hat I have never been in Boston. I
have never attended a tea party there."

It has been said that the tact and good sense of Page and Grey, working
sympathetically for the same end, avoided many an impending crisis. The
trouble caused early in 1915 by the ship _Dacia_ and the way in which
the difficulty was solved, perhaps illustrate the value of this
cooeperation at its best. In the early days of the War Congress passed a
bill admitting foreign ships to American registry. The wisdom and even
the "neutrality" of such an act were much questioned at the time.
Colonel House, in one of his early telegrams to the President, declared
that this bill "is full of lurking dangers." Colonel House was right.
The trouble was that many German merchant ships were interned in
American harbours, fearing to put to sea, where the watchful British
warships lay waiting for them. Any attempt to place these vessels under
the American flag, and to use them for trade between American and German
ports, would at once cause a crisis with the Allies, for such a paper
change in ownership would be altogether too transparent. Great Britain
viewed this legislation with disfavour, but did not think it politic to
protest such transfers generally; Spring Rice contented himself with
informing the State Department that his government would not object so
long as this changed status did not benefit Germany. If such German
ships, after being transferred to the American flag, engaged in commerce
between American ports and South American ports, or other places
remotely removed from the Fatherland, Great Britain would make no
difficulty. The _Dacia_, a merchantman of the Hamburg-America line, had
been lying at her wharf in Port Arthur, Texas, since the outbreak of the
war. In early January, 1915, she was purchased by Mr. E.N. Breitung, of
Marquette, Michigan. Mr. Breitung caused great excitement in the
newspapers when he announced that he had placed the _Dacia_ under
American registry, according to the terms of this new law, had put upon
her an American crew, and that he proposed to load her with cotton and
sail for Germany. The crisis had now arisen which the well-wishers of
Great Britain and the United States had so dreaded. Great Britain's
position was a difficult one. If it acquiesced, the way would be opened
for placing under American registry all the German and Austrian ships
that were then lying unoccupied in American ports and using them in
trade between