June 6, 19 1 8 
Land &: Water 
1 1 
a mile wide, was alive with gaily coloured craft ; I recall 
this animated scene with particular vividness because 1 
retain in my mind the contrast it presented a few months 
afterward, when Turkey's entrance into the war had the 
immediate result of closing this strait. 
Day by day huge Russian steamships, on their way from 
Black Sea ports to Smyrna, Alexandria, and other cities, 
made clear the importance of this little strip of water, 
and explained the bloody contests of the European 
nations, over a thousand years, for its possession. However, 
these summer months were peaceful ; all the Ambassadors 
and Ministers and their famihes were thrown con- 
stantly together ; here 
daily gathered the re- 
presentatives of all the 
Powers that for the last 
three years have been 
grappling in history's 
bloodiest war, all then 
apparently friend^, sit- 
ting around the same 
dining tables, walking 
arm in arm upon the 
porches. The Ambassa- 
dor of one Power would 
most graciously escort 
in to dinner the wife 
of another whose coun- 
try was perhapw the 
most antagonistic to 
his own. Little groups 
would form after din- 
ner, the Grand Vizier 
would hold an im- 
promptu reception in 
one corner, Cabinet 
Ministers would be 
whispering in another, 
a group of Ambassa- 
dors would discuss the 
Greek situation out on 
the porch, the Turkish 
officials would glance 
quizzically upon the 
animated scene and 
perhaps comment 
quietly in their own 
tongue, the Russian 
Ambassador would 
glide about the room, 
pick out some one- 
whom he wished to 
talk to, lock arms and push him into a comer for a 
surreptitious tSte-dtite. I felt that there was something 
electric about it all ; war was ever the favourite topic of 
conversation ; every one seemed to realise that this peace- 
life was transitory ; that at any moment 
the spark that was to set everything 
The American Summer Embassy on the Bosphorus 
Not far away, .icross the Strait, which is here only a mile wide, Darias crossed 
wilh his Asiatic hosts nearly 2,500 years ago. 
ful frivolous 
might come 
aflame. 
Yet, when 
the crisis came it produced no immediate 
sensarion. On June 2gth we heard of the assassination 
of the Grand Duke of Austria and his consort. Everybody 
received the news calmly ; there was, indeed, a stunned 
feeling that sometliing momentous had happened ; but there 
was practically no excitement. A day or two after this 
tragedy I had a long talk with Talaat on diplomatic matters ; 
he made no reference at all to this event. I think now that 
--Hve were all affected by a kind of emotional paralysis — as we 
were nearer the centre than most people, we certainly reahsed 
the dangers m the situation. In a day or two our tongues 
seemed to have been loosened, for We began to talk — and 
to talk war. When .1 saw von Mutius, the German Charge, 
and Weitz, the diplomat-correspondent of the Frankfurter 
Zeitung, they also discussed the impending conflict, and 
again they gave their forecast a characteristically Germanic 
toiich ; when war came, they said, of course the United States 
would take advantage of it to get all the Mexican and South 
American trade 1 
"Serbia will be Condemned" 
When I called upon Pallavicini to express my condolences 
over the Grand Duke's death, he received me with the most 
stately solemnity. He was conscious that he was representing 
the Imperial family, and his grief seemed to be personal ; 
one would think that he had lost his own son. I expressed 
piy abhorrence and that of my nation for the deed, and our 
sympathy with the aged Emperor. 
" Ja, J a, es ist sehr schrecklich" (yes, yes, it is very terrible), 
he answered, almost in a whisper. 
"Serbia will be condemned for her conduct," he added. 
"She will be compelled to make reparation." 
A few days later, when Pallavicini called upon me, he 
spoke of the nationalistic societies that Serbia had permitted 
to exist and of her determination to annex Bosnia and 
Herzegovina. He said that his government would insist 
on tlie abandonment of these societies and these pretentions, 
and that probably a punitive exp>edition into Serbia would 
be necessary to prevent such outrages as the murder of the 
Grand Duke. Herein I had my first intimation of the famous 
ultimatum of July 
22nd. 
The entire diplo- 
matic corps attended 
the requiem mass 
for the Grand Duke 
and Duchess, celebrat- 
ed' at the Church of 
Sainte Marie on July 
4th. The church is 
located- in the Rue 
Pera. not far from the 
Austrian Embassy ; to 
reach it we had to de- 
scend a flif^ht of forty 
stone steps. At the 
top of these stairs re- 
presentatives of the 
Austrian Embassy, 
dressed in full uniform, 
with crepe on the left 
arm, met us, and es- 
corted us to our seats. 
All the Ambassadors 
sat in the front pew — 
and it was the last 
time that we ever sat 
together. The service 
was dignified and beau- 
tiful ; I remember it 
with especial vividness 
because ol the con- 
trasting scene that 
immediately followed. 
When the stately, gor- 
geously robed priests 
had finished, we all 
returned to our motor 
cars and started on our 
eight mile drive along 
the Bosphorus to the American Embassy. For this was not 
only the day when we paid this tribute to the murdered 
heir of this mediaeval autocracy ; it was also the Fourth of July. 
The verysetting of tlie two scenes seemed to me to symbolise 
these two national ideals. I always think of this ambassa- 
dorial group going down those stone steps to the church 
to pay their respects to the Grand Duke, and then going up 
to the gaily decorated American Embassy, to pay their 
respect to the Declaration of Independence. All tlie station 
ships of the foreign countries lay out in the stream, decorated 
and dressed in honour of our national holiday ; and the 
Ambassadors and Ministers called in full regalia. From the 
hanging gardens we could se _> the place where Darius crossed 
from Asia with his Persian hosts 2,500 years before — one 
of those ancient autocrats the line of which is not yet entirely 
extinct. There also we could see the fine Robert College, 
an institution that represented America's conception of the 
proper way to "penetrate " the Turkish Empire. At night the 
hanging gardens were illuminated with Chinese lanterns, 
and good old American fireworks, lighting up the surrounding 
hills and the Bosphorus, seemed almost to act as a challenge 
to the plentiful reminders of autocracy and oppression which 
we had had in the early part of the day. Not more than 
a mile across the water the dark and gloomj' hills of 
Asia, for ages the birthplace of mihtary despotisms, 
caught a faint and I think prophetic glow from these 
illuminations. 
In glancing at the little ambassadorial group at the church 
and later at our reception I was suq^rised to note that one 
familiar figure was missing. Wangenheim, Austria's ally, 
was not present. This somewhat puzzled me at the time ; but 
afterward I had the explanation from Wangenh im's own 
lips. He had left some days before for Berlin. The Kaiser 
hid summoned him to an Imperial Council, which met on 
July $th, and which decided to plunge Europe into war. 
{To be continued.) 
