20 
LAND & WATER 
August 3, i9i6> 
fields were white with rime, and the fir trees powdered hke a 
wedding cake. We took a different road from the night 
before, and after a run of half a dozen miles came to a Uttle 
town with a big railway station. It was a junction on some 
main hue, and after five minutes waiting we found our train. 
Once again we were alone in the carriage. Stumm must 
have had some colossal graft, for the train was crowded. 
I had another three hours of complete boredom. I dared 
not smoke, and could do nothing but stare out of the window. 
We soon got into hilly country, where a good deal of snow 
was lying. It was the 23rd day of December, and even in 
war-time one had a sort of feel of Christmas. You could see 
girls carrying evergreens, and when we stopped at a station 
the soldiers on leave had all the air of hoUday making. Here 
in the middle of Germany was a cheerier place than Berlin 
or the western parts. I liked the look of the old peasants, 
and the women in their neat Sunday best, but I noticed 
too how pinched they were. Here in the country, where no 
neutral tourists came, there was not the same stage-manage- 
ment as in the capital. 
Stumm made an attempt to talk to me on the journey. 
I could see his aim. Before this he had cross-examined me, 
but now he wanted to draw me into ordinary conversation. 
He had no notion how to do it. He was either peremptory and 
provocative, like a drill-sergeant, or so obviously diplo- 
matic that any fool would have been put on his guard. That 
is the weakness of the German. He has no gift for laying 
himself alongside different types of men. He is such a hard- 
shell being that he cannot put out feelers to his kind. He 
may have plenty of brains, as Stumm had, but he has the 
poorest notion of psychology of any of God's creatures. In 
Germany only the Jew can get outside himself, and that is 
why, if you look into the matter, you will find that the Jew 
is at the back of most German enteq>rises. 
After midday we stopped at a station for luncheon. We 
had a very good meal in the restaurant, and when we were 
finishing two officers entered. Stumm got up and saluted 
and went aside to talk to them. Then he came back and 
made me follow him to a waiting-room, where he told me to 
stay till he fetched me. I noticed that he cjdled a porter and 
had the door locked when he went out. 
It was a chilly place with no fire and I kicked my heels 
there for twenty minutes. I was living by the hour now, 
and did not trouble to worry about this strange behaviour. 
There was a volume of time tables on a shelf, and I turned 
the pages idly till I struck a big railway map. Then it 
occurred to me to find out where we were going. I had 
heard Stumm take my ticket for a place called Schwandorf, 
and after a lot of searching I found it. It was away south in 
Bavaria, and so far as I could make out less than fifty miles 
from the Danube. That cheered me enormously. If Stumm 
hved there he would most likely start me off on my travels 
by the railway which I saw running to Vienna and then on to 
the East. It looked as if I might get to Constantinople after 
all. But I feared it would be a useless achievement for what 
could I do when I got there ? I was being hustled out of 
Germany without picking up the slenderest clue. 
The door opened and Stumm entered. He seemed to have 
got bigger in the interval and to carry his head higher. There 
was a proud Ught, too, in his eye. 
" Brandt," he said, " you are about to receive the greatest 
privilege which ever fell to one of your race. His Imperial 
Majesty is passing through here, and has halted for a few 
minutes. He has done me the honour to receive me, and 
when he heard my story he expressed a wish to see you. You 
will follow me to his presence. Do not be afraid. The All- 
Highest is merciful and gracious. Answer his questions Uke 
a man." 
I followed him with a quickened pulse. Here was a bit of 
luck I had never dreamed of. At the far side of the station 
a train had drawn up, a train consisting of three big coaches, 
chocolate-coloured and picked out with gold. On the plat- 
form beside it stood a small group of officers, tall men in 
long grey-blue cloaks. They seemed to be mostly elderly, and 
one or two of the faces I thought I remembered from photo- 
graphs in the picture papers. As we approached they drew 
apart, and left us face to face with one man. He was a little 
below middle height, and all muffled in a thick coat with a 
fur collar. He wore a silver helmet with an eagle atop of it, 
and kept his left hand resting on his sword. Below the 
helmet was a face the colour of grey paper, from which shone 
curious sombre restless eyes with dark pouches beneath them. 
There was no fear of my mistaking him. These were the 
features which, since Napoleon, have been best known to 
the world. 
I stood as stiff as a ramrod and saluted. I was perfectly 
cool and most desperately interested. For such a moment 
I would have gone through fire and water. 
" Majesty, this is the Dutchman I spoke of," I heard 
Stumm say. 
' What language does he speak ? " the Emperor asked. 
" Dutch," was the reply, " But being a South African he 
also talks English." 
A spasm of pain seemed to fllit over the face before me. 
Then he addressed me in English. 
" You have come from a land which will yet be ours, 
to offer your sword to our service ? I accept the gift and 
hail it as a good omen. I would have given your race its- 
freedom, but there were fools and traitors among you who 
misjudged me. But that freedom I shall yet give you in 
spite of yourselves. Are there many hke you in your 
country ? " 
" There are thousands, sire," I said, lying cheerfully. 
"I am one of many who think that my race's hfe hes in your 
victory. And I think that that victory must be won not ia 
Europe alone. In South Africa for the moment there is nc 
chance, so we look to other parts of the continent. You 
will win Europe. You have won it in the East, and it now 
remains to strike the English where they cannot fend the 
blow. If we take Uganda, Egypt will fall. By your per- 
mission I go there to make trouble for your enemies." 
A flicker of a smile passed over the worn face. It was the 
face of one who slept little and whose thoughts rode him 
like a nightmare. 
" That is well," he said. " Some Englishman once said 
that he would call in the New W^orld to redress the balance 
of the Old. We Germans will summon the whole earth to 
suppress the infamies of England. Serve us well, and you 
will not be forgotten." 
Then he suddenly asked : " Did you fight in the last South 
African War ? " 
" Yes, sire," I said. " I was in the commando of that 
Smuts who has now been bought by England." 
" What were your countrymen's losses ? " he asked 
eagerly. 
I did not know, but I hazarded a guess. " In the field some 
twenty thousand. But many more by sickness and in the 
accursed prison-camps of the English. 
Again a spasm of pain crossed his face. 
" Twenty thousand," he repeated huskily, " A mere 
handful. To-day we lose as many in a skirmish in the Polish 
marshes." 
Then he broke out fiercely. 
" I did not seek the war. ... It was forced on me 
. . . I laboured for peace. . . . The blood of millions 
is on the heads of England and Russia, but England most of 
all. God will yet avenge it. He that takes the sword will 
perish by the sword. Mine was forced from the scabbard in 
self-defence, and I am guiltless. Do they know that among 
your people ? " 
" All the world knows it, sire," I said. 
He gave his hand to Stumm and turned away. The last 
I saw of him was a figure moving like a sleep-walker, with 
no spring in his step, amid his tall suite. I felt that I was 
looking on at a far bigger tragedy than any I had seen in 
action. Here was one that had loosed Hell, and the furies 
of Hell had got hold of him. He was no common man, for 
in his presence I felt an attraction which was not merely the 
mastery of one used to command. That would not have 
impressed me, for I had never owned a master. But here 
was a human being who, unlike Stumm and his kind, had 
the power of laying himself alongside other men. That was 
the irony of it. Stumm would not have cared a tinker's 
curse for all the massacres in history. But this man, the 
chief of a nation of Stumms, paid the price in war for the 
gifts that had made him successful in peace. He had imagina- 
tion and nerves, and the one was white hot and the others 
were quivering. I would not have been in his shoes for the 
throne of the Universe. . . . 
All the afternoon we sped southward, mostly in a country 
of hills and wooded valleys. Stumm, for him, was very 
pleasant. His Imperial master must have been gracious to 
him and he passed a bit of it on to me. But he was anxious 
to see that I had got the right impression. 
" The All-Highest is merciful, as I told you," he said. 
I agreed with him. 
" Mercy is the prerogative of kings," he said sententiously ; 
" but for us lesser folks it is a trimming we can well do with- 
out." 
I nodded my approval. 
" I am not merciful," he went on, as if I needed telling ^ 
that. " If any man stands in my way I trample the life out 
of him. That is the German fashion. That is what has made 
us great. We do not make war with lavender gloves and 
fine phrases but with hard steel and hard brains. We 
Germans will cure the green-sickness of the world. The 
nations rise against us. Pouf ! They are soft flesh, and 
flesh cannot resist iron. The shining ploughshare will cut its 
way through acres of mud." 
I hastened to add that these were also my opinions. 
