Amid the strains of the German national anthem, played by the Turkish
military band, Lieut. Capt. von Mücke, together with the War Minister,
Enver Pasha, paced along the long German and Turkish fronts. Then he
led forth his forty-four men and marched, amid new ovations, all
through Stamboul, across the great bridge to Galata, to the deck of
the steamship General, at the head of his little band, now grown epic,
amid the cheers of Byzantium, on which he and his officers had never
set foot before--always in the clear blue and sunlight of this
war-heavy Whitsuntide day.
But nothing stirred me more deeply on the whole journey than that cold
official report of the man who was being celebrated, before his
Admiral, and I saw in that lowered swordpoint the symbol of the old
and incorruptible Prussian spirit.
[Illustration]