The army was satisfied
with what it had done and had great plans for the future.  Food and
economic conditions had changed very little as compared to the changes
which were to take place before 1917.  Supplies were flowing into
Germany from all neutral European countries.  Even England and Russia
were selling goods to Germany indirectly through neutral countries.
Considerable English merchandise, as well as American products, came in
by way of Holland because English business men were making money by the
transaction and because the English Government had not yet discovered
leaks in the blockade.  Two-thirds of the butter supply in Berlin was
coming from Russia.  Denmark was sending copper.  Norway was sending
fish and valuable oils.  Sweden was sending horses and cattle.  Italy
was sending fruit.  Spanish sardines and olives were reaching German
merchants.  There was no reason to be dissatisfied with the way the war
was going.  And, besides, the German people hated their enemies so that
the leaders could count upon continued support for almost an indefinite
period.  The cry of "Hun and Barbarian" was answered with the battle
cry "Gott strafe England."

The latter part of April on my first trip to the front I dined at Great
Headquarters (Grosse Haupt Quartier) in Charleville, France, with Major
Nicolai, Chief of the Intelligence Department of the General Staff.
The next day, in company with other correspondents, we were guests of
General von Moehl and his staff at Peronne.  From Peronne we went to
the Somme front to St. Quentin, to Namur and Brussels.  The soldiers
were enthusiastic and happy.  There was plenty of food and considerable
optimism.  But the confidence in victory was never so great as it was
immediately after the sinking of the _Lusitania_.  That marked the
crisis in the future trend of the war.

Up to this time the people had heard very little about the fight
between the Navy and the Foreign Office.  But gradually rumours spread.
While there was previously no outlet for public opinion, the
_Lusitania_ issue was debated more extensively and with more vigour
than the White Books which were published to explain the causes of the
war.

With the universal feeling of self confidence, it was but natural that
the people should side with the Navy in demanding an unrestricted
submarine warfare.  When Admiral von Bachmann gave the order to First
Naval Lieutenant Otto Steinbrink to sink the Lusitania, he knew the
Navy was ready to defy the United States or any other country which
might object.  He knew, too, that von Tirpitz was very close to the
Kaiser and could count upon the Kaiser's support in whatever he did.
The Navy believed the torpedoing of the Lusitania would so frighten and
terrorise the world that neutral shipping would become timid and enemy
peoples would be impressed by Germany's might on the seas.  Ambassador
von Bernstorff had been ordered by the Foreign Office to put notices in
the American papers warning Americans off these ships.  The Chancellor
and Secretary von Jagow knew there was no way to stop the Admiralty,
and they wanted to avoid, if possible, the loss of American lives.

The storm of indignation which encircled the globe when reports were
printed that over a thousand people lost their lives on the Lusitania,
found a sympathetic echo in the Berlin Foreign Office.  "Another navy
blunder," the officials said--confidentially.  Foreign Office officials
tried to conceal their distress because the officials knew the only
thing they could do now was to make preparation for an apology and try
to excuse in the best possible way what the navy had done.  On the 17th
of May like a thunderbolt from a clear sky came President Wilson's
first Lusitania note.


"Recalling the humane and enlightened attitude hitherto assumed by the
Imperial German Government in matters of international life,
particularly with regard to the freedom of the seas; having learned to
recognise German views and German influence in the field of
international obligations as always engaged upon the side of justice
and humanity;" the note read, "and having understood the instructions
of the Imperial German Government to its naval commanders to be upon
the same plane of human action as those prescribed by the naval codes
of other nations, the government of the United States is loath to
believe--it cannot now bring itself to believe--that these acts so
absolutely contrary to the rules and practices and spirit of modern
warfare could have the countenance or sanction of that great
government. . . .  Manifestly submarines cannot be used against
merchantmen as the last few weeks have shown without an inevitable
violation of many sacred principles of justice and humanity.  American
citizens act within their indisputable rights in taking their ships and
in travelling wherever their legitimate business calls them upon the
high seas, and exercise those rights in what should be a well justified
confidence that their lives will not be endangered by acts done in
clear violation of universally acknowledged international obligations
and certainly in the confidence that their own government will sustain
them in the exercise of their rights."


And then the note which Mr. Gerard handed von Jagow concluded with
these words:


"It (The United States) confidently expects therefore that the Imperial
German Government will disavow the acts of which the United States
complains, that they will make reparation as far as reparation is
possible for injuries which are without measure, and that they will
take immediate steps to prevent the recurrence of anything so obviously
subversive of the principles of warfare, for which the Imperial German
Government in the past so wisely and so firmly contended.  The
Government and people of the United States look to the Imperial German
Government for just, prompt and enlightened action in this vital
matter. . . .  Expressions of regret and offers of reparation in the
case of neutral ships sunk by mistake, while they may satisfy
international obligations if no loss of life results, cannot justify or
excuse a practice, the natural necessary effect of which is to subject
neutral nations or neutral persons to new and immeasurable risks.  The
Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of the United
States to omit any word, or any act, necessary to the performance of
its sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and its
citizens, and of safeguarding their free exercise and enjoyment."


Never in history had a neutral nation indicted another as the United
States did Germany in its first _Lusitania_ note without immediately
going to war.  Because the Foreign Office feared the reaction it might
have upon the people, the newspapers were not permitted to publish the
text until the press bureaus of the Navy and the Foreign Office had
mobilised the editorial writers and planned a publicity campaign to
follow the note's publication.  But the Navy and Foreign Office could
not agree on what should be done.  The Navy wanted to ignore Wilson.
Naval officers laughed at President Wilson's impertinence and, when the
Foreign Office sent to the Admiralty for all data in possession of the
Navy Department regarding the sinking of the _Lusitania_ the Navy
refused to acknowledge the request.

During this time I was in constant touch with the Foreign Office and
the American Embassy.  Frequently I went to the Navy Department but was
always told they had nothing to say.  When it appeared, however, that
there might he a break in diplomatic relations over the Lusitania the
Kaiser called the Chancellor to Great Headquarters for a conference.
Meanwhile Germany delayed her reply to the American note because the
Navy and Foreign Office were still at loggerheads.  On the 31st of May
von Jagow permitted me to quote him in an interview saying:


"America can hardly expect us to give up any means at our disposal to
fight our enemy.  It is a principle with us to defend ourselves in
every possible way.  I am sure that Americans will be reasonable enough
to believe that our two countries cannot discuss the _Lusitania_ matter
_until both have the same basis of facts_."


The American people were demanding an answer from Germany and because
the two branches of the Government could not agree on what should be
said von Jagow had to do something to gain time.  Germany, therefore,
submitted in her reply of the 28th of May certain facts about the
_Lusitania_ for the consideration of the American Government saying
that Germany reserved final statements of its position with regard "to
the demands made in connection with the sinking of the _Lusitania_
until a reply was received from the American Government."  After the
note was despatched the chasm between the Navy and Foreign Office was
wider than ever.  Ambassador Gerard, who went to the Foreign Office
daily, to try to convince the officials that they were antagonising the
whole world by their attitude on the _Lusitania_ question, returned to
the Embassy one day after a conference with Zimmermann and began to
prepare a scrap book of cartoons and clippings from American
newspapers.  Two secretaries were put to work pasting the comments,
interviews, editorials and cartoons reflecting American opinion in the
scrap book.  Although the German Foreign Office had a big press
department its efforts were devoted more to furnishing the outside
world with German views than with collecting outside opinions for the
information of the German Government.  Believing that this information
would be of immeasurable benefit to the German diplomats in sounding
the depths of public sentiment in America, Gerard delivered the book to
von Jagow personally.

In the meantime numerous conferences were held at Great Headquarters.
Financiers, business men and diplomats who wanted to keep peace with
America sided with the Foreign Office.  Every anti-American influence
in the Central Powers joined forces with the Navy.  The _Lusitania_
note was printed and the public discussion which resulted was greater
than that which followed the first declarations of war in August, 1914.
The people, who before had accepted everything their Government said,
began to think for themselves.  One heard almost as much criticism as
praise of the _Lusitania_ incident.  For the first time the quarrel,
which had been nourished between the Foreign Office and the Admiralty,
became nation-wide and forces throughout Germany lined up with one side
or the other.  But the Navy Department was the cleverer of the two.
The press bureau sent out inspired stories that the submarines were
causing England a loss of a million dollars a week.  They said that
every week the Admiralty was launching two U-boats.  It was stated that
reliable reports to Admiral von Tirpitz proved the high toll taken by
the submarines in two weeks had struck terror to the hearts of English
ship-owners.  The newspapers printed under great headlines: "Toll of
Our Tireless U-Boats," the names and tonnage of ships lost.  The press
bureau pointed to the rise in food prices in Great Britain and France.
The public was made to feel a personal pride in submarine exploits.
And at the same time the Navy editorial writers brought up the old