The Nome daily nugget., 1915-08-09
FULL TEXT 0F THE
 LATEST GERMAN NOTE

thod of warfare adopted by them in Icontravention of international. law. With all its efforts in principle. to lprotect neutral life and property from damage as much as possible, the Ger
 man Government recognized unre- Iservedly In it's memorandum of Feb ruary that the interests of neutrals might suffer from the submarine war fare. However. the American Govern ment will also understand and appre- ciate that in the fight for existence which has been forced upon Germany by its adversaries and announced by them it is the sacred duty of the Im- perial Government to do all within its power to protect and save the lives of German subjects. If the Imperial Gov ernment were derelict in these. it's duties. 1t would be guilty before God and history of the violation of those principles of highest humanity which are the foundation of every national existence.
 "The case of the Lusitania shows with horrible clearness to what jeop- |ardizing of human lives the manner of eonducting war by our adversaries leads. Tn the most direct contradiction 'of international law all distinctions be- tween merchantmen and war vessels have been obliterated by the order to British merchantmen to arm themsel- ves and to ram submarines. and the promise of rewards therefor, and neu- trals who use merchantmen as trav- elers thereby have been exposed in an increasing degree to all the dangers of war
 If the commander of the German submarine which destroyed the I.usil tania had caused the crew and passen- gers to take to the boats before firing a torpedo this would have meant the sure destruction of his own vessel After the experiences in sinking the much smaller and less seaworthy yes sels it was to be expected that migh- ty ship like the Lusitania would re- main above water long enough. even after the torpedoing. to permit pas- 'sengers to enter the ships boats. i
 "Circumstances of very peculiar kind. especially the presence on board of large quantities of highly explosive materials. defeated this expectation.
 Tn addition 1t may be pointed out thousands of cases of munitions would have been sent to Germany's enemies and thereby thousands of German mo- thers and children robbed of bread winners.
 "In the spirit of friendship where- with the German nation has been im- bued towards the Union and it's in habitants since the earliest days of existence, the Imperial Government will always be ready to do all 1t can. during the present war also, to pre- vent the jeopardizing the lives of American citizens.
 "The Imperial Government there fore, repeats the assurances that Amer
 ican ships will not be hindered in the prosecution of legitimate shipping and the lives of American citizens in neutral vessels shall not be placed in jeopardy.
 | "In order to exclude any unforeseen dangers to American passenger steam ers made possible in view of the con- duct of maritime war by Germany Iadversaries, German submarines will
 be instructed to permit the free and
 safe passage of such passenger steam CTS when made recognizable by special
 markings and notified reasonable time in advance.
 "The Imperial Government, how ever, confidently hopes that the Amer ican Government will assume to guar antee that these vessels have no con- traband on board. Details of arrange '
 ments for the unhampered passage oi these vessels to be agreed upon by the
 naval authorities of both sides. "In order to furnish adequate faclli
 ties for travel across the Atlantic foI
 American citizens. the German Gov
 ernment submits for consideration .a
 proposal to increase the number ol
 available steamers by installing in pas
 senger service reasonable number of
 neutral steamers under the American flag. the exact number to be agreed upon under the same condition as the
 above mentioned American steamers
 "The Imperial Government believes it, can assume that in this manner ade- quate facilities for travel across the Atlantic Ocean can be afforded Ameri-
 can citizens. There would. therefore appear to be no compelling necessity
 for American citizens to travel to Eu.