Class 71 (.-. y, -i _ 
 Book . o -/ H ,', 
 CoipghtN 
 
 COPYRIGHT deposit: 
 

MY EXPERIENCE 
 WITH SPIES 
 
 IN THE 
 
 Great European War 
 
 BY 
 
 BERNHART PAUL HOLST 
 
 Author, Publisher and Business Man; Teacher 
 and Superintendent of Schools, Iowa; Insti- 
 tute Lecturer and Instructor; Author 
 of Educational Literature. 
 
 Writer and Collator of Works of General Reference; 
 
 Author of Poems of Friendship and Other 
 
 Poems; Traveler for Research 
 
 Work in Art, Sciences, 
 
 Antiquities, Etc. 
 
 'The soul, secured in her existence, smiles 
 
 At the drawn dagger, and defies its point." 
 
 — Joseph Addison 
 
 BOONE, IOWA, and CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 
 
 THE HOLST PUBLISHING 
 
 COMPANY 
 
.S7H6 
 
 Copyright, 1916 
 THE HOLST PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 i)CI.A428436 
 
PREFACE 
 
 npHIS volume is offered the reader as a col- 
 -*- lection of chapters which treat of subjects 
 that are closely allied to the great war in Europe 
 which burst forth like an earthquake in 1914. 
 Each one of the several topics has a place in the 
 list of vital themes in an eventful epoch. 
 
 The treatment is written in a narrative style, 
 not technical, but quite fully conversational. In 
 connection with a number of the chapters are 
 stanzas of verses written especially for this 
 book. 
 
 In narrating many facts in regard to spies 
 and scouts, the writer introduces the leading 
 places visited in an eventful trip abroad. In 
 the third chapter, entitled My Introduction to 
 Spydom, is the beginning of the list of chapters 
 which recite the details of the object and work 
 of spies. 
 
 It must not be assumed that the writer con- 
 demns spies as workers of evil and iniquity. 
 While these secret agents sometimes are false 
 
6 PREFACE 
 
 and detestable, sometimes vile and traitorous, 
 they frequently do good and are the means of 
 bringing about results by methods that operate 
 quickly and in the end save life and property 
 from destruction. Perhaps, in the wiser econ- 
 omy of war, it is impossible wholly to dispense 
 with systems of espionage. 
 
 The treatment in this book is from an Ameri- 
 can standpoint. It is the result of touring as 
 a student and writer in twelve countries of 
 Europe. The possibility of giving so much 
 detail in regard to espionage is due to no mean 
 ability to mingle freely with different nationali- 
 ties and to converse with them in their own 
 tongue. 
 
 It is hoped that this volume will be read and 
 pondered in the spirit in which it was written. 
 If it contributes to the correction of wrongs 
 suffered by Americans at sea, personally and 
 commercially; if, at the same time, the reader 
 is entertained and instructed, the purposes of 
 the writer will have been accomplished. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 I Motives and Purposes - 11 
 
 II The First Step 16 
 
 III The Flight to Niagara - 23 
 
 IV My Introduction to Spydom - - 31 
 V Breaking Bread with Spies - - 43 
 
 VI Spies at the Round Table 49 
 
 VII On the Waves - - - ' - 61 
 
 VIII In Prison at Sea .... 66 
 
 IX Dieting Norway and Sweden - 79 
 
 X In the Danish Capital 92 
 
 XI Like Smelling Powder - - - 105 
 
 XII Visits with Claus Bravo - - - 112 
 
 XIII The Imprisonment and Release - 120 
 
 XIV Secret Agents in Warsaw - - 129 
 XV The Dainty Spy in Berlin - - 141 
 
 XVI Methods and Dangers of Spying - 157 
 
 XVII Sailing the Cattegat - - - 167 
 
 XVIII A Thousand Miles Around - - - 176 
 
 XIX Filing a Protest .... 183 
 
 XX America off the Sea - - - - 189 
 
 XXI What is Americanism ? - - - 199 
 
 XXII Poems Written Abroad - - - 206 
 
THE SPY 
 
 Once he was young and brave and fair, 
 Free from the strain of guilt and care; 
 His mind was pure, his heart was clean, 
 His face bore marks of happy mien; 
 His teacher looked with hopeful pride 
 Upon the joys that thrift betide; 
 And often said, "Life well begun, 
 Assures the laurels will be won." 
 
 He grew to manhood tall and fair, 
 
 With manly strength and shoulders square; 
 
 He stood six feet, and every inch 
 
 Was borne to work and not to flinch; 
 
 When others fainted by the way, 
 
 He did his part without dismay; 
 
 With all his mind and all his heart 
 
 He ever strove to do his part. 
 
 Then came the tempter and he fell 
 Before the vile, seducing spell; 
 He learned to fetch and feint and lie, 
 Which fitted him to be a spy; 
 8 
 
THE SPY 
 
 Although oftimes he was dismayed, 
 From day to day he plied his trade, 
 But proved a traitor to his cause 
 And wronged the mandates of the laws. 
 
 He shrank from man. His silent mood 
 Made him but fit for solitude; 
 He hid his face and breathed a sigh, 
 When he met others eye to eye; 
 And when a sound came to his ear 
 He trembled much with deadly fear; 
 And, as his dubious course he ran, 
 He palled beneath the curse of man. 
 
My Experience with Spies 
 
 IN THE 
 
 Great European War 
 
 i 
 
 MOTIVES AND PURPOSES 
 
 MANIFOLD were the motives that induced 
 me to leave my home in Boone, a thriving 
 town in Iowa, and undertake a trip to Europe 
 while the sparks were flying from the fire of 
 many battlefields. I had no desire to expose 
 myself to the carnage of war, or to witness the 
 destruction of men as they fought for the prin- 
 ciples which their country espoused, but rather 
 to pursue in peaceful manner the investigations 
 which seemed essential in the study of art, 
 history and literature. 
 
 The time within which the tour was to be 
 made limited me somewhat, hence I prepared 
 a schedule of places to be visited, including in 
 my list the institutions and their special char- 
 
 11 
 
12 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 acteristics that I considered most noteworthy 
 from my standpoint. This preparation for a 
 trip always is necessary. It gives in a regular 
 plan the objects to be seen and studied, thereby 
 economizing the element of time to the best 
 advantage. 
 
 My purpose was to visit in order Norway, 
 Sweden, Denmark and Germany. This could 
 be accomplished in from three to four months 
 with good results. My list of noteworthy things 
 and places to be seen was quite large, but in 
 this chapter only the leading ones will be 
 mentioned. 
 
 The chief aim in Norway was to study the 
 folklore of the Norsemen. This caused my 
 interest to center in the National Library and 
 the Norwegian Folklore Museum in Christiania. 
 Incident to this study was to be an investigation 
 of the ships and other relics buried in tumuli 
 by the Vikings at Gokstad. It also involved a 
 trip through Trondhjem and as far north as 
 Hell, a seaport on a fjord of the western coast. 
 
 My purpose in Sweden was first of all to visit 
 the university city of Upsala, in whose library 
 
MOTIVES AND PURPOSES 13 
 
 is preserved the only Gothic manuscript in 
 existence. This document contains parts of the 
 four evangels written by Archbishop Ulphilas, 
 about 500 A. D., and was taken from Prague in 
 1648 by the Swedes. My plan also included a 
 visit to Gamle Upsala, the scene of Gustaf 
 Vasa's activities, to view at Stockholm the 
 Ridderholms Church and to make a short study 
 in the Nordiska Museum. 
 
 To Denmark I was attracted by the works of 
 Thorwaldsen, whose museum is the shrine of 
 artists and poets. Incidentally I placed on my 
 list such adjacent towns as Helsingor and other 
 places made famous by Shakespeare, Ibsen and 
 Andersen. 
 
 My plan was to visit at least one of the 
 warring countries for the study of economic and 
 sociological conditions as they were influenced 
 by the war. At first I planned to make England 
 that country, but, thinking the Baltic safer 
 water than the North Sea, I decided to enter 
 Germany. 
 
 In my travels through Europe I have visited 
 more than a dozen of the leading countries. On 
 
14 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 my list of noteworthy objects to be seen were 
 the prominent churches, libraries, opera houses, 
 theaters, universities, museums, art galleries, 
 tombs, armories, fortifications, gardens and 
 parks, castles in ruins and royal palaces. The 
 noted churches, such as the Dom at Berlin and 
 Westminster Abbey in London, are first in my 
 mind and I have visited and attended worship 
 in more than one hundred of this class of 
 churches and cathedrals. 
 
 Europe is the cradle and nursery of modern 
 civilization. Here is the soil in which the roots 
 of American institutions had their primitive 
 growth. Every nation of that continent has con- 
 tributed vital elements to the newer and freer 
 life in the new world. 
 
 That life is freer in America must of course 
 be taken in the spirit in which such a statement 
 is made. In many respects human activities 
 are less limited and restricted in Europe than in 
 America. As a whole the restraints upon an 
 individual and the limitations upon society are 
 less in the old world than in the new, except in 
 the ability that men and women have in America 
 to rise from poverty to affluence and wealth. 
 
MOTIVES AND PUEPOSES 15 
 
 From the standpoint of education, both liberal 
 and industrial, as well as professional, the 
 European youth has the advantage. The activ- 
 ities of life are unhampered and the possibilities 
 of .growth are unlimited, except by the station 
 of birth, which places the uninfluential beginner 
 at a disadvantage. This is true of republican 
 France and Switzerland as well as of imperial 
 England, Germany and Austria-Hungary. 
 
 A trip to Europe, no matter whether the 
 traveler is of native or foreign birth, broadens 
 and liberalizes the mental processes. It fur- 
 nishes the stimuli to live in the higher fields of 
 art and literature, to think more systematically, 
 and yet to appreciate American possibilities and 
 institutions more thoroughly. 
 
 Here are stated briefly the motives and pur- 
 poses that induced me to venture abroad while 
 the sea was infested by mines and submarines, 
 while the air was rent by shot and shell from 
 the largest cannon ever drawn into battle. In 
 the chapters that follow are given some of the 
 experiences I had incident to the trip, all of 
 which impressed me as landmarks in a memor- 
 able tour of the old world. 
 
II 
 
 THE FIRST STEP 
 
 lV/fY 40-liorse power automobile did good 
 ■*• A service in the drive of seven blocks on 
 the rainy evening of September nineteenth, 
 1915, when I began my trip to the turbulent 
 scenes of Europe, where the great war, which, 
 since its beginning in the Balkan states, had 
 been spread as a cloud of evil over the largest 
 part of the continent. The drive was from my 
 residence to the Northwestern depot, from 
 which the great train of steel cars was about to 
 depart on its run for Chicago. 
 
 At the station I was greeted by a number of 
 anxious friends, who looked upon such a trip 
 as I was about to make more in the light of a 
 tragedy rather than a necessary quest for 
 material to weave into history and literature. 
 It appeared to them as though we were at the 
 brink of a final separation, at the verge of the 
 
 16 
 
THE FIRST STEP 17 
 
 last farewell, so much had the reports of float- 
 ing mines and other demons of destruction at 
 sea, in the zone of naval blockade, impressed 
 them. I confess even now that to me the liabil- 
 ities of a venture into Europe at this hazardous 
 time seemed to become magnified, especially as 
 thoughts of the fate of the Lusitania, the Arabic 
 and other ships passed through my mind, but 
 such illusions, as I choose to call them now, 
 quickly passed away and I soon felt fully 
 assured of utmost safety even in the war zone. 
 
 Though several hundred passenger and 
 freight vessels had been wrecked in the waters 
 contiguous to the countries at war, though many 
 seagoing people had found their grave beneath 
 the waves, though I was to pass through the 
 same waters infested with submarines and float- 
 ing mines, it remained true that no ocean-liner 
 sailing under a neutral flag had been destroyed, 
 or even damaged, by Germany or any other 
 belligerent country. These nations, fighting for 
 their life and their economic integrity, sought 
 to destroy only the ships of the enemy that 
 
18 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 were armed or were engaged in carrying con- 
 traband. 
 
 In my possession I had an official passport 
 to enable me to conduct my work of study and 
 research in Norway, Denmark, Sweden and 
 Switzerland, issued by authority of the United 
 States government, which, in order to become 
 valid in the belligerent countries, required the 
 visa of a consular officer of each of the coun- 
 tries which were at war and which I necessarily 
 must enter to conduct my investigations. With 
 this document in regular form, I felt that my 
 security was absolute, so long as I traveled on 
 a ship of a neutral country, such as steamship 
 Frederick VIII, which carried the flag of Den- 
 mark. These conditions well guarded, I left 
 home and friends with pleasant anticipations of 
 an interesting trip across the Atlantic. 
 
 As I was about to board the Pullman car, I 
 noticed one of the leading suffragettes of the 
 community among those who had gathered on 
 the platform. She was coming toward me with 
 the winsome smile that only a veteran in the 
 battalion of a suffragette campaign can wear, 
 
THE FIRST STEP 19 
 
 and I felt rather pleased than disappointed to 
 have her among those who were to wish me a 
 pleasant journey and a safe return. 
 
 "Put a few bullets into the kaiser for me 
 while you are in Europe ' ' were the words with 
 which this apostle of equal rights greeted me as 
 I felt her hand taking mine. "Well," said I 
 earnestly, " I am an American and am going to 
 Europe to study, to explore, not to fight. If it 
 were possible, and, if the life of the kaiser were 
 at stake, I would put forth an effort to save it 
 as quickly as I would, to the extent of my ability, 
 protect the life of the king of England or the 
 president of the United States. I believe it to 
 be the duty of an American, when he is abroad, 
 to so conduct himself that he will be a credit 
 and honor to his country. This duty compels 
 me to preserve absolute neutrality in relation 
 to the belligerent nations instead of — " At this 
 point she began speaking and I cannot recall all 
 she said, but her parting words, which she 
 intended to be friendly, were these: "If that 
 is the way you feel about it, if you are not going 
 to help overthrow the kaiser, I do not care what 
 happens to you. ,, 
 
20 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 The trainmen were giving the signal to 
 depart, hence I said the final goodbye to all, 
 stepped upon the platform of the car and waved 
 my hat as the engine pulled the train from the 
 electric lighted city into the darkness of the 
 night. For some reason I could not easily for- 
 get the words of the suffragette, not as easily 
 as I wished, and they came back to me not only 
 as I lay my head on the pillow in the sleeper, 
 but likewise later when the ship on which I 
 sailed was rocked on the swells of the sea. 
 These words came to my mind when the British 
 detained me and my fellow passengers in the 
 Orkney Islands; they surged to the surface 
 when I saw the flash lights and heard the sound 
 of bursting shells in an engagement in the 
 waters off the coast of Scotland. Again they 
 came to me when I met face to face William II., 
 the accomplished leader and devout Christian, 
 as he stepped, accompanied by his wife and only 
 daughter, from the great Bom Kirche in Berlin, 
 after the five hundredth anniversary service of 
 the Hohenzollerns. But each time, no matter 
 when or where I recalled a trivial, unbalanced 
 
THE FIRST STEP 21 
 
 remark of any kind, I grew stronger in the con- 
 viction that the true American loves America 
 first and that he cannot, that he must not, be 
 unfair to either side in the great War of Nations. 
 
 The firm conviction that safety lies in fairness 
 and sympathetic neutrality, sympathetic be- 
 cause friendly to peace and humanity, is the 
 mighty bulwark of defense when we enter the 
 field of dangerous contention among nations. 
 That I profited by this conviction is attested by 
 the many acts of kindness which were extended 
 to me in my travels in the leading countries of 
 Europe, in a number of which I saw much of 
 the destruction and hardship that the carnage 
 of war has power to produce. 
 
 The written, as well as the unwritten, law of 
 nations requires that each nation must so shape 
 its policies that the public conscience will justify 
 its acts. This law is likewise operative upon 
 each individual, and by it we are to be guided 
 and governed. When we live up to this law, 
 conducting ourselves according to its mandates, 
 we become a potentiality of great power. 
 
 America is not the vassal of any country, but, 
 
22 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 instead, an independent, sovereign state. Each 
 citizen, whether at home or abroad, should 
 manifest by word and act a high class of citizen- 
 ship ; he should be ' ' Slow to anger, and of great 
 kindness.' ' With this motto I was venturing 
 on my exploit to the perilous scenes of war. 
 
 In the earnest times produced by war and 
 rumors of wars, it is not considered wise to 
 give full expression to our feelings, when dis- 
 cretion directs that we should control our pas- 
 sions. In this connection it may be well to con- 
 sider who is 
 
 THE REALLY WONDERFUL MAN 
 
 The man who smiles when he's glad, 
 And frowns and scolds when he 's mad, 
 And bitterly cries when he's sad 
 Is only the natural man. 
 
 But the man who smiles when he 's mad, 
 And joyfully laughs when he's sad, 
 And tearfully cries when he's glad 
 Is really the wonderful man. 
 
Ill 
 
 THE FLIGHT TO NIAGARA 
 
 nnHE great engine which pulled the Calif or- 
 ■*■ nia Mail train into the Northwestern pas- 
 senger terminal at Chicago labored with the 
 precision of the solar law. Although it had 
 come to a full stop before I passed by its great 
 drivers, there was a beating within quite like 
 the pulsation of the human heart after a great 
 effort, like that following a long and precipitous 
 ascent. A quarter of a century ago such a 
 machine would have attracted the plaudits of 
 multitudes, but the passengers it had deliv- 
 ered safely at their destination hurried by with- 
 out noticing the powerful monster, intent on 
 passing through the station and securing rapid 
 conveyance to the Loop District in the heart of 
 Chicago. 
 
 Breakfasted and shaven, my first work in- 
 cluded the purchase of book paper and the de- 
 
 23 
 
24 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 "£xrrutiur DfpnrtuWxil 
 
 6TATC OF IOWA 
 DCS MOINKA 
 
 TO ILL TO V7H0M THESE PRESENTS 3EA1L C0i£— GREETED. 
 
 Mr. Bernhart P* Hoist, the bearer hereof, a most 
 
 excellent eltizen of the State of Iowa, one of the States 
 
 of the United States of America, and wide lyknown as an educator, 
 
 publisher and man of business, contemplating a trip to European 
 
 countries, more especially to the oountries of northern Europe, 
 
 for the purpose of gathe ing information along historical lines 
 
 In oonneotion with his editorship of hooks of reference and 
 
 /or the purpose of studying conditions, political, sociological 
 
 and educational, I do hereby. In the name of the people of Iowa, 
 
 bespeak for him such official and other recognition as shall be 
 
 oompatible with the public interest of the places he may visit, 
 
 and X espeolally ccnmend him to the kindly consideration always 
 
 due a high order of oltlzenahip of one country from a like 
 
 citizenship of another. 
 
 IN TSSTI1SJKY WHERETF, I have here- 
 unto set my hand and caused to be affixed 
 THE GREAT SEAL the Creat Seal of Io,r »' 
 
 Done at See Moines, Iowa, this 
 Of TEE 13 *k day of September 1915. 
 
 8TATS W M fy.Ux6ltV>-/& 
 
 Governor of the State of Iowa. 
 Copy of letter written by Governor G. W. Clarke. 
 
THE FLIGHT TO NIAGARA 25 
 
 livery of copy for an edition of books to my 
 publisher. My publishing house, knowing that 
 I was starting on a trip abroad, seemed so- 
 licitous about safety on the sea and reminded 
 me of the fate of my friend Elbert Hubbard, 
 who had gone down on the ill-fated Lusitania. 
 Here, again, I reminded the apprehensive 
 friends that security had been assured to those 
 neutrals who travel on neutral ships and jok- 
 ingly added, "In my case destruction is impos- 
 sible; I carry an ample amount of life insur- 
 ance." 
 
 Having dispatched general business matters, 
 my final object in Chicago was to have my pass- 
 port visaed so as to admit me to the warring 
 countries of Europe. However, this was merely 
 a matter of form, as the personal letters which 
 I carried from Senator Cummins, Congressman 
 Woods, Governor Clarke, Senator Kenyon, 
 Professor Bell and many other men prominent 
 in politics and in education were sufficient to 
 make the introduction ample and effective. 
 
 At the door of the German consulate on Mich- 
 igan Avenue was the notice of Zutritt ohne An- 
 
26 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 JOMN (MIAN, etc.*. 
 
 TXnHeb &l*U* Senate, 
 
 COMMITTEE ON 
 THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES. 
 
 Dee Moines, Iowa. 
 Sept. 22,1915. 
 
 To Whom It May Concern? 
 
 I am glad to say in behalf of the 
 bearer of this note. Mr. Be mart P. Hoist, of 
 Boone. Iowa, that he is an energetic, success- 
 ful business roan of my state. He is a gentle* 
 roan of hl£h character and worthy of confidence* 
 I cordially commend him to those whom he may 
 meet in the trip to Europe that he is about to 
 begin. 
 
 Yours wry truly, ^ 
 
 Copy of letter written by Senator Albert B. Cummins. 
 
THE FLIGHT TO NIAGARA 27 
 
 klopfen, which was the first vivid suggestion on 
 this trip of notices as they are posted in Eu- 
 rope, where reminders are seen in nearly all 
 public places as to what should be done and 
 what should not be done in keeping with public 
 safety and sanitation. Americans who travel 
 in Europe will do well to read such notices 
 and heed them; by doing so they may save 
 themselves annoyances. At home such notices 
 as ' ' Do not Spit on the Floor ' ' are of little in- 
 terest to Americans; they seem to think the 
 reminders are meant for some one else, but in 
 Europe the injunction is enforced by a penalty 
 on the negligent. 
 
 The reception at the German consulate was 
 cordial, but I felt somewhat self-conscious lest 
 my usual democratic demeanor would prevent 
 me from returning graciously the very hearty 
 reception accorded by the officials with whom I 
 came in contact. However, I was soon put at 
 ease and my passport was validated, in spite of 
 the fact that many others had been refused. 
 After having been told the fee was $1.20, 1 laid 
 $2.00 on the desk and said, " Although I have 
 
28 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 not yet acquired the habit I presume you have, 
 and the change will provide the necessary Ha- 
 vana. ' ' But the official assured me he had not 
 learned the art of smoking and stated his gov- 
 ernment would not permit any consular officer 
 to accept a treat or gift and that I would not 
 be permitted to leave the change on the desk. 
 It appeared to me that this officer was emulat- 
 ing the Iowa anti-tipping law which had re- 
 cently come into force. However, I said, "Gut 
 gesagt," and we shook hands and I bowed out 
 as cleverly as possible. 
 
 The trip from Chicago to New York was 
 made over the New York Central lines. Leav- 
 ing Chicago at three o 'clock in the afternoon on 
 the Michigan Central train, I passed through 
 Detroit and Lower Canada, reaching Niagara 
 Falls while the early twilight was beginning to 
 beautify the great cataract. The train halted 
 on the Canadian side, near Table Eock, and the 
 Pullman passengers were notified so they might 
 see the falls in early morning, before the hun- 
 dreds of electric lights along the shore were 
 turned off. The great rush and roar of the 
 
THE FLIGHT TO NIAGARA 29 
 
 water and the dense mists rising above the 
 precipice, before the orb of the sun had risen 
 above the horizon, was very beautiful. 
 
 The Falls of the Niagara properly are classed 
 with the natural wonders of America. This 
 phenomenon of nature is not excelled in gran- 
 deur of aspect and in magnitude of strength 
 anywhere. It is utilized to a very large extent 
 for water power and through this source fur- 
 nishes light and propelling force to scores of 
 hamlets and cities. My tribute to it is expressed 
 in the following stanzas: 
 
 THE FALLS OF THE NIAGARA 
 
 My soul is awed in me 
 
 As I look up to thee 
 And see the waters pouring o'er thy brink; 
 
 In silence here I stand, 
 
 Nor move a foot nor hand, 
 As of thy grandeur solemnly I think! 
 
 "When the flight of years began, 
 No stream in thy course ran, 
 For all the region was a boundless sea; 
 And as the land appeared, 
 
30 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 And hills and vales were cleared 
 Of waters deep, thy place was marked for thee. 
 
 And thou wert not content 
 
 To leave thy course unbent, 
 Or pour thy waters ever at one place — 
 
 But broke the icy locks, 
 
 And cut away the rocks, 
 Thy brink with certain strides up-stream to trace. 
 
 Thy waters gently glide, 
 
 In vale, on mountain side, 
 As from the mists and silvery clouds they fall; 
 
 But wakened from their sleep, 
 
 As from thy rocks they leap, 
 O'er hills and woods peal forth a mighty call. 
 
 Deep echoes unto deep 
 
 As swift thy waters leap 
 And glide adown the channel to the bay; 
 
 A veil of mist is seen, 
 
 And as thy waters stream 
 They mark the flood of years in rock and clay. 
 
 Thy ever deafening roar 
 
 Causes the mind to soar 
 To Him who in a deluge plied the rod, 
 
 But in His sight thou art 
 
 A very meager part 
 And speak in simple tones of nature's God. 
 
IV 
 MY INTEODUCTION TO SPYDOM 
 
 rilHE route of the New York Central lines 
 A from Buffalo to Albany, about 300 miles, 
 follows quite closely the course of the Erie- 
 Hudson Canal, so-called because it is the water- 
 way between Lake Erie and the Hudson Eiver. 
 This, the most important artificial waterway in 
 the United States, was once the greatest route 
 of commerce in New York and in the eastern 
 part of the country. In the open season quite 
 a number of small canal boats are seen, al- 
 though the lines of the West Shore Eailway 
 and the New York Central and Hudson Eiver 
 Eailway now parallel the entire distance and 
 carry all but a small fraction of the business. 
 However, the canal is in a better working con- 
 dition than it ever was, even in the time of Gov- 
 ernor Clinton, as it has been deepened and the 
 sluices, bridgeheads, locks and in-flow channels 
 
 31 
 
32 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 are in part or wholly built of solid and rein- 
 forced concrete. 
 
 Along this canal, in view of fields and pas- 
 tures, the train was speeding swiftly when 
 breakfast was announced in the diner. The 
 call was a welcome summons and I repaired 
 at once to the modern, well-arranged dining 
 car, where several ladies and a somewhat larger 
 number of gentlemen already were seated at 
 the tables. My eyes surveyed the passengers 
 with more than ordinary interest, not that I was 
 looking for a familiar face, but because I was 
 attracted by the appearance of several gentle- 
 men who gave the impression that they were 
 not Americans. 
 
 I ate at a table designed for two diners, but 
 the seat opposite mine was unoccupied and I 
 had, for that reason, greater freedom in study- 
 ing the faces of those who attracted my atten- 
 tion. It was my conclusion that the faces in 
 which I was interested included those of one 
 Englishman, one German and two Frenchmen. 
 They seemed to avoid conversation with each 
 other, both here and later in the Pullman cars, 
 
MY INTRODUCTION TO SPYDOM 33 
 
 and I began to think of them as secret agents 
 who were operating in connection with the busi- 
 ness end of the war in Europe. 
 
 At the first call for lunch I again made my 
 way to the diner and noticed that the gentleman 
 whom I had suspected of being an Englishman 
 was seated at a small table by himself. This 
 appeared to be my opportunity to study him 
 more closely and I took the seat left unoccupied 
 at the same table, facing him squarely, and 
 began a conversation about the weather ancl 
 other topics which usually are uppermost in the 
 semi-vacant mind. My first effort secured the 
 information that he had boarded the train at 
 Niagara Falls and was ticketed for New York, 
 where he had very important business not en- 
 tirely of a personal nature. His conversation 
 was guarded and considerate, while mine began 
 to appear evasive ; at least this is my estimate 
 of the diplomacy we were practicing. 
 
 Several years before I had been told by a 
 court-joker, of which there are many in Eu- 
 rope, that the name of Hanson is borne by one- 
 third of the people of Denmark and that the 
 
34 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 remainder of the populace in that country is 
 largely of the Hoist, Peters and Larsen fami- 
 lies. Now, under these circumstances, if I 
 would gain the confidence of this fellow trav- 
 eler, I could not reveal my real identity, but, 
 instead must choose one or more of the meth- 
 ods of concealment which are so common in 
 detective work. 
 
 It appeared to me that I could gain some 
 very important information through this new 
 acquaintance and, at the same time, acquire 
 knowledge which would enable me more fully 
 to realize and understand the position which 
 the United States as a neutral nation is occupy- 
 ing to the warring countries in Europe, espe- 
 cially in regard to over-sea commerce. The 
 principal facts of this information I could, of 
 course, obtain from my government, but the 
 secret, the concealed manipulations that pro- 
 mote the interest of a belligerent nation must 
 be looked for elsewhere. 
 
 "I take you to be an Englishman, or at least 
 an English subject," said I, after a pause. 
 
 He smiled knowingly and answered affirma- 
 
MY INTRODUCTION TO SPYDOM 35 
 
 tively, saying, "Your guess is correct in both 
 particulars. ' ' 
 
 "Well," I continued, "I was born English, 
 that is, I hail from the Australian state of Vic- 
 toria, near the city of Hamilton, where my 
 father settled on land nearly seventy years 
 ago. ' ' 
 
 "0, indeed,' ' said he, "then you must know 
 much of Ballarat and Melbourne and Geelong, 
 where I have been often. ' ' 
 
 "Yes," I replied, "they are easy of access 
 by rail from Hamilton, especially Ballarat, 
 where the diggings yielded great wealth in gold 
 nuggets and still are rich in this mineral. And 
 Melbourne, the second city of Australasia, the 
 beautiful metropolis of the state of Victoria, 
 with its wide streets and fine university, is a 
 favorite place." 
 
 After this our conversation was easy and 
 covered a wide range of topics. Luckily we did 
 not occupy seats in the same Pullman car, hence 
 we agreed to meet at Albany and take dinner 
 together on the run from that city to New York. 
 I indicate that it was fortunate that we did not 
 
36 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 occupy seats in the same car, and I found it so, 
 because it gave me an opportunity to plan a 
 line of conversation for the evening ride. 
 At Albany all passengers for New York were 
 
 Simple outline of the so-called Sign of Silence. 
 
 required to change cars and it was necessary 
 to wait a brief time to make connections. On 
 the platform I met my new acquaintance, who 
 had made himself known to me as John Fen- 
 
MY INTRODUCTION TO SPYDOM 37 
 
 wick of Adelaide, Australia, and here lie was 
 in earnest conversation with two young men. 
 These he introduced to me as George Fenton 
 and James Barton, the former a stout man 
 with blue eyes and auburn hair and the latter a 
 tall individual with keen, dark eyes and slightly 
 gray hair. 
 
 In greeting them I took the right hand in 
 mine and pressed the last joint of the small 
 finger between the thumb and second finger of 
 my right hand. Then I opened the back cover 
 of my watch and inside of it exposed the Sign 
 of Silence, saying, ' ' This is the safe side. ' ' They 
 answered, each for himself, l i I notice. ' ' 
 
 Having made the impression that I had 
 knowledge of this order of secret agents and 
 their manner of identification, I won their con- 
 fidence. This way of winning them to trust me 
 I had learned in Chicago several weeks before, 
 where I met a number of large buyers of horses, 
 who confided in me because I knew much of the 
 horse market and the shipment of horses from 
 Iowa. 
 
 Although Mr. Fenwick and his companions 
 
38 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 looked upon me as one of their class of people, 
 I was far from it and entered upon a study of 
 this line of operations as an interesting adjunct 
 of the great war in Europe and Asia. 
 
 Mr. Fenwick had confused my statement, "I 
 was named after my father," to mean that my 
 name was William Henty. I did not tell him 
 this, but said that an Australian ranchman 
 named William Henty, who, I think, was a rela- 
 tive of George Alfred Henty, the noted English 
 author, owned a large range in the state of Vic- 
 toria, near Hamilton, and that he resided on 
 this range and engaged in rearing sheep and 
 cattle. From this circumstance he spoke of me 
 as the Australian, and seemed to be pleased that 
 I was British by birth. 
 
 The trio of spies, as I choose to call them now, 
 hailed with satisfaction the intelligence that I 
 had been in Iowa, where I had made observa- 
 tions of the purchase and shipment of horses 
 for the allies, especially England and France. 
 These shipments included several thousand 
 animals. 
 
 This information was correct, as I had seen 
 
MY INTRODUCTION TO SPYDOM 39 
 
 many car loads of horses unloaded for feeding 
 at Boone, Valley Junction and other railway 
 divisions in the Mississippi valley, later to be 
 reloaded and forwarded to points east and 
 eventually to Europe. I had also seen many 
 horses that had been bought in the vicinity of 
 Boone for the entente allies and had examined 
 them in the yards before shipment. 
 
 The western farming and ranching country, 
 especially the Mississippi Valley, was covered 
 by agents buying draft and army horses. 
 Hundreds of posters were scattered throughout 
 the stock-raising districts, among mule and 
 horse raisers, and many newspapers carried dis- 
 play advertising in their columns. 
 
 This enterprise was promoted by speculative 
 buyers, and secret service men usually were near 
 at hand to create sentiment favorable to the en- 
 tente allies among the farmers and at the hotels. 
 It would have been more profitable to the 
 farmers and ranchers, the prices of horses would 
 have been higher, had transportation across the 
 Atlantic been unobstructed by Great Britain. 
 
 Mr. Fenwick and his associates admitted this 
 
1000 
 
 HORSES WANTED 
 
 We buy more horses than any 2 
 firms in the west. 
 
 We Will Buy All Marketable Horses 
 
 from 1100 to 1800 lbs., and 4 to 
 9 yrs. old. We buy the best that 
 grows, there are none too good 
 for us. If you have a good horse 
 be sure and bring him in. 
 We don't mind slight blemish. 
 
 At North Feed Barn 
 Boone, Sat, Feb. 12 
 
 Harrison & Shames, Chicago Horse Buyers 
 
 Sample Advertisement of Horse Buyers published in 
 the Boone News-Kepublican. 
 
MY INTRODUCTION TO SPYDOM 41 
 
 without argument. While the entente allies 
 were paying a moderate price for horses, they 
 profited greatly by shipping before or at the 
 time England began to blockade the neutral 
 trade, that is, before the freight rates across the 
 Atlantic had increased enormously. This prof- 
 it was at the expense of the American horse 
 growers, a definite loss to our farmers and 
 ranchers, of which these secret agents were well 
 aware. 
 
 They secured the impression that I was on 
 my way to Europe for the purpose of looking 
 more closely into the stock market in Denmark, 
 where Germany had purchased quite heavily at 
 the beginning of the war. As all this caused 
 them to speak more freely, I evaded a discus- 
 sion of my mission to Denmark, but told them 
 I was ticketed for Copenhagen and that I ex- 
 pected to make the Hotel Central, on Eaadhus- 
 pladsen, my headquarters. This induced them 
 to have even greater confidence in me than be- 
 fore, as strangers usually give the mailing ad- 
 dress at general delivery in the post office, 
 instead of divulging their place of abode. 
 
42 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 No blockade of the neutral countries had been 
 declared up to this time, but neutral commerce 
 was greatly limited through delays caused by 
 stopping ships on the high sea, often holding 
 them at such ports as Kirkwall, Greenock and 
 Stornoway, but a general movement for a for- 
 mal blockade of all neutral ports was under 
 consideration. This impending policy was the 
 reason why many secret agents were employed 
 to watch very carefully the movement of freight 
 in such ports as Copenhagen and Rotterdam. 
 
V 
 BEEAKING BREAD WITH SPIES 
 
 SOON after the train left Albany, I joined the 
 trio in the dining car and, fortunately, we 
 secured a table by ourselves. This was to be 
 the farewell dinner of four who had widely di- 
 verging routes and vastly different purposes 
 before them. Mr. Fenwick was to sail to Liver- 
 pool, Mr. Fenton and Mr. Barton were en route 
 to the south and west, and I, as stated in a 
 former chapter, was bound for Copenhagen. 
 How wonderful it would be if we could meet 
 two months later to compare the experiences 
 and achievements of each traveler with that 
 of the others ! 
 
 The ride down the Hudson River always is 
 pleasant, especially along the lower course, 
 where every foot of ground stands out promi- 
 nently in the annals of America. Orators and 
 poets, owing to the beauty of the scenery along 
 
 43 
 
44 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 its banks and its celebrity in history and litera- 
 ture, have named the Hudson the "Bhine of 
 America.' ' This term is quite appropriate, to 
 say the least, as here are Tarrytown, Pough- 
 keepsie, "West Point, Ossining and other places 
 of note. In this stream Eobert Fulton operated 
 the first steamboat. Here also are the scenes 
 of the treason of Benedict Arnold and the ad- 
 ventures of Ichabod Crane and Eip Van Win- 
 kle, the wonderful creations of Washington 
 Irving. Toward the lower course are the cliffs 
 known as the Palisades, which tower as a solid 
 wall of granite above the great volume of water 
 in the channel. 
 
 The circumstance that we were passing down 
 the margin of one of the greatest waterways of 
 America, so rich in the history and literature of 
 the new world, gave an opportunity for a wide 
 range in conversation while dinner was being 
 served. However, each member of the quar- 
 tette spoke passively and uninterestedly of the 
 many topics which were mentioned, asking and 
 answering questions in a strikingly absent- 
 minded fashion. The cause was not difficult to 
 
BREAKING BREAD WITH SPIES 45 
 
 guess, as it was apparent that each had a lower 
 stratum of thought — each was thinking of the 
 situation in which he was placed and the work 
 he expected to do. 
 
 At length, in order to turn the trend of 
 thought into a new channel, I made a successful 
 effort to bring the conversation to my child- 
 hood scenes in Australia. I spoke of the great, 
 arid plains, dotted with salt-water lakes, the 
 sheep and cattle ranges, and the numerous birds 
 of fine song and beautiful plumage. Later I 
 drifted the conversation to the rich diggings of 
 Ballarat, where my father had found many 
 large nuggets of gold, saying that the gold of 
 Ballarat is the brightest of the metals and, for 
 that reason, is among the most valuable. 
 
 "By the way," I said, "I still have a brother 
 and several other relatives in Australia. One 
 of these, Mr. John Holt, was a school teacher 
 in his early manhood. Correspondence which 
 I carried on with him a number of years, and 
 which proved very interesting to me, led me to 
 mention circumstances of which he knew in sev- 
 eral poems. One of these, entitled If Sweetest 
 
46 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Charms of Love are Lost, I wrote recently and 
 expect to mail to his address when I reach New 
 York." 
 
 The fact is that I had written these simple, 
 unpretentious lines after I had met Mr. Fen- 
 wick at breakfast, thinking I could employ them 
 as a lure to gain his confidence. 
 
 When a traveler is far from home, totally 
 among strangers, it often happens that some 
 little word spoken at the right time, some slight 
 mannerism, or even knowledge of a peculiar but 
 insignificant event, will win a friend or influ- 
 ence a kind act. With this in mind I passed 
 my verses written on railway paper to each 
 separately. They read them and nodded 
 approvingly. 
 
 The effect of my feint was that I was invited 
 to meet with them at Hotel Belmont in New 
 York, where they had planned a consultation. 
 This invitation I accepted and agreed to be 
 there as soon as possible after I would reach 
 the city, not later than eight o 'clock. The verses 
 that won this invitation and the entire con- 
 fidence of these secret agents are as follows : 
 
BREAKING BREAD WITH SPIES 47 
 
 IF SWEETEST CHARMS OF 
 LOVE ARE LOST 
 
 The free gold found at Ballarat, 
 On slopes, in vales and placer mines, 
 Made many a bank deposit fat, — 
 As brightest of the metals shines — 
 And I asked Jonathan to bring 
 None other in the wedding ring. 
 
 REFRAIN 
 
 0, Jonathan, remember this; 
 The prices paid do not bring bliss ; 
 Buy no costly diadems, 
 No brilliant stones, no shining gems ! 
 0, Jonathan, heed what I say 
 And save your coin for future day — 
 Buy a plain ring at Ararat, 
 Made of the gold of Ballarat. 
 
 The rainy season came and went 
 
 And beauty roses bloomed once more, 
 
 A brilliant diadem he sent 
 
 With wreaths of flowers to my door — 
 
 I said, ' ' I much regret the cost, 
 
 If sweetest charms of love are lost." 
 
48 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 We had been friends a year or more 
 And took a trip to Melbourne-side ; 
 A bracelet on my arm I wore, 
 And gems of pearls cut full and wide — 
 But said, "I much regret the cost, 
 If sweetest charms of love are lost. ' ' 
 
VI 
 SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 
 
 IT OTEL BELMONT is at Park Avenue and 
 ** ■* Forty-Second Street, near the Grand 
 Central Terminal, and is a fine structure of 
 twenty stories. It required little time to ar- 
 range for transferring my baggage, hence I 
 soon entered the lobby of the great hotel, where 
 I met the trio with whom I had eaten dinner on 
 the train. They were expecting me and greeted 
 me heartily, complimenting the promptness I 
 had shown in keeping my engagement. 
 
 After a short visit in the lobby of the hotel, 
 we repaired for a light luncheon to a cafe in 
 the vicinity, where a private dining room had 
 been reserved for us and to which refreshments, 
 including cigars and several bottles of cham- 
 pagne, had been brought. It was not long until 
 we got down to " merriment and business,* ' as 
 Mr. Fenwick called the proceedings. 
 
 4 49 
 
50 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Unfortunate in goodfellowship is he who at- 
 tends such a meeting, if he has not learned to 
 smoke and to imbibe the nectar of Bacchus, but 
 this was my plight in the council which had 
 assembled to promote or influence the labors of 
 Mars. However, I was excused good-naturedly 
 on the ground that, as I was to sail on the mor- 
 row, such indulgence would unsettle me as a 
 sailor. 
 
 Between jokes and drinks, both of which 
 came fast, but of which the latter came the 
 faster, the discussion turned almost entirely to 
 the project of starving Germany and her allies 
 into submission. 
 
 "The neutral countries," said Mr. Fenwick, 
 "particularly Holland and the Scandinavian 
 nations, are to be restricted more and more in 
 their trade, especially the imports. This policy 
 is beginning to take effect already, since their 
 freighters are either held up in British harbors 
 or are on the black list ; their passenger steam- 
 ers likewise are being delayed from several days 
 to a week in each passage across the ocean, all 
 of which means limitation of the goods needed 
 to feed the hungry in Europe. ' ' 
 
SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 51 
 
 Mr. Barton mentioned an article he had seen 
 in the New York Tribune to the effect that 
 nearly one hundred neutral freight ships had 
 been blacklisted because they violated the 
 requirement which Great Britain imposed, 
 namely: that any vessel carrying goods which 
 found their way ultimately into Germany would 
 be seized, and both vessel and goods would be 
 held as prizes of war. " Another demonstra- 
 tion that Britannia rules the waves, ' ' said he. 
 
 Mr. Fenton called attention to the stagnation 
 of freight in New York, where not less than 
 25,000 loaded freight cars had accumulated and 
 were unable to unload or discharge their goods 
 because transportation across the ocean either 
 was delayed or in many cases entirely sus- 
 pended. He added, smiling: "But the Ameri- 
 can people, especially President Wilson, will 
 not do more than file meaningless protests, even 
 if the British should destroy totally the trans- 
 Atlantic commerce of the United States. There 
 are now two politicians who are British by birth 
 in the presidents cabinet, I mean Secretary 
 Lane and Secretary Wilson, and both are very 
 agreeable friends of their mother country. ' ' 
 
52 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 The discussion of these and kindred topics 
 continued for several hours. I joined in the 
 exchange of thoughts from time to time with 
 the view of learning all I could about the work 
 of spies and particularly of the objects of the 
 trio with whom I was spending the evening. 
 In this I was not only successful, but I learned 
 many circumstances which would aid me in com- 
 municating with spies in Europe, especially in 
 Christiania and Copenhagen. 
 
 In some manner these men had secured the 
 information that the entente allies designed a 
 virtual blockade instead of a nominal obstruc- 
 tion of German and neutral ports, which they 
 stated would take effect early in 1916. The im- 
 mediate purpose of Mr. Barton and Mr. Fenton 
 was to visit Philadelphia, "Washington and Chi- 
 cago on a propaganda to create sentiment in 
 favor of such an actual blockade, or at least to 
 neutralize and, if possible, dissipate grave op- 
 position to the impending Orders in Council, 
 which Great Britain was contemplating. They 
 were to aid in spreading reports unfavorable to 
 Germany, such as would prejudice the Ameri- 
 
SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 53 
 
 can people against the Central Powers, particu- 
 larly the claims of cruelty to wounded soldiers 
 and the needless destruction of churches and 
 charitable institutions. In this connection they 
 mentioned several newspapers and public men 
 of New York and Washington who could be re- 
 lied on to support their designs. 
 
 "The report that Turkey has destroyed the 
 life of 800,000 non-combatant Armenians,' ' sug- 
 gested Mr. Fenwick, " is a prolific benefit to the • 
 British. What care I whether true or false, 
 whether dreamed or imagined. So long as the 
 political newspapers and church journals will 
 publish this faked piece of war news it will hurt 
 the Central Powers, especially if the kaiser is 
 charged with knowingly approving of such 
 slaughter. I tell you," he added, "this kind of 
 dope makes the Americans take notice." 
 
 "Well," said Mr. Barton, after emptying a 
 fair-sized glass of champagne and blowing a 
 cloud of tobacco smoke across the room, "I 
 think the best dope is to keep the Yankees think- 
 ing the Germans are about to invade New York 
 with an army of a million men, supported by a 
 
54 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 fleet of fifty superdreadnaughts. This will keep 
 them discussing what they call ' preparedness 
 for defense ' while England is destroying neu- 
 tral trade between America and Europe." 
 
 " There seems to be method in this proposi- 
 tion/ ' said I, "because if America and the neu- 
 tral countries of Europe are permitted to build 
 ships and establish many transportation lines, 
 placing large merchant marines on the seas, 
 England will have powerful trade competition 
 with which she will need to reckon after the war 
 is over. The easiest way, it seems to me, is to 
 pursue the policy of killing the possibility of 
 this competition before it is established, just as 
 England is doing by blacklisting neutral ships 
 and interfering with freight cargoes in transit 
 on the seas." 
 
 "Bravo!" said Mr. Fenwick, "Bravo! Keep 
 neutrals off the sea while the war is in progress, 
 while there are few ships and much freight. 
 Prevent them from developing a larger trans- 
 oceanic trade ; destroy what they already have, 
 if possible, and when the war is over England 
 will continue to be mistress of the waves and 
 
SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 55 
 
 the scheme known as the freedom of the seas 
 will be a forgotten dream !" 
 
 Having made what he considered a capital 
 speech, Mr. Fenwick blinked his eyes and lilted 
 in an unusually cheerful tone the rag-time he 
 had hummed several times before : 
 
 ' ' Ah 1 lend y o ' ma hat ! 
 Ah T lend yo ' ma flat ! 
 Ah'l lend yo' ma lovely overcoat of fur ! 
 Ah'l lend yo' eberyt'ing Ah've got — excep' ma wife ! 
 An' Ah'l mak' yo' a present of HER!" 
 
 The trio laughed merrily and smacked their 
 lips as they sipped the champagne drawn from 
 a bottle with a long, slender neck. Mr. Fenton 
 held his glass near his chin and smiled approv- 
 ingly, shouting, "That is the spirit of genuine 
 liberality." 
 
 To me his smile appeared bland and harm- 
 less, but the impression he made, as he moved 
 the glass up and down, was sinister and betrayed 
 covert evil and danger. I began to feel uneasy 
 and uncertain of the situation. This was the 
 first experience of the kind I had ever witnessed, 
 
56 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 and it was wholly possible that these men might 
 become unmanned by drink and do both me and 
 themselves harm. 
 
 I had long ago learned that the nicotine in the 
 tobacco and the alcohol in the champagne, each 
 working by itself in the human system, are less 
 powerful than when they join forces and attack 
 the inner vitals of man. Under such conditions, 
 when the body is saturated with these ardent 
 foes of the nerve forces, reason is dethroned 
 and man becomes a slave instead of a powerful 
 molding and directing force. He stoops and 
 cringes before the influence which he started out 
 to control. 
 
 Instead of studying me and my motives and 
 purposes, these men became anxious to tell me 
 of their experiences in the past and what they 
 had set out to accomplish in the future. Instead 
 of being a plastic organism in their hands, to 
 be formed into shape and used to accomplish 
 their desires as they had intended, they were 
 divulging to me what I wanted to know of them 
 in particular and the work of secret agents in 
 general. 
 
SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 57 
 
 The school in which I had suddenly become a 
 student was interesting beyond my power to 
 describe. They howled and roared like raving 
 beasts that are seeking to devour each other. 
 My eyes and ears were open every moment, per- 
 mitting nothing to escape, while I said only 
 sufficient to keep the trio busy in their eagerness 
 to surpass each other in relating the smart 
 stories with which detectives are familiar. In 
 this manner I easily accomplished my purpose, 
 that is, I learned much of the work and methods 
 of secret agents in America and received the 
 information which enabled me to find their com- 
 patriots in Europe. 
 
 At this juncture I also learned that Mr. Fen- 
 wick was ultimately to locate in Holland, where 
 he was to join other secret service men in keep- 
 ing a close watch of the movements of goods 
 imported with the consent of Great Britain from 
 North and South America. He was to ascertain 
 whether any of these goods were finding their 
 way into Germany, and, if so, in what quantity 
 and under what conditions. 
 
 By this time we had finished our luncheon and 
 
58 
 
 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 the table was cleared of dishes and bottles. Mr. 
 Fenwick, who was the spokesman of the trio, 
 acted in the role of the jester. At times he would 
 
 Pointing his finger at me, he fairly screamed: "I'm the 
 boy that's doing the business. My work will give England 
 absolute world dominion ! ' ' 
 
 shont vengeance against the foes of Great 
 Britain and at other times he became docile and 
 tractable. 
 
SPIES AT THE ROUND TABLE 59 
 
 He was inclined to be emphatic when he spoke 
 of "horse flesh," as ne <^Ued aYm J horses. 
 Pointing his finger at me, he fairly screamed, 
 "I'm the boy that's doing the business. My 
 work will give England absolute world 
 dominion ! ' ' 
 
 I was ready to leave the table and planned to 
 do so as gracefully as possible. All I still wanted 
 was some information about the confederates of 
 Mr. Fenwick in Denmark. This was not difficult 
 to obtain. 
 
 These spies, or secret service men as they 
 called themselves, had the impression that I was 
 in the same line of work as Mr. Fenwick, except 
 that I was to operate in Denmark. For this 
 reason they gave me much information about 
 commercial affairs which were not open for 
 publication and supplied me with addresses of 
 people in Denmark in whom I could confide. 
 The session came to a close at about ten o'clock, 
 after which I hurried to the place of my resi- 
 dence near the Battery, where I had engaged 
 quarters. 
 
 Before leaving New York I mailed several 
 
60 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 letters and many American newspapers to the 
 Danish capital, addressing them in care of 
 Hoved Post Kontor, Kopenhagen, Denmark. 
 The letters had been given to me by Mr. Fenwick 
 for identification among some people he knew 
 and they later proved of much value to me in 
 conducting my study of the work of spies and its 
 effect upon commerce and the trend of the war. 
 My purpose in mailing the letters and news- 
 papers was to evade the possibility of losing 
 them in case of detention and seizure of the 
 ship before reaching the capital of Denmark, 
 which was not entirely out of the range of prob- 
 ability. 
 
VII 
 ON THE WAVES 
 
 nnHE ocean-liner Frederick VIII was throb- 
 * bing under the pressure of superheated 
 steam when I arrived at the docks in Hoboken, 
 shortly before two o'clock in the afternoon of 
 September twenty-second. Everything was 
 ready for her to put to sea in the long route 
 across the northern part of the Atlantic. My 
 baggage had come on time, marked with the 
 usual sign "Baggage Wanted,' ' meaning that 
 it was to be taken to my room No. 10 on the 
 promenade deck, and I was supplied with the 
 
 BEWARE 
 
 OF 
 
 CONFIDENCE-MEN AND SWINDLERS ! 
 
 familiar card bearing the injunction "Beware 
 of Confidence-men and Swindlers!" Soon the 
 
 61 
 
62 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 band began to play Kung Kristian stod ved 
 hojan mast, the whistle sounded the final warn- 
 ing, and the ship began to move from her 
 moorings. 
 
 The thrill of excitement, the joy of the open 
 sea, the impulse of a freer life are experiences 
 which never are felt more vividly than when the 
 ship has left the land and moves forward 
 proudly in its voyage upon the waves. With the 
 face toward the fore, as the ship passes swiftly 
 outward from New York Bay, the passenger 
 J leaving the shore of America looks back only 
 twice, once to receive a last vivid impression of 
 the sky-line marked by the great buildings of 
 the Knickerbocker City and once, but the last 
 of all, to note the figure of Bartholdi's statue 
 representing Liberty Enlightening the World. 
 Strangely, too, the impressions made by these 
 two features of New York seem to accompany 
 the traveler ever after. 
 
 The observing voyager begins to study faces 
 and characters as soon as the first few highly 
 interesting hours on the open sea are over. On 
 this trans-Atlantic trip I met many fine people, 
 
ON THE WAVES 63 
 
 ladies and gentlemen of wide reading and 
 experience, and I began to cultivate them very 
 early in the voyage. They embraced many 
 classes of people from western Europe, includ- 
 ing also those in the second cabin and third 
 class, in both of which I spent some time in 
 studying conditions in America and Europe as 
 they are reflected by those who take a journey 
 across the ocean. 
 
 At the table to which the chief steward 
 assigned me were one Danish officer of the 
 steamship and seven passengers. The latter 
 included one English, one German, two Belgian 
 and three American citizens. The general con- 
 versation was in German, and this was pleasing 
 to me, as it gave me an opportunity to cultivate 
 the use of the Teutonic tongue with much effect. 
 As a whole, the circle of people at this table and 
 of the first cabin was very congenial and they 
 soon became the best of friends. We made the 
 long ride as far as the Shetland Islands with no 
 strange or unusual events. 
 
 Mr. Otto Tamini, the noted German-Italian 
 singer, who occupied a seat at the table opposite 
 
64 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 mine, was on his way to Europe to take the chief 
 role in Wagner's Lohengrin and to sing in other 
 operas and he often delighted us with choice 
 selections. At a benefit concert, which netted 
 380 kroner for the Sailors' Society of Good 
 Intentions in Copenhagen, he sang several num- 
 bers with much success. The instrumental 
 music for this program was furnished by Mrs. 
 Car] a Fuhn, of Bumania, and Mr. Henry C. 
 Hanson, of Denmark, gave a reading. I read a 
 number of selections from my works, including 
 the following, which I wrote especially for the 
 occasion : 
 
 ON "FREDERIK VIII." 
 
 At Fred'rik's festal board we met 
 
 From day to day, 
 But now must part with deep regret 
 
 To our dismay ; 
 Sadly we leave the roses here, 
 That bloom for us, that give us cheer, 
 And ne'er forget, if far or near, 
 
 When we go 'way. 
 
ON THE WAVES 65 
 
 Much like a dream o'er ocean's waves 
 
 The good ship sails, 
 No matter how the wild wind raves 
 
 It never fails ; 
 And as it proudly moves along", 
 "We pass the time with cheerful song, 
 Or visit much, — a happy throng — 
 
 In calms or gales. 
 
 An ocean trip, like human life, 
 
 Soon passes by; 
 We gather strength from toil and strife, 
 
 A smile, a sigh ; 
 And if we live the larger sphere, 
 Live for the right, for true friends dear, 
 Then, with the very best of cheer, 
 
 Bid them goodbye! 
 
VIII 
 IN PRISON AT SEA 
 
 /^N the morning of September thirtieth, even 
 ^^ before the light of day announced its 
 coming, wireless messages concerning the 
 steamship were caught up by the Marconi 
 operator. They came in rapid succession, ask- 
 ing "Frederick VIII, where are you?" 
 
 Commander Andersen, the veteran captain 
 of the Scandinavian- American Steamship Com- 
 pany, was in no hurry to have an answer, which 
 would divulge the location of the vessel, flashed 
 back to the inquiring intruder. He apparently 
 was driving as rapidly as possible toward a 
 point north of the Shetland Islands, thinking he 
 might be able to escape capture and detention 
 of his ship by the British. 
 
 The British were keeping a careful account 
 of the sailings across the Atlantic in both direc- 
 tions. They knew that steamship Frederick 
 
 66 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 67 
 
 VIII was somewhere approaching the region of 
 the Shetland Islands and they were determined 
 to intercept her and hold her subject to inspec- 
 tion. 
 
 The cargo had already been listed by British 
 officers in New York, who had been detailed to 
 keep an account of the freight as well as the 
 passengers taken on board. They knew that the 
 ship had large quantities of American mail and 
 much meat, the latter consisting in the main of 
 ham and bacon. This information was obtained 
 at the custom house, from the clearance papers, 
 and even more minute details were required to 
 be given by the owners of the ship, as the 
 passage across the ocean was granted by Great 
 Britain only under such conditions as she her- 
 self imposed. 
 
 In this connection I recalled the conversation 
 of the English secret service men in New York, 
 how they said England would interfere with the 
 transportation of goods and passengers, not 
 alone to injure Germany, but also to damage 
 and, if possible, disrupt the trade of neutrals. 
 It was becoming certain that the Marconi calls 
 
68 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 for information regarding the captain's ship 
 came from the British and that they had decided 
 to seize and search her. 
 
 "Frederick VIII, where are yon; an imme- 
 diate answer demanded, ' ' came the cajl, but the 
 ship surged forward. Officers with powerful 
 telescopic glasses were sweeping the sea in quest 
 of a ship, but none was seen. They kept their 
 own vessel racing with the utmost velocity, they 
 redoubled their efforts to make away and 
 become lost to the searcher. 
 
 It was an interesting race, a fine show of 
 power and endurance as the fore of the ship 
 plowed through the moaning sea at early morn. 
 Behind the great vessel was a briny furrow in 
 the waves, evidencing that the powerful twin 
 screws were working under the utmost pressure 
 of superheated steam. 
 
 It was not until the bright orb of the sun had 
 risen above the horizon that a British auxiliary 
 cruiser came into full view. The ship 's Marconi 
 station had already answered the call, and the 
 course of the vessel was bending to meet the 
 ship of war. Much excitement prevailed among 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 69 
 
 the passengers, especially when the ship came 
 to a full halt in response to a cannon shot from 
 the intruder, and a shrill megaphone from the 
 battleship announced, "You are wanted at 
 Kirkwall' ' 
 
 Soon a small boat with officers and men came 
 toward us and boarded the steamer, while the 
 guns on the battleship constantly pointed at us. 
 The officers and men who had come from the 
 battleship immediately disconnected the wire- 
 less apparatus, at which an armed guard with 
 a fixed bayonet was stationed. Other armed 
 soldiers were detailed to guard different parts 
 of the ship, in the front and rear, and on the 
 different decks. At the same time a pilot took 
 charge of and directed the steamer in the drive 
 of about two hundred miles to the Wide Firth 
 and through it to the Bay of Kirkwall. 
 
 When nearing the narrow channel which 
 affords entrance into the bay, several estates 
 with imposing buildings became visible, near 
 which were pastures and grounds for hunting 
 rabbits and small game. Delightful cliffs and 
 vales with interesting features were numerous. 
 
70 
 
 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 But the passengers seemed to see only the nets 
 set to catch submarines and the evidences of 
 mines placed to prevent intrusion by the enemy. 
 
 An individual mine, capable of 
 great destruction. 
 
 A flagship piloted our vessel through this hot- 
 bed of destruction, but it moved with the velocity 
 of a snail. This precaution was necessary 
 
The British auxiliary cruiser which arrested the neutral 
 steamship Frederick VIII. and compelled it to be imprisoned 
 seven days at Kirkwall. 
 
 Mines exploded and lighted the heavens and filled the air with 
 fumes and smoke. 
 
 (Opp. 71) 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 71 
 
 because the danger of being blown to atoms was 
 formidable. 
 
 To be deprived of personal freedom was in it- 
 self bad, but the presence of mines made the 
 danger of sudden destruction probable. Every- 
 where I could see long strings of floaters that in- 
 dicated the exact points of danger. Here and 
 there I could observe large and ugly looking 
 machines capable of producing death and anni- 
 hilation at the slightest impulse. 
 
 At night, after the imprisonment had con- 
 tinued several days, a battle occurred at sea. 
 Streaming searchlights shot far into the 
 heavens as each side endeavored to keep sure of 
 the exact location of the enemy. Shot and shell 
 were thrown great distances as the heavy guns 
 boomed forth with much noise and power. 
 Mines exploded and lighted the heavens and 
 filled the air with fumes and smoke. 
 
 And this is said to be civilization ! In no line 
 of enterprise have the races of culture exceeded 
 the savage so much as in devising machines to 
 ruin and kill! I heard and saw the dastardly 
 work and became resigned to the conditions 
 that surrounded me in this unfortunate place. 
 
72 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 In the Bay of Kirkwall we spent seven days. 
 The bleak and dismal hills of the Orkney Islands 
 bounded our view, except towards the south, 
 where we could see the small town of Kirkwall, 
 the capital of Orkney County, Scotland, which 
 nestles in a depression between the hills. On 
 the first day the passports of the passengers 
 were examined, for which purpose all on board 
 passed before a British officer and Commander 
 Andersen, each showing his papers and answer- 
 ing questions as to occupation, place of birth 
 and purpose in traveling. 
 
 Our ship was anchored near the center of the 
 bay, in the vicinity of many freighters, but no 
 passenger vessels were seen. I counted fifteen 
 vessels that had been hauled in, some of which 
 were too far away to enable me to distinguish 
 their names, which were near the water line, but 
 in my notebook I recorded the names of the 
 Muskogee of New York, the Pythia of Norway, 
 the Minsk of Denmark, and the Ester, the 
 Oregon, the Osterland, and the Gustav Adolf of 
 Sweden. Each day some were released and 
 others were brought into the bay to be searched 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 73 
 
 for contraband destined to the enemies of the 
 entente allies. 
 
 It was difficult to secure information of the 
 contents and the exact destination of these 
 ships. The British soldiers on board were 
 reluctant and divulged little. Finally an Ameri- 
 can passenger of Scotch descent with a Scotch 
 brogue became interested and made himself 
 agreeable with these soldiers; his Scottish 
 appearance and manners won their confidence 
 and to him they talked freely. 
 
 From this source, coupled with information 
 obtained from other reliable quarters, it was 
 learned that by far the larger number of these 
 ships were destined for Scandinavian ports, 
 while a few, loaded in part with chemicals of 
 German manufacture, were bound for America. 
 The ships sailing for Europe contained chiefly 
 American wheat, meat, lard, cotton, corn and 
 petroleum. This is in part an explanation of 
 why the more important chemicals in the 
 American market had advanced in price from 
 fifty to five hundred per cent. It likewise con- 
 tained the reason why the products of the farm 
 
74 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 and factory were stagnated in the warehouses 
 and on railways at New York and other eastern 
 gateways of America. 
 
 It was also learned at Kirkwall that ships 
 loaded with powder, dynamite, mines, grenades 
 and other implements designed to burn prop- 
 erty, wreck homes and destroy human life were 
 permitted to sail without interference. In fact, 
 such vessels were aided to move with the great- 
 est facility. On the other hand, the ships that 
 contained food for the hungry and appliances 
 to take care of the sick and wounded were 
 obstructed and delayed. 
 
 To my mind came the 12,000,000 refugees, 
 cold and starving in the bleak winter of central 
 Europe, who had flown as the army of the czar 
 of Eussia retreated eastward to the Dvinsk and 
 the Dnieper rivers. I thought of the women and 
 children of Poland, Servia and Belgium who 
 needed succor and support. In my mind I could 
 see the depressed serfs, poor and uneducated, 
 who had escaped to Petrograd, where food 
 prices had reached the high mark that only the 
 rich could defray. Finally, I had in mind the 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 75 
 
 laboring elements of the Scandinavian coun- 
 tries, where necessaries were scarce and employ- 
 ment limited. These peoples, especially those 
 who had flown from their homes, were suffering 
 vastly more than the people of Germany by the 
 restriction of trans-Atlantic trade. 
 
 Every moment at Kirkwall seemed like a day 
 and every day like a cycle while we were held 
 as prisoners in a strange land surrounded by 
 mines, submarines and torpedo boats. British 
 soldiers with fixed bayonets guarded the ship 
 and the passengers were deprived of the privi- 
 lege of telegraphing or writing to friends or 
 consulting the consul representing their coun- 
 try. No one was permitted to set foot on shore 
 or receive information and news from any 
 source. It was strictly forbidden to take pic- 
 tures, but this injunction was not obeyed by 
 those who possessed kodaks. 
 
 Among the passengers was Mr. Niels Peter- 
 sen, who had been in Canada and had taken 
 pictures at the principal seaports, such as St. 
 John, Halifax, Quebec and Montreal. His 
 photographs included views of harbors, bridges, 
 
76 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 railway terminals, stretches of highways and 
 prominent buildings. He had been tracked to 
 New York, where he was detected by British 
 spies, and a telegram to Kirkwall by way of 
 London demanded his arrest on the charge that 
 he was guilty of espionage. 
 
 This party declared his innocence and claimed 
 to be a Dane. He admitted having the photo- 
 graphs, but said they were taken for his per- 
 sonal study and for no other purpose. On the 
 seventh day at Kirkwall he was taken from the 
 ship as a spy and removed in a small boat. At 
 the time of his arrest he was singing a patriotic 
 song of Denmark, verses of which he continued 
 singing as he was removed, and while taken 
 away he waved his hand in farewell to the 
 steamship that had carried him into the hands 
 of his accusers. This was the last seen of him 
 by the passengers ; it is said he was taken to a 
 detention camp and later imprisoned. 
 
 No one else and no part of the cargo were 
 removed. The latter was allowed to go forward 
 under bond that none of it would be permitted 
 to enter Germany. Thus, after a delay of seven 
 
IN PRISON AT SEA 77 
 
 days, without justification and contrary to inter- 
 national law, the steamship finally was piloted 
 out of the bay and through the same field of 
 mines which terrorized the passengers at the 
 time of entry. 
 
 After leaving Kirkwall, the ship sailed 
 almost continually in places of danger until 
 Copenhagen was reached. Fields of mines were 
 encountered in the Christiania Fjord as well as 
 in the Skager-Eak, the Cattegat and portions of 
 the Sound. However, I left the ship at Christi- 
 ania to make a trip through Norway and Sweden 
 before going to Copenhagen. 
 
 While at Kirkwall I was requested by a num- 
 ber of passengers to write two or three comic 
 verses on the capture, detention and release of 
 the vessel. Although I am not specially adept 
 at telling a story or writing humorous literature 
 of merit, I penned several as a substitute for 
 the latter, of which the following is a sample : 
 
78 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 WHEN WE SAILED FOR DENMARK 
 
 When we sailed for Denmark 
 Like Crusoe sailed of old, 
 Pirates caught us napping 
 And captured all our gold, 
 And captured all our gold. 
 
 But our gold was bacon 
 And gave them all the gout; 
 So the sickly pirates 
 Soon threw us down and out, 
 Soon threw us down and out. 
 
 Near a rocky island 
 We waited many a day 
 For final word from London, 
 So we might sail away, 
 So we might sail away. 
 
 Youngsters grew to manhood 
 And adults lost their sight, 
 But we kept on waiting, 
 A waiting day and night, 
 A waiting day and night. 
 
 Though we 're growing aged, 
 We will not feel forlorn, 
 If we land in Denmark 
 Ere Gabriel blows his horn, 
 Ere Gabriel blows his horn. 
 
IX 
 
 DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 
 
 A T Christiania I was accompanied to Hotel 
 -**■ Continental by Mr. H. 0. Nordin, a build- 
 ing contractor of Chicago, who was en route to 
 Sweden on business and remained in Norway 
 only a short time. To this gentleman I am 
 indebted for assistance in searching for evidence 
 of the measures Great Britain had adopted to 
 control and, if possible, disrupt the neutral 
 trade across the Atlantic. He had taken kodak 
 pictures of much value, including a number of 
 views of the British cruiser that had stopped us 
 and impressed the passengers to be imprisoned 
 at Kirkwall. 
 
 British trade spies were numerous at the rail- 
 way stations and in the vicinity of the docks. I 
 saw them at restaurants and in the lobbies of 
 the leading hotels, especially at the Grand, the 
 Scandinavie, and the Continental. It was not 
 
 79 
 
80 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 difficult to identify myself by using the Sign of 
 Silence, which I had employed successfully at 
 Albany, when the two companions of Mr. Fen- 
 wick were introduced to me. My knowledge of 
 the purchase of horses, grain, cotton and meat 
 by the allies in America interested them. 
 
 These spies were studying the register at the 
 leading hotels so they might know the class of 
 strangers who were in the city, whether German, 
 Russian, French, etc., and the effect which the 
 propaganda of these or any of them had upon 
 public thought in Norway. They were concerned 
 with the classes of goods imported and exported 
 by Norway, particularly the volume of business 
 transacted and with what nations trade rela- 
 tions were sustained. The data which the secret 
 service men of the allies were tabulating were 
 gathered with the view of securing information 
 which would aid Great Britain to restrict the 
 trade of Norway so closely that only sufficient 
 imports to keep the country from starving 
 would be moved. 
 
 From Christiania I went to Trondhjem and 
 later to Hell, both seaports on fjords with deep 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 81 
 
 harbors. At both these places I found spies of 
 the allies on the same mission as those at 
 Christiania, but in addition also agents friendly 
 to Eussia who were counteracting the rising 
 feeling against the czar and his alleged desire 
 to annex northern Sweden and Norway, to 
 secure an outlet through an open port on the 
 Atlantic. 
 
 On my second day at Trondhjem, shortly after 
 leaving the Grand Hotel, I met Mr. Solomon 
 Lankelinsky, a Hebrew merchant, from whom I 
 learned much of the Russian agents who were 
 working to influence sentiment. In fact I had 
 met many Jews and all with whom I came in 
 contact expressed themselves anti-Russian. 
 
 At this time the campaign at the Dardanelles 
 was in full swing, which the czar expected would 
 be forced by the British and French, after which 
 Constantinople would be captured and the 
 whole region annexed to Russia to connect her 
 commercially with the Mediterranean. Several 
 secret agents of Russia I met here and at Hell 
 made this solution in the near East the theme 
 of conversation and promulgated discussion by 
 
82 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 publishing articles regarding it in the news- 
 papers. It appeared singular that these secret 
 agents, although acting for Eussia, conversed 
 almost entirely in the German language, which 
 tongue is spoken extensively in Warsaw and 
 many large cities of Eussia. 
 
 The harbor at Hell is not as advantageous in 
 many respects as the one at Trondhjem and the 
 town is of less importance, but it is located con- 
 veniently on the railway which crosses into 
 Sweden and forms a continuous route to Sund- 
 vall, which, by steamship routes across the Bay 
 of Bothnia, can be reached easily from Eussia by 
 way of Finland. It is not difficult to understand 
 how important this route would be to Eussia, 
 especially in the time of war, as it would furnish 
 an open sea and enable free communication for 
 troops and supplies the entire year. 
 
 However, the secret agents of Eussia, detailed 
 to influence sentiment, were emphasizing the 
 value of the Dardanelles as a Eussian route by 
 water. They repudiated the reports that the 
 czar had any desire to annex any part of the 
 Scandinavian Peninsula. But, in spite of this, 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 83 
 
 the shadow of the Bussian bear was disturbing 
 the suspecting Norwegians. 
 
 In the Swedish capital, the city of Stockholm, 
 the secret service men likewise were abundant. 
 They were active in the lobbies of the Grand, 
 the Continental and the Central hotels. I met 
 them in the city and in the suburbs, everywhere 
 busy as bees. Here the work of spies was not 
 so much concerned with commerce as with the 
 study and direction of public sentiment, for 
 which purpose they wrote for newspapers both 
 in Sweden and in their own countries. 
 
 This was before the movement for conscrip- 
 tion had made much progress in England, and 
 the British were endeavoring in vain to induce 
 men to join the army. One of the English 
 secret agents showed me a poster that was being 
 used to enlist the support of the women, think- 
 ing they would lend a hand to induce their 
 husbands, sons or sweethearts to go to war. A 
 reduced size of the printed form is shown in 
 this book. Posters of this kind attracted much 
 interest when they were shown to the Swedes. 
 
 Sweden has a long history of progress in art, 
 
rfleWi 
 
 anew 
 
 
 cn< 
 
 
 1&77V 
 
 Sample poster used by the British to induce the women to 
 support the war. 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 85 
 
 science and learning. Intellectually she com- 
 pares with Russia as the brightest day does with 
 the darkest night. From the standpoint of 
 universal education she has greatly outranked 
 both France and England for many decades. 
 Her people, humiliated by the interference of 
 trade through the British, had become restive 
 and were openly declaring their opposition on 
 the platform and through the press. Secret 
 service men of both sides in the great war were 
 on the ground to learn of the trend of affairs 
 and, if possible, influence them so as to make 
 them more favorable to the country they repre- 
 sented. 
 
 On the eighteenth of October I ticketed for 
 Malmo by way of Norrkoping, taking the train 
 from the central station. The seat opposite 
 mine in the well-cushioned compartment was oc- 
 cupied by a lady of middle age. She kept her 
 suit case near her seat as if she feared it might 
 become lost. 
 
 Little was said at the beginning of the trip. 
 She took observations through the window of the 
 compartment, especially of the outlying districts 
 
86 
 
 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 of the city, a part of which is known as Gamle 
 Stockholm, and seemed interested in the fields, 
 gardens and forests. 
 I busied myself reading in a guide of Sweden. 
 
 Pointing my finger at her, I said: "You are a Eussian 
 spy and the evidence is in your suit case. ' ' 
 
 At length we began a conversation. She tried to 
 convey the idea that she spoke no language but 
 Swedish, but I soon discovered her accent to be 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 87 
 
 that of a Slav and that she was able to converse 
 freely in German. 
 
 Pointing my finger at her, I said, "You are a 
 Eussian spy and the evidence is in your suit 
 case." 
 
 To me it seemed that her face displayed all the 
 colors of the rainbow. She threw up her hands 
 excitedly, moving them up and down like a coun- 
 try pedlar. 
 
 "Sir," she said at length, "you surprise me, 
 you offend my loyalty. Why accuse me for no 
 other reason than that I am a Eussian?" 
 
 "Calm yourself, madam," I replied. "Al- 
 though I am an American, I know of your work 
 and have you noted in a list of people who are 
 practicing espionage. However, you need not 
 fear me in the least. I am neutral and am inter- 
 ested in you only as a matter of general informa- 
 tion." 
 
 Then I showed her my American passport and 
 many letters of identification, in which manner 
 she was led to confide in me. My guess had 
 proven a correct one. 
 
 She gave her name as Miss Michailowitsch 
 
88 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 and showed me some letters to bear out her state- 
 ment. The work she was doing consisted of 
 cooperating with others in watching Finland, 
 where the men of military age had become rest- 
 ive and many were emigrating. It was her 
 special business to observe these people and, if 
 possible, to learn who and how many were join- 
 ing the German army in Poland and on the 
 Dvinsk Eiver. 
 
 I left the train at Norrkoping while Miss 
 Michailowitsch went on to Malmo. At the time 
 of leaving the train, I advised her to change 
 her occupation, if she valued her life. This 
 admonition elicited a bland smile. 
 
 The next day I took the same train for south- 
 ern Sweden, which is the best agricultural sec- 
 tion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. 
 
 At the seaport of Malmo, the southern outlet 
 of Sweden, secret service men again turned at- 
 tention to commercial lines rather than to a 
 propaganda to create favor in public opinion 
 for the entente allies. These spies studied the 
 Swedish imports and exports as to kind, quan- 
 tity, source and destination. Much of the 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 89 
 
 coastal waters in this vicinity had been mined 
 as a protection to trade, but a number of British 
 submarines had found their way into the Baltic 
 and were actively seeking to destroy the ship- 
 ping between Germany and the ports of lower 
 Sweden. 
 
 Opposite the equestrian statue of Carl X., in 
 the Stortorget, I entered Hotel Standard, at 
 which I engaged quarters. Here and at other 
 hotels, especially at Hotel Kramer and Hotel 
 Savoy, were many secret agents of England and 
 Germany, whose activities were not confined to 
 Malmo but rather to the southern part of 
 Sweden, including the ports of Goteborg, 
 Trelleborg and Karlskrona. 
 
 The customs house, an imposing structure of 
 brick and stone, was busy in the affairs of trade 
 with Denmark and Germany. At first sight the 
 parcels and boxes which made up the great car- 
 goes that were loading and unloading looked 
 regular, but closer inspection convinced me, in 
 the manner of the experience at the early stages 
 of prohibition in Kansas, that the outside of a 
 sealed package may be more innocent than the 
 
90 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 inside. Although I had some unavoidable 
 doubts, I kept my own counsel and said nothing. 
 
 Germany had possession of the great coal 
 fields of France and Belgium, which she was 
 working as extensively as they were worked in 
 the time of peace, hence both France and Italy 
 depended largely on England for fuel to keep 
 the hearths warm and enable the factories and 
 railways to operate. This was about all Eng- 
 land could do in addition to supplying her own 
 needs, but it was not so with the Germans. In- 
 deed, Germany had coal to sell in large quan- 
 tities, thanks to the employment of war-prison 
 labor. Not only Sweden, Denmark and Norway 
 were depending upon Germany for coal, but 
 also Holland and Switzerland. 
 
 This paved the way for an exchange of prod- 
 ucts. Germany was very friendly to the Scan- 
 dinavian countries and would not let them 
 suffer, but in return she required certain quan- 
 tities of produce, such as fish, oil, grain and 
 textile products. This exchange element in the 
 trade explains very largely the busy life I saw 
 in the ports of the Scandinavian countries which 
 I visited. 
 
DIETING NORWAY AND SWEDEN 91 
 
 North of west from Malnio, across the Sound, 
 is Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark. The 
 ride by steamer in the time of peace does not 
 require over two hours, but this water was now 
 protected by mines and nets, hence the cir- 
 cuitous route necessary to evade danger length- 
 ened the trip to four hours. 
 
 The Sound is a busy water. On it float innu- 
 merable steamers and many crafts of fishermen 
 plying their art. The ride was pleasant, rather 
 cold but not windy, and I reached the Danish 
 capital just after night had called into use 
 thousands of electric lights on the streets and 
 along the famous Langelinie. 
 
X 
 
 IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 
 
 f |\BE steamer ran into port at Havnegade, 
 A which is the landing place for the vessels 
 crossing the Sound, and I made haste to Hotel 
 Central, on Eaadhuspladsen. At this hotel and 
 at general postal delivery I expected mail from 
 America and from secret agents I had met at 
 New York and at various places in Europe. The 
 mailman was liberal and gave me many letters 
 and packages, small and large, which reminded 
 me of an American mail order house. Had I 
 been in a country at war, where strangers were 
 carefully watched, I would have been under no 
 mild suspicion. 
 
 At Hotel Central I found many guests from 
 Germany and Austria-Hungary. Indeed, all 
 the employees spoke German and much of the 
 conversation heard at the tables was in that 
 tongue. This is a very natural condition, a 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 93 
 
 situation which I had expected before I reached 
 the city, because Germany is nearer Denmark 
 geographically than any other of the larger 
 countries and the trade and intercourse between 
 the two nations are very extensive. 
 
 The first evening, after a hasty meal, I made 
 a trip to the leading hotels, including the Bris- 
 tol, the Cosmopolite, the Dagmar, the Palads, 
 the Monopol and the Grand Hotel National. By 
 this initial but rapid tour it was possible to lo- 
 cate the places where strangers gather and to 
 feel the pulse of commerce and public sentiment. 
 My first impression was right : ' * Copenhagen 
 is at present the Babel of travel and the Mecca 
 of European secret service work. ' ' 
 
 No introduction is needed in the best cafes 
 and restaurants. When at the Wewel, the Al- 
 hambra, the Grand National or any other of 
 the high-class eating houses, the introduction 
 may be personal. That is, if a lady or gentle- 
 man is unaccompanied and you wish an ac- 
 quaintance, all you need to do is to invite her 
 or him to dine or attend theater with you. If 
 appearances are favorable, and here they usu- 
 
94 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 ally are because only well-dressed people are 
 admitted, the invitation generally is accepted. 
 This is the custom of the country and is prac- 
 ticed very extensively. 
 
 It must be remembered, too, that the people 
 as a whole are well accomplished in the art of 
 conversation. They speak three or four lan- 
 guages and know much of history and the 
 themes of art and literature. The larger num- 
 ber, both ladies and gentlemen, like some form 
 of alcoholic beverage, chiefly wine and beer, 
 and nearly all smoke; the ladies smoke ciga- 
 rettes and the gentlemen almost universally use 
 cigars. My first choice was coffee and my sec- 
 ond choice was tea; this is as far as I could go 
 on intoxicants, but I could match most of the 
 Danes in the use of languages. 
 
 When I was about to retire for the night, 
 while on my way back to the hotel, I met a man 
 who wanted to sell me a lead pencil. I pur- 
 chased, but at the same time studied the expres- 
 sion of his face, which seemed to tell a story of 
 a different life than that of the street vendor. 
 He limped while stepping on his right foot and 
 carried a rather elegant looking cane. 
 
DEATH AND SORROW IN COPENHAGEN 
 
 Two men hailed me at Raadhuspladeen and wanted to take 
 my photograph. Being likeable fellows, I engaged them to take 
 pictures in different parts of the city. These included one at 
 the Hellig Aand Kirke (Holy Ghost Church), where the fine 
 figure of Death and Sorrow is located. 
 
 These men were spies. They were posing as photographers, 
 but their business was to represent England in secret service 
 work. This they admitted with unusual frankness and showed 
 me pictures they had made of many freight transports. 
 
 I told them I might as well appear in this picture as any- 
 where else in Europe which, indeed, was a hotbed of death and 
 sorrow. The monument represents the Mother lying in sorrow 
 on the ground, while Death is hastening away with her Child in 
 order to catch the next victim. 
 
 (Opp. 95) 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 95 
 
 The next morning I was ready to begin my 
 study of the places where I was specially inter- 
 ested, that is at the libraries, art galleries and 
 museums, but these institutions were not open 
 until eleven o'clock, hence I had several hours 
 every morning and evening to interest myself 
 in the effect of war upon the neutral countries. 
 
 On Eaadhuspladsen I met several men who 
 were taking pictures for travelers. They were 
 agreeable looking fellows and I engaged them 
 to take several views for me, including one of 
 the monument known as Death and Sorrow, 
 which is a fine bronze piece near the Hellig 
 Aand Church. It was not long until I made the 
 discovery that these men were spies. Indeed, I 
 found spies disguised as street vendors, news- 
 paper sellers, bootblacks, interpreters, guides 
 and as workers in many other common callings. 
 At the Bristol Hotel I met several spies to 
 whom Mr. Fenwick had referred me while I 
 was in New York. This gave spice to my 
 leisure moments and stimulated interest in the 
 war. 
 
 After I had been in Copenhagen several days, 
 
96 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 late in the afternoon, I decided to go to the 
 docks and shipping yards to take observations 
 of the freight which was moving through the 
 city. Here I discovered a man making nota- 
 tions of cars which were either loading or un- 
 loading. These cars were from the continent 
 and were marked from different places, such as 
 Bromberg, Dresden, Munich, Bautzen and other 
 cities of Germany. 
 
 Here was the clue that Denmark was trading 
 extensively with the Central Powers. This spy 
 was listing the cars and steamships engaged in 
 this trade ; he was taking the names of the ships 
 and cars and making a record of the commodi- 
 ties in which trading was done. After observ- 
 ing his work for some time, I made my presence 
 known and found him to be the street vendor 
 from whom I had purchased a lead pencil on 
 my first evening in the city, but he was now 
 posing as a railroad official and held his cane 
 before him as he walked rapidly away. 
 
 It did not require much time for the street 
 vendor, who pretended to be lame as he leaned 
 upon his cane, to dent the crown of his hat and 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 
 
 97 
 
 assume the more important attitude of a railway 
 and steamboat inspector. He may have de- 
 ceived others a long time, but I was on his trail 
 and discovered his smart delusion much sooner 
 than he expected. 
 
 The spy who pretended to be a lame street vendor, but who 
 afterward posed as a railway official and held his cane before 
 him as he walked rapidly away. 
 
 Great Britain had already notified Denmark 
 that she would control the imports and exports 
 
98 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 of the Danes, that she would exercise the right 
 of search on ships crossing the seas, and now a 
 movement was on foot to study by secret meth- 
 ods the trade in domestic productions with the 
 view of ultimately controlling all the foreign 
 commercial business of the country as well as 
 the foreign commerce of Norway and Sweden. 
 
 This is still further explained by the case of a 
 Dane, Andrew Christiansen, who was pretend- 
 ing to be a guide and interpreter, but who was 
 employed by the British and their allies as a 
 spy and detailed to make a record of the pas- 
 sengers who were going out and coming into 
 Copenhagen on the daily trains to and from 
 Berlin and Hamburg. I met him many times 
 and engaged him in conversation. He and a 
 company of other secret service men were pro- 
 mulgating the idea everywhere that Germany 
 expected to invade and annex Denmark. 
 
 London was living in the dark at night, fear- 
 ing attacks by German aviators, and the Danes 
 were being influenced to feel unfriendly to their 
 Teuton neighbors as a means of resenting less 
 vigorously the British encroachment on Danish 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 99 
 
 commerce. Articles published from time to 
 time in such newspapers as the Hovedstaden and 
 the Berlingshe Tidende in spirit supported the 
 work of several dozen secret service men em- 
 ployed by the British allies in the Danish capi- 
 tal to influence sentiment against Germany. 
 
 Several times I invited a number of the spies 
 that I met at the Bristol Hotel to accompany 
 me to entertainments, including a certain John 
 Denton, a friend of Mr. Fenwick, who went 
 with me to the Scala Theater, where a comic 
 opera known as Polsk Blod was presented. This 
 gentleman entertained much and came in con- 
 tact with many prominent Danes. 
 
 I gave him the letter written by Mr. Fenwick 
 at New York, but not before I made a copy of it, 
 thinking this precaution would serve my pur- 
 pose to an advantage elsewhere. Later, when 
 I returned to New York, I secured stationery 
 and had duplicate copies written on letterheads 
 of Hotel Belmont, one of which is shown on 
 another page of this book. 
 
 Mr. Denton was profuse in publishing the 
 charge that Germany expected to annex Den- 
 
FoftTY-SECOvn St. 
 at Park Avenue 
 
 B.LJ*. BATES. 
 
 -^^Sa^jUa^ * ) . >j)S, 
 
 s^^AX ^0>v^ Vv^ <*~&- A^R **Uo 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 101 
 
 mark. He said: "In 1864 Germany forced 
 Denmark to give np Schleswig-Holstein, which 
 the Danes have not forgotten and will not forget 
 until it is restored and in addition the Kiel 
 Canal is annexed to Denmark." 
 
 "On the other hand," said I, "many Danes 
 think the greater crime against Denmark was 
 committed in 1807, when the British destroyed 
 the Danish fleet and burned most of Copen- 
 hagen to make England instead of Denmark the 
 mistress of the sea." 
 
 "Yes," he answered, "but this is over a hun- 
 dred years ago and since then England has had 
 a change of heart. The British may, in order 
 to starve Germany, make it unpleasant for Den- 
 mark, but she will not do more to the Danes 
 than to control their commerce." 
 
 "So you think England has had a change of 
 heart ! Your views do not agree with the boast 
 of many English politicians who proclaim that 
 Great Britain expects to conquer and control 
 the earth. How about Canada, Australia, South 
 Africa, Egypt and the remainder of the domain 
 she is holding?" 
 
102 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 ' ' 0, these comprise conquered territory and of 
 right belong to her," he replied. 
 
 ' ' The United States has set an example to be 
 emulated,' ' I said. "Our country took Cuba 
 over only for so long a time as was necessary 
 to enable the island to develop a safe and stable 
 government. This is true likewise of the Philip- 
 pines, which probably will become equally in- 
 dependent within the next decade.' ' 
 
 "That may be a good policy for a country 
 which has no world-wide ambition, but England 
 set out a century ago to control the commerce of 
 the world and this policy she will maintain," he 
 said. 
 
 "But suppose," I replied, "the United States 
 would unite with the neutral countries of Amer- 
 ica and Europe in positive action against Great 
 Britain for this interference with their trade, 
 claiming they rightfully are entitled to and must 
 have absolute freedom of the sea. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Then, ' ' said he, ' ' England may be compelled 
 to back down, but the United States will not do 
 it. Americans are money mad; they will sell 
 their souls for money, and for this reason will 
 not assume or maintain high ideals of justice." 
 
IN THE DANISH CAPITAL 103 
 
 Continuing, I said: " America might place 
 an embargo on the exportation of munitions of 
 war, forbid floating war loans, censor the cable 
 and telegram communications of the allies, and 
 finally convoke a convention of neutral nations 
 to retaliate against the British restrictions of 
 trade. All these measures have been consid- 
 ered in America. ' ' 
 
 "All these are possible/ ' he replied, "but the 
 entente allies do not fear America and will do 
 as they think best and promote their own causes 
 to the best advantage for themselves. England 
 has the strongest navy in the world and will 
 not permit any nation to surpass her or suc- 
 cessfully compete with her in commerce on the 
 high sea, not even America. President Wilson 
 is expected to do little more than protest mildly 
 against England so long as he can be induced by 
 British friends in America to give his attention 
 to German submarine warfare." 
 
 This conversation is about an average of what 
 was heard by those who came in contact with 
 spies of the allies. On the other hand, German 
 secret service men contended that their govern- 
 
104 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 ment considered it of interest to the Fatherland 
 to protect the independence of Denmark. They 
 claimed that the many islands, separated by 
 navigable channels, which make up the kingdom 
 of Denmark, are difficult to defend, and, for 
 that reason, the country is a secure protection 
 to the northern coast of Germany so long as it 
 remains neutral. 
 
 As a whole, Copenhagen was in the midst of 
 great prosperity. The Nordisk Magasin and 
 other great stores were well stocked with goods 
 and trading was brisk. At the Borsen (Board 
 of Trade) excitement was at fever heat as grain, 
 meat and other produce rose or fell on the mar- 
 ket. In short, the Danish capital had become 
 the Mecca of trading, the center of travel and 
 the heart of theaters and other amusements. 
 
 After some time of interesting visits and con- 
 versations, I left Copenhagen to go partly by 
 train and partly by steamer to Berlin, making 
 the trip to Germany by way of Warnemunde. 
 This is the port on the Baltic Sea through which 
 the German capital and the interior of Europe 
 may be reached most conveniently. 
 
XI 
 
 LIKE SMELLING POWDER 
 
 rTIHE trade between Copenhagen and Berlin 
 *- has been a large enterprise for many 
 years. Two daily vestibuled trains carry the 
 through passenger business, one of these leav- 
 ing each city in the morning and reaching the 
 other metropolis in the evening. 
 
 About one hundred and fifty passengers were 
 on each of these trains at the time I was making 
 the trip. They consisted chiefly of people in- 
 terested in business and included quite a num- 
 ber who were leaving for America or returning 
 to visit their old home. Few tourists were to 
 be seen. As a student and writer, I appeared 
 to be alone in my class. 
 
 Denmark being made up largely of islands, 
 the train crosses the first piece of land to Maas- 
 nedo, where the passengers transfer to a boat 
 and in about twenty minutes reach the village 
 
 105 
 
106 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 of Ourehoved. Here they take a train for 
 Gjedser, which is reached in half an hour, and 
 then transfer to a larger steamer which carries 
 them across an arm of the Baltic Sea to Ger- 
 many. 
 
 This trip impresses the traveler with the im- 
 portance of international commerce, with the 
 dependence that one nation has upon other peo- 
 ples. It also affords an opportunity to see the 
 wonderful and far-reaching preparations that 
 had been made to defend the German coast 
 against the enemy. On every hand were evi- 
 dences of preparedness to repel an attack or an 
 invasion; everywhere could be seen measures 
 of protection. It gave the effect upon the mind 
 that a civilian has when he hears the bursting 
 of shells and smells the fumes of exploding 
 powder. 
 
 The steamship had hardly landed when a 
 voice announced in clear tones, " Those taking 
 the train for Hamburg are to enter first ; those 
 going on the train for Berlin will wait until the 
 Hamburg passengers have landed.' ' 
 
 That meant a brief delay for me and I con- 
 
LIKE SMELLING POWDER 107 
 
 eluded to utilize the time profitably. I observed 
 that the officers spoke in the Plattdeutsch, that 
 is in the dialect of North Germany, and, when 
 they communicated in German, they used the 
 clear tongue for which the Holstein people are 
 noted. This gave me the hint that I would have 
 no trouble in passing the very scrutinizing ex- 
 amination which those who entered Germany 
 at the time of war were required to undergo. 
 
 Several years before I had a similar experi- 
 ence at Winnipeg, where the Canadian govern- 
 ment had stationed some soldiers to guard a 
 part of the city in the time of local trouble. To 
 pass through a part of the closed district, to be 
 able to meet a person I wanted to see, it was 
 necessary to win the good will of an officer. 
 
 This officer was of Scottish descent, hence I 
 planned to use a few sentences in the brogue 
 of the Scots. The effect was magical. It 
 caused the officer to open his eyes like the bosom 
 of Loch Lomond and to give his permission for 
 my passage. 
 
 Instead of crowding forward and elbowing 
 my way through the crowd at Warnemunde, I 
 
108 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 came near the last part of the line with my 
 passport and hand baggage. When I reached 
 the first officer of half a dozen who were con- 
 ducting the examination, I said, "Na, hir spra- 
 ken de Liit Plattdiitsch, und ick bin rekt tau 
 Hus," meaning, " Surely, here the people speak 
 Plattdeutsch, and I am really at home. ' ' 
 
 After this the conversation was largely in the 
 local dialect and I had no difficulty in entering 
 the borders of the Fatherland. Indeed, the offi- 
 cers, feeling assured of my mission of study and 
 investigation, extended assistance by telling me 
 of many places of interest that I should visit in 
 Berlin and in the country along the line of my 
 investigations. 
 
 The train had become belated because of the 
 examination and the delay would make me late 
 at Berlin. At first I thought of stopping over- 
 night at Warnemiinde, but learned that the town 
 was a closed military camp, no stranger being 
 permitted to enter the place without a permit 
 from the authorities at the capital. I wanted 
 to make the ride entirely by daytime, but, under 
 the circumstances, boarded the train with the 
 other passengers. 
 
LIKE SMELLING POWDER 109 
 
 A favorable seat was assigned to me in one 
 of the compartment cars. It was opposite a 
 reservation occupied by a young lady, and I 
 engaged her in conversation. She had come 
 from New York and was on a trip to Ballen- 
 stadt for a visit. From her I learned that the 
 ladies had been ushered into private rooms for 
 examination by female officers, who required 
 them to remove their clothes. The examina- 
 tions, from information secured at Christiania, 
 were identical in this respect to those required 
 in England. 
 
 At first it seemed strange that both the per- 
 son and the clothes as well as all the baggage 
 were examined, but it was not long until I found 
 proof that such precautions were necessary. 
 This I learned by observing a Dane, an engi- 
 neer, who occupied a seat near mine. He con- 
 stantly held the thumb of the left hand across 
 the palm and this attracted my attention. At 
 first it occurred to me that he had a crippled 
 limb or some slight defect, but soon I noticed 
 that he was concealing something. 
 
 I remained constantly with him. At the first 
 
110 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 opportunity I had to speak to him privately, 
 which was not long, I inquired about his secret 
 message. He became nervous and resented my 
 impertinence. In this I did not blame him, but 
 I felt sure he must either confide in me or de- 
 stroy whatever he was concealing. 
 
 He chose the former course and showed me 
 his message in miniature. It proved to be a 
 harmless note, a letter sent by a friend in 
 Odense to a relative in Berlin, under the false 
 impression that correspondence of friendship 
 was prohibited. In fact, it was dangerous to 
 conceal such a letter or anything else, but the 
 letter itself was entirely proper and permissi- 
 ble. 
 
 I had not been in Germany many days until I 
 learned from personal observation that some 
 travelers I met professed friendship for Ger- 
 many and in spite of their professions were 
 false and dangerous enemies. To me it seemed, 
 in view of this fact, that the authorities leaned 
 rather on the side of leniency than on the side 
 of severity. In all public places was the notice : 
 
LIKE SMELLING POWDER 111 
 
 SOLDATEN 
 
 VOESICHT IN GESPRACHEN 
 
 SPIONENGEFAHR 
 
 The translation is as follows : Soldiers, care- 
 ful in conversations ; danger of spies ! 
 
 That there was an invasion of spies and se- 
 cret service men, mostly representing England 
 and France, I learned soon after I reached the 
 large cities of Germany. They were disguised 
 in various ways, as laborers, students and pro- 
 fessional and business men. At the Nordland, 
 the Fiirstenhof, the Europaischerhof and other 
 hotels I met many that I put on the suspicious 
 list, but I evaded them lest they might draw me 
 into trouble and annoyances. In this I chose 
 the wiser course, as several Americans I met 
 were innocently thrown into difficulties in this 
 way. 
 
XII 
 
 VISITS WITH CLAUS BEAVO 
 
 rpHE restrictions on those who made applica- 
 -*■ tion to visit the front, to inspect the forti- 
 fications in the near-war zone and to see action 
 in the trenches, had become very stringent when 
 I reached Berlin. It was not so at the begin- 
 ning of the war, when considerable latitude 
 was given newspaper reporters and students 
 of military tactics, but deception of professed 
 friends and many aggravated instances of 
 espionage caused the change of policy. 
 
 Now the Oberhaupt Commando had absolute 
 charge of all places considered important from 
 a military or naval standpoint. Those who 
 could make a satisfactory showing, who were 
 trustworthy and had a reasonable purpose, re- 
 ceived passes, but the examination was thor- 
 ough and action in granting concessions was 
 slow. 
 
 112 
 
VISITS WITH CLAUS BRAVO 113 
 
 I learned in Breslau, while in consultation 
 with Hon. Harry G. Seltzer, the American con- 
 sul, that the newspaper reporters from foreign 
 countries had been greatly restricted or were 
 barred from places of importance, where action 
 was in progress or where supplies, such as pro- 
 visions and ammunition, were stored. Those 
 who were permitted to visit these places had 
 difficulties in having their reports pass the veto 
 of the censor. 
 
 These circumstances had developed various 
 methods in obtaining information in Germany 
 as well as in England and elsewhere. One com- 
 mon method was to visit the larger cities near 
 the border, such as Breslau, Bromberg and 
 Karlsruhe, there to learn as much as possible 
 by conversing with the people and reading the 
 newspapers. After that the wily reporter would 
 make a trip to some neutral city, such as Am- 
 sterdam or Copenhagen, where the reports 
 were written and placed in the mails. This 
 method had the advantage of escaping the cen- 
 sor, the dates were changed in America, and the 
 American reader was delighted with something 
 sensational ! 
 
114 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 I had been in Berlin more than three weeks, 
 had consulted with the American ambassador, 
 Hon. James W. Gerard ; with Mr. James 'Don- 
 nell Bennett and Mr. Eobert J. Thompson, 
 American newspaper reporters ; with members 
 of the German parliament, and many officials 
 in civic and military positions, including Herr 
 Gottlieb von Jagow, the German secretary of 
 foreign affairs, before I obtained privileges to 
 visit prison camps, border fortifications and 
 fields in the east where action had destroyed 
 cities and devastated the country. 
 
 After I had traveled to inspect the points 
 which I wanted to visit, I began to plan to learn 
 from first hand experience the strange and hor- 
 rible action and destruction in war. It was my 
 purpose to meet those who had fought at the 
 front and had been in the thick of the fight at 
 noted engagements. In this manner I obtained 
 information by personal inspection and at the 
 same time saw safely by proxy what would 
 otherwise be dangerous and impossible. 
 
 A trip on business to Zehlendorf, a thriving 
 suburb of Berlin, where I had gone to examine 
 
VISITS WITH CLAUS BRAVO 115 
 
 a residence that had been advertised for sale, 
 brought me in contact with a number of soldiers 
 who had fought both in the east and the west 
 and who were home on a furlough because of 
 wounds. I cultivated the acquaintance of these 
 soldiers, which required several trips to Zehlen- 
 dorf, as it was necessary to win their confidence. 
 The story of one of these, Claus Bravo, so 
 strange and interesting, impressed me greatly. 
 I recite it here as he confided it to me, omitting 
 nothing, not even the details, which were then 
 prohibited by military restrictions. 
 
 Claus Bravo had reached the age of thirty 
 when the war began. He had been trained as 
 a soldier, but was engaged in the business of a 
 building contractor, and volunteered to serve 
 in the artillery against Eussia. In the memora- 
 ble campaign of the Mazurian Lakes, which 
 made the name of General von Hindenburg his- 
 torical, he was awarded the Iron Cross for 
 bravery in action. Later he took part in the 
 assaults upon Warsaw, Novogeorgievsk and 
 Brest-Litovsk. In the latter he was wounded 
 in the left shoulder and captured. 
 
116 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 The capture of Claus Bravo was not the re- 
 sult of miscalculation by German leadership, 
 for the campaign against the entrenchments 
 and the solid walls and abutments of Brest- 
 Litovsk had been planned and executed with 
 the utmost precision. The largest siege guns 
 ever employed in modern warfare, known 
 among the Germans as "Big Berthas,' ' so- 
 called from Bertha Krupp, daughter of the late 
 Alfred Krupp of Essen, were on the field of 
 action. These huge steel monsters with great 
 gaping mouths, loaded with tons of steel and 
 explosive bullets, were fired by means of wire 
 cables, attached at one end to the trigger of the 
 cannon and at the other end to a station in the 
 ground. Claus Bravo and his comrades, after 
 charging the great cannon, found safety from 
 the sudden explosion by disappearing in the 
 underground stations, where they pulled the 
 wires and thereby caused the machines to belch 
 forth. Had they remained on the surface, near 
 the cannon, the sudden rupture would have 
 destroyed their nerves and made them deaf and, 
 perhaps, blind and insane. 
 
BATTLE FIELD HYENAS 
 
 The battle fields are infested by spies and thieves. These 
 two classes do not work together, but as separate and distinct 
 classes. 
 
 The spies are most numerous before and during engage- 
 ments, when they endeavor to learn of the strength, equipment 
 and plans of the enemy. In many cases they remain on or near 
 the field of action after the battle, hoping to gather information 
 which will aid in further action. 
 
 The thieves commonly follow the engagements to steal food 
 and clothing. The illustration shows a number of spies and 
 thieves that were captured in Russia. No quarters are given to 
 such captives. 
 
 (Opp. 117) 
 
VISITS WITH CLAUS BRAVO 117 
 
 Overhead, like a mere speck of dust, hovered 
 the flotilla of taubes and double deckers which 
 signaled to the men at the big guns. These 
 flying crafts could be seen only by means of 
 powerful telescopes, but their signals, given 
 by throwing out milk-colored dust, had indi- 
 cated the effective results of the explosions as 
 they struck terror to the fortifications of Brest- 
 Litovsk. 
 
 The center of the city was fully twenty miles 
 away, but every few seconds after the great 
 cannon belched forth a miniature earthquake 
 was caused when tons of explosives fell in its 
 midst. Those near one of these projectiles 
 when it fell, although not even struck by a frag- 
 ment, were killed or made insane by the terrific 
 explosion. Under this high pressure of the 
 Teutonic attacks the czar's forces were soon de- 
 feated and compelled to retreat toward the 
 marshes of the Pripet, which was the only ave- 
 nue left open for escape. 
 
 Scouting lancers had made numerous incur- 
 sions into Russian territory, advancing far be- 
 yond the line of safety, so eager had they been 
 
118 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 to find the best highways on which the army 
 could advance. In a thicket of willows near a 
 small stream, well sheltered and hidden by pine 
 and deciduous forests, they suddenly came upon 
 a camp of spies and thieves. 
 
 These pests and leeches of the battle fields 
 were brought to the camp where Claus Bravo 
 was quartered. Among the captured articles 
 were many letters and other communications 
 which were employed as evidence against those 
 who had been charged with espionage. The 
 evidences of field vandalism included parts of 
 ears and fingers cut from slain soldiers. These 
 parts contained rings and were so enlarged that 
 the jewelry could not be easily removed, hence 
 parts of the body were taken to secure the rings. 
 
 The capture of Claus Bravo, as stated before 
 in this chapter, was not the result of miscalcula- 
 tion, but, instead, resulted from a lure employed 
 by the Eussians to mislead a number of 
 wounded Teutons. These wounded soldiers had 
 been placed in a farm home that had become 
 greatly damaged from Bussian.shot before the 
 Slavs had retreated. On the roof of the build- 
 
VISITS WITH CLAUS BRAVO 119 
 
 ing, in order to mislead the latter, several fig- 
 ures had been placed as a target for unfriendly 
 attack. Here the wounded were to remain until 
 rescued with an auto-ambulance by the Eed 
 Cross corps. 
 
 Before the rescuing party could arrive, a de- 
 tachment of soldiers in German uniforms, wear- 
 ing the familiar spiked and helmeted caps, was 
 seen in the distance. They were approaching 
 the building and fired several volleys of shots 
 at the figures on the roof as they approached. 
 However, the approaching soldiers were not 
 Germans, but, instead, they were Eussians who 
 had put on the field-gray uniforms of the kai- 
 ser J s men. No one within returned the fire, 
 knowing that defense and escape of the wounded 
 soldiers were out of the question. 
 
 When the Eussians discovered whom they 
 had captured, they ordered the wounded sol- 
 diers out of the building and set it on fire. Those 
 unable to walk were left on the greensward to 
 shift for themselves or to die, depending upon 
 their condition, and the others were taken cap- 
 tive for ultimate transportation to Siberia. 
 Claus Bravo was among the prisoners. 
 
XIII 
 THE IMPEISONMENT AND EELEASE 
 
 fTHHE march of Claus Bravo, wounded in the 
 -*■ shoulder and carrying his left arm in a 
 support, was difficult. At last, after several 
 days of dreary and tiresome walking with little 
 rest and scant food, he reached Pinsk, where he 
 was quartered for two weeks in a barn. The 
 roof leaked when it rained and the raw, moist 
 wind blew the larger part of the time, entering 
 freely through the cracks in the walls. His bed 
 consisted of straw; the covering was nothing 
 more than three sacks of gunny cloth sewed 
 together with wrapping cord. 
 
 Although this habitation in itself was bad, 
 being damp and cold, it was made doubly worse 
 by the large number of soldiers, many ill and 
 severely wounded, who were crowded together. 
 The day seemed long and dreary, but the night, 
 disturbed by the groans and sobs of sick and 
 
 120 
 
IMPRISONMENT AND RELEASE 121 
 
 dying men, was a hideous torture. Nearly 
 every morning one or more men who had died 
 in the night were dragged out to be buried in the 
 potters 9 field. 
 
 Dirt, disease and vermin were thinning the 
 ranks of the prisoners. Many who came well 
 and strong had grown sick; few had sufficient 
 vigor of constitution to endure cold and neglect 
 very long. They needed suitable food, medical 
 attention and protection against exposure and 
 vermin. 
 
 It seemed a relief to Claus Bravo to be taken 
 from the barn at Pinsk and placed on a train 
 which was destined for the prison camps of far- 
 away Siberia, although the reports that had 
 come from that haven of prisoners were not 
 favorable. Many had died of want and exposure 
 in the cold atmosphere ; others had been made 
 invalids while at work in the forests and mines 
 of the far north. However, any kind of a change 
 seemed to be better than to remain in the barn 
 at Pinsk. 
 
 Although thousands of refugees had flown 
 from Poland and surged eastward as the army 
 
122 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 of the czar retreated, there were still innumer- 
 able hordes fleeing to escape the battle line 
 that was steadily falling back before the victo- 
 rious march of the Germans. Many peasants, 
 with carts drawn by cows and oxen, were seen 
 along the roadsides in the flight toward Moscow 
 and eastward in the direction of the Ural Moun- 
 tains. The freight cars were filled with fleeing 
 women and children who could not walk. 
 Families were separated and scattered without 
 the slightest prospect of ever again becoming 
 united. Children and even babes were seen 
 wandering alone in search of food and shelter. 
 Claus Bravo was assigned to one of twenty 
 freight cars that made up the train. His place 
 was on a thin bed of straw at one end of the car. 
 Every available inch of space on the floor was 
 occupied by a human form, in a car that had 
 recently been used to transport swine. The 
 movement of the train was subject to the trans- 
 portation of soldiers and war supplies to the 
 battle line, hence the progress eastward was 
 slow and uncertain. Sometimes the train was 
 in motion only half an hour, when it halted to 
 
IMPRISONMENT AND RELEASE 123 
 
 permit a limited or special train to pass, and 
 sometimes it ran long distances, but the speed 
 ahead never was fast or safe. 
 
 The cars, being of a poor class of Eussian 
 freight wagons, made the transportation in- 
 humanly torturous to the sick and wounded, 
 which, in fact, were the only passengers. Men 
 and women groaned with pain, hunger and 
 thirst. The water, what little was obtainable, 
 was insanitary and the food was scarce and 
 unwholesome. Sometimes raw meat, sometimes 
 hard, black bread, and sometimes whole, un- 
 cooked rye and wheat were offered to those who 
 were already slowly dying of want and starva- 
 tion. 
 
 A Jewish woman who had given birth to a 
 child had died in the night. No one knew of her 
 death, as all on board were so depressed with 
 pain and want of food that they knew little aside 
 from their own misery. The condition of this 
 unfortunate woman and child, cold in death, was 
 not discovered until two days after death had 
 relieved them of their suffering. A brakeman 
 was apprised of these facts at the next stopping 
 
124 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 place, but he paid no attention to the dead bodies 
 and the train moved on in its woeful course. 
 
 Ultimately, after it became apparent that the 
 officers of the train would give no attention to 
 the corpses, it was planned to expunge them 
 secretly from the car. Two men cleared the 
 way to the side door of the freight car and 
 dragged the bodies forward. As the train rolled 
 onward at a place where a long curve occurred, 
 at the time the engine and the men on the loco- 
 motive were hidden from view, the dead bodies 
 were hurled from the train. Moving with the 
 momentum of the train, the body of the mother, 
 deflected from the usual course by the force 
 that threw it out, became lodged against an 
 embankment of the railway right-of-way, prob- 
 ably to be the prey of hungry wolves that infest 
 the woods of Smolensk. 
 
 Every day of the long slow ride to Moscow 
 was as eventful as the beginning of the trip. 
 Children were born and many people died from 
 neglect and without medical attention. Those 
 who survived found great multitudes of refu- 
 gees, in rags and want, at the Moscovite city on 
 
IMPRISONMENT AND RELEASE 125 
 
 the Moskva River. Thousands, it is true, had 
 passed further eastward in the stream of people 
 who had left their homes and had flown before 
 the invading Teutons since the early spring of 
 1915, but thousands more were coming by the 
 trains and highways leading into the city. 
 
 Diplomatic negotiations between Germany 
 and Russia, through the kindly offices of 
 Sweden, had reached the point whereby wounded 
 prisoners, whose injuries were such that they 
 could under no conditions return to the field of 
 action, might be exchanged. This number in- 
 cluded Claus Bravo. Although his wound at 
 first appeared slight, the want of medical atten- 
 tion and the lack of proper care and food while 
 in transit to Moscow had made his case very 
 dangerous. Accordingly, he was returned by 
 way of Petrogracl, through Finland and along 
 the eastern shore of the Gulf of Bothnia, to 
 Haparanda, Sweden, where he was exchanged 
 for an incapacitated Russian prisoner who had 
 been captured in the campaign against Riga. 
 
 Finally, after serving his country with the 
 determination that drove the Slav out of Ger- 
 
126 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 many and far east to the Dvinsk and the 
 Dnieper, after an nnusnal experience of capture, 
 imprisonment and exchange, he returned to his 
 friends a sick and incapacitated man. I listened 
 with a never-failing interest to his narrations 
 of the deeds and experiences that only war can 
 make possible. 
 
 The last time I visited Zehlendorf and walked 
 with Claus Bravo through the beautiful city 
 park of tall pines, which nowhere are more 
 majestic, I asked him to tell me what he thought 
 to be the reason why the Germans had been so 
 remarkably successful in the great struggle, 
 driving armies before them in decisive battle- 
 fields on all the fronts. 
 
 He took my hand in his and said : ' ' The help- 
 ing hand of God, which, inspiring faith and 
 hope, called every Teuton to the defense of the 
 Fatherland and guided him at all times in the 
 tide of events; every German state from the 
 Memel to the Ehine, from the North Sea to the 
 Bavarian Alps, rallied her sons and every 
 mother supported them in prayer. This faith 
 and hope, these prayers, this unity and brother- 
 
IMPRISONMENT AND RELEASE 127 
 
 hood of purpose common to the Germans, while 
 the enemies disputed and quarreled among 
 themselves, won the fields in the east and west 
 and defeated the foe in a thousand charges. The 
 Germans dare and do; therefore they have 
 turned failure to success, and, as Bismarck said : 
 'We Germans fear God; otherwise, none in the 
 world. ' " 
 
 These were the parting words of Claus Bravo. 
 The more I thought of what he said, the more 
 I become convinced of the courage of the 
 German nation and her purpose in maintaining 
 her national integrity. The following lines are 
 not my words, but they were written to embody 
 the thoughts spoken by this faithful defender 
 of the Teutonic eagles with whom I had spent 
 many interesting hours : 
 
 THERE IS NO HOME 
 
 There is no home in all the German land 
 
 That has not felt the presence of God's helping hand, 
 
 In guiding through the course of time and tide 
 
 And giving faith and hope which still within abide. 
 
128 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 There is no home from Memel to the Rhine 
 Which did not send a sword out to the fighting line, 
 In which a mother's heart did not in prayer yearn 
 For vict'ry and the safety of the son's return. 
 
 It is this faith, still linked with earnest prayer, 
 Which nerved the German hosts to do and dare, 
 It is this hope which swells within the breast 
 That held the field both in the east and west. 
 
 While others doubted and by quarrels were rent, 
 The German eagles, still in their course unbent, 
 Struck terror to the heart of yielding foe 
 And laid him in a thousand charges low. 
 
 No voice is known within the German tongue 
 Which in the War of Worlds defeat has sung, 
 For all the voices echo out anew 
 That victory comes to those who dare and do ! 
 
XIV 
 
 SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 
 
 rpHE shortest trip from Berlin to Warsaw is 
 *■ by way of Bromberg and Thorn, but I chose 
 the route going through Breslau-Oppeln-Czesto- 
 chowa, the last mentioned town being in Russia, 
 which takes the traveler through Skierniewice 
 and enters Warsaw from the southwest. In 
 returning, I chose the route Skieraiewice- 
 Alexandrowa, which, in Germany, is the line 
 Thorn-Bromberg-Schneidemiihle-Berlin. 
 
 This route permits the traveler to see much 
 of the farming districts in eastern Germany 
 and a large part of Poland, which, by the way, 
 is no mean ambition in the time of war. Here 
 as nowhere else is exemplified the great faith 
 the Germans had in the soil as a mainstay of 
 success. They had gone into partnership with 
 nature to work out their salvation. 
 
 All the fine forests of pine and oak, forestry 
 
 9 129 
 
130 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 being a fixed industry, were intact from the 
 waste of war. Indeed, not a single trace of cut- 
 ting was observed until the train entered 
 Poland, where the ravages of battle had swept 
 through the forests like a cyclone, but only in 
 streaks or belts. The country as a whole showed 
 little cutting, except for repairs of bridges and 
 buildings that had been damaged or destroyed. 
 In some sections were establishments for the 
 manufacture of wood alcohol, which to some 
 extent took the place of gasoline and benzine in 
 automobiles. 
 
 The cultivated lands were either green with 
 growing winter rye and wheat or were plowed 
 and harrowed ready to receive the seed in 
 spring. Where the husband was away at war, 
 the wife and children harvested the crop and 
 planted for the coming year, or the neighbors 
 came to their assistance. In many fields I saw 
 prisoners, under the direction of soldiers, 
 working with the ardor of a Maud Muller, no 
 doubt thinking of the sad words, ' i It might have 
 been. ' ' 
 
 Germany is capable of producing about 
 
SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 131 
 
 ninety-two per cent, of her food products in the 
 time of peace. War developed new economic 
 requirements and she was utilizing her 
 resources to meet them by putting the plowshare 
 into every roadside susceptible of cultivation, 
 not only in Germany, but also in the occupied 
 lands of France, Belgium, Eussia and Servia. 
 Although everybody had plenty to eat, all the 
 grain, meat, vegetables, nuts and milk were con- 
 served to furnish the greatest possible support. 
 
 My entrance into the Polish capital was with- 
 out formality. I went at once to Hotel Eom, 
 where I left my hand baggage, and then reported 
 at the police station. The fact that I had an- 
 nounced myself as a literary writer (Schrift- 
 steller) seemed to entitle me to more than ordi- 
 nary courtesies. 
 
 In the afternoon of my first day in the city, 
 while near the main building of the university, 
 I met a young man who was walking leisurely. 
 He was holding a cane and was resting his chin 
 upon his right hand. 
 
 Not long afterward, in an angular street near 
 by, I saw a person who reminded me of the young 
 
132 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 man I had met shortly before. His pants seemed 
 to be made of the same kind of woolen goods, but 
 his hat and coat appeared different. 
 
 This young man had a coat with two sides suitable for 
 outside wear. 
 
 The following day I met the same person and 
 took the liberty to speak to him. In the course 
 of time I learned that he was a secret service 
 
SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 133 
 
 man and had been detailed to watch a number 
 of strangers who were sojourning in the city. 
 Those who were under surveillance, I learned 
 soon after, included me as well as several guests 
 at Hotel Rom. 
 
 This young man had a coat with two sides suit- 
 able for outside wear. When one was exposed, 
 he looked like a student, and in the other he had 
 the appearance of a newspaper seller. He was 
 one of many secret service men in civilian clothes 
 who were doing police duty and detective work. 
 
 After that, when I met a person on the street, 
 I seldom answered an inquiry or engaged in 
 conversation. I refused to buy newspapers ex- 
 cept the Warschauer Zeitung, the official Ger- 
 man newspaper. 
 
 This policy put me squarely on the safe side. 
 I went about my studies and investigations 
 alone, and when I wanted information I asked a 
 policeman. This appeared to be the wiser 
 course in a city whose government had recently 
 been changed under military compulsion. 
 
 The Russians had destroyed by fire some of 
 the smaller stations before they retreated from 
 
134 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Warsaw, but the Hauptbahnhof (central 
 station) showed little evidence of battle. Before 
 it were many cabs and carriages drawn by- 
 horses, but automobiles were not available for 
 travelers, as they had been taken away by the 
 Eussians, or were serving military purposes for 
 the Germans. 
 
 Here and there were evidences of shot and 
 shell in buildings and pavements, some of the 
 latter having large ruptures from bombs, but as 
 a whole the damage to the city was not great. 
 The greatest destruction was seen in the fine 
 bridge across the Weichsel (Vistula), which 
 unites Praga with Warsaw. However, a pon- 
 toon bridge was laid across the river and carried 
 a large pedestrian and vehicle trade. 
 
 General von Beseler, the conqueror of Ant- 
 werp and Novogeorgievsk, was at the head of 
 the civil government for all Poland. The 
 burgerwehr (civil guard), made up of young 
 Poles in civilian clothes, were responsible for 
 order in the city and reported to the German 
 administration. Few soldiers and policemen 
 were on duty in the streets, where order was 
 
SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 135 
 
 perfect. The language spoken was largely 
 Polish, but German was heard extensively, 
 especially among the Jews and the educated 
 Poles. 
 
 The imperial castle of Eussia, a large but 
 simple structure, was the seat of the general 
 government. It contained a few holes where 
 the walls were penetrated by Eussian bullets, 
 fired from Praga, but as a whole it was in good 
 condition. No spies were in evidence here or 
 at the hotels, as the number of strangers was 
 very limited and those who entered the city 
 were examined and looked after with the utmost 
 care. It was impossible to visit strategic places 
 without permits. Such permits could be 
 obtained only from the general administration, 
 and, to obtain them, much time and considerable 
 political support were required. 
 
 Instruction of children in Polish was pro- 
 hibited by Eussia, even by private tutors in the 
 homes under penalty of fifty rubles fine for each 
 offense, but the German administration had 
 placed the teaching of Polish on the free list. 
 The university and many schools had been 
 
136 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 opened, both for German and Polish, and the 
 theaters and other amusements were open to 
 both these nationalities as well as to the Jews. 
 
 On Miodowa Strasse, one of the leading 
 thoroughfares of the city, was the seat of the 
 great German daily newspaper, the Warschauer 
 Zeitung. In this periodical appeared daily the 
 announcement of twenty playhouses. From the 
 list I copied such well-known plays as the Jewish 
 Friend, Carmen, Lohengrin, Barber of Seville, 
 Captain Dreyfus and Cricket on the Hearth. 
 The prices ranged from two marks to six marks. 
 
 At such hostelries as Hotel Eom and Hotel 
 Polonia, two of the leading taverns, it was pos- 
 sible to eat all an epicure would want at about 
 two marks per meal of four courses, about 
 forty-five cents. The money spent at the eating 
 houses and the theaters would not indicate 
 poverty, although much want was experienced 
 by the poor. Women and children were work- 
 ing at almost every kind of employment, — in the 
 railway shops, on the streets and electric cars, 
 at the shipping docks, — and many were depend- 
 ing on help from abroad. Often mention was 
 
SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 137 
 
 made of America, where large sums of money 
 were collected by friends of the Jews and Poles. 
 This benevolent support was already beginning 
 to reach Poland and the people were very thank- 
 ful for it. 
 
 I had with me a number of American, German 
 and Swedish letters of identification, including 
 several written by men prominent in the educa- 
 tional affairs of the United States. These 
 proved very helpful in securing admission to 
 the most prominent places, especially the 
 academies and institutions of higher learning. 
 
 It was a source of much gratification to me to 
 observe the eagerness with which both young 
 and old were taking hold of the work in educa- 
 tional lines. The people had been deprived to 
 a very large extent of this privilege since 1772, 
 when Poland became Russian, and now they 
 were beginning the great effort which is to re- 
 build the country on the line of larger growth 
 in mental power. 
 
 After some time of more than usual activity, 
 visiting the university, libraries and museums, 
 my inclination was to return to Berlin rather 
 
138 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 orricc or thc president 
 
 pmke ICnmersity 
 Pes Molnea 
 
 September 9, 1915, 
 
 To Whom This Concerns:- 
 
 This is to certify that I have 
 for many years known Mr. Bernhart P. Hoist, 
 of Boone, Iowa, as one of the leading citi- 
 zens of this state. Mr. Hoist Is aggressive 
 in his civic relationships, and is considered 
 one of the best citizens of our commonwealth* 
 He has taken a leading part in educational 
 and political matters, and is recognized 
 everywhere as a man of force. I have very 
 great pleasure in commending him to any 
 with whom he may come in contaot in his 
 travels in this and foreign countries. 
 
 Very respectfully yours. 
 
 President. 
 
 Copy of the letter written by President Hill M. Bell. 
 
SECRET SERVICE MEN AT WARSAW 139 
 
 than venture farther east or north. The country 
 necessarily was thoroughly policed with Ger- 
 mans and trustworthy Jews and Poles, and 
 movement from place to place was impossible 
 without the most careful scrutiny of the officials. 
 Strangers reported daily at the police stations 
 nearest their residences and their movements, 
 both going and returning, were made a matter 
 of record. This was not out of place and no 
 one complained of such supervision, as caution 
 is no more than a reasonable requirement in the 
 time of war. 
 
 All the regularly scheduled trains were run- 
 ning in Germany, but they were subject to the 
 movement of trains carrying troops, supplies 
 and provisions to the front. Secret service men, 
 who worked in harmony with the police, had 
 absolute knowledge of every stranger who came 
 to Warsaw, from the time he came until he went, 
 and he was frequently observed and watched 
 without being conscious of the scrutiny these 
 officers were exerting over him. 
 
 The customs duties existing before the war 
 had not been disturbed. At Alexandrowa, on 
 
140 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 the German-Polish border, each passenger was 
 examined with the usual formalities common to 
 customs officers. The examination was not 
 severe, although the officials were sufficiently 
 observing to allow nothing to pass unnoticed. 
 
 In Poland I was impressed by the satisfaction 
 with which the inhabitants looked upon the Ger- 
 man occupation of the country and the region 
 stretching northward to the Baltic Sea, an ex- 
 panse of about 113,500 square miles. The spirit 
 of approval was shown by the fact that many 
 Polish citizens, including Poles and Jews, had 
 joined the German army and were fighting in 
 the trenches to help free their country from 
 Eussian control, favoring independence but pre- 
 ferring any other government to that of the 
 czar. 
 
XV 
 THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 
 
 \ X 7HEN I returned to Berlin from the east, I 
 * * engaged quarters at Pension Stern, a 
 pleasant place on Unter den Linden. The out- 
 look from the front' window enabled me to see 
 all of that famous thoroughfare, from the 
 statue of Frederick the Great to the Branden- 
 burger Tor. The panorama included the vacant 
 French embassy, the Cafe Victoria, the main 
 building of the University of Berlin and the 
 Dom Kirche in the distance. 
 
 I had returned to the capital city to visit the 
 museums, libraries, art galleries and palaces of 
 Berlin as well as the suburbs of Spandau, 
 Charlottenburg and Potsdam. It was my pur- 
 pose to study life at the capital as well as to see 
 the military side of the war in the German 
 metropolis, including the great prison camp at 
 Doberitz. 
 
 141 
 
142 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 At the reading rooms of the Chicago Daily 
 News, on Unter den Linden, I found many- 
 American and English periodicals and went 
 there frequently to peruse them. Several times 
 I met at this place a dainty lady who spoke 
 German like a Bavarian and English with the 
 (ze) accent of a Parisian. This lady I learned 
 to know as Miss Julia Bross and I put her on 
 my list of possible spies. 
 
 She accepted pleasantly my invitation to take 
 dinner at Cafe Victoria, where she drank coffee 
 and smoked a cigarette while I labored over a 
 cup of tea as a final course in a long list of eat- 
 ables. Her home was in Denmark, which was 
 evidenced by numerous letters which she car- 
 ried, and she was in the city to teach French 
 and study German. 
 
 The story of the dainty dame was well 
 planned, but I doubted her. She was a spy and 
 was on dangerous footing. With apologies to 
 Bret Harte, I wrote in my diary : 
 
 That for ways that are dark 
 
 And for tricks that are vain 
 The female spy is peculiar, 
 
 Which the same I would rise to explain. 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 143 
 
 It was not difficult to escape notice in Berlin. 
 The strangers reported to police headquarters 
 in the district of residence as soon as they ar- 
 rived, or the day following, and reported again 
 the day before departure, stating when and 
 where they were going. Aside from this 
 requirement there was no supervision. 
 
 All the theaters were carrying announcements 
 in the daily newspapers. Those who desired 
 could witness such plays as Hamlet, Mary 
 Stuart, Lohengrin, Tannhauser, Maria Theresa, 
 Antony and Cleopatra, Parsifal and many comic 
 operas and moving picture shows. 
 
 Tuesdays and Fridays were "meatless days," 
 but eggs and fish were abundant. Nothing was 
 fried in fat on Mondays and Thursdays, 
 although every kind of meat and by-foods were 
 on the bill of fare and were prepared by cooking 
 or broiling. There were no restrictions on Sun- 
 days, Wednesdays and Saturdays, when the 
 voluptuous follower of Epicurus could eat 
 without limitations. What had been done to 
 limit the consumption of certain foods did not 
 indicate a scarcity. On the other hand, it em- 
 
144 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 bodied a scheme to induce regularity and system 
 in the habits of life which would conserve the 
 supply of food and likewise promote the public 
 health. 
 
 What had become known as "high prices' ' 
 were not excessive, but, instead, meant the 
 maximum rates to which the dealers in food 
 stuffs were limited. That is, the market price 
 for eggs was sixty cents per dozen, fish were 
 fifteen cents per pound and potatoes were forty- 
 eight cents per bushel. These are samples of 
 the maximum prices and dealers could sell for 
 less but not for more. As a whole the cost of 
 living was less than in America for the reason 
 that the money system is different and wages in 
 Europe are based upon economical conditions 
 which differ from those prevailing in American 
 countries. 
 
 The city was full of soldiers, — at churches, in 
 theaters, at restaurants, on the streets, in short, 
 everywhere were soldiers. Life was no depar- 
 ture from the usual. The shops were full of 
 goods and everybody was doing business in the 
 even tenor of his way. The sound of martial 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 145 
 
 music, the marching of soldiers and the flutter 
 of many German, Bulgarian, Turkish and 
 Austria-Hungarian flags in public places were 
 the only reminders that war was in progress. 
 
 On a train of the Stadtbahn (city railway) I 
 went to Doberitz, where I made a complete tour 
 of the military camp, including the prison yards, 
 the military drill grounds and the field of avia- 
 tion. The clear sky was dotted with many flying 
 machines, including taubes, biplanes and Zeppe- 
 lins, making the district buzz with their rapid- 
 working machinery. 
 
 Toward evening I wended my way from the 
 prison yards to the depot, about a half mile, 
 walking slowly over the sandy tract. When I 
 arrived at the station I was surprised to find 
 that Miss Bross was among the passengers who 
 were waiting to return to the city. 
 
 The village of Doberitz was nothing more 
 than a wayside station before the war. In the 
 vicinity are tracts of very sandy land, particu- 
 larly toward the south, and for this reason it 
 was chosen to be the center of prison life, the 
 light soil and rolling surface making the region 
 
 10 
 
146 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 quite sanitary. Although the place is not im- 
 portant from an industrial standpoint, it is one 
 of the most talked of and frequently visited 
 suburbs of Berlin. 
 
 Miss Bross had reached the place by a differ- 
 ent train than the one by which I came. She had 
 been busy in the sunlight, she said, enjoying the 
 open sky and the warm, autumnal breezes. 
 
 To me her mission at Doberitz appeared very 
 different. It seemed that she had no interest in 
 the prison camp, that to her the sanitation and 
 employment of prisoners was a blank book, but 
 everything I mentioned about the drill of sol- 
 diers and the maneuvers of flying machines 
 aroused her interest. To the one she was blind 
 and to the others she was wide awake and far- 
 seeing. The difference in her feeling on these 
 topics deepened my suspicion that she was prac- 
 ticing a clever game of espionage. 
 
 I had taken a seat beside her on a bench in the 
 railway station and began to study her face. 
 She was alert and cunning, but her attitude was 
 vague and evasive. 
 
 "The Germans have a wonderful system of 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 147 
 
 war-prison camps/ ' I said as a means to begin 
 a general conversation. 
 
 "Why? Why wonderful ?" 
 
 "In the first place, they capture the enemy 
 and take him to a debusing tank, an establish- 
 
 FAHRKARTEN 
 
 She was alert and cunning, but her attitude was 
 vague and evasive. 
 
 ment that cost not less than $10,000, where 
 bathing removes the vermin with which soldiers 
 are infested. I say soldiers are infested, because 
 the trench life of modern warfare is peculiarly 
 
148 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 favorable to the development of suctorial para- 
 sitic insects. 
 
 "I found the prison camp wonderfully com- 
 plete in modern facilities, such as bathing, heat- 
 ing, ventilation, waterworks, sewerage and other 
 appliances that make life worth while. The 
 prisoners do their own work, including cooking, 
 baking, cleaning, mending, washing, ironing and 
 all other household duties. In this work they are 
 directed by competent supervisors at every 
 stage. No one is free from work at any time, ex- 
 cept when he sleeps or is busy with personal 
 duties. 
 
 "Not only this, but a large per cent, of the 
 prisoners have definite employment day after 
 day under the direction of the state. They work 
 on sewers, railways, canals, buildings and other 
 improvements. The regular union scale of 
 wages is allotted the prisoner per day, of which 
 one third is paid the worker and the remainder 
 is retained by the state for his support. In this 
 way the thousands of prisoners in Germany are 
 largely self-supporting. ' ' 
 
 What I said was news to Miss Bross. She had 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 149 
 
 studied the village and its environments in the 
 light of a strategic military camp. It was her 
 object to learn what the place signified as a point 
 of defense against an invasion. She was not con- 
 cerned in anything else at Doberitz. 
 
 When the express train rolled into the station, 
 I was ready to board it without delay. The even- 
 ing was pleasant and the train moved rapidly 
 toward the metropolis. Miss Bross alighted at 
 Potsdamer Platz, while I went as far as Fried- 
 rich Strasse. 
 
 My purpose in Berlin was well defined. I was 
 studying to revise works of reference on war 
 topics, and my study hours were only from 
 eleven in the morning until three in the after- 
 noon, which included the time when the public 
 institutions were open. This gave me ample 
 opportunity to carefully investigate the secret 
 service work, including that of Miss Bross, 
 which I had decided to study. She looked upon 
 me as an American of English (Australian) 
 birth and spoke freely about her experiences in 
 Berlin as well as in Denmark. 
 
 Several times I met Miss Bross at the reading 
 
150 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 rooms of the Chicago Daily News, where she 
 observed the news columns and editorials of the 
 German-American newspapers with special in- 
 terest. Near the last of November she told me 
 she had decided to go home to Denmark on the 
 third of December. By this time I had pur- 
 chased passage to New York and left for Copen- 
 hagen the same morning. 
 
 After luncheon on the railway diner, Miss 
 Bross seemed worried about the examination 
 at Warnemiinde, where German officers in- 
 spected the baggage and person of the passen- 
 gers. This examination, owing to much espion- 
 age, had been greatly intensified. 
 
 ' ' What do you think of the case of Miss Edith 
 Cavel!?" she asked, "I mean the nurse who was 
 executed as a spy in Belgium by the Germans." 
 
 1 l This case," I answered, "is an unusual one. 
 Miss Cavell had the utmost confidence of the 
 German officers, who granted her extraordinary 
 privileges as a nurse, while she busied herself 
 most of the time organizing a band of spies to 
 operate against the German army in France. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, that is true; but she was a woman 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 151 
 
 who had done some good and her life should 
 have been spared. At least they think so in 
 France and England where funds are being 
 raised to build monuments to her memory. ' ' 
 
 "That seems to be the policy in France and 
 England because the politicians are endeavor- 
 ing to mold public opinion more strenuously 
 against Germany. But both countries estab- 
 lished a precedent by executing German 
 women as spies. This is true likewise of the 
 Belgians, who executed Julia von Wauterghem 
 as a spy at Louvain in 1914." 
 
 This answer perplexed Miss Bross, but she 
 replied at length, "The good people do seems 
 to count little in actual life. Miss Cavell was 
 the means of relieving the pain of the sick and 
 aiding many wounded to recover. ' ' 
 
 "On the other hand," said I, "Miss Cavell 
 admitted that she knew of at least two hundred 
 and fifty Belgian civilians whose release had 
 been secured by her intrigues. They had joined 
 the allies to fight in France and in this way she 
 probably caused the death of many Germans. ' ' 
 
 "Perhaps that is true, but I do not think 
 
152 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 well of the Germans for shooting a woman/ ' 
 she replied. 
 
 "War is not much of a respecter of persons,' ' 
 I answered, ' ' and just recently the French shot 
 two German women as spies, so I saw in the 
 newspapers. Besides, remember the case of 
 Joan of Arc, who was a brave leader of the 
 French. She never was accused of being a spy, 
 but the English burned her at the stake. To 
 me it seems that excesses are common to war, 
 sometimes rightfully, sometimes wrongfully. ' 9 
 
 By this time the train was entering the sta- 
 tion at Warnemiinde. Miss Bross seemed ner- 
 vous. She handed me a small scrap of paper, 
 saying, "If I am on the train after we leave 
 Warnemiinde, hand it back to me ; otherwise do 
 what you like with it. ' ' 
 
 It was currently reported that all the passen- 
 gers when entering or leaving a country at war, 
 in Germany as well as in France and England, 
 would be required to remove all their clothes 
 and undergo a thorough examination. This 
 proved to be the case in this instance, except 
 where travelers could make an unusually good 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 153 
 
 showing of neutrality and fairness, under which 
 condition I passed the scrutinizing officers to 
 my utmost satisfaction. 
 
 When the steamship was crossing the Baltic 
 Sea, I looked in vain among the passengers for 
 Miss Bross, who, according to subsequent re- 
 ports, was retained as a spy. The examining 
 officer, a German lady, had found a plat of the 
 military grounds at Spandau pasted to the sole 
 of her bare foot. I never saw her again. 
 
 This gave me the liberty to do as I pleased 
 with the scrap of paper Miss Bross handed to 
 me on the train. On examination I found it 
 embodied a somewhat faulty plat of the mili- 
 tary camp at Doberitz. 
 
 In the illustration on the following page is 
 shown the inner part of the grounds as con- 
 ceived by this spy. Her scheme divulges the 
 idea that the important positions, including the 
 heavy guns and the garrison, were south of the 
 railway station. Two monoplanes indicate by 
 parabolic lines the positions where bombs may 
 be thrown with great destructive effect upon the 
 main body of the troops. 
 
*\&CU*?te^CLs£~t 
 
 I 
 
 WWiV/n ,',',',", 7, y, ',;>' ' ' ■ i 'fy wift •',','„* && 
 
 £*£<z&&*t> 
 
 A 
 
 p^ 
 
 k * 
 
 
 >^ >r 
 
 * M ' 
 
 l\ 
 
 \\ 
 V. 
 
 m J&. 
 
 t 
 
 
 *>r*+<fz£i>^y?qjesiX& 
 
 The plat of Doberitz drawn by Miss Bross, who was arrested 
 as a spy at Warnemiinde, where she was caught with a plat of 
 Spandau pasted to the sole of her bare foot. 
 
THE DAINTY SPY AT BERLIN 155 
 
 The outskirts of the prison camp, including 
 the yards where the prisoners were employed 
 at work, are shown so the enemy may avoid an 
 attack from the south, since an assault from that 
 direction would jeopardize the lives of the pris- 
 oners. She conceived the idea that possession 
 should be taken of the railway and two assaults 
 should be made simultaneously from the east 
 and west. 
 
 All this appeared perfectly clear to me, since 
 I had been over the grounds. Although her plan 
 had proven of no value to any one, she had 
 demonstrated much ability in studying condi- 
 tions as they were and making an effort to place 
 the report of her investigations in the hands of 
 the foes of Germany. But she was foiled in her 
 sharp practice and her map became worthless. 
 
 It occurred to me immediately that I had as- 
 sumed a dangerous and unnecessary risk in per- 
 mitting her to place it in my custody. Had I 
 known the contents of this innocent looking 
 scrap of paper, it would have been utterly im- 
 possible to have induced me to even touch it. 
 However, the matter ended without injury to 
 
156 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 me, and I was extremely glad that I was sailing 
 on the Baltic Sea, instead of being at the in- 
 spection rooms at Warnemiinde with the scrap 
 of paper in my pocket. 
 
 In this matter I had been recklessly careless 
 and had not exercised the precaution shown by 
 Mr. Otto Tamini who had offered to sing some 
 humorous verses if I would write them. I pro- 
 posed When We Sailed to Denmark, which 
 will be found on page seventy-eight of this book. 
 
 These verses Mr. Tamini declined to sing be- 
 cause he considered that the singing of such 
 stanzas while he was detained in the imprisoned 
 ship might be considered treasonable. He said : 
 " If I sing these verses at such earnest times as 
 war produces in this British territory the Eng- 
 lish might shoot me as a spy." At the time the 
 matter seemed trivial, but since then I came to 
 agree with him. 
 
XVI 
 
 METHODS OF SPYING 
 
 rpHE business of a spy is looked upon very 
 '■' differently by writers of repute. Some 
 regard the spy as a base outlaw, fit only for 
 execution. Others regard him as a necessary 
 adjunct to warfare, or even as a benefactor in 
 the scheme of protecting the country to which 
 he belongs. 
 
 As a general rule espionage is regarded a 
 reputable profession as well as a military neces- 
 sity, except when the spy is a traitor to his own 
 country. 
 
 In most instances the spy enters an extremely 
 dangerous field, unnoticed and without ap- 
 plause, and he does so with a feeling of patriot- 
 ism. He seldom is honored or rewarded for his 
 achievements. 
 
 Sir Robert Baden-Powell, the noted major- 
 general in the British army, has a long record 
 
 157 
 
METHODS OF SPYING 159 
 
 as a scout and spy, perhaps the best known in 
 the annals of English military history. In sev- 
 eral of his books he details many interesting 
 incidents of his eventful career while serving 
 in Afghanistan, Ashanti, India and South 
 Africa. 
 
 Sir Baden-Powell was not specially success- 
 ful as an organizer of spies. His work con- 
 sisted chiefly of his own activities, such as 
 studying positions occupied by the enemy. Fre- 
 quently he represented himself in the guise of a 
 student, studying the contour of a district, the 
 coast or shore of a country, or the fortifications 
 of a city, aiming to learn their positions and 
 armament. 
 
 The accompanying illustrations are from the 
 work of Sir Baden-Powell. They must be 
 studied carefully to be understood. For in- 
 stance, the ivy leaf and the butterfly show the 
 plans of the forts, the spots denoting the num- 
 bers and positions of the guns ; the calibers of 
 the guns are indicated by the size of the spots. 
 
 The present German system of spying took 
 root in the campaigns of Frederick the Great 
 
160 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 and still stands without a peer in the annals of 
 modern warfare. Other nations have large 
 numbers of spies and what is commonly known 
 as the secret police service, but nowhere do we 
 find such thorough organization of scouts and 
 the secret service police as in Germany. 
 
 In 1870, soon after the beginning of the 
 Franco-German war, Germany was able to put 
 into the field not less than 20,000 secret service 
 men. They operated not only in France, but 
 were busy at home and in the neutral countries, 
 everywhere observing and reporting. At the 
 head of this force was Herr Wilhelm Stieber, 
 who has the world record for daring deeds and 
 for organizing large forces of secret service 
 workers, both men and women. An account of 
 his achievements was published under the title, 
 Memoirs of the Secret Service Officer Stieber. 
 In estimating the value of his work, Herr Stie- 
 ber himself said, "One cannot set down in tha- 
 lers the value either of bloodshed which has 
 been avoided, or of victories which have been 
 secured." 
 
 That all countries in Europe have large forces 
 
METHODS OF SPYING 161 
 
 of spies, particularly in the time of war, is well 
 known. In my travels I met more English and 
 Kussian spies, especially in Denmark, than 
 either German or French spies. The spies and 
 other secret agents in the Scandinavian coun- 
 tries, barring those who act wholly from sym- 
 pathy and including only those retained for con- 
 sideration, I think the number of English secret 
 service men, judging entirely from personal ex- 
 perience, exceed in number those of any other 
 class. 
 
 Women acting as spies very commonly dis- 
 guise as students, teachers and Eed Cross 
 nurses. Sometimes they secure employment as 
 domestics for service in the homes of influen- 
 tial families ; at other times they engage as em- 
 ployees in cafes, hotels and restaurants. They 
 mingle with those who employ them and pay 
 them wages, and at the same time plot against 
 their life and property. However, more fre- 
 quently they do not seek to destroy their bene- 
 factors, but, instead, put forth their ingenuity 
 to aid the army of their own country which they 
 are helping so as to make the capture of a city 
 
 11 
 
162 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 or the conquest of an unfriendly nation pos- 
 sible. 
 
 The occupations in which men engage while 
 practicing espionage are very numerous. But 
 that depends upon the region where they op- 
 erate and the class of information for which 
 they are looking. 
 
 Many remove to the country where they op- 
 erate and even become naturalized citizens. 
 This I found to be common in Berlin, where 
 many Belgians, French and English were 
 operating. They had taken out naturalization 
 papers, protested their loyalty to the country 
 of their adoption, and at the same time carried 
 on secret operations in disguise. This they did 
 as barbers, waiters in eating houses, street la- 
 borers and in numerous common occupations. 
 They dressed and worked the same as others, 
 attracted no attention, and generally pursued 
 their art without suspicion. 
 
 It is not seldom that the male spy disguises 
 as a priest or minister. As missionary work is 
 permitted in the Scandinavian countries, it is 
 not uncommon to find a secret agent preaching 
 
METHODS OF SPYING 163 
 
 in a public place, or visiting in the homes of 
 those who want spiritual comfort. This method 
 enables him to work on the public sentiment, to 
 learn of the trend of public thought and to ac- 
 quire a knowledge of arsenals, harbors and 
 fortifications. 
 
 The successful spy is well informed in the line 
 in which he operates. It would not do for one 
 to pose as a doctor unless he understands at 
 least the rudiments of medicine, or to represent 
 himself as a teacher if he is not versed in peda- 
 gogy. For this reason each spy is an expert at 
 what he professes. He is thereby equipped to 
 discuss his pretended trade or profession intelli- 
 gently, while, at the same time, he is working 
 to accomplish his real purpose in espionage. If 
 he is operating against your side, you put him 
 down as a cur; but when he makes common 
 cause with you, your feeling is that of admira- 
 tion. 
 
 Those who work at spying like it intensely. 
 It seems to have a fascination for them, owing 
 to the new conditions that arise constantly and 
 tax the active brain. On the other hand, it 
 
164 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 makes men distrustful and suspicious. A spy 
 looks upon everyone as of doubtful veracity; 
 he relies only upon his own observations and 
 verifies them with the greatest of care before 
 forming conclusions or making reports of his 
 operations. 
 
 The danger of spying in the country of an 
 enemy lies in being detected. Here the spy 
 must exercise great care in writing or drawing, 
 even in secret ink, as the censorship is so strict 
 that every scrap of paper is examined and in 
 many cases submitted to a chemical test. In 
 the country of an enemy, the spy cannot have 
 fellowship with another spy and must shift en- 
 tirely for himself. 
 
 The methods of spying have changed mate- 
 rially since the advent of aviation. At present 
 the flying machine is employed almost wholly 
 to locate the enemy and the movements in the 
 field of action. Not only this, but the firing 
 itself is directed from the air, through signals 
 which indicate the locality to be fired upon and 
 the effectiveness of the shots. 
 
 Many are the instances where armies consid- 
 
METHODS OF SPYING 165 
 
 ered themselves safe from attack only to be hit 
 by missiles thrown from cannon twenty miles 
 away under the direction of aerial spies. These 
 spies frequently are brought down to their death 
 by a sudden attack from aerial field guns, which 
 make destruction swift and certain. In fact, 
 death is the lot of any spy who accomplishes 
 much, and usually he dies self-satisfied with his 
 own achievements. 
 
 While I was in Copenhagen, early in Decem- 
 ber, my eyes happened to catch in a magazine 
 the declaration of Lieutenant Carl Lody, who 
 had been condemned as a German spy in London 
 and ordered shot for war treason. His declara- 
 tion contains the following: "I do not cringe 
 for mercy ; I am not ashamed of anything I have 
 done ; I am in honor bound not to give away the 
 names of those who employed me on my mis- 
 sion; I was not paid for it; I did it for my 
 country 's good ; I knew that I was carrying my 
 life in my hands. Many a Briton was at the 
 same time doing the same for his country." 
 
 Lieutenant Lody, although he was executed as 
 a spy, was lauded by a member of the British 
 
166 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 parliament as "A patriot who had died for his 
 country as much as any soldier who fell in 
 battle." 
 
 There is as much system in spying as in the 
 most exact of the recognized arts. In some 
 places the stranger is entirely unnoticed, and 
 in that case he needs to have no fear. When 
 he is watched, when secret agents study him, 
 although he has nothing to conceal and is 
 entirely neutral, he best keep his own council. 
 In this regard I had no difficulties at any time in 
 my travels and never was under suspicion. 
 Several times I thought it best to refuse to 
 accept newspapers published in a country that 
 was an enemy to the country in which I was 
 traveling, and in some instances I refused to 
 engage in any conversation whatever. These 
 and similar precautions sometimes are very 
 necessary as a protection to the innocent 
 traveler. 
 
XVII 
 SAILING THE CATTEGAT 
 
 A FTER leaving Warnemunde, while on the 
 •**■ Baltic Sea, I made the acquaintance of Mr. 
 Carl Lutz, a business man from Wiirttemberg. 
 He had been buying large quantities of supplies 
 in Holland, shipping them to Germany, and was 
 now opening a line of shipping from Denmark. 
 "We lived at the Mission Hotel in Copenhagen 
 the remainder of my time in that city, about six 
 days, after which I embarked on the Danish 
 steamship United States for New York. 
 
 My experience with spies at this time was 
 about the same as before. I met them in large 
 numbers, their chief objects being to influence 
 sentiment for or against Germany or England, 
 depending on the country represented by these 
 spies. 
 
 At Hotel Bristol I met Mr. Denton, whom I 
 had seen on my first visit to the city, through the 
 
 167 
 
168 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 JioTfcL MfSTOL 
 
 H. L WILKENING 
 
 Prpt. 
 
 Kobenhavn, d. Ott, %\ } (ft^ 
 
 Telegramadresse : ., B R I S T L" 
 
 International . f 
 
 Hotel Telegraph-Code foj^d/u X)dA><A^! 
 - Statstelefon 9 - 
 
 Telefon 7200 . //-• 
 
 C~t~*-j j£jC2*&fc % 
 
 Copy of the letter written to Mr. Jno. Davis. 
 
SAILING THE CATTEGAT 169 
 
 influence of Mr. Fenwick. At first lie did not 
 recognize me and, when I reminded him of our 
 former meeting, he appeared pleased to see me. 
 
 At Cafe Alhambra, a very nice eating place 
 near the Hovedbanegaarden (principal railway- 
 station), we met frequently and exchanged ex- 
 periences in our recent travels. He was a good 
 mixer and spoke German like a native. 
 
 In a traveler's guide of Denmark, which Mr. 
 Denton loaned to me, I found a letter written in 
 October to Mr. Jno. Davis at Malmo, Sweden. 
 With his consent I copied this letter on station- 
 ery of Hotel Bristol, on which the original was 
 written. A copy of it will be seen on another 
 page of this book. 
 
 This letter was important from the circum- 
 stance that a number of British submarines had 
 found their way into the Baltic Sea and were 
 preying on the Swedish-German commerce. 
 English spies were busy as bees watching the 
 movements of German battle ships, fearing they 
 would defeat and destroy the submarine flotilla 
 that had commenced its work in a new field. 
 
 The conditions in the Danish capital were nor- 
 
170 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 mally the same as they had been in October. 
 Bulletin boards kept the public informed of the 
 trend of the war, especially at the office of the 
 Berlingshe Tidende, where the curious gathered 
 in large numbers. 
 
 The English spies were gathering data more 
 than ever on Danish trade with Germany. When 
 they learned that I was about to sail to New 
 York they persuaded me to make inquiry about 
 the Canadian Pacific steamships which sail from 
 Liverpool to Saint John, New Brunswick. They 
 recommended this line for the reason that the 
 steamers were British and would not be stopped 
 on the ocean. 
 
 At the office of the Canadian Pacific Line I 
 was offered a ticket from Copenhagen to Saint 
 John, the conditions including board and lodg- 
 ing to Liverpool as well as at that city while 
 waiting for the steamer to reembark for Canada. 
 However, I did not accept, because it would 
 involve crossing the North Sea, which was 
 dangerous at this time. Besides, I greatly pre- 
 ferred to sail under a neutral flag. 
 
 When I embarked on the ninth of December, 
 
SAILING THE CATTEGAT 171 
 
 on steamship United States, several Russian 
 and English spies I had seen before were at the 
 ship. They had watched the loading of mails 
 and admitted having information that Great 
 Britain had changed her policy and would seize 
 the American mails in the future. They like- 
 wise told me they were looking for some parties 
 wanted for espionage, but it appeared that those 
 for whom they were looking did not sail at this 
 time. 
 
 A very narrow neck of water connects the 
 Sound with the Cattegat, separating Denmark 
 from Sweden. On the east side is Helsingborg 
 and on the opposite side is Helsingor, the town 
 where Shakespeare laid his foundation for the 
 story of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. This 
 water was protected by innumerable mines, 
 planted by the adjacent countries, to prevent 
 acts of hostility by the belligerent countries 
 which might cripple or destroy the neutral ship- 
 ping trade. 
 
 The Cattegat is a fine stretch of water from 
 the Sound to the Skagar-Rak, and on its eastern 
 shore is Goteborg, the second city of Sweden. 
 
172 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 This city was interesting for the reason that a 
 new line of trans-Atlantic shipping had been 
 established late in the year. The largest steam- 
 ship of this line is the Stockholm, which had just 
 sailed for America. Sweden had no passenger 
 steamers running to New York prior to the war 
 and the larger business of the war period, partly 
 larger because most of the ships of the bel- 
 ligerent countries were not running, had caused 
 the business men of Sweden to invest in trans- 
 portation facilities. 
 
 A few days after sailing, the Stockholm was 
 stopped by an English cruiser and it was 
 reported that she was hauled to Stornoway, 
 where the mails bound for New York and some 
 other cargo were removed. Being a neutral 
 country was in itself not a guarantee that it 
 could enjoy the freedom of the seas. Holland 
 and the three Scandinavian countries had been 
 placed between the upper and nether millstones. 
 This intrusion of the British caused a wave of 
 resentment to sweep over Sweden. 
 
 When the ship reached Christiania, I im- 
 mediately left the steamer and took some time 
 
SAILING THE CATTEGAT 
 
 173 
 
 to look over the docks and warehouses. The 
 sentiment among the younger Norwegians, who 
 
 I saw the painter put the finishing touches on the sign of 
 the Red Cross. 
 
 were emulating the maritime achievements of 
 the Vikings, was favorable to the building of a 
 
174 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 larger merchant marine under the flag of 
 Norway. 
 
 They kept their vessels, including the smaller 
 boats, well painted and in good repair. In many 
 instances the sign of the Red Cross was painted 
 on the life boats. 
 
 Few people are as patriotic as the Norwe- 
 gians, especially the sailors. I recall several in- 
 stances where I saw the painter put the finishing 
 touches on the sign of the Red Cross while sev- 
 eral of his comrades stood by to see the ensign 
 of their country sketched as a complement of the 
 same. 
 
 At Christiania the steamship United States 
 was delayed two days, taking on much paper 
 pulp and other freight, and this gave me time 
 to renew some very interesting acquaintances I 
 had made on my former visit. However, I found 
 no change in the conditions, except that public 
 opinion was becoming aroused against the 
 British for the liberties they allowed themselves 
 in detaining and searching Norwegian ships at 
 sea. 
 
 Some persons I met offered as an apology the 
 
SAILING THE CATTEGAT 175 
 
 explanation that England, France and Eussia 
 had supported Norway when it became inde- 
 pendent from Sweden, while the policy of Ger- 
 many was to encourage the union of the two 
 countries. However, they admitted that the 
 support given by the trio against Oscar II. was 
 no adequate reason for trampling under foot 
 the sovereignty of Norway. The sentiment of 
 all Norwegians was centered on an agreement 
 that no one nation is a lord or dictator over 
 other nations on the sea and that the sea must 
 be made alike free to the commerce of all 
 countries. 
 
 Secret service men were on hand at the docks 
 to look over the cargo which was loading. A 
 number of these worked their way on deck, 
 pretending to say goodbye to friends, and when 
 the ship sailed the crew and passengers were 
 resigned to the conviction that the ship would 
 be molested and delayed by the British con- 
 trary to international law. 
 
XVIII 
 A THOUSAND MILES AROUND 
 
 rpHE course from Christiania to Christian- 
 *■ sand was along the coast of Norway, in 
 a southwesterly direction, but here we bent 
 toward the west and then toward the northwest 
 until a point north of the Shetland Islands was 
 reached. We were now nearing the region 
 where steamship Frederick VIII. had been cap- 
 tured and imprisoned. 
 
 It was on the thirteenth of December, early 
 in the morning, that a wireless message flashed 
 into the Marconi station saying, "United States, 
 where are you?" Captain Goetsche clinched 
 his fist and Chief Steward Lyngbye gritted his 
 teeth as the ship went speeding toward the 
 west. 
 
 The passengers had been promised that the 
 ship would reach New York by the twenty-first, 
 in time to permit them to spend Christmas at 
 
 176 
 
A THOUSAND MILES AROUND 177 
 
 home. Every possible effort of the ship's offi- 
 cers was being made to redeem that promise. 
 
 Wireless messages began to come faster and 
 more urgent, but nothing was seen of the 
 intruder. It was still early in the morning and 
 a deep darkness with some fog hung over the 
 sea. Those who had come on deck became 
 interested in the race for freedom that the 
 United States was making. It was a righteous 
 cause, a justifiable effort to escape the clutches 
 of a powerful monster who was interfering with 
 the trade of a neutral on the open sea. 
 
 At last, coming around a point of land, ap- 
 peared a British cruiser, which stopped us by 
 a shot over the bow. The warship neared our 
 starboard and a megaphone announced, "You 
 are ordered to proceed to Greenock." 
 
 "Greenock, where is Greenock V 9 reechoed a 
 hundred voices. All were willing to admit that 
 they had lived up to that time without knowing 
 aught of Greenock. 
 
 A map showed that the newly discovered town 
 is in the Clyde Eiver, not far from Glasgow, 
 Scotland. It looked as though we were to sail a 
 
 12 
 
178 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 thousand miles out of the way. Visions of 
 Christmas at sea began to percolate the intricate 
 anatomy of the brain. 
 
 After the formality of policing the ship with 
 British soldiers armed with bayoneted rifles had 
 been looked after, the vessel began to move 
 southward. We passed the west end of the 
 Shetland Islands, then cruised by the Orkney 
 Islands, then sailed through the Straits of Minch 
 and between the Hebrides and Scotland, then 
 moved forward between the coasts of Ireland 
 and Scotland, then passed into an arm of the 
 Irish Sea, and finally turned northeast into the 
 mouth of the Clyde. What reason Great Britain 
 had for taking the ship on this long detour is a 
 mystery unfathomable ! 
 
 While we were at Greenock in an imprisoned 
 ship, the Stockholm was reported at Stornoway 
 and the Oscar II. with the Ford peace party was 
 at Kirkwall. Other ships, mostly freighters, 
 were being detained in all these places. The 
 spies at Copenhagen had informed me correctly, 
 that is, England had designed to tighten her 
 grip upon neutral trade, including the Ameri- 
 can mails. 
 
A THOUSAND MILES AROUND 179 
 
 At the time we had approached the narrower 
 channel of the river, after passing the Firth of 
 the Clyde, the eye could trace long lines of 
 floaters on the surface of the water. These 
 floaters indicated both the nets to trap subma- 
 rines and the presence of mines, of which there 
 were thousands, and tugboats were employed to 
 pull the floaters with the mines and nets aside 
 so our ship could proceed up the stream. 
 
 Illustration to show a string of mines in position, connected by 
 wires with an electric station on the coast. 
 
 Some of the mines were suspended loosely 
 from the floaters, depending for explosion upon 
 a jar or sudden contact, such as occurs when 
 struck by the ship of a foe. Others were con- 
 nected by copper wires with a station on the 
 coast, from which they could be discharged 
 
180 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 electrically at will by an operator when the ships 
 of an enemy came into their vicinity. 
 
 Here I was a prisoner, surrounded by imple- 
 ments of destruction. No matter where I looked, 
 or in what direction I turned, thousands of 
 bombs and mines confronted me. It required 
 nothing more than a little spark, or even a mis- 
 take in the movement of the ship, to set on fire the 
 greatest field of powder and scatter the largest 
 amount of shrapnel the world had ever seen at 
 one place ready for action. 
 
 On the fifth day of detention, that is, on the 
 seventeenth of December, British officers and 
 men began to remove the mails. They de- 
 manded of Captain Goetsche that he must order 
 the ship's crew to reload the bags and parcels 
 on two small British steamers, the Flying 
 Sprite and the Flying Scotchman. This the cap- 
 tain refused to do, saying he had received the 
 mails with special orders to deliver them to the 
 American postal authorities in New York and 
 that he would not willingly be a party to any 
 project which would divert them from their 
 legal course. 
 
This photograph shows the British in the act of taking the 
 mails destined for America off the Danish steamship United 
 States, reloading it on the small steamer Flying Sprite. 
 
 (Opp. 180) 
 
A THOUSAND MILES AROUND 181 
 
 The British, seeing that Captain Goetsche 
 could not be intimidated, then seized the mails 
 forcibly. They unloaded about 2,900 bags and 
 parcels, consisting chiefly of Christmas presents 
 sent to friends in America. When the captain 
 reached New York, he could not deliver the 
 mails entrusted to him, but, instead, gave over 
 a scrap of paper issued as a receipt by the 
 British officers in lieu of the same. 
 
 The trip from Copenhagen to New York, 
 owing to the long detour and delay caused by 
 the British, had a duration of nineteen days and 
 we landed in Hoboken on the twenty-eighth of 
 December, three days after Christmas. 
 
 A concert held on board the steamship while 
 in mid-ocean for the benefit of the Sailors' 
 Eeading Boom in Copenhagen netted 218 
 kroner. For this concert I wrote the following 
 lines : 
 
 ON " UNITED STATES' ' 
 
 The U. S. sailed across the sea 
 
 With certainty through wave and swell ; 
 
 Fast fled the time. — Now we must part 
 And bid each other Fare-you-well ! 
 
182 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 To me life seems a tender thread 
 That leaves the spindle day by day, 
 
 We scarcely know how very soon 
 Its sweetest moments pass away. 
 
 The time your life was linked with mine 
 In pleasant hours, with happy song, 
 
 I'll ne'er forget, when far away — 
 In memory's pages e'er prolong. 
 
 A happy bird housed in its bower 
 Sang ever in the sweetest tone, 
 
 And so shall I in pleasant hour 
 
 Recall the friends that I have known. 
 
 The shell, though taken far away, 
 Still sings its sweet song of the sea ; 
 
 I wish that you some happy hour 
 Would likewise sing a song for me. 
 
 And thus may we, though far or near, 
 Make life to us just what it seems, 
 
 And ever live as best of friends 
 In thoughts, in verses and in dreams ! 
 
XIX 
 
 FILING A PROTEST 
 
 A LARGE number of the passengers on 
 board Frederick VIII. had united in a 
 protest to the government of the United States 
 and the countries of Denmark, Norway and 
 Sweden. They had been delayed and endan- 
 gered at sea without legal cause and had taken 
 this method of making their objection known 
 to their respective governments. 
 
 A similar protest was prepared on board the 
 United States and signed by many passengers. 
 This petition was placed in my hands to be 
 presented at the office of the Secretary of State 
 at Washington. With this purpose I went per- 
 sonally to the capital city. 
 
 Here I learned that protests of various classes 
 relating to the interference with neutral trade 
 were multiplying rapidly. Mr. Ben G. Davis, 
 chief clerk of Secretary Robert Lansing, had 
 
 183 
 
184 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 been detailed to establish a branch office at New 
 York so the business of this kind could be taken 
 care of with greater dispatch than was possible 
 at Washington, considering the distance of the 
 capital city from the ports on the eastern coast. 
 The British had placed on the black list one 
 hundred and two trans-Atlantic freight ships. 
 These ships were suspected of trading with the 
 foes of Great Britain, or representing German 
 capital, or carrying unneutral trade. They had 
 a gross tonnage of 80,000 and a carrying 
 capacity of 200,000 tons. The countries and the 
 number of ships represented on the black list 
 were as follows : 
 
 Spain 1 
 
 Brazil 3 
 
 Holland 4 
 
 Denmark 8 
 
 United States 11 
 
 Sweden 37 
 
 Norway 38 
 
 Total 102 
 
 The American shippers were greatly crippled 
 
FILING A PROTEST 185 
 
 by the policy of Great Britain. It was im- 
 possible to secure sufficient ships to move the 
 shipments which were accumulating in New 
 York, Boston and other ports. On the black 
 list appeared the following American vessels: 
 Allagaush, Ausdble, Genesse, Hocking, Kanka- 
 kee, Manitowoc, Maumee, Seneca, Winnebago, 
 Minneconne and Mukkegon. 
 
 The effect of this interference with neutral 
 trade was a stagnation of shipments in the ports 
 of the Atlantic seaboard. At New York there 
 were 30,000 freight cars which were unable to 
 unload, owing to the fact that the warehouses 
 were glutted and insufficient ships were avail- 
 able to relieve the pressure. In many places the 
 goods were unloaded on the streets for want of 
 room. Our farms and factories were losing 
 their market, or at least in part, because the 
 avenues of transportation to Europe were 
 blockaded by British warships. 
 
 The passengers on steamship United States 
 who registered their protest against this ruinous 
 policy did so in the following document : 
 
 "Whereas, we, the undersigned passengers 
 
186 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 on the steamship United States, crossed the 
 Atlantic ocean on said steamship sailing on 
 December 9, 1915, from Copenhagen for New 
 York; 
 
 "Whereas, the said steamship was stopped 
 and seized by a British cruiser when north of 
 the Shetland Islands on December 13, 1915, and 
 compelled under military escort to proceed with 
 passengers and cargo to Greenock, Scotland, 
 where a part of the mails (parcel post) bound 
 for New York was unloaded and retained by 
 the British; 
 
 "Whereas, each of us was compelled unwill- 
 ingly to be in the custody of military men for 
 five days and with said steamship delayed in 
 our course of necessary travel and conveyed the 
 long distance from north of the Shetland Islands 
 to the Clyde Eiver and in transit exposed at 
 numerous places to mines and other great dan- 
 gers while in the war zone, which said steamship 
 did not intend to enter, we do, therefore, 
 
 "PKOTEST most earnestly against the re- 
 peated and persistent interference with neutral 
 commerce in direct violation of international 
 
FILING A PROTEST 187 
 
 law and contrary to the spirit and terms in 
 which the issues of the War of 1812 were settled, 
 and 
 
 " PETITION our respective governments to 
 adopt a firm policy to the end that illegal and 
 indefensible interference with neutral travel 
 and commerce be stopped and that any nation 
 repeating or committing such flagrant acts of 
 unfriendliness be held to strict accountability 
 for the same. ' ' 
 
 This is one of innumerable similar protests 
 that were filed with the hope of securing protec- 
 tion for American commerce. In the meantime, 
 while the German marine trade was off the 
 ocean and about a million tons of England's 
 fleet had been sunk in the sea, while many 
 neutral ships had been seized or were blacklisted 
 by Great Britain, the freight rates on the high 
 seas doubled and later increased from 200 per 
 cent, to 500 per cent., in some instances even 
 700 per cent. These conditions were made pos- 
 sible largely through the work of secret service 
 men of the entente allies, who were watching 
 every car load of freight which arrived at our 
 
188 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 eastern gateways as well as every cargo loaded 
 for transportation across the Atlantic. 
 
 My experience with spies in the great Eu- 
 ropean war led me to believe that the United 
 States must rise up in defense against the 
 pretensions of Great Britain on the sea. If our 
 country is to be an independent nation, a force 
 at home and a power in commerce, it must de- 
 mand the freedom of the seas for the protection 
 of its trade with other nations. A surrender of 
 this principle now or in the future would reverse 
 the achievements which came through the War 
 of 1812 ; it would make Columbia subservient to 
 the mandates of the British Jack. 
 
XX 
 
 AMERICA OFF THE SEA 
 
 rilHE British had issued Orders in Council 
 •*■ under date of March 11, 1915, in which 
 restrictions were placed upon American trade. 
 This order and certain subsequent measures 
 caused Robert Lansing, American Secretary of 
 State, to promulgate many diplomatic notes and 
 protests. They generally dealt with themes 
 " relating to restrictions upon American com- 
 merce by certain measures adopted by the 
 British government. ' ' 
 
 The number of cases in which American 
 neutral rights were invaded had grown to enor- 
 mous proportions during the progress of the 
 war. They were so numerous that it became 
 very difficult to determine the damage to com- 
 merce, both actual and prospective, and to com- 
 prehend the great importance of the wrongs 
 inflicted upon the productive and shipping 
 
 189 
 
190 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 industries. This fact and the influence that this 
 policy of restriction on commerce, as promoted 
 by Great Britain, would have upon the bel- 
 ligerents of the present as well as future wars, 
 especially so far as concerned the neutral rights 
 and neutral interests, caused very serious ap- 
 prehension among the people of America and 
 the neutral countries of Europe. 
 
 Within the first eleven months of the war no 
 less than two thousand American cargoes were 
 detained by the British. The number of such 
 eases in the three months beginning March 11, 
 1915, and ending June 15, 1915, according to 
 public documents issued at Washington, were 
 extremely large. Hundreds of ships were seized 
 within this period and a list of the individual 
 cases covers eleven pages of these documents. 
 All these cases are tangible causes for damages, 
 but the vast number of neutral vessels that were 
 blacklisted and the still greater aggregation of 
 ships that did not sail, fearing seizure or con- 
 fiscation, must likewise be taken into account 
 when contemplating the enormous depression 
 which was suffered commercially by neutral 
 nations. 
 
AMERICA OFF THE SEA 191 
 
 By the beginning of 1916 the conditions had 
 grown similar to those which prevailed immedi- 
 ately before the beginning of the War of 1812. 
 At that time, under date of June 1, 1812, Presi- 
 dent James Monroe issued a message in which 
 he used the following language : 
 
 " Under pretended blockades, without the 
 presence of an adequate force, and sometimes 
 without the practicability of applying one, our 
 commerce has been plundered in every sea, the 
 great staples of our country have been cut off 
 from their legitimate markets, and a destructive 
 blow aimed at our agricultural and maritime 
 interests. In aggravation of the predatory 
 measures that have been considered as in force 
 from the dates of their notification, a retrospec- 
 tive effect being thus added, as have been done 
 in other important cases, to the unlawfulness of 
 the course pursued. And to render the outrage 
 the more signal these mock blockades have been 
 reiterated and enforced in the face of the official 
 communications from the British government 
 declaring as the true definition of a legal block- 
 ade 'that particular ports must be actually 
 
192 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 invested and previous warning given to vessels 
 bound to them not to enter.' " 
 
 This statement of President Monroe had 
 reference to the system of blockades proclaimed 
 by the British under the name of Orders in 
 Council and, in speaking of the freedom of the 
 sea, he says the following in the same message : 
 
 "It has become, indeed, sufficiently certain 
 that the commerce of the United States is to be 
 sacrificed, not as interfering with the belligerent 
 rights of Great Britain; not as supplying the 
 wants of her enemies, which she herself sup- 
 plies, but as interfering with the monopoly 
 which she covets for her own commerce and 
 navigation. She carries on a war against the 
 lawful commerce of a friend that she may the 
 better carry on a commerce with an enemy.' ' 
 
 The commercial marine of the United States, 
 under the vigorous policy of President Monroe 
 and his successors, developed sufficiently within 
 this period that ninety-two per cent, of the for- 
 eign trade was carried in American ships. This 
 favorable condition continued throughout the 
 epoch extending to the beginning of the Civil 
 
AMERICA OFF THE SEA 193 
 
 War, which remained in full sway from 1861 
 until 1865. During this contest, while the 
 Americans were in the greatest war of the New 
 World, the British again destroyed the com- 
 merce of America. Ever since that time the 
 commercial flag of the United States has been 
 practically unknown in trans-oceanic trade. 
 
 The so-called Declaration of London, which 
 is a codification of the laws of the sea, was 
 promulgated in 1909 by the representatives of 
 an international conference called at the invita- 
 tion of the British government. In this meeting 
 the leading nations participated, although some 
 of the countries, including Great Britain, did not 
 formally ratify the final conclusions. According 
 to the Declaration of London, no absolute con- 
 traband of war is recognized, except the actual 
 implements employed in action by the belliger- 
 ents. The same document defines such articles 
 as saddlery, coal, barbed wire, food and clothing 
 as conditional contraband. However, in case 
 the latter class were in transit and destined for 
 the enemy, such articles might be seized. 
 
 In his book entitled The Economic Aspect of 
 
 13 
 
194 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 the War, Prof. Edwin J. Clapp discusses the 
 relevant portion of this feature of international 
 law as follows : 
 
 "By common consent the seas are the public 
 highways of nations ; outside a zone three miles 
 from shore they are not the domain of any one 
 nation. They belong to peaceful commerce, not 
 to belligerents who roam their surface seeking 
 to destroy each other. As a remnant of marine 
 barbarism, a belligerent has the right, if it has 
 the power, to capture or drive from the ocean 
 the merchant vessels of its foe. To the extent 
 of its command over the sea, a belligerent may 
 prevent contraband of war from reaching an 
 enemy in any vessels ; and, if capable of block- 
 ading the enemy's sea coast, may put a stop 
 to all ocean commerce of the blockaded country. 
 Under international law these were the limits 
 and conditions of interfering with commerce 
 between neutrals and a country at war. 
 
 1 ' Only within much narrower limits, according 
 to modern conceptions of international law, can 
 a belligerent interfere with commerce between 
 neutrals themselves. This commerce may be 
 
AMERICA OFF THE SEA 195 
 
 interrupted only when it consists of contraband 
 of war — the actual tools of fighting — demon- 
 strably in transit to enemy territory. ? ' 
 
 According to the Declaration of London, such 
 articles as cotton, hides, rubber, wool and lin- 
 seed oil were to be on the free list. This was 
 agreed upon because these commodities were 
 important as articles of the commerce of neutral 
 nations and because they were necessary to 
 support civilians in belligerent countries who 
 do not participate in acts of hostility, particu- 
 larly children, women and aged persons. From 
 this no change was made until England, by 
 Orders in Council on August 20, 1914, added 
 the conditional list to the absolute list and later 
 added still many more free articles to the 
 schedule of contraband. Regarding this Prof. 
 Clapp says: 
 
 "This action stopped our direct trade with 
 Germany. It might appear that goods on the 
 free list could still move. Some of them did 
 move, from free to contraband. People feared to 
 ship to others lest they should be so listed while 
 ships were on the ocean, and the goods made 
 
196 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 subject to seizure. Practically nothing has been 
 shipped to Germany from this country but 
 cotton, and it was not shipped until December. 
 In belated response to the insistence of southern 
 senators and of American business interests 
 which had found themselves gravely embar- 
 rassed by the cessation of cotton shipments, 
 Great Britain finally made a clear statement 
 that this particular commodity would not be 
 considered contraband. ' ' 
 
 Although the American government protested 
 from time to time against the British Orders 
 in Council which transferred practically every 
 important article of commerce to the absolute 
 list, no relief whatever was secured. To these 
 protests must be added the many notes and 
 protestations filed against the British blockade 
 by Sweden, Norway, Denmark and other neutral 
 countries. In the latter part of 1915, when the 
 feeling for independence on the sea had reached 
 a high mark in the Scandinavian countries, they 
 went so far as to form an understanding favor- 
 able to a union of effort for relief and in some 
 cases reprisals were made by holding British 
 mails. 
 
AMERICA OFF THE SEA 197 
 
 These protests were not only without avail, 
 but England became even more active in limiting 
 commerce among the neutral countries. This 
 policy included the scheme which permitted the 
 non-belligerent countries to obtain only suffi- 
 cient clothing and food which was actually 
 necessary for a scant living. As a consequence 
 their trade was diminished or ruined, while the 
 prices of food and clothing attained high marks 
 and the fires of many factories became dark and 
 cold. The nations which did not engage in the 
 war, which preferred to remain neutral, were 
 paying a high price for their neutrality and at 
 the same time were reduced to a form of depend- 
 ence upon England quite akin to vassalage. 
 
 Step after step had been taken to destroy the 
 high dignity of the countries which loved the 
 victories of peace better than the glories of war. 
 Within these nations were hundreds of spies and 
 secret service men who had studied the condi- 
 tions of their economical life, who had learned 
 the situation and made reports to their own 
 governments, and upon which many of the un- 
 suspecting Scandinavians looked as friendly. 
 
198 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 In the meantime the garrote was fixed around 
 the neck so tightly that the strangulation of 
 their commerce was nothing less than a gigantic 
 and felonious industrial, moral and political 
 homicide committed on the high seas by Great 
 Britain. 
 
 Indeed, it was difficult to understand the 
 policy of the American government as defined 
 by President Wilson. While the neutral coun- 
 tries, under the leadership of Sweden, took 
 steps to warn their citizens not to sail on the 
 armed ships of belligerent nations, while they 
 made reprisals upon Great Britain for interfer- 
 ing with their mails, President Wilson pro- 
 moted the view that Americans should be pro- 
 tected when sailing on the ships of warring 
 nations which carried armament. 
 
 It is doubtful whether the position of Presi- 
 dent Wilson could be defended from the stand- 
 point of international policy ; whether the Amer- 
 ican government itself would consider the ship 
 of a foe, if it were engaged in a war, immune 
 from attack because it had on board a citizen 
 from a neutral country. 
 
XXI 
 WHAT IS AMERICANISM 
 
 npHE United States is an aggregation of 
 *■" nations, many peoples having contributed 
 to the up-building of a glorious whole. Endless 
 generations, many of which came from the best 
 physical forces of Europe, have been united by 
 inseparable bonds of hands and hearts. The 
 amalgamation and assimilation is growing so 
 complete, so truly uniform, that all traces of 
 distinct groups of citizens are disappearing 
 rapidly. 
 
 It seems to me that we should have no quarrel 
 with those who still treasure fond recollections 
 of the country of their ancestry, or even the 
 land of their nativity, so long as they willingly, 
 whether in peace or war, defend the interests 
 of the United States. Indeed, the inclination to 
 think well and speak tenderly of the parent 
 
 199 
 
200 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 stock should be regarded a virtue to be 
 emulated. 
 
 Although the conquest of England by the 
 Danish-German invaders occurred fifteen cen- 
 turies ago, many Englishmen and people of 
 English descent, including numerous Ameri- 
 cans, display no mean pride when they speak of 
 themselves as Anglo-Saxons. They continue to 
 contribute to the literature and history of civili- 
 zation in terms, not of inordinate self-esteem, 
 but of justifiable self-respect. 
 
 Americans of foreign birth, or of foreign 
 parentage, have contributed so much to the 
 success and greatness of the United States that 
 any text in history would be incomplete if the 
 details of their achievements were omitted. And 
 in this respect no one nation of western Europe 
 stands alone. Neither does one group of these 
 loyal people occupy a place of honor above the 
 others. In peace and war, in fellowship and 
 patriotism, these peoples have vied with each 
 other and with the native Americans to lead in 
 the procession that has sustained Old Glory. 
 
 The proof of what is said here will be 
 
WHAT IS AMERICANISM 201 
 
 emphasized when such names as Baron von 
 Steuben, Patrick Henry, John Ericsson, the 
 Sheridan family, Carl Schurz and hosts of 
 others, who helped to make and save the Ameri- 
 can republic, are mentioned. These patriots 
 and people of their kind, including millions in 
 number, have marched forward with no uncer- 
 tain step. 
 
 They plowed the fields, felled the forests, 
 drained the swamps and irrigated the deserts. 
 In every epoch of our history, in all parts of 
 our broad domain, we find these people in the 
 professions, in commercial pursuits and in 
 transportation enterprises. In the last two 
 hundred years, we scarcely find an invention, 
 an unusual and valuable discovery, that they 
 did not seek to make before it became known 
 or promote after it was actuated. Every sec- 
 tion of the country, from the Mississippi Valley 
 to the most remote outposts, the nation has felt 
 the impulse of their thrift and loyalty. 
 
 One of the marvels of American history is 
 found in the ease with which the various peoples 
 who came from foreign lands have been assimi- 
 
202 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 lated. They are found everywhere, in all the 
 fields of political, social and religious life, and 
 in no instance have they banded themselves to- 
 gether in opposition to law and order. On the 
 contrary, they have been as law-abiding as the 
 average native Americans. 
 
 Those who seek to arouse race antipathies 
 commit a grievous offense against public policy. 
 They excite the passions, the hatred, which can 
 be overcome only by honesty and fair treatment. 
 In committing this off ense, they display a prej- 
 udice which a patriotic citizen considers un- 
 patriotic, if not criminal. 
 
 Americanism may be defined as a virtue which 
 attaches one to the laws, customs and institu- 
 tions of the United States. It embodies loyalty 
 and devotion to the welfare of his country. 
 
 The name Americanism must not be used as 
 a cloak to conceal prejudice. It cannot be em- 
 ployed to arouse antagonism among groups of 
 citizens who are of different lines of descent. 
 Instead, the term implies charity toward all. 
 It signifies a desire to fulfill conscientiously the 
 duties and obligations due the government. 
 
This photograph shows the petition which demands that the 
 Congress of the United States maintain strict neutrality by 
 placing an embargo on the shipment of arms and ammunition 
 to any belligerent nation of Europe. It was photographed at 
 the residence of Miss Nellie L. Miller, President of the American 
 Women's League for Strict Neutrality. 
 
 This petition contains l,035,6y7 names and is the largest 
 document of the kind ever presented to Congress. It is 82,000 
 feet long, about fifteen and a half miles. Senators Kenyon, 
 Works, La Toilette, Hitchcock and others supported it by 
 making vigorous speeches in favor of its demands, designating 
 the petition as the most patriotic evidence of Americanism. 
 
 (Opp. 202) 
 
WHAT IS AMERICANISM 203 
 
 On Bedloe *s Island, in the Bay of New York, 
 stands Bartholdi's celebrated statue known as 
 Liberty Enlightening the World. This work of 
 art does not escape the eye of the traveler, no 
 matter whether he is going or coming from 
 abroad. By displaying the torch of liberty, 
 which the goddess proudly holds aloft, it dis- 
 plays the love and charity of Americanism. 
 The following stanzas, entitled Liberty, I dedi- 
 cated to this emblem of higher citizenship : 
 
 LIBERTY 
 
 Hail to the woman with the torch of fire, 
 
 Standing on Bedloe 's Isle the world to guide ! 
 Beacon to pilgrims of worthy sire, 
 
 Guide to the homeless! Far and wide 
 Has thy mighty welcome blazed its way 
 
 To all earth's tired as well as me, 
 And now I see the break of better day, 
 
 The dawn of freedom and of liberty ! 
 
 Unlike the brazen Rhodes of Grecian lore, 
 With mighty limbs from land to land; 
 
 She stands upon the eastern sea-washed shore, 
 The emblem of the free in heart and hand ! 
 
204 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Her face is glad with music of the Spheres, 
 Her eyes as stars in glowing beauty shine, 
 
 She lights the path to peace in future years, 
 She progress gives to me and all of mine ! 
 
 Long centuries had pressed upon the poor, 
 
 Had made them dead to joy and faith and fear ; 
 They could not hope to see an open door, 
 
 So pressed with pain, could scarcely shed a tear: 
 The Tragedy of Time caused head to bow, 
 
 The Wheel of Labor made the back to bend ; 
 Profaned and robbed, what could they do, and how? 
 
 What shores to them would friendly welcome send ? 
 
 The masters and the lords of royal blood 
 
 With monstrous mandates crushed the living soul, 
 And ground man down with burdens and the flood 
 
 Of wars. And, as the years and ages roll, 
 Refused to right the base perfidious wrongs 
 
 That dwarf and stun the much-bewildered brain — 
 But hark! I hear the welcome, new-born song 
 
 And see the torch of liberty again ! 
 
 Glides now the ship to anchor in the bay — 
 
 Soon will I tread the shore of my adopted land 
 
 And breathe a purer spirit, blessed day, 
 As I step on the far-enchanted strand ! 
 
WHAT IS AMERICANISM 205 
 
 This heritage is nature's noblest gift 
 To man, and to the multitudes that come, 
 
 As well as all who long have been adrift, 
 And rest at last to make this land their home. 
 
 Hail to the woman with the torch of fire, 
 
 Standing on Bedloe's Isle the world to guide! 
 Beacon to pilgrims of worthy sire, 
 
 Guide to the homeless! Far and wide 
 Has thy mighty welcome Mazed the way 
 
 To all earth y s tired as well as me, 
 And now I see the break of better day, 
 
 The dawn of freedom and of liberty! 
 
XXII 
 
 POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 
 
 THE SISTINE MADONNA 
 
 I lingered much in Dresden's famous halls 
 And long before the noted canvas stood ; 
 
 It cast a wondrous halo on the walls 
 And seemed to pledge the soul for greater good ; 
 
 I fancied here that heaven is not afar 
 
 And that the pearly gates are turned ajar. 
 
 The cloud of countless cherubs drawing near, 
 And saints with deep devotion singing praise, 
 
 Announce that the heaven-born child is here, 
 And herald tidings forth in seraph-lays ; 
 
 Peace be to men, avoid the scourger's rod, 
 
 Hail ye the chosen, holy Son of God. 
 
 Let those who came to scoff remain to pray, 
 And those who jest, heed well the voice within ; 
 
 Let those who will now choose the better way 
 Forsake the paths of evil and of sin — 
 
 And woe to him who scorns the holy song 
 
 I seem to hear from Raphael's angel throng. 
 206 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 207 
 
 GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS 
 
 In Riddarholms Church, now six centuries old, 
 Is the tomb of Gustavus Adolphus, the Bold; 
 Inscribed with the Gothic so strange, seer and hoary 
 And bedecked with the flags that won honor and glory. 
 
 At seventeen years he ascended the throne 
 And made the great cause of Sweden his own ; 
 The wars with the Danes he brought to an end 
 And yielded to them no part of his land. 
 
 The Russians defeated, at Stolbowa made peace 
 
 And to fair Esthonia signed a release, 
 
 While the Poles from the shores of the Baltic were 
 
 driven 
 And the land of the Letts to Gustavus was given. 
 
 With a foothold in Europe far south of the sea, 
 His armies marched forward through valley and lea ; 
 They crowded the foe from line back to line, 
 From the highlands of Prague to the banks of the 
 Rhine. 
 
 At Breitenfeld Tilly met signal defeat 
 
 And his army to Liitzen beat hasty retreat; 
 
 Where Gustavus again to victory led, 
 
 But was found in the field with the honorable dead. 
 
208 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 He had marched far in Europe with men, horse and 
 
 car 
 To end the great waste of the Thirty Years' War, 
 To save for his country the faith he held true, 
 To give to the world this old faith anew. 
 
 In Riddarholms Church I bowed at his tomb 
 
 And thought of the light that he plucked from the 
 
 gloom, 
 Of the faith that he saved and the schools that he 
 
 built, 
 And his freedom from stain, from wrong and from 
 
 guilt. 
 
 And the lesson I learned from his life good and true 
 In memory I stored and write it for you : 
 // we seek after wisdom, put falsehood aside, 
 We will march on to victory through storm, flood and 
 tide! 
 
 THE SEASONS 
 
 I love the springtime for its flowers, 
 For its cooling evening showers; 
 For the buzzing of the bees, 
 And the blossoms of the trees; 
 For the freshness of the air, 
 And the joy seen everywhere; 
 For the birds that sweetly sing 
 In the Spring ! 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 209 
 
 I love the summer for its growing, 
 For its herds of cattle lowing, 
 For the long and pleasant day, 
 And the fields of new-mown hay; 
 For the waving fields of corn, 
 And the tuneful dinner horn ; 
 Which is the favorite season mine? — 
 Summertime ! 
 
 I love the autumn for its glimmer, 
 As the twilight hues grow dimmer; 
 For the laden orchard trees, 
 And the cooling, healthful breeze ; 
 For the chase of squirrel and coon, 
 And the happy harvest moon ; 
 Then we have the mystic haze — 
 Autumn days! 
 
 I love the winter for its pleasure, 
 For its rigor, health and leisure ; 
 For its evenings full of mirth 
 At the fireside on the hearth ; 
 For the school days full of labor, 
 For the visits with the neighbor ; 
 Pleasant days in every clime — 
 Wintertime ! 
 
 I love all seasons of the year 
 
 For what they bring of hope and cheer ; 
 
 14 
 
210 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 They serve us well in nature's plan, 
 If we but do the best we can ; 
 And if we strive as seasons roll, 
 Successfully well reach the goal — 
 In winter, spring — summer and fall, 
 Seasons all! 
 
 ES KAM EIN SCHONES MADCHEN 
 
 Es kam ein schones Madchen 
 Weit uber Land und Meer 
 
 In einem Schiff gefahren — 
 Die liebe ich so sehr! 
 
 Ihr' Augen gleich den Knospen 
 Sind hell wie Morgentau, 
 
 Die Wangen, 0, so lieblich 
 Wie Friihling's schonste Au. 
 
 Ihr Haar ist wie die Seide, 
 Im klaren Sonnenschein ; 
 
 Die Lippen sprechen zartlich, 
 Nur sanft und schon und fein. 
 
 Ein solches holdes Madchen 
 Mehr wertvoll ist denn Gold; 
 
 Gott nioge sie erhalten 
 So zart und rein und hold. 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 211 
 
 HOPE AND TRY 
 
 Hope within the heart lies slumbering 
 
 Like the dew in field and vale, 
 And springs out of deepest sorrow 
 
 Like the sun through storm and gale. 
 
 Hope sprouts as a tender plantlet 
 
 Like the seed by day and night, 
 And shines through the largest tear-drops 
 
 Like the gem in sparkling light. 
 
 As the spider, spinning daily, 
 Makes new webs to catch the fly, 
 
 So the heart must toil and labor, 
 Plan and plod and hope and try. 
 
 Though you may be disappointed 
 
 Full a thousand times or more, 
 Hope will be your stay and comfort 
 
 As your thoughts to heaven soar. 
 
 TWO ROSES 
 
 At early morn two roses 
 
 Bedecked with sparkling dew 
 
 Had blown in blushing beauty, 
 No finer ever grew, 
 No finer ever grew. 
 
212 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 I waited till the noontide, 
 The bloom had larger grown, 
 
 But still I could not pluck them 
 And left them there alone, 
 And left them there alone. 
 
 At eve the bloom had wilted 
 With petals shrunk and torn, 
 
 And sadly I regretted 
 That I was left forlorn, 
 That I was left forlorn. 
 
 And let this be a lesson 
 
 To my friends kind and true, 
 
 That we should pluck the roses 
 In early morning dew, 
 In early morning dew. 
 
 WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN 
 
 When Peace, the noblest gift of all, 
 
 Had from fair Europe's face been torn, 
 And many nations, great and small, 
 
 Were called their gallant sons to mourn- 
 In these great times he rose to speak 
 
 To sway the trend of soul and mind, 
 With purpose clear and calm and meek, 
 
 For peace and love and human kind. 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 213 
 
 His voice was heard in chambered hall 
 
 By men who guide the ship of state, 
 And like the oak, firm, strong and tall, 
 
 He would not yield; he could not hate 
 The common cause of God and man, 
 
 And plead for peace with fervid breath, 
 And sounded forth eternal ban 
 
 On cruel war and brutal death. 
 
 Can it be true that men of state 
 
 Heed not the voice that pleads for peace- 
 Will they delay until too late 
 
 To bid the dogs of war to cease? — 
 He stood for honor, firm and strong, 
 
 A stately man, the nation's pride, 
 The trusted son of host and throng, 
 
 And laid the robes of state aside. 
 
 His larger mission, joy betide, 
 
 Extends far over palm and pine, 
 To human kind and nations wide 
 
 In every land and every clime — 
 And this it is : We'll crown God King, 
 
 When love shall reignrand wars shall cease, 
 And to Him praise and homage bring, 
 
 The ever-living Prince of Peace. 
 
214 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 IN THE NORTHLAND 
 
 Far to the north where the cold breezes blow 
 And the peaks of the mountains are covered with snow, 
 Where the hills through the fjords reecho to me 
 The roar and the storm of the wonderful sea — 
 
 Thence would I fly 
 
 With storm-elf s to vie ! 
 
 Away in the cold of the Laplandic haze, 
 Where the sun of the midnight shines endless days, 
 And the shrubs all are bowed with dense, hoary frost, 
 And the heat of the desert is scattered and lost, 
 
 There would I roam 
 
 Away, far from home! 
 
 And far on the heights of the tundra and plain, 
 With lightning and thunder and deluging rain ; 
 Where the wayward are swept in the wake of the 
 
 storm 
 And the valleys and hills of their forests are shorn — 
 
 There would I be 
 
 Grim nature to see ! 
 
 In the primeval woods, eternally green, 
 Where the bright rays of sun seldom are seen ; 
 And wrapped in the darkness of night throughout day, 
 The lynx and the fox and the bear are at bay — 
 
 There would I go 
 
 In coldest of snow ! 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 215 
 
 On the wild, restless deep, 0, let me sail 
 When the breakers are dashed high by the gale 
 And the wild ocean moans its wonderful song 
 As the great vessel plunges and hastens along — 
 There let me glide 
 Through gales swift and wide ! 
 
 My soul is enraptured when nature is mad, 
 And its gales and its storms but make me glad ; 
 And whither I go, or where I may be, 
 Just send the great northern Storm King to me — 
 
 Then will I be 
 
 Both happy and free ! 
 
 IF I WERE A BIRD 
 
 If I were a bird, I would sing for you 
 
 The sweetest songs that ever I knew, 
 
 And I would sing them in tones so clear 
 
 That they would soothe and comfort and cheer. 
 
 If I were an artist, I'd paint your face 
 With its sweetest smiles and gentlest grace, 
 And I'd place the picture so it would be 
 A constant companion and guide for me. 
 
 If I were a gardener, I 'd grow the bloom 
 To bedeck and scent your favorite room; 
 I'd bring you blossoms from day to day 
 And stay by your side forever and aye. 
 
216 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 If I were a poet, I'd write in rhyme 
 And tell of the love that only is thine ; 
 These verses would cover volumes of pages 
 With tales of devotion in cycles and ages. 
 
 0, were I so skilled in all of these graces 
 I 'd cheer and illumine your favorite places, 
 And there we would dwell at each other's side, 
 With art, song and flowers forever abide. 
 
 WENN ICH MEIN HERZ VERSTEHE 
 
 Wenn ich mein Herz verstehe — 
 
 Schlagt es allein fur dich, 
 Du mach 'st mir Freud und Wehe — 
 
 Denk'st du auch oft an mich? 
 
 Du bist mein Heil und Leben, 
 Mein Sinn, mein Wohl, und Gut ; 
 
 Willst du dein Herz mir geben? 
 Vollkommen war' mein Mut. 
 
 Die Zeit da ich dich sahe, 
 1st jetzt schon lang' dahin; 
 
 0, war die Stunde nahe, 
 Wenn du war'st wo ich bin. 
 
 Enfernt, lass' ich dich griissen, 
 Verbannt in Sklavenschacht, 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 217 
 
 Im Traum zu deinen Fiiszen, 
 Bringt mich fast jede Nacht. 
 
 Ick mochte dich unfassen 
 
 Sobald die Tulpen bliih'n; 
 Und wiird' dich nie verlassen, 
 
 Und niemals von dir flieh'n. 
 
 Treu werde ich dir geben 
 
 Das beste was ich hab, — 
 Allein fiir dich zu leben 
 
 Bis an das kiihle Grab. 
 
 Wenn ich mein Herz verstehe — 
 
 Schlagt es allein fiir dich, 
 Du mach 'st mir Freud und Wehe — 
 
 Denkst du auch oft an mich? 
 
 THE CHURCHYARD AT TRONDHJEM 
 
 The churchyard at Trondhjem, the city of silence, 
 Reposed 'mid the hills of stone and of clay, 
 
 Thy graves are as green as the leaves of the birchwood 
 Though many were made when the Vikings held 
 sway — 
 
 Long ere the great dome church towered above thee, 
 
 Long ere its bells rang over tundra and lea. 
 
218 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Here sleep the Northmen, whose wonderful sagas 
 Of valor at sea, now ten centuries old, 
 
 Still live in legend, in song and in story 
 And often at bedtime to children are told — 
 
 How they conquered the restless maelstrom commo- 
 tion, 
 
 How they bridled the waves of the mightiest ocean. 
 
 Here sleep the monks that founded the dome church, 
 Near by the priests who prayers often said, — 
 
 See, how the many moss-covered crosses 
 
 Show us where lie these long-honored dead — 
 
 May they sleep in peace, their labor is done, 
 
 May they sleep in peace, their laurels are won. 
 
 Here sleep the reformers of Gustavus Adolphus 
 In silence at rest beneath the greensward, 
 
 They lived for their work, they lived for the church, 
 And now are reposed in the bosom of God — 
 
 Speak kindly of them, they toiled not in vain, 
 
 Speak kindly of them, their work is our gain. 
 
 Here sleep the dead that are noted in story, 
 "Whose fame has been sung and in history told, 
 
 And here sleep the dead who have long been forgotten 
 Because they were poor and not keenly bold — 
 
 But the sickle of death knows no title or nation, 
 
 And the sickle of death is no respecter of station. 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 219 
 
 The churchyard of Trondhjem, the city of silence, 
 Reposed 'mid the hills of stone and of clay, 
 
 Thy graves are as green as the leaves of the birchwood 
 Though many were made when the Vikings held 
 sway — 
 
 Thy graves and thy dead and thy church seem to me 
 
 As great as the greatest of land and of sea. 
 
 THE SLOTHFUL 
 
 By the field of the slothful I went, 
 
 At the early dawn of the day, 
 Where the summer in folly was spent, 
 
 And the winter brought want and dismay; 
 Rank thistles were robbing the soil, 
 
 And nettles were choking the grain ; 
 The hedges had long been afoul 
 
 With weeds that were seeding again. 
 
 And the sluggard was yet on his couch 
 
 With sleep and with slumber unmanned, 
 He was living the way of the slouch 
 
 And wasting the fat of the land ; 
 And with age shall his poverty come, 
 
 And his want and distress shall be great, 
 And his sorrows shall sadden his home — 
 
 Because he has always been late ! 
 
220 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 And this is the lesson I learned 
 
 As I turned from the slothful awa£ : 
 That wisdom by labor is earned 
 
 At the golden dawn of the day — 
 And I left the sluggard asleep, 
 
 Alone to his slumber and want, 
 To the heights of Excelsior to leap, 
 
 In labor's most beautiful hawnt! 
 
 VENICE 
 
 All night the steamer sailed the Adriatic 
 
 To reach at early morn the calm lagoon 
 At Venice, — the famous, the erratic, — 
 
 Where pipes the gondolier his doleful tune ; 
 And here the sea is even more inspiring 
 
 As far and high Palladian temples rise — 
 We view the Doge's Palace, so admiring, 
 
 And scan with dread the wondrous Bridge of Sighs. 
 
 Comes now the gondolier. His numerous horde 
 
 Surrounds the ship that brought us here ; 
 Tn groups of two or three we leave the board 
 
 And slowly move with little doubt or fear. 
 And now I set my foot on land again, 
 
 Not far from Marcos' Place with mighty tower, 
 And with the lion of Byzantine's fame — 
 
 T shall not soon forget this crowning hour ! 
 
POEMS WRITTEN ABROAD 221 
 
 How shall I ever scan these streets and bridges, 
 
 And these canals that form a mystic maze, 
 Or tire of gazing over roofs and ridges, 
 
 That now are glimmering in the morning haze ? 
 And can I ever tell, the wondrous vision 
 
 That from San Marcos • tower comes to me, — 
 How lagoon and islands form a marked division 
 
 Between the Alps and the ever restless sea? 
 
 All day the Grand Canal its burdens carries 
 
 Of barge and boat that hurry to and fro, 
 And e'en at night this movement little tarries 
 
 Or when the restless tides are high or low ; 
 At the Rialto Bridge the crowds are vaster 
 
 Even than at the famed San Marcos' Place, — 
 At day they come to trade, at eve to master 
 
 The native songs, or to promenade apace. 
 
 How lovely is a trip, when shadows lengthen, 
 
 To Lido, the flowery islet of the sea ; 
 At eve, when sea-cooled breezes strengthen 
 
 The human form, it gives new hopes to me ! 
 Soon I will see the lights of Venice gleaming 
 
 Across the lagoon's much reputed shoal, 
 And hear the mighty tide of Lido streaming 
 
 As from the sea the rushing water roll ! 
 
 But Venice still of olden times is dreaming 
 When masters, such as Titian, flourished here, 
 
222 MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIES 
 
 Its ancient walls, in the sunset gleaming, 
 As shades of former glory now appear ; 
 
 The stallions which on yonder church are prancing, 
 The prize once taken by the Corsican, 
 
 Remind us only by their graceful dancing 
 How falls the powerful reign of kingly clan ! 
 
 I glance once more across the panorama 
 
 Of gilted tower and bridge and halls of art, 
 And ponder long upon the cyclic drama 
 
 In which such men as Marco Polo played a part- 
 But what of life and all the joy and leisure, 
 
 And golden hours, if they but end in vain ? 
 I view Venetian glory filled with pleasure, 
 
 And feel her poverty with grief and pain ! 
 
POEMS OF FRIENDSHIP 
 
 The Latest Epoch-Making Literary Production 
 of America 
 
 By 
 BERNHART PAUL HOLST 
 
 This newly copyrighted book is a work of art, containing the newest and 
 most interesting writings in poetic form produced by the pen of an active 
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 ing and are classified under the following departments: 
 
 Poems of Friendship Poems of Religion 
 
 Poems of Life Poems of Power 
 
 Poems of Home Poems of Humor 
 
 Poems of Love Poems of Sentiment 
 
 Prof. Hoist's poems are full of living interest. Every page of the 
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