The Emperor William himself was even more open and direct than his minister. At his dinner to the ambassadors in the spring of 1900, he spoke to me very fully on the subject, and, in a conversation which I have referred to elsewhere, assured me of his complete and hearty concurrence in the American policy, declaring, "We must stand together for the open door." Finally, on the 9th of April, 1900, I had the satisfaction of sending to the German Foreign Office the proofs that all the other powers concerned, including Japan, had joined in the American declaration, and that the government of the United States considered this acquiescence to be full and final. It was really a great service rendered to the world by Mr. McKinley and Secretary Hay; their action was far-seeing, prompt, bold, and successful. Yet another subject of contention was the exclusion of sundry American insurance companies from Germany, due in part to a policy of "protection," but also to that same distrust of certain American business methods which had given me much trouble in dealing with the same question at St. Petersburg. The discussions were long and tedious, but resulted in a sort of modus vivendi likely to lead to something better. The American sugar duties were also a sore subject. Various writers in the German press and orators in public bodies continued to insist that America had violated the treaties; America insisted that she had not; and this trouble, becoming chronic, aggravated all others. The main efforts of Count von Bulow and myself were given to allaying inflammation by doses of common sense and poultices of good-will until common sense could assert its rights. The everlasting meat question also went through various vexatious phases, giving rise to bitter articles in the newspapers, inflammatory speeches in Parliament, and measures in various parts of the empire which, while sometimes honest, were always injurious. American products which had been inspected in the United States and Hamburg were again broken into, inspected, and reinspected in various towns to which they were taken for retail, with the result that the packages were damaged or spoiled, and the costs of inspection and reinspection ate up all profits. I once used an illustration of this at the Foreign Office that seemed to produce some effect. It was the story of the Yankee showman who, having been very successful in our Northern and Middle States, took his show to the South, but when he returned had evidently been stripped of his money. Being asked regarding it, he said that his show had paid him well at first, but that on arriving in Texas the authorities of each little village insisted on holding an inquest over his Egyptian mummy, charging him coroner's fees for it, and that this had made him a bankrupt.