that both Hughes and Wilson are to be elected. It will be a relief tomorrow night at this time to begin to receive the returns and to know how New York State has gone for I imagine that will go far to determine the whole. I shall vote before breakfast as usual, and enjoy the rest of the day in quiet at the Club.'

To His Daughter

"Metropolitan Club, November 7, 1916.

"I voted before breakfast this morning as is my wont. But there were a good many before me, so my ballot was No. 60. But they put me at the head of the line because I had voted for Fremont & Dayton in 1856, and then I had to be introduced and shake hands with a young gentleman who was now voting for President for the first time in his life. * *

"On the way up in the stage I called at the Savoy on M. de Sillac who was at the Hague with us, a sort of attaché, I believe, to M. Bourgeois, and is now here on a mission from M. Briand, Premier & Foreign Secretary, to find out the drift of opinion here about the League to Enforce Peace. I told him that if they would leave out the 'Force' I could support it, but I could not agree that the United States should bind itself to be punished by all the other members of the League if it differed from them; e. g., the Monroe Doctrine.

"We hope to hear who is President before midnight.

So he voted for Hughes, and the election, after considerable hesitation, went against him. And presently things began to come along and in spite of the election

and what hopes of his, if any, it may have withered, the things that came were the things he wanted. November 6 the British liner Arabia was sunk without warning in the Mediterranean. On November 29, Washington protested against Belgian deportations. On December 6 Lloyd George became Prime Minister of England. On December 12, the Germans made a peace offer, refused, December 30, by the Allies as "empty and insincere." On December 20 went out President Wilson's peace note, to which Germany replied on December 26 and the Allies on January 10. On January 22 the President addressed the Senate, telling them his ideas of steps necessary for world peace. On January 31 Germany announced unrestricted submarine warfare in specified zones. Three days later, February 3, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Germany and dismissed Ambassador von Bernstorff. On February 26, President Wilson asked authority to arm merchant ships and did arm them by announcement of March 12. On March 27 Minister Whitlock and the American Relief Commission were withdrawn from Belgium, and on April 6 the United States declared war on Germany. It took five months to go from election to war.

How Mr. Choate felt about it appears in the letter following to Earl Grey, which was published in the London Times of May 30:

"8 East 63rd Street, April 7, 1917. "DEAR LORD Grey:

"Your delightful cable came to hand on the 5th, immediately after the President's Message delivered in person to Congress, which, as you say, has swept all clouds from our sky, and before it had culminated in

MR. BALFOUR AND MR. CHOATE RIDING UP FIFTH AVENUE, MAY, 1917, AT THE TIME WHEN THE BRITISH MISSION WAS RECEIVED.

the declaration of war by Congress and its proclamation by the President.

"At last Americans at home and abroad can hold up their heads with infinite pride. The whole nation is now lined up behind the President, and I think that you will hear no more about doubt or hesitation or dissent among us. I think that we may now forget all the past, and let bygones be bygones, and accept the President as our great leader for the war; and we must give him credit for one signal result of his watchful waiting, and that is, that he was waiting to see when the whole nation would be wrought up to the point which has now been reached, so that he could safely announce to the world our alliance with France and Great Britain without any practical dissent.

"I say alliance, because that is justified by his noble utterances. We must stand together now until victory is won, and I think that victory will be greatly hastened by the entrance of the United States into the conflict. As you know, I have thought from the beginning that, while for the time being we might better serve the cause of the Allies by remaining neutral and supplying all that we could in the way of arms and munitions, and I am happy to say some men, as our neutral right was; that nevertheless when by entering into the war with all our might and with the aid of all our boundless resources, we could help to bring it to an end in the right way by the complete suppression of Prussian militarism, and the triumph of civilization, it would be our duty to do so. That time has now come, and I am happy to think that our great nation has acted upon the same thought, and has been really true to all its great traditions.

"We can hardly be expected to send over any large