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 THE SELB PRESS 
 
 1915 
 

 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1915, 
 
 BY 
 
 WM. ARMIN SBIBERT 
 
 PUBLISHED NOVEMBER, 
 
 1915 
 
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 ^!QV 20 1915 
 
 ^CLA414913 
 
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THE ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ^'^Another Young Officer, in Different 
 
 Uniform'' Frontispiece 
 
 An Old Scrap 53 
 
 A War Office Passport 79 
 
 Allenstein, Hohes Tor 82 
 
 Russian Expert Work 86 
 
 In Ortelsburg 88 
 
 East Prussian Street 94 
 
 A Scientist's Letter . 125 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. Fellow Travellers 9 
 
 11. Fishy-Eyes 16 
 
 III. Warships 21 
 
 IV. ''Where Is Bolivia. Anyhow?''. 25 
 
 V. Cesar's Ghost 33 
 
 VI. Petticoat Diplomacy 41 
 
 VII. Border Knowledge 49 
 
 VIII. A Cleansing Bath 56 
 
 IX. Wartime Women 60 
 
 X. A Lecture 67 
 
 XI. In the War Office 71 
 
 XII. In East Prussia 77 
 
 XIII. Near the Russian Border 84 
 
 XIV. Fiction-Factories 93 
 
 XV. Among Wounded 102 
 
 XVI. Commuting Swiss Soldiers .... 110 
 
 XVII. A Familiar Odor 117 
 
 XVIII. Noble Gratitude 121 
 
 7 
 
I 
 
 FELLOW TRAVELLERS 
 
 The HoUandish steamer Botherdam had the 
 bkie peter in her foremast on a bright morning 
 of September, 1914, ready to leave her Hoboken 
 pier at noon with thirty first class passengers, 
 among them six women but no children. 
 
 There were no relatives and friends of the 
 travellers to bid them good-bye, for no one was 
 allowed aboard without a passport. The band 
 did not play. There was no band. No crowd, no 
 laughter, no flowers, no small flags to wave and 
 no loud word spoken. Instead whispers, sober 
 faces, furtive glances, empty corridors and many 
 empty staterooms. The whole show looked like 
 the preparation for a funeral, our own funeral, 
 but a disorderly one for my steamer trunk had 
 disappeared. 
 
 During the two hours after the announced time 
 of departure while the captain waited for the 
 appearance of a certain diplomat (who was to be 
 a passenger), an extensive search on the dock and 
 in the rooms of the ship made by the cabin stew- 
 ard and his chief, at last resulted in finding the 
 trunk in a corner of the second class dining room 
 with its face to the wall. 
 9 
 
Great Rabin ! Most famous of all chief stew- 
 ards of the North German Lloyd (now on a vaca- 
 tion), if this had occurred on one of your boats 
 your hair would have risen and possibly turned 
 grey, even so, like that of the most famous quar- 
 antine expert, Robert Koch, if he had seen the 
 subordinates of the Health Officer of the port of 
 New York attempt to disinfect the baggage of 
 the passengers on the forward deck of the steamer 
 Elbe, on October the second, 1892, by scrubbing 
 the outer surfaces of the trunks with brushes 
 dipped in carbolized soap water to prevent the 
 Asiatic cholera, then prevalent in Hamburg, from 
 taking root in New York. But no, on second 
 thought, there would have been no ascending of 
 hair for both of these famous men were bald- 
 headed. 
 
 The expected diplomat did not appear and the 
 Bother dam started without him. A check re- 
 turned from his bank with the remark "insuffi- 
 cient funds," had detained him. Nothing in that, 
 for no doubt other members of his profession will 
 have a similar experience before and after this 
 war is over. 
 
 Of course, I was shocked at the behavior of my 
 trunk. After hanging up my clothes and dis- 
 tributing the photographs of my family about the 
 room to make it look homelike, I examined it. 
 The patches were all there and the lock worked. 
 
 "What caused you to behave like this T' I ad- 
 10 
 
dressed the trunk. "You came into my service 
 twenty-two years ago, you have crossed the At- 
 lantic thirty odd times since, you have been in 
 Mexico when Diaz was still in command there, 
 you have been in many tight places and you have 
 been patched so often that but little of your orig- 
 inal hide is left. You are an aristocrat among 
 trunks and, possibly, you were spoiled last sum- 
 mer when strapped to an automobile taking my 
 wife over the Dolomites in the Austrian Tyrol to 
 show her the mountain passes along the Italian 
 border her husband had crossed afoot and awheel 
 in the company of a young Prussian army officer, 
 two years before. Did you hide because this boat 
 is not a German ocean grey-hound, or did you 
 intend to remind me that you and I were too old 
 for the job ahead of us? Not so! Easy times 
 have gone. This is wartime, of which you know 
 nothing.^^ 
 
 At lunch, outside of Sandy Hook, I was seated 
 in the midst of five of the half dozen women in 
 our cabin. Two of these, the Misses Krueger, 
 were sisters-in-law of a well-known New York 
 surgeon returning to their home in Berlin; the 
 third, Mrs. Barens, an American of Anglo-Saxon 
 origin, who had been caught in the war while 
 visiting her parents in New Jersey, was returning 
 to her German husband and children ; to my left, 
 the only young girl in the company. Miss Whiet- 
 ing, with brown eyes and graceful poise and 
 11 
 
figure^ crossing to meet her sick mother in Rot- 
 terdam, and to my right the primest, best dressed 
 and best humored white-haired woman I had ever 
 met at sea or on land, Mrs. Luebben. She had 
 made a tour of our httle globe, had heard of the 
 war while in Alaska and was hurrying to her 
 home in Hannover, Germany, because her two 
 sons were officers in the army. When during the 
 small talk of a first mutual meal I had admitted 
 that my sixtieth birthday had been passed^ she 
 lifted her finger and announced : "I can beat 
 you ; Tm sixty-five !" 
 
 In the smoking room a fat but distinguished 
 looking Dr. Auer with American clothes and 
 diploma going over to do Red Cross work armed 
 with an Austrian passport, and a bespectacled 
 Kalamazoo lawyer, Mr. Vandal, with a shrill 
 voice and an American passport, joined me while 
 sipping cofifee. They were surprised to learn that 
 I had no Red Cross connections, more so when I 
 dropped into German to relieve them and my ears 
 of their painful accents, but appeared completely 
 puzzled when, after using the Saxon, the Suavian 
 and the Austro-Hungarian dialects during the 
 conversation, I concluded the interview with a 
 story given in the Irish brogue. They had intro- 
 duced me to the third medical passenger, a Dr. 
 Lange of Weimar, Germany, who had come from 
 Paraguay, South America, to answer the call of 
 his country. Tall, blond, bright and thirty, full 
 12 
 
of fun and well-mannered, he, like Mr. Vandal 
 and Dr. Auer never conversed with me again 
 until the Botherdam dropped anchor at the Hook 
 of Holland. 
 
 There was Mr. Berkely Freeman a fruit grower 
 from California; two strapping Anglo-Saxon 
 Canadians in the Dutch East India service going 
 back to their work in Batavia after a six months' 
 vacation; an officer of the American army. Cap- 
 tain McManemy, bound for Vienna to study Aus- 
 trian artillery in action, and the sunny South had 
 contributed to our passenger list in the person of 
 Mr. Culbertson from South Carolina, a cotton 
 merchant who had spent the last fifteen years in 
 Bremen. He had taken his wife and young boys 
 to his Southern home at the outbreak of the war 
 and was returning with a suitcase, to wind up his 
 European business for the time being. We learned 
 from him (a young man of thirty) that Bremen 
 imported more American cotton than any other 
 port on earth. He was one of the very few 
 Anglo-Saxons I had met who could speak cor- 
 rect German, but he had been at school in 
 Bremen. 
 
 By common consent the fellow pa&senger best 
 informed on international topics of trade, travel 
 and present conditions in most countries was Mr. 
 Praetor, an American fur trader having a branch 
 business in Leipzig, Germany, a large man in 
 English clothes, with a sharp, clean-shaven face. 
 13 
 
His only son, aged nineteen, had been "detained" 
 in Russia at the outbreak of the war. 
 
 "Yes, I shall have to go for the boy by way of 
 Sweden," he remarked coolly. "We have many 
 friends in Russia. They and money will release 
 him. The rubel is omnipotent there, like the dol- 
 lar in America." 
 
 Aside of a few commercial travellers rep- 
 resenting large American concerns and half a 
 dozen Hollanders (among them an ex-admiral of 
 the Dutch navy), one more passenger appeared 
 noteworthy, Mr. Bruck, a Bolivian with tanned 
 skin and dark eyes, in South American clothes. 
 During the many hours spent in the smoking 
 room the Bolivian invariably sat among the Ger- 
 man-Austrian passengers staring blankly into 
 space, unless addressed in Spanish. He drank no 
 liquor, wine or beer, and he always appeared 
 bareheaded. And he did not smoke, a fact which 
 made me think. 
 
 The conversation at our .table, with the first 
 officer of the ship in our midst, was conducted in 
 German, English and French. The big, good- 
 natured seaman answered in either tongue, but 
 Miss Whieting insisted on answering in English 
 although her pronunciation reminded me of the 
 idiom of that part of Brooklyn formerly called 
 Williamsburgh. 
 
 The ship's surgeon, Dr. Shields, an American 
 who had spent some years at sea in the service 
 14 
 
of the Holland-America Line, was a handsome, 
 well-mannered man of thirty-five, who treated his 
 elder colleague in the best manner possible. Like 
 most of our fraternity he had a hobby, a farm 
 on Long Island, where his childless wife raised 
 fancy animals from donkeys down to dogs and 
 pigeons, instead of children. Daily he presented 
 his patients to his colleague, thereby whiling 
 away many an hour of this long voyage. To my 
 astonishment I found that when he conversed 
 with his patients in Hollandish, I understood this 
 better than the Bavarian and Swiss dialects. 
 
 The gait of Captain McManemy on deck be- 
 trayed his West Point training readily, but he 
 spoke English only. How he had been able to 
 gain information during the French army 
 manoeuvres which he had attended the year before 
 and could profit on the battlefields of Austria 
 without conversation seemed so mysterious, that 
 I jocularly offered to give him lessons, which he 
 accepted with alacrity. He, the typical modern 
 warrior trained to destroy human enemies in sci- 
 entific manner, and I, trained to destroy the para- 
 sites in human beings, understood one another 
 well, although he never requested me to answer a 
 single medical question, nor I a military one of 
 him. His parents were born in Ireland and he 
 proved to have the linguistic talent of his race to 
 
 a marked degree. 
 
 15 
 
II 
 
 FISHY-EYES 
 
 The steward in charge of my room had sparse 
 yellow hair, a short, stocky figure and light-blue, 
 fishy eyes. It took him three days to go through 
 my baggage and clothes in search for contraband 
 and compromising papers, because he could only 
 do this safely while I was bathing at 6 :30 a. m. 
 I chuckled in the water when thinking how hard 
 the scoundrel was working to earn pin money, 
 and all in vain. On the fourth day out my be- 
 longings had not been touched, but every nook 
 and corner of the room including the life-preserv- 
 ers and mattress, had been thoroughly overhauled. 
 Even some glass bottles containing drugs, stand- 
 ing in the rack, had been opened. 
 
 That afternoon I awoke with a start from my 
 accustomed mid-day nap, and found Fishy-Eyes 
 standing aside of my bed. He had attempted to 
 inspect the papers I carried on my person, for 
 those left in my trunk he was well acquainted 
 with by this time. 
 
 "Halloh, what's the row?'' I inquired with an 
 artificial yawn. 
 
 '^There is a steamer heading for us and I 
 thought you might be interested because it may 
 16 
 
be an English warship,'' the man answered with 
 a cold stare and without embarrassment. 
 
 "You are very attentive and evidently a jewel 
 among stewards/' I replied, "but this time you 
 have put yourself to unnecessary trouble because 
 warships do not interest me, but, — coming to 
 think of it — when talking to your comrades in the 
 corridor you had better lower your voice because 
 I understand Hollandish and, besides, be careful 
 not to touch those bottles in the rack because you 
 might acquire Asiatic cholera, spotted typhus or 
 the bubonic plague and die, before this boat 
 reaches Holland/' 
 
 Fishy-Eyes turned pale and large beads of per- 
 spiration appeared on his forehead, but he kept his 
 nerve. 
 
 "All the same, you are a German/' he spouted 
 out hoarsely, "and the British will take you off. 
 You have fooled all on this ship, but you can't 
 fool me !" 
 
 "I never intended to ^fool' anyone, least of all 
 a steward/' I laughed. "The pure German blood 
 in my veins I am rather proud of. But do not 
 worry about my safety. And now you may 
 
 so 
 
 V' 
 
 On the second day out Mrs. Luebben told me 
 that our table neighbor, Miss Whieting from 
 Brooklyn, was drinking champagne in the smok- 
 ing room alone among the younger men. I was 
 shocked. Evidently this young girl, crossing for 
 17 
 
the first time^ knew nothing of international man- 
 ners. She was exposing herself. Mrs. Luebben 
 declined to interfere with a shrug of her shoulder 
 and a twinkle in her eye. 
 
 '^It is your duty to protect this 'green' American 
 girl and to teach her European manners. If you 
 decline, I will talk to her myself V I asserted an- 
 grily. And I did when the culprit came out of 
 the smoking room with red cheeks, surrounded 
 by laughing young men. She came to the railing 
 at my request, where the difference between 
 American and European aspects regarding the 
 conduct of a young girl travelling alone were 
 explained in few words, emphasized by mention- 
 ing my wife and married daughters and, in con- 
 clusion, by saying: 
 
 "If your mother were here, she would agree 
 with me.'^ 
 
 The girl listened to the short lecture with 
 drooping eyelids. 
 
 "You are a good man,^' she answered slowly 
 with a shake in -her voice, "and you certainly 
 mean well but, if you knew all, you would not 
 have addressed me so harshly.^^ 
 
 "Fm not curious,^^ I retorted gruffly, "and your 
 private affairs do not concern me, but as a citi- 
 zen of the United States I hate to see an Ameri- 
 can girl place herself in a false position.^^ 
 
 "But Doctor, I only drank one glass of cham- 
 pagne !" the girl argued with genuine feminine 
 18 
 
logic and a bright smile. I stared at her, then 
 touched my cap and walked away. 
 
 At dinner that evening, the chair to my left 
 remained vacant. Instead, Miss Whieting came 
 into the dining room "all dressed up" like a 
 woman of the world when the fish was being 
 served, handed in by Captain McManemy, U.S.A. 
 Next morning at breakfast, Mrs. Luebben 
 broached the subject. 
 
 "Don't you bother me with the conduct of this 
 girl/' I exclaimed, chagrined by the conviction of 
 having made a false diagnosis. "She claims to 
 study art. No doubt she does, but her methods 
 are too modern for me, for I do not recognize a 
 woman unless she is a daughter, a sister, a wife 
 or a mother.'' 
 
 After this the girl never took her dinner with 
 us, but was taken to the other table by some male 
 passenger every evening. During lunch she never 
 addressed me and I treated her like thin air, but 
 during the evening hours in the smoking room 
 which she invariably spent among the German- 
 Austrian contingent I detected her frowning eyes 
 resting on me^ in the American corner, very often. 
 Usually she breakfasted in the company of young 
 Dr. Lange and otherwise spent so much of her 
 time with him that Mrs. Luebben predicted smil- 
 ingly on the sixth day out: "There will be an 
 engagement announced before we leave this ship !" 
 Kind Mrs. Luebben ! Her two sons were in the 
 19 
 
war and she knew herself to be in personal dan- 
 ger, and yet she enjoyed the prospect of seeing a 
 young girl becoming a bride on the ocean during 
 wartime. A fine illustration of the maternal in- 
 stinct ! 
 
 Mr. Berkely Freeman from California joined 
 me in a deck-walk that evening. The weather 
 was clear and the stars were out. 
 
 "It is a fine sensation to walk the deck of a 
 neutral ship on the free ocean during wartime/' 
 he remarked. "I feel elated to-night for being a 
 free citizen of the United States^ at peace with 
 the whole world V" 
 
 My companion was a typical American of 
 Anglo-Saxon origin, sixty-one years of age. Dur- 
 ing the last twenty years he had done business 
 with Germany, had been there often and had in- 
 variably been treated decently. He was an opti- 
 mist regarding the future of the United States 
 in general and of California in particular, but he 
 had only a "^newspaper" knowledge of European 
 conditions, the present international situation and 
 of history, and thereby represented the bulk of 
 the American people very well. At the railing I 
 pointed to the water. 
 
 "You termed this the free ocean?" I inquired. 
 
 "Sure \" he answered. 
 
 "Well, mark my word. Before you put your feet 
 on land again you will realize that this sheet of 
 water, called the Atlantic, is but a British pond !" 
 20 
 
Ill 
 
 WARSHIPS 
 
 After lunch on the seventh day out, a steward 
 burst into the smoking room shouting: "War- 
 ships !" 
 
 Sure enough^ the smoke of three steamers 
 dotted the Eastern horizon, equally far apart. 
 
 "It seems strange," I addressed the army offi- 
 cer after handing back his binoculars, "that the 
 British send their cruisers six hundred miles West 
 of the Scillies to intercept neutral merchant ships. 
 We ought to feel proud for being received so far 
 out by a whole squadron I" 
 
 A half hour later on our engines stopped and 
 H. M. S. Charybdis came alongside, a half mile 
 away. She was an old tub of about 5000 tons,* 
 with a long gun on her forward, a like one on 
 her rear deck and smaller artillery on her sides. 
 Over her bow she wore a shield covering the hole 
 formerly used for torpedo expulsion, conspicuous 
 like a patch on a trouser-seat. There was a swell 
 on the sea and the small cruiser's ends rose and 
 fell, while our steamer layed steady. The war- 
 
 *Wheii beached on one of the Bermuda islands a 
 few months later on as a total loss, her displacement 
 was given as 4450 tons. 
 
 21 
 
ship lowered a boat, and it was a fine sight to see 
 how the cutter dropped on the water, the wet 
 blades of the oars glittering in the sunlight at 
 regular intervals. It reminded one of RussePs 
 maritime novels, read in times gone by. 
 
 The cutter came alongside. The officer coming 
 over the railing first was a fine human specimen, 
 good nature spread all over his face when he 
 shook hands with our chief mate. He was fol- 
 lowed by a boy of possibly fifteen years, who 
 stalked over the deck with sober face and threw 
 out his abnormally big feet in a manner as though 
 he attempted to do the German parade march 
 sideways. A handsome young sailor with signal 
 flags stuck in his bosom shirt closed the proces- 
 sion, disappearing on the stairs leading to the 
 bridge. 
 
 During the two hours he signalled to the 
 Charyhdis, an inspection of the cutter was possi- 
 ble. The fourteen men in canvass uniform who 
 had handled the oars appeared to be stocky and 
 well-fed, but none of them under forty years. 
 Three had full beards, three others mustaches and 
 the rest were clean-shaven. One wore black, a sec- 
 ond tan shoes, and a third canvass slippers, while 
 the rest were barefooted. All had life-preservers 
 on their shoulders, the chest and the waist, cork 
 enough on each to float a dead whale, and this in 
 a swell of the sea which any American fisherman 
 in a flat-bottomed boat would have laughed at. 
 22 
 
"You may smoke !^^ the boarding officer had 
 called down to his men. Two stuffed their pipes, 
 but judging from the way the rest smoked cigar- 
 ettes, the British admiralty will have a larger 
 bill for this luxury than for shot and shell when 
 this war is over. 
 
 No weapons were visible on the men who 
 boarded the ^otherdain and among those in the 
 cutter, but when the one at the tiller at last bent 
 his back sufficiently forward, long strings of cart- 
 ridges in the bottom of his craft came into view. 
 
 Our uninvited guests came down from the 
 bridge in the same order they went up, '^^Liliput" 
 (as he had been dubbed since) spreading and 
 clapping down his big shoes, evidently borrowed 
 for the occasion, on deck in an even more im- 
 pressive manner than before. We learned that 
 the boy had taken down the "wigg-wagg'^ notes. 
 After lying quietly for another half hour, our 
 engines worked again and the Bother dam headed 
 for Queenstown by order of the British admiralty, 
 with her wireless taken down. 
 
 "This gives me a first chance to see the land 
 of my ancestors !" the American artillery officer 
 exclaimed grimly, when we heard the news, 
 
 "Ah, Captain, this explains all !" I put in. 
 "The British Sealords, who evidently knew this, 
 thought to pay you, the military representative 
 of the United States, a compliment by ordering 
 our steamer to Ireland.'^ 
 23 
 
Mr. Berkely Freeman, from California, took 
 my arm for a stroll along the deck. The dear old 
 fellow appeared perturbed. 
 
 "Why does the captain of this neutral ship ac- 
 cept orders from the British ?" he whispered when 
 we were alone. 
 
 "Because his ship is on British property V I 
 answered. "If he had been ordered to steam to 
 Gibraltar or even back to Hoboken, he would have 
 obeyed, for as yet ^Britannia rules the wave' out- 
 side of the three-mile limit from Sandy Hook or 
 any other coast on this little earth, Helgoland 
 excepted/' I answered. 
 
 "Ah ! I understand now why you called the 
 Atlantic ocean a 'British pond' the other even- 
 ing!" the Californian exclaimed excitedly. "By 
 God, I thought then that you were cracking one 
 of your sarcastic jokes on me. But do you really 
 believe that Germany has a chance to win in this 
 war ?" 
 
 "I gave up believing many years ago, and my 
 knowledge is my private property!" I answered. 
 "And now I'm going to take a nap." 
 
 24 
 
IV 
 "WHERE IS BOLIVIA, ANYHOW?" 
 
 Forty hours steaming brought us into Queens- 
 town harbor where two anchors were dropped 
 and two searchlights illumined our decks from 
 shore during the following three nights. Only 
 those accustomed to cold water could take a 
 bath as the fires were out^ and no warm water 
 ran into the tubs. Likewise no tobacco or alco- 
 hol, in any shape or form^ could be bought on 
 board while there. 
 
 The weather was cold and the only way to keep 
 warm was to tramp the deck vigorously or to stay 
 in bed. The surrounding landscape was beautiful, 
 but even the finest scenery may become monoto- 
 nous if one is compelled to view it during four 
 consecutive days. 
 
 A small tug deposited a half dozen men in un- 
 clean clothes, armed with thieves^ lanterns, on our 
 deck to search the hold for contraband goods, and 
 later on the American consul and a British army 
 officer in khaki, with a monocle in one eye-socket 
 and a baby cane in his hand, boarded the Bother- 
 dam from a fine gasolene launch. 
 25 
 
Meanwhile our stewards went fishing from the 
 railing all day long. Whenever a small porgy 
 was landed, a great shout went up in the air. 
 They were the descendants of men who had 
 fought the English successfully under De Ruyter. 
 
 During the next forenoon a bald-headed lawyer 
 from somewhere in Pennsylvania rushed up to me 
 on deck. 
 
 "Do you know that every male and female pas- 
 senger with a German name is going to be taken 
 from this ship to a British detention camp?" he 
 inquired excitedly with blanched features. 
 
 "Who told you this ?" I inquired. 
 
 "One of the men on the tug," he whispered. 
 
 "Rubbish !" I answered scornfully, for cowards 
 try my temper. "Your news does not concern 
 me." 
 
 "But your name is German/^ the man protested. 
 
 "Quite so," I retorted, "and an ancient one at 
 that. You can find it on the oldest slab of West- 
 minster Abbey in London. Good morning!" 
 
 The appetites of the ladies appeared impaired 
 at luncheon on that day, some barely touching 
 food. One of the Misses Krueger had tears in 
 her eyes, Mrs. Barens was red in her face, appar- 
 ently next to hysteria, and even Mrs. Luebben 
 treated me with icy reserve. 
 
 The Calif ornian broached the subject of the 
 day, giving his opinion on English chivalry, ulti- 
 mately winding up with the question : 
 26 
 
"What have you to say, Doctor ?'' 
 
 "Fm not a member of the British cabinet, thank 
 goodness," I repHed, "and therefore cannot pre- 
 dict our immediate future. But, I take it, that 
 they are not anxious to increase the number of 
 women on their islands. They now are looking 
 for men to do their fighting. They evidently 
 joined this war to rid themselves of the suffra- 
 gettes pestering them." 
 
 "Oh, drop your jokes, Doctor !" Mrs. Barens 
 exclaimed. "It does not concern you whether we 
 German women are to be taken off or not. You 
 are a safe outsider in this. Whatever you may be, 
 you certainly are no German !" 
 
 The lady made a fine appearance in her wrath. 
 With her flashing blue eyes, her regular features 
 and large perfect frame, she certainly looked the 
 typical descendant of the ancient Saxons who 
 conquered Britain. She was now going back, 
 after centuries, to the old German home. 
 
 "When answering Mr. Freeman's question I 
 was in earnest," I protested drily. "If the cackle 
 of geese on the capitol could save Rome, then the 
 activity of suffragettes could assist in bringing 
 England into this war. Small causes with great 
 effects are not so uncommon ! But your assump- 
 tion as to my nationality is correct, for in Ger- 
 many I am classed and treated as an outlander." 
 
 On the third day of our captivity the male 
 cabin passengers were ordered to show their pass- 
 27 
 
ports to Captain Dickie of the British army sit- 
 ting on the sofa in the smoking room with his 
 cap on, aside of the bare-headed master of the 
 ship. I came in late and missed hearing an old 
 German, dubbed "Uncle Carl/' read off a written 
 protest addressed to the British government 
 against our detention. The Bolivian stood before 
 me in the line. Through Mr. Vandal, who volun- 
 teered to interpret the South American's Spanish, 
 we learned that his papers had been stolen in 
 Buenos Ayres, that his father, a German, had died 
 long ago, that his mother was a native Bolivian 
 and that he was bound for Germany to collect an 
 inheritance. 
 
 "Have you served in the German army?" he 
 was asked. 
 
 "No !'' the man answered with emphasis. 
 
 "Rave you ever been in Germany ?" the British 
 officer continued. 
 
 "This is the first time I ever left Bolivia V' Mr. 
 Bruck asserted. 
 
 Captain Dickie looked bored. Turning to the 
 commander of the Botherdam, he inquired : 
 
 "Bolivia ! Captain, where is Bolivia, anyhow ?" 
 
 The Dutch seaman explained politely that Bo- 
 livia was a part of the South American comment. 
 1 fairly held my breath. Mr. Vandal, Dr. Auer 
 and Mr. Praetor, standing near, looked sober, 
 but a few men in the background turned to hide 
 their mirth. 
 
 28 
 
After inspecting my passport (giving age, 
 height and appearance) the officer drawled: 
 
 "I hope you can speak some EngHsh/' 
 
 "Weh, I shotdd think so !" I responded 
 promptly. 
 
 "Oh, I see you're a native," Captain Dickie an- 
 swered visibly relieved. 
 
 Pointing at the passenger list and imitating the 
 English drawl slowly, I requested : "In checking 
 off my name, would you mind adding 'M.D.'? 
 Fm a stickler on titles, don't you know.'' 
 
 The British officer appeared highly amused. 
 
 "Just so/' he laughed. "You shall certainly 
 have your title !" 
 
 The American consul was standing near a cor- 
 ner table of the smoking room ready to advise 
 and aid his compatriots, in conversation with 
 Captain Mac, as his fellow passengers called him 
 for short. No other American citizens were near. 
 Knowing that the artillerist needed no help, it 
 occurred to me to be a patriotic duty to give our 
 consul some work and handing him a single 
 paged, typewritten document impressed by a seal, 
 I requested : 
 
 "Consul, would you mind looking at this?" 
 
 There were but few sentences. The consul 
 read the signature aloud and returning the paper 
 he said hastily : 
 
 "Oh, yes ! I remember the name. Just so. Oh, 
 
 29 
 
I was astonished. The consul was a young 
 man of thirty-five. 
 
 "You are in a hurry, Doctor ?" he continued. 
 
 "Of course !" I retorted. 
 
 "This steamer will be released in a day or two, 
 I believe/^ he remarked, "but I can manage that 
 you and Captain McManemy can proceed, by way 
 of London, to-day." 
 
 "Are the boats from Hull to the Hook of Hol- 
 land running now?'^ I inquired. 
 
 "I do not know. In fact we know nothing here 
 about transportation," the consul answered. 
 
 "Then I will consult Captain McManemy," I 
 replied. 
 
 "This is worth while considering," the latter 
 remarked after musing some time. "I have never 
 been in England, and it would be interesting to 
 spend a few days in London in your company. 
 You know the town, of course?" 
 
 "Yes," I answered, "but I doubt if a stay there 
 now would be as pleasant as my former visits 
 were. At best, we would be treated with suspi- 
 cion for which the Londoners could not be 
 blamed, for you are bound for Vienna and I for 
 Berlin. Besides, we would have to cross the 
 North Sea on a small English side-wheeler to 
 reach Holland." 
 
 "But, Doctor, the British navy control the 
 water. No German warship would come in 
 sight!" Captain Mac laughed. 
 30 
 
"Right you are^ Britannia rules the waves of 
 the ocean^ but she is not in command lower down 
 in the water. Fm not a coward but also no idiot 
 not to prefer a neutral ship, when I have the 
 choice. Besides, I would hate to be blown up by 
 a German submarine because my parents were 
 born in Germany, like yours in Ireland," I argued. 
 
 The warrior gave me a cold stare. 
 
 "ril stay with you on the Botherdam'' he re- 
 plied after a while, "but aside of languages and 
 medicine you apparently have studied naval archi- 
 tecture also.^^ 
 
 "God forbid \" I replied astonished. "My good- 
 natured brother always had to assist me in rnathe- 
 matics." 
 
 After luncheon the British officer took his 
 American comrade ashore for an outing, and be- 
 fore dinner the rumor spread through the ship 
 that none of the cabin passengers would be taken 
 off and that the Botherdam might be released 
 on the following day, as no contraband had been 
 found in her hold. During the dinner the bald- 
 headed Pennsylvanian, now in high feather, tin- 
 gled his glass and invited all to the smoking room 
 to sample the contents of a keg containing "the 
 best vintage of Ireland," alleged to have been sent 
 aboard by the American consul. 
 
 At 9 p. M. the passengers had assembled and 
 were chatting and laughing like happy children. 
 Captain Mac in their midst, happiest of all, while 
 31 
 
the six Hollanders kept aloof, playing domino. 
 But when I found that the fluid in the keg re- 
 sembled a solution of quinine in ink much more 
 than any wine or beer I had ever tasted, I pro- 
 posed Captain Mac as chairman of the meeting 
 to get square with him for he, of course, and not 
 the consul had sent this stuff aboard. 
 
 The artillerist accepted the chair with dignity, 
 and began : "Ladies and gentlemen !" and raising 
 his hands as though bestowing a blessing, without 
 another word sat down again, thus finishing the 
 best presidential address I had ever listened to in 
 record time. 
 
 The speeches made later on were short and 
 noncommittal, subjects like "The Ladies," "Our 
 Chairman" and "Those we left behind," being 
 preferred, until some one drank a toast to the 
 young Queen of Holland, "for if it were not for 
 the Hollanders we would not be here to-night," 
 which drew the domino-playing Dutchmen, in- 
 cluding the ship's commander and the ex-admiral, 
 into our midst, where some of them remained un- 
 til two o'clock in the morning. 
 
V 
 
 CESAR'S GHOST 
 
 The Botherdam steamed out to sea before 
 sun-down the next evening. It was a fine night, 
 the stars shining so clear that they appeared much 
 nearer than usual, as though lowered by invisible 
 strings. And there was a comet low down over 
 the Eastern horizon toward England, looking like 
 an illumined, stubby broom. 
 
 Coming down from the bridge, the commander 
 joined me in my solitary tramp on deck and all 
 went well in our conversation until I mentioned 
 that, to my mind, it had been a sporty act on the 
 part of the British officer in pretending ignorance 
 as to the location of Bolivia. 
 The Dutch seaman stood still. 
 "Pretend?'' the big Hollander almost roared. 
 "That Englishman had never heard of Bolivia 
 before in his life. Take my word ?' 
 
 We were bowling along up Channel over 
 smooth water while the sun shown, when off 
 Plymouth our engines stopped again toward noon 
 and another British cruiser, the Cesar, approached 
 and sent a dozen men armed with rifles over our 
 side. The officer leading them had long legs, a 
 short hunch-backed body, a sharply pointed nose 
 33 
 
and thin lips. His men were under-sized, partly 
 bow-legged and untidy looking individuals. One 
 of them dropped his gun on the deck, picked it 
 up with a sheepish grin and followed the rest to 
 the bridge. 
 
 These hold-ups became tiresome ! While tak- 
 ing a vigorous stroll along the empty side of the 
 deck as an antidote against chagrin, a young 
 British officer came out of the smoking room as 
 I was lighting a cigarette and he at the end of 
 one. I extended my case with a smile and a 
 "Good morning." Smiling back with a "Thanks," 
 he began to smoke. 
 
 "You Americans have good cigarettes. We 
 smoke rotten stuff lately." 
 
 "But these are English," I replied and pre- 
 sented the box. 
 
 "I doubt it !" he laughed. "We have none such 
 on board ship at least. It's a rum go in the Chan- 
 nel here during rain and fog. Fve not been 
 ashore during three weeks. First bright day 
 we've had. Tedious! Quite a treat to board a 
 neutral ship and to see other faces." 
 
 The young man was quite sincere. Although 
 "Naval Reserve" was written all over him, his uni- 
 form fitted well and, anatomically, his figure was 
 almost perfect barring his skull, a trifle too small 
 in comparison to his perfect legs. His good man- 
 ners and frank speech, but even more so his 
 young, regular features and engaging smile had 
 34 
 
reminded me of another young officer, wearing a 
 different uniform^ and made me take to him 
 strongly. 
 
 "Well, why don't you get permission to accom- 
 pany us to the Hook of Holland?" I suggested. 
 "Then this boat would not be held up by your 
 cruisers every now and then and, in reward, I 
 could introduce you to the only girl aboard. She 
 is good looking and bright.'' 
 
 "Would I like it though !" the young chap ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 "Speak of the devil et cetera," I replied, for 
 Miss Whieting, Mrs. Luebben and Mrs. Barens 
 were coming around the corner of the deck. 
 "Come along! I'll present you to the ladies, so 
 you can have their company at least while they 
 'wigg-wagg' on the bridge." 
 
 After being introduced as one of our "war- 
 visitors," the embarrassed boy addressed the ma- 
 tron first, but chose the worst question pos- 
 sible : 
 
 "You are an American, of course?" 
 
 "Oh, no," Mrs. Luebben answered joyously, 
 "I'm a German, thank God !" 
 
 "But you speak English so perfectly," our vis- 
 itor stammered helplessly. 
 
 "Aside of my mother-tongue I converse in 
 
 French and Spanish as well as in English," Mrs. 
 
 Luebben responded with a sarcastic smile. "Not 
 
 an uncommon accomplishment among my people, 
 
 35 
 
by the way. Being English, you of course know 
 no foreign language ?" 
 
 "Quite so V the young man answered with a 
 blush. 
 
 To my taste Mrs. Luebben, mindful of her sons 
 at the front, possibly wounded or fallen by now, 
 behaved rather too severely. 
 
 "Our visitor would gladly safeguard our ship 
 to Rotterdam," I put in slowly, "but I doubt if his 
 superior officer would consent. He is under or- 
 ders of his country like your sons are of theirs, 
 Mrs. Luebben." 
 
 "Do try to stay aboard and take us to Holland," 
 Mrs. Barens gushed into the conversation, "we 
 will give you a good time !" 
 
 "I have no doubt of it," the Englishman as- 
 serted looking at Miss Whieting, who had not 
 kept her eyes from his face. 
 
 By this time the Californian and Dr. Auer had 
 joined us, the latter planting himself behind Miss 
 Whieting and whispering into her ear. 
 
 Taking Mr. Ereeman's arm I forced him into a 
 turn around the deck, and when we returned Miss 
 Whieting and the British officer were ascending 
 the stairs to the bridge. 
 
 An hour later on the Botherdam was steam- 
 ing a Westerly course to Ealmouth, seventy miles 
 to the rear, accompanied by the Cesar flying flags 
 as though she had captured an enemy warship. 
 The signature on the British admiralty's free- 
 36 
 
pass given to our captain in Queenstown was in- 
 distinct^ the passengers were told. 
 
 ^^Great Cesar's ghost !" I murmured at the rail- 
 ing. ^^Is this a petty, post-humous revenge of 
 yours on the Germanic barbarians you could not 
 subdue after conquering Gaul and Britain?" 
 
 When the last patient of Dr. Shields, the ship's 
 surgeon, had left his room that evening and he 
 had given me a cigarette, he closed the door after 
 inspecting the corridor and took his armchair with 
 a sigh. The Botherdam was anchored in the 
 lovely, toy-harbor of Falmouth. 
 
 "I consider it my duty to inform you that the 
 English are furiously sore on the Germans !" he 
 whispered. "The officers of the Cesar reported 
 that the Germans, of late, cut off the right hand 
 of every British officer they capture, heal him up 
 and send him back to England." 
 
 Staring at the ceiling to retain a straight face, 
 I responded slowly: "Sterilized and dished up in 
 vinegar, pepper and good ohve oil, such chopped- 
 off hands might make even better morsels than 
 pigs' feet." 
 
 "I see your sarcasm," my host whispered, "but 
 you do not seem to realize the position this new 
 German atrocity may place you in ! I'm afraid 
 that every person with a German name on this 
 ship will be taken off to an English detention 
 camp, irrespective of their American passports." 
 
 In response, I handed him the document the 
 37 
 
American consul at Queenstown had inspected. 
 After glancing it over he handed it back quickly 
 and extended his hand : "Great Scot ! The British 
 will drop you like a red-hot firepoker when they 
 see this !'' 
 
 That night a vocal concert was held on the deck 
 of one of the Dutch steamers from South Amer- 
 ica anchored near us. The singers were German 
 reservists bound for British detention camps, and 
 their songs were familiar to me from the time I 
 had spent as a foreign student at German uni- 
 versities^ many years ago. Our passengers were 
 hanging over the near railing and so I had the 
 ofif deck to myself in the attempt to get away 
 from those songs. Entirely ignorant of what is 
 termed music, I had attended a concert but once 
 in a blue moon for years and not an opera in a 
 decade, because the sounds had produced unnerv- 
 ing efifects on me. But this night was calm and 
 the stars were out, and the songs coming from 
 that ship reached me wdierever I went until, at 
 last, the strains of "In the Home-land, In the 
 Home-land, I shall meet you again,^' caused me 
 to find a dark spot along the railing to sob, like 
 a woman weeping over her dead child. 
 
 At noon of the next day the captain of the 
 Botherdam returned from shore, our anchor 
 was raised and once more we proceeded up Chan- 
 nel until midnight, when we were hailed out of 
 the darkness : 
 
 38 
 
"What ship is this?" 
 
 "The Botherdam bound for Rotterdam." 
 
 "Follow me !" the command came through the 
 megaphone of a destroyer. 
 
 Our chief officer came along the deck. 
 
 "Where are you bound for now?" I teased 
 him. 
 
 The giant bent down to my ear and whispered : 
 "To Hell !" 
 
 Aha ! So the Hollanders were waking up to 
 the fact that their independence, neutrality and 
 freedom at sea, guaranteed during the piping 
 times of peace by "scraps of paper," became 
 worthless when the big nations were at war ! Evi- 
 dently the "buffer"— and other — states with di- 
 minutive armies and toy navies, will learn a big 
 lesson during this belligerent mass-meeting. 
 
 We were kept at anchor South of Sandown, 
 Isle of Wight. Many empty transport steamers 
 left there during that night and the following day, 
 steaming around the Eastern corner of the island 
 toward Portsmouth and Southampton. 
 
 Most of that fore- and after-noon was spent by 
 the artillery captain and his voluntary teacher by 
 drilling and frilling the German language below, 
 but when going on deck before dinner the clanks 
 of the anchor chain reverberated through the ship. 
 
 "Dropping another hook for the night?" I in- 
 quired of the purser on deck. 
 
 "No, they are lifting the anchor," he answered. 
 39 
 
"To go where-to ?" Captain Mac asked curtly. 
 
 "Possibly to Dover. I do not know !" the Hol- 
 lander answered while tilting the weight of his 
 body from one leg to the other, like a chained 
 elephant in the circus. 
 
 The Bother dam did head for those straits^ 
 and the number of revolutions of her engines in- 
 dicated extra speed and final release. 
 
 Toward midnight the powerful searchlights on 
 the rocks of Dover came into view, the rays of 
 one skipping over the water and those of the 
 other protruding far into the dark sky in search 
 for the gate guarded by St. Peter, — or for Zep- 
 pelins. Their flashes were rapid, about three sec- 
 onds to each. 
 
 "Watch this performance !" I entreated the 
 artillerist at my side. "Yonder, due South, is the 
 light of Calais on the French coast. At most, we 
 are one and one-half miles from Dover rock but, 
 so far, have not been ^picked up' by that light. 
 Evidently, the British Admiralty have sleepy Irish 
 boys on this job !" 
 
 40 
 
VI 
 PETTICOAT DIPLOMACY 
 
 Fishy-Eyes handed me an English newspaper 
 when announcing my bath the next morning. 
 
 "Read it'/' he urged in a low voice but with 
 bulging eyes. "A German submarine blew up 
 three British cruisers in this neighborhood yes- 
 terday morning." 
 
 Unfolding the newspaper while in the water, I 
 found the location of Weddigen's feat given as 
 '^twenty miles Southwest of the Hook of Hol- 
 land," the very spot the Botherdam, was over 
 now. For the first time during this trip a feeling 
 of possible danger approached me because some 
 stray mine might collide with our speeding ship 
 while I was in the tub, and so I quickly reached 
 for a towel and laid it near, that St. Peter should 
 not be shocked. 
 
 After breakfast we anchored in a thin fog rest- 
 ing on the North Sea, sufficiently dense to hide 
 the near shore, and out of it came a toy torpedo 
 boat showing Holland's flag and circled busily 
 around our steamer as to assure us of our ultimate 
 safety. I laughed out loud. 
 
 "Good morning. Doctor !" Turning I saw the 
 41 
 
Bolivian coming along the deck with extended 
 hand. "I have found my mother-tongue again ! 
 So sorry you never spoke Spanish. Of course 
 you can?^' 
 
 ^^No. What made you think so?'" I inquired. 
 
 "You were suspected of understanding mosi 
 modern languages, and of other knowledge, 
 by some of our fellow-passengers/' he laughed, 
 "but I trusted you all the same I" 
 
 "Thanks !" I retorted. "In retaliation I can 
 state that I knew from the first day out that you 
 were not a Spanish Bolivian, in spite of your his- 
 trionic talent." 
 
 "Why ?" he inquired eagerly. 
 
 "Because you did not smoke I" I answered. "A 
 South American using no tobacco is unthinkable.'^ 
 
 The Hook of Holland was sprinkled with sol- 
 diers and in the sheds of the wharf we made fast 
 to, some of the rescued wounded from the tor- 
 pedoed British cruisers rested in cots. 
 
 The passengers of the Botherdam were 
 crowded together on the deck of a tender steam- 
 ing up the canal to Rotterdam, steeragers and 
 cabin passengers mixed together. Brave Mrs. 
 Luebben elbowed her way to where I sat with 
 Culbertson, who gave up his seat to go forward. 
 The matron was in excellent humor. 
 
 "Oh, ye men !" she began. "You never under- 
 stand women ! I now have a good joke on you 
 in retaliation for your many sarcasms aimed at 
 ^2 
 
every race, creed^ custom and profession, your 
 own included. Of all men I ever met, you were 
 fooled best by a woman !" The mirth of the lady 
 had brought tears to her eyes. 
 
 "A woman ?^^ I repeated contemptuously. "The 
 only woman which concerns me is my wife, and 
 she is in New York. To whom do you allude?^' 
 
 "To Miss Whieting, of course/' my tormentor 
 answered, "the young girl who sat next to you at 
 table and ignored by you cruelly, after lecturing 
 her on her champagne drinking T' 
 
 Mrs. Luebben had another attack of hilarity. 
 
 "She is the Austrian countess Palfy taking im- 
 portant papers to her government, and Mr. Van- 
 dal is her husband, the count ?' 
 
 A Dutch windmill had attracted my attention 
 meantime and, besides, a steerager standing near 
 whom I had seen in the ship's surgeon's office re- 
 peatedly complaining of vague nervous troubles, 
 was now listening attentively to our conversation 
 carried on in English. 
 
 "What ails you. Doctor?" Mrs. Luebben in- 
 quired when I remained silent. "I have never 
 seen you look so sober and old, as you do now." 
 
 "Pardon my inattention I" I answered in the 
 Saxon dialect which Mrs. Luebben understood. 
 "It is Austrian-like to employ a woman cackling 
 about her achievement before the job is finished. 
 Apparently the petticoat diplomacy of the Met- 
 ternich school is not yet extinct in the land of the 
 43 
 
Hapsburg dynasty. I shall certainly make my 
 apologies to the Countess Palfy on the pier at 
 Rotterdam V 
 
 As the ladies intended to rest a day in Rotter- 
 dam and Captain Mac concluded to call on a 
 diplomatic friend in the Hague, Culbertson and I 
 left the wharf in Rotterdam first. We counted 
 eighteen ocean steamers and over fifty tenders laid 
 up along the waterways while riding through the 
 city in an antediluvian cab^ and saw thousands of 
 men in blue blouses lounging along the canals out 
 of work. 
 
 At the railway station my companion offered to 
 buy the tickets to the border while I studied the 
 bill of fare in the restaurant and looked for the 
 renowned Dutch cleanliness. 
 
 "Get me some Pall Mall cigarettes !" Culbert- 
 son addressed a waiter hovering near us when he 
 returned. Turning to me, he sniffed: "Dutch 
 cleanliness? There is but one clean country, 
 Germany !" 
 
 The man looked pale. He had ordered cigar- 
 ettes and had always made his own on the liner. 
 
 Leaning over the table he whispered: "Appar- 
 ently our troubles have not yet come to an end. I 
 have no railway tickets. They pretend not to un- 
 derstand me at the office.^' 
 
 Many tales we had heard on the Botherdam 
 regarding the difficulty of crossing the border to 
 Germany. 
 
 4A 
 
''Order the regular dinner for me and whatever 
 you may choose for yourself, while I get the 
 tickets " I answered. 
 
 At the ticket window I placed my hat on the 
 sill, showed my open hand containing twenty 
 mark gold-pieces and demanded curtly in Ger- 
 man: "Two first-class tickets for the next train 
 to the German border ! When does it leave?'' 
 
 "At six-thirty! You have over an hour's time 
 for dinner," the clerk answered promptly, straight- 
 ening up. "Your train will arrive at Bentheim at 
 11:30 P. M." 
 
 When he handed the tickets and the change I 
 remarked : "My trunk must be checked. Where 
 can I do it?" 
 
 "Certainly, I'll send a man to assist you !" he 
 answered, and he did. 
 
 Picking out a paper gulden I handed the rest of 
 the Dutch change to the interpreter after the 
 trunk was checked : "Distribute this among those 
 who assisted me. This gulden I will keep to re- 
 member you by !" 
 
 The paper gulden was bare-backed. 
 "How did you do it?" Culbertson inquired 
 when I gave him his ticket. 
 
 "Simplicity itself !" I laughed while attacking 
 the excellent thick soup. "You spoke English, 
 with Anglo-Saxon ancestry written all over you, 
 and I addressed the Hollanders in 'military' Ger- 
 man ' On the ocean England is as yet supreme 
 45 
 
but a single German is to-day more respected in 
 Holland than the entire British navy^ for dread- 
 naughts are useless on land and will keep away 
 from the Dutch coast, I take it, for quite a while/' 
 
 A large, blond Hollander and two Hebrew mer- 
 chants were "talking war'' in our compartment in 
 the train, the Dutchman denouncing the Kaiser 
 and the others defending him. Meanwhile Cul- 
 bertson smoked incessantly. He appeared to grow 
 more nervous and had barely tasted his food, 
 while I, well fed and content to ride in one of the 
 first Hollandish express trains to the border since 
 the war began^ was enjoying this impromptu de- 
 bate immensely. 
 
 After the Hollander had left I pretended look- 
 ing for a match which the elder Hebrew extended 
 (as I had expected), with the remark: "You 
 Americans will find travelling in Europe some- 
 what difiicult just now!" 
 
 His broken English savored of the London 
 variety. 
 
 "Not so difficult as your attempts to convince 
 a stubborn Hollander of being on the wrong side 
 of the fence," I rejoined. 
 
 The man sat up straight. 
 
 "I did not take you for a Hollander !" he ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 "You were right," I laughed, "but I have spent 
 most of a half century within a forty-two centi- 
 meter rifle shot of the New York City Hall among 
 46 
 
the most international population on the globe, 
 and have picked up a few of their dialects and 
 brogues. But why are you so sure of Germany's 
 success in this war ?" 
 
 The fellow-passenger eyed me suspiciously and 
 shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "You may answer in German if you prefer/' I 
 urged him on in that tongue^ with a twinkle in 
 my eye. 
 
 "God, the righteous V the Hebrew exclaimed 
 beaming all over. "You speak German like a 
 native and I took you for a Yankee ! Now I will 
 tell you. My old mother lives in Galicia, Austria. 
 I have been a money broker in Rotterdam during 
 the last twenty years. This is my son-in-law 
 and partner. I am in England every fortnight^ in 
 Paris about once in a week and in Germany^ Aus- 
 tria and Russia at least four times in a year. I 
 have made comparisons. Ignorance is flourishing 
 in all of these countries excepting in Germany. 
 I can do very little business there. The Germans 
 know too much. For that I admire them.'' 
 
 "How are the Hollanders?" I queried. 
 
 "You had a typical specimen of them here. He 
 represents the mass. During the first week of 
 the war the people stormed my office in Rotter- 
 dam begging me on their knees and with tears in 
 their eyes to take their German money and securi- 
 ties for fifty cents on the dollar, as you Americans 
 term it. I did. If their fright had lasted a month 
 47' 
 
instead of a week, I would be a millionaire to-day. 
 Jacob, open my valise ! Gentlemen, I have two 
 bottles of a very good German vintage. Let us 
 drink to the health, — not of the Kaiser and his 
 people for they will win out anyhow, — but of the 
 ignorants among the other nations. May they 
 live long and prosper V 
 
 Culbertson, by now interested, asked after 
 draining the last drop of the Oberingelheimer 
 Auslese from his glass : ^^And the Belgians ?" 
 
 "When I travel in Belgium I have to speak 
 three languages to do business, French, Vlamish 
 and Wallonish,^^ the merchant answered. "Which 
 tribe do you refer to ?" 
 
 "I don^t know. I mean the Belgians as a na- 
 tion,'^ the Southerner replied. 
 
 "Good God !" the international broker ex- 
 claimed. "You call a mess of eight million peo- 
 ple composed of three distinct races, a nation? 
 Belgians ? The very name is artificial and a polit- 
 ical pretense ! There are French, Vlames and 
 Wallons living there who never intermarry and 
 have but business intercourse with one another, 
 and most of their foreign trade is represented by 
 goods sent by Germany through Antwerp." 
 
 48 
 
VII 
 BORDER KNOWLEDGE 
 
 At 11 :30 p. m. the train stopped at Bentheim, 
 the border town of Germany. The baggage was 
 inspected by customs officials in a large hall^ the 
 outlet guarded by uniformed men. 
 
 While leisurely strapping my trunk after the 
 other passengers had left the building, a civilian 
 under a soft hat addressed me: "Please show me 
 your passport.'^ 
 
 I had placed two documents into my pocket for 
 this occasion, my passport and a typewritten let- 
 ter addressed to the chief of the German Health 
 Office, and handed them over. The inspecter 
 unfolded the latter first, read it and handed both 
 papers back with a smile. 
 
 '^^Oh!^^ he exclaimed. "You have come from 
 afar to help us.^^ 
 
 "Yes/^ I answered, "but you have not inspected 
 my passport.^^ 
 
 "Not necessary V the official replied with em- 
 phasis. "Allow me to help you strap that trunk." 
 
 He did and he went for a porter, advised me 
 as to a hotel and my departure in the morning, 
 and clicked his heels together when I passed the 
 uniformed men at the door unmolested. 
 49 
 
Culbertson had to share my room and bed in 
 the border hotels but both were large and spot- 
 lessly clean. 
 
 On opening the three windows we looked into 
 the foliage of trees and heard a nightingale sing. 
 It was past midnight. 
 
 "Now for a bottle of Rhine wine " I suggested 
 and pressed the button. 
 
 "Fll join you but I also must have a bite/' Cul- 
 bertson assented cheerfully. "I'm hungry for the 
 first time since leaving Bremen six weeks ago. 
 Thank God, Fm back to Germany !" 
 
 The man seemed completely changed. His sol- 
 emn face and reserved manner had disappeared, 
 and his wife and children were in South Carolina ! 
 Here was a riddle. 
 
 I questioned and he answered : "Germany is my 
 home. I have my business there and my children 
 were born there. Of course Tm an American, 
 but my people in the South are fifty years behind 
 my neighbors in Bremen and they get on my 
 nerves after being with them over night." And 
 he added much which can not be repeated here. 
 
 A feeling of envy overcame me. Here was a 
 pure Anglo-Saxon enjoying his life among my 
 race, while I was but an outlander in Germany. 
 
 Our host entered the room with a tray. Cul- 
 bertson filled the glasses, saying: "Here's to Ger- 
 many !" and then made for the food. 
 
 "Can I do anything more for you?" the inn- 
 50 
 
keeper asked. "Had I not better close those win- 
 dows?" 
 
 "Not on your life !" I answered. "But this 
 cool air has made me hungry also. Bring me 
 some Belgian baby-steak, or the hand of a British 
 officer in vinegar." 
 
 The man looked at me in blank amazement. 
 
 "Why do you stare?" I demanded. "I have 
 pure Barbarian blood in my veins and can pay in 
 Barbarian gold !" presenting the twenty mark 
 coins in my hand. 
 
 At last the innkeeper smiled. 
 
 "Fm sorry, but we have run out of these war- 
 delicacies ! But did you bring this gold over the 
 Atlantic?" he inquired. 
 
 "Bought in Wall Street," I answered. 
 
 "Then you were lucky in not showing it on 
 board the Bother dam, for in that case the British 
 would have taken you of¥, for gold is contraband. 
 Good night !" 
 
 I laughed out loud and felt crushed, because a 
 German innkeeper at the border knew more about 
 international law than a New York professor. 
 
 "If the British had searched us I would have 
 been your companion in some English prison," 
 Culbertson remarked, "for I have more gold coins 
 with me than you. Thank God we're in Ger- 
 many !" 
 
 "Why did you leave me alone with my baggage 
 in the railway station?" I asked soberly, because 
 51 
 
this did not coincide with Culbertson's char- 
 acter. 
 
 "I feared that the Germans might hold you up 
 and if I had been found with you. I would have 
 shared your fate !" he answered drily. 
 
 ^^Detain me at the German border !" I laughed. 
 "What on earth gave you this idea?" 
 
 My companion blushed. 
 
 "Most of the passengers of our ship did not 
 trust you," Culbertson asserted, "because you 
 were always in good humor ! You spent many 
 hours in your room with the American artillery 
 officer, you even poked fun at the British officer 
 in Queenstown harbor, and the American consul 
 offered to take you through London with Captain 
 McManemy." 
 
 "Who told you this?" I inquired. 
 
 "Not one of you two mentioned this, but it was 
 rumored about the ship that evening," he re- 
 phed. 
 
 "Is that all?" I inquired. 
 
 "No, Doctor !" Culbertson answered. "Your 
 toast to the Queen of Holland, your friendly in- 
 tercourse with the Canadians, your long walk 
 with the Dutch captain, your kindly treatment of 
 the young officer of the British cruiser Cesar, and 
 the marked deference of the American ship^s sur- 
 geon, — placed the rest of us on our guard." 
 
 ''Mundus viilt decipi!" I exclaimed, astonished. 
 "Read this paper." 
 
 52 
 

 
 '/4:9i 
 
 To the Health Authorities, 
 
 HambujTg, Germany. 
 Dear Sira.*- 
 
 The bearer of thia letter, Dr. Augijst Seibert, is visit- 
 ing your city for the purpose of studyii^ means taken by you to 
 disinfect after contagious diseases. He is comnissioned by me to 
 ascertain facts in connection with the matter referred to above, 
 and to report the resiilts of his investigation. You will confer 
 a very great favor on the undersigned by affording him any facili- 
 ties that may be consistent and in your power to enable him to at- 
 tain the object of his visit. We would like to have yoiu* methods 
 of action, especially sigalnst the Asiatic Cholera. It is needless 
 forme to say that any courtesy shown Dr. Seibert will be gladly 
 reciprocated. 
 
 I hCve the honor to be. 
 
 Re qp eyrt full y yours/, 
 
 ^^^^^^^^^-c^ h 
 
 Sanitary Superintendent. 
 
 53 
 
Culbertson ran his eyes over the typewritten 
 sheet the American consul in Queenstown harbor 
 and the Botherdam's surgeon had inspected, and 
 quickly handed it back. 
 
 "Aha !" he answered. *^''Now I can place you, 
 but I would not care to have your job.^' 
 
 "Let us turn in !" I suggested and shortly after, 
 while Culbertson snored the nightingale again 
 sang and I thought of the time when this paper 
 was signed by the late Dr. Cyrus Edson, then 
 Sanitary Superintendent of the New York Health 
 Department, to facilitate my investigation of the 
 Asiatic cholera epidemic in Hamburg, tzventy-two 
 
 years ago! 
 
 Before leaving home I had found that old 
 document in my strong-box and took it along as 
 a help for identification and — evidently in revenge 
 — it now kept me awake by arousing memories. 
 1892! Then, like now, I travelled as a private 
 citizen at my own expense and had no official 
 standing whatsoever, but that paper — a mere in- 
 troduction with a request to show me things— had 
 opened the doors of the Imperial German Health 
 Office for me, of the police department of Berlin, 
 of the disinfection and water-works plants and 
 of the hospitals in that city and in Hamburg 
 where Asiatic cholera patients were being treated, 
 and had allowed me to go with the disinfectors 
 into the rooms of houses where new cases had 
 been found, to watch their work. And, last but 
 54 
 
not leasts this old *^^scrap" had induced Robert 
 Koch, the highest authority of his time, to dictate 
 his advice as to the effective disinfection of the 
 cholera ships from Hamburg anchored in the 
 lower bay of New York, so^ that it could be cabled 
 that evening! 
 
 And it made me think of Mr. Coleman Jackson, 
 then secretary of the U. S. Legation in Berlin, to 
 whom I had taken a letter of introduction very 
 unwillingly from a former member of President 
 Arthur's cabinet, ex-Postmaster General James, — ■ 
 for that diplomat had been so surprised by my 
 refusal to ask favors from his office that he had 
 left his chair and, extending his hand, had ex- 
 claimed : "Shake ! You are the first American to 
 walk into this office and to refuse help, and I 
 have been here ten years/' And he had forced 
 me into a chair and had given me card introduc- 
 tions with his signature to the great officials of 
 Berlin, which helped me materially. 
 
 Temp ova iiuitantur! 
 
 55 
 
VIII 
 A CLEANSING BATH 
 
 The train left Bentheim at 7 :30 a. m. on the 
 second^ like all trains I travelled in during my 
 stay in Germany, and they always arrived prompt- 
 ly. The passing scenery presented nothing of 
 war for the fields were being tilled by men and 
 women and the roads, houses and stations were 
 as clean and orderly as in times of peace, and no 
 one appeared excited. Only at railway crossings, 
 bridges and stations, men in uniform were on 
 guard. 
 
 Culbertson left me within an hour and at 
 Loehne I had to change for the express to Berlin. 
 This ran in two sections, the first filled with 
 wounded soldiers from the Western front, but in 
 the second I found an empty corner. 
 
 When barely seated a uniformed nurse came to 
 the door of the compartment. 
 
 ^^Has anyone cigarettes?" she inquired. "I'm 
 out of them and some of my wounded soldiers 
 would like to smoke." 
 
 "Where are they ?" I inquired, arising. 
 
 "If you walk through the train you will find 
 them," she answered. 
 
 56 
 
Eight lightly wounded sat in one compartment. 
 Two with bandaged skulls, four with wounded 
 hands^ one with a leg in plaster and the last with- 
 out visible bandages. 
 
 "Good morning children V I addressed the sol- 
 diers. "Fm a physician. Are any of you in pain 
 or distress?" 
 
 "No/^ a large framed sergeant answered^ "none 
 of us have wound fever." 
 
 While offering cigarettes a man with both 
 hands bandaged remarked: "I would like to 
 smoke but when the first bullet struck my left 
 hand at the rifle I must have lifted the right one 
 or it would not have been hit also." 
 
 I lit a cigarette and placed it between his lips. 
 
 "Of course you are wounded also ?" I addressed 
 the sergeant. 
 
 "A French bullet is on the inside of a rib/' he 
 answered. "They will remove it in Magdeburg, 
 so that I can return to the front in two weeks. I 
 am used to it. Two Russian bullets have passed 
 through my calves. During our first advance 
 through Belgium into France I was not touched 
 but while resting on our stomachs in open fields 
 for hours with Russian aviators over us, we re- 
 heved our feet by raising them and were hit. Next 
 time, it will be an EngHsh or American bullet." 
 
 "An American?" I exclaimed. "The United 
 States will not join the Allies." 
 
 "Possibly not," the sergeant answered curtly, 
 - 57 
 
"but the Americans manufacture ammunition for 
 them ! My brother is a foreman in the steelworks 
 at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He wrote all about 
 the large contracts to our father." 
 
 I felt the blood rise to my face. A man with 
 his head bandaged over one eye, relieved my em- 
 barrassment. 
 
 "Doctor, do you believe that I could go back to 
 the front with my right eye intact?" he inquired. 
 "The optic nerve of the left one was cut by a bone 
 splinter." 
 
 "Of course/' I assured him, "if you are not 
 left-handed." 
 
 "No," he replied. "Then I need not stay at 
 home a cripple. My best thanks !" 
 
 "Are all of you North Germans?" 
 
 "We are Pommeranian Landwehr," the ser- 
 geant replied. "All married and fathers of chil- 
 dren. Pm the oldest, aged thirty-two." 
 
 Moltke had pronounced their fathers the 
 "core" of the troops he had led into France in 
 1870. 
 
 Realizing that I was in very good company I 
 remained in that compartment for some time lis- 
 tening to the reports of these "Huns" and, in 
 return, entertaining them with my boyish remin- 
 iscenses among the soldiers of 1870. 
 
 Strange to relate, their utterances were devoid 
 of bragging and curses and no harsh word was 
 said against the enemies they had fought. In fact^ 
 58 
 
it was like a cool, cleansing bath— this stay among 
 real soldiers— after spending the month of Au- 
 gust in New York, where the war had been fought 
 over again by printer's ink squeezed into hysteri- 
 cal head-Hnes and editorials savoring of a hodge- 
 podge compounded of malice, envy and stark 
 ignorance. No wonder dyspepsia is the ''Ameri- 
 can" disease par excellence! 
 
 Toward evening my train arrived in Berlin but 
 my eldest daughter and her young son were not 
 at the station to receive me, as I had expected. 
 On entering her apartments she remarked : ^'Your 
 grandson and I were at the depot, but the train 
 contained but wounded soldiers. Little Paul was 
 very much disappointed !" 
 
 "Because his international mother, though 
 versed in travel, never thought of a possible sec- 
 ond section r I laughed. ''Show me your babies 
 and then report on the casualties among our rela- 
 tives and friends.'^ 
 
 And it was well that I saw the sleeping children 
 first before she admitted that the war had killed 
 the man with the best brain among our clan and 
 the only friend I had in Germany, while I was 
 on the Atlantic. 
 
 59 
 
IX 
 
 WARTIME WOMEN 
 
 A HANDSOME automobile^ picked up on the 
 street, took me into the finest suburban section of 
 BerHn the next morning where I ahghted in front 
 of a modern, stone villa surrounded by a lawn, 
 large trees and a wrought-iron fence. 
 
 The lady of the house received me in a library 
 adorned with old masters. She was of medium 
 height, had massive blond hair and regular but 
 cold features. She read my letter of introduc- 
 tion at the window, came back and extended her 
 hand. Her manner had changed. 
 
 "Show me your credentials and tell me what 
 you intend to do !" 
 
 "My object is to personally introduce some 
 measures in the treatment of epidemic diseases in 
 the military hospitals back of the front, but my 
 stay is limited to four weeks/^ I answered. 
 
 "Why personally?" the lady inquired. 
 
 "Because these measures were devised by my- 
 self and because my medical education was ob- 
 tained in Germany, paid for by inherited German 
 coin," I replied. 
 
 "Ah, I see !" my hostess remarked. "It will be 
 60 
 
difficult to place yon, but your request is unique. 
 That may help. Go to the Imperial Health Office 
 first and be explicit. Then try the Red Cross 
 authorities. Do not mind a turn-down there, be- 
 cause they have more medical volunteers than 
 they can accommodate. Insist on your demand 
 and accept nothing else! Meanwhile, I will try 
 to make an opening for you among the military 
 physicians who have a caste of their own, as you 
 may possibly know.^^ 
 
 I bowed my head. 
 
 Arising, the lady once more extended her hand. 
 "Report your progress to me by telephone. Dur- 
 ing your stay in Germany, wherever you are, I 
 shall be at your service daily from 7 a. m. to 10 
 p. M. Good success V 
 
 When again in the automobile and beginning 
 to think, I realized that I had met the second 
 woman who had ever impressed me. The one had 
 been a matron born on the fourth of July, 1791. 
 Her husband had been severely wounded at 
 Waterloo in 1815 and she had reported her ex- 
 periences during the Napoleonic wars to her boy- 
 ish grandson from America in an old house with- 
 out a sigh or complaint, while the other, in the 
 prime of life, was giving orders like a born 
 strategist in a modern castle. What contrasts and 
 yet, what similarity ! The same cool reflection 
 and the same indomitable will. Women during 
 wartime. 
 
 61 
 
The director of the Imperial Health Office, 
 Prof. Bumm, received me as a colleague, dis- 
 cussed my case and offered his help but also made 
 it plain that I would have difficulties to overcome. 
 He insisted on my seeing Prof. Yochmann, the 
 chief of the Institute for Infectious Diseases of 
 the Berlin University, to interest him in my plans, 
 thus avoiding my going near the front. 
 
 Duplicity of cases. Twenty-two years ago an- 
 other director of the German Imperial Health 
 Office, Dr. Koehler, had advised me not to go to 
 Hamburg but to stay in Berlin where I could 
 learn much more about the fight against Asiatic 
 cholera without incurring personal danger. Then, 
 like now, I refused the offer. Prof. Yochmann 
 has since succumbed to spotted typhus acquired 
 in a Russian prisoners' camp, while I am still at 
 large. 
 
 Yes, war destroys the best ! 
 
 The next stop my car made in front of the 
 Reichstags Gebaude (parliament building), of 
 which the German Red Cross occupied one side. 
 Bismarck's statue looked down on me when I 
 entered. 
 
 The Red Cross people were busy, for a steady 
 stream of persons were entering and leaving con- 
 stantly. When my turn came in the line the 
 porter made me wait until a page could show me 
 up. Ascending massive stairs my guide suddenly 
 stopped and handed my credential to a tall, lean 
 62 
 
man with white hair and bronzed features in field- 
 gray uniform who had come along bareheaded, 
 conversing with a civilian. 
 
 Pausing, the chief of the German Red Cross 
 read the paper, placed his right arm around my 
 shoulders and, smiling down at me, remarked : 
 
 "So you came all the way from America to help 
 us ? That is fine. I like that V 
 
 Not accustomed to being hugged coram pub- 
 lico I felt embarrassed for the passers-by had 
 stopped to gaze and listen, but the handsome, old 
 Prussian military aristocrat kept his arm around 
 me nonconcernedly until he had conducted me to 
 a chair in his room. 
 
 "Did you have a good voyage ?" he inquired. 
 
 "Excepting three enforced stays in British har- 
 bors lasting a week," I responded. "The seven 
 days at anchor made this trip monotonous be- 
 cause, since long, I have been accustomed to reach 
 Germany inside of a week." 
 
 "Then you have crossed the Atlantic often?" 
 
 "Since childhood about forty-seven times," I 
 answered. 
 
 "Heavens !" my host exclaimed. "I was at sea 
 but twice. Never again, unless ordered by His 
 Majesty ! Pm a landsman. What an interesting 
 life you must have had." 
 
 "Hardly as interesting as yours," I laughed, 
 pointing at the war medals on his uniform, the 
 only decorations aside of the Iron Cross, he ex- 
 62> 
 
hibited. "You have fought the Danes in 1864, the 
 Austrians in 1866 and the French in 1870/^ 
 
 "Oh yes/' the old warrior drawled, "but always 
 in the service. You must have had more diver- 
 sion." 
 
 "Impossible !" I rejoined astonished. "The sea 
 and the people one meets during travel differ but 
 in their color. The motion of the water and the 
 emotions of the humans are alike wherever one 
 goes and, in the end, become monotonous to look 
 at." 
 
 "You may be right," my host answered with 
 a sigh. 
 
 A civilian entered the room and handed him a 
 paper for signature. 
 
 "Ah, I'm glad you came in ! Here is a medi- 
 cal friend from abroad willing to help," General 
 Pfuel remarked, introducing me. "Please see to 
 it that he is placed," and the prototype of Ger- 
 man militarism extended his hand : "Good suc- 
 cess !" 
 
 In the next room things were different for med- 
 ical civilians now looked over my paper, asked 
 questions and shrugged their shoulders. How- 
 could they place a foreign physician for a month 
 when they had more of their own than they 
 needed, ready to pledge themselves for the dura- 
 tion of the war? 
 
 Returning from a whispered conversation near 
 the open window, one of the Red Cross ofhcials 
 64 
 
suggested that I could possibly be made use of in 
 the handling of sick EngHsh prisoners. 
 
 Although feeling somewhat uncomfortable in 
 playing the part of a beggar I refused, because 
 the treatment of home-sickness was not included 
 In my specialty. 
 
 The door opened and another medical civilian 
 entered the room. Another whispered conversa- 
 tion ensued among the trio. 
 
 ''Tres faceunt collegium!" I thought^ feeling 
 like a very sick patient at sight of this consulta- 
 tion. But it was brief. 
 
 "The physician from New York?^^ the new- 
 comer exclaimed. "Why of course. His name is 
 on file. The document must be in this shelf/^ and, 
 on finding it, he told me to report to the Kriegs- 
 ministerium. 
 
 Outside of the building I drew a deep breath, 
 for a load carried since leaving my house, had 
 been taken ofif my mind. I waved my hand to- 
 ward Bismarck's statue. After this I did not care 
 whether school kept or not, for my name was on 
 the card-index of the greatest fighting concern 
 on earth, the German War Office ! 
 
 Leisurely I strolled through the park, glanced 
 carelessly over the closed shutters of the British 
 and French embassies near the Brandenburger 
 Thor, and ultimately handed my card to the ad- 
 jutant of Physician-General Paalzow in the Ger- 
 man War Office building. 
 65 
 
"Of course, you wish to go to the front ?^^ the 
 imposing, elderly officer in field-grey inquired after 
 greeting me as "colleague'' and offering a chair. 
 
 "I will go to where I'm sent," I answered 
 curtly, for I resented being taken for a war- 
 correspondent or battlefield-bum. "Any old place 
 is good enough for me, provided I can help. But 
 I'm not a surgeon and my time is limited to four 
 weeks." 
 
 "Self-understood !" Dr. Paalzow answered with 
 a faint smile. "What can you do?" 
 
 After mentioning the names of those epidemic 
 diseases I had experience in, I asked for the op- 
 portunity to show the colleagues in charge certain 
 tricks in the treatment I had devised myself and 
 had found effective for I knew well, that the most 
 formidable of these war epidemics, typhoid fever, 
 had been almost extinct in hygienic Germany for 
 decades and that the military physicians there had 
 seen but few cases. 
 
 Waving my credentials aside without a glance. 
 Dr. Paalzow, in reply, gave me a concise report 
 on the condition of the German army along both 
 fronts regarding the above diseases, which tallied 
 exactly with what the director of the Imperial 
 Health Office had told me. 
 
 "I will have to send some telegrams concerning 
 you," he concluded. "Leave your town address. 
 You will be notified." 
 
 The interview had lasted seven minutes. 
 66 
 
A LECTURE 
 
 A HALF HOUR later on I ate most of the cake 
 on the afternoon coffee table of my daughter at 
 3 p. M. (for I had not tasted food or drink since 
 early morning)^ while Signorina Bagatelli, her 
 Italian teacher and companion during the frequent 
 travels of her husband, discussed the latest politi- 
 cal news in her native tongue until at last our 
 hostess replied so vigorously, that I leaned back 
 in my chair and laughed out loud. 
 
 "If you keep this up ladies/^ I explained my 
 hilarity, '^there will be war between Italy and 
 France in a minute or two !" 
 
 "France ?^^ the Signorina inquired. 
 
 "Of course !" I retorted. "Look at your op- 
 ponent and then state to which race she belongs." 
 
 "She certainly looks, acts and argues like a 
 French woman," the Signorina replied astonished, 
 "but, strange to say, I never thought of this be- 
 fore. Doctor, although I have known your daugh- 
 ter for years !" 
 
 "It was great fun to see two descendants of 
 Latin races go for one another on account of the 
 German Kaiser's cause !" I replied. "My daugh- 
 67 
 
ter^s maternal grandfather had French blood in 
 his veins which accounts for her atavistic make- 
 up. But daughter^ get your hat and coat^ for your 
 husband's train from Italy is due in half an hour V' 
 
 During dinner that evening my Holland- Amer- 
 ican son-in-law reported on Italy's preparations 
 for war, and my arguments against the possibility 
 of the spaghetti-eaters joining the crushers of 
 German scientific efhciency, did not impress him. 
 But his wife stopped our political talk by an- 
 nouncing that we three were to attend a lecture 
 in the "Urania'' on East Prussia and the Masur- 
 ian lakes that evening, where General Hinden- 
 burg had done his trick against the Russians. 
 
 "Dad may be sent to the Russian border by the 
 War Office to-morrow !" my daughter argued 
 with a glance at her husband. "This lecture will 
 interest him. Besides^ I will make him buy a heavy 
 overcoat." She arose and went to the nursery. 
 
 When her husband had lit mine and his cigar- 
 ette in the library, I broke forth: "This is rot, 
 Paul ! You must be tired. Give me the word 
 and I will turn her down." 
 
 "Not unless you wish to go to bed early to- 
 night," he replied with a sarcastic smile. "But I 
 know your habits." 
 
 "Why do you allow your wife to ^boss' you in 
 this manner?" I inquired. 
 
 "Because I had to '^boss' others in Berlin, Lon- 
 don, Paris, Vienna, Budapest, Milan and Rome 
 68 
 
during the last five years in the interest of our 
 American concern/' he answered. "This is quite 
 a diversion. Occasionally my wife is eccentric, 
 but I enjoy it. We are happy children when 
 together in Berlin. Thanks to the international 
 education you gave her, her knowledge of four 
 languages and of music, aside of her personality, 
 she is the one woman for me V 
 
 The lecture on ^^East Prussia and the Masurian 
 Lakes" in the "Urania," a building devoted to 
 popular scientific lectures, had drawn a full house. 
 It was illustrated by pictures on a screen and the 
 lecturer spoke without notes. His discourse lasted 
 two hours with a pause of fifteen minutes in be- 
 tween, but the audience never stirred and only 
 applauded at the end, to thank the speaker. At 
 first inclined to be bored as I was fairly well in- 
 formed on the history of every section of Ger- 
 many, the purely scientific statements of the lec- 
 turer devoid of rhetorical clap-trap, bragging, or 
 the slightest attempt to arouse political patriotism, 
 so interested me that I forgot my surroundings 
 entirely and in those few hours lived through the 
 Germanic colonization of this borderland in 
 reality. In the cloak room my daughter inquired 
 in German : 
 
 "Well Father, did the lecture satisfy you?" 
 
 "Much more than that," I answered in English, 
 
 "and when the pictures of Thorn on the Vistula 
 
 were shown I thought of Marcus Koenig in the 
 
 69 
 
Ancestors. You know my weakness for Gustav 
 Freytag V' 
 
 "Yes Dad, of course, but please converse in 
 German !" she replied in that tongue. "You have 
 often been taken for an Englishman." 
 
 Her husband had gone for our hats and wraps. 
 Looking up I saw our neighbors staring. 
 
 70 
 
XI 
 
 IN THE WAR OFFICE 
 
 The next day was Sunday and the sun shone 
 bright. During breakfast my daughter suggested 
 that I had better attend the service in the dome 
 to see the Germans worship and, possibly, to see 
 the Empress. Although walking briskly (a dis- 
 tance of four miles) I found the doors of the 
 dome closed and was told by a polite porter that 
 the church was filled to the limit. Turning back, 
 I walked Unter den Linden after examining one 
 of the captured French .field pieces stationed in 
 front of the Crownprince's palace. Many people 
 were promenading, most of them from out of 
 town evidently, but they did not interest me, in 
 fact nothing did, for I had but one thought in 
 mind and here I was idling with three weeks of 
 my two months' leave of absence gone. Rehears- 
 ing for the thousandth time that I was not needed 
 and not wanted and that, in fact, I was a nuisance 
 to the German authorities I was bothering, I no- 
 ticed that at last my natural spunk was leaving me. 
 
 ^^History repeats itself !'' I murmured. ^^When 
 I oflfered my services in July of 1870 coming from 
 America aged fifteen, the German military author- 
 ities would have made use of me on account of 
 71 
 
my linguistic abilities, but ultimately they turned 
 me down, because my father was an American 
 citizen/^ 
 
 Standing still to get my bearings, I found my- 
 self aside of the best monument of Berlin, that 
 of Frederic the Great. He certainly had been a 
 man^ for during seven years he had fought the 
 rest of continental Europe single-handed and had 
 won, William Dean HowelFs assertion in his Sil- 
 ver Wedding Journey that the Germans had never 
 won a war unaided before 1870, notwithstanding, 
 and he won by his intuitive talent. He did not 
 wait for others to give him suggestions. Sail eta 
 simplicitas, and I will wait no longer ! 
 
 The big porter at the door of the War Office 
 building saluted me as an old acquaintance. 
 
 "I take it^ you will find the way^ Doctor?" he 
 addressed me. 
 
 I did. Walking through the long corridor with 
 many open doors showing stacks filled with docu- 
 ments, without meeting anyone, I wondered. A 
 bomb dropped here would have made havoc. Why 
 could I, an "outlander," walk through the German 
 War Office building alone? 
 
 At the end of the corridor a sergeant saluted : 
 "The telegrams concerning you have arrived." 
 The adjutant took my card into the Sanctum sanc- 
 torum, came back and remarked : "You will have 
 to wait some time. Conferences !" 
 
 I did wait while walking the floor of that small 
 72 
 
waiting room, like a navigator his bridge. I at- 
 tempted to think, but I never succeeded. My 
 mind was a blank excepting for the words : "The 
 telegrams have arrived/^ and I walked that floor 
 for hours, mechanically. Again I tried to think 
 of my long life, my wife and children. They had 
 enough to live on, and I wondered why I was not 
 shocked at my cynical thoughts and why all this 
 appeared so trivial to me. In fact, my whole life 
 seemed but a preparation for the one object now 
 before me, to assist in bringing sick German sol- 
 diers to the front again. 
 
 Hunger asserted itself and I laughed, because 
 I could be without food or drink for days and 
 keep on walking that floor. 
 
 At last the adjutant entered the waiting room 
 with a smile. 
 
 "You are to report to General-Physician Arndt 
 of the 20th Army Corps in Allenstein, East Prus- 
 sia/^ he announced. 
 
 "That is somewhere near Koenigsberg?" I 
 queried. 
 
 "Yes. I was there last week. It took me 
 thirty-six hours to reach it,^^ he answered. 
 
 "It took me almost three weeks to reach Ber- 
 lin," I retorted. ^Tlave you a paper for me to 
 show in Allenstein?" 
 
 "Not necessary. You have been announced by 
 wire," the adjutant replied, "but please be seated 
 and tell me what you intend to do." 
 73 
 
And I told him in few words and short sen- 
 tences and gradually the faintly supercilious smile 
 disappeared from the face of my young colleague 
 and^ when I arose, he struck his heels together, 
 and with a hand-shake wished : "Good success." 
 
 Hailing an automobile I raced to the Potsdam 
 railway station, where information regarding the 
 movements of all trains in Germany could be ob- 
 tained. A dozen clerks behind a counter in a long 
 room gave answer to many, after consulting huge 
 ledgers. 
 
 "Next train to Allenstein, East Prussia?" I re- 
 quested. 
 
 "At 10:55 p. M.," the clerk answered. 
 
 "And when does it arrive there?" 
 
 "At 8:16 the next morning. Expresses to the 
 Eastern front since yesterday !" 
 
 I certainly was in luck. 
 
 On entering my daughter's flat she threw her 
 arms around my neck, sobbing. 
 
 "What's up?" I inquired of her husband while 
 stroking her hair. 
 
 "She thought you were lost or killed !" he 
 laughed. 
 
 "And he suggested that you might have made 
 some new acquaintance and had forgotten all 
 about me and your grand-children," his wife re- 
 torted laughing again, with tears on her cheeks. 
 "I could have killed him for that remark !" 
 
 A bell rang. "The children !" my hostess ex- 
 74 
 
claimed and rushed out of the room leaving the 
 door wide open and her tots^ entering from their 
 afternoon outing followed by their nurse, a young 
 girl born and raised in Connecticut, U. S. A., 
 made a bee-line for their grandfather. 
 
 "So you defended my character?" I addressed 
 the lady of the house winking at her husband 
 when their children had made themselves com- 
 fortable on my knees. "Thanks ! You were quite 
 right in doing so, for I spent five hours in the 
 building of the War Office and I am bound 
 for the Masurian lakes to-night. But now I am 
 hungry.-'^ 
 
 The 10:55 p. m. express left Berlin on the sec- 
 ond. But few civiHans were among the passen- 
 gers, and before the start was made the scene at 
 the station was a live y, military one. Three army 
 officers shared my compartment, two from the re- 
 serve and the third a professional, aristocratic, 
 cavalry captain. While inspecting the bunch of 
 German, English and French illustrated papers I 
 had bought at the station, he asked permission to 
 join me in looking at the pictures, and soon we 
 were in conversation which became animated and 
 more intimate when he learned that my youngest 
 son-in-law was a comrade of his, now at the front 
 near Ypres — and the "outlander" felt at home in 
 Germany for the first time during this trip be- 
 cause he was in the company of a professional 
 German warrior. Blood will tell. 
 75 
 
At 4 A. M. the train ran slowly through the 
 gates of the fortress of Thorn on the Vistula and 
 in the light of early dawn I noticed miles of pre- 
 pared trenches and barbed wire fences^ ready for 
 Russian onslaught. 
 
 After a nap of two hours the Masurian lakes 
 came into view, when the morning sun had arisen. 
 Between them black, well-tilled, rohing soil ; men, 
 women and horses at work in the fields, occasion- 
 ally a patch of timber with trees of one size and 
 then again meadows, where black and white cat- 
 tle were grazing. In all, the scenery looked like 
 a huge, well-kept park. 
 
 The express train raced on and at 8:16 a. m. 
 arrived at the last stop for civilians, the town of 
 Allenstein. 
 
 76 
 
XII 
 IN EAST PRUSSIA 
 
 One hour later on I was shown into the office 
 of General-Physician Arndt of the 20th Army 
 Corps, a tall^ kindly man in field-grey, with sharpy 
 clean-shaven features^ reminding me of the pic- 
 tures of Moltke. 
 
 Our conversation was brief. 
 
 "Your visits to our hospitals will be announced 
 by wire/' Dr. Arndt said in conclusion^ handing 
 me a passport stating that "by order of the Ger- 
 man War Office" I was allowed to visit the Re- 
 serve hospitals of the 20th Army Corps. This 
 extended North to the Baltic Sea and South to 
 the Russian border. 
 
 The door of the hotel recommended to me by 
 the adjutant of Dr. Arndt had been battered in 
 by Russian troops and the silver and linen of the 
 house had been removed by them. 
 
 "No Russian has slept here/' the oldish maid 
 laughed when she saw me scratch my head and 
 wriggle in my clothes at sight of the coverless 
 bed in my steam-heated, electrified, large room 
 with bath. ^They had no time for sleep and were 
 driven out by Hindenberg's men after a short stay 
 and a still shorter fight." 
 77 
 
An hour later on I made rounds with Dr. 
 Schroeder, in charge of the division for infectious 
 diseases in the first miHtary hospital in Allen- 
 stein. 
 
 "Our dysentery and typhoid cases sent back 
 from the front are mild so far/' he reported, "but 
 one patient has had very high fever for three days 
 and I am worried about him, and I shall be glad 
 to have your suggestions as to his case." 
 
 This patient proved to have typhoid and pneu- 
 monia of severe type. When we saw him again 
 the next day he had improved and I told him so by 
 way of encouragement, but he only answered with 
 a blank stare. 
 
 Dr. Schroeder smiled: "He does not under- 
 stand you ?' 
 
 "Have you Polish men in your army who do 
 not understand German?" I inquired. 
 
 "Oh no," my colleague answered, "this patient 
 is a Russian prisoner." 
 
 It is one thing to walk through the wards of a 
 hospital where one has given orders for twenty- 
 five years, but quite another, to go with a mili- 
 tary physician through strange wards near the 
 Russian border trying to interest him in your 
 own methods of treatment. Personality, manners 
 and the prestige of having been announced may 
 assist, but, ultimately, one has to convince the 
 German scientist by logic and result, to make him 
 coincide with your opinion. 
 78 
 
er, cheiri gun 
 
 Deutsch sprechender ainerllcanischer Arzt Dr. S e i b e r t 
 hat die Erlaubnis durch Verfugung des Kriegsn>inlsteriu^« vom 4. 
 l0.l4.Nr-.l104/l0.l4.M.A.erhalteT,,die Reservelazarette des XX. 
 Armeekorps zu besuc-hen. 
 
 Allcrstein, den 
 
 10 
 
 1914. 
 
 Generalarzt.u.stellv.Korps- 
 arzt der. XX.Armeekorps. 
 
 79 
 
Of all the work I have ever done^ that in East 
 Prussia was the hardest of all. 
 
 The delicacy of my situation as a visitor was 
 invariably relieved by the manners of the military 
 physicians who took me through their services. 
 By avoiding giving advice unless requested^ and 
 by only asking questions regarding the treatment 
 leading up to the points I wanted to make^ I suc- 
 ceeded in interesting one after another in the 
 measures I had devised and found useful. As I 
 made rounds during three days in succession^ I 
 could see that these hints were utilized effectively. 
 
 Requested to dictate, I had typewritten copies 
 made of my notes on three pages, comprising all 
 I had to suggest regarding the treatment of the 
 six "war diseases" I had experience in, and al- 
 though this was the shortest medical paper I had 
 ever written, it proved to be one of the most effec- 
 tive ones, judging by the letters and postal cards 
 I received from East Prussia. 
 
 Thus, as a medical free-lance, I went from one 
 place to another, ate my breakfasts alone, my 
 luncheons occasionally in the company of a col- 
 league, but my evening meals invariably among 
 physicians in uniform, oftentimes of a general's 
 rank, frequently feeling embarrassed because of 
 my civilian clothes and roaming occupation. Their 
 talk touched medicine, science, literature, art and 
 music, but never politics, religion or the military 
 situation of their borderland. These men doing 
 80 
 
their scientific work to friend and foe alike, ex- 
 posed daily (at that time) to another possible on- 
 slaught of the Russian army in this Northeastern 
 appendix of Germany^ were evidently so preoccu- 
 pied by their calling, that personal thoughts had 
 no room in their brains. 
 
 In all the towns children went to school every 
 morning nonconcernedly ; the stores were open, 
 and they and the streets were filled with people, 
 but, of course, many men in uniform. All ap- 
 peared busy. Loungers, like unclean streets were 
 absent, as in every German town I had visited in 
 the last forty-four years during peace time. And 
 I noticed that in the late afternoon the "buds" 
 promenaded in every town, and that, to my ana- 
 tomically trained eye, these future mothers of 
 German soldiers would win out if compared with 
 their sisters tramping Fifth Avenue^ provided the 
 judges could see them in the garb of the Venus 
 of Milo. 
 
 Strange to say, of soldiers I saw very little dur- 
 ing daytime, but about three in the morning I was 
 usually aroused by long columns stamping their 
 nail-shod boots on the pavement when passing 
 the open windows of my room, not hundreds, but 
 thousands of them, while only occasionally grey- 
 colored war cars containing officers and two pri- 
 vates with rifles in their hands, raced through the 
 streets while the sun shown. 
 
 No automobile was to be had to take me and 
 81 
 
the adjutant of General-Physician Arndt to the 
 near battlefield of Tannenberg, and all my trips 
 had to be made by rail, but again strange to re- 
 port, wherever I came to, no one requested me to 
 show my papers. 
 
 The days passed. The weather was fine and I 
 rarely had to creep into my raincoat. The food I 
 obtained in restaurants and hotels was ample, 
 well-cooked and stocked with venison, grouse and 
 hare to such extent, that I returned to ham and 
 eggs, beef steak and fried potatoes occasionally to 
 remind me of America, and all such meals for the 
 exorbitant price of two marks (48 cents). If the 
 British seriously had attempted to starve out Ger- 
 many, their gunners ought to have shot off the 
 game abounding in the forests of that country 
 before Jellicoe got the order : ^^Capture or destroy 
 the enemy." 
 
 S3 
 
XIII 
 NEAR THE RUSSIAN BORDER 
 
 The place nearest the Russian border I visited 
 toward the end of my stay was Ortelsburg, a 
 town of about 6000 inhabitants, picturesquely 
 located on one of the Masurian lakes. 
 
 After inspecting the new hospital outside of the 
 place where a professor of technology stood guard 
 in the uniform of a Landwehr private, I fell to 
 viewing the trail of the Russians, for they had 
 occupied this region during three days. 
 
 Bullet marks on the walls of the houses at the 
 Southern end of the town and large cuts in the 
 steeple and roof of the Gothic brick church made 
 by artillery, proved that fighting had been done 
 here, but the complete destruction of every house 
 along the main street by explosives and fire was 
 not done in battle. They had been one to three- 
 story modern buildings of stone and iron, and 
 each looked as though an explosion had wrecked 
 them, for the bricks and mortar lay in heaps and 
 the iron girders were bent and twisted. 
 
 Not a single house outside of this street was 
 wrecked, and not one in it had escaped complete 
 destruction. 
 
 84 
 
On inquiry^ I learned that on retiring for 
 ^^strategical reasons" from a place the Russians 
 were in the habit of marching off with a "de- 
 stroyer company" at the tail end of their column 
 composed of past-masters in the arts of incendiar- 
 ism and bomb-throwing. In this case they must 
 have been experts, for a cleaner job performed 
 within half an hour, could not be imagined. 
 
 It was market day. The wrecked street was 
 lined by dozens of wagons loaded with farm pro- 
 duce and fat geese. The Polish farmers with 
 their small horses^ Jewish traders in long curls 
 and kaftanS;, housewives with baskets and men in 
 uniform — made a fine moving picture show. 
 
 All were busy and if any were depressed, they 
 certainly did not show it. 
 
 Needless to mention, beggars were conspicuous 
 by their absence and no one offered to show the 
 sights and to tell the story. On the contrary, the 
 few natives I addressed for information gave but 
 curt answers with sarcastic smiles, as though 
 astonished to meet an idler. Men were busy re- 
 pairing the roof of the shelled church situated at 
 the Southern end of the town, and others were 
 carting away bricks of a factory ruined by Rus- 
 sian artillery. 
 
 It was a fine day, the sun was bright and a brisk 
 
 wind from the East promised good weather. 
 
 Passing out of the place I wandered due South 
 
 for miles to reach a hill in the distance, expecting 
 
 85 
 
a good view of the landscape. Along the road 
 small farm houses reminded me of America and 
 I stopped occasionally to talk to the women of the 
 farmers. Not given by nature to probe into pri- 
 vate affairs, the advice of a newspaper correspon- 
 dent from Koenigsberg to question the women 
 and not the men^ had been remembered. The 
 women invariably stated that the Russian soldiers 
 had demanded bread with pistols drawn^ because 
 they were hungry and their tins, supplied by their 
 government, had oftentimes contained sand in- 
 stead of food. The women had placed pictures 
 of Catholic saints in their windows, illumined by 
 candles in the evening. Of a dozen of these 
 Polish females but one reported that a Russian 
 >had misbehaved, and that, on complaining to an 
 officer, the culprit had been whipped with a knute 
 (horse-whip) so that the blood streamed from his 
 face. 
 
 A barn near the hill I was making for attracted 
 my attention. It was stocked with grain and 
 three children were playing hide and seek around 
 it and through abandoned trenches, the oldest a 
 blond-haired girl of eleven. 
 
 Their mother expressed the belief that the Rus- 
 sians did not burn the barn because their trenches 
 did not reach up to it and were the first to be 
 emptied when Hindenberg's men drove them out. 
 The blond hair and fair skin of her daughter 
 were accounted for by the fact that her father 
 ^7 
 
was a blond German, now in the army^ of course. 
 
 ^^She takes after him and the boys after me/^ 
 the PoHsh mother remarked with a sad smile. 
 
 ''^And how did you like the Russian soldiers?" 
 I inquired of the girl. 
 
 "I never saw them !" the young miss answered 
 vigorously. "Mother kept me under the potatoes 
 in the cellar for three days^ till they had gone." 
 
 The woman stared in open fright at her child 
 and began to scold her in Polish. 
 
 "Stop that !" I interrupted her, placing my arm 
 around the weeping child. "I'm not a Russian 
 border spy, but a physician. The Sister Superior 
 of the hospital I serve in across the ocean gave 
 me her blessing and came out to the sidewalk to 
 see me off. Here is her signature !" 
 
 "I see the Cross and the seal !" the border 
 woman murmured^ staring at the document. "It 
 must be true what you say and Tm glad you 
 came. You are under oath. Will you listen and 
 tell no one?" 
 
 I nodded, and she crumpled all up in a heap 
 on the wall of a trench and without a tear, told 
 her story of the three days of Russian occupa- 
 tion. 
 
 And while I listened the shine of the sun turned 
 grey, the beauty of the landscape vanished, my 
 spine grew cold, the ground under me seemed to 
 melt away, and all my pride of being a man left 
 me, for at last I had been brought face to face 
 89 
 
with the naked, scientific fact that, unless under 
 iron restraint, the human animal is worse than the 
 wildest brute. 
 
 Leaving the border woman, her children and 
 the barn, I wandered toward the distant hill me- 
 chanically until, at last, four fresh graves, adorned 
 by crosses and flowers aroused me, at a crossing 
 of the road. A sergeant and three privates of 
 the 176th infantry regiment had fallen and been 
 buried here, a wooden tablet stated. And I sat 
 down and stared at those graves with envy in my 
 heart, because I was not in one of them. 
 
 "The 176th Infantry!" I soliloquized. ''I know 
 the 143d, have seen it march, have heard its band 
 play and was present when the youngest lady of 
 that regiment was married shortly before this 
 war, in a Madison Avenue church. Also I know 
 her grave so near the Western front that she can 
 hear the boom of the cannon by day and by 
 night, while her young husband is seeking a sol- 
 dier's death in battle.^' 
 
 It might have been minutes but it felt like a 
 half century that I sat there, staring Eastward 
 toward Russia, when a sound reached my ear 
 which instantly recalled the boyish time during 
 which I rode broncho ponies near the Mississippi, 
 — the click of a horse's shoe against a stone, and, 
 sure enough, a troop of cavalry in field-grey, 
 lances in hand, were coming up the hill. 
 
 Arising, I awaited meeting them and when they 
 90 
 
drew nearer I heard their horses pant, but sud- 
 denly their leader turned into a road running due 
 South, and he and his troop vanished over the 
 hill, like a spectre in broad day-light. 
 
 In the busy restaurant of the hotel in Ortels- 
 burg I joined two middle aged civilians waiting 
 to be served. They had been among the soldiers 
 in the trenches at Suwalki and Stalluponen and 
 had taken pictures with a large camera. Notic- 
 ing my interest in the feeding and sanitary well- 
 fare of the soldiers, they gradually dropped their 
 reserve and gave me valuable information on 
 these subjects. They appeared well pleased with 
 the manner in which the common soldiers were 
 fed and taken care of, but I pricked my ears when 
 one of them said : 
 
 ^'Not so along the Austrian front! There the 
 men are suffering from the inefficiency of their 
 officers who allowed the Russians to cross the 
 Carpathian mountains. They have no system ?' 
 
 The man's eyes flashed and his companion gave 
 him a dig with his elbow. Just then a waiter 
 arrived with our soup. 
 
 "Before you join our meal you must learn that 
 we are Social-Democratic members of the Reichs- 
 tag (parliament)," one of the men addressed me. 
 
 "Impossible!" I exclaimed, astonished. 
 
 "Why do you doubt it?" the man inquired. 
 
 "Because you do not exist any more," I re- 
 plied. "You are dead ! All of you were shot at 
 91 
 
the outbreak of this war by order of the Kaiser. 
 You can^t fool me ! Fm a New Yorker and I 
 have read our papers, the best on earth. When 
 the New York Chimes, the New York Earth, the 
 New York Typhoon, the New York Holder and, 
 last but not least — the Evening Boast have all 
 stated that you are in Heaven^ how can you be 
 here in Ortelsburg hungry for soup and roast 
 goose? But, if you don^t mind, Fll run the risk 
 to dine with your ghosts !" 
 
 Then we shook hands, had a hearty laugh and 
 a good meal. 
 
 92 
 
XIV 
 FICTION FACTORIES 
 
 The tables reserved for the military physicians 
 in a corner of the restaurant "Zur Traube" in 
 Allenstein that evening were surrounded by quite 
 a gathering, for Prof. Wernicke, now General- 
 Physician and Chief Bacteriological Inspector of 
 the entire Eastern front, was present. A large 
 man of fifty-six, with a clean-shaven, broad 
 countenance. 
 
 ''So you came from America?" he inquired 
 when Dr. Schroeder had introduced me; "then 
 you must sit on the sofa next to me." And with- 
 out further ceremony he placed me to the right 
 of the only civilian aside of myself, a man with 
 sharp features and eye-glasses, who sat at the 
 head of the table next to General-Physician 
 Arndt. 
 
 While the bill of fare was consulted Wernicke 
 dilated on America and reported on the splendid 
 reception the scientific men and the Health au- 
 thorities of New York had given him in 1893, 
 mentioning incidents, names, and places I was 
 well acquainted with. All this with so much 
 warm feeling, high expectations and good wishes 
 93 
 
in 
 
for the future of the United States, that he al- 
 most brought tears to my eyes. 
 
 A waiter^ placing a partridge before me, inter- 
 rupted and told him^ that I had been given the 
 last bird at hand. 
 
 "Here's the illustration of an American !" the 
 scientist laughed with a slap on my shoulder. "He 
 has ordered his bird before he sat down." 
 
 "I am innocent/' I protested, "for Dr. Schroe- 
 der, who took me here to-night, knew that a 
 Masurian lake partridge would suit me better on 
 my last evening in East Prussia than ham and 
 eggs." 
 
 "Where did you come from to-night ?" General- 
 Physician iVrndt inquired, and I told him. 
 
 "Send him to Stalluponen and Suwalki where 
 he can see sights, compared to which Ortelsburg 
 is a paradise !" Wernicke broke in, munching his 
 food. 
 
 "I am bound to my instructions from the War 
 Office," Dr. Arndt answered with a shrug of his 
 shoulders. 
 
 "You had better curtail the roaming of your 
 visitor," the civilian remarked, "for to-day he was 
 not far from the Kossacks ! His American pass- 
 port would not have prevented them from shoot- 
 ing him as a spy, or from sending him to Siberia, 
 if they had caught him." 
 
 Prof. Wernicke had finished his meal and 
 looked contented. 
 
 95 
 
^'^Nothing of that sort would have happened to 
 him!^' he laughed. "The certificate from his 
 Catholic hospital would have prevented it. — But 
 to change the subject: Why do American papers 
 print this rubbish about German atrocities and 
 treat us like enemies ? I was completely surprised 
 when I heard of itP 
 
 "If you were, I was not," I answered feeling 
 very uncomfortable, "for I could not expect of 
 them in wartime what they never practised during 
 the forty-four years of peace, namely, to show 
 fair play to Germany ! You and the German 
 authors who wrote books on America obtained 
 your knowledge in weeks of travel and at dinners 
 given in your and their honor, while I have read 
 New York newspapers and magazines during half 
 a century and I can prove from their files that 
 their attitude toward everything German has in- 
 variably been maliciously hostile, an occasional, 
 condescending article on music, art or science not- 
 withstanding. This press campaign began in 
 1864 and flourished grotesquely while the Ger- 
 mans fought the French in 1870." 
 
 "That was during wartime when people are ex- 
 cited," Wernicke replied. "Can you give me facts 
 during times of peace to illustrate your asser- 
 tion?" 
 
 "Certainly, and I will begin with one which 
 concerns you personally," I answered. "Twenty 
 years ago Emil Behring published his invention 
 96 
 
of a curative serum against diphtheria^ the great- 
 est remedy ever devised by human effort. You 
 had materially assisted him in this for years. 
 Nine months later on, in December of 1894, the 
 Nezv York Herald, our foremost daily, printed 
 long articles with large headlines for weeks, re- 
 questing contributions for the manufacture of this 
 great remedy invented by — Prof. Roux in Paris ! 
 The medical advisory committee, indorsing these 
 statements in each article, comprised the names 
 of prominent local physicians, some of which had 
 received their bacteriological training in Berlin, 
 but recently. When at last a friend of mine went 
 to the office of the Herald and threatened to have 
 the editor denounced ^f or willfully spreading scien- 
 tific falsehoods' in the next meeting of the New 
 York Academy of Medicine, this paper published 
 a cablegram from Prof. Roux, in French and in 
 English, the next morning disclaiming any par- 
 ticipation in, and giving sole credit to, Behring 
 of Berlin, for the discovery of this so-called anti- 
 toxin, but in an editorial of the same issue Prof. 
 Roux was lauded to the sky for not having taken 
 the chance for stealing this honor from a German 
 and, nonconcernedly, the Herald kept on from day 
 to day to solicit alms for the manufacture of Prof. 
 Roux's great remedy.^' 
 
 Conversation had ceased when Prof. Wernicke 
 put the question and all listened attentively while 
 he was being answered but when I had finished, 
 97 
 
much to my surprise, a merry laughter from all 
 around that table broke the silence. 
 
 "This is very funny !" the big scientist spurted 
 out while wiping the tears from his cheeks. "Have 
 you more such stories to tell?" 
 
 "Yes !" I answered soberly. "When the New 
 York steamer General Slocum, containing fifteen 
 hundred women, children and men of a German 
 Lutheran Sunday School excursion burned in the 
 East River on June 15th, 1904, with a loss of over 
 one thousand lives, the New York papers pro- 
 claimed her captain a %ero' before the victims of 
 his negligence had been counted. I was at the 
 dock that evening and the next morning for 
 hours, and examined hundreds of burned and 
 drowned human remnants of this atrocity. The 
 then United States government, in charge of all 
 steamboat inspection, made light work of this 
 affair for the Slocum 'hero' of the New York 
 press. Captain van Schaik, was pardoned after a 
 short imprisonment so he could marry the nurse 
 who pulled him out of the water. He was a 
 descendant of an old Dutch New York family, 
 while the victims of his and his government's 
 negligence were but Germans and their children.'* 
 
 "When the Titanic had been driven into ice and 
 sunk by her English captain in spite of the wire- 
 less warnings he had received the same day, with 
 a loss of fifteen hundred lives including many 
 Americans, the New York papers instantly pro- 
 98 
 
claimed him a 'hero' and asserted in big headlines 
 for days, that German steamers near, did not 
 come to the rescue. When the Congressional in- 
 vestigation, conducted in Washington, proved this 
 to be malicious falsehood and that the only vessel 
 which could have saved all lives, being even near 
 enough to see the Titanic s skyrockets, had been 
 the English steamer Calif ornian, the New York 
 papers did not report this in large headlines on 
 their front pages, but in very small print, inside 
 of their sheets. 
 
 "When the Viturno was on fire in mid-ocean 
 during a gale (in October, 1913) with eight steam- 
 ers around her, the men of the English Cunarder 
 did not succeed in reaching her, for they picked 
 up but one man drifting near their own vessel in 
 life-belts and their captain steamed away, while 
 the sailors of German steamers succeeded in tak- 
 ing off the imperilled passengers and crew. Mean- 
 while, the New York papers printed the following 
 headlines: 'The German crew of the burning 
 Viturno in cowardly mutiny V ' The captain of 
 the English Cunarder Carmonia is directing the 
 rescue work of all the steamers near from his 
 bridge ! ' And, of course, they pronounced him 
 the 'hero,' while the German sailors of the 
 Grosser Kurfuerst received not a word of praise 
 when they landed the women, children and men 
 they had succeeded in rescuing at the risk of their 
 lives, after the English had failed !" 
 99 
 
No laughter rent the air this time around that 
 table; instead^ one could' have heard the proverbial 
 pin drop. 
 
 ^'But why this animosity?'^ the civilian inquired 
 at last. 
 
 "Upon my v^ord of honor^ I do not know !" I 
 replied. "Of course, hearsay has reached my ears 
 during many years concerning the motives of 
 the New York fiction-factories, the galley-slave 
 work of their poorly paid editorial writers, and 
 the antecedents of their wealthy owners, but, 
 as a scientist, I report but on proven facts.'' 
 
 "But will not the Americans of German blood 
 be a strong factor in ultimately moulding the 
 opinion of your nation as to our cause in this 
 war !" Dr. Schroeder inquired. 
 
 "Certainly not while it lasts !" I answered. "On 
 the contrary, their attempts at this, although 
 praiseworthy, will but increase the hostility of the 
 English-American press and not win over a 
 baker's dozen of so-called neutrals, and when this 
 war is over, Germany will not need sympathy, I 
 take it." 
 
 Dr. Schroeder saw me back to my hotel that 
 evening. 
 
 "Who was the civilian next to me ?" I inquired. 
 
 "One of the highest officials of this province," 
 he answered, mentioning his name and title 
 (which I have forgotten). "Wernicke placed you 
 to his right, to do you honor." 
 100 
 
Of all the medical men I had met in East Prus- 
 sia, Dr. Schroeder had attracted me most, not 
 because he had received me better than others, for 
 he had not; not because he was a modern physi- 
 cian, hygienist and bacteriologist, for all others 
 I met were likewise; and not because he had 
 given up his practice to serve his country and to 
 support his wife and two children on the salary 
 of a reserve army surgeon amounting to 20' marks 
 (five dollars) a day, for many hundreds of his 
 colleagues were doing the same; but because this 
 typical Prussian in appearance, manner and char- 
 acter resembled the dearest friend I had during 
 the years I studied at a Germany university, John 
 Holding, a full-blooded Englishman from Cape- 
 town, South Africa, who fell two years after we 
 parted as British army surgeon, while England 
 was fighting the impies of the Zulus under their 
 chieftain Cetchwago, in 1879. 
 
 101 
 
XV 
 AMONG WOUNDED 
 
 When about to step into the only cab left in 
 Allenstein to reach the railway station the next 
 afternoon, a Red Cross nurse addressed me : 
 
 "Please take me along, for I have to accompany 
 wounded officers to Berlin !^' 
 
 "Self-understood/' I answered handing her in 
 after raising my hat, for her speech and manner 
 betrayed the woman of culture used to command. 
 
 After relieving her embarrassment by mention- 
 ing my calling, but without name or country, and 
 praising the odd beauty of the surrounding 
 Masurian lake region (for her dialect told me 
 that she was an East Prussian), the lady dilated 
 on that subject with a grateful glance until we 
 reached the station. 
 
 Alone in my compartment of the express I 
 walked the floor for an hour thinking, with the 
 conclusion that another old theory had been 
 proven wrong, for if physicians had no families, 
 I could have gone from the reserve lazarets of 
 one army corps to those of many others, all win- 
 ter long. 
 
 "Will you take coffee?" a very young waiter 
 inquired at the door of the compartment. 
 102 
 
"Of course/' I answered, "but where does it 
 come from?" 
 
 "From the dining car/' the boy answered. 
 
 "That means progress !" I mused while sipping 
 the excellent beverage. 
 
 For weeks I had not read a newspaper and had 
 but looked at the pictures of illustrated journals. 
 The result was like dropping tobacco, alcohol, 
 ice-cream and candy, attending church or the 
 meetings of medical societies, for a while. 
 
 I can recommend this cure for "nev/spaper- 
 itis'' to my fellow townsmen, the perusal of the 
 editorials of the Evening Boast excepted, which 
 may replace the sleeping powders made in Ger- 
 many. 
 
 When the tea came with the fried potatoes and 
 steak in the diner, I sent it back and asked for a 
 pint of wine from the banks of the Rhine. 
 
 "May I give this tea to a wounded soldier?'' 
 the waiter inquired. 
 
 "If you add sandwiches enough to make a 
 meal," I answered. "How many wounded are on 
 board of this train?" 
 
 "About two dozen, aside of the officers." 
 
 "When will they get their suppers?" 
 
 "At 1 A. M., in Berlin !" It was 6 p. m. 
 
 "Call the head waiter/' I concluded the conver- 
 sation and, after a consultation with this official, 
 left the diner. 
 
 In the corridor the Red Cross nurse I had taken 
 103 
 
to the station in Allenstein asked me to look at 
 one of the wounded officers in her charge who 
 had a fever. The patient, a first Heutenant of the 
 reserve from Hamburg, had his left shattered 
 hand and forearm in bandages, but his fever had 
 another source, which to a measure, could be re- 
 moved. He had lain forty-eight hours on an 
 Eastern battlefield without food or drink before 
 he was found five days ago, and he told me of a 
 letter from his brother serving in another regi- 
 ment, he had with him, which reached him a week 
 after the writer had fallen. 
 
 On the other couch rested a captain with five 
 bullet wounds through his right leg, without fever 
 and in splendid humor. He was a professional 
 soldier and an aristocrat, larger than his comrade, 
 with a voice like a fog-horn, and I noticed that 
 he treated the nurse with marked deference. 
 
 The latter sat on a camp chair at the window 
 and I on another near the door. The lady looked 
 tired and worn out. 
 
 "You must have a nap ! I have compartment 
 No. 4 in the next car. My overcoat will serve 
 you for cover and I will stay here and attend to 
 your patients,'^ I told her. 
 
 The nurse arose with a weary smile. 
 
 "I will obey your orders for an hour." 
 
 After readjusting the feverish man's pillows 
 and giving him a tablet, I turned down the light, 
 opened the window, told the aristocrat that his 
 104 
 
comrade needed sleep, took the well hand of the 
 patient and commanded : "Shut your eyes and go 
 to sleep. I will stay with you until you awake." 
 
 The train raced on ; the wounded warriors 
 snored; the nurse slept under the ulster in my 
 compartment, while I held the hand of a wounded 
 man of my race as though he was my son^ and 
 the reminiscenses of a long life passed through 
 my brain. 
 
 After an hour the Red Cross nurse reappeared 
 and smilingly said : "The corridor is lined with 
 soldiers. They asked for you, Doctor." 
 
 When I returned the captain exclaimed : 
 
 "Thunder-weather ! What entitled you to take 
 off a parade of our men on this train?" 
 
 "Nothing worth mentioning," I answered with 
 a blush. 
 
 "Your report does not coincide with the Doc- 
 tor's answer, Countess !" the officer remarked 
 curtly but with twinkling eyes. "He is an out- 
 lander and this is wartime." 
 
 "My only title while in uniform, Captain, is 
 ' Sister Marie,' as you ought not to forget," the 
 Countess replied wnth shining eyes. Her weari- 
 ness had evidently disappeared entirely. "Yes, 
 Doctor, your fellow-conspirator, the head waiter 
 of the diner, gave you away when he found me 
 instead of you in compartment No. 4, and he gave 
 me a full account of how your twenty-five wound- 
 ed guests cleaned out his entire supply of Wiener 
 105 . 
 
schnitzel in the diner^ and how he and his help 
 had to carve for and feed those, who had both 
 hands bandaged. They all behaved very modest 
 and ate moderately, although they could order 
 whatever and as much as they pleased. Each one 
 took two cigars^ but all refused the two bottles of 
 beer you had ordered. They will certainly remem- 
 ber this meal, their first repast in a dining car." 
 
 '^So you had ordered beer?'^ the captain 
 laughed. "Don't you know that it is forbidden 
 to give alcohol to the wounded?" 
 
 "Yes !*' I replied, "but I'm sorry they did not 
 drink it. I'm an American. Nothing pleases us 
 more than to disobey. It is a habit with us. In 
 this case I would have even taken my chances be- 
 fore a German court, for I could have easily con- 
 vinced the judge that I had acted in an emergency 
 because I am the only physician on the train." 
 
 "Very good !" the captain roared. "Could you 
 not make an emergency case of me?" 
 
 "No sir!" I replied. "You do not look worn 
 out enough for a stimulant." 
 
 "Pardon me," he continued, "but was it not 
 also an extravagant American idea to spend a 
 small fortune for these men in the diner, instead 
 of dividing the money among them?" 
 
 "No !" I answered with emphasis. "I have paid 
 off an old debt I owed the fathers of these sol- 
 diers. When sent to Germany for the first time 
 I arrived in Hamburg two days after the French 
 106 
 
declaration of war, July 21st, 1870, and could ob- 
 tain no railway ticket. Being a little chap, aged 
 fifteen, 1 jumped into a train filled with soldiers 
 bound for the front when evening came and no 
 official was looking and begged them to take me 
 along because I came from America. They did. 
 In the morning I had to get out and say ^ Good- 
 bye,^ which gave me the chance to inspect an- 
 other German town during day-time, but at night 
 I jumped into another military train with the 
 same result, and a third time the next evening. 
 During three nights I travelled with German plain 
 soldiers. They hid, fed and protected me; lis- 
 tened to my descriptions of transatlantic life, and 
 when sleepy, bedded me on their laps covered by 
 an overcoat and even stopped smoking while I 
 slept. The cars were third-class, with wooden 
 benches, and the compartments were lighted by 
 small oil lamps, but my sleep was invariably 
 sound and refreshing. I do not recall a single 
 oath or vulgar talk and not the slightest sign of 
 drunkenness, although beer was not Werboten' 
 during that mobilization. No ! If I had accom- 
 plished nothing more on this trip than to pay off, 
 in so small a manner, this indebtedness to the sons 
 of the men who treated the little American 
 stranger with so much kindness forty-four years 
 ago during wartime, I would be satisfied." 
 
 There was a short silence in that compartment, 
 107 
 
after which the wounded aristocrat extended his 
 hand to press mine : 
 
 "In my thoughts, I have to beg off much." 
 
 'Tlease continue, Doctor !" his feverish com- 
 rade murmured. "While you talk I feel no 
 pain." 
 
 And I told them of my last trip across the At- 
 lantic and of Miss Whieting, for they were young 
 people, as yet inclined to romance, and none of 
 them had ever been at sea. 
 
 "Your story reminds me of the novel, My Offi- 
 cial WifeT the patient exclaimed excitedly. 
 "Have you read it?" 
 
 "No," I replied. "Since long novels have 
 ceased to interest me, because most authors have 
 no correct knowledge of what they report on and 
 usually deviate from reality, like the playwrights, 
 who let their heroes or villains die on the stage in 
 ridiculously impossible manner. Fiction is mis- 
 leading and harmful, like smoking opium." 
 
 "You are a callous medical man !" the captain 
 laughed. "How could we go through life without 
 delusion ?" 
 
 "Much better!" I repHed drily. "Delusions, 
 caused by fictitious novels, have brought this war 
 about ! Science will win and end it." 
 
 A guard came along the corridor announcing: 
 
 "Berlin !" Time had passed quickly. 
 
 The officers were bound for the second and I 
 for the third station of that city. After the fever- 
 108 
 
ish lieutenant had been placed on a stretcher in 
 the Friederichstrasse Bahnhof, attempts were 
 made by sanitarians to bring out the aristocrat 
 with his plastered leg but without success until 
 his soldier-servant^ a giant hursche, brushed 
 them aside without ceremony and took the patient 
 into his arms^ like a mother her child. 
 
 "He needs no assistance ?^ the captain remarked 
 cheerfully. ^'He can carry me out alone, for he 
 carried me from the battlefield under fire.^^ 
 
 While placing- my last cigarette between the lips 
 of the patient on the stretcher, the nurse who had 
 meanwhile stood among some elderly officers, 
 rushed up to me and extended both hands. 
 
 "Sometime in life, I hope to meet you again !" 
 
 "Don't keep the Doctor, Countess/' the lieuten- 
 ant called out, "his train is in motion !" 
 
 Jumping on the running-board, I remained 
 there holding up my hand, until the wounded and 
 their nurse were out of sight. 
 
 109 
 
XVI 
 COMMUTING SWISS SOLDIERS 
 
 After spending one day in making a contract 
 with a large chemical firm for the manufacture 
 of a certain remedy of my own device, so, that my 
 profits went to the widows and orphans of fallen 
 soldiers through the War Office, I spent the sec- 
 ond in looking up the Social-Democratic members 
 of the Reichstag I had met in East Prussia; ad- 
 mired the buildings the workmen of Berlin had 
 put up; still more what I learned of their organ- 
 ization; lunched in the Rathskeller with one of 
 them, and wound up the day by inspecting the 
 ^''twelve worst dwellings in Berlin" under the 
 guidance of one of his subordinates. 
 
 Nine of these habitations in old houses were 
 within a rifle shot of the Kaiser's palace, waiting 
 to be torn down for the high prices their owners 
 demand. In the oldest three rickety stairs led up 
 to below the roof, where two old men, skilled but 
 roaming workmen, (handwerksburschen) , were 
 waiting for the death of old age in a toy bed- 
 room and kitchen. Both appeared contented and 
 looked very much alike, so as to recall to my 
 memory the description of the monks Bertram 
 and Sintram in Freytag's Nest der Zaunkoenige, 
 110 
 
who lived in the convent of Herolfsfeld-on-the- 
 Fulda in Hessia nine hundred years ago. 
 
 In but one of the nine famihes I found dis- 
 order, because the mother of three anemic chil- 
 dren was hysterical. Her husband was at the 
 front. 
 
 The three dwellings in the modern districts 
 were janitor lodgings, in the basements of tene- 
 ments. Again in one of them disorder, due to 
 hysteria. 
 
 "You have seen our worst dwellings,'^ my 
 young guide remarked, after we had climbed out 
 of the last basement. "None of the people in 
 them starve. No sickness is tolerated at home, 
 for all patients are sent to our hospitals, but we 
 cannot change the character of some of the 
 mothers.''^ 
 
 "How about alcoholism among the women ?'^ I 
 inquired. 
 
 "That is practically unknown in Berlin," the 
 guide answered. 
 
 Evening had come before we were through and 
 the electric street lights began to burn. Of course 
 I had lost my bearings, for we had been four 
 hours under way. 
 
 "Would you mind walking with me to the 
 centre of the town and answer my questions?" I 
 inquired. 
 
 "Certainly not," my guide answered. "I am 
 under orders." 
 
 Ill 
 
To those of my fellow-townsmen who care to 
 learn the naked truth about the conditions of the 
 laboring class in large cities, I can but recommend 
 visiting the twelve worst dwellings in New York, 
 in London and in Berlin after this war is over, 
 for then the editorials of their newspaper on the 
 difference between English "culture" and German 
 "Kultur" will not impress them. And if they go 
 a bit further and spend a week in each town, they 
 will find ragged children and drunken women but 
 in London; more bath-tubs in New York City 
 (with the finest plumbing and the filthiest, ty- 
 phoid-soaked water) than in Great Britain, and 
 the most contented, patriotic workmen in Berlin. 
 
 While travelling South I saw a train filled with 
 French military surgeons and nurses in uniform, 
 bound for the prisoner's camp near Cassel, in 
 Hessia. They had come in exchange. German 
 boys, wearing caps of their college classes, were 
 trying their French on the hereditary foes of their 
 race at the windows of the cars. At last ! If 
 time had permitted I would have gone over to 
 shake hands with my French colleagues, but al- 
 though this was impossible, my pride of being a 
 physician rose to its normal level for the first time 
 since this war started ! The English had not taken 
 German physicians ofif neutral steamers, and the 
 French government had released the captured 
 German military physicians condemned to prison, 
 for theft, because they had taken French wine 
 112 
 
for their patients; and again I held my head 
 erect, for as long as scientific men dealing out 
 their knowledge to friend and foe alike are im- 
 mune against arbitrary military power, so-called 
 civilization has not been extinguished among the 
 warring nations^ entirely. 
 
 Some few days later on, my international son- 
 in-law and I were tramping the road between 
 Ludwigshoehe, Germany, and Basel, Switzerland, 
 a mile away, in a driving rain, after our passports 
 had been inspected, stamped and countersigned at 
 the last German railway station. A small boy 
 was running ahead with our luggage on a small 
 wagon. 
 
 The border of Switzerland was barricaded by a 
 fence made of twigs and shrubbery, which any 
 Texas steer could have trampled down. The 
 Swiss, apparently, were very much afraid of Ger- 
 man transgression of their border. 
 
 A young German officer again asked for our 
 passports on the verandah of a small house, half 
 Swiss and half German. Bareheaded and drip- 
 ping wet, I handed him the first paper of the 
 bunch in my overcoat pocket. It happened to be 
 my free-pass issued in East Prussia, by order of 
 the German War Office. 
 
 "But where are you bound for now, Doctor ?'' 
 he inquired with an intonation of reproach. 
 
 "To where my wife and children live across the 
 ocean/' I replied harshly while looking straight 
 113 
 
into his eyes. We stared at one another for some 
 time, until the young warrior at last stiffened up, 
 clicked his heels together and saluted. 
 
 '^'^Ah ! I understand now. Good voyage !" 
 
 During wartime I went into and came out of 
 Germany, without the border guards ever looking 
 at my passport. 
 
 Silence reigned in the carriage hurrying toward 
 Basel, but at last my companion placed his hand 
 on my arm. 
 
 "Do not talk to me!'^ I spurted out. "Like a 
 coward Tm leaving the people of my race hedged 
 in by foes instead of shaving my beard off, joining 
 their men in the trenches, and reaching an honest 
 death in battle !" 
 
 "Some members of your family were afraid 
 that you might do this,^^ my companion answered, 
 "but I knew better. Men of your age, experience, 
 knowledge and kind disposition, will be inval- 
 uable in bringing the nations together again after 
 this war is over." 
 
 We were the only guests in the largest hotel 
 of Basel that night, and a train took us through 
 the tunnel under the St. Gotthard in sixteen min- 
 utes the next day, while it had taken Hannibal 
 fifteen days to cross the Alps (over the small St. 
 Bernard) 219 years before the birth of Christ, 
 but, of course, he had 102,000 men and Z7 ele- 
 phants with him. The modern Swiss had not 
 been afraid to have their Alpine barriers toward 
 114 
 
Italy pierced under the Gotthard and the Simplon, 
 as the British the mud under the Channel, for 
 they knew that a tunnel could be blocked in 
 few seconds during wartime, and that an army 
 from the South could no more cross their Alps 
 to-day, than those of their Austrian kinsmen in 
 the Tyrol. 
 
 If the British had reasoned likewise years ago, 
 their troops and war material could reach the 
 Western war front in as many hours as it must 
 take them days, now. 
 
 Such a drastic change in weather, scenery and 
 inhabitants, as occurred between the Northern 
 and Southern end of the St. Gotthard tunnel after 
 one-fourth of an hour's ride in the dark, I dare 
 say, may not present itself to the traveller else- 
 where on earth, for while North of the Alps we 
 encountered early morning fog, occasional rain 
 and but now and then a chilly peep of the sun: 
 saw the Northern villages and shepherd huts of 
 the mountaineers ready for winter ; the Germanic 
 featured and framed inhabitants going to church 
 and their uniformed young men entering and 
 leaving the train without noise or bravado horse- 
 play, — South of the mountain the cars raced 
 down hill through hot sunshine; past vineclad 
 huts, yellow houses, villages, towns and ruins of 
 old castles, while the young men in Swiss uniform 
 not alone conversed in loud Italian but also with 
 their hands, shoulders and facial muscles, and the 
 115 
 
prim cleanliness of Northern Switzerland had dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 "Swiss friends reported that their government 
 employ their Italian-speaking soldiers on the 
 Northern front^ and their Germanic men along 
 the Southern border^ during this mobilization !" I 
 addressed my companion, on returning from a 
 lengthy conversation with the conductor of the 
 train in the corridor, to our compartment. "What 
 I have seen so far^ looks like the reverse/^ 
 
 "You forget that this is Sunday/^ my son-in- 
 law replied with one of his most sarcastic laughs. 
 "The mobilized Swiss militiamen commute at 
 week-ends to meet their wives or sweethearts, for 
 from North to South, one can travel through this 
 toy country with a good train in six hours.'^ 
 
 116 
 
XVII 
 A FAMILIAR ODOR 
 
 My companion passed the Italian border guard 
 (a civilian with piercing, black eyes and long 
 mustache under a broad, soft hat) at Chiasso 
 readily, after presenting his American passport 
 bedecked by many endorsements of foreign con- 
 suls, but I was turned back with the sweep of an 
 arm because my passport had not been endorsed 
 by an Italian consul, and the one nearest resided 
 in Lugano, twenty miles to the rear. 
 
 "You turn him back?'^ my companion ex- 
 claimed with a dive for his purse. "Why he is 
 an old man and my father-in-law !" 
 
 For the first time during fifteen years of ac- 
 quaintance I saw this scientific vendor of subter- 
 ranean American produce lose his calm manner, 
 so that I burst into a loud laugh in which the 
 border guard and the interpreter joined heartily. 
 
 And so we parted, he to go on to Rome and I 
 to return to Lugano and to lose an entire day, for 
 but one train left the Swiss border for Genoa 
 during twenty-four hours. 
 
 That evening I sat on the balcony of a hotel 
 room facing Lugano Lake after enjoying a lonely 
 117 
 
twilight roam through the old town with its nar- 
 row, winding streets, quaint Italian houses and 
 purely Italian inhabitants and along the lonely 
 promenade on the lake front with its closed hotels 
 and tourist offices, and back to the ghastly solitude 
 of the large dining room and corridors of the 
 hostelry, where the sound of one^s footstep echoed 
 sharply through the grave-like silence. 
 
 The air was calm and quiet. No leaf on the 
 trees along the lake front was moving and, but 
 now and then, the shrill tone from a steamer 
 whistle sounded through the night from afar like 
 the screech of some giant bird of prey. 
 
 At last the moon arose from beyond the moun- 
 tains across the deserted lake shining through the 
 hazy atmosphere like a large, yellow coin of gold 
 dipped in blood, and, gradually, an odor of 
 mouldy decay crept into my nostrils, at first at- 
 tributed to the dead autumnal leaves on the 
 ground below, but a strangely familiar blend in 
 it aroused me so that I drew in the air deeply, 
 resulting in the conviction, that this smell of the 
 dissecting room emanated from the many dead 
 lying unburied on the battlefields of the Alsace for 
 days and weeks, not many miles away. 
 
 Of all the atrocities alleged to have been com- 
 mitted during this war, the desertion of the 
 wounded on the battlefields between the lines to 
 slowly die of thirst, starvation and wound fever, 
 and of the dead to rot and to pollute the atmos- 
 118 
 
phere— for military reasons, is the one which will 
 but bring utmost contempt to the minds of the 
 scientific men of all nations later on, and the 
 names of the commanders responsible for it, will, 
 at best, be doomed by them to fameless oblivion. 
 
 The next afternoon the Italian border guard at 
 Chiasso greeted me with a smile, dofifed his hat 
 and took one of my cigarettes when I passed him 
 with my endorsed passport. A young Genoese 
 lawyer entertained me in conversation during the 
 hours our train ran over the plains of Northern 
 Italy where hundreds of battles, known to history, 
 had been fought by the Punic Hannibal, the Ro- 
 man Caesar, the Gothic Alarich, the Corsican Na- 
 poleon and his small nephew Louis, and, when 
 again alone beyond Milano, I was wondering if 
 this most blood-stained patch of Europe would 
 not obtain its accustomed toll of this fluid before 
 the peace treaty of this war had been ratified. 
 
 The next morning early I walked up hill along 
 the street-car tracks of Genoa to the end of the 
 line and beyond, to obtain a good view of the 
 town and harbor, until stopped by a sentinel, and 
 for hours I tramped through the streets to see, to 
 read and to listen. 
 
 The view was fine, what I read was bad, and 
 what I heard was worse. 
 
 On returning to my hotel I heard that my 
 trunk, checked from Basel to Genoa two days 
 ago, had not arrived. Although the reputation of 
 119 
 
Italian railways regarding the care of baggagge 
 was not the best^ I knew also that my trunk had 
 a habit of playing "hide-and-seek'^ with me when 
 not on American or German ships or soil^ and 
 after I reported this fact to the baggage-master 
 at the station with my best smile and friendliest 
 manner without effect, I changed my tone^ man- 
 ner and speech and gave him five minutes by my 
 watch to produce that trunk, or to prepare for a 
 much warmer climate than that of Italy — and he 
 took the first alternative speedily. 
 
 In my hotel room half of the vagrant's lock 
 fell into my hand^ so that at la^^t I understood the 
 remark made by the young Genoese lawyer in the 
 train after he had listened to my experience at the 
 border : 
 
 '^My people did not know who you were yes- 
 terday, but they know to-day." 
 
 No wonder ! 
 
 120 
 
XVIII 
 NOBLE GRATITUDE 
 
 While watching the arrival of the steerageis 
 from the deck of the Due a D'Aosta, about to leave 
 for New York, a man with mutton-chop whiskers 
 and thin lips addressed me in Londonish English : 
 
 ^^Have you a coin left for the Salvation Army?" 
 
 "Certainly/' I replied^ dropping some silver 
 into his tin. 
 
 "When you say your prayer, on retiring, I 
 hope you will pray for the success of the Allies 
 every night !" the spy, in the garb of a Holy man, 
 suggested. 
 
 "Most decidedly !'' I replied with all the sar- 
 casm in me while remembering that my last noc- 
 turnal devotion belonged to ancient history. "And, 
 in particular, I shall then pray for the success of 
 the Japanese!" 
 
 That day we passed Corsica and Sardinia dur- 
 ing squalls, the former reminding one of the 
 forceful originality of a single man and the latter 
 of the mediocrity of the mass, compressed in the 
 tin of oily conventionality, and the next morning 
 we docked at Naples, to stay till 10 p. m., but I 
 (declined to join a party of Metropolitan Opera 
 121 
 
singers in motoring to the ruins of Pompeii at 
 the base of the smoking Vesuvius, although the 
 constant screeching of the dark-skinned natives on 
 the wharf sounded through the ship as though a 
 flock of pre-historic giant gulls had descended on 
 a dead whale near by. 
 
 My learned father had published A History of 
 the Kingdom of Naples long ago and, while lean- 
 ing over the railing of the Diica with the town 
 and its grand surroundings in view, I wondered 
 why, and also, why Conradin ^^the Hohenstaufe" 
 and other Northern men, before and after him, 
 had come South to conquer Italy and have their 
 heads chopped off in the attempt, as happened to 
 him. Rather a high price to pay for looking at 
 fine shore scenery and Roman ruins ! Sure 
 enough, sinc^ his death in 1268, many medieval 
 cathedrals and galleries of old masters have been 
 added to the attractions of Italy, and the chance 
 of being infected with the virulent malaria para- 
 sites of the Roman Campagna has been materially 
 reduced by the activity of her scientists through 
 governmental distribution of effective quinine 
 among the inhabitants, nevertheless I was not im- 
 pressed, not even in the museum of Naples, 
 through which I walked that afternoon after 
 dodging the dripping linen, strung across the 
 streets to dry, in the poorer sections of the town, 
 for how could the sight of marble figures chiseled 
 out before, during and after Cesar's tiny wars, 
 V22 
 
impress one now living through the greatest 
 struggle of the white races? 
 
 We spent the next day in the Sicilian harbor of 
 Palermo where the island mountains towering 
 above the flat-roofed, yellow houses of the town 
 presented a fine picture in the bright sunlight. 
 
 The Straits of Gibraltar were passed two days 
 later on after an officer of a British torpedo boat 
 had given his permission through a megaphone, 
 and ten days steaming brought the Duca outside 
 of Sandy Hook, where the British auxiliary cruis- 
 er Carmonia, of Viturno fame, now in war-paint 
 with a long gun on her forward deck, signalled 
 condescendingly that we might enter New York 
 Harbor. 
 
 The food and the attendance on the Duca 
 D'Aosta had been excellent. I had not experi- 
 enced a minute of illness for sea-sickness never 
 touched me although I had spent one and a half 
 of the sixty years of my life on the Atlantic, and 
 the good luck of the roaming free-lance had never 
 deserted me on this trip, no more than on many 
 others. But after the steamer left the quarantine 
 at Staten Island I felt anxious to meet my family, 
 for but one postal card had reached me in East 
 Prussia since I left them, three months ago. 
 
 The upper harbor of New York, known and 
 loved so well by me from childhood on, ap- 
 peared ominously empty of shipping excepting a 
 dozen untidy ocean tramps anchored abreast of 
 123 
 
the Statue of Liberty, waiting for their load of 
 "neutral" shot and shell to assist revengeful 
 political dilletants of France, the Russian Czar, 
 and the real king of Great Britain, Edward the 
 Grey, in extending the thanks of their peoples to 
 the "Barbarian Huns" for safe-guarding the lives 
 of their women and children by their scientific 
 work, given "free of charge," during the last 
 thirty years. 
 
 How "deelighted" American parents, patients 
 and practitioners must feel when they realize the 
 true meaning of this "shot-and-shell gratitude" to 
 "out-lawed" Germany, — after this war is over ! 
 
 The letter reproduced on the following page 
 from England's foremost physician, was among 
 my accumulated mail. 
 
 The document proves that even so eminent a 
 scientist as Sir William Osier can be hypnotized 
 by wartime into believing "first-hand stories" of 
 men who fled their country at a time when they 
 were needed there most, the Belgian professors 
 he speaks of, — exactly like the consul at Queens- 
 town, the Botherdam's surgeon and the South- 
 erner, Culbertson, who read the New York Health 
 Department's letter given to me in 1892 without 
 ever looking at the date. Wartime hypnosis ! 
 124 
 
From the Regius Pro/esrnr of Medicine, Oxford. 
 
 ?.5, September, 1914, 
 
 Dear Seibext, 
 
 Thanks for your pamphlet. If here, you would read 
 a different story, and you could see the spirit of the 
 ♦country. The Germans against whom we ore waging wnr are 
 not the Cerraens that we used to know, but these milit- 
 ary barbnriFinB of the first water. You should henr the 
 first-hand stories of some of the Belgian professors v/ho 
 are now with us - they would make even your Teutonic blood 
 boll . 
 
 Sincerely yours, 
 
 fT'^^s^^iAA.^^/^'^^ 
 
 125 
 
Prof. Osier knows that, if the .Barbarian Rob- 
 ert Koch and his German pupils had not devel- 
 oped modern bacteriology and thus found the true 
 causes of most infectious diseases and the possi- 
 bility of their cure (formerly searched for by 
 lengthy pen-and-ink antics in medical journals 
 and by windy discussions in medical meetings), 
 he could not now persuade British soldiers to have 
 dead typhoid-germs, found by the Barbarian 
 Eberth, injected under their skins to make them 
 immune against typhoid fever. 
 
 And my friend in Oxford also knows that 
 if, for instance, the German government had 
 prevented Emil Behring from giving his inven- 
 tion of a positive cure of diphtheria free to all the 
 world, as he did, instead of keeping it a trade 
 secret for exclusive manufacture in Germany, — 
 over one hundred thousand American children 
 would have been strangled to death during "^he 
 first year of this war, not to mention those in 
 countries now at odds with the Barbarians, for 
 England inhibits all exports from Germany. 
 
 Or, possibly, such a measure could have pre- 
 vented this war ! 
 
 In conclusion, I can not refrain from reminding 
 Dr. Osier (whom to-day I esteem as before and 
 who may take this booklet as an answer to his 
 letter), of Heine's verdict on the English: 
 126 
 
"They have four hundred and fifty different 
 rehg-ions — and but one sauce"! 
 
 'Scientia Veritas est/