He then announced in a voice of thunder that they were all wrong and that he was having them rewritten. Before I could summon enough breath to shout him down and protest, he had gone into another room and slammed the door. I rushed back to my trusty aide-de-camp and told him to get me those telegrams right away; he came back with word that they would be sent after correction. I said that under no circumstances could they send out a word over the signature of the American Minister without his having written it himself. He came back and said that he could not get the cables. I started to walk into the office myself to get them, only to bump into the General coming out with the messages in his hand. He threw them down on a table and began telling a young officer what corrections to make on the telegraph form itself. I protested vigorously against any such proceeding, telling him that we should be glad to have his views as to any errors in our message, but that he could not touch a letter in any official message. At this stage of the game he was summoned to the office of the Burgomaster and rushed off with a string of oaths that would have made an Arizona cow-puncher take off his hat. The young officer started calmly interlining the message, so I reached over and took it away from him, with the statement that I would report to my chief what had happened. He was all aflutter, and asked that I remain, as the General would not be long. I could not see any use in waiting longer, however, and made as dignified a retreat as possible under the circumstances. There were a number of cables in the handful I had carried around that were being sent in the interest of the German Government and of German subjects, and I took good care to tell the young man that while we were glad to do anything reasonable for them or for their people, we had stood for a good deal more than they had a right to expect, and that these cables would stay on my desk until such time as they got ready to make a proper arrangement for our communications. Now we shall settle down and see what happens next. [Illustration: German officers and soldiers were always ready to oblige by posing for the camera] [Illustration: "Mit Gott fuer Kaiser und Reich." This trio had a mania for being photographed] [Illustration: Count Guy d'Oultremont, Adjutant of the Belgian Court. French howitzer in the background] [Illustration: From left to right: Colonel DuCane, Captain Ferguson, and Colonel Fairholme] When I got back to the Legation I found the Argentine and Brazilian Ministers and the Mexican Charge d'Affaires waiting to hear the news of my mission. I was rather hot under the collar, and gave an unexpurgated account of what had happened. By this time I was beginning to see some of the humor in the situation, but they saw nothing but cause for rage, and left in a fine temper.