The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II by Burton Jesse Hendrick
page 52 of 510 (10%)
page 52 of 510 (10%)
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papers."
_To the President_ London, January 5, 1916. DEAR MR. PRESIDENT: I wish--an impossible thing of course--that some sort of guidance could be given to the American correspondents of the English newspapers. Almost every day they telegraph about the visits of the Austrian Chargé or the German Ambassador to the State Department to assure Mr. Lansing that their governments will of course make a satisfactory explanation of the latest torpedo-act in the Mediterranean or to "take one further step in reaching a satisfactory understanding about the _Lusitania_." They usually go on to say also that more notes are in preparation to Germany or to Austria. The impression made upon the European mind is that the German and Austrian officials in Washington are leading the Administration on to endless discussion, endless notes, endless hesitation. Nobody in Europe regards their pledges or promises as worth anything at all: the _Arabic_ follows the _Lusitania_, the _Hesperian_ follows the _Arabic_, the _Persia_ follows the _Ancona_. "Still conferences and notes continue," these people say, "proving that the American Government, which took so proper and high a stand in the _Lusitania_ notes, is paralyzed--in a word is hoodwinked and 'worked' by the Germans." And so long as these diplomatic representatives are permitted to remain in the United |
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