"GERMAN GREAT HEADQUARTERS IN FRANCE, Dec. 1.—There is a certain monotony about the scientific murder of the firing line—a routine repetition of artillery duels, alarums, and excursions which can be and are being vividly described by 'war correspondents' from the safe vantage ground of comfortable cafés miles away. The real human interest end of this ultra-modern war is to be gleaned from rambling around the operating zone in a thoroughly irresponsible American manner, trusting in Providence and the red American eagle sealed on your emergency passport and a letter from Charles Lesimple, the genial Consul at Cologne, to keep you from being shot.
"For instance, you get some interesting first-hand knowledge as to how spies can 'get away with it' in spite of the perfect German military system of controls and passes. There is no 'spy hysteria' in Germany but none the less the German authorities know perfectly well that there are swarms of spies in their midst and are hunting them down with quiet, typically Teutonic thoroughness. But the very perfection of the German military machine is its weak spot, and on this, my second visit to the German Great Headquarters, I was able to give the astonished authorities a personal demonstration as to how any smooth-tongued stranger could turn up at even this 'holy of holies.' The nocturnal trail led in a military train from Luxemberg over Longwy to Longuyon.
"From here I started out on a foot tour, and entered the Grosses Hauptquartier (Great Headquarters) unchallenged, by the back door. Journalistically it was disappointing at first, for it was Sunday morning and apparently Prussian militarism keeps the Sabbath holy. There was no one interviewing the Kaiser, for he had gone 'way down East' and with him his war minister, Gen. von Kalkenhayn. The courteous commandant, Col. von Hahnke, was not on the job. Even the brilliant chief of the press division, Major Nikolai, was out of town when I called on the Great General Staff. But there were compensations, for at a turn of the road I saw a more impressive sight than even the motoring Kaiser—a mile of German cavalry coming down the straight chausse, gray horsemen as far as the eye could see and more constantly coming over the brow of the distant hill, with batteries of field artillery sandwiched between.
"On the next day I again dropped in on the great General Staff and found it not only at home, but very much interested on discovering that I had no pass to come or go or be there at that time. The war-time mind of Prussian militarism is keen and right to the point. It saw not the chance of getting publicity in America, but the certainty that other more dangerous spies could come through the same way. By all the rules of the war game, Prussian militarism would have been thoroughly justified in treating me as a common spy in possession of vital military secrets, but it courteously contented itself in insisting on plucking out the heart of the journalistic mystery. All attempts at evasion and humour were vain—here was the ruthless reality of war. It was the mailed Prussian Eagle against the bluff American bird of the same species, and the unequal contest was soon ended when Major Nikolai, Chief of Division III. of the great General Staff, stood up very straight and dignified and said:
"'I am a German officer. What German violated his duty? I ask you as a man of honour how was it possible for you to come here?'
"The answer was quite simple: 'The German military machine was so perfect that it covered every contingency except the most obvious and guarded every road except the easiest way. All you have to do is to take a passenger train to Luxemberg, and hang around the platform until the next military train pulls out for Belgium or France, hop aboard, and keep on going. In case of doubt utter the magic phrase, "I am an American," and flash the open sesame, the red seal of the United States of America—to which bearded Landsturm guards pay the tribute of regarding it as equally authoritative as the purple Prussian eagle stamped on a military pass.'
"Followed a two-hour dialogue in the private office of the chief of the Kaiser's secret field police, as a result of which future historians will find in the Kaiser's secret archives the following unique document, couched in Berlin legal terminology and signed and subscribed to by the Times correspondent:
"'Secret Field Police, Great Headquarters, Dec. 1, 1914.
"'There appears the American war correspondent and at the particular request of the authorities, explains:
"'On Saturday, Nov. 30, I arrived at Trier on a second-class ticket at about 10.30 P.M. There I bought a third-class ticket and boarded a train leaving Luxemberg at about 12.15 A.M. I did not go into the railroad station, but trusting to my paper, boarded a military train leaving at 12.45 A.M., going over Longwy to Longuyon, where I arrived at 3.30 A.M., Sunday. There an official whose name I do not know took me to a troop train and made a place for me in the brake box. I left the train at X and went on foot to H (the Great Headquarters), where I reported myself to the Chief of Police.