Let the American remember:
1. Remember you are talking to a friend.
2. Remember you are talking to a man who regards his nation as the greatest in the world. He will not tell you this, because he takes it for granted that you know already.
3. Remember you are talking to a man who is a member of a traditionally reticent and unexpansive race; who says about one third of what he feels; who is obsessed by a mania for understating his country's case, exaggerating its weaknesses, and belittling its efforts; who is secretly shy, so covers up his shyness with a cloak of aggressiveness which is offensive to those who are not prepared for it. Remember that this attitude is not specially assumed for you: as often as not the man employs it toward his own wife, who rather enjoys it, because she regards it as a symptom of affection.
4. Remember you are talking to a man who is fighting for his life. To-day his face is turned toward Central Europe, and his back to the United States. Do not expect him to display an intimate or sympathetic understanding of America's true attitude to the War. He is conducting the War according to his lights, and is prepared to abide by the consequences of what he does. So he is apt to be resentful of criticism. Bear with him, for he is having a tough time of it.
5. Enemy propaganda to the contrary, remember that this man is not a hypocrite. He is occasionally stupid; he is at times obstinate; he is frequently high-handed; and often he would rather be misunderstood than explain. But he is neither tyrannical nor corrupt. He went into this War because he felt it his duty to do so, and not because he coveted any Teutonic vineyard.
6. Remember that your nation has done a great deal for this man's nation during the War. Tell him all about it: it will interest him, because he did not know.