who had not mentioned the matter to Sir
Cecil[94], prepared a long communication to you which he sent to
the President for approval. The President and I went over it and I
strongly urged not sending it until I could have a conference with
Sir Cecil. I had this conference the next day without the knowledge
of any one excepting the President, and had another the day
following. Sir Cecil told me that if the dispatch had gone to you
as written and you had shown it to Sir Edward Grey, it would almost
have been a declaration of war; and that if, by any chance, the
newspapers had got hold of it as they so often get things from our
State Department, the greatest panic would have prevailed. He said
it would have been the Venezuela incident magnified by present
conditions.

At the President's suggestion, Lansing then prepared a cablegram
to you. This, too, was objectionable and the President and I
together softened it down into the one you received.

Faithfully yours,
E.M. HOUSE.

In justice to Mr. Lansing, a passage in a later letter of Colonel House
must be quoted: "It seems that Lansing did not write the particular
dispatch to you that was objected to. Someone else prepared it and
Lansing rather too hastily submitted it to the President, with the
result you know."

This suppressed communication is probably for ever lost, but its tenor
may perhaps be gathered from instructions which were actually sent to
the Ambassador about this time. After eighteen typewritten pages of not
too urbanely expressed discussion of the Declaration of London and the
general subject of contraband, Page was instructed to call the British
Government's attention to the consequences which followed shipping
troubles in previous times. It is hard to construe this in any other way
than as a threat to Great Britain of a repetition of 1812:

_Confidential_. You will not fail to impress upon His
Excellency[95] the gravity of the issues which the enforcement of
the Order in Council seems to presage, and say to him in substance
as follows:

It is a matter of grave concern to this Government that the
particular conditions of this unfortunate war should be considered
by His Britannic Majesty's Government to be such as to justify them
in advancing doctrines and advocating practices which in the past
aroused strong opposition on t