William II had much of the brilliancy which characterized the Great Frederic, but he commenced his war at the wrong end-he missed the psychological moment. Frederic became King at 28; William Emperor at 29. Frederic was done with fighting at the age of 51, whilst William started the World War when he was 55 and fled into the swamps of Holland a refugee at the age of 60. Frederic fought for tangible results and he contemplated suicide in case of disaster. William fought for the nebulous crown of a world conqueror and has achieved only the fame of that crazy one who fired the Temple of Ephesus.

William II was born on the 27th of January of 1859 and spent his boyhood largely in the so-called Neues Palais of Sans Souci Park. His father and mother spared no pains in training him for prospective empire and their example alone was worth many school masters. Both parents were highly cultivated and happily married; both inclined to curb the Bismarckian militarism by concession to parliamentary demands; both loved country life and both found time to look after their children, not only when at their books but also when they had playmates for a free half holiday in the park."

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My friendship with William II commenced in 1871 and lasted uninterruptedly for twenty-five years, at the end of which I published a book and was never

again invited to that palace. The book was called: A History of the German Struggle for Liberty between the Battle of Jena in 1806 and the Revolution of 1848. There were four volumes, each handsomely illustrated; and altho the American publishers became financially embarrassed soon afterwards, I like to think that there were other causes of their failure.

But even without my history, William II must have withdrawn his countenance from one who was then writing in public journals, not as a Hohenzollern historiographer but rather as an American free lance.

In January of 1896 there was a domestic brawl in South Africa which concerned the Transvaal and Queen Victoria. The Kaiser thought that it concerned him also and therefor he cabled to the Boer president words which Queen Victoria read with surprise and her subjects with clenched fists. Of course I assumed that his Prime Minister would resign by way of protest against this rash act; for under the Imperial Constitution the autograph of the Kaiser has no validity unless countersigned by his chief minister, who then was Prince Hohenlohe. But no protest was made by any minister; nor was anyone dismissed. All Europe was momentarily alarmed as though a general war were imminent; but England mobilized her fleet; the German foreign office made some clumsy explanations; the newspapers passed on

to other news and only the initiated realized that the Kaiser meant from now on to speak not merely for Germany but for the whole of Europe.

This January of 1896 may be taken as the moment when the Kaiser lost his balance; when the example of the Great Frederic ceased to influence him and when he succumbed to a disease called megalomania.

But he was to me only a sincere lover of Peace; an eager student in every department of human science; an admirer of England; a conscientious public servant after the pattern of the great sage of Sans Souci. In 1888 he became Emperor, and each year I was his guest for every one of his corps inspections; which meant visiting each province of the Empire and seeing the country at first hand; for we were in the saddle and riding across country from before sunrise until close of day. He gave me many occasions for conversation and could listen as well as talk. His reading was extensive and his memory magnificent; he knew personally every important person in every town of Germany and those who deal in politics know how much that means in the making of popularity. One day when on horseback near him, he called my attention to the venerable Field Marshal von Blumenthal, then upwards of 80 years of age. It was a raw, sleety and windy day in September, but the old general wore no overcoat. The Emperor sent

an aide de camp to beg von Blumenthal to dơn his great coat, but the answer came back that he felt very comfortable.

At this the Emperor proceeded to put on his own warm cloak, saying to me:"I must do it-otherwise the old general will get a chill on my account!" Of course, so soon as Blumenthal saw the Emperor cover himself he lost no time in following suit-as did the rest of his suite. Endless were the tales I heard of the Kaiser's thoughtfulness for others; and interest in anything that meant a betterment of social conditions. He frequently asked me about problems of government in England and America-and expressed himself with severity regarding the worldly life of his uncle the late Edward VII and the apparently harmful effect of his example upon an aristocracy much given to mere amusement. He was deeply religious and regarded the building of churches as a very essential part of his political work.

These pages are necessarily personal, for I pretend to know no more than a witness in court giving evidence regarding one whom the world now is judging as another Genseric.,!

In his home life William was a model husband and father. He was married so soon as he came of age; and whilst scores of professional dancers and singers claimed through their press agents that they had en

joyed in Berlin more than platonic handling in the Palace, the prosaic truth is that we can find no substance for these pleasing dreams. He loved his wife and home after the most approved puritan pattern and marvelled that his anacreontic uncle could preserve his popularity in the land of Queen Victoria. The Kaiser smoked very little; drank light wine moderately; was up and at work amongst the earliest in his Capital and took regular out-door exercise. He had no fear for his life. Any one could have shot him as he rode on horseback the whole length of the broad Linden Avenue, under the Brandenburg Arch of Triumph and so on through the great park. All the world knew the hour of his ride and the route. No secret service men accompanied him as they do our Presidents; his two equerries rode far behind out of ear shot and could not have saved him had a furibund Guiteau or Czolgosz attacked him with a pistol or even a knife.

One day he asked me to walk with him from the Neues Palais to the so-called Holy Pond and thus to the Havel-about three miles in each direction. It was a drizzly November day and he walked brisklythrough the long Sans Souci Avenue and then the whole extent of Potsdam itself. The town was alive with peasants who crowded the sidewalks in eager chaffering or gazing into shop windows. The two