ment could live here at this time if peace
was proposed upon terms that would have any chance of acceptance.
Those in civil authority that I have met are as reasonable and
fairminded as their counterparts in England or America, but, for
the moment, they are impotent.

I hear on every side the old story that all Germany wants is a
permanent guaranty of peace, so that she may proceed upon her
industrial career undisturbed.

I have talked of the second convention[110], and it has been
cordially received, and there is a sentiment here, as well as
elsewhere, to make settlement upon lines broad enough to prevent a
recurrence of present conditions.

There is much to tell you verbally, which I prefer not to write.

Faithfully yours,
E.M. HOUSE.

Colonel House's next letter is most important, for it records the birth
of that new idea which afterward became a ruling thought with President
Wilson and the cause of almost endless difficulties in his dealings with
Great Britain. The "new phase of the situation" to which he refers is
"the Freedom of the Seas" and this brief note to Page, dated March 27,
1915, contains the first reference to this idea on record. Indeed, it is
evident from the letter itself that Colonel House made this notation the
very day the plan occurred to him.

_From Edward M. House_
Embassy of the United States of America,
Berlin, Germany.
March 27, 1915.

DEAR PAGE:

I have had a most satisfactory talk with the Chancellor. After
conferring with Stovall[111], Page[112], and Willard[113], I shall
return to Paris and then to London to discuss with Sir Edward a
phase of the situation which promises results.

I did not think of it until to-day and have mentioned it to both
the Chancellor and Zimmermann, who have received it cordially, and
who join me in the belief that it may be the first thread to bridge
the chasm.

I am writing hastily, for the pouch is waiting to be closed.

Faithfully yours,
E.M. HOUSE.

The "freedom of the seas" was merely a proposal to make all merchant
shipping, enemy and neutral, free from attack in time of war. It would
automatically have ended all blockades and all interference with
commerce. Germany would have been at liberty to send all her merchant
ships to sea for undisturbed trade with all parts of the world in war
time