I can say that with absolute conviction from the bottom of my heart.

Mr. Speaker, and gentlemen of the House, I thank you very much for the way in which you have received this mission, for the way in which you have received the utterances of His Royal Highness, the president of our mission, and for the way in which you have received the very few remarks I have been able to improvise.

BARON MONCHEUR IN WASHINGTON

On June 20 Baron Moncheur, of the Belgian mission, expressed to the American people, through the Washington correspondents, Belgium's gratitude for America's "generous outpouring of material assistance and sympathy," and paid a special tribute to Herbert C. Hoover for his Belgian relief work, as follows:

The purpose of our visit to this country is to express to your Government and people the heartfelt gratitude of Belgium for the generous outpouring of material assistance and sympathy which have gone so far to save my stricken countrymen from the horrors of famine and to maintain their unshaken courage in this hour of trial.

Our warm gratitude to you for this help will never cool, but you are now adding still more to our great debt. Our people, saved from famine, still groan under the yoke of a merciless invader. Of all the peoples of the world none have ever had a more flaming love of liberty than those of Belgium, and

this makes their suffering the more acute. Your entry into the war not only brings to us the satisfaction of finding in an old friend a new ally, but fires us with complete confidence in an early and victorious issue of the great struggle which has brought to my country so much of misery and suffering.

Our admiration for your decision in entering the war is all the greater because we know that you did so in full knowledge of all its horrors, and realized fully the sacrifices you will be called upon to make, the tears that will flow, the inevitable heartache and sorrow that will darken your homes. This shows us, as nothing else could, the determination of your country to see that when peace comes it shall be an honest peace, one that can last, and one that will bring freedom and happiness to all nations.

In voicing my country's gratitude I am happy to be able to pay a tribute of admiration and affection to Mr. Hoover, under whose able and untiring direction the great work of feeding Belgium was carried on. We rejoice for you that a man so eminently fitted by ability and experience should be at your service in handling the great food problems that confront you.

From being one of the foremost industrial nations of the world, ranking fourth among exporting countries, Belgium for the time being has been ruthlessly wiped out. Her factories are closed. With cold calculation for the ruin of the country, the invader has even removed the machinery from our factories and shipped it to Germany as part of a far-sighted and

cynical program of economic annihilation. And, worst of all, a part of Belgium's unoffending laboring class has been torn from their families and sent to toil in Germany under a system that would have offended the moral sense of the Middle Ages.

But this is only a passing phase. Belgian confidence and courage have never wavered. On the day of deliverance sounds of industry will again be heard. And on that final day of victory the friendship of our two peoples, purified in the fire of suffering, will emerge greater and stronger than ever and unite us in even stronger bonds that shall, God willing, never be broken.

On June 17 the Belgian Commissioners called at the White House and handed President Wilson an autograph letter from King Albert, which read as follows:

I commend to Your Excellency's kindly reception the mission which bears this letter. This mission will express to the President the feelings of understanding and enthusiastic admiration with which my government and people have received the decision reached by him in his wisdom. The mission will also tell you how greatly the important and glorious rôle enacted by the United States has confirmed the confidence which the Belgian nation has always had in free America's spirit of justice.

The great American nation was particularly moved by the unwarranted and violent attacks made upon Belgium. It has sorrowed over the distress of my subjects, subjected to the yoke of the enemy. It has suc

cored them with incomparable generosity. I am happy to have an opportunity again to express to Your Excellency the gratitude which my country owes you and the firm hope entertained by Belgium that on the day of reparation, toward which America will contribute so bountifully, full and entire justice will be rendered to my country.

My government has chosen to express its sentiments to Your Excellency through two distinguished men, whose services will command credence for what they have to say-Baron Moncheur, who for eight years was my representative at Washington, and Lieutenant General Leclercq, who has earned high appreciation during a long military career.

I venture to hope, Mr. President, that you will accord full faith and credence to everything that they say, especially when they assure you of the hopes I entertain for the happiness and prosperity of the United States of America and of my faithful and very sincere friendship. ALBERT.

In presenting the King's letter, Baron Moncheur said:

Since the first days of the greatest tragedy which has ever befallen humanity, Belgium has contracted an immense debt of gratitude to the generous American nation. In a magnificent outburst of sympathy for the little country which had chosen to delay a powerful and pitiless enemy rather than to tarnish its honor or forswear its plighted word, the initiative of American citizens gave to the unfortunate victims

of German cruelty in Belgium the most splendid evidences of generosity.

But the chivalrous sentiments which animate the people of the United States went further than this when President Wilson, giving an admirable example of disinterested power, uttered the words well fitted to make us tremble with hope and to cause us to fix our eyes confidently upon the starry banner which has become more than ever the symbol of strength placed at the service of the highest and most pure principles.

Yes, Belgium will again take her place among the nations. The enemy brought us massacre and devastation, but there still remains to the Belgian people their soil, made fertile by the toil of their ancestors; there still remains to Belgium an industrious population of unconquerable energy.

Leaning upon the young, strong, and generous hand which the American people holds out to her, Belgium, once she is delivered from the oppression of the enemy, will arise, and, throwing aside the odious weight of foreign occupation, will, courageously and proudly, resume the path of progress in the light of the sun of liberty.

President Wilson, in thanking Baron Moncheur, and through him King Albert, said:

Your Excellency is good enough to express the thanks of the Belgian people for the participation of America in feeding the people of your stricken country. This work in which so many Americans have