And even if to-day many look askance at these prophecies, and turn from the whole cause,—indifferent, yawning, shrugging their shoulders, as if it concerned something impractical, unessential, fanciful,—yet very speedily, if once that which is in preparation, as yet silent and unobserved, comes into sight, there will be awakened the general realization that this cause demands conscious coöperation, that it includes the mightiest task of onward-marching human society,—in a word, that it is “the one important thing.”
July, 1908
SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER
1904
THREE WEEKS IN AMERICA
The Bremen Rathauskeller · The Emperor’s beaker · A peaceful voyage · A ship on fire · A curious contradiction · The Statue of Liberty · Tariff vandals · The first interviewers · First impression of New York · Old comrades · The “yellow press” · The Interparliamentary Conference · Secretary Hay’s address · Public meetings · Russia and Japan shake hands · A Chinese lady · The Boston Public Library · Sojourn in New York · The “smart set” · Carl Schurz · The Waldorf-Astoria · The worship of bigness · At the Pulitzers’ · The World · Philadelphia · Fairmount Park · Two days in Washington · A conversation with Roosevelt · “Universal peace is coming” · A peace meeting at Cincinnati · Niagara Falls · An advertising monstrosity · A visit in Ithaca
For the English-American edition of this book I will add a few reminiscences of my visit to the United States as I committed them to paper in October, 1904, while returning to Europe.
Here on board the Kaiser Wilhelm II I find time and leisure to set down in my diary some of the multitudinous and vivid impressions whereby the store of my experiences has been increased through my brief, all too brief, sojourn on the other side of the ocean.
The thirteenth World’s Peace Congress was opened in Boston on the fourth of September. That was the object of my journey; so I was not induced to cross the ocean by my desire to make acquaintance with the New World, and yet a wholly and completely new world was revealed to me.
I will begin at the embarkation. My traveling companion and I spent the evening before in the senators’ room of the Rathauskeller at Bremen, where the local group of the German Peace Society had arranged a small festivity in our honor.
I saw there the enormous hogshead which holds ever so many gallons, and the one that is filled with such precious old wine that every drop is reckoned as worth so many hundred marks, and the beaker from which Emperor William II is accustomed to drink when he visits the wine cellar, and—what pleased me most—the model of the fountain on which the quaint city musicians of Bremen are portrayed, namely, the ass on which stands the dog which supports the cat on which sits the cock,—possibly very clever, but certainly extremely lean, tone artists.
The next morning, which was bright and clear, we proceeded to Bremerhaven by a special train. This train takes transatlantic passengers only, and stops directly opposite the gangway of the steamship. When we arrived at the dock, gay music was pealing from the deck, and we went on board as if we were embarking for a pleasure sail.