Berlin, Yale, Oxford, and St. Andrews—1901-1903 [excerpt]

DARKEST of all hours during my embassy was that which brought news of the assassination of President McKinley. It was on the very day after his great speech at Buffalo had gained for him the admiration and good will of the world. Then came a week of anxiety—of hope alternating with fear; I not hopeful: for there came back to me memories of President Garfield’s assassination during my former official stay in Berlin, and of our hope against hope during his struggle for life: all brought to naught. Late in the evening of September 14 came news of the President’s death—opening a new depth of sadness; for I had come not merely to revere him as a patriot and admire him as a statesman, but to love him as a man. Few days have seemed more overcast than that Sunday when, at the little American chapel in Berlin, our colony held a simple service of mourning, the imperial minister of foreign affairs and other representatives of the government having quietly come to us. The feeling of the German people—awe, sadness, and even sympathy—was real. Formerly they had disliked and distrusted the President as the author of the protective policy which had cost their industries so dear; but now, after his declaration favoring reciprocity,—with his full recognition of the brotherhood of nations,—and in view of this calamity, so sudden, so distressing, there had come a revulsion of feeling.
     To see one whom I so honored, and who had formerly [197][198] been so greatly misrepresented, at last recognized as a great and true man was, at least, a solace.

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So it was that, on my journey to America, made necessary by the sudden death of my son, I accepted Mr. Carnegie’s invitation to visit him at his castle of Skibo in the extreme north of Scotland. Very striking, during the two days’ journey from London to Edinburgh, and from Edinburgh to Bonar, were the evidences of mourning for President McKinley in every city, village, and hamlet. It seemed natural that, in the large towns and on great public buildings, flags at half-mast and in mourning should show a [200][201] sense of the calamity which had befallen a sister nation; but what appealed to me most were the draped and half-masted flags on the towers of the little country churches and cottages. Never before in the history of any two countries had such evidences of brotherly feeling been shown. Thank God! brotherly feeling had conquered demagogism.