ritain was so
great--indeed the Germans had reduced the situation to a mathematical
calculation of success--that an American declaration of war seemed to
Berlin to be a matter of no particular importance. The American
Ambassador in London regarded Bernstorff's dismissal much more
seriously. It justified the interpretations of events which he had been
sending to Mr. Wilson, Colonel House, and others for nearly three years.
If Page had been inclined to take satisfaction in the fulfilment of his
own prophecies, Germany's disregard of her promises and the American
declaration of war would have seemed an ample justification of his
course as ambassador.

[Illustration: Walter H. Page, at the time of America's entry into the
war, April, 1917]

[Illustration: Resolution passed by the two Houses of Parliament, April
18, 1917, on America's entry into the war]

But Page had little time for such vain communings. "All that water," as
he now wrote, "has flowed over the dam." Occasionally his mind would
revert to the dreadful period of "neutrality," but in the main his
activities, mental and physical, were devoted to the future. A letter
addressed to his son Arthur shows how quickly and how sympathetically he
was adjusting himself to the new prospect. His mind was now occupied
with ships, food, armies, warfare on submarines, and the approaching
resettlement of the world. How completely he foresaw the part that
the United States must play in the actual waging of hostilities, and to
what an extent he himself was responsible for the policies that
ultimately prevailed, appears in this letter:

_To Arthur W. Page_

25 March, 1917, London.

DEAR ARTHUR:

It's very hard, not to say impossible, to write in these swiftly
moving days. Anything written to-day is out of date to-morrow--even
if it be not wrong to start with. The impression becomes stronger
here every day that we shall go into the war "with both feet"--that
the people have pushed the President over in spite of his vision of
the Great Peacemaker, and that, being pushed over, his idea now
will be to show how he led them into a glorious war in defense of
democracy. That's my reading of the situation, and I hope I am not
wrong. At any rate, ever since the call of Congress for April 2nd,
I have been telegraphing tons of information and plans that can be
of use only if we go to war. Habitually they never ackno