The Great Pacifist. 



619 



would agree to any proposal for the arrest of arma- 

 ments, but that Germany and Austria would not listen 

 to any such proposal, and were determined to exclude 

 the question of armaments from practical consideration. 

 I reported to Sir Edward Grey and Sir Henry Campbell- 

 /Jannerman exactly how I found the situation. I told 

 Sir Edward Grey that I considered that some of the 

 British Ambassadors, notably Sir Francis Bertie, were 

 the worst enemies of his policy to be found anpvhere 

 in Europe. 



THE SECOND H.\CUE CONFERENCE. 



On my return from America I accompanied the 

 British journalists, who made a return visit to their 

 German colleagues, and then went straight to the 

 Hague, where I published and edited the Courricr de 

 la Conference, an illustrated four-page dail\- paper, 

 which I produced every day at my own expense 

 during the time of the sitting of the Conference. My 

 son Henry and myself remained at the Hague during 

 the whole time of the second Conference, gratuitously 

 devoting much labour to the production of the paper, 

 which was the only unofficial record of the proceedings 

 of the Conference. I used my influence as editor 

 strenuously in favour of arbitration, but my own 

 Government gave it very lukewarm support. Mv 

 paper was the organ of militant pacifism. I was in 

 constant touch with all the leading members of the 

 Conference, with the exception of the British delegates, 

 with whom I was in more or less opposition owing to 

 the extraordinary instructions which they seemed to 

 have received for the Hague Conference. Every- 

 thing that Sir Edward Grey said to me he would do 

 he appears to have told them not to do, and instead 

 of leading the van of progress in th*e cause of peace, 

 the British delegates hung back behind. Ica\ing the 

 first place to f)e scrambled for by Germany and the 

 United States of America. A more miserable and 

 scandalous dehAdc I have seldom seen. 



I'ROrflSEI) I'lI-GRIMAdE OF I'RnPAC.XNDA. 



.\t the close of the Hague Conference I proposed 

 that a Pilgrimage of propaganda should be made 

 across the world. What the Hague Conference had 

 done was very considerable, but what it had left 

 undone was still more considerable. The constitution 

 of a permanent tribunal wa.s left over, and there were 

 many other questions upon which it wa.s felt that 

 public opinion was not yet ripe. In order to ripen 

 public opinion I proposed that some, say a dozen, 

 members of the Conference should devote themselves 

 for six months lo a tour round the world. In 

 every capital they should explain what the Conference 



had done, and state also the problems that were left 

 over to solve at the approaching Conference. The 

 scheme met with great approval, and at one time I 

 thought it might have succeeded in obtaining a grant 

 of the Xobel Prize money for defraying the expenses 

 of a tour, but a domestic bereavement prevented me 

 from prosecuting the idea any further. The death 

 of my eldest son rendered it impossible for me to 

 leave London as I had done before, so the idea came 

 to nothing. 



THE ITALIAN-TURKISH WAR. 



!My next sphere of international activity ^Yas in 

 Turkey in the year 191 1. I twice visited Constanti- 

 nople, the first time before the war, and I seized the 

 opportunity of presenting as vigorously as I could 

 upon the attention of the Sultan and the Grand 

 Vizier the absolute necessity for following the policy 

 of peace and reform, and avoiding any collision with 

 the Balkan States. My second visit was after the 

 Italian War had broken out, when I went to see what 

 could be done towards demanding that the Powers 

 should refuse to recognise any change in the stains quo 

 before an International Tribunal. My visit was an 

 active propaganda for arbitration in Constantinople, 

 which met with great support, and when I left every- 

 thing was arranged for the departure of a band of 

 Ottoman pilgrims representing all the races and 

 religions of the Empire, which would go round Europe 

 protesting against violated Treaties, demanding the 

 establishment of an International Tribunal before 

 which it would be possible to arraign such an inter- 

 national malefactor a.s the Italian Government. On 

 my return home I summoned a meeting at Whiteficld's 

 Tabernacle, for the purpose of rendering an account 

 of my stewardship, and setting forth the result of my 

 pilgrimage. The meeting was a great success. After- 

 wards I took the chair at another meeting, when 

 Mr. McCulIagh lectured upon the Italian atrocities in 

 Tripoli. But other issues, notably that of the .\nglo- 

 German dispute over Morocco, and the question of 

 Anglo- Ru.ssian policy in Persia submerged the Tripoli- 

 taine question. The Turks themselves broke up 

 into parties, the Pilgrimage never started from 

 Constantinople, and the war is going on to this day. 



WORKING ALWAYS TOWARDS THE WORLD-STATE. 



Such is a brief survey of my activities in the cause 

 of international or domestic peace since I wrote the 

 foregoing memorandum. It may be said that it is 

 little better than a series of failures. In some cases 

 the failure was comp'ele, in others it was partial. 

 The effort was always in the same direction, and if 



