I was looking on at the negotiation without any very great interest, sharing, as I did, in the general impression that Spain would give way before long, when I was surprised one morning by receiving a visit from a very remarkable character. Ludwig Kehler was a Bavarian, who had begun life as a candidate for the priesthood. A disgraceful affair, the particulars of which I had never learned, had caused his dismissal from the seminary, and, after drifting about the world for a time, and mixing in very shady company, he suddenly appeared in Berlin in the character of a police agent. The exact nature of the services which he rendered to the police was a mystery, but I had formed the theory that he was employed as a spy on the German Catholics, whose attachment to the House of Hohenzollern has always been suspected in Berlin. The presence of this man in Paris was in itself an unusual event. It did not occur to me to connect it with the Spanish-American question, and that for a very simple reason. Germany is the one country in Europe which has never possessed a foot of soil in the New World. Spain, Portugal, England, France, and even Holland and Denmark have planted their flags across the Atlantic, but the German Michael has been content to remain at home while his neighbours were colonising the globe. I received Kehler coldly. My acquaintance with him was a purely professional one, and he was a man whom I profoundly distrusted. As soon as I could do so, without positive rudeness, I invited him to explain the object of his visit. ‘It is of a confidential nature,’ prefaced the Bavarian. ‘May I assure myself that our conversation will remain a secret between us two?’ I bowed gravely. ‘That is always understood, where I am concerned. A man who desires to be trusted must begin by establishing a reputation for secrecy.’ Kehler contented himself with this assurance, dry as it was. ‘I thank you, Monsieur V----. Your reputation is so well established that I had no intention except to ask whether you were willing to receive the proposals I have come to make?’ ‘Proceed, Herr Kehler, if you will be so good.’ ‘You have learnt, no doubt, that the Spanish Government has made up its mind to concede the terms demanded on behalf of the Cubans by the United States?’ Although I was not aware that things had reached this point, I did not allow Kehler to see that he had given me any information. ‘By this act,’ he continued, ‘the Americans have, in fact, declared that no European Power has any right to enter their hemisphere without their permission.’ ‘All that is well known, Herr Kehler.’ ‘The question then arises whether the European Powers will allow themselves to be driven out, one by one, or whether, by a bold combination, they will reduce the United States to some respect for the law of nations.’ ‘Such a combination would be inopportune at this moment, because the British would stand aloof.’