No. 323.
relating to the conduct of international affairs affecting the exchange of confidential communications between governments, etc. etc. have the honor to report that as have considered the suggestions contained in your telegram so opportune and the advice and logic so promotive of beneficial results, decided upon acquainting President Meléndez with its purport at once, without waiting until a matter of this character.
or THE should be again brought to my attention.
Therefore, in a visit which made this afternoon upon President Meléndez, gave him, for his personal and confidential use, a translation of a paraphrased copy of the telegram in question, while also discussed with him at some length the inconvenience and inadvisability of giving out to the press matter which might tend to hazard or imperil the relations between two nations; and am pleased to say that the President manifested great appreciation of your indications, especially the concluding sentence of the telegram in which you expressed the hope that he would always consider himself as free to communicate with us as we feel in communicating with his government, making public only so much of our respective correspondence, however, as we believe would be beneficial to the relations of the two countries.
Long before Don Carlos Meléndez became President of Salvador we were intimate personal friends, and the friendship between us formed in 1909 has continued up to the present time.
It is not unnatural, then, that he should confide to me the fact, which he has done frequently, that as he is a simple agriculturist,