usual summer leave, which
had been granted a few weeks before. For the last time I crossed
the ocean on one of the proud German liners, and, indeed, on the
finest of our whole merchant fleet, the _Vaterland_. For the last
time I saw, on my arrival, the port of Hamburg and the lower Elbe
in all their glory. Germans who live at home can hardly imagine
with what love and what pride we foreign ambassadors and exiled
Germans regarded the German shipping-lines.

A few days after I had arrived in my home at Starnberg there began
strong public excitement and uneasiness over the political situation.
However, of late years so many crises had been successfully averted
at the eleventh hour, that this time, too, I hoped up to the last
minute that a change for the better would set in. It seemed as
though the responsibility for a war was too great to be borne by
anyone man--whoever he might be--who would have to make the final
decision.

On the wonderful, still summer evening of the 1st August, we heard
across the Starnberger Lake, in all the surrounding villages, the
muffled beat of drums announcing mobilization. The dark forebodings
with which the sound of the drums filled me have fixed that hour
indelibly in my memory.

The following day was devoted to preparations for the journey to
Berlin, where I had to receive instructions before returning with
all possible speed to Washington. The journey from Munich to Berlin,
which could only be made in military trains, occupied forty-eight
hours.

In the Wilhelmstrasse I had interviews with the authorities, the
substance of which was instructions to enlighten the Government
and people of the United States on the German standpoint. In doing
so I was to avoid any appearance of aggression towards England,
because an understanding with Great Britain had to be concluded
as soon as possible. The Berlin view on the question of guilt was
even then very much the same as has been set down in the memorandum
of the commission of four of the 27th May, 1919, at Versailles,
namely, that Russia was the originator of the war.

Further, I was informed at the Foreign Office, that in addition
to some other additions to the staff of the Washington Embassy,
the former Secretary of State of the Colonial Office, Dr. Dernburg,
and Privy Councillor Albert, of the Ministry of the Interior, were
to accompany me; the former as representative of the German Red
Cross, the latter as agent of the "Central Purchasin