Conditions at Washington favoured operations of this kind.  Secretary Bryan was an ultra-pacifist; like men of one idea, he saw only the fact of a hideous war, and he was prepared to welcome anything that would end hostilities.  The cessation of bloodshed was to him the great purpose to be attained:  in the mind of Secretary Bryan it was more important that the war should be stopped than that the Allies should win.  To President Wilson the European disaster appeared to be merely a selfish struggle for power, in which both sides were almost equally to blame.  He never accepted Page’s obvious interpretation that the single cause was Germany’s determination to embark upon a war of world conquest.  From the beginning, therefore, Page saw that he would have great difficulty in preventing intervention from Washington in the interest of Germany, yet this was another great service to which he now unhesitatingly directed his efforts.

The Ambassador was especially apprehensive of these peace moves in the early days of September, when the victorious German armies were marching on Paris.  In London, as in most parts of the world, the capture of the French capital was then regarded as inevitable.  September 3, 1914, was one of the darkest days in modern times.  The population of Paris was fleeing southward; the Government had moved its headquarters to Bordeaux; and the moment seemed to be at hand when the German Emperor would make his long anticipated entry into the capital of France.  It was under these circumstances that the American Ambassador to Great Britain sent the following message directly to the President: 

     To the President
     American Embassy, London,
     Sep. 3, 4 A.M.

Everybody in this city confidently believes that the Germans, if they capture Paris, will make a proposal for peace, and that the German Emperor will send you a message declaring that he is unwilling to shed another drop of blood.  Any proposal that the Kaiser makes will be simply the proposal of a conqueror.  His real purpose will be to preserve the Hohenzollern dynasty and the imperial bureaucracy.  The prevailing English judgment is that, if Germany be permitted to stop hostilities, the war will have accomplished nothing.  There is a determination here to destroy utterly the German bureaucracy, and Englishmen are prepared to sacrifice themselves to any extent in men and money.  The preparations that are being made here are for a long war; as I read the disposition and the character of Englishmen they will not stop until they have accomplished their purpose.  There is a general expression of hope in this country that neither the American Government nor the public opinion of our country will look upon any suggestion for peace as a serious one which does not aim, first of all, at the absolute destruction of the German bureaucracy.

From such facts as I can obtain, it seems clear to me that the opinion of Europe—­excluding