"
In addition to making visits to the royalties, custom required
me to call first upon the Imperial Chancellor and the Minister
of Foreign Affairs. The other ministers are supposed to call
first, although I believe the redoubtable von Tirpitz claimed
a different rule. So, during the first winter I gradually made
the acquaintance of those people who sway the destinies of the
German Empire and its seventy millions.
I dined with the Emperor and had long conversations with him on
New Year's Day and at the two court balls.
All during this winter Germans from the highest down tried to
impress me with the great danger which they said threatened America
from Japan. The military and naval attaches and I were told that
the German information system sent news that Mexico was full
of Japanese colonels and America of Japanese spies. Possibly
much of the prejudice in America against the Japanese was cooked
up by the German propagandists whom we later learned to know
so well.
It is noteworthy that during the whole of my first winter in
Berlin I was not officially or semi-officially afforded an
opportunity to meet any of the members of the Reichstag or any
of the leaders in the business world.
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