Robert Donald : being the authorized biography of Sir Robert Donald, G.B.E., LL.D., journalist, editor and friend of statesmen

V-W

T^obert ^Donald

Claude Harris

SIR ROBERT DONALD, G.B.E., LL.D.

Being the authorized biography of Sir
'Donald ', Cf.B.8., Z/Z/.2)., journalist, editor and
friend of statesmen

h
H.

Author of

"JIX, Viscount Brentford," "Smith of Birkenbead,'
" The Strange Case of Andrew Bonar Law,"
ttc.

With a Foreword

h

The Right Honourable
J.

London
STANLEY PAUL £f CO. LTD.

Made and Printed in Great Britain at
Tin Mayflower Press, Plymouth. William Brendon & SOB, Ltd.

(Contents

CHAPTER »A«B

I. BETWEEN Two WARS 17

II. THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 30

III. FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 54

IV. WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 76

V. PROFIT AND Loss 95

VI. EXIT ASQUITH 106

VII. AFTERTHOUGHTS ON ASQUITH 143

VIII. THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 151

IX. SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS 165

X. SOLD 175

XI. A TRIBUTE TO COURAGE 194

XII. PROPRIETOR OF " THE GLOBE " 199

XIII. IMPERIAL SERVICE 208

XIV. COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES ...... 221

XV. BOOKS AND SPEECHES 231

XVI. THE TRAGEDY OF THE " DAILY CHRONICLE " . .239

XVII. CLOSING YEARS 256

APPENDIX 265

20673G7

List of Illustrations

SIR ROBERT DONALD, G.B.E., LL.D. .... Frontispiece

FACING PAG*

IN THE EDITORIAL CHAIR 32

A NEW YEAR GREETING FROM W. T. STEAD .... 48

FROM THE FIRST SEA LORD 64

MR. LLOYD GEORGE AT WALTON, WITH Miss M ARGOT DONALD AND

Miss MADELAINE DONALD 80

As PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE OF JOURNALISTS .... 80

FIRST NUMBER OF " THE ECHO " 96

ON THE WESTERN FRONT 128

MR. LLOYD GEORGE AT ROBERT DONALD'S HOUSE AT WALTON-ON-

THE-HlLL l6o

MR. RAMSAY MACDONALD 184

MR. C. F. G. MASTERMAN WITH ROBERT DONALD, AT WALTON . 184

A " COMMITTEE OF ONE " 200

AT GOLF WITH THE BISHOP OF LONDON .... 224

THE LAST PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN OF SIR ROBERT DONALD . . 240

^Author's ^Acknowledgments

IT had been the intention of Sir Robert Donald to write
an autobiography, but he did not keep a diary, and it is
obvious that he was relying upon an excellent memory
to bridge the many, inevitable gaps in his correspondence and
memoranda. In these circumstances I have been obliged
frequently to turn to his friends for assistance, and I wish here
to acknowledge my indebtedness for all the help I have received
from such sources. I am equally grateful to those who have
permitted me to quote correspondence, and to Mr. E. F. P.
Bartlett for letting me incorporate his verses on Fleet Street.

I wish to thank particularly, both on Lady Donald's behalf
and my own, the Prime Minister (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald),
who interrupted a holiday taken on medical advice to write
the appreciation of Sir Robert which forms the foreword of
this book. I should add, perhaps, though he has not asked
for such a statement, that Mr. MacDonald had no opportunity
of reading the proofs of the book before it went to press.

That Lady Donald should have invited me to write this
biography is something which I shall regard always as a great
honour, and my appreciation of it is enhanced by the fact that
although she has given me invaluable assistance in many
directions she has left me entirely free to treat the subject in
my own way. On me alone, therefore, must fall any criticism
of the portrait I have presented, or of the manner in which,
after very careful consideration, I have chosen to tell the story
of Sir Robert Donald's life.

H. A. TAYLOR.

Fo reword

SCOTTISH characteristics and Scottish newspaper
training have laid a special highway across the Border
to Fleet Street, and along that highway . . . years
ago came Robert Donald.

The Banff shire farm is a stimulating nursery. It yields
nothing for nothing ; its heart is of flint, indeed of even a
rougher material ; it is " out-of-the-way " — so much so that
when the spring tide of the Reformation washed over the land,
remoteness was like a dyke protecting great parts of Banff-
shire from the upheaval.

The people, however — or perhaps one ought to write,
" therefore " — know the true values of life ; hardship has
strengthened them for the fray of living ; they do not complain
that they are not as comfortable as other men are, but valuing
education both in books and in the manly spirit prepare their
sons to go forth to live a hard life honestly and uprightly and
to find work interesting to themselves and of service to others.

To them, the Press was one of the coveted honourable
professions. A number of truly high class and well- written
weekly papers were published in the county. They gave the
news of their districts and discussed the business of the
Parties at Westminster with a zest untarnished by any thought
of reward or fame ; the editorials were rooted in deep principles
of church and state with historical memory as the background.
Johnnie Gibb of Gushetneuk, by Dr. W. Alexander of Aberdeen
(himself an editor and newspaper writer), unfolds the rich
life of humour, of interest in the abiding things of existence,
of simple and unswerving honesty, from which Robert
Donald came.

ii

12 FOREWORD

The editors of the smaller weekly papers were generally
also their printers and could set up editorials as well as write
them ; and for but a few pence a week — or for nothing at all
— local correspondents supplied such news as reports of Debat-
ing Societies, deaths of worthies, snowstorms or early
sproutings, pulpit supplies and the like. The youth of journal-
istic promise was marked out, London sometimes required a
northern correspondent, a London pressman sometimes had
an opportunity to fill a job from his own neighbourhood.
Thus Fleet Street was supplied and from the stream a specially
good discovery was often made.

The Fleet Street of to-day was not born when Donald
arrived. The " story " stunt was still in the gutter, bedraggled
and disreputable. A news paragraph that during the day was
found to be false was followed by a castigation if not dis-
missal ; the news column was meant to be, by both editors
and their subordinates, the sanctuary of truth ; the dashing
war whoops of the political leading articles had to be accom-
panied by the solid offensive material of sound sense and
weighty argument ; the careless reader had not been massed
as a field of circulation. The discovery had not been made that
false news and baseless rumour issued as news would not
damage sales. There was perhaps a lack of enterprise in all
this. It was a profound mistake to abandon the shifting
undergrowths of stable opinion to such papers as the then
Police News and the Family Herald. The newspapers owed
them some earnest attention, but Fleet Street then lacked a
psychologist who saw how the neglected ones could be
exploited. The Victorian Press was doomed. Its virtues
became dull ; it lived in a cultivated patch not in the wide
domain of democracy.

It was unfortunate that the revolutionising movements came
as a copying of United States methods, but the field was
unprotected, British traditions were neglecting it and the
revolution came with an overseas accent.

Robert Donald lived through the revolution and played

FOREWORD 13

no small part in trying to direct it into right channels. To the
end, he kept the light burning which he took with him from
home : that the Press should be controlled by men who
believed that they had a moral obligation to perform to public
life and to the opinion which sustains it. He had a firm
political faith which gave him a cause to serve. He was the
first man to see the new function which municipalities had to
perform in the political development of the modern state,
and his Municipal Journal is a permanent landmark in that
development. In national politics he was a Liberal of the
Socialistic school, and was amongst the first to see that mere
political Radicalism had no continuing lead to offer to the
electors. He was of those who from the very beginning of the
change understood the inner significance of the independent
Labour movement inspired by the Socialist — at any rate, the
British Socialist — conception of history, and assumed that the
Liberal Party would split and a new Progressive Party would
arise to rally both the practical sense and idealism of the
youth of the nation. With later Liberalism he was impatient
as one who saw others trifling and fumbling with changes which
were marking a new epoch in the history of British politics.

I saw much of him during the last twenty years. Then his
Scottish characteristics of caution, practical sense, forethought
and foresight came out. Caught up in the eddying currents
of those years since the war — years of real anxiety and
legitimate difference in judgment festooned by personal
rivalry, unscrupulous propaganda, ill-concealed partisan
manoeuvrings, he kept true to his compass of rectitude and
sacrificed not a little in consequence. He never followed
the new idols which Liberalism in distress set up. Once the
war was fought, he knew that the old things had passed
away, and when the financial crisis of 1931 came he saw that
the only way to recovery lay in a national combination in
which he hoped that the Labour Government would retain
its position, but when he found that it drew back and returned
to the stage of pure propaganda from which its understanding

i4 FOREWORD

friends hoped it had emerged, he threw himself with all his
diminished health and strength into making a national com-
bination a reality. An insidious disease had gripped him,
and the services he rendered to the country at that time were
his last.

As an editor, he followed the best traditions of British jour-
nalism, though, like Mr. Fletcher, a predecessor in the editorship
of the Daily Chronicle, he knew that great changes in journalism
had begun and would go far. He dreaded the effect on
journalism of a vast mass of readers of untrained judgment and
with but rudimentary powers of reflection, who could be
swayed by the simple emotions and be kept as readers by a
supply of " astounding," " sensational " and such-like
" stories," but he tried to meet the problem which the new
armies of newspaper readers presented by interesting them in
matters of serious importance. The Daily Chronicle's success
under Mr. Fletcher in extending its circulation by rousing a
wider interest in literature improved for the time being the
standards of political intelligence and was an important
factor in the new thought which then made itself felt in public
life. Robert Donald played no small part in this newspaper
movement. It was his way of meeting the new requirements
of democratic responsibility and government. The various
deteriorating influences of the war checked this movement,
and Donald not only had to regret the set-back to his policy,
but found himself unable to hold the ground from which he
could rally the moral and intellectual forces which he had
helped to bring into being. He dreaded the effect of the
capitalisation of newspaper property and the use of news-
papers as ordinary articles of merchandise. He saw that the
race for circulation would not improve the Press of the
country. But he accepted it as inevitable as a phase, and did
his best to restrain its worst results by raising the standards
by which readers valued newspaper qualities.

His personal relations with the journalist won for him the
confidence of his fellow craftsmen. His hand and advice

FOREWORD 15

were always available for the assistance of every promising
recruit to Fleet Street. Many a struggling journalist whose
capacity had since been established owed his opportunities
to Robert Donald. No one could detect better than he sound
qualities, no one was more adventurous in giving chances and
in using his papers to test and encourage hard working
journalists of independent thought who showed devotion to
their craft. During his ruling days such men instinctively
turned to Robert Donald for help and, if they could use it
when given, they were rarely turned away. His high con-
ception of the functions of both newspaper and editor in-
cluded the closest and most confidential relations between the
chief and his staff ; the chief expecting sincerity, ability and
hard work, the staff receiving in return the treatment of men
who did not belong to a hired profession but whose self-respect
was never injured by their service. The editor of the Daily
Chronicle, up to its sale as a party broadsheet and a financial
property, rendered memorable service both to the Press of our
country and to the honourable profession of journalism, and
when he left the high places of Fleet Street every journalist
who loved his calling knew that it was no small thing which
had happened. The memorial service held in St. Bride's
Church after his death was a fitting and moving farewell
of Fleet Street to one who had served it well, one who was
ever jealous for its reputation and power, one who had left
many intimate and grateful memories of generous kindness
and considerate helpfulness.

J. RAMSAY MACDONALD.

l^obert "Donald

CHAPTER I
BETWEEN TWO WARS

Three Saints in their churches keep watch over Fleet Street,
Saint Bride to the South and Saint Andrew to North,

While honest Saint Dunstan he sits by the Temple
And sees all the paper vans run back and forth.

Says Saint Bride to Saint Dunstan : "Oh what is the uproar ?

I am all of a tremble from steeple to pews."
He says " My dear Bridget, I pray you, don't fidget,

They're printing the papers to tell you the news."

Three Saints in their churches keep watch over Fleet Street

With the presses a-roaring on every side,
So pray for the people who bring out the papers

O Holy Saint Andrew, Saint Dunstan, Saint Bride.

E. F. P. BARTLETT.

MEN talk of Fleet Street as though it were immune
from change in its outer aspect, like some ancient
seat of learning. But that is an illusion, sustained
no doubt by the fact that St. Paul's still crowns Ludgate Hill,
that the churches of St. Dunstan and St. Bride also abide
where Wren put them, and that no licensing bench has been
so foolhardy as to attempt to close any of its numerous and
familiar taverns.

So much is immutable. For the rest, the only unchanging
feature of the street is the pronounced discord of its architec-
ture, so symbolic of the undisciplined individualism of the

B I7

i8 ROBERT DONALD

profession whose centre it is, and of the proprietors whom that
profession serves.

The changes made in Fleet Street in recent years have been
so numerous that it is not easy even for those who trod its
footpaths in pre-war years to remember the aspect which the
street presented in August, 1914. Perhaps the feature least
difficult to recall (because it remained unchanged for five
years or more) was a vacant site on the southern side, between
Whitefriars Street and Salisbury Square.

When in the spring of 1914 that site was cleared, habitues
of the street pointed to it as evidence of the remarkable pro-
gress of the Daily Chronicle, and of the prosperity of Frank Lloyd,
the proprietor of the paper. For the moment, the newspaper
was being produced under restricted conditions in a portion
of its old home in Whitefriars Street, while a new wing, on
which the builders were working day and night, would carry
the structure across to Salisbury Square, where it would link
up with the offices of that other Lloyd concern, the great
paper-making company. On completion of the new wing,
the builders were to begin an even larger operation which
would give the premises a broad, imposing frontage in Fleet
Street.

Thus the Daily Chronicle building would become the
largest newspaper office in London. That implied progress,
real progress, for Frank Lloyd was not a man for empty
ostentation. The need of the paper dictated the size of the
office.

Among daily newspapers, the Daily Chronicle now claimed
to have the largest sale in London and the Home Counties.
There were certain papers which had a larger sale, taking the
whole country as their area of circulation ; but that superior
result was achieved only by having expensive repetition
offices in Manchester, wherein were produced special editions
covering Ireland, Scotland and Wales and the North of
England. The Chronicle had then no such duplicate office,
and could not exploit efficiently the more distant territories :

BETWEEN TWO WARS 19

but within the area in which it met its rivals on an equal
footing, its claim to ascendancy was expressed thus : " The
net sale of the Daily Chronicle exceeds the combined sales of
the following London penny papers : The Times, Daily Tele-
graph, Morning Post, Standard, Daily Graphic, and Morning
Advertiser"

The history of the Daily Chronicle reached back to 1852^
when it was established by a Clerkenwell printer named
Pickburn. The primary purpose of the paper in its earliest
days was to present advertisements of interest to the watch-
making industry, of which Clerkenwell was then the centre ;
and no charge was made for the sheet. So modest were its
beginnings that Pickburn's wife was obliged to help in the
production of the paper by rolling ink on the formes of type.
From a weekly advertising sheet it became a bi-weekly news-
paper, with the title of the Clerkenwell News and a charge of
a halfpenny per copy was instituted. Progress continued until
a daily issue became feasible.

In 1876, the paper being then a thoroughly prosperous
little property, Edward Lloyd cast covetous eyes upon it.
Lloyd, who had founded Lloyd's Weekly News, was shrewd and
enterprising, so enterprising, in fact, that he had used the
rocks of the Welsh mountains as billboards on which to adver-
tise his paper. Nor was that his most notable effort in cheap
publicity. Until the Government stepped in and prohibited
the practice, he even defaced the coin of the realm by stamping
the name of his paper deep into the metal of thousands of
pennies, which coins he put into circulation through the
wage-packets of his workers !

Lloyd wished to take a daily newspaper into his organisa-
tion, and, after long negotiations, he induced Pickburn to sell
the Clerkenwell News for £30,000. That was a newspaper
transaction of some magnitude in those days ; but the price
was not extravagant having regard to the fact that the news-
paper was earning a nett profit of £5000 a year.

With the change of proprietorship, the Clerkenwell News

20 ROBERT DONALD

became the Daily Chronicle, its news services were enlarged
and it became an advocate of Liberal and Radical policies.

Veterans of London journalism tell some amusing stories of
the ways of Fleet Street at that time.

Of the Chronicle it is said that, relatively early in the evening,
a plan or dummy of the next day's issue was drawn up, and
any story that came in after the dummy was made, had a poor
chance of seeing the light of day. Bold enterprises such as
are now called " scoops " were discouraged. They were suit-
able only to the columns of the Pall Mall Gazette. If a reporter
announced that his story was absolutely exclusive, and that no
rival had secured it, he was told that he had given a very good
reason why his masterpiece could await a later issue.

Still, the paper justified its purchase. It progressed, though
not with rapid strides. At the time of the Boer War, however,
it suffered a set-back.

H. W. Massingham, its editor of that period, a remarkable
personality and a brilliant journalist, was opposed to the war.
As a consequence of the policy which he propounded in the
paper, the revenues and circulation of the Chronicle suffered
so seriously that Frank Lloyd, to whom the paper had now
descended from his father, was obliged to overcome his
reluctance to interfere with the political judgment of the
editor. The proprietor called for a less extreme policy.
Massingham, like the courageous journalist he was, re-
signed rather than surrender his independence.

In the five years that followed, under the editorship of a
Mr. Fisher, some ground was regained, but not until 190^.
did the paper enter upon a period of prosperity.

In that year two important events occurred. Robert Donald
was appointed to the editorship, and the price of the paper was
reduced from one penny to a halfpenny, thus bringing it into
the field occupied by such vigorous and enterprising journals
as the Daily Mail and the Daily News.

Circumstances now favoured the development of the
Liberal press. A Conservative administration had been in

BETWEEN TWO WARS 21

office for eight years, and the inevitable sequelce of the South
African War were accelerating the loss of popularity which
every government experiences after a long period in office.
The extent of that loss of support was to be revealed by the
" landslide " election of 1906, in which Conservatives lost
more than 170 seats.

But although the tide was running strongly in favour of
Liberalism when Robert Donald took control of the Daily
Chronicle, there were several Liberal newspapers eagerly
exploiting the opportunity, and the success which the Daily
Chronicle achieved would have been utterly unattainable
without the application of the highest degree of journalistic
skill and sound political judgment in its editorship.

Robert Donald, and the men he gathered about him, sup-
plied the gifts which the opportunity demanded, and the
newspaper was rewarded with material prosperity and immense
influence in public affairs.

Of Donald's part in the progress of the Daily Chronicle a
correspondent of the Boston Transcript wrote in 1915 : " He
has brought a big metropolitan daily through a critical
transitional period in its history and has made it a power in
politics and metropolitan life. Ten years ago, he was
practically unknown."

As the paper prospered, Donald, too, prospered. August,
1914, found him established not only as editor of the Daily
Chronicle and its old established ally, Lloyd's Weekly News,
but also as Managing Director of United Newspapers Limited,
the private company owning the two properties. Frank
Lloyd and his two other colleagues of the board invested
Donald with complete editorial control, subject only to the
fundamental condition that the policy of the papers was to be
Liberal. So far as the editor's powers as managing director
were concerned, his service agreement with the company
provided that he was to be " responsible for the control and
direction of the business, with full power to appoint and
dismiss employees ... to enter into contracts for the

22 ROBERT DONALD

ordinary conduct of the business and generally do all things
connected with the staff and the undertakings which in his
judgment will be conducive to its success." It is unlikely that
any journalist in Fleet Street had a position of comparable
authority, unless, like Lord Northcliffe, he was the proprietor
of the newspapers which he directed.

Such was the position of the Daily Chronicle in 1914 ; and
it had achieved that position since the close of the Boer War.

Now another war menaced the future. There was no danger
on this occasion that the Daily Chronicle would find itself on
the unpopular side, for the Liberal Party was now in power,
and while there were some members of the Government who
would resign rather than countenance a war with Germany,
Donald was not sympathetic to their view. On the other hand,
he was not with those who considered war inevitable.

To within a few days of the declaration of war, Donald had
hoped that the catastrophe would be averted. For several
years his reluctance to believe ill of Germany had been strong
almost to the point of obstinacy. In 1913, when Mr. Philip
Gibbs1 was disturbed by strong evidence of German intentions
presented by several trustworthy men, Donald exclaimed,
" Utter rubbish ! . . . Go to Germany yourself, and write a
series of articles likely to promote friendship between our two
peoples and undo the harm created by newspaper hate-doctors
and jingoes. Find out what the mass of people think of this
liar talk."

Undoubtedly, Donald allowed his intense will to peace to
restrain the influence which the facts of the situation should
have exercised upon the mind of so good a journalist. It was
not that he had any pronounced affection for Germany. True,
he was intimate with Haldane. But, on the other hand, he
had married a daughter of France. He was neither pro-
French nor pro- German. He was ardently, too ardently if
that be possible, a lover of peace.

Even while the July ultimata were flying about Europe, he

1 Later Sir Philip Gibbs. Adventures in Journalism.

BETWEEN TWO WARS 23

accepted, and the Chronicle reflected, the view that Serbia
had a bad case, which Russia was not likely to espouse ; and
that, in any event, Great Britain's interest in the conflict was
nil. This last consideration, he thought, made London the
natural source of mediatory efforts.

But when, on Sunday, August 2nd, 1914, he drove to Fleet
Street from his villa at Walton-on-the-Hill, it was impossible
to see in London any affinity with The Hague or Geneva.
The reservists, escorted by relatives and friends, crowded the (
streets on their way to the mobilization stations, and the
atmosphere was heavy with a suppressed excitement such as
London had not known since the days of the South African
War.

Donald had now small hope that war would be averted.
The previous day, in his garden at Walton, he had talked for a
time with his neighbour, Mr. Lloyd George, then Chancellor
of the Exchequer. The Government had just been informed
that German troops had entered Luxemburg. Plainly,
Germany meant to invade France via Belgium. With Belgian
neutrality violated, Great Britain would have to do more than
give support to France in the North Sea, which was all that Sir
Edward Grey had, so far, promised to the French Ambassador.

Donald's conversation with Mr. Lloyd George had been cut
short by a message summoning the Chancellor to his home,
and Donald was left to continue the talk with his guest of the
week-end, a personality no less interesting — Mr. Ramsay
MacDonald. The leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party
sat in a deck chair on the lawn, brooding. The news had a
profound meaning for him. It was over Donald's telephone
that he heard the news of the assassination of Jaures,
and over the same line he talked, later in the day, to Mr.
Lloyd George, who pressed the Labour leader to return to
London at once. In vain did Mr. MacDonald plead that there
was no car available. The Chancellor countered him with an
offer to send a car, and Donald's guest cut short his visit.

Talks with political leaders were a feature of Robert

24 ROBERT DONALD

Donald's week-end respite at Walton. On Saturdays, fre-
quently, almost habitually, he partnered Mr. Lloyd George in
a game of golf. The Chancellor preferred a foursome always,
because it afforded better opportunities for talk. Opponents
were drawn from a little coterie of political friends, several of
whom had houses near the Heath. This group included Lord
Reading, the Master of Elibank, Mr. Winston Churchill, Mr.
Reginald McKenna, Mr. Percy Illingworth (later Lord
Illingworth), and Mr. C. F. G. Masterman. There were
Fleet Street friends in the neighbourhood, too, notably Sir
George Riddell (now Lord Riddell).

Of Mr. Lloyd George's play on these occasions, Donald has
noted : " He made the result fairly certain by skilful pre-
liminary work on the first tee. He was a persuasive negotiator
for strokes. For bargaining purposes he did not rate his
partner's performance over-high, and was quite modest about
his own. Having laid a good diplomatic foundation, he
entered into the game with great zest. His handicap was over
single figures ; he played a good steady game. But no silent
golf for L.G. ! He chatted cheerily with whoever was near to
him, and politics got mixed up with his golf."

If there had been no golf for Mr. Lloyd George on that
Sunday afternoon in August, 1914, the international situation
was not to blame. The Chancellor's religious convictions did
not sanction the playing of golf on Sunday. He might walk
the Heath with a friend, but, to quote Robert Donald again,
" he kept a safe distance from temptation."

Evidently these week-end meetings did not give the Chan-
cellor and the editor all they desired of each other's company,
for frequently Donald was a guest at No. n Downing Street
for breakfast.

In so far as Donald derived his political inspiration from
Downing Street, it was from No. n rather than No. 10.
Asquith had an ill-disguised contempt for the halfpenny
press. It would seem, in fact, that he had little respect for
any daily newspaper other than The Times.

BETWEEN TWO WARS 25

The Chancellor of the Exchequer was, happily for the
Liberal Party, very different in his attitude to Fleet Street.
He cultivated journalistic acquaintances, and developed a
technique in the handling of the Press which ultimately
enabled him to employ, with very great skill, any newspaper
that might serve the purpose of the moment. But of all the
journals with which he had transactions, open or covert, the
Daily Chronicle was, for a long period, his favourite. That
fact made inevitable his friendship with its editor. And
although that friendship with Robert Donald exhibited all the
characteristics of an intimate comradeship, there lingers a
suspicion that self-interest was its basis.

It would seem that Mr. Lloyd George cared much for the
editor and less for the man : at least such is the conclusion to
which one is driven by later events.

In August, 1914, that friendship, whatever its real quality,
appeared to be so close as to be beyond the possibility of
disruption. There are some who believe that Donald knew
even then that the friendship was not wholly altruistic. It
is certain that he did not allow its existence to impair his
independence of judgment, although Mr. Lloyd George's
view of any public matter received from Donald, at this time,
closer consideration than the opinion of any other man.

Whether it expressed Mr. Lloyd George's view or not,
the statement made by the Daily Chronicle in the issue that
went to press on the night of Sunday, August 2nd, is
interesting.

" There can be no question," said the leading article,
entitled The Coming Armageddon, " of our sending troops to
the Continent, even if the half-dozen divisions we have for
sending anywhere would make any difference in a war of six
million combatants."

There was in the article, also, a passage which is of special
interest to those who aim at maintaining peace by pacts of
non-aggression. Appearing on the eve of war in a newspaper
of strong pacifist views, this judgment represents the voice of

26 ROBERT DONALD

experience which cannot be ignored. ' The events of the
week," said the Daily Chronicle, " have illustrated the difficulty
of deciding in a great war who is the aggressor."

At that time, the identification of the aggressor would
scarcely have helped the peacemakers. Events had gone too
far for war to be avoided.

Still, although the facts were hopeless, Donald refused to
despair. As he glanced through the proofs of the paper, he
saw, reflected in the leading article and in the presentation
of the news, a glimmer of the optimism which he still cherished.

" Will England Declare War To-day ? " was the ribbon
headline that ran across the entire width of the front page. A
paragraph towards the foot of the page showed that a pacifist
policy is not incompatible with an academic interest in
strategy, for here was an announcement that " to enable
readers to follow the war news " the Daily Chronicle had in
preparation a map which would shortly be put on sale.

Next day, Donald went to the House to hear Sir Edward
Grey's historic survey of the situation. It impressed him so
deeply that he caused a whole page to be devoted to the report
of it, although the office was flooded with picturesque and
sensational war news from all parts of Europe.

He had now no illusions . Neutrality was out of the question .
Earlier in the day he had refused a page advertisement from a
league whose aim was to maintain neutrality. Donald saw
that, as a policy, neutrality was now dishonourable : so he
refused to take revenue from it. But since the peace of the
world was to be violated, let the world know plainly where the
blame resided : and Grey's speech was admirable for that
purpose.

Towards midnight, the master printer appeared in Donald's
room with a proof of the front page of the next day's paper.
Across the top of the page stretched the banner heading :

BRITAIN DECLARES WAR ON GERMANY

To left and right headings ran across two columns

BETWEEN TWO WARS 27

announcing that the ultimatum expired at midnight ; that the
King had sent a message to the Fleet ; that the Navy and Army
were ready ; that Lord Kitchener was at the War Office ;
that the Government had taken over the railways and had
annexed certain foreign battleships in the shipyards.

Donald handed the proof back to the master printer with a
word of approval. This ritual of glancing over the page was
completed swiftly, for the hour was past midnight, and the
paper was behind its time-table. Hardly had the printer left
the editor's room when there echoed through the building,
amplified by the temporary wooden partitions which divided
the dismembered premises from the new wing, the sound of
singing.

The rattle of the batteries of the linotypes had ceased, and
the rumble of the presses had not yet begun, so that in the
pause between composition and printing, sounds of singing
could be heard distinctly in the editorial rooms and corridors.
The men were singing the National Anthem, just as the mem-
bers of the House of Commons, led by the Labour Member
for Woolwich, had sung it before dispersing that evening.

Forgetting alike the dignity of his office and the weight of
his body, the master printer broke into a run. " Hell ! " he
exclaimed as he disappeared, " I'll give them sing ! Think of
it — singing, while we're missing trains ! "

In the editor's room, Robert Donald was clearing his desk
of the litter of proofs that almost covered it. Now and then
he paused to read one of these damp slips of paper. Here
was the announcement of the Daily Chronicle news service
dealing with the war. It detailed the correspondents engaged
on the Continent, a catalogue remarkable for talent and com-
prehensiveness. Apart from the writers here advertised, men
from the staff were on the way to Flanders to get as near to the
war as their ingenuity and a very liberal supply of good
British sovereigns would take them. (By some stroke of

28 ROBERT DONALD

genius a large amount of gold had been secured from the bank,
even though the cashiers were paying only 10 per cent of
each cheque in sovereigns.)

Here was the leading article, not Donald's work,1 for he
rarely wrote a leader, but certainly the expression, not only of
his views, but of the spirit which had animated the policy of
the Daily Chronicle under his editorship.

It bore the title " An Appeal to the British People," and
after visualizing calmly but impressively the ordeal through
which the country must pass, it called for national unity, for
an obliteration of class differences and for a sense of kinship
throughout the whole community in meeting the stern trials
that lay ahead. The article continued :

This moral effort which alone can carry us through, is
not to be had by boasting and shouting, by mafficking
and drunkenness, still less by preaching windy hatred
against the great peoples with whom an inscrutable
Providence has brought us into collision. Let us respect
ourselves and respect others. Let us show the world that
a democracy can have dignity, and let us remember the
precept, " Let not him that putteth on his armour boast
as him that putteth it off." Last week the Kaiser told a
shouting crowd in Berlin to go to the churches and pray.
We might in our turn remember that admonition of true
manhood. Clever ridicule is sometimes poured on the
prayers which opposite combatants offer to the same God ;
but the scoffers forget something which simpler people
know. It is that in this world of unplumbed mysteries
where frail, short-lived, short-sighted humanity gropes
amid unmeasured forces, conflicts arise that are past
our solving, or averting or reconciling. Human wisdom
is sorely limited at its best ; but we believe that there is a
wisdom beyond it ; and to that, in the tremendous hour

1 The author of the article was Mr. R. C. K. Ensor, the chief leader
writer of the paper.

BETWEEN TWO WARS 29

when the resources of human providence have all been
tried and tried in vain, we humbly commit our destiny,
our lives and the lives of our nearest and dearest. We
can only make this prayer, as we can only make any that
deserves the name, in the spirit of sincere and self-
forgetting resignation to duty — the spirit that alone can
give honourable victory, alone can found lasting great-
ness, and alone can ennoble even the darkest defeat.

CHAPTER II
THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR

THOUGH by custom journalism is described as a pro-
fession, it has no accepted standard of qualification ;
there is no prescribed course of apprenticeship or
training. The attainment of distinction in the calling is
fortuitous. There are no scaling ladders, and though some
well-trodden paths of approach are apparent, no fences exist.
An aspirant starts from any point of the educational or social
compass, and finds a track where he may. Thereafter,
his own ambitions, ability, and achievements are the factors
that will determine his progress, subject always to his being
favoured by a modicum of that which men call luck. Ability
to write well is not, as some laymen suppose, a primary
qualification. Academic distinction may be a serious handicap.
So much is evident from the fact that few university graduates
ever reach the editorial chair of a daily newspaper.

Having regard to the potent influence which journalism
still exercises upon every aspect of social life and national
development, it is astonishing that it should be an entirely
open profession, one for which no kind of passport is essential,
and that its code of professional conduct should lack legis-
lative sanction. But such are the facts, and it is arguable that
any effort to make journalism comparable to the more orthodox
professions would make the journalist less amenable to his
proprietor, and result in violations of the accepted rule that
he who pays the piper is alone entitled to call the tune.

Had the way to journalism been protected by any fence
whose gate could be passed only by the production of an

30

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 31

educational certificate, it is unlikely that Robert Donald
would ever have entered the profession, for he was the son of
poor parents whose means were equal to no more than
elementary education for the boy. He confessed frankly, when
he was president of the Institute of Journalists, " I am
badly educated." He added with all the emphasis which a
conscientious journalist would give to the assertion, " But I
don't admit to being ill-informed."

Donald was born in Banffshire, at Auchidoun, and received
his education in a parish school at Lismore, near Rhynie in
Aberdeenshire. In his later years he spoke of the " long
weary journey to school." There were then no buses for
country scholars. " In sunshine, rain, sleet, or snow, we
trudged miles over the rough country roads daily, with the
prospect of sitting for hours on the hard, rudely constructed
benches of the classroom."

His schoolmaster he described as " not very cultured, but
tremendously conscientious, and a hard taskmaster." Despite
his cultural deficiencies, Dominie Hutchinson may have been
wiser than some of the modern and expensive directors of
education. He solved the problem of dealing with a variety
of intelligences in a very simple way. He divided the boys
into two categories . There were promising lads and there were
laggards. To the promising scholars he devoted, almost
entirely, his patience and limited gifts, and trusted to the rod
to drive home such lessons as he was able to bestow upon the
laggards.

He soon discerned in Robert Donald something that
qualified him to sit with the lads of promise, and the boy
responded to the master's painstaking efforts.

It would seem that at the outset of his career, Robert
Donald cherished the hope of entering journalism, for, no
sooner was he settled in his first job, as a junior clerk to a
firm of horticultural builders in Aberdeen, than he began to
teach himself shorthand. But ambition ran ahead of quali-
fication. Before he had mastered the art, he had secured a

32 ROBERT DONALD

post as shorthand clerk to a solicitor, relying upon a retentive
memory to make good the deficiencies of his shorthand.

His salary at this time was only fifteen shillings a week,
which sum afforded no margin at all for the books which he
desired to read in order to equip himself for journalism. But
a youth who has not the resourcefulness to overcome a diffi-
culty of that kind lacks one of the essential gifts of a journalist.
Donald found a solution. He had a collection of books which
he had brought with him when he came to Aberdeen. These
volumes he took to a second-hand bookseller, proposing an
arrangement whereby the bookseller was to exchange this
small library for a similar number of books, and, when that
second series had been read, to exchange it for another. The
man agreed, and Donald was thus able to satisfy his voracious
appetite for books, though he lacked the means to pay even
the smallest library subscription. One book only from his
original collection was excluded from this scheme, a popular
educator entitled Science for All, which long survived in his
library.

While he was still a clerk, Donald began his journalistic
experience by contributing paragraphs to the Aberdeen Journal ',
but a time came when he felt that he might apply for a post
on the staff. The chief reporter agreed to give him a practical
test, along with another ambitious youth, Alexander Still.
But it was made plain that they would receive no pay during
the trial period. At the end of the experiment, the chief
reporter announced that neither was worth engagement, even
on the terms of the trial.

In point of fact, Aberdeen was full of young men who
thought they were born for editorship, and the chief reporter
of the Journal would appear to have hit upon an effective
method of disillusioning them. But Donald once recalled
with a smile that when he was editing the Daily Chronicle
and Alexander Still was editing the Birmingham Daily Gazette,
the gentleman who had dismissed them both with a verdict so
crushing remained the chief reporter of the Aberdeen Journal.

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THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 33

In his memoirs, Gentlemen of the Press, another veteran
journalist who achieved distinction in London, Mr. W.
Hutcheon, has offered similar testimony to the rigours of
Aberdeen journalism. A few years after Donald's exit from
the office of the Journal, Mr. Hutcheon was given the privi-
lege of " frequenting " the editorial rooms of the Aberdeen
Free Press. " The editor," he says, " never to my knowledge
recognized my presence by so much as a nod, though later,
when I was established in England, he was full of affability."

Because Aberdeen's production of embryo journalists was
so much in excess of the demand, Donald, after his brief spell
of " frequenting," looked south for his opportunity. On a
holiday visit to Edinburgh he made the acquaintance of a man
who "had a friend who knew a reporter on the Edinburgh
Evening News"

The very next day Donald set out to track down the reporter.
He turned out to be an Aberdonian, than whom, Donald used
to say, there is no more clannish type of Scot. " I profited
by the Aberdonian freemasonry," says Donald. Various
recommendations were demanded, but they were forth-
coming, and Donald was soon established as a reporter on the
Evening News.

Of his work on that paper Donald once wrote : " There
could be no better training for a young reporter." The office
standard of professional skill was high, and the supervision
was strict. Donald benefited by it. His observation of the
work of others must also have been valuable in equipping him
for the more responsible posts that he was to occupy later, for
the Evening News had an unusually able staff, of whom perhaps
the most notable was John M. Robertson, later to become a
member of the Liberal Government between 1911 and 1915,
and a Privy Councillor.

Necessarily, on the staff of such a paper, promotion is slow.
Donald had set his heart on Fleet Street, and he was eager to
gain the experience that would enable him to invade London
with some prospect of success. He left the Evening News for

34 ROBERT DONALD

another newspaper, long since defunct, which had a much
smaller staff and which might, therefore, afford him greater
variety of experience.

There are indications that had Sir Robert Donald survived
to write his memoirs he would have presented some interesting
reminiscences of the Edinburgh of his day, but it is not the
purpose of this work to deal exhaustively with its subject's
early life or to dwell upon those incidents of professional
graduation which can be described effectively only by the
person who was intimately concerned in them.

Once launched in journalism, his career was relatively
uneventful until he arrived in London. The years between
the ages of eighteen and twenty-three were spent on the staffs
of the Edinburgh Evening News, the Edinburgh Courant, and
the Northampton Echo.

At Northampton, he was near enough to London to make
an excursion to the metropolis, where he met a man named
Nankeville who was conducting a paper for journalists called
the Reporter's Magazine. But evidently this visit did not
take Donald to Fleet Street. When he first trod Fleet Street,
he came, not as a visitor, but as an invader. He had relin-
quished his work on the Northampton Echo, and had resolved
to install himself in London journalism without preliminary
negotiations.

He had always a preference for achieving his objects by
personal visit rather than by correspondence. In that he was
wise, for his letters were reminiscent of the Edinburgh days
when he was required to reduce a column to a paragraph ;
they failed to convey even a hint of a rare charm of manner
which he possessed and which, in a personal interview, always
took him a long way towards his objective.

So, on a day in July, 1885, without preliminary letters, he
walked into Fleet Street, his first mission being to collect
the sum of two guineas owing to him by the Evening Standard
for an article. Cynics will say that only a disturbance of
phenomenal kind would distract the attention of a Scotsman

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 35

in pursuit of two guineas. But the truth is that Donald, as
becomes a journalist, was more inquisitive than acquisitive,
and his search for the office of the Evening Standard was
interrupted by a scene of considerable commotion in the street.
A crowd was surging about a news-seller at the corner of Salis-
bury Square, where, at that time, the Daily Chronicle had an
advertising office. The incident had nothing to do with the
paper which Donald was destined to edit. It arose from the
fact that the first edition of the Pall Mall Gazette had arrived
in the street. On the fringe of the crowd, by a coincidence
that was not remarkable considering that the man was a
journalist, Donald found the only person in London with
whom he was acquainted, namely, Edward Nankeville.
From him Donald had the explanation of the com-
motion. The Pall Mall Gazette was then printing
W. T. Stead's exposure of the immorality of London
under the title of " The Maiden Tribute of Modern
Babylon."

The story of how Stead revealed, with a frankness which
shocked Victorian London, the ease with which young girls
were procured for immoral purposes, and the extent of that
foul traffic, is history which need not be recounted. Although
Stead was conducting this crusade from the noblest of motives,
the details with which he sought to arouse public indignation
provided succulent fare for a very large section of the com-
munity. As Donald noted : " This excited crowd had
gathered, not to make a demonstration for or against a reform,
but to secure a piece of pornographic literature which dis-
cussed with amazing and brutal frankness," things not usually
mentioned in print.

Nankeville knew all about the success of the " Maiden
Tribute," for he was now on the staff of the Pall Mall Gazette.
1 We cannot print papers fast enough," he told Donald. At
once the young journalist hinted that if the office were so
abnormally busy, he might be able to relieve the pressure to
some small extent. He told Nankeville how he was situated,

36 ROBERT DONALD

and together they went to the office of the Pall Mall, then
located in Northumberland Street, Strand.

The turbulent scene of Fleet Street was repeated outside
the publishing office. High above the heads of the crowd, in
a window, Donald noticed " a fierce-looking fuzzy-haired
individual," the great W. T. Stead, whose " journalistic
outrage " had caused the sales of the paper to shoot up like a
rocket from ten thousand copies per day to a total of six
figures, a sale such as had never been attained by a London
evening paper.

" The editor is invisible before noon. As time is short
and visitors are many, the latter are requested not to waste
the former." So said a notice in the entrance which Nanke-
ville and Donald reached, after forcing their way through
the clamant, empty-handed news-sellers around the door.

Being yet morning, the editor was " invisible." But the
manager was available, and he offered Donald a job in the
mailing department which was overwhelmed with orders for
back numbers of the paper containing early instalments of
" The Maiden Tribute." The job was to address wrappers,
and the pay was £1 per week. It was hardly the sort of work
for which Donald had come to London, but he was not the
man to sniff contemptuously at an opportunity because it was
small. It represented, anyhow, a place in the office of a
London newspaper, and from that foothold something better
might soon be reached. So Donald accepted.

His colleagues were " a lot of scallywags, beery out-of-work
clerks," but he stuck to his new work for two days and then
went to the manager, not to resign, but to suggest that per-
haps he might be more usefully employed, remarking inci-
dentally that he knew shorthand. As the manager's office
was flooded with unanswered letters, the mention of short-
hand proved to be the key to a new opportunity. Donald
was promoted to the position of shorthand clerk to the
manager, at a salary of £2 per week. " A hundred per cent
increase in two days ! " he reflected. " I was getting on."

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 37

The transition of Donald from the managerial to the
editorial side of the Pall Mall Gazette was inevitable. A
brother Scot whom Donald discovered while " exploring "
the editorial department, provided the bridge by which the
young man entered the reporters' room and secured a vacancy
that happened to exist. His progress had been remarkably
rapid. In seven days he had risen from addressing wrappers
at a salary of £i per week, to the dignity of a reportership at £3 .
The increased pay was not unimportant, but what pleased
Donald more than the financial aspect of his progress was the
fact that he was now on the editorial staff of a London news-
paper, the head of which was the most famous editor in the
world.

In his new duties, Donald's first assignment of each day
was to report company meetings in the City, and his last was
to take notes in the gallery of the House of Commons. But the
most agreeable duty of the day intervened, for he spent a
certain time daily with the great W. T. Stead, taking down in
shorthand new instalments of the " Maiden Tribute."

Robert Donald was profoundly impressed by Stead. This
tireless reformer exerted upon the young man an influence
which, without doubt, had permanent effects upon Donald's
character. What might have happened had not their earliest
association been broken by Stead's conviction and imprison-
ment, it is impossible to say. But it is doubtful whether
Donald would ever have become an indiscriminate disciple of
Stead. He was too much in love with journalism, and while
he never ceased to regard Stead as a master of the craft, he
saw him as an evangelist to whom journalism was a form of
preaching. Journalism was to Stead what the Salvation
Army was to Booth — a means of conducting a great crusade.
Donald felt that Stead would have been more at home in the
Salvation Army but for the fact that not even the abnormal
resources of Christian charity possessed by William Booth and
W. T. Stead could have sustained for long a partnership of
two such forceful personalities.

38 ROBERT DONALD

Though they were never again so closely associated, the
friendship which was established when Donald acted as
shorthand writer to Stead, lasted to the end of Stead's life.
During Donald's editorship of the Daily Chronicle Stead was
a frequent contributor, and though Lord Northcliffe claimed
to have given Stead his last commission, it is possible that
Stead carried with him also on his fateful voyage in the
Titanic, a commission from the Daily Chronicle. There exists
a letter written by Stead to Donald on the eve of his crossing,
in which Stead offers to write articles on either the maiden
voyage of the S.S. Titanic or on the mission which is taking
him to America.

So lasting was the impression which Stead created upon
Donald that at one time Donald appears to have contemplated
writing a biography of Stead, to which end he accumulated a
large amount of material. Though the memoir of Stead was
never written, Donald was responsible for commemorating
the " impossible fellow " in another way. In 1913 he
organized and presided over the committee which erected a
memorial tablet to Stead on the Thames Embankment.

Stead helped Donald forward, as, indeed, he helped many a

young journalist. And in doing so he set Donald an example,

for when Donald, in turn, became an editor, he never failed to

display a sympathetic interest in all young aspirants. This

virtue brought its reward, for he developed a faculty for

selecting young men of unusual capacity, to the improve-

I ment of his staff. Robert Donald was never a boastful

/ man, but late in life he derived much satisfaction from

/ the fact that he had given to many men who subsequently

/ attained distinction, their first appointments in London

journalism.

Though he enjoyed acting as Stead's amanuensis, the
part of Donald's first job which he valued most was his duty
in the Press Gallery of the House of Commons. Here he
mingled with many senior parliamentary journalists, chief
among them being William Jeans, who represented The Globe

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 39

and whose copy was borne from St. Stephen's to the Strand
office of the paper by a messenger on horseback.

Donald reported many of the famous parliamentary figures
of that period, among them Gladstone, Chamberlain, Bright,
and Parnell. Possessing from the first a flair for politics, it
is surprising that Donald resisted the temptation to continue
in so congenial a sphere as the Press Gallery, but he fought it
successfully. His mind was set upon editorship, and he saw
that specialization might be a hindrance rather than a help
to him in that ambition. He decided to seek variety of journa-
listic experience, and to look for it even beyond the wide range
of London journalism.

In his profession Donald exhibited always the chess
master's gift of thinking ahead of the game. As will presently
appear, he was always endeavouring to penetrate the future,
and in some matters he was able to forecast developments
with a degree of accuracy which no other prophet
attained.

In the late 'eighties he appears to have realized that
journalism was on the eve of great changes. He had small
opinion of the craft as it was then practised. The London
Press was then, he once said, the least progressive of all
national institutions. It was still following the course it had ,
pursued in the days when education was restricted to the few.
It was ponderous, dull, and lacked enterprise. The reporter
of the 'eighties he characterized as a " stenographic robot."
He criticized the editors for their cloistered remoteness. Most
of them hid themselves. They were hermits hedged about
by impenetrable defences. Donald relates, as characteristic of
the editors of his early days, that the butler employed by
Mudford of the Standard once turned " a great statesman "
from the door with the message that the editor of the Standard
was at dinner.

Delane of The Times went everywhere, and so did Stead,
who made it particularly his business to go where he was not
wanted, For the rest, editors remained in their fastnesses,

4o ROBERT DONALD

catering for a population with which their contacts diminished
every year. They devoted an inordinate amount of space to
politics and foreign affairs. " They published columns on the
oppression of some oriental race," wrote Donald, " and over-
looked the misery that existed at their own doors. Misery at
home was not news, and politicians had not yet made it
politics."

In journalism no man gets far on a policy of safety first.
Donald yearned for experience abroad, and because it was
unlikely that any editor would send a man of Donald's age
and limited experience to a foreign post, he decided to accept
the hazards and to go to Paris as a free-lance. He obtained
authority to call himself the correspondent of the Pall Mall
Gazette, but there was no salary attached to the title, and his
pay was dependent upon the amount of acceptable copy which
he sent to the paper.

On the eve of his departure came a letter from his editor,
written from Holloway Gaol. " I am very sorry you are
going to leave us," wrote Stead, " but I daresay that it is
wiser for you to gain experience now." Then followed a
homily upon the dangers awaiting a young man in foreign
capitals, " where the eye which we fear a hundred times more
than the eye of God, is no longer upon him."

Of the stern economies that were necessary to support him
during his adventure as a free-lance in a foreign capital, and
of the means by which he taught himself the French language,
Donald has left no information. All he notes is that he
occupied himself " chiefly in studying the French language
and institutions." But an experience as agreeable as it was
unexpected befell him in Paris. Its nature may be inferred
from the fact that, four years later, he married Mile Jeanne
Garassut, the daughter of a distinguished scientific man.

He stayed in Paris for about a year, and then returned to
London, prior to setting out upon a similar free-lance mission
to America. Because there was no language to study in the
United States, he appears to have concentrated his attention

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 41

upon the institutions of the country, foremost among them
being the local government bodies and the great commercial
trusts that were then growing up.

But the Atlantic was not broad enough to prevent him from
hearing of an opportunity of advancement in London. He
returned from New York to see Mr. T. P. O'Connor, who was
then at work upon his project for a new evening paper for
London, to be called The Star. The speed with which Donald
tracked down the parent of the enterprise may be gathered
from the fact that, when Donald reached him, the editor had
engaged only one man for the staff of his unborn paper. That
man was H. W. Massingham. Donald was O'Connor's second
appointment. " He took me on trust ... as a special
correspondent, and turned me to cleaning the Augean stables
of London's local government."

It is to be doubted whether any newspaper has ever been
served, at one time, by so much journalistic talent as was The
Star in the first years of its career. No fewer than eight of
the men whom T.P. engaged, were destined for editor-
ship. Massingham became editor of the Daily Chronicle, as
also did Donald. Mr. Ernest Parke became editor of The Star.
Lord Northcliffe chose Mr. Thomas Marlowe to edit the Daily
Mail, and Mr. W. J. Evans to edit the Evening News. The
sixth editor who graduated under O'Connor on The Star was
Clement Shorter, whose name will always be associated with
the success of the Sphere. The remaining two were Mr.
Lincoln Springfield who founded London Opinion, and Mr.
R. A. Bennett who became editor of Truth.

Then there were several gifted men who did not aspire to
editorship, but who achieved great distinction in their own
chosen spheres. Massingham introduced as a leader-writer at
two guineas a week, a young Fabian named Bernard Shaw,
who, when his leaders shocked the shareholders, became, on
his own nomination, the music critic of The Star, writing
(occasionally on music) under the pseudonym of " Corno di
Bassetto." Seemingly the shareholders did not read the

42 ROBERT DONALD

musical notes, where sometimes, says Donald, " the only
reference to music was in the title of the column." Of a visit
to Shaw at his rooms in Fitzroy Square, Donald notes : " The
only possessions which he had in abundance seemed to
be a superfluity of footwear. He had enough to start a
bootshop."

A. B. Walkley, the famous dramatic critic, was another
colleague. In those days he was an official of the General
Post Office, but he " covered " the theatres for The Star for a
fee of one guinea per article.

A by-election in Lancashire brought to The Star some
contributions of exceptional merit from a young man named
Gordon Hewart, who had returned to his native county after
a distinguished career at Oxford. This Mr. Hewart was
invited to join the staff of The Star, and thus, for a time, a
future Lord Chief Justice of England shared Donald's table,
writing leaders and notes. Later, on Donald's recommenda-
tion, and upon the strength of a name that had a good Cale-
donian ring, Mr. Hewart was appointed London correspondent
of the Edinburgh Evening News. But though exceptionally
endowed as a journalist, Mr. Gordon Hewart had set his
heart upon the Bar and politics, and Fleet Street lost
him.

Succeeding Shorter as literary critic, came Richard le
Gallienne, of whom Donald wrote : " Le Gallienne came to
London from Liverpool, seeking to make his reputation as a
poet. He was an attractive personality with well-moulded
classic features, as delicate and refined as a woman's. When
he published his English Poems he may have hoped to take
London by storm, to repeat the Byronic precedent and
become famous in a day. He reckoned without Bernard Shaw.
G. B. S., or ' Corno di Bassetto,' was given the volume
to review, and he simply scarified poor Le Gallienne. Among
the cruel things he said was that Le Gallienne was the type
of versifier who was longing for you to die so that he might
enjoy the opportunity of mourning you in verse." Le

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 43

Gallienne made a gallant attempt at a neat rejoinder as

follows :

" Poor little book that only yesterday
Fluttered newborn in delicate array,
How bruised and broken in the mud you lie !
Surely some elephant was passing by :
Or those mad herd of Galilean swine
Have hoofed across that pretty page of thine.
A nightingale the Minotaur hath torn,
So seems my little murdered book this morn.
Bury it gently where no eyes may see,
And for its epitaph write C. di B."

Then there were on the staff of The Star such varied
claimants to fame as Mr. Charles Hands, one of the most
versatile and entertaining of journalists ; Joseph Pennell, the
distinguished artist ; and an American reporter who subse-
quently wrote a successful musical comedy called The Shop
Girl.

In the investigation of the corruption and mismanagement
of London government, Donald was in his element, the more
so because O'Connor did not handcuff his reporters. It was
the declared policy of The Star to expose scandals, and
O'Connor was not a timid, interfering editor. He chose his
men with care and gave them the latitude essential to good
work. He trusted them.

To his staff, O'Connor was confidant, as well as editor.
Their relationship is well illustrated by a story related by
' T.P." at a luncheon given to Donald in later years. " If I
did not give Robert Donald his first job," he said, " I gave
him one of his first jobs. And I did more. When I was
consulted by a French gentleman about the young man who
was paying suit to his daughter, never in my most flamboyant
mood, in the heaping up of exaggerated adjectives which
critics say is characteristic of my style, did I write such a
eulogy as I did of Robert Donald." The monument to that
" great article " was, he said, Lady Donald.

Two years after his marriage, Donald resigned from The

44 ROBERT DONALD

Star in order to capitalize his specialized experience of muni-
cipal government in a new weekly paper which he had con-
ceived. Backed by Massingham and financed by leaders of
the newly formed Progressive Party, Donald founded a
weekly newspaper which he called London. The London
County Council was then in its infancy, and a revolution was
in progress in the sphere of local government. For once,
Londoners were displaying a lively interest in civic affairs,
which was not wholly surprising, having regard to the corrup-
tion and inefficiency disclosed by the Royal Commission on
the Metropolitan Board of Works. In establishing London,
Donald seized an excellent opportunity for exploiting public
interest and for promoting a happier condition of government.

His first number of London, produced in February, 1893,
evoked congratulations and good wishes from a company of
notable people as varied as it was extensive. A. J. Balfour and
H. H. Asquith (then Home Secretary) united to greet it.
Charles Dilke thought it " excellent " and invited the editor
to meet him at the House of Commons. Mr. John Burns had
many suggestions to make, and Mr. Tom Mann, then secretary
of the London Reform Union, was helpful in practical ways.
Many were the notes from Members of Parliament, whose
names are now forgotten, but who played a prominent part in
securing the better administration of the metropolis. Finally,
there was a post card from Mr. Bernard Shaw saying that his
contributions to the paper must wait until he had finished a
play to which he was devoting every spare moment. To
write for London immediately would mean that he would kill
himself, " for which I should expect at least £10 a column."

If the Londoner had continued to manifest the interest in
his city which he displayed when Donald founded London, the
paper would have prospered. At first, it made excellent
progress, but with the coming of a better regime the Lon-
doner relapsed into his old condition of apathy towards local
government.

In the early days of London, Donald made the acquaintance

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 45

of a man who influenced his later career profoundly. That
man was Frank Lloyd, the proprietor of the Daily Chronicle
and Lloyd's News. To quote Donald's own account of this
event, Frank Lloyd " came very gallantly to my rescue to
maintain a small paper devoted to civic affairs. Mr. Lloyd
took no part in public life. I had never met him. But he
very kindly took the burden of that little propagandist paper
upon his shoulders. It was an aggressive paper. I am afraid
I have always been addicted to attacking vested interests and
abuses — always in what I thought to be good causes. These
attacks sometimes landed us in libel cases. Mr. Lloyd never
grumbled ; he never said a word ; he stood by me. We won
most of our cases, except a big one connected with the Daily
Chronicle which I did not want to fight, and which the people
on the other side did not want to fight. That, however, was a
political matter."

When London disappointed his sanguine expectations,
Donald was obliged to find another outlet for the major part
of his energies. Massingham, now editing the Daily Chronicle,
provided the desired appointment, and Donald became news
editor of that paper. For about four years he continued in that
capacity, until, in 1899, his career took its most unexpected
and unorthodox turn. As the result of negotiations with a
Mr. William Coxon, a director of Gordon Hotels Limited,
Donald became publicity manager to that company.

Since 1899, the path connecting journalism and adver-
tising has been well trodden ; but at that time the art of
publicity was not very highly developed, and the action of
Gordon Hotels Limited in engaging a news editor from Fleet
Street to direct its publicity was distinctly a novelty. Some of
Donald's friends were surprised that he should leave journa-
lism at a time when he had reached a position which was
regarded as a stepping stone to editorship. Although, generally,
Donald did not overrate the importance of money, the excel-
lent salary that he was offered on this occasion may have been
the decisive factor. According to the letter of appointment,

46 ROBERT DONALD

Donald was to receive a salary of £1000 per annum, plus " a
commission on new business which should result in a large
addition to your emoluments, the larger the better from our
point of view." In 1899, £1000 per annum was, for a journa-
list, a princely income, and Donald's thousand was not all he
received.

There was good scope for the publicity manager, for the
company owned thirteen hotels. Four of them were in Lon-
don (the principal being the Hotel Metropole), seven served
important seaside resorts, and two were on the Riviera, at
Cannes and Monte Carlo.

For about five years Donald held this post. The
resourceful mind of the journalist was able to discern many
new ways of directing public attention to the hotels. For
writing, the post offered few opportunities, and they were
mainly in the production of brochures. But there was scope
for a more intelligent handling of advertisements, and in the
production of hotel guides. Donald seems to have been happy
and successful in his work, and to have had leisure for a good
deal of free-lance journalism. He began to contribute to
the magazines and reviews on his favourite subject of local
government. Alfred Harmsworth commissioned him to write
for the Daily Mail a series of signed articles on the great
industrial trusts, both of Britain and America.

Although he was never a good business man in the acquisi-
tive sense, Donald had an extraordinary gift for grasping the
intricate details of company finance, and the processes by
which companies preserve an appearance of independence
while allying their fortunes to other concerns. He could
trace the golden threads through a mass of interlocking com-
panies with the confidence of a hound following a strong scent.
No board of dummy directors ever concealed from him for
long the real masters of a concern. This faculty, rare among
journalists, made him an authority upon trusts, and early in
the century his name appeared in many newspapers over
articles dealing with industrial combinations.

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 47

Occasionally, too, he gave lectures on the subject. A paper
on trusts which he read at the National Liberal Club was
widely quoted and provided the text for a leading article in
several newspapers both in London and the provinces. Thus
encouraged, he delivered addresses here and there on local
government, notably on the development of municipal trading
which was then exercising the public mind.

Donald's experience of the platform was evidently agreeable
to him, and it appears to have given birth to an ambition,
short-lived and never re-born, to enter Parliament. His party
lost no time in providing him with an opportunity of achieving
his ambition, for in May, 1903, he is found addressing the
Liberal Executive of West Ham (North), with a view to his
adoption as Liberal and Progressive candidate for the division.
Some little delay occurred in securing his adoption, because it
was necessary for the Liberals to obtain the co-operation, or at
least the acquiescence, of the Labour organizations.

In the meantime, Donald went through the usual experi-
ences of a new parliamentary candidate, addressing meetings,
both of the faithful and the unconverted, and of making
himself pleasant at social functions.

In the end, unity was secured, and Mr. John Burns gave his
benediction to Donald's candidature. But a more important,
and certainly a more interesting commendation was that of
Mr. Lloyd George, who wrote to wish " God Speed " to the
new candidate. There never was a time, Mr. Lloyd George
said in his letter, when the Liberal Party stood more in need of
men of Donald's stamp. He was looking forward to the day
when he would welcome his friend in the House of Commons
as a representative of West Ham. And more : " This I know
full well — that there is no one the House of Commons would
listen to with greater respect and satisfaction on the great
topics of the hour, for they love, above all, a man who is
well-informed and can communicate his information with
lucidity."

In January, 1904, Robert Donald was obliged to choose

48 ROBERT DONALD

between journalism and politics, between the editorial chair
and a place in the House of Commons. The fact that West
Ham (North) returned a Liberal at the next general election is
proof that his place in the House was assured. The decision
must have been one of some difficulty, for at that time
Donald's interest in politics was hardly less than his interest in
journalism. But whereas politics in those days did not con-
cede the Member of Parliament even so much as a few
hundred pounds a year for expenses, the editorship of a Lon-
don morning newspaper offered far more political influence
than was wielded by any Member of Parliament and, in
addition, it carried emoluments that freed its holder from
financial anxiety.

So when Frank Lloyd offered Donald the editorship of the
Daily Chronicle, Donald accepted, and mollified the disap-
pointed Liberals of West Ham by producing C. F. G. Master-
man to take over the candidature, and by assisting him in his
campaign. Masterman, of course, won the seat at the next
election.

From the time that Robert Donald took the editorial chair
of the Daily Chronicle the fortunes of the paper advanced
without interruption. Donald was a well-trained journalist.
He did not make the mistake of putting views before news.
That is peculiarly the vice of politicians who acquire control
of journals and who decline to be advised by journalists.
Frank Lloyd was not of that genus.

The Daily Chronicle made its reputation on its news and
its features. People bought it because it was a good news-
paper ; and because it was a good newspaper it gained immense
influence and was able to render great service to the political
party it espoused.

Though Donald was primarily responsible for its success,
he would have been the first to say that no single individual
makes a newspaper, and that the Chronicle was made by many
excellent men whom he induced to serve in his team. But
good leadership is vital, and it was that which Donald supplied.

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 49

He had the gift, not only of enlisting capable craftsmen, but of
evoking such a degree of loyalty that men of diverse tempera-
ments worked harmoniously under his editorship.

Their names are of little public interest, but Donald
remembered them all. His notes show that he knew the extent
of their contribution to the success of the paper and that he
appreciated each according to his talent and his character.

Foremost among them was Mr. Ernest Ferris, who served
as news editor throughout the fifteen years of Donald's regime,
and who succeeded Donald in the editorship. These two
men, Donald and Ferris, constituted one of those rare com-
binations in which the one was always able to supply what the
other lacked. They were complementary to an extraordinary
degree, and each possessed more than an average love of
adventure and an eager interest in every new manifestation of
progress.

From 1904 to 1914 the Daily Chronicle marched with
lengthening strides to the forefront of the newspaper world.
Only the absence of a repetition office in the North of England
prevented the paper from attaining the first place among
morning newspapers with the largest sales. But that develop-
ment was only delayed because Donald was averse from
attempting it prematurely. He was not anxious to increase
sales by reducing the earning capacity of the paper, which
had been the result of the northern experiment of at least one
rival. Further, the growth of the paper entailed demands for
augmentation and replacement of plant, and for extension of
premises, which it was wise to satisfy before embarking upon a
northern adventure.

In 1906, the editorship of Lloyd's Sunday News was added to
Donald's responsibilities, and in 191 1 he was further appointed
Managing Director of the company owning both papers.

The progress of the Daily Chronicle had been of considerable
value to the Liberal Party. During Donald's editorship there
were three general elections, in each of which the paper
played an increasingly important part.

5o ROBERT DONALD

In the Chronicle, the Liberal programme had always a stout
advocate, although the paper was entirely independent of
party control and Donald was the sole interpreter of the broad
Liberal policy which Edward Lloyd stipulated. More and
more, Liberal Ministers entrusted the editor with their con-
fidences, and found in him a well-informed and sagacious
adviser. An honour might have been his had he felt able to
accept such a distinction, but he discouraged the suggestion
for various reasons, one being that he saw something incon-
gruous in his acceptance of such a reward while the proprietor
of the paper remained unrecognized.

A distinction of a different kind which was offered to him,
and which he was very happy to accept, was the presidency of
the chartered society of his profession, the Institute of Journa-
lists. That honour is bestowed sometimes for distinction in
journalism, and sometimes for reasons less obvious. Donald,
whose editorial duties had left him with little time to serve the
Institute, was elected unanimously to its presidency as an
acknowledgment of his professional distinction.

Before his day, notable journalists had occupied the presi-
dential chair, and there have been occupants no less distin-
guished since Donald's year of office. But none delivered a
presidential address that aroused such widespread interest as
that which he delivered to the annual conference of the
Institute at York in IQI3-1

In pre-war days newspapers generally were much less ready
to discuss themselves than they are to-day, but Donald's
presidential speech was something they could not ignore. He
made it news, and, as a consequence, every daily newspaper
appears to have reported it. Among Donald's papers survive
many cuttings from the Dominion and foreign Press, showing
that extracts from the address were cabled abroad freely.

The passage which aroused the greatest interest was that in
which, speaking of the newspaper of the future, he predicted :

1 Reprinted in Appendix.

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 51

People may become too lazy to read, and news will be
laid on to house or office just as gas and water are now.
The occupiers will listen to an account of the news of the
day, read to them by much improved phonographs, while
sitting in the garden.

That prophecy is so remarkably accurate that it is essential
to emphasize the fact that it was made in 1 9 1 3 . How incredible
it seemed at the time may be gathered from the report that the
assembled journalists (who, after all, are supposed to have a
little more vision than the rest of the community) greeted it
with " loud laughter."

That laughter was echoed in some organs of the Press.
Cartoonists and satirical versifiers found in Donald's " dream "
a useful text. Even the Manchester Guardian headed the
report, " Amusing Picture of What may Happen." A Lan-
cashire leader writer who may have lived to hear the song
of the nightingale broadcast, invited his readers to a guffaw at
the thought of the notes of the first cuckoo coming out of the
" newsograph " as the citizen of the future reclined in his
garden chair or lay propped up in bed. One West-country
newspaper displayed a shade of indignation at the idea of " the
distribution of information, thought and opinion by means of a
glorified gramophone." Admittedly developments in news-
paper work were coming, but this was " grotesque " ; and,
" who shall say after this prediction that Scotsmen are lacking
in imagination ? "

But the sceptics were not all resident in the provinces.
Speaking at a London dinner, Sir George Riddell (now Lord
Riddell) said that Donald's prediction opened up an " awful
prospect." He drew an amusing picture of the speeches of
Sir Edward Carson and Mr. John Redmond getting mixed in
the " pipe." For himself, he hoped he would never have to
preside at the dinner of the Gas Pipe Makers and Liquid
Speech Distributors.

But Lord Riddell has lived to lead a deputation of newspaper

52 ROBERT DONALD

proprietors urging the Postmaster- General to protest against
the broadcasts of sponsored advertisements from foreign
centres, and to preside over a board of the company that
publishes the Radio Times.

Lord Northcliffe, however, did not scoff. He sent imme-
diately a message of congratulation.

From Criccieth came a letter from the Chancellor of the
Exchequer :

MY DEAR DONALD,

I feel I must write to congratulate you on the
extraordinarily interesting speech you delivered from the
chair. I read it in The Times, which gives an excellent
report. It was simply first-rate, and contained a good deal
of matter for reflection. . . .

Yours sincerely,

D. LLOYD GEORGE.

Donald's presidential address aroused much discussion in
the correspondence columns of the Press. A fortnight after
its delivery, the Westminster Gazette was still publishing letters,
many from well-known journalists and public men. The
prophecy with which the popular Press made great play, was,
of course, only a small portion of the speech. As an examina-
tion of the full text will show, it raised issues much more
serious, such as the ownership of the Press and the precarious
future of newspapers whose sales were small, but whose public
influence was considerable and beneficent.

The publicity evoked by this presidential address caused the
newspapers to give special attention to other speeches which
Donald made as the mouthpiece of the Institute of Journalists
though they were of small interest to the man in the street.
An American commentator writing of Donald's presidency of
the Institute said : " As in everything he does, he took hold of
his job with an intensity of purpose which shook the old
concern into new and vigorous life."

THE EVOLUTION OF AN EDITOR 53

During 1913, much against his wish, Donald became
something of a public figure. Though later in life, when he
was concerned with interests which might be advanced by his
becoming better known, Donald was not averse from the
limelight, during his editorship of the Daily Chronicle he
deliberately avoided it. It was a standing order of the office
that his name was never to appear in the paper, except when he
was acting in some capacity which made such a reference
unavoidable, as in presiding at a meeting or making a presenta-
tion. No function would be reported merely because the
editor was present. If he contributed an article it never bore
his name. It was presented anonymously or as being written
by " A Special Correspondent." But for the publicity given
to his speeches as president of the Institute, Donald might
have passed through most of his fifteen years of editorship of
the Daily Chronicle without his name being known to any but
the most observant of readers.

So far as the world at large was concerned, he elected to be
an unknown deus ex machina. That, he felt, was the role most
appropriate to the editor of a daily newspaper.

To-day different views govern editorial conduct, but such
was the practice of most of the Fleet Street editors down to the
outbreak of war in 1914.

I

CHAPTER III
FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY

be unknown to the world at large, but to be well
known to those who directed the thought and the
affairs of the world, was one of Robert Donald's aims
as an editor. As has been noted, he criticized the editors of the
'eighties for their lack of contact with the world. To him it
seemed a paradox that men who professed to be amplifiers of
the voice of the public should spend their time in monastic
solitude.

Such as these he called " writing editors." They considered
that they could serve their papers best by devoting most of
their time to the writing of ponderous leading articles.
Donald held the view that writing was an unimportant part of
an editor's duty. The production of editorial articles should
be delegated, leaving the editor free to perform those duties
which only he could discharge satisfactorily. Foremost among
those duties he placed the maintenance of contact with leaders
in every walk of life. By that means, and that only, could an
editor keep himself well informed and fitted to formulate
policy and to direct the operations of his staff.

For this vital work of liaison, Donald was well equipped.
He was a man of striking appearance and great charm of
manner. ' Wherever he was, he would make a difference,"
James Milne has written. Though never a bon viveur, he was a
good mixer. He could, and often did, lay the foundations of a
long and friendly relationship in a few minutes' conversation at
a crowded reception. He used his clubs, and joined every

54

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 55

society that appeared likely to bring him in touch with inter-
esting and important people. If he declined an invitation to a
public dinner it was usually because he had already accepted a
card for another dinner on the same evening. It follows that
he was not easily bored. He had, in fact, the art of dividing
his attention, so that he might appear to be intensely interested
in the prattle of a dull person, while the sensitive part of his
mind was occupying itself with thoughts far removed from the
subject of the conversation. The art is rare, but not unique.
Some of its most able exponents are the parliamentary journa-
lists whose duties require them to suffer bores gladly, for even
a bore may sometimes, in the manner of an unwitting carrier of
germs, be a vehicle of news whose importance he does not
comprehend.

Donald's activities, however, were not those of a reporter,
and no journalist was ever more scrupulous concerning the
use of information he acquired as a guest or a friend. At times
his standard of conduct in this matter was the despair of his
staff. There was an occasion when, confronted with a rival
newspaper which had scored a " scoop " with a story of a plot
to poison Mr. Lloyd George, Donald remarked quietly,
" Oh, yes ; L.G. told me all about it at breakfast two days
ago." '

Possibly, on occasions, he was too meticulous, and
withheld from his news department information which
might properly have been used ; but it was better to err
on the side of discretion than to impair the confidence he
enjoyed.

It may be wrong to describe as friendship a relationship
established at the dictation of self-interest. Yet it is an inter-
esting fact and a tribute to Donald's character and gifts, that
many of those whom he first met as an editor became his
friends. And if proof of their friendship were needed it was
provided by the fact that, long after he ceased to control a
daily newspaper, and when the forces of publicity at his com-
mand were negligible, many of those whom he first met as

S6 ROBERT DONALD

editor of the Daily Chronicle remained attached to him, and
he to them, by ties of genuine affection.

One of the most interesting men in Donald's circle of
friends was the late Lord Fisher of Kilverstone, Admiral of the
Fleet, who twice filled the post of First Sea Lord of the
Admiralty.

Early in his career, Fisher recognized the value of publicity.
According to his biographer (Admiral Bacon) he never sought
it, but he foresaw that, without the support of the Press, he
was unlikely to secure the revolutionary reforms in naval affairs
which it was his life's mission to bring about.

During the most fruitful period of Fisher's regime at the
Admiralty, and again during his brief but vital term of war
service, the Admiral cultivated the friendship of three influen-
tial journalists. One of them was Robert Donald, and to him
Fisher opened his mind, and sometimes his heart, both in
conversation and correspondence.

Their acquaintance appears to have begun soon after
Donald became editor of the Daily Chronicle, and for a little
time it remained the sort of friendly contact that any journalist
would seek to maintain with any man occupying so important
an office as that of First Sea Lord.

In 1908, when Fisher was about to accompany King
Edward on the Royal visit to Kiel, and later to Reval for the
famous meeting with the Czar, Donald is found commending
to Fisher the Berlin correspondent of the Daily Chronicle,
" Mr. Morrison," he said, " has lived in Germany for many
years. . . . He is very well-informed on German affairs, and
very discreet." In contrast with some of Fisher's later com-
munications, came the briefest of acknowledgments.

DEAR MR. DONALD,
All right.

Yours truly,

J. A. FISHER.

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 57

The formality of this note characterized their relationship
for a time ; but not for long. Early in 1909, Donald's
influence with Fisher was considered sufficient to make him
the best person to approach the First Sea Lord with a request
that the Press should be given facilities for witnessing some
naval exercises at Portsmouth. The negotiations brought
from Fisher a letter in which the Admiral enclosed a piece of
his blotting-pad. Scrawled across it in pencil were the words,
" See Donald about June 12." In the accompanying note he
explained, " This bit of blotting-pad, a week old, tells you I
have not forgotten. I have worked out all details, but don't
want to disclose them yet."

A later note on the same subject is interesting by reason of
its hint of the Fisher-Beresford quarrel which was then
reaching a climax. " Don't imagine," he writes, " that I am
forgetting June 12, but I am frying other fish just now." He
closes the letter thus :

" Yours till the angels smile on us." (They are not
doing so at present !)

J.F.

Shortly before June i2th, the attack upon Fisher by Lord
Charles Beresford had become so notorious that a Cabinet
committee, with the Prime Minister as chairman, had been set
up to investigate the complaints which Beresford had made
against Fisher's administration at the Admiralty. The consti-
tution of the committee and its procedure were causing intense
annoyance to Fisher. On June 3rd, 1909, he wrote thus to
Donald :

DEAR DONALD,

Forgive pencil and haste to thank you for your
approval. Pray for a fine day ! I am to be ruined
publicly and privately, but I've determined not to say

58 ROBERT DONALD

one word whatever may be said — / am not going to
advertise the advertisers.

" You common people of the skies,
What are you when the moon shall rise ? "

(Sent me yesterday, written in I568.)1

Yours,

J. A. FISHER.
3.6.09.

On the Admiral's " determination " to keep silence, how-
ever, an interesting sidelight is thrown by Admiral Bacon's
biography. Far from being Fisher's own desire or resolve, it
appears that " Mr. McKenna extracted a promise from Fisher
that the latter should keep complete silence unless directly
addressed by a member of the committee ; as he feared that
the anger of the Admiral at Beresford's mis-statements might
lead to the harmony of the inquiry being rudely interrupted."

From the time when Fisher relinquished his appointment,
in 1910, down to the outbreak of war in 1914, there appears to
have been little correspondence between Donald and the
Admiral, who spent much of this period in travelling. One of
the most interesting documents is a copy of a long letter
written by Fisher to Mr. Churchill in 1912, in which Fisher
expresses in trenchant style his disapproval of Mr. Churchill's
choice of officers for certain high commands in the Fleet, and
in which he says : " I fear this must be my last communication
with you in any matter at all."

Ostensibly, Fisher had no political partiality. When he
entered the House of Lords, he took no party label. But in
his correspondence with Donald there is evidence of Radical
tendencies. He viewed with misgiving the efforts of the King
to bring about an understanding in the Irish crisis of March,

1 From a poem by Sir Henry Wootton (1568-1639) :
You meaner beauties of the night,

That poorly satisfy our eyes
More by your number than your light,

You common people of the skies ;

What are you when the moon shall rise ?

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 59

1914. These methods were, he complained, " unconstitu-
tional." The appearance of the Primate at a conference on
the subject aroused his ire. * What the hell has the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury to do with this job ? "he demanded in a
fiery letter to Donald. In another note he denounces as a
" rotund cad " an individual whose " sole object has been to
vilify the Liberal Party . . . carrying damnable tales to the
detriment of good men and true now in the Government,
and especially against McKenna." Fisher's loyalty to Mr.
McKenna, however, was not due to political sympathies so
much as to his appreciation of Mr. McKenna 's courageous
support of the Admiral at the time of the Dreadnoughts
controversy.

By November, 1914, Fisher having now been recalled to his
old post at the Admiralty, asperities disappear from his
correspondence — at least for a time. He is now thoroughly
pleased with the world, and " My dear Donald " becomes
" My beloved Friend," in a note in which Fisher thanks the
editor for his " kind support." After expressing the hope
that Donald and his wife will often come to lunch when he and
Lady Fisher are installed at Admiralty House, he continues :

We have roped in Sir A. K. Wilson, but don't allude to
it at present. He has written a nice letter, which has
greatly pleased the Prime Minister, that he intends to be
" Fisher's slave ! ! I "

I worked 22 hours out of the 24 yesterday ! But 2
hours sleep is not quite enough, so I shall slow down
gradually ! I shall have some lovely episodes to relate

Yours always,
1.11.14. FISHER.

The hope that Donald would be a frequent visitor at
Admiralty House was not fulfilled ; Fisher's second term of
office, ending in the violent quarrel with Mr. Churchill over
the Gallipoli campaign, lasted only seven months.

His departure made history. It brought down the Liberal

60 ROBERT DONALD

Government, and, in the crisis, the first Coalition was born.
Whether Fisher's resignation was shrewdly, timed to have the
effect it produced, it is difficult even now to say. He was
sufficiently astute to bring about such a coup. On the other
hand, there is enough evidence to support the theory that
he resigned simply because his position had become untenable ;
and that he acted without reference to the political situation,
and without regard to the bitter hostility with which the
Opposition then viewed Mr. Churchill.

Fisher wrote subsequently to Donald : "I sent Asquith to
bed ! You didn't know that ! ! ! "

The Admiral may not have intended the expression to be
taken literally. At all events, the immediate effect of Fisher's
resignation on Asquith was not so disabling. Believing,
erroneously, that Fisher had left London without waiting for
the acceptance of his resignation, Asquith sent him a melo-
dramatic note ordering him, in the King's name, to return to
his post. Fisher returned (voluntarily, from Westminster
Abbey, where he had been attending Matins) and for a few
days he remained, nominally, First Sea Lord. During those
few days Fisher ruined what seems to have been a substantial
prospect of remaining in office, under a new Minister, by
presenting to the Prime Minister an ultimatum demanding, as
the price of his continuance in office, autocratic powers over
the Navy and complete control of the war at sea. When
Asquith had completed the difficult business of forming the
First Coalition Government, he sent to Fisher a letter of one
sentence accepting his resignation.

On the day when Fisher's hopes were thus destroyed, the
Admiral wrote thus to Donald :

MY BELOVED DONALD,

I never forget a friend, and never forgive an
enemy.

Yours till Hell freezes,
22.5.15. FISHER.

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 61

Then he added a postscript inviting Donald to lunch with
him, " when this crisis is over."

That large section of the public to whom Fisher was a hero,
felt that the Government had made a profound mistake in
letting Fisher go. Of course, nothing was known by them of
the ultimatum which had made his retention impossible, and
for a long time the hope was extensively cherished that the
Government would recall Fisher. The Admiral, however,
professed to recognize the finality of the position. Writing
from Scotland on June 5th, 1915, he tells Donald :

People think I am coming back soon, but I foster no
illusions ! The conditions which are essential to success
in sea war are too hard for the politician. / asked to
be un-trammelled — I was refused. . . .

Some friend anonymously sent enclosed cutting.
Please return and burn this letter. The bitter thing is I
have prepared a big Armada of new vessels from huge to
tiny and no one but myself will know exactly how to use
them.

Yours,

FISHER.

5-6.15-
In reply, Donald said :

I have been discussing the situation with good friends
of yours, and they seem to be inclined to the opinion that
the conditions in your memorandum upset the Prime
Minister and stopped negotiations. There is a general
impression amongst the public, and also politicians, that
we will see you at the Admiralty again.

Fisher, it will be remembered, was induced within a few
weeks of his resignation to take the chairmanship of the
newly established Board of Invention and Research. The
motive, no doubt, was to furnish the public with the con-
soling thought that their man of genius was still serving the

62 ROBERT DONALD

country's cause. Actually, the post was one that might have
been filled adequately by a man of less exceptional gifts. The
personnel of the Board were men of great distinction and, as
Fisher wrote, his function was well expressed by the couplet :

I have culled a garden of flowers,
Mine only is the string that binds them

Fisher was not happy in his new role. As a close friend
wrote to Donald, "It is nothing short of criminal that our
greatest sailor and strategist should be kept unemployed while
in his prime, for the Board of Inventions gives nothing like
scope to his energies." In proof that Fisher was " in his
prime " his friend added the information that one of the two
doctors who had overhauled the Admiral recently and inde-
pendently, had remarked that a man of fifty might envy his
arteries, while the other doctor had pronounced his physique
to be that of a man of forty.

Early in 1916 Fisher wrote to Donald, evidently in refer-
ence to a short and dignified statement he had made in the
House of Lords in reply to a criticism by Mr. Churchill :

How always personal attacks rectify themselves if you
leave them alone. Beresford goes for me to-night. Let
him go ! Never throw stones at a yelping cur. He only
yelps all the more.

Yours for evermore,

FISHER.

When Donald mentioned a talk he had had with the new
First Lord, Fisher replied on 5th April : "I wonder if you
got anything out of Balfour as to the 100,000 tons of shipping
sunk by German submarines between March ist and April
2nd ? "

The effect on Fisher of such tidings can be imagined, the
more so when it is recalled that the request of his Inventions
Board for a submarine for experimental purposes was refused
on the plea that a submarine could not be spared.

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 63

Shortly afterwards, inspired by the belief that he might be
recalled to his old post, Fisher sent to Donald what he called
a jeu d' esprit with a whimsical suggestion that Donald should
publish it, adding : " Don't let out I wrote it. I'll haunt
you if you do ! " Here is the document :

An intercepted letter from Lord Fisher to Grand Admiral
Von Tirpitz on his sudden dismissal from the German
Admiralty :

DEAR OLD TIRPS,

We are both in the same boat ! What a time
we've been colleagues, old boy ! However, we did you
in the eye over the Battle Cruisers, and I know you've
said you'd never forgive me for it when bang went the
Blucher and Von Spee and all his host !

Cheer up, old chap ! Say " Resurgam ! " You're the
one German sailor who understands war ! Kill your
enemy without being killed yourself. I don't blame you
for the submarine business. I'd done the same myself
only our idiots in England wouldn't believe it when I
told 'em !

Well! So long!

Yours till Hell freezes,

FISHER.
29.3.16.

P.S. I say ! Are you sure if you had nipped out with
your whole High Sea Fleet before the Russian ice thawed
and brought over those half-million soldiers from Hamburg
to frighten our women, that you could have got back
un-Jellicoed ?

R.S.V.P.

Whether the belief that he would be recalled was respon-
sible for Fisher's inability to accede to a request which
Donald put to him is not evident ; but it would seem that,
after the Battle of Jutland, Donald wished him to introduce

64 ROBERT DONALD

the late Harold Begbie, then a special correspondent of the
Daily Chronicle, to the Commander-in-Chief of the Grand
Fleet. Said Fisher : " I would love to do it for his own
sake, but you will see the reasons why I can't write to either
Jellicoe or Beatty at present owing to bigger causes."

His feelings towards Sir John Jellicoe he disclosed in a
letter to that Admiral later in 1916, and of which he sent a
copy to Donald. It would not be proper here to reveal the
contents of that communication, but one may perhaps be
allowed to quote one innocuous but amusing passage :

He (Hindenburg) sent those ten German destroyers
later to Boulogne and Folkestone a few days after the
German Emperor gave him authority over the German
Fleet when naval officers thought it madness — just as
Napoleon succeeded, or as Nelson succeeded when both
were voted mad, and King George made the classic
rejoinder to Admiral Sir John Orde that he wished to
God Nelson would bite some of his Admirals.

Fisher's position at this period was one which any man
would find exceedingly irksome. He not only believed that
he was the one sailor who could direct naval policy aright,
but he was equally convinced that he could bring a speedy
and complete victory to the Allied arms. Yet the leaders of
the country would not call him into consultation, or give him
a post in which his gifts could find adequate expression. The
public still had immense faith in him. His popularity must
have been the envy of many a politician. But none of the keys
he held — his remarkable record, his undeniable genius, or the
confidence of a large section of the public — could open the
door to high appointment.

Small wonder, then, that his correspondence exhibited an
increasing degree of bitterness.

A long memorandum which he sent to Donald (undated,
but written, probably, towards the end of 1916), indicates

l&o

FROM THE FIRST SEA LORD
A characteristic note from Admiral Sir John Fisher (later Lord Fisher).

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 65

Balfour's administration of the Admiralty under the title of
" The Six Big Balfourian Blunders." Fisher gives what he
claims to be examples of Unimaginative Strategy, Futile
Foreign Intelligence, Futile Ship-Building Policy, Inadequate
and Foolish Blockade, Inefficient Mine-laying, and sixthly,
the Ignoring of the Baltic Project (Fisher's favourite plan)
for landing an invading force on the Pomeranian coast, eighty
miles from Berlin.

The first Coalition was now nearing the end of its days.
Those who were intimate with the political situation were
aware that soon, by some means as yet unforeseen, a new War
Cabinet, in which Asquith would have no vital part, would
come into being, with the sole aim of prosecuting the war
with the utmost vigour. A new body with such an aim might
be expected, as one of its first steps, to summon to its aid
the man who had staged the one completely successful action
at sea, and who was full of plans for bigger and even better
victories.

It is revealed1 that, at this time, Fisher had arranged to
make a speech of seventeen words in the House of Lords.
He submitted the seventeen words to Mr. McKenna, who,
however, dissuaded Fisher from making the speech on the
ground that it would have a fatal effect on the Allies. Mr.
George Lambert, M.P., Fisher's old friend, is of opinion that
if the Admiral had made the speech, "it is probable that
Lord Fisher would have been backed by Lord Northcliffe as
First Sea Lord." And at that time Northcliffe was exceedingly
powerful.

Unfortunately, the seventeen trenchant words which might
have had this dramatic effect are not, apparently, on record.
But there survives among Robert Donald's papers this cryptic
document written by Fisher. (The introduction would appear
to have been addressed to Mr. McKenna, the censor of the
seventeen words.)

1 Lord Fisher, by Admiral Bacon,

66 ROBERT DONALD

Another proposed Speech, more vile than the one you
vetoed on Nov. 9th, 1916. Do you veto this one ?
R.S.V.P. !

The First Sea Lord has quite recently made a carefully
prepared public statement at the Fishmongers' Hall that
the German Submarine Menace is more serious now, at
this moment, than at any previous period of the war.
Without doubt he is right. He infers that so far it is not
yet being coped with. It is not ! That is a fact. The
Germans state (and it cannot be denied) that they are
launching new German Submarines three times quicker
than we kill theirs ! Also they prove that they sink more
shipping than we build — over 800 ships have been sunk
in the last six months. This is official. Have we built
800 ? The White Star Britannic was 50,000 tons, and
so on ! What follows ? The British Empire and the
German submarine cannot co-exist — one or other must
shortly be destroyed. This Menace which now confronts
us requires INSTANT BIGGER ACTION and GIGANTIC PUSH !

THE EMPIRE is IMPERILLED !

NOTE. — We have it officially that the German Military
authorities have ordered the release from the Front of
all skilled mechanics. These have been sent to the Ports
where German Submarines are being " built feverishly ',"
and 300 engines for German Submarines have been
recently procured from Switzerland ! Are we releasing
ship mechanics and getting engines ? ? ?

It would appear that for some time afterwards Fisher's
mind was framing frank statements for the House of Lords,
one of which he submitted to Donald. So much is to be
deduced from a letter dated February yth, 1917, and the letter
is noteworthy because it shows, as Mr. Lambert suspected
three months previously, Fisher was in touch with Lord
Northcliffe. The Admiral wrote to Donald :

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 67

I shall follow your advice and not make the speech
though so urgently pressed by Northcliffe and
others.

While in Fisher's mind hope and disappointment alternated
with the changing tide of events, and while he composed
pungent speeches which were never to be delivered, he received
a birthday note from Mr. Churchill. It was a generous,
graceful message. There was no reference to the Admiral's
age ; merely a well-turned phrase about his perennial youth
and vigour. But what seems to have moved Fisher to a
cynical smile was a sympathetic comment upon the absence
of any naval operations in the Baltic, whose prospects Mr.
Churchill seemed now to regard with favour. Fisher sent a
copy of the letter to Donald with a footnote :

The lovely part of this is that Winston blasted my
plans for this Baltic operation by pressing the Dar-
danelles. This blasted me, and I remain blasted.

By March, 1917, the Admiral appears again, and finally, to
have renounced hope of recall, for he writes to his " beloved
Donald," thanking him, no longer with the old exuberance,
for some service he has rendered, in terms which, coming
from Fisher, have a muffled, despairing note. He continues :

Lord Rosebery took me for a walk to comfort me and
thinks Meux's speech vulgar and that it will recoil on
himself. But the Tories cheered him I The German
submarines are not yet being dealt with. . . . But a far
bigger menace is any disaster or drawn battle in the
North Sea, owing to Jellicoe's withdrawal by Balfour to
prop himself up 1 Hindenburg will then launch half a
million men on the banks of the Thames and you'll have
a second Austerlitz ! That will certainly end the War ! ! ! !
The Germans have more troops now than at any time in
the war.

I went for a walk with Lansdowne yesterday, he fears

68 ROBERT DONALD

this retreat of the Germans on the Western Front is a
deadly trap ! This is private ! He is intensely anxious !

Yours for evermore,

F.

1.3.17.

In March, 1917, on the abdication of the Czar and the estab-
lishment of the Kerensky regime in Russia, Donald invited
Fisher, in common with other public men, to send a message,
via the Daily Chronicle, to the Russian people. The request
must have been a little embarrassing to the Admiral. During
King Edward's visit to the Russian Fleet in 1908 Fisher was
much in the company of the Czar and his consort, and is
believed to have been responsible for King Edward's action
in appointing the Czar to the honorary rank of Admiral of the
Fleet in the British Navy. Fisher, however, turning a Nel-
sonic eye upon the deposed Czar, contrived to become
enthusiastic about republicanism, but not about the Russian
variety. He wrote :

I've struggled to respond to your desire for a rousing
telegram to the Russian people, but I couldn't evolve
anything good enough beyond " Stick to it ! ! I ! And the
Hohenzollerns will go next and so end the war ! "

I tell you solemnly that if every newspaper and every
public man and all our Allies with one voice say to the
German people : " We will never makepeace with Hohen-
zollerns, the German people would then have a revolution
much easier than the Russian. We would have a German
Republic 1 1 ! The German soldiers are sick to death of
the war and the German homes are crying for peace.

That Lord Northcliffe was sometimes a correspondent of
Fisher about this date is plain from certain phrases in the
next two letters. On April 2ist, 1917, Fisher wrote to
Donald :

^*1

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 69

I must send you a line to tell you how great an effect
your article on the Admiralty has produced. Northcliffe
put it whole into the Weekly Dispatch and Daily Mail.
The question is " Can the Army win the war before the
Admiralty loses it ? " McKenna told me yesterday (he
telephoned to me to see me) that the German submarine
menace is increasing. The figures officially given are
most misleading, but even at that the destruction of our
shipping is prodigious and famine is near us, and the
country at large is not yet alarmed. Repetition is the soul
of journalism. Say it again I If you got rid of Carson
you'd settle Ireland as well as the submarine menace.

Yours always,

FISHER.

Late in April Fisher has recaptured his old quarter-deck
spirit. Pleased with certain leading articles in the "Daily
Chronicle^ he dashes off a note to Donald with much use of a
red pencil to impart emphasis to certain passages :

MY BELOVED DONALD,

Your broadsides are hitting between wind and
water ! ! ! You are the one man with courage I ! I Go on and
prosper. Repetition is the soul of journalism ! The War
Cabinet is frightened and well it may be ! " Can the Army
I win the war before the Navy loses it ? " That is the
question.

Yours for evermore,

F.

There were at this period critics who dismissed the veteran
sailor with a gesture or a word that implied madness. His
biographer has faced that issue and has disposed of it.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to read the following letter from
Fisher to Donald in the light of that slander. Writing on
March 27th, 1917, he says :

70 ROBERT DONALD

Permit me to congratulate you on your excellent
leading article in the Daily Chronicle of yesterday and
also on the excellence of your War news ! You are ahead
of them all !

It has been a most disastrous war for one simple
reason that our Navy with a sea supremacy quite un-
exampled in the history of the world (we are 5 times
stronger than the enemy) has been relegated into being a
subsidiary service. (It was so quite accurately described
recently in the House of Commons by Sir Ivor Phillips,
M.P.) Our blockade of the German coast was a farce
due to the ineptitude of the Foreign Office, and our
military authorities failed to understand the military mind
of Frederick the Great who stated that the Baltic coast of
Germany was Germany's vulnerable point (her one
weak spot) and geography has not altered since his day,
and the Pomeranian coast in the Baltic is still only 90
miles from Berlin. For the only time in his life Frederick
the Great was frightened and lost heart when the Russian
Army landed on the Pomeranian coast and he sent for a
bottle of poison, but that night the Russian Empress
died, and peace came and he was saved !

Mr. Lloyd George's speech of "14 times too late "
still holds the field in its acumen and its truth ! Our
Navy is in " cotton wool " at Scapa Flow. When it acts
it will be now " too late."

What crashes we have had !

Tirpitz — sunk.
Joffre — stranded.
Kitchener — drowned.
Fisher — marooned.
Lord French — made a Viscount.
Lord Jelficoe — do.

Lord Davenport — do.

Sir W. Robertson — the Eastern Command in Tim-
buctoo.

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 71

Bethman Hollweg — torpedoed.
Asquith — torpedoed,
von Moltke — do.

Falkenhayn — do.

Admiral von Pohl, the Commander of the German
Fleet — committed suicide !

Heaven bless you ! I am here walking 7 miles a day,
and eating my heart out !

Yours always,

FISHER.

After this letter, there was silence for a time. But the
Admiral was not idle. He was using his pen to urge upon the
Prime Minister a more vigorous policy, not only at sea, but in
the air. Whether the letters were sent is not clear, but Donald
received copies of them.

Throughout his correspondence with Donald, Fisher seems
never to have addressed him at his office. Always the letters
were sent to Donald's town house, in Taviton Street. Some-
times the envelopes were heavily sealed. At first, the Admiral
was given to heading his letters " Secret," " Confidential," or
" Burn this when read " ; but later, as he came to know that
he could trust Donald implicitly, these injunctions disappeared.

In the late summer of 1917, Fisher resumed the corre-
spondence. Writing from Swanage on August 22nd he says :

MY BELOVED FRIEND,

I've not written you or seen you for ages ! I am
here at the above address scanning the dark horizon for
some faint glimmer of the end of the war. Not a sign of
a glimmer I So far as the Germans are concerned there is
indisputable authority for stating that Germany is equal
to a seven years war. Are we ? So far we have had no
Nelson, no Napoleon, no Pitt ! The one only victory of
ours in war (and as Nelson has said, it was not a victory —
it was annihilation !), was the destruction of Admiral

72 ROBERT DONALD

Von Spec's Armada off the Falkland Islands which
saved Africa. He was en route there to gobble up our
Cape Squadron as he had gobbled up poor Admiral
Craddock's precisely similar squadron of ships, and
Botha's fifty transports going to S.W. Africa would have
gone to the bottom ! And the above accomplished under
the sole direction of a septuagenarian First Sea Lord who
Jellicoe and all else thought mad for demanding the
Grand Fleet of our fastest Battle cruisers to send them
14,000 miles on a wild goose chase ! And they arrived as
Von Spec arrived, almost to the minute ; and not many
minutes afterwards, his Armada was at the bottom of the
sea, and our Battle cruisers that did the job had not a
single man killed or wounded ! And yet how I was
execrated for inventing the Battle cruisers ! " Monstrous
Cruisers " they called them !

To this day Beresford and others of his kidney calum-
niate them and their still more wonderful successors !
How would they have saved England without them ?
Our nitrate trade to Chili and Peru and therefore our
munitions were in Von Spec's hands.

We have no poet now like Warburton describing the
Battle of the Nile ! Von Spec blowing up like another
" Orient " and his son with him a la Casabianca !

And yet, dear friend, what comes to the author of the
scene ? The words of Montaigne,

Qui de nous n'a en sa terre promise.

Son jour d'extase,

Et sa fin en exil ?

Yours for evermore,

FISHER.

A week after writing this letter, the Admiral was in London,
and the purpose of his visit is revealed to Donald in this letter :

I'm too late to see you this journey. Sir Eric Geddes
asked me to come up and lunch with him and opened all

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 73

his heart. He was very cordial, indeed affectionate, I
might say, but he apparently thinks me impossible any-
where. He was much tickled at my telling him in reply
to a question that the whole art of war was surprise,
begotten out of Imagination by Audacity, and no such
copulation had yet taken place except in the solitary
instance of the Battle of the Falklands when Von Spec
said as he saw the battle cruisers, " Oh ! What a
surprise ! "

Bless you,

Yours,

F.

I go back to the country day after to-morrow, as
Geddes has sucked me dry.

During this summer, Donald received from Fisher the most
unusual of all the Admiral's communications. It was a sermon
on the English Bible ! The circumstances in which the sermon
was written were explained by its author in a covering note.
A rich American woman, he said, had asked him to write it
for her grandson who, after serving in the British forces, was
lying in hospital, wounded. " She might have asked an
expert," added Fisher, facetiously — " an Archbishop or a
Dean, and sent him a fat fee : all she sent me was her love."

It will be agreed that, fee or no fee, an Archbishop or a
Dean would have been much more expansive, but it is doubt-
ful whether either would have produced a treatise so readable,
or so well adapted to its purpose. The following is an exact
reproduction :

THE ENGLISH BIBLE

John Wycliffe, in A.D. 1380, began the translation of the
Bible into English. This was before the age of printing,
so it was in manuscript. Before he died in A.D. 1384, he
had the joy of seeing the Bible in the hands of his country-
men in their own tongue.

74 ROBERT DONALD

Wycliffe's translation was quaint and homely, and so
idiomatic as to have become out of date when, nearly two
hundred years afterwards, John Tyndale walking over
the fields in Wiltshire, determined so to translate the
Bible into English " that a boy that driveth the plough
should know more of the Scriptures than the Pope," and
Tyndale gloriously succeeded ! But for doing so, the
Papists, under orders from the Pope of Rome, strangled
him and burnt him at the stake. Like St. Paul, he was
shipwrecked just as he had finished the Book of Jonah,
but there was no whale handy and he was cast ashore in
Holland.

Our present Bible is almost word for word the Bible
of Tyndale of A.D. 1530, but in A.D. 1535, Miles Cover-
dale, Bishop of Exeter, was directed by Archbishop
Cranmer and Thomas Cromwell (who was Secretary of
State to Henry VHIth), to make a fresh translation, and
he beautified Tyndale's original. Cranmer and Cromwell
both suffered death because of their Bible business, and
Coverdale was deprived of his Bishopric and died of
hunger in the City of London.

In 1539, " Divers excellent learned men expert in the
Aforesaid tongues " (Hebrew and Greek) made a true
translation of the whole Bible which was issued in 1540
and remained supreme till 1568, when the Bishops tried
to improve it and failed ! And then, A.D. 1607, the present
Authorised Version, issued in A.D. 1611, became the
Bible of the Land, and still holds its own against the
recent pedantic Revised Version of A.D. 1884. No one
likes it.

In the opinion of Holy men, Cranmer's Bible (as it is
called) or " the Great Bible "—the Bible of 7540 to 1568
holds the field for Beauty of Language and the emotional
rendering of the Holy Spirit. A great Atheist said :
' There may be some doubt whether the Hebrew and
Greek writers of the Original Bible Manuscripts were

FISHER OF THE ROYAL NAVY 75

inspired or not ; there can be none that the English
translators were ! "

We don't know their names, we only know of them as
" Divers excellent learned men ! "

It is the greatest achievement in letters. The Beauty
of the translation of these unknown men excels, far excels,
the real and the so-called originals. All nations and
tongues of Christendom have come to admit reluctantly
that no other Version of the Book offers so noble a setting
for the Divine Message. Read the Prayer Book Psalms.
They are from this noble Version — English at its zenith !

After the summer of 1917, either the Admiral's correspon-
dence fell off, or Donald did not preserve it. More likely the
Admiral ceased to write, for Donald, having cherished Fisher's
letters for ten years, would scarcely have begun to destroy his
notes. Probably they met occasionally in London, and at such
meetings the Admiral handed to Donald copies of the memo-
randa which he wrote for the inspiration of Cabinet Ministers,
for some of these documents have no covering letters to
explain how they came into Donald's hands.

CHAPTER IV
WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL

IN his " War Diary," Lord Riddell affords to those who
bring imagination to bear upon a somewhat arid presenta-
tion of facts, a diverting picture of the colony of politi-
cians and journalists which existed at Walton Heath in Surrey
during the war years. There has been nothing quite like it,
before or since.

The colony was not large. It was a mere coterie, whose
obvious raison d'etre was golf on the Walton Heath course.
Generally, at the week-ends, it was reinforced by a contingent
of equally notable guests, so that a little light play with a
machine-gun from a Walton Heath bunker on a Saturday
morning might have had revolutionary results, transforming
the Cabinet, accelerating promotion to the judicial bench, and
changing the course of history in Fleet Street. With a cynicism
born of disillusionment and of cheap wisdom after the event,
some may regret that such a fusillade did not occur ; but
the truth would seem to be that in spite of the sycophancy, the
plotting and counterplotting, and the insincerities which the
evident camaraderie of the colony could not conceal, what was
said and done at Walton Heath during the war years was
incidentally, or perhaps accidentally, of real service to the
country.

Whatever the dominant motives in the minds of some of the
colonists, at these informal conferences of statesmen, politi-
cians and editors, the realities of the country's task were
recognized, the desire for action was present, and the atmo-
sphere was more appropriate to the times than that of the

76

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 77

cloistered retreats in which some leaders of the period chose
to spend their leisure.

" In the early days of the war, I played a good deal of golf
with Mr. Lloyd George," Donald told a Canadian audience in
1 920. * * He was thinking more of the war than he was thinking
of the game ; but it was necessary for him to take some
exercise. The first thing on his mind was a tremendous
interest in rifles. He did not know how a rifle was made, but he
soon picked it up, and he said, ' We are searching the whole
world for rifles. We can't get them, and we won't get them
for a year.' But he got rifles. ... It was due to Mr. Lloyd
George that the Americans were brought in to supply
munitions."

It is a pity, perhaps, that Donald kept no diary of these fair-
way conversations with Mr. Lloyd George. Possibly a
fastidious sense of propriety forebade it. He was always
careful to discriminate in his use of information given to him in
his professional capacity and knowledge acquired in social
intercourse.

Though the fraternal spirit of the colony may have been a
spurious thing (Donald once settled an incipient libel action
between two notable colonists), some genuine friendships were
formed at Walton Heath. That there was a real bond between
the Lloyd George and Donald households is undeniable, what-
ever may have been the real relationship of the Minister and
the editor. Suck friendship as there was between the two men
fluctuated considerably during the war, until, ultimately, the
memory of it only survived to prevent their relationship
degenerating into an affair of frigid formalities. But in 1914
their attitude towards each other bore every sign of genuine
friendship, and even at the middle period of the war they were
on such agreeable terms that an engagement book shows seven
meetings between Mr. Lloyd George and Donald in a space of
six weeks. Those were meetings at Walton only. They do
not include calls or meals together in London.

Lord Riddell's Diary opens with a glimpse of Mr. Lloyd

78 ROBERT DONALD

George, Donald and Lord Riddell attending a performance
of Potash and Perlmutter, not the first theatrical performance
which Mr. Lloyd George and Donald had witnessed together ;
but the golf course was their more usual meeting place.

Donald has left a note recalling a Saturday morning
which he spent with Mr. Lloyd George on the golf course
when " L.G. began ruminating on the prospects of the
war. No one at that time (continues Donald) foresaw the
stupendous developments and duration of the conflict, but he
(L.G.) was convinced that we were in for a terrific struggle. He
remarked that every war threw up a man. He wondered who
would emerge as the big war figure in England. Kitchener, he
thought, were he more of a statesman (at that time Kitchener's
weaknesses as a War Minister were not patent). Balfour, had
he been younger, might have a chance. Churchill could not
carry democracy with him. At that time Asquith's political
leadership was not in question, but Mr. Lloyd George was
thinking also of war leadership. I do not believe that he was,
at this time, thinking of himself . . . but his thoughts were an
interesting premonition."

After such intimacy, it is painful to find Lord Riddell
recording on March 29th, 1915 :

L.G. telephoned to me in a state of great anger and
excitement regarding a leader in the Chronicle referring to
a so-called conspiracy to supersede the Prime Minister.
The names of his suggested successors were mentioned,
including L.G. who described the leader as most injurious
and indiscreet.

The next scene in the drama is found in Lord Oxford's
Memories and Reflections :

March 3oth, 1915. L.G. and McKenna came here at
3.30 . . . L.G. began on a very stormy note accusing
McKenna of having inspired Donald to write the article
in the Chronicle which was headed, " Intrigue against
the P.M."

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 79

Lord Oxford does not disclose to what degree this episode
was exceptional, and whether sharp exchanges between Mr.
Lloyd George and Mr. McKenna were not, in fact, of frequent
occurrence. This particular bout, however, must have been
memorable, for Lord Oxford reverts to it later in his narrative,
and writes of " L.G. and McKenna fighting like fishwives."
The relationship of the two Ministers at this date is important,
because it may account for the interpretation which Mr. Lloyd
George put upon the offending article. That a bitter feud
unbalances the judgment of the contending parties, and causes
each to discern the other's hand in the most innocent situations,
is well known. This episode may have been another example
of the baseless suspicion which animosity can breed.

Mr. Lloyd George's feelings were so deeply disturbed by
the Chronicle article, that even after the turbulent scene in the
Cabinet room, the storm had not blown itself out. The same
day Lord Riddell saw Mr. Lloyd George at the Treasury :

He spoke very strongly about the Daily Chronicle
article, which he described as indiscreet and foolish. He
said that the Prime Minister is much perturbed. " The
old boy was in tears," L.G. continued. " I shall not let
this rest. I have never intrigued for place or office. I
have intrigued to carry through my schemes, but that is a
different matter. The Prime Minister has been so good
to me that I would never be disloyal to him in the smallest
detail. I may criticize him among ourselves, as I have no
doubt he criticizes me, but we are absolutely loyal to each
other. I have been very worried by this leader, which is
open to the construction that it was inspired by me with a
view to giving point to the criticisms in the Tory papers,
of which no one is taking any notice." I strongly advised
L.G. not to allow the subject to worry him. He looked
quite ill. He thanked me for my advice and said he had
told the Prime Minister he should consult me.

8o ROBERT DONALD

It is interesting to turn from these painful scenes to the
article which caused the commotion, and to search it with a
disinterested eye for justification of Mr. Lloyd George's anger.
It appeared on March 29th, 1915, and was headed " The
Intrigue against the Prime Minister."

After remarking that observance of the political truce on the
Unionist side seemed almost confined to their front bench, and
giving details of some Press attacks on Liberal Ministers and
on Lord Kitchener, the article continues :

The target of the latest intrigue is the Prime Minister.
No one in these islands holds a more responsible position ;
no one is more alive to his responsibilities or discharges
them more thoroughly. Few men possess a greater power
of work or make better use of it. But because the very
facts of his occupation withdraw Mr. Asquith from the
public gaze, and because in his public appearance he pre-
serves always that bearing of serene cheerfulness and that
total absence of fuss which is not the least factor in his
efficiency, it has been thought worth while to put about by
innuendo and suggestion the pretence that he is not fit
for his task. Catalogues of the nation's leaders appear —
such as that in the Observer of March 2ist — from which
the Prime Minister's name is conspicuously and with
obvious significance omitted. At one time it is Mr. Lloyd
George whom the Unionist press seem inclined to exalt as
a luminary eclipsing his chief. At another, it is Lord
Kitchener, behind whom the Government (and as The
Times put it on March 2oth, especially the Prime Minis-
ter) are accused of sheltering themselves. At another time
it is Mr. Balfour whose welcome readiness to lend a hand
in various matters regarding the public safety is stressed as
if it pointed in some way to his superior fitness for national
leadership. And then come the hints that these statesmen,
with perhaps Mr. Churchill thrown in, and no doubt some
further contributions from the Unionist benches might

MR. LLOYD GEORGE AT WALTON

Left : Miss MARGOT DONALD (now Madame R. Saulnier-Blache).
Right: Miss MADELAINE DONALD (died 1917).

AS PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE OF JOURNALISTS
Robert Donald photographed with some veterans of the Institute at York, 1913.

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 81

coalesce into a Government whose strenuous virility
would put the present Prime Minister to shame. It is
instructive, if one runs over the anti-Ministerial pin-
pricks for the last month or so, to notice how large a pro-
portion of them are either expressly or by implication
directed to Mr. Asquith.

That the article had no such implication as Mr. Lloyd
George read into it is evident from a leader note published
in the Daily Chronicle on the following day — that is to say on
the morning of March 3Oth, before Mr. Lloyd George
embarked upon his altercation with Mr. McKenna, and before
he summoned Lord Riddell to soothe his outraged feelings.

After referring to the Morning Post's rejoinder to the
editorial article of the previous day (" The Intrigue against the
Prime Minister "), the note observed : " As for the Chancellor
of the Exchequer (Mr. Lloyd George) his unswerving loyalty
to his chief has always been and is, one of the bedrock factors
in Cabinet affairs. The Opposition mischief-makers are as far
away from reality here as in their caricature of the Prime
Minister."

It is possible that for a correct appreciation of Mr. Lloyd
George's state of mind one must turn to Lord Oxford's record
of March 29th, the day upon which the Daily Chronicle article
was published. Here we find Asquith speaking to Mr. Lloyd
George about certain " sinister and as I believed, absurd inter-
pretations which were being given to the articles in The Times,
Observer, and Morning Post." It was in this conversation that
Mr. Lloyd George with tears in his eyes, made his famous
protestation of loyalty to Asquith, saying he would rather (to
quote Lord Oxford's catalogue) " break stones, dig potatoes,
be hung, drawn and quartered " than say a word or harbour a
thought that was disloyal to his chief.

In his conversation with Mr. Lloyd George, it will be observed
that Asquith made no reference to the Daily Chronicle article
published that morning. If he had seen it (which is unlikely,

82 ROBERT DONALD

in view of his disdainful attitude towards the " popular "
Press) it is inconceivable that a mind so lucid and direct could
have regarded it as being capable of a " sinister " interpreta-
tion. But seemingly Mr. Lloyd George did so regard it.

The breach which this article created between Mr. Lloyd
George and Donald healed, superficially. Less than three
weeks after the publication of the article, Donald was dining
with Mr. Lloyd George in company with the editors of the
Daily News, the Westminster Gazette, the Manchester Guardian,
and the Liverpool Post.1 These distinguished Liberal jour-
nalists had been gathered together by Mr. Lloyd George to
hear his impulsive proposals for State purchase of the liquor
industry.

This scheme for the acquisition of the trade at a cost
estimated at 350 millions sterling captured the imagination of
many men who were not warm admirers of its author, among
them Mr. McKenna. Donald, however, would not support it.
Writing of the dinner party at which Mr. Lloyd George
explained his scheme Lord Riddell says, " With the exception
of Donald of the Chronicle, the editors appear to have
acquiesced." Donald's own version reads : " Some of us
feared difficulties in management would arise. These, how-
ever, he (Mr. Lloyd George) brushed aside."

This ambitious project soon collapsed under strong opposi-
tion from Conservative leaders who were acting in friendly
co-operation with the Government. A month after Mr. Lloyd
George's promising conversation with the editors, Asquith was
writing the epitaph of the scheme, " The Great Purchase Folly
is as dead as Queen Anne."

With the formation of the first Coalition the liquor scheme
was quickly forgotten. New issues arose, but they provided no
new note to which Mr. Lloyd George and Donald could attune
their minds. Dissonance between them continued. The first
Saturday's golf after the formation of the Coalition was marked

1 Others present, according to Donald's record, included Mr. McKenna,
Sir Thornas Whittaker, C- F. Q. Masterman, and H. W, Massingham,

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 83

by an argument in which Donald and Charles Masterman
opposed Mr. Lloyd George's view about the wisdom of form-
ing a Coalition government. Then when Mr. Lloyd George
showed himself sympathetic to conscription he failed to carry
Donald with him, and the statesman who had so frequently
inspired the political policy of the Daily Chronicle was again
out of sympathy with his favourite newspaper. During a round
of golf in September, Mr. Lloyd George who was " very strong
on the necessity of conscription " told Donald that he was
pursuing a wrong course and that he would have to " eat his
words."

This conversation, according to Lord Riddell, took place on
August 1 5th, 1915. It is significant that in Asquith's Memoirs
an August entry shows that among the " most stalwart and
passionate opponents of conscription was Mr. McKenna." If
Mr. McKenna was visualized by Mr. Lloyd George as being
actively engaged in persuading Donald to his point of view, of
alienating the support of the Daily Chronicle from Mr. Lloyd
George, then it is curious that no clue to such activities
exists among Donald's papers ; and it is curious also that Mr.
McKenna at the moment when he was supposed to be concen-
trating upon this purpose, should have taken a view strongly
and entirely contrary to Donald's on the question of State
purchase of the liquor trade.

So far as his papers provide evidence, Donald was not on
specially intimate terms with Mr. McKenna. Though in 1918,
as will appear later, Donald interested Mr. McKenna in a
scheme for acquiring the Daily Chronicle (but even here Mr.
McKenna was interested as Lord Cowdray's adviser and not
on his own behalf), at other times his relationship with Mr.
Lloyd George's bete noir was not noticeably different from his
relationship with any other Liberal Minister.

In the matter of conscription, the Daily Chronicle, like every
other Liberal newspaper, was in an extremely difficult position.
The choice was not between the need of the nation and the
traditional policy of the Liberal Party, but a question of

84 ROBERT DONALD

whether the mass of people at home, still scarcely conscious of
the grim realities of the war, would support the Government in
abandoning the voluntary principle — a point upon which even
Lord Kitchener harboured doubts. At all events, the Daily
Chronicle, which could not be accused of lack of patriotism,
did not follow Mr. Lloyd George's lead on this issue. And
Mr. Lloyd George was not the only reader to complain.

Among the many letters addressed to the Editor was one
from an officer serving at the front which appears to have been
written at almost the same time that Mr. Lloyd George was
voicing his criticism to Lord Riddell.

Donald was much impressed by the letter. He had it put
into type and would have published it, but for the fact that
the parts from which it derived its strength would certainly
have been deleted by the censor, and the rest would have been
almost meaningless. As evidence of the feeling prevailing in
the army at the time, the letter merits preservation, and is here
given in full save for the deletion of a somewhat confused
passage which has no bearing on the writer's arguments.

To the Editor of the " Daily Chronicle."

Sir, — I cannot help but start with abuse, although
you are only one of those " in touch with the vast anti-
conscriptionist mass of British opinion," as your leader
writer puts it. Damn British opinion, Sir ; damn the
vain, self-complacent English smugness and English
arrogance. To your " vast mass " the idea of defeat is
quite inconceivable, for are they not the boys of the bull-
dog breed, the descendants of countless heroes, free
men in a free country, who just won't be slaves, the
liberators ! of Belgium, and so on ad nauseam ? So
colossal is British arrogance that our brains and imagina-
tion are swamped. We still seem to think that the Ger-
mans have made war to gratify us, so that we may show
them what fine fellows we really are. Probably you, too,

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 85

have never entertained the idea that we are losing this
war. Yet the bald truth remains that the Germans are
winning on points ; and we go on talking, talking about
the " big push " — to be delivered next spring, according
to the " Times " military correspondent. (Please observe
that we have given up the idea this year — we are still
wearing down the " baby-killing Hun.")

If you could see trenches hammered to hell by hundreds
of guns, hours of smoke, dust, blood and noise, and then
go across to take these same battered lines, only to be
met by a hail of bullets, to return leaving your friends
and men lying dead outside, it might make you
realize what an enormous advantage lies with the
defence.

The French have battered for five weeks — I have
heard it day and night — net gain two miles !

The bubble of breaking through has burst, but we are
too deaf to hear the " pop."

You answer with the German advance in Russia, and
then go on to the financial problem. Of course Germany
cannot last, of course she will be starved in a few months,
of course she has no cotton, no copper, but she has got
brains and method, and uses both.

And we muddle along in our well-worn grooves, our
party politics, our newspaper dictatorship, our racing,
our brides in their baths.

I have been ten months in France fighting for that —
the thought almost makes me vomit.

Don't talk about the " glorious traditions of our
race." Only fools fight for traditions ; the wise man
fights for realities and the future.

This long-winded preamble leads me on to your
crowning folly — your fear and hatred of conscription.

You, in touch with your vast mass, won't have National
Service in the nation's cause because " all that is charac-
teristically English dies if English freedom perishes."

86 ROBERT DONALD

Those worn-out myths ! None of us are free, and you
know it. Smith was not free to drown his brides. We
are all slaves of the community, and, some think, of the
country in which we live.

Will you leave your dear old principles for a
moment, and look at things from another point of
view ?

In a great national crisis it must be taken for granted (I
assume that the nation is virile) that every man and
woman is willing to serve the country. In other words,
every man and woman is a volunteer.

If you deny this hypothesis, you damn the country
and " your vast mass of British opinion."

Probably your " principles " will not be shocked by
this statement. Well, then, every man and woman is
willing to serve. To take full advantage of this willing-
ness it must be organized — in a word, conscription ; that
awful bogey word, which gives some little Liberals and
some little Conservatives and some little Socialists bad
dreams.

I know that I am not writing to a child, but conscription
does not mean that everyone is a soldier — it means that
George, who is an engineer, engineers for the State.
Tom, who is a skilful workman, works for the State ;
and Harry and Bill, who are fit to fight, fight and perhaps
die for the State.

The State calls her children and allots to them their
tasks.

What monstrous, wicked, bloody oppression !

And you must go on unblushingly with your old volun-
tary muddle. George the engineer may join the
R.A.M.C., Tom the skilled workman may fight, and the
Harrys and Bills may become politicians and newspaper
editors, for all the country seems to care.

Of course, one volunteer is equal to four pressed men.
Our copy-books say so, therefore it must be true. " Any-

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 87

how," said an English soldier, " I hope I never meet a
bloody German volunteer."

When you think of the Germans, their wonderful self-
sacrifices, their wonderful courage and fortitude and
unanimity, doesn't it make you blush for your own
country ?

Throw away your principles man, throw away the
lumber of the past and look things in the face.

Don't blather about God upholding the cause of the
just and the bulldog pluck pulling us through — I am
tired of pulpit and music-hall sentiments. Realize that
the Germans are a better and a more virile race than we
are and try to teach your vast mass of British opinion to
surpass them at their own game.

I am an Englishman and the chances are that I shall
never see another year, yet our national sentimentality,
our conceit, our petty squabbling, our politics, our lack
of method have made of me one of the most ardent pro-
Germans in Europe.

I cannot say why I have treated you to this round of
abuse — you are no worse than others, if anything a trifle
better than that loathsome Northcliffe crowd with their
party political jobbery.

But you, sir, are blinded by Principles — which is
nearly as bad. Bound hand and foot by past traditions
and the utterances of statesmen now happily dead, but
unfortunately not forgotten. Cannot " The Daily
Chronicle " think for itself, or must it still be bound by the
opinions of, say, Gladstone ? Really, even such a demi-
god as he can get out of date.

Could you but realize how nauseating it is to read any
London daily, " the mouthpieces of the nation " (in block
letters, please) with their squabbles, their meanness and
their follies.

You are better — that is why I take the trouble to write
this, but good God ! you're bad enough.

ROBERT DONALD

I am abusive, but when moved, superficial politeness is
jettisoned, and, candidly, nothing would give me greater
pleasure than to drive these things into your head with a
mallet — the distance, however, is too great. Even the
Germans and their deadly earnestness cannot convince
you.

This letter is not intended for any publicity, though it
would be amusing to see some of your public reading it,
nor is it intended to draw forth any reply. The labour in
writing it will not be grudged if I know that you
had read it and thought for five minutes on what I
have said.

We have such a colossal task before us that poor
mortals like me are appalled, but the Olympians at home
still go unmoved about their god-like business. It is
they who need help, not we.

In conclusion I shall quote Mr. Walter Long (Morning
Post, July 10). "It would not have met the situation to
have simply pressed more men into the service unless we
could have put in their hands the rifles and ammunition,
without which they would be useless to take part in the
war." There you have the fallacy in a nutshell. Surely
Long must know that National Service does not cram
every man into the ranks when we cannot equip them
(our voluntary system did that from August to December).
If there is National Service they are called up when
required.

You know that, and he knows it, yet your damnable
politics befoul your mouths.

The Liberals are bound by Principles ; the Socialists
by the word Freedom ; the Conservatives have no Prin-
ciples and no traditions since 1906 — if there were an
ounce of ability in their broken camp they might break
fresh ground, but the soil is barren.

I am asking my friend to transmit this letter to you, as
it would be lost in the ordinary channels. My thoughts

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 89

and their mode of expression may be crude, Sir, but they
have the virtue of being honest and outspoken.

I am, Sir, yours very truly,

DOCTOR IN THE R.A.M.C.

(Attached to a Lanes. Regiment.)

Plainly, Mr. Lloyd George reflected accurately the opinions
of the soldiers when, in August, 1915, he differed from
Donald on the question of conscription, but whether at that
time he could have carried the country with him, is a matter
upon which two opinions exist even now.

In June, 1916, at the time that the War Secretaryship was
rendered vacant by the death of Lord Kitchener, there was
another acute difference of opinion between Donald and Mr.
Lloyd George. The Prime Minister desired Lloyd George to
succeed Kitchener, and the public regarded him as incom-
parably the best successor to Kitchener. The political corre-
spondent of the Daily Chronicle readily acknowledged that he
was the most eligible man for this onerous post, which, as a
consequence of the nation being at war, had acquired an
importance second only to the Premiership.

But it soon became apparent that there were obstacles to the
consummation of the general wish. In the course of the war
the duties and responsibilities of the Secretary of State for War
had undergone drastic changes. They had been adapted to
meet the unprecedented situation created by the appointment
of a Field-Marshal to a civilian post ; they had been adjusted
to create a working relationship between the War Office and
new Ministry of Munitions ; they had been further diminished
because of the inequalities of Kitchener's gifts. Experience,
sometimes painful and expensive, had dictated these changes,
and the general effect of them was to deprive the office of
some of the powers which its holder enjoyed in times of peace,
and to distribute them among others,

9o ROBERT DONALD

The prospect of moving from the Ministry of Munitions,
where he enjoyed enormous powers, to a post more glamorous,
but whose scope was now severely restricted, did not appeal
to Mr. Lloyd George. " I had no liking," he confesses in his
War Memoirs, " for the prospect of finding myself a mere
ornamental figure in Whitehall," and in a letter to Asquith he
wrote, " No statesman with any self-respect would consent to
occupy office under the humiliating conditions to which poor
Kitchener had been reduced during the last few months of his
life. Many a time I have seen him wince under the indignity
of his position." It seems relevant to remark in passing that
his solicitude for Kitchener (whose changed status was
entirely the work of Mr. Lloyd George and his Cabinet col-
leagues) does not appear to have moved Mr. Lloyd George
until he was invited to fill Kitchener's place.

Be that as it may. On June iyth the Daily Chronicle pub-
lished a leading article on the subject of " The New Secretary
of State for War." After touching upon the speculations that
were current concerning Kitchener's successor the article
continued :

We do not propose to nominate anyone for the position,
nor to offer the Prime Minister any advice on the subject.
There are, however, some general considerations which,
though obvious, may be usefully noted. The War Office
has undergone important changes during the war. The
vast growth of work under Lord Kitchener led to devolu-
tion in many directions. First, the provision of munitions
was taken away, and a new Ministry started with the
conspicuous energy of Mr. Lloyd George. After that,
recruiting was delegated ; and later again came the
development of the Imperial General Staff. These off-
shoots of the parent tree are now at different stages.
Recruiting has passed the point of greatest difficulty and
importance. Munitions, on the contrary, have not. . . .
There must be a continuous development of new weapons.

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 91

Mr. Lloyd George said long ago that this is an engineers'
war. But the novelty with the most continuing impor-
tance is the Imperial General Staff. Created under a
Chief who is for the first time independent of the War
Minister, his staff has practically taken over the strategic
control of the war. . . .

That the Imperial General Staff is efficient everyone
admits and it is well known that it has the complete con-
fidence of the Army. The arrangement which now exists
is unprecedented in our political history ; and it has been
justified by the unique position in which the nation finds
itself, when anything like a pedantic insistence on political
traditions might prove fatal. But in fact the relation
between the Parliamentary Chief and the High Command
is always a difficult matter in democratic countries. It
has been so in France. . . .

At present, the touchstone in Great Britain — the test
which the Prime Minister must inevitably apply before
all others — is simple : What system is now best suited for
the direction of the war ? Is the General Staff going to
continue to carry on the work which it has perfected
during the last six months, or are we to have another
reorganization of the War Office ? But to ask such a
question is almost equivalent to answering it. Certainly
this is no opportunj time to reorganize the War Office.

The system which has been in operation during the
last six months has, on the whole, worked decidedly well.
It had only one element of weakness, in that there was no
Cabinet Minister of standing to speak for the War Office
in the House of Commons. He would, of course, be a
civilian, but he should be one who would take a keen
personal interest in the work of the Army, besides speak-
ing with authority in the House. Apart from the direc-
tion of the war, the duties left to the War Minister to carry
out are heavy and responsible. There is room for an out-
standing man, but he must be a man content to work and

92 ROBERT DONALD

shine in his own orbit, without infringing on the orbit of
the Chief of the Imperial General Staff.

On the day following the publication of this article, Mr.
Lloyd George was at Walton, and invited Lord Riddell to
dinner. " I referred," says Lord Riddell, " to a leader in
yesterday's Daily Chronicle"

L. G. — The article is most harmful : it will prejudice
the negotiations with Robertson. When one is negotiating
one often asks more than one is prepared to accept. The
publication at a critical moment in the negotiations of an
article which urges that the other party should grant
nothing is most prejudicial. And it is by no means
certain that I shall go to the War Office.

It is significant that, according to his Memoirs, on the very
day that the offending article was published Mr. Lloyd George
wrote to the Prime Minister a lengthy communication giving
vent to his dissatisfaction with the whole conduct of the war,
and expressing his wish to leave the Government.

Ultimately, he was dissuaded from his apparent intention to
resign, and he took the War Office.

Donald's article, however, was not forgotten. From the
time of its publication in June until Mr. Lloyd George was
installed as Prime Minister in December, the two men did
not meet, although they spent most of their week-ends as near
neighbours at Walton Heath, and played golf on the same
course. Before the war, such an estrangement would have
been incredible.

In pre-war days the policy of the Daily Chronicle was to sup-
port Liberalism. Following the Liberal path, it pursued a line
almost midway, inclining slightly to the left. Thus, for long
periods, it was moving with Mr. Lloyd George, and was so
consistently in harmony with his views that it came to be
regarded by many, including Mr. Lloyd George, as peculiarly

WALTON HEATH AND WHITEHALL 93

his mouthpiece. But when the war came, bringing problems
that were not related to the old issues, and making political
opinion more fluid, the independence of the Daily Chronicle
became manifest, and Mr. Lloyd George resented the fact that
Donald would not follow at his heels wherever his impulses,
his intrigues, and his personal ambitions took him.

Lady Donald recalls an occasion when Mr. Lloyd George
entered the Donald home in high dudgeon, with a copy of the
Daily Chronicle in his hand. Donald being absent, he invited
Lady Donald's attention to the leading article and expressed
great annoyance with some part of it which he interpreted as
a criticism of himself.

Lady Donald reminded her visitor of his devotion to the Bible.
She quoted the line " whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth,"
and suggested that any criticism of him which appeared in the
Daily Chronicle must be taken in that spirit.

But Mr. Lloyd George was not appeased. Wagging a moni-
tory forefinger he exclaimed, " Tell Robert I will not have it.
If it appeared in any other paper I would not care much, but
the Chronicle is different."

Lady Donald declined to deliver the message, saying that
she did not interfere in her husband's professional affairs, and
if she did convey such a message to her husband, she did not
believe for a moment that he would be intimidated by it.

The rebuff which Mr. Lloyd George suffered on this
occasion may or may not have an echo in a conversation which
took place on Christmas Day, 1916, between Lord Riddell and
Mr. Lloyd George.

R. : You saw Gardiner of the Daily News on Thursday.
I hear that he asked Donald to join him in urging discus-
sion of peace terms. Of course D. declined. He is sound
on the war, and he knew what to expect when he reached
home had he adopted any other course.

(Mrs. D. is a Frenchwoman and a most ardent patriot
and anti-German.)

94 ROBERT DONALD

L.G. (laughing heartily) : Well, surely you don't object.
Every man is entitled to endeavour to ward off domestic
misery.

R. : In this instance, interest coincided with duty.

Which is proof that what the rationed dining-tables of the
colony lacked in fare was made good by the witty conversation
of the diners. And to dissipate the suspicions of the un-
generous, it should be said that most of the colonists by habit,
or by force of the Royal example, were teetotallers, so that
these coruscations of wit were sustained only by tap -water.

CHAPTER V
PROFIT AND LOSS

THERE was a time when pacifists argued that the Press
made wars because wars meant good business for the
newspapers. If that statement were true at any time,
the experience of the Great War did not confirm it.

During 1914-1918, interest in the news about the war cer-
tainly increased the demand for newspapers. Readers
acquired the now widespread habit of buying more than one
newspaper. Individuals who had been content to buy one
morning newspaper now purchased two, in the hope that the
second paper carried some news that was not in the first : or
perhaps they supplemented the resources of the orthodox
paper by those of a picture paper. Sales of newspapers
increased substantially.

Income from the sale of the paper, however, is not the most
important item in the accounts of newspaper enterprises ; the
advertisement revenue is far more important. And no less
important are the costs of production.

As the war dragged on, the costs of newspaper production
grew enormously. Paper (" newsprint ") rose in price from
about £9 per ton in 1914, to £35 in 1918, and the restrictions
upon imports led to the rationing of supplies, so that enterprise
was cramped and the space available for advertisements was
severely limited.

A study of the pre-war habits of the public in relation to
newspapers makes it fair to assume that, had the war not
occurred, the newspaper industry would have enjoyed a con-
siderable growth of prosperity. Taking that prospect, and

95

96 ROBERT DONALD

setting beside it the actual experience of newspaper companies
during the period 1914-1918, there is no doubt that the news-
papers lost heavily by the Great War. The aftermath was
even more serious. The economic consequences of the war
killed off newspapers by the score.

In the first two years of the war, however, business was good.
In 1915 the net profits of the Daily Chronicle and Lloyd's
Weekly News were £43,650 — equal to a dividend of 32-7 per
cent (free of tax) on the ordinary shares. Though the company
had done better than that in some pre-war years, 32-7 per cent
was a return well above the average.

During 1915 and 1916 there was encouragement to enter-
prise in the newspaper field, so long as those in charge did not
take too gloomy a view of the duration of the war. In those
circumstances, although it was none too easy to make good the
losses of the staff through the claims of war service, Frank
Lloyd and Robert Donald felt that development should not be
entirely arrested.

In the early days of the war they decided to launch upon the
production of periodicals and cheap books. One of the first
fruits of this decision was a pictorial weekly called the War
Budget which in the course of the war attained a weekly sale of
250,000 copies. Other productions were added, and many
small booklets and popular " libraries " were published by the
company. By 1918 this branch was yielding a net profit in the
neighbourhood of £20,000 per annum.

In this development it is only fair to say that Donald's part
was largely advisory. The credit for the success of the under-
taking belonged to others, prominent among them a newspaper
manager who has since achieved distinction in a larger field,
Mr. F. J. Cook.

Less fortunate, however, was the decision to launch an
evening newspaper. Impelled by the well-founded belief
that there was room for another halfpenny evening paper in
London, Donald secured Frank Lloyd's approval to plans
for a paper to be launched in the spring of 1915.

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PROFIT AND LOSS 97

The choice of a title was not easy, and eventually it was
decided to revive an old name — The Echo. For thirty-seven
years (from 1868 to 1905) there had been in London an evening
newspaper called The Echo, and at one time it had enjoyed
great popularity. Only ten years had elapsed since its name
had been cried throughout the city, and possibly some of the
goodwill it had enjoyed might be secured by the new paper.
As against sentimental objections to giving the new paper the
title of a paper that had died, there was the important fact that
no other available name was so agreeable to the ear or so easy
for the sellers to call. So the new paper was named The Echo.
There was to be a subsidiary, family title, The London Evening
Chronicle, attached obviously with the intention of capturing
the goodwill of readers of the morning paper.

This part of the plan was generally approved. But the next
decision was surprisingly unorthodox. It was resolved that
" at first " the paper would take no advertisements.

The arguments in favour of this course were cogent and
ingenious. By excluding advertisements during the time when
the paper must win popular favour, it would be possible to
give a much larger measure of news. The public, it was
reasoned, bought a newspaper for the news. The Echo
would give an abundance of news, full measure, pressed
down and running over. That would make the public
talk about the new paper. Advertisements would wait upon
success. Advertisements for the first issues of a new paper
were always easily secured, because public curiosity in the first
few numbers ensured a good circulation and careful perusal.
But an excess of advertisements would mean less space for
news at the very time when the paper should be giving better
value than its rivals. So the one-idea men, the " news, first,
last, and every time " school, won the day.

London was promised not merely a new evening paper, but
one which, at first, would be unique by reason of the absence
of advertisements. In the sequel, that proved to be its only
claim to distinction.

98 ROBERT DONALD

The Echo and London Evening Chronicle was born in March,
1915. That was a propitious month for new newspapers.
Within a few days of the publication of The Echo, the Sunday
Pictorial and the Sunday Herald (now the Sunday Graphic)
were launched upon the world, and achieved very great suc-
cess. But not by giving a surfeit of news at the expense of
variety.

On March 22nd, a fleet of swift, attractive little vans broke
away from Salisbury Square bearing the first issue of The Echo.
It had a clean, workmanlike appearance and, as the result of
several rehearsals in which a complete paper was printed but
not issued to the public, the first number gave no evidence of
having emerged from an office which had never before
published an evening newspaper.

The news of the day was above the average in interest. The
Russians had captured Przemysl after a six months' siege : a
Zeppelin had been wrecked near Liege, and a German liner
that had attempted to dash out of a neutral port in South
America had been turned back by gunfire from forts. The
plats du jour were excellent, and the news a la carte was
prolific.

On the feature pages there was some good reading. T. P.
O'Connor contributed a special article, predicting a great
future for evening newspapers. Charles Garvice, then the
most popular writer of romantic fiction, provided the serial
story. Feminine interests were represented efficiently but not
generously. The new paper began well.

Six weeks later The Echo was dead. A " funeral card " in
its thirty-sixth issue, published on May 3rd, announced its
amalgamation with The Star, to take effect the next day. Fleet
Street estimated Frank Lloyd's loss at something between
£60,000 and £100,000.

Expert opinion, published in the Newspaper World, said
that the paper had been " extremely well-done in every
respect," but " lacked distinguishing form."

An inquest by a jury of experienced journalists would, per-

PROFIT AND LOSS 9$

haps, have held that the paper was not given the chance it
deserved. Six weeks is no time in which to establish a habit,
and the purchase of a particular newspaper is a habit which the
public must be induced by patient and persistent effort to
acquire. Nor can a newspaper, in so brief a space, develop
distinctive characteristics, or even outgrow its teething
troubles.

The first requirement of a new London newspaper is a pro-
prietor with the courage to see his money poured out in
distressingly large sums. In this instance (if the estimate of
loss be correct) Frank Lloyd watched it gush out at the rate of
more than £10,000 per week. After six weeks he faltered, and
suddenly — quite unexpectedly it would seem — he decided to
cut his loss and stop the publication of the paper.

The decision not to take advertisements was mistaken. After
the first week it was rescinded, and a certain measure of
success attended heroic efforts to get advertising, in spite of the
fact that canvassing arrangements had to be improvised hur-
riedly, instead of being set up pan passu with the carefully
constructed organization for producing the paper. An
increasing revenue from advertising, even though it were
inadequate, would have fortified the proprietorial nerve.

It is questionable, too, whether readers appreciated the
absence of advertisements. In varying degrees, the general
public are interested in advertising, and it is arguable that even
readers who do not peruse the advertisements would have an
uneasy feeling that a paper that did not carry advertising was a
freak publication which could not live long. While news is the
first essential of a newspaper, it is by no means the only
desirable component.

Fleet Street had few tears for its lost infant, and within the
Daily Chronicle office the mourning was neither profound nor
prolonged. Events immeasurably more tragic were happening
every hour across the English Channel.

During 1915 Donald paid two visits to France. One of
these he appears to have undertaken with a semi-official mission

160 ROBERT DONALD

to inquire into the state of political opinion in France concern-
ing the war. In a long report written on his return he records
several conversations with French politicians, and adds his own
observations. One Minister with whom he talked made a
remark concerning the post-war future which is worth recalling
now, nearly twenty years after it was made. This statesman,
visualizing the period after the war, said :

" We must have a reduction in armaments. I do not see
the millennium in sight yet, but the production of arma-
ments could be controlled by an international Commis-
sion, upon which the present belligerents and the neutrals
would be represented. The Commission would have its
agents in every country to see that the production of arms
was reduced to the scale imposed upon all nations. No
guns, explosives, or war equipment should be manufac-
tured secretly or by private firms. Limitation of arma-
ments can only be accompanied by international agree-
ment, and it would be necessary to have an international
force to see that agreements were observed. I throw out
this only as a suggestion for the purpose of emphasizing
the imperative need for united action by England and
France when the war is ended."

Among those whom Donald met was Georges Clemenceau,
then free of office and employing his gifts largely in out-
witting the French censorship regulations. His paper,
L'Homme Libre, having been suppressed, he was editing a new
journal, L'Homme Enchaine. Donald wrote a short, anony-
mous article for the Chronicle describing a call on Clemenceau,
in which he remarked, " M. Clemenceau has a notable record,
and we may expect that in spite of his seventy-four years, he
still has a great future." How great, perhaps hardly Donald
guessed, for it could not then have seemed credible that
Clemenceau would become the supreme political figure pro-
duced by France during the war.

This was not Donald's only call on Clemenceau, the editor.

PROFIT AND LOSS 101

" During the war," Donald told a gathering of French-
Canadian journalists at Quebec in 1920, " I visited Clemen-
ceau frequently in his modest home in the Rue Franklin, and
also in the tiny office of his paper, up a small stairway in a dark
court, where sat the strong, virile man of France, at a plain
deal table, writing his articles and correcting his proofs. . . .
From this position he leapt to the head of the Government at
the gravest time in the history of his country. By his courage,
his tenacity, his fine spirit and his ardent patriotism he saved
France and became the greatest figure in the world. When he
was eighty years old and retired, a friend regretted that he had
not become President of the Republic. ' That is nothing,' he
replied, ' with good men and a good paper, one can be king
of the world.' "

In August, 1915, Donald crossed the Channel on a visit to
the British Army. Although he was received at General Head-
quarters, he did not see the Commander-in-Chief, and Sir
John French wrote to him later expressing his regret that they
did not meet. Close behind this letter came another from the
Field-Marshal thanking Donald for a leading article dealing
with the British Army in France which had been published in
the Daily Chronicle as the result of Donald's visit. This
second note must have been gratifying to Donald, because,
some time earlier, there had been published in the Daily
Chronicle, without Donald's approval, something about G.H.Q.
which had been less pleasing to the Commander-in-Chief, for
French wrote concerning it :

" I am quite sure the article to which you refer was
never approved by you. It is very unfortunate that people
can be found with such evil minds as to spread slanderous
reports — particularly in such times of stress and strain ;
but we must take this world as we find it ! "

In the following year, Donald visited the French Army,
taking with him Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who, later, wrote a
series of articles for the Chronicle recording his impressions.

102 ROBERT DONALD

With Conan Doyle to write the story, there was little left for
Donald to say, but under the pseudonym of " A Special
Correspondent," he wrote an article for the War Budget
describing some of his experiences in the Argonne, in which
he said :

The great forest consists of sturdy oaks and beeches and
firs, with a thick tangle of undergrowth, mountain, valley,
and plateau alternating. The soil is soft clay, admirably
suited for entrenching, tunnelling, and mine warfare —
when it is dry. As an outside observer, I do not see why
the war in this area should not go on for a hundred years,
without any decisive result. What is happening now is
precisely what happened last year. The only difference
is that the trenches are deeper, dug-outs better made,
tunnels are longer, and the charges of explosives heavier.
The armies are fighting Nature in the Argonne. The
great oak and beech trees have to be destroyed completely
before any advance can be made. Shells smash the trees,
but leave broken trunks and torn and twisted branches, as
an impenetrable barrier between the foes. They cannot
be destroyed by liquid fire ; there is equal danger to both
sides from such a conflagration. Explosives — and some-
times there are fifty tons in one mine — tear up the trees by
the roots, hurl them into the air and excavate a huge
crater ; but obstacles remain which make an immediate
advance impossible. . . .

Starting from Sainte Menehould you are motored along
the valley, passing villages which have been burnt by the
enemy or have suffered from his artillery. There are
many soldiers on the road. There are encampments in
the woods, where huts have been built, or tents erected —
" nigger villages " as the French call them. You notice
that the huts are in some cases planted on the hillsides and
great underground dwellings constructed. Leaving the
car you are led up a mountain-side along rough paths.

PROFIT AND LOSS 103

Everywhere there are trenches, barbed wire, machine
guns where they are least suspected, and all the compli-
cated arrangements for defence. You soon have to take
to the trenches. They are very deep, very narrow, and
very wet. Streams of water run at the bottom. You
must walk over wooden ladders made of the branches of
trees, and have difficulty in keeping your feet. When
nearing the summit the visitor has to put on a steel
helmet. It is very heavy.

The nearer one gets to the front the more mysterious
and wonderful become the methods of defence. You are
allowed to peer through an observation post towards the
German trenches a few hundred yards away. You see
absolutely nothing but a mass of brushwood, broken
trunks of trees, hanging branches and barbed wire.

At one point we are only ten yards from the enemy.
" The Bodies are just the other side of the road," said
our guide. You look through a periscope, but see no sign
of life whatever. You can just identify the enemy
trenches. They have snipers on both sides to catch the
unwary, and just as we are looking a French soldier on
outpost duty is hit. We return down the hillside again by
devious trenches to safer quarters. . . . " The whole
mountains," said an officer, " are burrowed like a mole-
hill. . . ."

On another part of the front we had a similar experience
of exploring the Forest, but in this case the lines of con-
tending trenches were about four hundred yards up the
hill ; we came down the opposite slope, trudging through
trenches to the valley near the Four de Paris, the scene of
the fierce battle in 1914.

Shells had left their imprints in the valley quite
recently. The soldiers were encamped at the foot of the
hill. Their kitchens and huts were at the base, barbed
wire and entrenchments behind them. We wanted to
know why the Germans, having what appeared to be the

104 ROBERT DONALD

advantage of position, did not attack at night. We were
told that the French guns on the opposite hill were
trained on the enemy trenches, and at the first signal of a
movement they would pour a shower of shells into them.
The enemy tried an attack by gas recently, but it rolled
back on themselves. Every now and then trenches change
hands in the Argonne. The French capture a first trench
partly for the purpose of securing a few German prisoners.

The guns are always at work. On the day of my visit to
this area there was an almost continuous bombardment
going on. The shells were hurtling over our heads. You
heard the sharp discharge, and then the exploding of shell.
You saw nothing. The sound re-echoes through the
woods and valleys like rolling thunder. The French fire
six rounds to the enemy's one. The object of the cannon-
ading is to disturb any work going on behind the enemy
lines.

We watched the system at work from the security of
an observation post. The concealment of observation
stations in the Argonne is complete.

The " Boches " occupied an exposed position, about a
mile and a half away. They were at work in a quarry
above the French trenches. " Give them a salvo of ten,"
telephoned the lieutenant to the guns, perhaps a couple of
miles behind us. The first shell fell short. The lieu-
tenant telephoned the direction in metres and the gunners
soon got the exact range and planted their shells in the
quarry. " We saw a German band hobbling along over
there in a bunch the other day," said the lieutenant, " and
we planted a shell in the middle of them. You should
have seen them roll down the hill ! "

Donald would have liked to see more of the war, but there
is no evidence that he visited the front again. He was not one
of those journalists who are inclined to seek such privileges
more for the satisfaction of their own curiosity and the inci-

PROFIT AND LOSS 105

dental pleasures of an excursion, than for the discharge of a
specific duty. Apart from the necessity of informing his mind
in a general way on the realities of the campaign in the field,
there was no need for Donald to add to the embarrassment of
the military authorities by swelling the crowd of civilians who
visited the front. Such assistance as he could give in the
conduct of the war lay in other directions, and he applied
himself to the work that he could do.

CHAPTER VI
EXIT ASQUITH

A)UITH'S resignation of his office of Prime Minister
in December, 1916, and the dissolution of the first
Coalition Ministry have been the subject of lengthy
controversy. To those who, like the writer, viewed this
upheaval from obscure military places, it had the appearance
of an inevitable event. It seemed very like the familiar
spectacle of the supersession of a manager whose loss of grip
on his duties has long been apparent ; or as Dr. Addison has
expressed it, as " the culmination of a well-grounded dissatis-
faction with the handling of affairs." For large numbers of
people the only circumstance connected with the episode
which causes any surprise is that such a vast amount of dis-
cussion and controversy has rumbled and flashed about it.

That much-instructed person, the historian of the future,
may possibly accept Lord Beaverbrook's estimate of the
importance of all the details attending the change of govern-
ment of 1916. But we cannot anticipate the historian's verdict,
and since the minutiae of the episode are still considered
important, Robert Donald's record of events merits
presentation.

Donald was, rightly and properly, a close observer of the
political events of December, 1916. He witnessed the play
from the wings. It is not claimed that he acted as a prompter,
or that he did anything that had a decisive effect on the
development of the drama. As the editor of what was then
the principal Liberal newspaper in London, he kept himself
closely in touch with the persons chiefly concerned in what

106

EXIT ASQUITH lof

was the end of the Liberal Government which began its reign
in 1905. The event was, perhaps, even more far reaching
than that. History may describe it as the beginning of the
end of the Liberal Party.

Though, normally, Donald did not keep a diary, he had a
habit of compiling memoranda concerning episodes of excep-
tional interest. They began as notes dictated immediately
after an interview or a conversation, and might be extended in
revision. During the political crisis of 1916 he made many
such memoranda. Arranged in a sequence which is not neces-
sarily their chronological order, these writings tell the story as
he knew it.

The first document, which he had filed under the heading
" Political War Crisis of 1916," relates to an event which
occurred on or about November 6th, 1916.

Sir Henry Norman called on me at 10 o'clock at night,
with M. Painleve, the French statesman who had come
over that morning from Boulogne. They remained
about two hours, during which time M. Painlev6 dis-
cussed the new situation in view of the German attack on
the Roumanians and the indication that Roumania would
be defeated. Formerly, Painleve had been rather
optimistic about the war, but on this occasion he was very
depressed. His theory was that the Germans would over-
run Roumania and they would then turn to attack the
allied force at Salonica, which would be unable to with-
stand them. We should have to withdraw, and the Allies
would never recover from the blow. It would be the end
of the war. There would be a revolution in France. The
conditions in France were thoroughly bad.

I pointed out that there had been great victories on the
Somme.

He replied that they did not matter ; taking a
few villages on the Somme would never win the
war.

io8 ROBERT DONALD

I said : " What about the French reconquest of Ver-
dun, retaking ground in a few days which had taken
Germany five months or so to conquer ? "

He replied that that was quite an easy matter, seeing
that the Germans had withdrawn many of their guns to
the Roumanian front and had weakened their forces. He
said that the military direction of the war was thoroughly
bad. It had been wrong since the Battle of the Marne.
They must get rid of Joffre and make other changes in
the High Command in France before any progress could
be made. Both the French High Command and the
British had deliberately starved the forces in Salonica.
Any old motor-car which was not good enough for France
was sent to Salonica ; old guns had also been dispatched.
The British had equipped only two divisions and they
were deliberately placing difficulties in the way of equip-
ping more. He complained of the complete failure of our
action in Greece, and he said that influences, not only here,
but at the Quai d'Orsay, had been at work against the
authorities whenever they attempted any firm action
against the Greek King. He considered that dynastic
influences were at work here and that other influences
were having the same effect in France.

M. Painleve came over, he said, to see Mr. Lloyd
George with whom he had lunched that day, and a good
deal of whom he would see during the week, in the hope
that by combined action they might devise plans, both for
France and for England, for the better direction of the
war. If something radical were not done at once he was
convinced that we would be defeated.

Painleve remarked that France was becoming ex-
hausted, and that there were only 800,000 reserves.
Practically the whole of the French Army had been
through Verdun. He was surprised that we had i ,700,000
British soldiers in France. The French people did not
know that we had any such force. Briand's speech,

EXIT ASQUITH 109

which was placarded all over France, only referred to the
British Army as being " thousands and thousands."

He said that the Allies could even then help Roumania,
by sending guns and men. His view was that the war
had to be won in the East. Germany would conquer the
whole of the Balkans. The Orient was the objective of
German ambitions. M. Painleve said that they must
have a secret session in France, to thrash out the whole
thing, and there might be a reconstruction.

M. Painleve spent several days in London and met Mr.
Lloyd George several times, Sir Henry Norman acting as
interpreter. The two statesmen seem to be of the same
mind.

The next entry in this informal diary occurs on November
24th, 1916.

Sir William Robertson and the Marquis de Chasseloup
Laubat lunched with me. Sir William on this, as on
former occasions, referred depreciatingly to the Rou-
manians. He never thought that they ought to have come
in, and he always considered they would not be much
good when they did join. He was quite against the
Eastern effort, as he has always been, and now he con-
sidered that it had become quite impossible owing to the
difficulty of transport. He thought that the effect of
dragging in the Balkans was only to prolong the war and
weaken our forces in the West. The only two Eastern
countries which could have given us effective help were
Bulgaria and Turkey, and we had them against us. He
looked upon the origin of the Salonica expedition as
purely political on the part of France. He was equally
opposed to our tactics in Greece. Being there, he con-
sidered that we should have taken drastic steps long ago.
Altogether, he thought that the Eastern policy was hold-
ing up a great many men. He said that the war would
never be won by killing Turks or Bulgars. It could only

no ROBERT DONALD

be won in the West, with the help of Russia in the East.

He said that an attempt had been made to get him to go
to Russia. He did not know who originated it, but he
thought it was Mr. Lloyd George. It was evidently one
of the results following the recent Paris Conference. He
did not want to go to Russia. He feared, apparently, that
his position might be jeopardized in his absence and his
colleagues interfered with. He did not want to run the
risk of meeting the same fate as Kitchener. He did not
see what good he could do if he were in Russia. Only
the previous night he had to go to No. 10 Downing
Street, where Mr. Asquith and Mr. Balfour had talked to
him and tried to persuade him to change his mind and
undertake the mission. He did not argue with them, but
simply reiterated his " No ! "

After lunch Sir William asked me to walk with him to
the War Office. He complained that there was far too
much delay and no possibility of getting decisions out of
the War Council. It was far too big and there was too
much discussion. Something had to be done, in order to
get a move on. He liked Mr. Asquith, but he was inde-
cisive and behaved more like a judge than a president who
is leading a war policy. He heard discussions and
generally decided by what appeared to be the opinion of
the majority, although it might be quite wrong. Sir
William said that the only man who could decide quickly,
say " Yes " or " No "without hesitation, was Lloyd George.
He might say the wrong " Yes " or the wrong " No "
sometimes, but he much preferred that to no decision at
all. He was in favour of some arrangement which gave
Mr. Lloyd George greater power. He did not mean
greater power to interfere with military operations, but
greater power in the direction of war policy.

During the afternoon I called on Mr. Bonar Law at the
Colonial Office. He was rather despondent. He said that

EXIT ASQUITH in

the more he saw of the war the less confident he was to pre-
dict what would happen. He had made up his mind that
some change must take place here. The War Council had
grown too big and too clumsy in its methods. He was
quite convinced from his point of view, and from his know-
ledge, that things could not go on as they were.

I told him that I had contemplated pointing out the
need of more energetic methods, and the creation of a
smaller and more businesslike War Council.

He suggested that I should see Mr. Asquith on Monday,
as soon as he returned to London.

I told him that I was not in the habit of seeing the
Prime Minister ; the danger was that if I did so, our
liberty of action would be restrained. We could not very
well publish articles, after such an interview, on lines
which the Prime Minister might think undesirable. But
I said I would try to use Mr. Asquith. As a matter of
fact, I did telephone to Mr. Bonham-Carter, but decided,
as it was difficult to see the Prime Minister that day or
even the next day, that it would be inadvisable to see him
before we published an article.

Mr. Bonar Law said he had no scheme to propose just
then, but he was going to think very hard over the matter
during the week-end and would see Mr. Asquith on
Monday or Tuesday, and tell him that things could not go
on as they were.

At this time, as has been revealed by Lord Beaverbrook and
others, proposals for the formation of a War Council within
the Cabinet were already being discussed by the principal
Ministers. Interested parties were holding secret meetings ;
" soundings " were being made. Without knowledge of these
developments, Donald caused to be published in the Daily
Chronicle an article strongly critical of the direction of the war.
This article was intended, says Donald, " to stimulate Mr.
Asquith and to assist him in carrying through reforms, as we

ii2 ROBERT DONALD

feared, unless he, on his own initiative, acted, the parliamen-
tary Opposition would become so powerful that he would be
forced to give way and to make humiliating concessions."

Published on Wednesday, November 29th, 1916, under the
title : " The Trials of the Coalition " the article declared :

We were not originally favourable to the formation of a
Coalition Ministry, but ever since it was formed we have
supported it, because in its very nature it can hardly be
replaced during the war without national dissension and
grave international peril. Nevertheless unless it shows
more grip than it latterly has, it seems to us in serious
danger of coming to grief in spite of the absence of an
alternative.

The Ministry's arch-defect is inability to make up its
mind. It is not so much that it reaches wrong decisions,
as that for weeks and even months, it fails in crucial
matter after crucial matter, to reach any decision at all.

After observing that any number of instances might be cited,
the article catalogued seven examples of " urgency dis-
regarded," and these without touching upon great questions
of war policy. " And, let nobody fancy that we have exhausted
our quiver."

The War Cabinet, the article continued, had become a
clumsy machine, without capacity for quick decision ; but no
remedy could be discerned in " mere changes of personnel."
The War Cabinet should be reduced to four, including Mr.
Asquith, Mr. Bonar Law, and Mr. Lloyd George ; and it
should have the widest powers of prompt action in conjunction
with the Admiralty and the General Staff.

On that prophetic suggestion, the Daily Chronicle terminated
a long and vigorous article.

This article was in the editions sold on the morning of
November 29th. On the afternoon of that day the Westminster
Gazette also published an article expressing somewhat similar
views. This coincidence (for such it was) caused Donald,

EXIT ASQUITH 113

many months afterwards, to inquire of the editor of the West-
minster Gazette, Mr. J. A. Spender, how the Westminster
article came to be written.

" Some of our friends," added Donald, " thought there
was collusion between us, which, as you know, was not
the case. My article has been in process of incubation for
about a week or so. I knew that a movement was going
on in favour of a reconstruction of the War Council, and
that it would be forced by the resignation of either Lloyd
George or Bonar Law, or both. As that movement had
been at work ever since the debate on the Nigerian
properties,1 the War Council was not likely to be made a
more efficient body in the meantime. I concluded
that if Asquith did not reform his own house it
would fall about his ears. Our article, therefore, while
critical, was designed to be friendly criticism, although I
believe it was not accepted as such, either by Asquith's
side or by Lloyd George's. We received protests from
some of the Whips about it, and I know that Lloyd George
seized on it to enforce his demands. Your article, coming
on the top of ours, greatly strengthened his hand."

To Donald's inquiry, Mr. Spender replied :

" I had no prompting except my own unaided wits. I
saw another tornado coming and tried to get in front of it.
No complaint was made to me by anybody.

Possibly, if I had realized how much some of the dead-
locks were contributed to by the motive which you con-
jecture, I should have worded what I wrote a little
differently. But whatever the motive, it was necessary for
friendly journalists to say that the consequences would
be what they were, unless the old Government could
shake itself loose and get out of the trap."

1 A debate notable for the fact that when the House divided sixty-five
Unionists voted against the Government, of which their leader (Bonar Law)
was a member.

n4 ROBERT DONALD

The effect of the Daily Chronicle article was considerable.
It was freely quoted in other newspapers and was interpreted
by some commentators as a revolt against Asquith in a quarter
which hitherto had been scrupulously loyal to him. The feel-
ing it created within the Asquithian camp is indicated by a
note made at the time by the then parliamentary correspondent
of the Daily Chronicle, the late Harry Jones. Within a few
hours of the publication of the article, Jones met, in the House
of Commons, one of the Liberal Whips. This member
expressed surprise that the Daily Chronicle had joined in the
attack on the Government. Jones replied that " our desire
was, by helpful criticism, to strengthen the Government's
hands, not to embarrass it." The Whip admitted that there
was justification for some of the Chronicle's criticisms, but
added, " There is a dirty intrigue on against the P.M. I hope
the Chronicle is not in it. ... Your article, coming now, will
encourage the plotters."

One immediate result of the article was a message to
Donald from Lord Fisher saying he wished to see Donald on
" a very urgent and important matter." Donald called on the
Admiral, and Fisher began by a reference to the article, but
soon launched into the subjects of Admiral Jellicoe's appoint-
ment to the Admiralty, of the rival merits of Admirals Jellicoe
and Beatty, and ending on his favourite topic of the necessity
of a landing on the Baltic coast of Germany.

Among Donald's memoranda on the political crisis the next
note of importance is :

Friday, ist December, 1916.

Called by appointment on Mr. Bonar Law. One of his
first questions was whether I had seen Mr. Lloyd George.
I said I had not. I referred to the article which the Daily
Chronicle had published on the 29th, and said that I had
decided not to go and see the Prime Minister before
writing, as it might have limited our point of view. He
said that was quite right. I asked him if any progress had

EXIT ASQUITH 115

been made with regard to the smaller War Council. He
said they were thinking about it. One thing he was
very anxious about was that nothing should be done to
humiliate the Prime Minister. He wanted a plan carried
through which would leave the Prime Minister's ultimate
authority untouched.

Discussing the personnel of the proposed smaller
Council, he said that he objected to Mr. Balfour ; he was
too much like Mr. Asquith ; indecisive. I said that, as
First Lord of the Admiralty, he ought to be a member.
Mr. Bonar Law hinted that it might be necessary to
remove him from that position. He said nothing to my
remark that perhaps he and Mr. Balfour would change
places. He also strongly objected to Mr. McKenna, and
said that it would be necessary to have Carson as a
member, otherwise his difficulties would not be removed
(referring to the position in the House of Commons).
Mr. Bonar Law said nothing about the presence of a
Labour member. Mr. Lloyd George would be chairman,
in the absence of the Prime Minister.

With regard to Carson, he said on a former occasion,
that it was always galling to him to know that the men
now supporting Carson were the men who backed him
for the leadership of the party and had been his steadfast
friends.

Saturday, 2nd December.

I dined with Mr. T. P. O'Connor and Mr. Dillon at
' Winddale," Walton Heath, on Saturday evening, and
discussed the possibility of a smaller War Council. Both
considered that Mr. Asquith should not be chairman ;
they also opposed the presence of Mr. Balfour. Mr.
Bonar Law was weak, and they would not have Sir Edward
Carson at any price. As a matter of fact, what it came
down to was, that the only member they approved of was
Mr. Lloyd George. They had been spending the after-

n6 ROBERT DONALD

noon with Mr. Lloyd George, and complained that the
Prime Minister did not use the men of action which he
had with him. (T. P. told me on Friday, the zoth Dec.,
that he gathered that what Mr. Lloyd George wanted was
a " One man " War Council.)

Sunday, yrd December.

On Sunday, December 3rd, 1916, the Unionist mem-
bers of the Cabinet, with the exception of Mr. Balfour,
met at Mr. Bonar Law's house. They passed a resolution
suggesting that the Prime Minister should resign, which
meant, of course, that the whole Government should
resign ; and if he did not do so, they would.

Mr. Bonar Law was deputed to take the resolution to
the Prime Minister and to explain that the object in view
was not to embarrass him, but to help him. The Prime
Minister, apparently, did not see how their action could
help him, and it was thought that the matter was not quite
clearly explained to him. Lord Curzon and some other
Unionist members also saw Mr. Asquith and pointed out
to him the advantages of the policy which they suggested.
It was quite evident that the purpose of the Unionists was
to give the Prime Minister a free hand in reconstructing
his Government.

Sunday, $rd December.

I saw Mr. Bonham- Carter,1 in the evening, when the
Prime Minister was discussing the situation with Mr.
Lloyd George. A little later Mr. Bonar Law called on
the Prime Minister. He saw him alone at first and then
the three had a long conference which lasted nearly three
hours. At that time Mr. Bonham-Carter hoped that an
arrangement could be arrived at, but he had no know-
ledge of what the three were discussing. Later it appeared
that the subject of discussion was the proposal which Mr.

1 Then Private Secretary to Mr. Asquith, now Sir Maurice Bonham-
Carter.

EXIT ASQUITH 117

Lloyd George had submitted on Friday. I was an hour
with Bonham-Carter, but could not wait to see the Prime
Minister. I spoke to Bonham-Carter later on the tele-
phone and gathered that the situation was hopeful and
the prospect of an agreement good.

Monday, ^th December.

When I saw Mr. Bonham-Carter in the afternoon, he
indicated that the Prime Minister was very much dis-
tressed by the article which appeared in The Times that
morning, which, he said, made an arrangement almost
impossible. It looked then as if a plan was being matured
to get rid of the Prime Minister or to humiliate him
altogether.

Tuesday, $th December.

Sir George Riddell telephoned in the morning to say
that things were very bad, that the " old man " had gone
back on his written word, had given himself away alto-
gether, and that Mr. Lloyd George was going to resign.

Later Sir George Riddell telephoned to say that the
Prime Minister was going to accept Lloyd George's terms
and be simply a member of the War Committee.

Wednesday, 6th December.

On Wednesday night Sir George Riddell telephoned to
say that Mr. Lloyd George had wished him to let me
know that he was forming a Government and that he was
confident of getting Labour to join him. Lloyd George
had gone to his (Riddell's) house in Queen Anne's Gate
for dinner after he had returned from the Palace. Lloyd
George said that unless something were done we should
be faced with a terrible disaster, etc.

Donald's most interesting interviews, however, occurred
after Asquith had resigned. Between December yth and the
end of the month, he discussed events in turn with Asquith,

ii8 ROBERT DONALD

Lloyd George, and Bonar Law. The talk with Asquith
occurred on the day after the resignation, and the following is
Donald's full note of the conversation.

jth December, 1916.

I called on Mr. Asquith at 10, Downing Street, at
4 o'clock. He was sitting at the large table in the Cabinet
room, his back to the fire. He looked a very lonely figure
and a tired man. Lying in front of him were a few letters,
just received from political friends. He had a quiet and
severe expression.

I asked him for his version of the negotiations which
had been going on. We began talking of Mr. Lloyd
George, and I asked if he thought, as it seemed on the
surface, that Mr. Lloyd George, or somebody in his
interest, had been preparing for the failure in the nego-
tiations which had occurred and for the removal of
himself as Prime Minister.

He said that Mr. Lloyd George had always professed
to be most friendly with him and no rift had occurred in
their personal relations. He had the greatest admiration
for him. Lloyd George possessed unique gifts, a real
flare for politics, foresight, inspiration, etc. He would
not say that Lloyd George owed everything to him, but
he certainly owed a great deal. He saved him during the
Budget of 1909, when all the Cabinet turned against him,
and he came to his rescue and risked his own fate with
Lloyd George's (see Lloyd George's reference to this
remark). There was another occasion, better known,
upon which he prevented Lloyd George from having to
disappear for a time from public life. (Mr. Asquith was
no doubt referring to the Marconi incident.)

Mr. Asquith had been convinced for some time that
the War Council had become too cumbersome and that a
more workmanlike body was necessary. Representations
had been made to him, both by Mr. Bonar Law and Mr.

EXIT ASQUITH 119

Lloyd George. He had discussed the subject with both
of them, but nothing definite had been arrived at and no
workable plan had been produced.

Mr. Asquith went to Walmer for the week-end. Hearing
that developments were taking place the Prime Minister
motored to Downing Street from Walmer on Sunday, and
sent for Mr. Bonar Law and for Mr. Lloyd George.
(Bonar Law had seen him earlier, to convey to him the
resolution of the Unionist members, but the Prime
Minister asked him to think that the resolution had not
been delivered.) They then discussed the scheme for the
smaller War Council. Most of the suggestions came from
Mr. Asquith and subsequently were referred to in a letter
which he sent to Mr. Lloyd George. There was prac-
tically no difference of opinion as to the general scheme.
The Prime Minister, of course, was to be a member of the
Council and to attend as often as he could. As a matter of
course he could not attend all the meetings, because the
idea was that the Council should meet daily ; in his
absence Mr. Lloyd George was to be chairman. A strong
difference of opinion developed on the suggested per-
sonnel of the Council, and that matter was left over for
adjustment on Monday.

On Monday the Prime Minister saw an article in The
Times, stating that the proposal was to exclude him from
the War Council altogether ; the personnel was suggested,
and other information given which could only have
emanated directly or indirectly from Mr. Lloyd George.1
This revelation led to the suggestion that the one purpose
in view was to humiliate the Prime Minister and to place
him in a position which could only have led to more
embittered attacks and increasing insults. His position

1 Mr. Lloyd George in his War Memoirs, Volume 2, says : "I had not
communicated any information as to the negotiations which were going on
with Mr. Asquith or the agreement arrived at with him to the editor of that
paper, either directly or indirectly,"

120 ROBERT DONALD

would have been made untenable. He wrote to Mr.
Lloyd George saying that he feared that the statement in
The Times would make any rearrangement difficult, if
not impossible. He then recounted in writing, for the
first time, what " the suggested arrangement " was,
writing in the past tense, and using the word " suggested "
as no agreement had been arrived at and no definite
arrangement settled. Mr. Lloyd George replied during
the morning that he had not read The Times and asked
the Prime Minister not to close the negotiations because
of what had happened.

Later in the day, the Prime Minister saw Lord Grey,
Mr. McKenna, Mr. Runciman and some other friends.
He gave the subject further thought, and on Monday
night sent a letter to Mr. Lloyd George closing the
negotiations, and leaving the Minister for War no option
but to resign.

Mr. Asquith explained why he objected to the per-
sonnel of the Council, as proposed by Mr. Lloyd George.
The whole proposal of creating a smaller War Council
was, he said, to make it more efficient for running the
war. Mr. Lloyd George was the most eminently quali-
fied person to be on the board and the best fitted to take
the chair in the absence of the Prime Minister. He was
entitled to do so because of the position he occupied and
because of the great part which he played in the war
previously as Chancellor of the Exchequer and as Minister
of Munitions.

As regards Mr. Bonar Law, Mr. Asquith said he was on
the War Council, not in virtue of any office he held, or of
any ability which he possessed, or for his knowledge
about the war, but because he was the leader of the Con-
servative Party. He had nothing to say against him ;
he had accepted him because of the position he held, but
he did not consider that he had shown any great qualities
jn helping thein to run the war. He was afraid to take

EXIT ASQUITH 121

decisive action, was very timid, and always showed up
better in the House of Commons than he did in Council.
Mr. Asquith said he had a very great personal regard for
Mr. Bonar Law, who had been most loyal and friendly to
him, and he appreciated his high character and personal
qualities more the longer he knew him. Mr. Asquith
believed that he had been a very good iron-master who
had come into political life late, and had shown no qualities
which entitled him to occupy a commanding position.

As regards Sir Edward Carson, Mr. Asquith would not
have him at any price. He ruled him out at once. He
said that his would be purely a political appointment, less
justified than Mr. Bonar Law's. Sir Edward Carson had
been in the Cabinet for six months, during which time
he had shown no initiative, had made no helpful sugges-
tions, and really was a disappointment to his friends. He
had been a personal friend of Mr. Asquith for many years,
but judging the War Council purely from the point of
view of efficiency he considered that Sir Edward Carson's
presence would be a drag, and could not be justified.

The inclusion of a Labour member was also purely
political, with no reference to the knowledge which the
member possessed, or his capacity to help them in run-
ning the war. Mr. Henderson had been mentioned, but
he failed entirely to pass any test which could be applied
to a member of a War Council, except as a delegate of
Labour. The body which Mr. Lloyd George proposed
was, then, acceptable as regards the number, but, with
the exception of the Prime Minister and himself, it was
far less efficient than the existing War Council. Mr.
Asquith said that the personnel of the new Council was a
body pour rire. In regard to himself, every personal con-
sideration would induce him to retire. He had had two
and a half years of very strenuous work in a difficult
position and he said he was almost au bout de mes forces.
Jf he had accepted the part in the new War Council

122 ROBERT DONALD

which was evidently destined for him, his life would have
been intolerable. The attacks upon him would have been
renewed, and, after a gradual process of humiliation, he
would have had to retire.

The personnel of the proposed Council had not been
seriously discussed, except with regard to Mr. Balfour.
Mr. Asquith said that he insisted that Mr. Balfour, as
head of the Admiralty, should be a member. He objected
strongly to his removal. Mr. Balfour had just carried
through a most difficult scheme of reorganization.

Mr. Asquith, for many months, had been very anxious
to get Jellicoe to the Admiralty as First Sea Lord. After
the Battle of Jutland the relations between Jellicoe and
Beatty became so strained, each with their strong
partisans, that it was extremely difficult to make a change.
Mr. Balfour went to Edinburgh, and it was due to his
tact and skill that he succeeded in getting Jellicoe to come
to the Admiralty as First Sea Lord ; which was not so
difficult, it appeared, as to get Jellicoe to consent to
placing Beatty in command of the Grand Fleet. Mr.
Asquith considered that Beatty had his limitations, but,
granted that Jellicoe had to go to the Admiralty, he
believed that Beatty was the next best man to command
the Grand Fleet. To have removed Mr. Balfour from
the Admiralty after he had accomplished this work
would have been most unjust and would have had a bad
effect on the Service. Mr. Asquith considered that the
Navy liked Mr. Balfour. They did not like Mr. Churchill,
and were not too fond of Mr. McKenna, although he
worked loyally with them. Mr. Asquith felt that it
would be disastrous if Lord Fisher were brought back to
the Admiralty.

Mr. Asquith spoke with great bitterness with regard to
the calumnious and unscrupulous campaign which had
been directed against him and his colleagues. He seemed
to be more concerned for his colleagues than for himself.

EXIT ASQUITH 123

I pointed out that he had shown always great toleration
and generosity, and he said that perhaps he had erred too
much in that direction ; but he was always anxious to
consider others, and had accepted many proposals
simply from a desire to bring about conciliation and
unity. He said that he could not have joined Mr. Bonar
Law's government unless he could have brought his
friends with him, referring to Lord Grey, Mr. McKenna,
Mr. Runciman, and also Mr. Balfour.

Although it seemed then that Mr. Lloyd George would
succeed in forming his government, it was very doubtful
whether it would last long, and in that case I presumed
that he, Mr. Asquith, would be sent for again. I asked
him what his attitude would then be towards Mr. Lloyd
George and others.

He said, with a good deal of animation and firmness,
" then Mr. Lloyd George would have to come in on my
terms." My impression was that Mr. Asquith was quite
convinced that Mr. Lloyd George could not form a stable
government.

Mr. Asquith was evidently not in touch with public
opinion, and had only prejudiced sources of information.
He complained of the Press attacks, but he never took any
account of the Press himself. He maintained a curious
aloofness and regarded newspapers as not being of much
account. He took no pains, either personally or through
his secretaries, to keep in touch with newspapers which
were his supporters. They had to support him in the
dark.

Some years ago, before the war, I wrote asking if I
could see him for a few minutes. His secretary replied
asking what I wanted to see him about. I did not answer,
and I forget what the subject was ; but I must have con-
sidered it important, or I would not have asked to see him.
Although I have written to him on several occasions, I
never again asked to see him.

124 ROBERT DONALD

The next interview of which Donald made a memorandum
was with Mr. (now Sir Maurice) Bonham-Carter, who
was Private Secretary to Asquith for many years and was
in the closest touch with the Prime Minister during the crisis.

Donald's note of his conversation was as follows :

2Oth December, 1916.

Mr. M. Bonham-Carter to-day gave me his version of
the course of events during the critical period.

Mr. Lloyd George submitted his first statement of what
he desired in the way of a War Committee on Friday,
December ist. He did not write a letter, but brought a
few notes with him and placed his plan before the Prime
Minister. The essential feature of his scheme was that
there should be a War Committee of three, including the
Minister for War and the First Lord of the Admiralty.
The third member was not mentioned. The Prime
Minister was not to be a member. Bonham-Carter
thought that Lloyd George had himself in view as Chair-
man ; the others would probably be Mr. Bonar Law, and
Sir Edward Carson — one or other of whom would go to
the Admiralty instead of Mr. Balfour.

There had been some talk earlier in the week with
regard to remodelling the War Committee — a change
which Mr. Asquith was quite ready to make. He, how-
ever, turned down Mr. Lloyd George's plan, on Friday
night. He left for Walmer on Saturday morning.

On Saturday, rumours were current that Mr. Lloyd
George proposed to resign, and were more definitely
announced in some Sunday newspapers. The Prime
Minister had also heard of a meeting of the Unionist
Party.

He returned from Walmer to Downing Street on
Sunday evening. He saw both Mr. Lloyd George and
Mr. Bonar Law, together and also separately. It was at
this meeting that a new plan was evolved. Mr. Lloyd

EXIT ASQUITH 125

George brought some points, and the Prime Minister
added others, and at the end of the evening there was
practically no difference with regard to the constitution
of the new War Committee. Mr. Lloyd George was to be
working chairman ; the Prime Minister would attend
when he could. It was not discussed whether he would
on those occasions occupy the chair or not, as it was taken
as a matter of course that, when present, he would be in
the chair. The situation, therefore, on Sunday evening
was hopeful. The difficult question of personnel had not
been seriously tackled, except that the Prime Minister
strongly opposed the suggestion that Mr. Balfour should
be removed from the Admiralty.

Mr. Asquith had a visit during the evening from the
anti- George members of the Conservative Party, who
explained that their resolution asking him to resign was
intended to be helpful — to give him a free hand in a
reconstruction scheme. Curzon was one of the Ministers
referred to.

Mr. Lloyd George, before he left on Sunday evening,
mentioned to Mr. Bonham- Carter that his idea was that
Carson should be a member, and also Henderson. This
was the first time that Labour had been mentioned. I
gathered that this point had not been seriously discussed,
except in a general way, with Mr. Asquith.

The whole situation was changed on Monday morning,
when it was obvious that the most confidential matters
discussed on the previous evening had been conveyed to
The Times. A new plan was disclosed in The Times, the
effect of which would have been to humiliate the Prime
Minister and to give a stimulus to the campaign of abuse
of Ministers, which had been carried on so long. Upon
this the Prime Minister wrote to Lloyd George, saying
that, in view of what had appeared in The Times, he
feared it was impossible for them to arrive at any under-
standing ; he questioned that any scheme would be poss-

126 ROBERT DONALD

ible. He then wrote what the " suggested arrangements "
were, and referred to the proposed constitution and
functions of the new Committee as " suggested " the pre-
vious night. Mr. Lloyd George replied during the day
that he had not seen The Times and he was not responsible
for what Northcliffe did. Northcliffe was out to smash
the Government, and Lord Derby and he (Mr. Lloyd
George) wanted to save it. I gathered that Mr. Lloyd
George expressed some hope that it was still possible to
arrive at an agreement and said that he was ready to
resume negotiations at the stage they had been left on
Sunday night. Mr. Asquith, in view of this letter from
Lloyd George, considered the matter again, but finally
came to the conclusion that he would only be seeking
more trouble if he proceeded with it. This conviction
was not affected by his conversation later in the day with
McKenna, Grey, Crewe, Harcourt, and Runciman. Their
opinions only strengthened him in the conclusions at
which he had arrived. He then wrote a letter to Lloyd
George, which left him no alternative but to resign.

Mr. Bonham-Carter thought that the reason why the
Conservatives joined the Lloyd George Government was
that they had come to the conclusion that he would form
a Government in any case.

Mr. Asquith was rather hurt on realizing that Mr.
Balfour had left the Admiralty and was joining the Lloyd
George government. Mr. Asquith was prepared to
reject Mr. Lloyd George's proposal solely on the question
of the retention of Mr. Balfour at the Admiralty. He
felt that, while Jackson and Mr. Balfour were a good
combination, Jellicoe and Balfour would be better. There
was also Balfour's loyalty to Asquith and his success in
bringing about the change at the Admiralty. Asquith
feared that without Balfour at the Admiralty, at any rate
for some time to come, strong personal antagonisms might
develop to the detriment of naval efficiency.

EXIT ASQUITH 127

The Prime Minister was kept in touch with the trend
of Lloyd George's policy through Mr. Montagu and the
Lord Chief Justice (Lord Reading).

Unfortunately, Donald's memorandum of his talk with the
new Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd George, lacks the day of the
month on which it occurred, but an allusion to propaganda
suggests that it occurred towards the end of the month for,
early in January, Donald took up, at the Prime Minister's
request, the question of British propaganda in neutral
countries. Donald's memorandum reads :

? December.

Mr. Lloyd George asked me to call and see him at
Downing Street to invite me to report on propaganda.
It was the first time I had spoken to him since May,
when our relations became strained on account of my
attitude about the conditions of his appointment as War
Minister. After discussing propaganda, our conversation
turned on the recent crisis.

Mr. Lloyd George told me that Mr. Asquith had him-
self acknowledged that it was impossible for him to
direct the war and also to carry on his duties as Prime
Minister, as things were. He quite realized the situation.
They were in perfect agreement on Sunday night (Dec.
3rd, 1916). Mr. Asquith went to dinner at Mr.
Montagu's and it was felt that the crisis was over. Mr.
Lloyd George at one time thought, like his colleagues,
that Mr. Asquith was essential to national unity. His
relations with Mr. Asquith had always been friendly,
and were so up to the last. I said that Mr. Asquith
mentioned to me that he was the only man in the Cabinet
who had supported Mr. Lloyd George in his Budget of
1909. To that Mr. Lloyd George replied that this
Budget saved the Liberal Government and the Party.
Mr. Asquith, he said, was shrewd enough to recognize
that.

128 ROBERT DONALD

Mr. Lloyd George said that if things had gone on as
they were going we should have lost the war within a
few months.

A series of letters passed between Mr. Asquith and
Mr. Lloyd George during the crisis. Mr. Lloyd George
allowed me to read them all.1

During the closing days of December, Donald had a long
conversation with Bonar Law, now installed as Chancellor of
the Exchequer and Leader of the House of Commons. Of
this talk, Donald has left the following note :

2C)th December, 1916.

When I saw Mr. Bonar Law for a few minutes on
Friday, December ist, he said he would like to tell me
the whole story of the crisis. I saw him by appointment
to-day. I had discussed the question of propaganda and
one or two other matters first before he reminded me that
he wished to tell me what happened in connection with the
reconstruction of the Government. He said it was a very
interesting story. He was sorry he did not make notes of
things at the time, as a great deal depended not only on
days, but on hours. He continued :

" I had felt for some time that the Coalition was not
going well. The thing which brought the matter finally
to a head, so far as I was concerned, was the debate on
the sale of German properties in Nigeria, on Nov. 8th.
My friends and Liberals told me that I had scored a
great parliamentary triumph ; but I knew better. There
were sixty-five of my party against me. They were the
men who had formerly been my staunchest supporters.
The Nigerian debate was simply a symptom of discon-
tent with the Coalition, rather than hostility to myself.

1 The memorandum proceeds to summarize the correspondence, but as
the letters have been reproduced many times the precis of them is omitted.

b«a

EXIT ASQUITH 129

" I told the Prime Minister soon afterwards that some-
thing would have to be done. A little later I met Carson
behind the Speaker's chair, and asked him to come to
my room, where we had a talk. He was quite friendly.
He was absolutely hostile to the Government, and con-
vinced that the Coalition could not get on with the war
successfully as things were. I said that there should be
a smaller and more businesslike War Council. He agreed.
We did not discuss the question of personnel. I said
that Mr. Asquith was indispensable to the unity of the
nation. (In this, as events have proved, I was wrong.)
Carson agreed that Asquith was essential.

" I then got to work to consider what should be done.
This must have been the last week of November. Max
Aitken suggested that I should see Lloyd George. I was
quite willing to do so. We had a meeting with Carson.
By this time I had got a scheme sketched out. My idea
was a War Council consisting of Ministers without port-
folios, with the Prime Minister as President and Mr.
Lloyd George as Chairman. It was not assumed that the
Prime Minister would be able to attend frequently, but
when he was present he would take the chair, otherwise
Lloyd George would be permanent chairman. I did not
discuss the question of personnel. Both Lloyd George
and Carson considered that Balfour would not do. They
evidently thought that he was too much of the same type
as Asquith, with regard to making up his mind and
arriving at decisions. I would not discuss Mr. Balfour's
position ; I said that I would not be a party to his
removal and I would not take his place at the Admiralty.

" I went to Mr. Asquith with my scheme, and pointed
out to him that unless he acted on his own initiative
things would get serious. If he acted then he would get
the credit for remodelling the machinery for running
the war, but, if he delayed, criticism might lead to an
agitation and he would be forced to act and thus find

i3o ROBERT DONALD

himself in a humiliating position. It was quite evident
that Mr. Asquith did not realize the seriousness of the
position. This must have been, I think, about the 28th
November. (The Daily Chronicle article appeared on
the 29th.) He evidently feared that my proposal would
injure his prestige as Prime Minister, and he was probably
anxious about the attitude of Mr. Lloyd George when
he assumed what was practically the chief part in the
direction of the war. I said to him that he had arranged
difficult situations before, and referred chaffingly to the
question of my claim to the Chancellorship of the
Exchequer when the Coalition was formed. Mr. Asquith
did not, however, accept my scheme.

" Mr. Lloyd George saw him, I think, on the 3oth,
and had a discussion. There did not seem to be any
serious disagreement. I was in communication with my
Unionist colleagues on the subject. On Friday, Dec.
ist, Mr. Lloyd George produced a scheme, without
going into the question of personnel, and providing for
a War Council of only three, without the Prime Minister
being a member. This committee was to consist of the
Minister for War, the First Lord of the Admiralty, and
another not named.

" By this date rumours of coming trouble had got
abroad. The question of Mr. Lloyd George's resigna-
tion was mooted, and I feared that the time for recon-
struction under Mr. Asquith had become too late. Mr.
Asquith went to Walmer on Saturday morning (Dec.
2nd). I called a meeting of my Unionist colleagues in
the Cabinet at my house on Sunday morning, and put the
position before them. They agreed with me that the
best policy was for Mr. Asquith to resign, or at any rate
for them to resign, so that Mr. Asquith could have the
question of reconstruction entirely in his own hands.
Our attitude was not intended to be hostile to the Prime
Minister ; on the contrary.

EXIT ASQUITH 131

" I went with the paper which we had drawn up and
saw him early in the afternoon, on his return from
Walmer. He did not like our proposals, and asked me
to consider that the paper had not been delivered. I,
therefore, did not deliver it.

" I saw my colleagues again that day and we became
anxious about the position.

" I told the Prime Minister he should see Lloyd
George. He sent for him. We both saw the Prime
Minister, separately and together, and we arrived at
practically an agreement with regard to the constitution
and functions of the new Council. Mr. Asquith had
not accepted Mr. Lloyd George's scheme, but we three
thrashed out a scheme which met with his approval. We
did not discuss the question of personnel, except that he
indicated he did not approve of our suggestions.

" There the matter rested on Sunday night, leaving
the question of personnel for settlement. The outlook
was favourable. The constitution and functions of the
new War Council had been agreed upon. The position
and authority of the Prime Minister in regard to the
Council had been agreed upon.

" On Monday Mr. Asquith was much disturbed by the
article in The Times, and then wrote to Mr. Lloyd
George turning his proposal down. This refers to Mr.
Asquith's letter which he read almost in full at the
Reform Club meeting. Before setting out the points of
the agreement on Sunday night he had used the phrase
' The suggested arrangements were . . .'

" I still thought that, in spite of this most unfortunate
disturbance of the negotiations, the situation could be
saved. I called on Monday afternoon at 10 Downing
Street. Lord Crewe, Mr. Runciman, and Mr. Harcourt
were waiting to see the Prime Minister. When I went in
I found McKenna with him. I told him that, whatever
he did, not to fall between two stools, and indicated

132 ROBERT DONALD

that I thought there was still a chance for him to
keep the Government together, if he acted promptly.
On Tuesday morning Mr. Lloyd George telephoned to
me to go to the War Office, to show me the letter which
he had received from the Prime Minister. I thought it
was better that I should not be seen about the War
Office, and asked Mr. Lloyd George to send the letter
to me and I would look at it. This was the letter com-
pletely turning down the whole scheme and leaving Mr.
Lloyd George no option but to resign."

Mr. Bonar Law agreed that the Prime Minister had
changed his attitude. He had not broken his written
word, but he had gone back on the agreement arrived at
by the three of them on Sunday night, with regard to
the constitution and functions of the War Council.

The change of attitude of the Prime Minister was
brought about, not only by what had appeared in The
Times, but partly on account of communications received
from the Lord Chief Justice (Lord Reading) and Mr.
Montagu. These two were apparently acting as inter-
mediaries between the Prime Minister and Mr. Lloyd
George, conveying to the Prime Minister what they
thought Lloyd George was thinking, and telling Lloyd
George what the attitude of the Prime Minister was.
Both were exceedingly anxious to keep the Coalition in
power and to maintain the association between the Prime
Minister and Mr. Lloyd George.

I told Mr. Bonar Law that Mr. Lloyd George's
secretaries had been very busy communicating to the
Press during the crisis, and that Mr. Lloyd George him-
self had seen a number of newspaper men. Mr. Bonar
Law said he feared that something of the kind was going
on, and he was sorry. Lloyd George agreed that Balfour
would be the most suitable man for the Foreign Office,
and commissioned Mr. Bonar Law to broach the subject
to Mr. Balfour. Mr. Bonar Law went to Mr. Balfour

EXIT ASQUITH 433

and put the proposal before him. At first Mr. Balfour
did not like giving up the Admiralty ; he said it looked
very much like putting a pistol at his head, but he was
attracted by the offer of the Foreign Office and, after a
little consideration, accepted. Mr. Bonar Law said that
this was a very noble act on Mr. Balfour's part. The
presence of Mr. Balfour at the Foreign Office retained
Lord Robert Cecil.

Mr. Bonar Law said that he did not believe that during
the crisis Mr. Lloyd George was planning to displace
the Prime Minister, or even wanted it done. He wished
to work with Mr. Asquith. They all believed that Mr.
Asquith was necessary to national unity, and they were
working towards maintaining him as the head of the
Government.

After considering Donald's reports of the views of Asquith,
Mr. Lloyd George, and Bonar Law, it is fitting that another
statesman who followed them into the office of Prime
Minister should enter into the narrative. In 1916, Mr.
Ramsay MacDonald was out of harmony with most of his
colleagues of the parliamentary Labour Party, and the possi-
bility of his becoming the first Labour Prime Minister
scarcely entered the mind of any responsible observer of
political events. The attitude of the country towards him
was reflected in the first electoral contest after the war, when
he experienced a crushing defeat and was unable for some
time to find a constituency that would return him. Through-
out this dark period of MacDonald's career, and although
differing profoundly from his views, Donald maintained his
friendship with the Labour leader. They breakfasted
together fairly regularly at Donald's house in Taviton Street,
and of one of these meetings Donald wrote as follows :

1 3th December, 1916.

Mr. MacDonald had breakfast with me and gave me
an account of the interview between the Labour members

134 ROBERT DONALD

and Mr. Lloyd George. Lord Derby was with Mr.
Lloyd George when they were received at the War Office.
Mr. Lloyd George spoke for about forty minutes, and
described in very vague and general terms what his
scheme was with regard to Labour. He referred to the
mobilization of men for agriculture ; the control of
mines, and the taking over of shipping. He devoted a
good deal of attention to the importance of keeping
pigs. He said that the refuse of London could be used
for feeding pigs. He told them about the condition of
the country and the state of war. Ramsay MacDonald
and Mr. Sidney Webb were present, as well as Philip
Snowden, and some others who did not agree with Lloyd
George, and they asked numerous questions, endeavour-
ing to pin the new Prime Minister down to definite
promises. He declined, however, to be caught. When
he was asked, for instance, what he meant by the " con-
trol of coal mines " he did not say definitely ; nor did he
answer definitely questions about the treatment of labour.
He was exceedingly amiable, but excessively indefinite.
He was like a bit of mercury ; when you thought you
had caught him he darted off to something else ; when
pressed with questions from MacDonald or Sidney
Webb he avoided coming to close quarters, by a diver-
sion. The majority of the Labour members were greatly
impressed by the conversation. The first man to whom
Mr. MacDonald spoke was J. H. Thomas. MacDonald
told him he thought it was a poor performance. Thomas
said he did not agree ; he was very much impressed by
what Mr. Lloyd George had said and thought that they
all ought to work for the nation. MacDonald assented,
but asked how — for the day or the morrow ? . . .

Thomas informed MacDonald later that he had
declined the most important office that Labour could
occupy in the new Government. MacDonald con-
gratulated him. He regarded Thomas as the strongest

EXIT ASQUITH 135

man among the Trade Union leaders in the Labour
movement.

Mr. Lloyd George was very amiable to MacDonald
personally, and jocularly remarked that he might have
to put him in prison, but he hoped he would come and
breakfast with him the day he came out. Discussing
Lloyd George's future, Mr. MacDonald said that he
quite realized the possibility of his becoming the leader
of the Labour Party.

Soon after the change of government, Donald met the
Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Sir William
Robertson, and made the following note of the conversation :

Monday, iSth December, 1916.

I had half an hour's talk with General Sir William
Robertson, whom I had not seen since the political
upheaval. He told me at once that the General Staff had
been charged with interfering in politics, and with having
inspired the articles which appeared in the Daily Chronicle
criticizing the general conduct of the war. (" Trials of
the Coalition," Nov. aQth, and " A Smaller War Coun-
cil," Nov. 3Oth.) He said that General X was supposed
to be the culprit. It seems that when the advocacy of
Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Bonar Law in favour of a
smaller War Council became critical, Mr. Asquith
informed Lord Stamfordham that the General Staff had
been interfering in politics and had inspired the articles
referred to. Lord Stamfordham told the King and the
King sent for Sir William Robertson. . . .

General X (who was with us) told me that he was
charged with writing the second short article, entitled
" A Smaller War Council." He said he agreed with
every word of it, but had nothing to do with it. ...
X said he had been present at one War Committee. He
said he had never heard people talk such a lot of rot.

136 ROBERT DONALD

They wasted a long time in discussion and arrived at no
decision whatever. The only man who was at all busi-
ness like and to the point was Mr. Montagu, whom he
much regretted had not remained in the Government.
(General Robertson held the same view with regard to
Montagu.)

Robertson seemed to be of opinion that there was a
system of espionage carried on from 10 Downing Street.
He said that he had been suspected because he had
breakfasted one morning with Lloyd George, Lord
Derby, and Sir Edward Carson. As a matter of fact he
had accepted the invitation to breakfast with Lloyd
George as it was an occasion when they had a little leisure
and opportunity to discuss business. Lord Derby was
present for the same reason. It was pure coincidence
that Sir Edward Carson turned up. He said that this
meeting was known at 10 Downing Street an hour after
breakfast.

On the general question of the new conditions, Robert-
son said that he liked the change. Mr. Lloyd George
was rather a difficult man to get on with, but he had
" go " and the power of decision. The only great danger
he could see was that Mr. Lloyd George would be in a
hurry to get victories. He had told him that we must
wait patiently, and that we are not likely to have victories
for several months. On the other hand Lloyd George
thought that victories were necessary to keep the Govern-
ment together and the country in good spirit. ' We
cannot," said Robertson, " do the impossible. Although
Mr. Lloyd George knows the conditions on the Western
Front in winter, and that any advance on our part is
impossible, he would like to see us try to get victories
somewhere else. He is not so keen on the Salonica
expedition as he was. He realizes the increasing
difficulties of transport."

EXIT ASQUITH 137

The next interview recorded did not take place until the
events to which it relates were two months old. In this
instance, Donald's informant was Edwin Montagu, who,
during the political crisis, had acted as liaison officer between
the Asquith and the Lloyd George camps. Donald's note of
the conversation is as follows :

2jth February, 1917.

Lunched with Mr. E. S. Montagu. The proposal
made with regard to the new War Council, when it was
first brought to Mr. Montagu's notice, was that it should
consist of Mr. Lloyd George, Mr. Bonar Law, Sir
Edward Carson, and himself. He at once wrote to the
Prime Minister, saying that he had heard of this, but he
would accept no position in a War Council of which he
(Mr. Asquith) was not the head, except on his express
instructions. This was a modification of the Council
proposed by Mr. Lloyd George on the ist December.
Mr. Lloyd George's proposal was that there should be
three members, but another Liberal was added so as
to hold the balance. Asquith did not agree to this
proposal.

Montagu hoped that the Prime Minister and Lloyd
George would remain in London during the week-end,
so as to be ready for any developments. The Prime
Minister went to Walmer, chiefly with the intention of
seeing Carson, who was supposed to be at Dover, but
who, as a matter of fact, had not left London. Mr.
Lloyd George contemplated resignation on Saturday.
Montagu realized that the Prime Minister should get Mr.
Lloyd George's letter at once, and, although he had left
for Walmer, got Bonham-Carter to take it to him by car,
with the purpose also of bringing the Prime Minister
back to town. The car did not get to Walmer until
12.30 a.m.

The Prime Minister returned to London on Sunday,

138 ROBERT DONALD

in time for lunch. Montagu lunched with him. Imme-
diately after lunch Mr. Bonar Law came in. The Prime
Minister said : c Well, have you anything to report ? "
Bonar Law was looking very grave, and said, " Excuse
me, Montagu, but I would like to see the Prime Minister
alone." Montagu then went downstairs. Lord Crewe
came in afterwards, and, after Bonar Law had gone, the
Prime Minister sent for him. Asquith did not say very
much in front of Crewe, who was not cognisant of the
negotiations proceeding with Lloyd George, as he would
have opposed any concession on the part of the Prime
Minister. Bonar Law had come to present a resolution
of the Conservative members of the Cabinet, which
opened up an entirely new and critical development.

On Montagu's suggestion, Asquith sent for Lloyd
George. It was found that he was not at the War Office ;
he had gone to Walton Heath. " That is the man of
quick action," said Asquith. Montagu said : " He must
be sent for." A message was sent to Walton Heath, and
Lloyd George returned to town that evening. Both he
and Bonar Law saw the Prime Minister, separately and
together. Montagu, who was waiting in another room,
was told by Lloyd George that they were likely to come
to an agreement, but he feared that Montagu would not
be a member of the new War Council. Lloyd George
said that they wanted Henderson. Montagu said that it
was an excellent suggestion. So far as he was concerned,
he did not mind so long as the question was settled.
When Bonar Law and Lloyd George were leaving they
met Gulland,1 and Lloyd George remarked, " You need
not get your writs ready, Gulland, there will be no
general election," which was another indication that an
agreement with regard to the new War Council had been
reached. Montagu did not anticipate that it would
break down over Balfour.

1 Chief Liberal Whip.

EXIT ASQUITH 139

That evening, when Mr. Asquith dined with him, the
Prime Minister mentioned that all Ministers would send
in their resignations to him, and that he contemplated
putting Runciman at the Admiralty in the reconstructed
Government. There were good hopes that the difficulties
over personnel would have been overcome.

Montagu begged the Prime Minister to put the under-
standing in writing and to send it to Lloyd George that
night, as he had promised Lloyd George that he would
do. Everything was exceedingly hopeful on the Sunday
evening, and it was from Montagu's house that the notice
was issued to the Press stating that Asquith had decided
to recommend the King to reconstruct the Government.

The next morning, at n o'clock, Montagu had a
message at the Ministry of Munitions that Lloyd George
wanted to see him at the War Office at once. Almost
simultaneously he had a message from Asquith that he
also wanted to see him. Lloyd George complained that
he had received no written message from Mr. Asquith
confirming the agreement arrived at. He, Lloyd George,
had been breakfasting at Lord Derby's with General
Robertson and Carson, but he had left word that a mes-
sage would find him there ; no message, however,
reached him there or at the War Office. He did not
know what this meant or where he stood. He asked
Montagu to see Mr. Asquith.

When Montagu arrived at 10 Downing Street he
found Asquith in a great state of perturbation over the
article in The Times. The Prime Minister felt that
everything was finished. Montagu told him that he was
attaching too much importance to the attack in The
Times. The purpose of Northcliffe,1 he explained, was
to get him out of office, and if he were to resign, North-
cliffe would be in a position to claim that he had accom-
plished his purpose. He begged Asquith still to write to

1 Then in control of The Times.

146 ROBERT DONALD

Lloyd George, putting on record the agreement arrived
at. Asquith did so in Montagu's presence, but he insisted
on prefacing it with some remarks about The Times
articles.

Montagu had a further talk with Lloyd George during
the day and there was a good deal of coming and going
between all parties. During the morning there was a
fair chance of matters being settled, and Lloyd George
thanked Montagu for the part he had played in saving
the situation and keeping him and Asquith together.

The previous night Asquith had intended resignation,
for the purpose of having a free hand in reconstructing
his Government, but on Monday, after he had seen
McKenna, Harcourt, and Runciman, he seemed to have
changed his attitude. They were very much annoyed at
not having been consulted when the negotiations were
going on with Lloyd George. Montagu tried to get hold
of Grey, but had failed. McKenna had succeeded in
capturing him. Things looked like breaking up on
Monday night.

The party known as " The Shadow Cabinet," consist-
ing of Hankey, Bonham- Carter, Masterton- Smith, and
Eric Drummond, dined at Montagu's house. Hender-
son's secretary, Young, was also present. It then
occurred to Montagu that it would be a good idea if the
King held a conference at Buckingham Palace. He sent
Hankey to see Lord Stamfordham. . . . Chiefly through
Montagu's persistency, the conference was subsequently
held, in the hope of keeping the Government together in
a reconstructed form. . . .

Lloyd George had told Montagu that he did not want
to form his own government ; he wanted to work with
Asquith. When, however, Bonar Law failed and Lloyd
George was invited to form a government, he discussed
the subject with Montagu. He would not have McKenna
on any conditions. He invited Montagu to join him as

EXIT ASQUITH 141

Chancellor of the Exchequer. Montagu said he would
rather remain where he was, but Lloyd George said,
" Supposing you were not able to do so." Montagu
replied that he would place himself at Lloyd George's
disposal. Montagu asked, " What about Grey ? " Lloyd
George said, " Well, would Grey take the Colonies ? "
Montagu said that that meant, of course, he would get
rid of Grey altogether, because, if he were not allowed
to remain at the Foreign Office, he would not be in the
Government.

Asquith was against Montagu joining a Lloyd George
Government. There was a meeting of the Liberal
members of the Cabinet on Monday evening, when
Asquith read Lloyd George's letter of resignation.
Buckmaster asked what their attitude should be if they
were invited to join a Bonar Law and Lloyd George
Government. McKenna said he would have no diffi-
culty in deciding, as he was not likely to receive an
invitation. There were a few laughing remarks, but no
formal decision was arrived at. When at a later stage
Lloyd George was forming his Government and Asquith
was invited to join, a meeting was held and both Montagu
and Henderson were in favour of Liberal Ministers join-
ing Lloyd George, but again no decision was reached
and no pledge taken. Later on Mr. Bonar Law sent for
Montagu and offered him the position of Financial
Secretary to the Treasury. Montagu felt that he could
not accept this position. When Lloyd George was
actually forming his government, Montagu received no
offer of a position beyond the preliminary sounding
which had taken place before Lloyd George realized that
he could form a government.

Lloyd George asked Montagu to take up the question
of Reconstruction and was ready to appoint him Director
of Reconstruction. Montagu drew up a scheme at the
new Prime Minister's suggestion. Lloyd George came

142 ROBERT DONALD

to breakfast with him and discussed it. He approved of
it and was sent to the War Cabinet. Montagu was invited
to attend a War Cabinet meeting. He was kept waiting
an hour and a half and was then told that his business
would not be reached that day. He was invited to
another meeting, waited for two hours, and still his
business was not reached. He went to a third, and,
without waiting long, ascertained that the business was
not likely to be reached, and left. Afterwards he was
informed that his scheme had been discussed and not
accepted. Another scheme had been put forward for the
creation of a committee, with the Prime Minister as
chairman and Montagu as vice-chairman.

Several years after the crisis, when time had given per-
spective to events, and there had been an interval for reflec-
tion, Donald set down briefly his own opinions of Asquith's
responsibility for what occurred. His comments will be
found in the succeeding chapter.

CHAPTER VII
AFTERTHOUGHTS ON ASQUITH

IN the autumn of 1932 the controversy concerning the
political events of December, 1916, enjoyed one of its
many revivals. The bellows which excited the embers
on this occasion were furnished by The Life of Lord Oxford,
a biography written by Mr. Cyril Asquith and Mr. J. A.
Spender, and the distinctive feature of this outbreak was
provided by Mr. A. G. Gardiner, sometime editor of the
Daily News, who, in reviewing the book in the Spectator,
focussed attention on Bonar Law's part in the events of the
fateful Sunday, December 3rd.

On that day, it will be recalled, the Conservatives who held
office in the Coalition Ministry took counsel together and
passed a resolution in the following terms :

" We share the view expressed to the Prime Minister
by Mr. Bonar Law some time ago that the Government
cannot continue as it is.

"It is evident that a change must be made, and in
our opinion the publicity given to the intentions of Mr.
Lloyd George makes reconstruction from within no
longer possible.

* We therefore urge the Prime Minister to tender the
resignation of the Government.

"If he feels unable to take that step we authorize
Mr. Bonar Law to tender our resignations."

When, later in the day, Bonar Law called upon Asquith,
he took with him a copy of that resolution. According to
Mr. Gardiner, the " intrigue " by which Asquith was over-

144 ROBERT DONALD

thrown " could not have triumphed but for the fact that
Asquith was never shown the terms of the resolution passed
by his Conservative colleagues on the Sunday morning.
Further," said Mr. Gardiner, " Bonar Law's failure to
convey them to him — he had already shown them to Lord
Beaverbrook — was one of the darkest blots on the page of
history. Asquith was led to believe that his Conservative
colleagues had come down on the side of Lloyd George, when
the precise contrary was the fact."

This criticism was construed by Bonar Law's son, Mr.
Richard Law, M.P., as a serious reflection upon his father's
integrity, and he defended Bonar Law's memory in a vigorous
rejoinder.

Donald followed this conflict with great interest, and set
down his own views upon the dispute in the following terms :

As an observer of events at the time, I am able to
throw some indirect light on the issue. The questions are :

Did Bonar Law show, read, or explain to Asquith the
resolution passed by his Conservative colleagues which
has provoked the discussion ?

The resolution was somewhat equivocal : it could have
been construed as directed against Mr. Lloyd George
and in favour of Asquith while at the same time it invited
Asquith to resign and reconstruct his Government. Had
Bonar Law actually delivered the resolution, would the
effect have been as is contended, that Asquith would have
remained Prime Minister and there would have been no
disruptive crisis in December, 1916 ?

Asquith's statement to me on the yth December,
recounting the history of the critical days, which I
recorded at the time, was that the Prime Minister pre-
ferred to think that the resolution had not been delivered.
My impression was that he knew its purport.

Before and after this incident Bonar Law explained to
me with the greatest frankness his attitude towards

AFTERTHOUGHTS ON ASQUITH 145

Asquith. He was loyal to his chief ; he declined to enter
into any intrigue against him — such action was repug-
nant to his nature. He considered that Asquith's
presence at the head of the Government was indispen-
sable to national unity, but Bonar Law was equally fixed
in his conviction that there must be a change in the direc-
tion of the war and that Asquith should give up the
Chairmanship of the War Committee. Some of the
Conservative Ministers, while they approved of Mr.
Lloyd George as the chief director of the war, did not
fancy him as the head of the Government : as his future
course was more difficult to forecast than was Asquith's.

The direction of the war had become so ineffective
that quick decisions with Asquith as chairman seemed to
be impossible ; while the clash of personalities, jealousy
and intrigue complicated the situation. There was no
other course than the reconstruction of the Government.
And the only alternative to the retirement of Asquith
was, in the opinion of military leaders, as well as of some
of his colleagues, that he should give up the chairman-
ship of the oligarchy who were to direct the war. This
he declined to do. The logical development of events —
opposition inside, and criticism outside the Government,
which cannot be tolerated in a war crisis — would have
forced Asquith's retirement. Events proved afterwards
that Asquith misjudged the situation and underestimated
the personal forces involved : he was convinced that Mr.
Lloyd George could not form a Government, because,
he said, no Liberals or Labour members would join him,
and also because Balfour, whom he looked upon as a
tower of strength, would not desert him.

When further records of the December crisis are pub-
lished I think the conviction will be confirmed that the
fate of Asquith did not turn on the Conservative resolu-
tion, but on the events which were crowding to a climax
in one of the darkest periods of the war.

146 ROBERT DONALD

On Asquith's record as Prime Minister opinions have been
pronounced by former colleagues and opponents. Robert
Donald's view, however, is of special interest by reason of
his friendly but distant relationship. As the editor of the
principal Liberal daily newspaper, Donald followed the whole
of Asquith's activities as Prime Minister with the closest
attention. He was a staunch supporter of Asquith, defending
him from criticism within the party as well as from the
assaults of his avowed opponents. Yet Donald viewed him
with a detachment which was denied to Asquith's colleagues,
for Asquith, as Donald has disclosed, never once during his
term of office admitted the editor of the Daily Chronicle to
his confidence. There was thus no intimacy to give bias to
Donald's judgment, and that denial of friendship by Asquith
would correct any excess of admiration which a Liberal editor
might naturally show towards a Liberal Prime Minister.
Further, Donald heard opinions of Asquith from many of
Asquith's colleagues, and the party truce which operated during
the war enabled him to hear also the judgments of men who had
spent the greater part of their political lives opposing Asquith.

In 1923, about the time that Asquith, now controlling the
balance of power between the Conservatives and the Labour
Party, had put Labour into office for the first time, Donald
was asked to write an article on " Mr. Asquith's Place in
History." In the course of the article he said :

Mr. Asquith has passed his grand climacteric. He will
not be Prime Minister again, head of a Liberal Govern-
ment. The Liberal Party will not be able to place him
in that position. But Mr. Asquith is capable of influenc-
ing the trend of current politics and of helping to mould
political thought. He can shorten or prolong the life of
the present Government. He was chiefly responsible for
its existence, and its life depends on his strategy.

Yet Mr. Asquith's place in the political history of his
country has been fixed by events of the past and nothing
in his future career, however notable it may be, can

AFTERTHOUGHTS ON ASQUITH 147

change seriously the perspective of his record. He will
be known as the first Parliamentarian of his time, a
finished debater, a sagacious leader. He will be remem-
bered as a man who had shining personal qualities, as
one who was loyal to friends and magnanimous to oppo-
nents, who never deviated from the strict canons of
honour to score a point in debate. His record of states-
manship will place him high up among Prime Ministers.
But he failed to put the coping-stone on his career. He
will not be classed in history with Peel, Gladstone, or
Disraeli, or with Campbell-Bannerman.

As Chancellor of the Exchequer under Campbell-
Bannerman he was a success. He introduced the greatest
measure of social reform of modern times, Old Age
Pensions, for which he never received full credit, and he
made more equitable the burden of income tax by
differentiating between earned and unearned incomes.

His career as Prime Minister was successful without
being brilliant. He lived on the policy which he had in-
herited from Campbell-Bannerman until Mr . Lloyd George
carried him along with the Radical current. Mr. Asquith
did not originate or initiate. In the latter years of his
pre-war Premiership Mr. Lloyd George supplied the
driving force and Mr. Asquith the restraining influence.
It was a fruitful political combination. If there had
been no war Mr. Asquith would have gone on the even
tenor of his way as a Prime Minister who, if he did not
originate, was always the loyal supporter of his colleagues
who did.

Mr. Asquith rose to his highest heights of patriotic
statesmanship when war was declared. He did not
hesitate. He did not flinch, but went straight forward
with the entire nation behind him.

In his lofty appeals to the nation he came nearer
inspiration than he ever did before or has done since,
and it is doubtful whether any other statesman would

148 ROBERT DONALD

have succeeded in uniting the people in that crisis in
their history when the fate of Europe depended on
national union in Britain. Had the war ended in the
first year Mr. Asquith would have been acclaimed as the
saviour of civilization.

History will judge him by the years which followed.
His moral authority began to decline in 1915. He
developed weaknesses as a war leader. He hesitated
when he should have acted. He studied the feelings of
others when he should have imposed his decisions.

Mr. Asquith's prestige received a blow when he
formed his first Coalition. He told the House of Com-
mons on 1 2th May, 1915, that the admission of leaders
of the Opposition parties " was not contemplated," and
he was not aware that it would " meet with general
assent." On the i8th he announced that " after long
and careful consideration " he had decided to do what
he had not contemplated six days previously.

He added one more failure to English statesmanship
in dealing with Ireland in his handling of the first
rebellion, with the result that Sinn Feinism was stimu-
lated and the seed sown which led to further tragedies.

But Mr. Asquith's fatality befell him at the end of
1916. There is no occurrence in the political history of
the war which provokes more controversy than the
crisis of November and December, 1916. No one who
took part in that drama will ever be able to get the right
perspective of it, and the material does not yet exist upon
which final judgment can be formed. Of the failure of
Mr. Asquith to rise to the occasion there can be no
doubt. He insisted on concentrating on himself too
heavy responsibilities. He was crushed under the load.
He allowed the War Committee to get altogether out of
hand. It was too big. As chairman, Mr. Asquith
behaved as a judge who was always trying to get a
unanimous decision and postponed the meeting if he did

AFTERTHOUGHTS ON ASQUITH 149

not get it. The machinery was breaking down. The
soldiers were in despair. Mr. Asquith was entreated by
Mr. Bonar Law and other friends to change. He waited.
His indecision was leading to disruption within. His
Government was crumpling. Mr. Asquith failed to
make up his mind. The crisis lasted two or three weeks
and then dramatic events swept forward with a rush
which carried Mr. Asquith to his doom.

Looking back on the incidents of those memorable
weeks one can see that Mr. Asquith misread the situa-
tion. He misjudged some of his friends and stuck
loyally to others who deserted him. He lost confidence ;
his courage failed. He was harassed by attacks from
without, and was apprehensive of tactics from within.
He had not the strength or the ruthlessness to conquer
the storm. He was wearied and worried, tired and down-
hearted. When he had fallen he was still hoping that
he might come back.

It was Mr. Asquith's fall in the most critical period
of the Great War which fixed his place in history. Sir
Alfred Robbins, the veteran parliamentary correspondent,
said the other day that all the Prime Ministers he had
known, with the exception of Campbell-Bannerman, had
gone out of office disappointed or humiliated men. Mr.
Asquith at the time may have felt that he was in both
categories.

Although during his term of office Asquith treated Donald
with something of the disdain with which he regarded the
popular Press, it would appear that in preparing the honours
list which it is customary for a retiring Prime Minister to
submit to the King, he desired to put forward Donald's name
for a knighthood. In his record of a conversation with Mr.
Lloyd George on Christmas Day, 1916, Lord Riddell says :

I told him (Mr. Lloyd George) that Asquith had
offered Donald a knighthood, which he had refused.

i So ROBERT DONALD

This had been followed by the offer of a baronetcy, which
Donald also declined. (Donald told me so this morning
and showed me Asquith's letter offering the knighthood.)

" It would not do," was Donald's comment on receiving
Asquith's letter, proposing the honour. He went at once to
see Asquith, and later sent to him the following reply :

2oth December, 1916.
DEAR MR. ASQUITH,

I am deeply sensible of the honour which you are
good enough to propose, with the King's approval, for
me, and I hope you will not think me ungrateful if I beg
you not to proceed with it.

I appreciate the generous motives which have prompted
you, and my gratitude to you is just as great and as
sincere as if I had been able to see my way to accept the
proposal.

I realize also that in proposing to honour me you were
honouring the profession I represent, and I shall ever be
grateful to you for this recognition.
Believe me,

Yours sincerely,

(Signed) ROBERT DONALD.

There were several reasons, the chief of which arose from
his unfailing sense of loyalty to the proprietor of the Daily
Chronicle, Frank Lloyd. Donald was conscious of the fact
that any services which had merited this proposed honour
were rendered only by virtue of his control of an instrument
which Frank Lloyd had entrusted to him. He felt that it
would be invidious to accept such a distinction while his
proprietor remained unhonoured. It was a worthy motive.
But loyalty must be mutual or it is futile. Whether Donald's
loyalty in this matter was properly requited by Frank Lloyd
should be considered in relation to the events of October, 1918.

CHAPTER VIII
THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD

IN days when war was a commonplace instrument of
policy or the expression of an autocrat's antipathies, it
can have mattered little to monarchs what the mass of
people in other countries thought about the causes of a
war, or about the manner in which it was conducted. There
was no such factor as world opinion with which to reckon.
To be sure, subjects might have their opinions on the purposes
for which their lives and their wealth were being expended ;
and, moved by the necessity of carrying popular opinion with
them, their rulers might take action to instruct the public
mind : but sustained efforts to influence popular opinion at
home or abroad were not regarded as an essential part of
statecraft.

Until the present century the necessity for such action in
time of war was scarcely appreciated, and not until the Ger-
mans found it desirable in 1914 to justify their actions did the
word " propaganda " obtain general currency, although a con-
siderable German organization for the manipulation of the
Press appears to have been at work for some time prior to the
war. Once begun, the German effort to influence the opinion
of neutral nations about the war had to be countered, and
early in the autumn of 1914 the British Government awakened
to the importance of meeting this unfamiliar form of warfare.

According to Robert Donald's notes on the subject, the
British Government began under very serious disadvantages.

In pre-war days it had been a British boast that its Press was
entirely free of official influences. Press bureaux such as were

151

152 ROBERT DONALD

attached to almost every Foreign Ministry on the Continent
were unknown in Great Britain. Journalists called at the
Foreign Office, but whether they received any information
depended very much upon the nature of their personal
relationships with the officials. According to Donald, the
desirability of keeping the Press informed was not recognized.
The Foreign Office had no press department for the assistance
of British newspapers or for the study of political conditions
abroad through the medium of the foreign Press.

In 1912, however, the British Government and the British
Press entered into official relationship of a rather distant kind.
The Cabinet had decided that in the event of war, instead of
controlling the Press by legislation, co-operation should be
established between the fighting departments and the news-
papers. To that end, there was set up a body representative
of the Services and the Press under the title of the Admiralty,
War Office, and Press Committee. This step, however, was
purely regulative and restrictive ; it had nothing to do with
that process of disseminating approved news and views
which we now know as propaganda.

With the outbreak of war came the setting up of a censor-
ship of the Press, but even when the hastily improvised
arrangements for censorship had begun to work, the Govern-
ment discovered that the world had presented to it a new task
which could only be executed in co-operation with the Press.
Ministers became aware of the fact that it was the duty of the
Government to justify and to explain Britain's part in the
terrible events which menaced the welfare of the whole
world.

The enemy was already at work explaining his case with
assiduity and skill. In this, Germany was helped very greatly
by the fact that some time prior to the war she had set up, and
had employed, a well-constructed organization for influencing
the Press of the world. It was, said Donald, " a most elaborate
network for the supply of news or the means for its distribu-
tion, and was worked in conjunction with the German Secret

THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 153

Service and the German Empire's representatives in different
countries." Through this widespread organization the enemy
supplied considerable quantities of tendencious news.

To the late C. F. G. Masterman, the British Government
delegated the duty of inaugurating a counter-campaign. The
immediate necessity was to explain the British case and to
defend British foreign policy. To that end Masterman, on
September 2nd, 1914, called a meeting of authors, who, in
response to his appeal, readily volunteered their services for
the writing of articles and pamphlets. There followed, a few
days later, a meeting of editors and journalists, at which plans
were formulated for reinforcing the supply of news to neutral
countries.

In the same month, on Donald's advice, a gifted journalist,
the late G. H. Mair, was attached to the Home Office for
special duties in counteracting German propaganda activities.
For a time Mair worked under a committee consisting of Lord
Burnham, Sir Frederick Smith (later Lord Birkenhead), Sir
George (later Lord) Riddell, and Sir Edward Cook. But this
was one of several committees on propaganda which were
more memorable for the brevity of their existence than for
anything they achieved.

Still, Mair did useful work, establishing on his own initia-
tive the British wireless news service, a foreign Press summary,
facilities whereby foreign journalists obtained news, and a
system for the distribution of newspaper articles to the Press
of the world.

" After a time," wrote Donald, " the Foreign Office began
to take an interest and a hand in the work, without being
reconciled to it."

Although Ministers appeared to take little or no interest in
it, the propaganda machine grew, and by the time the first
Coalition Government went out of office in 1916 both the news
and literary departments, from furtive and uncertain begin-
nings, had developed enormously, and had spread their
influence all over the world. But this growth had not been

154 ROBERT DONALD

properly directed ; there was no real head and no co-ordina-
tion of effort.

Through official and unofficial agencies abroad complaints
reached the Government concerning the deficiencies of the
British propaganda service, and the Press, too, was informed
by its foreign correspondents of the superiority of the enemy
effort to influence opinion in certain neutral countries. Donald
heard a great deal from correspondents abroad and from
visitors about the shortcomings of the British organization for
propaganda.

During 1916, Donald wrote extensively in the foreign Press
on British war aims. His best work in this direction seems to
have been done in Holland, where one article by him so dis-
turbed the enemy propaganda bureau that a German pamphlet
was issued in order to counteract its influence.

Soon after he was installed as Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd
George invited Robert Donald to Downing Street to discuss
the problem, and a few days after that interview Donald
received a letter which ran :

10, DOWNING STREET, S.W.

January ist, 1917.
MY DEAR DONALD,

I wish you would go into the question of our
present propaganda arrangements and let me have your
views on the subject soon.

Yours sincerely,

D. LLOYD GEORGE.

The appointment of a " committee of one," if not unpre-
cedented, was at least a refreshing change from the traditional
method of conducting official inquiries, and was characteristic
of the manner in which the new Prime Minister secured that
swift action whose absence had done much to bring the
Asquith administration into disrepute.

Donald lost no time in getting to work, and in little more
than a week — on January 9th to be precise — he submitted to

THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 155

the Prime Mnister a comprehensive report on the situation
and a series of recommendations.

The report showed how, in spite of many weaknesses, the
work had grown astonishingly from its small beginnings two
years earlier. The Foreign Office was assisting correspondents
by furnishing information and by arranging interviews with
public men. It was providing facilities for Allied and neutral
journalists to visit the Navy, the British front, the munitions
factories and other scenes of British war effort. Wireless
transmissions of enemy news were being intercepted, and a
certain amount of counter-propaganda was being conducted
by radio and by cabled statements to neutral countries.

At Wellington House, the headquarters of the National
Insurance Commission, C. F. G. Masterman presided over an
organization which was issuing an immense amount of propa-
gandist literature. From this centre six illustrated periodicals,
printed in many languages, were being published and dis-
patched. Official documents were being translated. Photo-
graphs illustrating the British effort were being distributed to
numerous countries and exhibitions of them were being
arranged. Cinematograph films had been made under the
auspices of the War Office and, with experts to exploit them,
had been sent out from Wellington House to Russia, Italy,
France, and other countries.

A particularly interesting section of Donald's report was
that in which he dealt with Sir Douglas Haig's dispatch on the
first Battle of the Somme. Those who have read that impres-
sive dispatch will agree with Donald in describing it as "a
memorable and historic document." Yet, at the time of
Donald's report, ten days after the publication of the dispatch,
it had not been issued in full to any of the Dominions, or to
any Allied or neutral country. Nor had it been translated into
any foreign language. This neglect was the more regrettable
because, as he pointed out, " England is the only country in the
war which issues full official accounts of this kind."

Donald made many far-reaching recommendations, the

156 ROBERT DONALD

purpose of which was to unify the various organizations, to
abolish overlapping and extravagance, but above all to ensure
a fuller, more prompt and more suitable service of news for a
larger part of the world than was then being supplied.

In accordance with Donald's recommendations, a Depart-
ment of Information was set up, and although the Prime
Minister " failed to secure the services of a man occupying a
strong political position and exercising Ministerial authority "
for its supervision, he acted on Donald's advice in appointing
Mr. John Buchan to the important post of Director of the
Department. Two attempts to set up advisory committees of
editors came to nothing, but many of the suggested improve-
ments were carried into effect to the general improvement of
British propaganda. The work, however, still fell short of
the ideal which Donald had in mind.

Ultimately, Sir Edward Carson was appointed Minister-in-
Charge of the Department, and the Prime Minister again
called on Donald's services in a letter which read :

October iqth, 1917.
MY DEAR DONALD,

After consultation with Sir Edward Carson, who,
as you know, is in charge of Propaganda, the War
Cabinet have decided to have an inquiry into the way in
which it has been carried out, with a view to its improve-
ment. I wish, therefore, you would undertake on behalf
of myself and the Cabinet to make a thorough investiga-
tion into all the Propaganda work carried on under the
direction of the Department of Information. You will
have full authority (i) to call for documents and reports
and to examine officials so as to obtain full information ;
(2) to have prepared a list of the officials employed, their
remuneration and conditions of service, also of the volun-
tary workers, and to compile an analysis of the total
expenditure ; and (3) to engage voluntary assistance, so

THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 157

that the investigation may be carried out as speedily as
possible.

Kindly let me know whether you undertake this very
important task on behalf of the Government.

Yours sincerely,

D. LLOYD GEORGE.

Donald submitted a preliminary survey within a few weeks,
and a more detailed report at the end of the year. In his
investigation he received valuable assistance from Mr. E. A.
Ferris (then News Editor of the Daily Chronicle) and from Sir
Arthur Spurgeon who examined the book-publishing side of
the Department's work.

The details of this report, highly important though they
were at the time, are of no interest to-day, but arising out of
his investigation Donald, later, made some notes about Russia
which are worth preservation. Writing in June, 1918, he
said :

We have failed in Russia both in the character and
extent of our publicity work, and this failure has played
into the hands of the enemy and of the Russian Pro-
Germans, assisting the German conquest, which is due to
propaganda and intrigue, and not to force of arms. For
six months after the Russian revolution the Department
paid for cables sent from a London newspaper which had
shown its sympathy with the old regime and was detested
by the new rulers. No attempt had been made by propa-
gandist literature or speakers to explain the British
Government treatment of labour, and to disabuse the
minds of the Russians of the idea that we are engaged on
a capitalist war. . . . The literature which has been
distributed in Russia was of little service in a country
where 80 per cent of the people do not read, compared
with the telling effect of personal contact and public
speaking. The German conquest of Russia was due

158 ROBERT DONALD

more to the stump orators and to intrigue than to the
weapons of war. They worked all through the army, and
in the cities and among the Soviets. We should have
adopted similar tactics. We sent a few propaganda
speakers who went to the army ; they were welcomed,
and were a great success, but we should have sent
hundreds instead of a few. Only one Englishman
addressed meetings throughout Russia. . . . Our propa-
gandist action has either been wrong or altogether inade-
quate. . . . The official committee in Petrograd have
been continually emphasizing their official character, and
thus neutralizing their influence. They remained isolated
from the people. Huge sums of money have been spent
to no practical end. It is a distressing story. . . .

The German conquest of Russia by propaganda could
not perhaps have been averted by the best-laid and far-
seeing plans, but, at any rate, the prejudice created by
German propaganda against England could have been
counteracted. The mischief cannot now be undone, but
we should at least give the Russian people an opportunity
of hearing our side and try to remove the prejudices
which have been fostered.

Whether those responsible for propaganda in Russia learned
much from the errors to which Donald drew attention, it is
difficult to say ; certainly it cannot be claimed that subsequent
efforts were conspicuously successful.

In the arrangements for propaganda generally, radical
changes were made in the last year of the war. Sir Edward
Carson's control of the work did not last long. In February,
1918, a Ministry of Information was set up and Lord Beaver-
brook, who held office in the Government as Chancellor of the
Duchy of Lancaster, was appointed Minister of Information.

Lord Beaverbrook inaugurated a new system, under which
the work was controlled by a Board of Directors. On Lord
Beaverbrook's invitation, Donald became Director of Propa-

THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 159

ganda in Neutral Countries ; and later certain Allied countries
were added to the territory for which he was responsible.

At the same time, Lord Northcliffe became Director of
Propaganda in enemy countries, working, in Donald's words,
" practically independently of Lord Beaverbrook . . . and
dealing directly with the government." Lord Northcliffe was
advised by a small committee of his own nomination, which
included such interesting personalities as Lord Denbigh,
Robert Donald, Sir Roderick Jones, Mr. Wickham Steed, and
Mr. H. G. Wells.

The announcement of these new arrangements in the House
of Commons by Bonar Law provoked some questions,
reported thus :

Mr. Pemberton Billing : Has the Right Hon. Gentle-
man inquired into the record of Mr. Robert Donald
before the appointment was made, and is he aware that
Mr. Donald held very anti-British views in the Chronicle
and has done so since the outbreak of war P1

Mr. Bonar Law : I do not think I am called upon to
answer that, but to the best of my knowledge the state-
ment is absolutely without foundation.

Mr. Roch : Will Mr. Donald continue to edit the
Chronicle ?

Mr. Bonar Law : I presume he will continue to edit
the Chronicle.

Mr. Billing : Is it the intention of the Government to
nobble every editor in London ?

No answer was returned.

Donald felt that his position required some explanation,
and, on the morrow of the announcement in the House of
Commons, the following statement was generally published.

The Press Association states, in reference to Mr.
Bonar Law's announcement in the House of Commons

1 The expression " anti-British views " was probably intended to relate
to Donald's defence of Lord Haldane.

160 ROBERT DONALD

yesterday regarding Propaganda, Mr. Donald's position
is purely an honorary one. During the last twelve
months, at the request of the War Cabinet, he made two
reports on propaganda arrangements, and has been a
member of two advisory committees which met last year.
Interviewed, Mr. Donald said : "I have been asked to
become the Director of a section of propaganda work.
The details of the position have not yet been definitely
arranged. I could not undertake work of this kind if it
interfered with my editorial responsibilities or my
political independence, or if it did not give me liberty of
action within the sphere allotted to me." In reply to a
question, Mr. Donald said he had taken an interest in
propaganda work since the outbreak of war and had, in an
unofficial way, presented the British case in a number of
foreign newspapers. " After all," he continued, " this is
a newspaper man's job. It consists simply of presenting
the British case in neutral and allied countries in a form
which is at once interesting and informative. It is pub-
licity work of a kind which was carried on by every Con-
tinental government before the war. The need for
propaganda was not frankly recognized in this country
when the war began, as the whole system is utterly
repugnant to our feelings, and contrary to our traditions.
Unless our war aims, and now more particularly our
peace aims, are described clearly, and misunderstandings
removed in foreign countries, our enemies would secure a
moral triumph over us as easily as they have a military
success against the unarmed Russians. ... I am quite
ready to assist in this national work if I can be of service,
but I shall be equally ready to retire in favour of any
journalist who is willing to undertake the directorship,
and give him my co-operation and help in any capacity."

In spite of this explanation, criticism rumbled in certain
sections of the Press. The Morning Post, while recognizing

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that Donald was " admirably qualified " for the post, felt that
the functions of a government official (for such he would be
despite the absence of pay) were entirely inconsistent with the
duty of conducting a " public newspaper " which was sup-
posed to be entirely independent of the Government. The
Saturday Review in a satirical article on the " Press Gang "
observed, " The platoon of papers owned by the noble trium-
virate of Northcliffe, Rothermere, and Beaverbrook are in the
Press Gang, and they add recruits every day, the latest and
most distinguished being, to our astonishment, the editor of
the Daily Chronicle. A correspondent of the Daily News said,
"It is thus that the Prime Minister holds his Pressmen in
leash, even when they run away with him. . . . The culture
of propaganda is not confined to countries either enemy or
neutral. In the widest sense of charity it begins (and some-
times ends) at home."

But Donald had no more to say : he was endeavouring to
find a way of competing with the almost intolerable burden of
conducting simultaneously a great daily newspaper and a new
branch of government activity.

Of all British propaganda work, Lord Northcliffe's effort in
Germany was the most successful. Much of his success, as of
all Northcliffe's success, was due to his capacity for choosing
the right men for the work. An examination of the personnel
of his department shows that Northcliffe's views coincided
with those of Donald, who, in one of his memoranda on
journalistic and literary propaganda, wrote :

I have always held that this kind of propaganda work
can be done best by the experts — the publicists, journa-
lists, and students of foreign politics with a knowledge of
the countries, their people and their language. From the
establishment of any kind of propaganda department
there has been a reluctance on the part of the authorities
to utilize the services of journalists in this work. Civil
servants, novelists, professors, historians and essayists —

162 ROBERT DONALD

men on the fringe of journalism — were brought in, but
few practical newspaper men have been given a chance
to organize or to supervise propaganda in countries of
which they have intimate knowledge.

The weakness which Donald criticized is still to be found in
certain organizations which seek to keep the public informed
of their activities through the Press. Journalism is considered
to be within anyone's capacity, and the advantages of having
a professional journalist for the work of liaison with the Press
are not always apparent to those who desire the goodwill and
the assistance of the newspapers.

Donald's insistence on the value of the journalist in the
organizing of propaganda during the war was one of the
causes of the protracted controversy that raged round his
reports of his investigation. That discussion went on inter-
mittently for two years, and, at times, his criticisms were
strongly resented by the departments concerned. Although,
in the end, he had the satisfaction of seeing many of his
recommendations carried into effect, it cannot be said that he
succeeded in securing to journalists the control of what was
their own province.

Some months after the establishment of the Ministry of
Information, Truth pointed out that five men who might be
regarded as " the higher command of British propaganda "
were directors of no fewer than forty-five companies. " The
average," said Truth, " is rather raised by one super-director
who adorns twenty-seven boards ; but that still leaves
eighteen for the other four."

The Westminster Gazette had much to say on the same
theme : " Shops, railways, rubber, tobacco, high finance in
all its branches are spread out before us. How exactly they
spread information is not understood."

By this time, however, Donald had severed his connection
with the Ministry. Within two months of his appointment, he
resigned his position as Director of Propaganda in Neutral

THE PEN BEHIND THE SWORD 163

Countries. Although there are among his papers notes which
suggest dissatisfaction with certain aspects of policy, he
tendered his resignation on the ground that he found the
pressure of the work too great. In accepting Donald's
resignation, the Minister, Lord Beaverbrook, said, " I do not
share your view that you have not been of much service to me ;
for I am deeply indebted to you for a great deal of most
valuable advice."

Donald retained an advisory place on the Board, and
remained for some months longer on Lord NorthclifFe's
committee, but in July, 1918, he felt unable to continue even
this limited association with the Ministry. As will presently
appear, events caused him to indulge in strong criticism of the
Prime Minister, and possibly he felt that his independence as
an editor was not compatible with his retention of seats on
committees connected with the Government.

Among the relics of Donald's association with the Ministry
of Information, there survives an interesting fragment of an
anonymous memorandum evidently prepared for the guidance
of those who were composing propagandist statements.
Although, judging by the style of writing, it is not Donald's
work, it is included here because it seems to merit a little
more permanence than is the usual fate of departmental
memoranda, if only because its first paragraph dissipates the
long-cherished but erroneous belief of some individuals that
British war propaganda was nothing but a mass of inventions
and falsehoods. The document runs :

Lies are the least effective form of propaganda ; the
effect of a lie diminishes and the effect of a frank state-
ment increases with the square of the time that has ensued
after it has been told.

Propaganda that looks like Propaganda is third-rate
Propaganda.

Never shove your propagandee to a conclusion he can
reach unaided.

164 ROBERT DONALD

Unless men are very ill or uncomfortable they resist
fears and welcome hopes. The human mind dismisses
fear and accepts and even invents hope with all its
strength. Propaganda that merely threatens achieves
nothing unless it holds out hopes also.

No man will blame himself if there is anyone else
to blame. Never blame your propagandee. Blame his
government, blame his leaders. Never blame " the
German " or " Germany." Indignation with others is
the natural state of man.

For the purpose of Propaganda in Germany at any
rate, the German is a brave, honest, orderly, clean, able,
good-hearted man, gentle-natured and cultured but
scandalously misled ; he was, in Switzerland, the first
republican in Europe ; he flourishes in the republics of
America ; Tacitus witnesses to his virtuous and demo-
cratic past ; and the Anglo-Saxons, the Franks, and
Lombards were all Germanic peoples.

During the year 1917, their mutual interest in propaganda
served to draw Mr. Lloyd George and Donald together again.
As Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd George had less time for social
contacts, but they met fairly frequently in London and at
Walton. '

CHAPTER IX

SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS

ON April 20th, 1918, Major- General Sir Frederick
Maurice, K.C.M.G., C.B., relinquished the highly
responsible appointment of Director of Military
Operations at the War Office. He was to be promoted. His
instructions were to take three weeks' leave, at the end of
which time he would receive further orders to proceed to
France to take a command on the Western Front.

General Maurice, the son of a general, had a distinguished
military record. Though still in the forties, he had first seen
active service twenty-one years previously. He had been
through the South African War, through the retreat from
Mons and much of the subsequent fighting. He had been
Director of Military Operations since 1915, which meant
that he had served at the War Office under Lord Kitchener
and Mr. Lloyd George. He had been mentioned in dispatches
seven times, he had been appointed C.B. and K.C.M.G., and
had been specially promoted to the rank of Major- General.

His last phase of duty at the War Office had coincided with
the German offensive of 1918 which broke the British line and
almost succeeded in separating the British and the French
armies. Further enemy attacks were pending when he
handed over his duties, and the situation still gave rise to
considerable anxiety.

Amid the multifarious duties of this trying period, which
period the General spent partly at the War Office and partly
in France, he had paid little attention to the newspapers.
While awaiting appointment to his new post in France,

165

166 ROBERT DONALD

General Maurice was directed to pay a visit to the front. At
G.H.Q. he encountered a feeling of profound uneasiness
created by certain statements made by the Prime Minister in
the House of Commons. The statements were regarded as
being seriously inaccurate and tending to undermine the con-
fidence of the troops in Sir Douglas Haig by putting upon the
Commander-in- Chief the responsibility for the recent reverses.

On April 9th, 1918, the Prime Minister (Mr. Lloyd George)
had told the House of Commons that notwithstanding the
heavy casualties in 1917, the Army in France was considerably
stronger on January ist, 1918, than on January ist, 1917.

The implication of the statement was that Haig's fighting
strength on the eve of the great German attack which began
on March aist, 1918, had not diminished. General Maurice,
whose duties had put him in possession of the secret statistics
of British military strength in the various theatres of war,
knew that implication to be incorrect.

There was another statement made by Mr. Lloyd George in
the same speech which the General read with astonishment.
It concerned the number of white troops serving in Meso-
potamia, Egypt, and Palestine. That statement, also, did not
tally with the General's intimate knowledge of the facts.

Accordingly, General Maurice wrote to the Chief of the
Imperial General Staff (as he was entitled to do) pointing out
these inaccuracies. He waited nearly a week for a reply, but
received none. The matter weighed heavily upon his mind,
for it appeared to him that Mr. Lloyd George's statements,
and certain answers to parliamentary questions arising out of
them, put upon the soldiers responsibilities that ought to have
been borne by the Ministers. As he saw the situation, for
some time prior to the German offensive, the Government,
under Mr. Lloyd George's direction, had been diverting to
distant and subsidiary theatres of war troops that were sorely
needed to maintain the strength of the British forces on the
vital front — the line in France and Flanders. Heedless of
Haig's appeals and warnings, necessary reinforcements had

SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS 167

been denied to the Western Front, and, what was equally
alarming, Haig had been instructed by the Government to
take over part of the French front, attenuating a line already
inadequately manned for the ordeal which the soldiers knew
to be coming.

Now, after the blow had fallen, and disaster had been
averted only by a hair's breadth, it seemed to General Maurice
that the Prime Minister was shifting the Government's
responsibility to the shoulders of the Commander-in-Chief.
That such action would undermine the country's confidence
in Haig, was obvious. But there was more in the Prime
Minister's tactics than that. Was it not commonly believed at
the War Office and in Whitehall that the Prime Minister
would have recalled Haig months previously but that he knew
such action would be resented by the public ? To General
Maurice, the Prime Minister's evident evasion of responsibility
seemed to be but another step in the process of dislodging a
commander whom he dare not openly remove, executed in an
hour of crisis when Haig was entitled to expect, and should
have received, the fullest support of the King's ministers.

Failing a reply from his late chief at the War Office, General
Maurice felt that he must take another course of action, one
that would evoke an immediate response. He decided to
direct public attention simply and certainly to the mischief by
writing to the Press. As a soldier on the active list, his
unauthorised communication to the Press would be an offence
against military regulations, and the consequences would be
serious. That he knew full well. He would be compulsorily
retired. His military career would be ended in middle life,
and at a moment when his professional advancement was
assured. He felt, nevertheless, that his " duty as a citizen
must override his duty as a soldier." Consulting only his
wife and his mother, and saying no word to any other person,
General Maurice sat down and wrote the letter that broke his
own career.

On May yth, 1918, the principal newspapers published a

168 ROBERT DONALD

statement by the former Director of Military Operations
accusing the Prime Minister of giving the House of Commons
inaccurate information. The letter, inevitably, created a
sensation. Fleet Street deployed its scouts in all directions
seeking the General, but he was not to be found. He did not
wish to give interviews to journalists or to meet politicians
who wished to ask questions. So he concealed himself in the
country for a week until interest in the subject had abated
somewhat.

He had scarcely resettled himself in his Kensington home,
when a visitor was announced. The caller was Robert Donald.

If as the result of what occurred subsequently, the assump-
tion was made that General Maurice and Donald acted in
collusion over the " Maurice Letter," it was entirely un-
founded. As has been stated, the General consulted no other
person but the two relatives mentioned.

General Maurice had met Donald casually when Donald,
like other editors, had visited the War Office in quest of
guidance, or in connection with his visits to the front. The
acquaintance of the two men was slight ; and now, in calling
upon General Maurice, Donald had come, not as a friend, but
as a shrewd editor, seeking to do a service to his paper.

Donald invited the General to become military correspon-
dent of the Daily Chronicle, a position which General Maurice,
being now a retired officer, was at liberty to take. The invita-
tion appealed to the General. He intended to devote himself
to some kind of work. He had literary gifts, and had already
some military books to his credit. To interpret the war to the
British public, and to help to a better understanding of military
events those who had such a vital interest in them, was not
unworthy work. So he decided to accept the editor's invita-
tion, and Donald returned to Fleet Street, having enlisted for
his paper the services of the late Director of Military
Operations on the Imperial General Staff.

Some of its contemporaries admitted that the Daily
Chronicle had made a coup, and tendered congratulations.

SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS 169

Other editors thought so, but omitted to say so in print.
Paper was scarce in 1918, and it was wise to consider Mr.
Lloyd George's feelings.

On the day that General Maurice took up his new duties,
Donald circulated to the Press Sir Frederick's first article. It
was an explanation of his action in challenging the Prime
Minister, and was of such great interest that although publica-
tion involved an acknowledgment of the Daily Chronicle,
almost every important newspaper published it, and pub-
lished it prominently.

But the article was not printed exactly as it was written.
The censor had intervened, deleting about thirty words.
That interference gave rise to more questions in the House of
Commons, to be met by answers that were ingenious but did
nothing to allay the uneasiness caused by the General's charges.
Truth voiced the feeling of many thoughtful people when it
observed, apropos of the answers concerning the censoring of
the article, " Misleading statements from the Treasury Bench
are no new thing, but the scandal has never been exhibited so
flagrantly as in this instance. Soldiers have been the worst
victims of it, and it is so again here. The more you insist upon
the gravity of General Maurice's offence against discipline,
the more indefensible you make the resort to unfair methods
in order to squelch him."

This is not the place to discuss in detail the pros and cons of
the Maurice case. The relevant facts and figures have all
been made available by General Maurice, and Mr. Lloyd
George has stated that he is content to leave the matter to the
" unprejudiced judgment of posterity."

What Mr. Lloyd George thought of Donald's action in
offering the platform of the Daily Chronicle to the soldier who
had dared to accuse him, a platform which he regarded at one
time as peculiarly his own, we have yet to learn. Subsequent
events, however, afford ground for fairly reasonable assump-
tions on that point.

After his first article explaining what he had done, and why

170 ROBERT DONALD

he had done it, General Maurice made no further reference to
the controversy in the columns of the Daily Chronicle. He
applied himself to the task of commenting upon the military
operations, and his articles were widely quoted at home and
in the foreign press.

In August, 1918, General Maurice paid a visit to the
British front, as a military correspondent. During the weeks
preceding his visit there had been a great transformation in the
situation. The British Army, now strongly reinforced by the
troops for which Haig had appealed in vain nine months
earlier, had embarked upon a series of operations which were
driving the enemy back to the Hindenburg Line. Although
acting in conjunction with the French, who likewise had
resumed the offensive, it is undeniable that then, and through-
out the last, victorious battles, the British bore the brunt of the
righting.

General Maurice found the army in good fettle. The
unseen obstacles that had thwarted them in the past had been
swept away. Political and military intrigues which denied that
unity of purpose essential to victory, had been cut short by the
dire emergency of the spring ; and now, at long last, the
armies could address their formidable tasks under conditions
that made success possible.

But General Maurice heard a strange complaint. Officers
told him that although the British forces were achieving
victories that evoked the tributes of other nations, no word of
congratulation had been offered by their own government.1

Writing in the Daily Chronicle of September yth, 1918,
when the British troops had added still more successes to their
battle honours, General Maurice mentioned this grievance at
the end of his article. He pointed out that although the
Canadian Government had congratulated General Currie and
the Canadian Corps on their achievement, and although even

*" 1 Field-Marshal Sir Henry Wilson, visiting the front as Chief of the
Imperial General Staff, a month after General Maurice, noted in his diary :
" Everyone here very hostile to Lloyd George for not having given Haig
a ' puff,' "

SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS 171

the Trade Union Congress was among the bodies that had sent
messages to Haig, " there has been no word from our own
Government."

" Why," asked the General, " has our Government
expressed no recognition of Sir Douglas Haig's leadership and
the valour of our men ? We are often accused of concealing
the performances of our own troops, and of giving the credit to
others. This time there has been no concealment, which
makes it more remarkable that so conspicuous a success should
have been allowed by the War Cabinet to pass unnoticed."

General Maurice mentioned the matter to Donald and,
simultaneously with the appearance of the General's reference
to the subject, there was published in the Daily Chronicle a
short leading article under the title, " Well Done Haig ! "
which expressed something of the feeling of the nation
towards the British troops and their commander.

On September 12th, the Prime Minister made an important
speech at Manchester. Evidently hopes had been entertained
that Mr. Lloyd George would take this opportunity of making
the amende honorable, and of using his great gifts of oratory to
pay an overdue tribute to the achievements of the British
Commander-in-Chief and the men under his leadership.
What the Prime Minister did, or failed to do, is best expressed
in a passage of the leading article of the Daily Chronicle of the
following day.

He (Mr. Lloyd George) did right in doing homage to
Marshal Foch, but his omission to make any reference to
the prominent part played by Sir Douglas Haig in the
achievement of the recent victories was very marked.
It is a small mind that petulantly refuses to acknowledge
the services of a great soldier."

The date of this rebuke (September i3th) is of some
importance, for, as will appear later, negotiations for the
purchase of the Daily Chronicle by certain friends of Mr.
Lloyd George entered a decisive phase " about the middle of

172 ROBERT DONALD

September."1 But of that matter Donald, at the time, knew
nothing ; nor would it have made any difference to his
championing of Sir Douglas Haig had he known.

The Daily Chronicle, however, was not alone in commenting
upon the Prime Minister's extraordinary behaviour. The
Spectator was not afraid to observe that Mr. Lloyd George
" did not think fit to say any word in praise of Sir Douglas
Haig, whose name was not even mentioned."

A week later, on September 2ist, the Daily Chronicle had
occasion to expose to the public the injustice inflicted upon
the British Commander (and upon others) by the Cabinet's
decision to withhold indefinitely Haig's dispatch on the
operations on the Western Front between March and June of
that year — the period during which the lack of reinforcements
had brought the British forces to the edge of disaster.

Two more weeks passed. The British Army, gathering
strength from its own success rather than from reinforcements
or encouragement from the Government, hurled itself at the
enemy's most formidable defensive system. By the end of
September the Hindenburg Line had been smashed, and the
way to victory was at last in sight.

" The British successes on the West front since 8th August,"
said the Daily Chronicle, " are much the greatest in scale ever
won by the British Army or a British General . . . Within
the period under review General Pershing and General
Allenby have received the official congratulations of the
British Government, and Mr. Lloyd George has congratulated
Marshal Foch. Various private organizations have sent
congratulations to Sir Douglas Haig, including the Labour
Party and the National Liberal Federation ; but the War
Cabinet has remained silent."

That was published on October 3rd. It was the last word
the Daily Chronicle said upon the subject. It was the last

1 According to Lord Riddell's War Diary, Mr. Lloyd George discussed
the purchase of the Daily Chronicle with Lord Riddell some time between
September 4th and 6th, but " there seems to be some difficulty in arranging
the finance."

SUPPORTING THE SOLDIERS 173

word the Daily Chronicle published in criticism of Mr. Lloyd
George.

Two days later, on October 5th, the paper passed into the
hands of Mr. Lloyd George's friends.

On October 9th Mr. Lloyd George sent a telegram of con-
gratulation to Sir Douglas Haig.1 The event of the week on
the home front, the capture of the Daily Chronicle, had
evidently caused the " small mind " to expand with generosity.

Lest the facts of this episode suggest collusion between
Haig and Donald, it should, perhaps, be stated that Donald's
papers afford no evidence of it. All that is known of Haig
indicates that, unlike his predecessor, Sir John French, he
was never party to any collusion with the Press. Donald was
known to Haig, and their acquaintance was sufficiently strong
to move the Commander-in- Chief to give to Donald, after the
end of hostilities, an autographed map showing the disposition
of the allied and enemy forces at the date when the Armistice
was signed. But, apparently, there was no correspondence
between them.

The more interesting of the personal aspects of this episode
is its effect upon the friendship of Mr. Lloyd George and
Robert Donald. During the greater part of 1917, their
relationship had been close and cordial, and when Mr. and
Mrs. Donald were under the shadow of family bereavement,
the Prime Minister and his wife visited them at eight oclock
in the morning in order to be the first to express their sym-
pathy. A contemporary diarist printed a story that Mr.
Lloyd George took his Christmas dinner at Donald's home,
but that was not quite accurate. According to a family diary,
Mr. Lloyd George visited the Donalds on December 23rd,
1917, and the Donalds lunched with Lloyd George three days
later — on Boxing Day : so that it would be true to say that
during the Christmastide of 1917, Mr. Lloyd George gave an

1 " Foch gave Haig and our men great praise, so I got a telegram of con-
gratulation to Douglas Haig from Lloyd George." — From Sir Henry Wilson's
diary, quoted in Field-Marshal Sir Henry Wilson, by General Callwell.

174 ROBERT DONALD

ample manifestation of goodwill towards one whom he was
soon to treat so ruthlessly.

Their last friendly meeting would seem to have been at
golf on May 4th, 1918, three days before the publication of
the Maurice letter. Five months later, Mr. Lloyd George was
virtually in control of the Daily Chronicle and his guest of the
previous Christmas was given the choice between humiliation
and resignation.

This episode, however, was not quite unprecedented,
though the circumstances were not identical. The biography
of an old colleague of Donald, the late Sir Edward Cook,1 tells
a comparable story.

In 1900, when the Boer War was at its height, Cook
was editing the Daily News, and was endeavouring "to
impress the Liberal Party with the justice of the British
case." And Cook was succeeding, to the intense annoyance of
the pro-Boer section of the Liberal Party, of which section
Mr. Lloyd George was an ardent member. Suddenly the
principal proprietor of the Daily News appeared in the editor's
room with the news that he had signed a preliminary contract
for the sale of the paper, and that the leader of the purchasing
syndicate — which included " R. Lehmann, Cadbury, Leon
and others " — was Mr. Lloyd George, M.P.

" Lloyd George," continues this story of his early
intrusion into the Press, " asked that the Daily News should
now take a neutral line on the war. . . . But Cook had not the
slightest intention of becoming a stop -gap or compounding
with his political conscience." Cook's prompt reply to his
proprietor was a request for a cheque in lieu of notice, " for it
is not pleasant to work on here with a halter round my neck
and my tongue tied."

This episode of 1900 is not without interest in considering
the story of purchase of the Daily Chronicle which must now
be told.

1 Sir Edward Cook, by J. Saxon Mills.

1

CHAPTER X
SOLD

sale of the Daily Chronicle to Mr. Lloyd George's
friends came as a painful surprise to Robert Donald.
For more than a year previously the proprietor, Frank
Lloyd, had listened to various proposals for the purchase of
his property, but his ultimate decision was to leave the whole
question in abeyance until the coming of peace. That, at
least, was Donald's understanding of the decision, and he had
many conversations with Lloyd on the subject.

The conversation containing possibly the first suggestion of
sale which Lloyd had entertained, was initiated by Robert
Donald in the spring of 1917.
Donald's own notes upon the subject open thus :

On several occasions since he had been Prime Minister,
Mr. Lloyd George has dropped hints to me that he
would like his friends to acquire the Daily Chronicle as
the official organ of his party. The first time was in
January, 1917, in the presence of the late Neil Primrose.
Later in the spring, Sir Howard Frank thought that Sir
William Lever (later Lord Leverhulme) might buy. Sir
Howard talked to me several times about the matter. I
sounded Mr. Lloyd and found that he was not averse to
negotiations.

Frank Lloyd gave Donald an indication of the figure at
which he might sell the paper, and Donald, dining with Lord
Leverhulme one night, discussed the matter with him. The
discussion was not encouraging, and later Donald heard that

176 ROBERT DONALD

Lord Leverhulme would not consider the matter further,
because " he knew nothing about newspapers." Nevertheless,
Lloyd received a certain accountant in the belief that he was
acting on behalf of Lord Leverhulme, and all the confidential
figures of the business of United Newspapers Limited were
revealed to that emissary. Simultaneously stories gained cur-
rency that Lord Leverhulme was acting in conjunction with
Lord Beaverbrook and that a combination between the Daily
Chronicle and the Daily Express was in contemplation. To
Donald, such an association was unthinkable. Knowing the
mind of Frank Lloyd and his strict loyalty to the Liberal point
of view, Donald did not believe that negotiations would be
allowed to proceed with such a prospect. He made investiga-
tions, and as a result, he had a conversation with Mr.
Lloyd which put an end to that project — a project in which
Lord Beaverbrook and not Lord Leverhulme was, according
to Donald, the dominant party throughout.

Later, Donald was accused by one of the interested parties of
" causing difficulties " and of " spoiling the deal," to which he
replied that he did not tell Lloyd all that he knew " otherwise he
would have been very much more annoyed than he was. He
was not well, and I did not wish to upset him."

" Another group then came forward and Mr. Lloyd accepted
a scheme which I had prepared," runs a note made by Donald.
Of this scheme, no details appear, but there is a record that, in
the summer of 1918, Donald succeeded in getting together a
syndicate of wealthy and distinguished Liberals with a view to
purchasing the paper. Up to a point, negotiations pro-
ceeded hopefully, but one financial proposal was made that
Frank Lloyd resented, and he terminated the negotiations.
Ultimately Donald understood Lloyd to say that he would not
sell the property until the war was over and, with that, the
editor ceased to interest himself actively in the efforts to
acquire the paper.

Towards the end of September, 1918, the Parliamentary
Correspondent of the Daily Chronicle, Harry Jones, heard a

SOLD 177

rumour that the paper had " changed hands." On this Jones
noted, " Having recently been assured by Mr. Donald that
the Lloyd family had decided not to sell during the war, and
that a new company would be formed when the war was over
— a company in which the staff would have an interest — I
confidently assumed the statement was untrue." Later, Jones
reported the rumour to Donald who " dismissed the whole
idea " and reassured Jones by saying there was nothing in the
story.

On October 3rd, however, the News Editor, Mr. E. A.
Ferris, met Sir George Riddell1 who told him that he under-
stood that the paper had been sold. When the news was con-
veyed to Donald, he laughed, but when he was persuaded to
take the story a little more seriously, he remarked : " Mr.
Frank (Lloyd) can't do a thing like that. He promised that if
he ever did think of parting with the paper he would give me
the first option, and time to get my friends together. He is a
good man : nothing would persuade him to do a thing like
that."

" Not even two million pounds ? "2 he was asked.

" Not unless he first kept his word to me."

Donald's own note on another attempt to " break the news "
to him is as follows :

I had no hesitation in denying the statement which Mr.
Ferris made, although he was quite emphatic that Sir
George Riddell was not mistaken. After the failure of
the previous negotiations Mr. Lloyd informed me that he
had decided not to dispose of the papers for at least two
or three years. He also informed Mr. Turner3 of this
decision. The annual meeting of the Company had been

1 Lord Riddell's War Diary shows that he was aware of the negotiations
a month before their completion.

2 This was the first rumour of the purchase price. The actual figure was
£1,600,000. Shortly before Donald became editor £400,000 was con-
sidered a " prohibitive " price. (Sir Edward Cook, by J. Saxon Mills.)

8 Presumably the General Manager of the company, the late Neil
Turner.

178 ROBERT DONALD

held only two or three weeks previously. As usual, I
seconded the adoption of the report, and spoke with
confidence about the future of the papers, about the
opposition which we would have to meet, and generally
about our plans and prospects during the period of
reconstruction.

Not a hint fell from Mr. Lloyd that he had other plans
in view, or that, in fact, the papers at that moment were
practically sold.

On the following day, October 4th, Donald called upon
Frank Lloyd to seek the truth on the subject. What transpired
is best described in his own words :

Thursday, \ih Oct.

I saw Mr. Lloyd just a little before lunch. I discussed
some other matters, and said casually that there were
rumours on foot again with regard to the purchase of the
Chronicle. He asked what I had heard. I informed him
of what Sir George Riddell had told Ferris. I was about to
ask him to allow me to issue a contradiction to settle the
rumours, when, to my astonishment, he told me that the
statement was true, and that Sir George Riddell must
have been informed by the Prime Minister.

He gave me some few particulars. He mentioned that
Sir Henry Dalziel had carried out the negotiations and
was to be associated with the new Company. I imme-
diately informed him that I could not continue. He asked
me to reconsider this decision. . . .

Mr. Lloyd, in order to justify his statement to me and
to Turner that he did not intend to sell, explained how
the new negotiations arose. He said that towards the
end of July he received a communication from Dalziel
and lunched with him. He informed Dalziel that he was
not prepared to negotiate, but a few days later Dalziel
apparently sent him a definite proposal. At any rate,
Mr. Lloyd read to me the first sentence of his reply to

SOLD 179

this communication from Dalziel. The reply was dated
July 29th, and began : " As I informed you when I
lunched with you on Tuesday, we had decided not to sell
the papers for at least two or three years, but "

Mr. Lloyd read no further. I can only surmise that
Dalziel made a definite offer, and asked for an option,
which Mr. Lloyd apparently proceeded to grant.

There was nothing in my conversation with Mr.
Lloyd to suggest that the purchase was complete, only
that negotiations were proceeding and that he had com-
mitted himself definitely to the sale.

Mr. Lloyd expressed great regret that he had been
unable to inform me. He said that this had worried him
a great deal ; that he had begun two letters to me but
was unable to send them. It worried him all the more
because the paper was adopting a critical attitude towards
Mr. Lloyd George on some matters. He said he had seen
Mr. Lloyd George, together with Captain Guest, some
time in September, but did not give me the date.

I think he must have seen the Prime Minister after
September i3th, the date upon which the " Small
Mind " article appeared. He said that Mr. Lloyd
George complained of the criticisms which had appeared
in the Daily Chronicle, and said, " We cannot trust
Donald." I said that we had always supported the
Government on the main issues of the war, and that he
himself had made no complaint about the attitude of the
paper.

I said that I always took a great deal of trouble to get
at the facts and did not take information from one
section of the Cabinet alone. He said that Mr. Lloyd
George did not resent ordinary criticism, but complained
very bitterly of the articles which had appeared about
Haig, more particularly with one in which the Prime
Minister was said to have a small mind. Mr. Lloyd said
that that was more than he could stand. I told Mr.

i8o ROBERT DONALD

Lloyd that I did not recall the article for the moment, but
I felt sure there was nothing personally objectionable
in it.

I did not return to the office until about three o'clock,
when I received a note from Mr. Lloyd requesting me to
make no mention of the fact that negotiations for the
sale of the property were taking place, and he also added
that he relied upon me to make no change in the policy
of the paper in the meantime. . . .

Friday, $th October.

As I was anxious to know more about the transaction
I called upon Mr. Lloyd about a quarter to one . . . and
asked him when it was contemplated that the transfer
should take place, thinking that it might be at the end
of the year. Mr. Lloyd said " To-day," adding that the
solicitor had just gone out and that he had been working
all night on the agreement. " There has been a terrible
rush to finish it," he said. " I am going to sign the
contract at three o'clock this afternoon, when one-third
of the purchase money will be paid."

I then asked how soon would the purchasers take
possession. He replied, " To-night at six o'clock." Sir
Henry Dalziel, apparently somewhat to Mr. Lloyd's
surprise, had been appointed political director, and he
said the new people insisted on taking charge at once.
He asked if I would see Dalziel when he came. I said,
" Certainly," but that I could not go on in any circum-
stances. I was prepared, however, to facilitate the transfer
and remain in charge for a week and to undertake that
during the period nothing would appear in the paper to
which the Prime Minister or his friends could take the
slightest exception. . . .

Mr. Lloyd did not give me very much information.
... I endeavoured to get a list of the shareholders from
him. He said that they were a financial group ; that he

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really did not know anyone definitely beyond Mr.
Andrew Weir. The group was represented by Sir John
Fergusson, manager of the National Bank of Scotland,
who apparently had carried through the transaction. . . .
Mr. Lloyd mentioned that he had received a visit from
Mr. James White a little before Dalziel opened up
negotiations, and he wanted to buy the paper. He did
not know who Mr. White was.1 . . . He could not
understand my disinclination to work with Sir Henry
Dalziel. I said if he was going to be managing director
and political director, which, owing to his (Lloyd's)
courtesy I had formerly been, it was quite obvious that
I would have no freedom. ... I arranged with Mr.
Lloyd to inform the staff that afternoon, and to see Sir
Henry Dalziel.

Saturday, October 6th.

On Saturday I wrote to Dalziel saying that I had
resigned, but offering to continue during the week and
to make the transfer easy. I also wrote to Mr. Lloyd
resigning my position as editor and managing director.
In my letter I referred to my many and pleasant associa-
tions with him, and said it was a great wrench to me to
have to leave.

I received two letters from Mr. Lloyd in reply, both
written from Coombe House, Croydon. The first letter,
which may be regarded as an official answer to mine, is
as follows :

October 5^, 1918.
DEAR MR. DONALD,

I am in receipt of your letter of even date, ten-
dering your resignation as editor of our papers and as

1 This was the notorious Lancashire company promoter who committed
suicide in 1927. According to Mr. Alan Bott, in The Post Victorians, White was
mentioned for a knighthood in 1918, " for munificence to Allied Forces."
He asked instead for permission to float a company, the Treasury having for-
bidden new issues. White received that permission.

1 82 ROBERT DONALD

managing director of the Company, which we accept
with the greatest regret. Your co-directors and every
member of the Lloyd family will ever remember with
gratitude the great services you have rendered to the
Company, and will doubtless give expression to their
feelings in that respect when the proper opportunity
comes for them to do so.

Yours very truly,

(Signed) FRANK LLOYD.

The other letter, which may be regarded as an unofficial
communication, was :

October 5 th, 1918.

DEAR MR. DONALD,

I am in receipt of your letter of this morning, and
want you to accept my most grateful thanks for the steps
you have taken with regard to Sir Henry Dalziel and for
communicating the change to the staff, as you did.

I greatly regret that you have found it necessary to
resign, and enclose formal acceptance on behalf of the
firm.

I am deeply moved by your kind reference to myself,
and I cannot tell you how pained I am at the severance
of our long and happy association. Throughout the
twenty years there has never arisen a shadow of a shade
between us, and I shall carry with me to the grave the
memory of your loyal support and friendship. I know
only too well that you have never spared yourself in the
interest of the papers. The only complaint that I have
ever had to make against you is that you have not done so.

I told you on Thursday how painful it had been for
me to withhold from your knowledge that negotiations
were in progress, but both parties had pledged them-
selves to absolute secrecy until the thing could safely be
made known. I never anticipated that the actual change

SOLD 183

would have to be made so precipitately and thought we
should have had time to give proper notice to all
concerned.

It is a great wrench for me to sever myself from the
associations of a lifetime, but the state of my health
rendered such a step necessary unless I want to shorten
the days left to me.

Believe me,

Yours very truly,

(Signed) FRANK LLOYD.

P.S. I am not feeling very well after all I have recently
gone through, and did not feel equal to coming up to-day.

The letter which he wrote on behalf of the directors
accepting my resignation was, of course, only on his own
behalf. The directors at that time were Mr. Lloyd,
Mr. Clark and myself. There was also Mr. Neville
Lloyd, but he, I believe, was away in France, and as a
matter of fact had not attended a meeting during the war.

On October 5th at five o'clock, an hour before the new
proprietors were to assume control, a meeting of the staff of
the Daily Chronicle was held in the editor's room. " The
news had got about, and everybody was in a state of high
tension," noted Harry Jones. " Seldom had there been in
any newspaper office so happy a family, and one felt an acute
sense of grief at the break-up of our old relations. Mr.
Donald could not speak, and Ferris made a brief statement
of the facts. He was labouring under suppressed emotion
and his voice was almost inaudible. Mr. Donald followed
with a few words."

The meeting was short and soon dispersed. Saturday's
paper had to be produced.

On Monday evening (October yth) Donald went to the
office to say farewell to the staff. He opened a brief address

184 ROBERT DONALD

by remarking that it was a great surprise to Mr. Lloyd that
the transaction had to be completed so precipitately, but the
new proprietor had insisted at midday on Friday that they
must take control that day at six o'clock. He did not wish
to go into any details, but he wanted to make it clear that his
resignation was inevitable. During the whole period of his
editorship he had enjoyed absolute freedom in every respect.
It would be quite impossible for him to adapt himself to the
new conditions. Mr. Lloyd was an ideal proprietor. The
only complaint he had to make against Mr. Lloyd was that
he held himself somewhat too aloof, so that they lost the benefit
of his wise counsel and guidance. Mr. Lloyd regretted
exceedingly that he had been unable to inform him (Donald)
of the negotiations. Both parties had pledged themselves to
absolute secrecy, and Mr. Lloyd as a man of honour had kept
his word. Donald closed his speech with a fitting tribute to
the staff and an expression of his confidence that they would
serve their new chiefs as loyally as they had served him.

A few days later Donald took leave of the staff of Lloyd's
Sunday News. In his remarks to his colleagues he said
plainly, " I have no complaint to make, no recrimination, no
grievance. ... If I am satisfied with Mr. Lloyd's treatment
of me I hope that my friends (if they are really my friends)
will refrain from criticizing his action. He (Mr. Lloyd) went
into this transaction under certain conditions which, as a
man of honour, he observed. If Mr. Lloyd had broken his
pledged word and had told me negotiations were proceeding
I should have thought less of him."

" When the moment of severance came," says the News-
paper World report of that gathering, " Mr. Donald, it was
plain, found the speaking of his last words a little hard. . . .
To some in that muster Mr. Donald had been especially
good, so that, although Fleet Street in its time had known
many partings, none can have been more full of personal
regard."

For the greater part, the staff, receiving assurances from the

MR. RAMSAY MACDOXALD

A snapshot taken in the garden of Robert Donald's home at Walton
in August, 1914.

MR. C. F. G. MASTERMAX (right) WITH ROBERT DOXALD
AT WALTON

SOLD 185

new proprietors that the policy of the papers would not be
changed, remained in the service of the company. In several
instances the decision to continue under the new regime was
made possible by the fact that the proprietors did not go
outside " the family " to find a new editor. They appointed
to Donald's place the news editor, Mr. E. A. Ferris, who, for
sixteen years, had been in the closest association with Donald.
Inevitably, General Maurice resigned, and was promptly
invited by Mr. A. G. Gardiner to join the Daily News
as its Military Correspondent. Harry Jones, the Parlia-
mentary Correspondent, after a short period of indecision,
agreed to remain, but it was not long before he transferred
his pen to the service of the Daily News. Others, too, fell
away after a short interval.

The journalist in charge of the feminine pages, Mrs. Mildred
Canivet, resigned promptly, and was soon associated with
Donald in his new enterprises. So also did Mr. Valentine
Heywood, a very able young journalist, now the Assistant
Editor of the Sunday Times. But the indignation with which
the staff first heard the news of the sale soon passed, and
Donald's attitude towards the event no doubt played its part
in ensuring that the change was made with a minimum of
friction and disturbance.

Nevertheless, he would have been more than human had
he felt no resentment against those who had planned this
coup. Unwisely, he allowed certain politicians to raise the
subject in the House of Commons. On October I5th, 1918,
the transaction came up for discussion on the motion for the
adjournment of the House. That Donald lent himself to this
move is undeniable, for certain observations made in the
course of the debate are almost textual quotations from his
own memoranda : and there are statements about Lord
Beaverbrook's association with the first attempt to buy the
Daily Chronicle which could have come only from Donald.

The subject was not a suitable one for parliamentary dis-
cussion. The debate upon it was doomed in advance to

186 ROBERT DONALD

futility, while it afforded certain Lloyd Georgian members
an opportunity of proving their devotion to their master by
making rancorous remarks about Donald.

Very ingeniously Mr. Pringle, who raised the question,
sought to show that the transaction merited the attention of
the House. He argued that the purchasing of newspapers in
this wise, to obtain political support for the Prime Minister,
involved the suppression of independent journalism. Money
for new newspapers could not be raised in the normal way
because the Treasury had placed a ban upon new issues of
capital. There was no longer a free market in paper, and thus
a new newspaper could come into existence only by the licence
of the Government. He inquired if the Government would
assent to an application for supplies of paper to enable a
newspaper to be published to advocate the views which were
formerly the policy of the Daily Chronicle. To that inquiry,
of course, he received no reply.

No representative of the Government intervened in the
debate, but Sir Henry Dalziel seized the opportunity of
explaining the occurrence from his own point of view. " This
is a business transaction," he said, " and why should I not be
allowed to carry through a business transaction without
bothering the House of Commons about it ? " The late editor
had succeeded to a large extent in getting the money for a
purchase. " He made one condition, I understand, which did
not operate for success, and that was he was to have complete
and absolute control, — a most desirable thing, but I succeeded
in getting it, and he did not. . . . But the late editor has not
suffered very much. He has taken £70,000 of my money for
an interest which probably cost him a nominal amount. So
therefore he has not done so badly."

Sir Henry was followed by the late Spencer Leigh Hughes,
a journalist who once contributed to the Daily News parlia-
mentary comment which was considered by some readers to
have the merit of humour. Of the quality of his wit, he
afforded the House a sample by observing : " Fleet Street

SOLD 187

has been said to be a land flowing with ink and money. I
have had a great deal more to do with the ink than the money."
He was more amusing, however, if unconsciously so, when
he said that Robert Donald " has bragged again and again in
public that he and his paper had more to do with the resig-
nation of Mr. Asquith than anyone else in the country," for
though Donald had his quota of human failings, he was
never a braggart. After Mr. Hughes's effort members were
more than ready to go to bed, and the House adjourned.

Some of Sir Henry Dalziel's statements in the House of
Commons moved Robert Donald to write to the Press. In a
letter published on October lyth, he said :

" Sir Henry Dalziel made several statements referring
to myself that were not strictly accurate. It had been
alleged, he said, that he had treated me unfairly. Sir
Henry has not treated me in any way. I have had no
dealings with him. He also stated that I ' had taken
£70,000 of his money ' and had received two years'
salary. The late governing proprietor has promised me
an amount, which I did not ask for, equivalent to one
year's salary. I am to be paid for my shares at the same
rate as other shareholders, but Sir Henry Dalziel con-
siderably overstated the amount, as I am a comparatively
small holder. I have no complaint whatever to make
about my treatment, but I do not judge the transaction
in terms of money.

" If Sir Henry Dalziel and his friends have found, as
he says, a sound investment, my sixteen years' service
as editor has, I hope, helped to create it.

" No editor ever worked with more freedom or enjoyed
more independence than it was my good fortune to
possess under the late proprietors. It was a special
privilege to have worked under such conditions. When,
therefore, I was informed that the property had been
sold, that the new owners insisted as a condition that

1 88 ROBERT DONALD

they must take charge of the policy in a few hours' time,
and that a new political director in the person of Sir
Henry Dalziel — to whose policy judging by his speeches
and his newspapers, on certain side-issues of the war, I
had been diametrically opposed — had been appointed, I
had no alternative consistent with editorial freedom and
personal dignity but to resign. Any editor placed in
similar circumstances would have done the same, with-
out any question of compensation, which, in my case, I
did not raise and was perfectly prepared to forego.
Obviously my financial interest lay in accepting the offer
which was to be made to me, to remain as editor under
the general control of a board, and under the political
direction of Sir Henry Dalziel."

Among the newspapers that dared to comment upon the
transaction, the sale of the Daily Chronicle cannot be said to
have had a good press. " It is at least a coincidence," said
the Morning Post, " that the Daily Chronicle should have thus
changed hands at a moment when that journal was developing
into an outspoken critic of Lloyd- Georgian policies. Just as
there are other ways of killing a cat than choking it with cream,
so there are other ways of silencing newspaper critics than
by conferring on them the Order of the British Empire."

In the same political camp, The Globe deprecated the
change. " We sincerely regret the transaction," said that
paper, " because, under the editorship of Mr. Robert Donald,
the Daily Chronicle has acquired a remarkable position as a
fearless and independent organ, representing the best side of
Liberalism."

On the Liberal side, the Westminster Gazette, after paying
a compliment to Donald's independence and ability, observed :
" Happily, we have seen in the past that though newspapers
may be bought, the journalist whose opinions count is not to
be sold. When that ceases, the influence upon opinion that
newspapers wield, and that makes them valuable to those who

SOLD 189

have a policy to promote, will quickly die." The radical Star
suggested that the announcement that the policy of the Daily
Chronicle would not change under its new proprietorship
should be taken with " several grains of salt." The article
continued : " One thing we may be certain of ... there will
be no repetition of the leading article which complained that
Sir Douglas Haig had never received the congratulations of
the Prime Minister and the War Cabinet on his brilliant series
of victories. That article appeared in the Daily Chronicle on
Thursday morning. On Friday night the Prime Minister's
representative had taken charge of the offices of the news-
paper and Mr. Donald had resigned. Fleet Street knows that
the Prime Minister does not spare those who cross his path.
General Maurice, who ceased to be a Director of Military
Operations when he exposed the Prime Minister's speeches,
is now the Military Correspondent of the Daily Chronicle,
and it will be interesting to see how long he holds that post."
Some newspapers, like the Manchester Guardian, while
refraining from criticism of the transaction, paid a tribute to
Donald and his work for the paper. " The position of the
Daily Chronicle" said its Manchester contemporary, " is a very
strong one. It has become, in the opinion of many journalists,
the best news organ among the popular papers, and in its
views it has shown much independence and courage." The
Birmingham Daily Post offered similar testimony. " Mr.
Robert Donald, a man of tireless energy and vigilant enter-
prise, has conducted the Daily Chronicle with conspicuous
success," said the Daily Post, " and in matters of party
politics before the war and since he often displayed a
courageous independence." The Nottingham Guardian,
another fine provincial newspaper, which, like the Birming-
ham Daily Post, advocated Conservative views, considered the
change was not a matter for congratulation. " For some time
past the paper (the Chronicle) has been conducted in a very
able manner, and in several directions it has done substantial
service to the State. It has often displayed unusual inde-

i9o ROBERT DONALD

pendence in its judgments, and many people have looked to
it for impartial and perfectly disinterested opinions."

Such views were typical of some scores of Press comments
upon the sale. The observations of several of the weekly
reviews were equally critical. The Nation declared that the
episode had " made men wonder what part of the newspaper
world can be made safe from Mr. George's peculiar brand of
democracy. Here was a paper which, in Mr. Donald's
capable and experienced hands, had given his Government a
support that was only not a slavish one. It committed an
error or two, no doubt. It dared to stand up for a British
soldier and state the palpable truth that the Prime Minister
had belittled his services ; straightway it falls out of favour.
Our Grand Vizier is not satisfied ; he must not only be
proclaimed right, he must never be deemed wrong."

" The Daily Chronicle" said Truth, " has been very frank
and outspoken, has hit a great many people who deserved it,
and has not kow-towed to anybody. Apparently that is why
Mr. Donald has had to go."

Even in America the change evoked comment. The New
York Times, which was not alone among United States news-
papers in touching on the subject, described Donald's retire-
ment as " a loss to journalism and to public life. . . . Holding
strong and steady beliefs, he was the creature of no man and
no party. . . . No British editor in recent times had so wide
a range of respect from leaders in the various fields of thought
and action."

During the days following his resignation, Donald received
about 150 letters, telegrams and cables, expressing the regard
of the senders, and, in many instances, recording also their
indignation at what appeared to be the motive of the trans-
action. The writers included statesmen, politicians, ministers
of religion, novelists, journalists, lawyers, civil servants,
business men, leaders of public movements, and old readers
of the Daily Chronicle personally unknown to Donald. Among
these last named was the then Bishop of Chelmsford. They

SOLD 191

came from all over the country, from men serving with the
forces in France and from the United States. Even a Judge
of the High Court, Mr. Justice Shearman, penned a few
discreet lines.

A catalogue of the names alone of these correspondents
would constitute an impressive testimonial to the respect in
which Donald was held by distinguished and representative
men and women in all spheres of life. The temptation to
quote from the letters must be resisted, but exceptions may
be made in favour of two statesmen who still hold high office
in the service of the country. Sir John Simon wrote :

MY DEAR DONALD,

I am just back from France, and I read with great
regret that you are leaving the Daily Chronicle and that
by all accounts it has got into less independent hands.
This is felt by all who prize a free Press to be a most
serious blow. You have always held your own course
without fear or favour, greatly to the public advantage,
and we shall miss your outspoken vigour. But I greatly
hope that you will soon be back in a position to influence
public affairs, as you can and should.

Ever yours sincerely,

JOHN SIMON.

No less gratifying was a note from Mr. Walter Runciman :

MY DEAR DONALD,

The journalistic upheaval of the last fortnight has
been much in my mind, and I feel that it is a matter for
pride to your friends to have seen the dignified and
emphatic manner of your departure from the Daily
Chronicle. The whole transaction bears the mark of the
hands which devised the scheme of political influence
from which public opinion has suffered during the last
two years, but I am not sure that the use to which money
has been put, to extinguish your independence, is to turn

192 ROBERT DONALD

out a journalistic success. They little know how much
your enterprise and ceaseless activity made the Chronicle.
Your high standard and high spirit, however, are what
in these days I most admire, and in the confident belief
that these are still valued in Fleet Street and Parliament
I send you my very best wishes, and remain,

Yours very sincerely,

WALTER RUNCIMAN.

Such were the feelings entertained towards Donald by two
statesmen. The emotions of those who knew him better,
of men who had daily contact with him and knew him as
their chief, were not dissimilar. Typical of many messages was
a letter from the late J. G. Hamilton, formerly in charge of
foreign affairs on the staff of the Daily Chronicle \ and, at
the time of writing, on the staff of the Manchester Guardian,
whose Paris Correspondent he became later. Hamilton wrote :

Men like myself have long memories, and yours has
been a really historic editorship. The cause of progress
in the country as a whole, and in London in particular,
owes you an immeasurable debt. It has been given to
few men to build up, as you have done, from the very
ground, one of the great organs of the world Press ; to
have done so without dishonour, without catering to mob
psychology, without the grosser form of appeal or
debauching the public mind, is almost a unique achieve-
ment.

As for myself, I shall always look back with gratifica-
tion to the years when I worked under your leadership.
If I say that I have never served under an editorship so
fair or kindly or helpful, I do so from an experience that
includes all the great Liberal papers of this country.

It is not given to every man who achieves distinction thus
to carry with him the loyalty and regard of his associates and

SOLD 193

subordinates. Some attain eminence only by mounting upon
the backs of those who serve them, and the impress of their
climbing boots is the only enduring mark which they leave
upon their fellows. But Donald was not of that breed. Of
him can be truly offered that eloquent but uncommon
testimony, " he was liked by his own people."

CHAPTER XI
A TRIBUTE TO COURAGE

AONG the men engaged in journalism there exists
a certain camaraderie, but it has a curiously uneven
quality. " Journalists," some cynic has observed,
" are brothers — like Cain and Abel." Certainly their rela-
tionship produces strange evidences of affection, as when, for
example, at the dinner of a Fleet Street confraternity glowing
with the spirit of professional fellowship, one editor adminis-
tered to himself a large dose of snuff, and marred the speech
of another editor by a fit of sneezing, exactly equal in duration
to the length of his colleague's contribution to the discussion.
Jealousy is not unknown in journalism. As a rule, the more
successful the journalist, the more difficult it is to discover
among men of comparable standing an opinion of him that
is wholly free from pettiness. Possibly that is just the scoria
produced by the heat and fermentation of Fleet Street ;
probably one must dip beneath it to ascertain the real feelings
of these men one to another.

Twice during his lifetime, however, there was manifested
towards Donald by the Fleet Street community a degree of
regard which was truly remarkable. The first occasion was
a luncheon given in his honour soon after his retirement from
the Daily Chronicle. Of this function, its chairman, Mr.
H. A. Gwynne, the editor of the Morning Post, declared :
" In all my experience, both as to the numbers and the
character of those present, I have never seen it equalled —
indeed, it surpasses anything I have ever seen."
Between three and four hundred persons attended, and

194

A TRIBUTE TO COURAGE 195

Mr. Sydney Brooks who organized the luncheon said that if
he read all the letters he had received from those who were
prevented from attending, those present would receive a
satisfactory answer to the question whether a Scotsman could
ever, in any circumstances, be made to blush.

Not far from the editor of the Morning Post, and General
Sir Frederick Maurice, sat H. M. Hyndman, the veteran
Socialist, and the tables linked journalists so opposite in their
views as Massingham of the Nation and Maxse of the National
Review ; Mr. A. G. Gardiner of the Daily News and Arnold
White, a Die-hard of Die-hards ; Mr. J. A. Spender of the
Westminster Gazette, and F. W. Wile of the Daily Mail.
Among other distinguished journalists present were Sir
Edward Cook, Sir William Robertson-Nichol, Sir Roderick
Jones, Sir Sidney Low, Sir Arthur Spurgeon, Sir Alfred
Robbins, Sir Edmund Robbins, Sir Charles Russell, Mr.
T. P. O'Connor, Mr. Hamilton Fyfe, Mr. R. A. Bennett,
Mr. J. M. Bulloch, Mr. Ernest Parke, and Mr. Hartley
Withers.

The Marquis of Lincolnshire with several members of
Parliament represented politics. Newspaper proprietors who
attended included Lord Burnham, Lord Cowdray, and Mr.
H. G. Cadbury.

Mr. H. G. Wells was there, and Mr. Arnold Bennett ;
Fisher Unwin, the publisher, and Sir Campbell Stuart, then
at Northcliffe's right hand. The ladies included Dame
Henrietta Barnett, Lady Violet Greville, Miss E. A. Horniman,
and Miss Lena Ashwell.

" All this," said Mr. Gwynne in proposing Donald's health,
" is to do honour to a most distinguished journalist. ..."

" Mr. Robert Donald and I," (continued Mr. Gwynne)
" have never seen eye to eye together on any great question
of politics, but I have never yet met a man in journalism for
whom I have had a greater respect. He has been fearless in
the presentation of the facts to the public ; he has been sin-
cere in the expression of his views, and he has been entirely

196 ROBERT DONALD

independent. These three qualities were the qualities which
were always ascribed to ourselves in the past as being the
essential qualities of good and sound journalism, and I beg
to say that Mr. Robert Donald has given to us who are con-
temporary with him and to those who will follow after him
an example of solid, sound, honest journalism of which we
ought to be proud. I don't think that we need commiserate
with him at all. An assembly like this to do honour to him
must be more than gratification to him for any trouble or any
suffering, or any pain he may have had in the past, but this
is not an end, we hope and believe, to Mr. Donald's career
in journalism. Journalism cannot afford to let him go."

Mr. T. P. O'Connor in supporting the toast said : "I
should be sorry to think the day would ever come when it
could be said with truth of journalists as a class that they
were willing to sacrifice their convictions to emoluments or
position. There is no reason except conviction why Mr.
Donald should not still be the editor of the Daily Chronicle.
Not the smallest. I am perfectly sure they would have been
only too glad to retain him, but Mr. Donald, being a man of
strong, earnest, and honest convictions all through his life,
said it was incompatible with his convictions that he should
remain the editor of the paper under the new proprietorship,
and accordingly he was ready to sacrifice what, after all, is
one of the great prizes of this world — the editorship of a great
and widely read daily newspaper. I, therefore, join most
warmly and willingly, not merely because of the long friend-
ship I have had with him and his family, but I join to do
honour to a man who has vindicated the independence and
the integrity of the great and powerful profession to which
he belongs.'*

Mr. J. A. Spender added a tribute, saying they had always
respected Donald deeply, but never so much as at that
moment. He added : " It is a very great service to jour-
nalism that a man in Mr. Donald's position should testify, in
his own person and at great sacrifice, that, though a news-

A TRIBUTE TO COURAGE 197

paper may be sold, an editor cannot be bought. We are here
to do honour to a man who has nobly upheld the best
traditions of journalism at a time when they have been in
danger of falling into discredit. We all owe him the warmest
acknowledgment for that service, and we can only express
our hope that in like circumstances we may be able to follow
his example."

Donald, replying to the toast, said that he would much
rather be at the reporters' table than in the place he occupied.
" I can only thank you and say that I am deeply moved," he
said. " It is quite impossible for me to thank you adequately,
but I wish you to understand that I appreciate this tribute as
the highest honour that could be offered at your hands. . . .
I do not, perhaps, quite agree with some remarks by my
friend Mr. Gwynne. You have heard him say we never did
agree. I don't know that I agree with him entirely on the
question of combinations in the Press. This is an era of
combinations and big businesses, and I do not think that
newspapers can be excluded from this modern tendency. . . .
We are drifting to company ownership, and there is more
than one kind of combine in the Press. I would like to draw
a distinction between such a group as the Northcliffe group
of papers, and other combinations. After all, you have the
principle in the Northcliffe Press that the papers are run by
newspaper men. The whole control is in the hands of news-
paper men. On the other hand, there is a tendency now for
people to buy newspaper shares and then consider that they
thus become newspaper men. That is an important distinc-
tion."

After showing how the industrialists of Germany, in pre-
war days, had acquired control of newspapers to promote the
demand for increased armaments, Donald instanced the end
to which that control was used during the war. He said :
" The German papers were publishing information which was
not true. It is as bad to keep out what is true as it is to put
in what is not true. During the war the German people had

198 ROBERT DONALD

never been told what they were fighting about. The Press
was Prussianized and controlled. The facts were suppressed.
It is only recently that the people have begun to be dis-
illusioned. I believe we in this country, on the propaganda
side, did something to help them to see the light. ... In
this country we had rather too much Press control and
inspiration during the war. Control was quite all right up to
a point. It was necessary and inevitable; but we are in danger
of beginning the Prussian system. Almost every department
has had its own publicity agency, and some Ministers have
their own Press agents. That system is the immediate danger.
After all, the British Empire rests upon freedom — freedom of
its political institutions, freedom in enterprise, freedom of
opinion, freedom of the Press, and anything that is to limit
that freedom is a national danger."

After a vote of thanks to the chairman, the company dis-
persed, believing that it would not be long before Donald
was back again in journalism, his prestige enhanced by the
test from which he had emerged so triumphantly.

CHAPTER XII
PROPRIETOR OF THE GLOBE

IN the course of his leave-taking at Salisbury Square,
Robert Donald remarked : " I am much too old to enter
upon a new editorial career of the kind to which I have
devoted the best years of my life." Whether at the age of
fifty-five he was right in taking that view is arguable. Taking
it, however, his wisest course might have been to retire
entirely from active journalism. Instead, he allowed himself
to become involved again in journalism to an extent which
imposed considerable physical strain and much anxiety.

Soon after his retirement from the Daily Chronicle he
accepted an invitation to become Managing Director of the
Bradford Newspaper Company, a prosperous concern which
owned the Yorkshire Observer, the Bradford Daily Telegraph,
and a number of weekly newspapers. He accepted also a
similar position on the directorate of a Hull newspaper com-
pany. His duties, however, were largely advisory and did
not entail his leaving London, except for board meetings.

But metropolitan journalism tempted him still. The
fragrance of the incense burned at the complimentary luncheon
persisted about him. He was conscious of the urgings of
those who hoped that he would find a new medium for his
gifts. Consequently, when he heard that The Globe might be
bought, he was interested.

The Globe was a newspaper with a great tradition. It was
London's oldest evening journal, having a history that reached
back to 1803.

Many of those who remember the paper think of it as being

199

200 ROBERT DONALD

primarily an organ of opinion rather than a commercial
undertaking, and as an uncompromising advocate of ultra-
Conservative views. In its origin it was neither. It was
established by a group of booksellers, goaded to action by the
treatment accorded to their advertisements by the Morning
Post. Far from being dyed-in-the-wool with Toryism, The
Globe was originally a Whig newspaper, and did not change
its political colour until it was purchased for Tory purposes
in 1866.

In its time, The Globe played a very influential part in
politics. At one period Palmerston took a hand in shaping
its policy. " It has been denied that he actually wrote articles
in it himself," observed a Globe editorial in 1903, " but the
fact is beyond dispute, as the archives of the office can prove."
In 1878 The Globe made a mark on history by publishing a
summary of a secret treaty between Great Britain and Russia.
An official denial of the accuracy of this summary was met by
the publication in The Globe of the full text of the treaty.

Even in post-war days The Globe seemed to exhibit a
certain consciousness of its past. Fleet Street respected it,
and viewed it with that peculiar veneration which, in England,
is accorded to men and things that exhibit abnormal powers
of survival. It carried itself with an air of silk-hatted
superiority. Less esteem and more sales would have pleased
its owii«. 3 better. But the mass of Londoners seemed to
have decided Ll.it appreciation of The Globe was an acquired
taste, and they had no time to acquire it.

The paper had always found " backers." Still more
remarkable, it had survived a break in its continuity of pub-
lication. In 1915 it offended the censorship regulations by
announcing that Lord Kitchener had resigned (actually, he
had left for a visit to Gallipoli, during which time the Govern-
ment hoped to find a way of removing him without alarming
the public). For this offence the paper was suppressed under
the Defence of the Realm Regulations, and remained out of
action for two weeks, after which interval it was permitted to

October 19th. 1917,

My dear Donald,

After consultation with Sir Edward

Carson who, as you know, is in charge of Propaganda,
the War Cabinet have decided to have an enquiry
into the way in which it has been carried out with
a view to its improvement. I wish, therefore,
you would undertake on behalf of myself and the
Cabinet to make a thorough investigation into all
the Propaganda work carried on under the direction
of the Department of Information. You will
have full authority (l) to call for documents and
reports and to examine officials so as to obtain
full information; (2) to have prepared a list
of the officials employed, their remuneration and
condition of service, also of the voluntary workers
and to compile an analysis of the total expenditure^ 'and

i»"TO -»TT ""

(2) to engage voluntary assistance so tte^V the
investigation may be carried out as speedily as
possible. Kindly let me know whether you undertake

this very important taek on behalf of the

Government.

YOUTB sincerely,

Robert Donald Xsq.

A " COMMITTEE OF ONE "

Mr. Lloyd George's letter asking Robert Donald to conduct an official inquiry.

PROPRIETOR OF "THE GLOBE" 201

resume publication. Such a breach of continuity would have
killed many a newspaper. But not so The Globe. It re-
emerged, though, no doubt, it lost many readers permanently
during its period of compulsory quiescence. The raising of
the price of the halfpenny papers to a penny, thus bringing
them to the same price-level as The Globe, did not improve
its fortunes.

The paper required revitalizing, and Donald considered,
with some justification, that he could give it the treatment it
needed.

The negotiations for the purchase of The Globe were not
protracted. Donald understood that there was another pro-
spective purchaser in the field and, remembering how rivals
had stolen a march on him in connection with the sale of the
Daily Chronicle, he came quickly to a decision — a little too
quickly according to some opinions. A sum of £40,000 was
asked, and Donald paid it. Nowadays the price seems small
enough for a metropolitan newspaper ; but The Globe was
not comparable to any London evening paper of to-day. Its
sales were small, its plant was limited and not particularly
modern, while its premises in the Strand were held on a lease
that was nearing its end.

Still, Donald had raised the Daily Chronicle from begin-
nings less promising, and he might have repeated the achieve-
ment had he been backed by resources as ample as those of
the Lloyds. Unfortunately, he seems to have relied upon his
own means, and they were not equal to the prolonged strain of
nursing the paper to a healthy, economic condition.

Though he did not edit the paper (he appointed Mr.
Frank Dilnot to the editorship) he was in close touch with
it and directed its affairs with his old skill and energy. He
divorced it from its somewhat antiquated plant, and had it
printed by contract — an arrangement which enabled him to
change the size and the format of the paper to suit prevailing
taste. He put at its disposal the sources of news which his
long and intimate association with leaders in various walks of

202 ROBERT DONALD

life had opened to him. He induced Sir George Paish to
become the financial director of the paper in the hope of
giving it new prestige in the City, and many of his influential
friends expressed their willingness to contribute articles to
The Globe.

The knowledge that Donald was directing the paper
destroyed some of the cobwebs with which, in the eyes of
many Londoners, it was festooned. His name, no doubt,
attracted to it readers who admired his editorship of the
Daily Chronicle and the spirit in which he had relinquished
that position. These readers, however, were for the most
part Liberals, and the name of The Globe was associated with
Toryism of the most reactionary kind. Apart from that con-
sideration, a more progressive political policy was essential if
new readers were to be won.

Donald was not so rash as to believe that he could trans-
form such a paper into an organ of Liberalism, nor did he
desire to do so. He intended to " execute a curve " as he
put it, and gradually to bring the policy of the paper round
to one of political independence and of moderate views.

An important step in that direction was taken in the first
number of The Globe produced under his control, on October
1 3th, 1919. In this issue began a series of articles on " The
New Political Outlook," by Lord Robert Cecil (now Viscount
Cecil of Chelwood). At that time Lord Robert's political
position was a trifle obscure. " I do not know exactly what
he would label himself in party politics, if he labelled himself
at all," wrote the Diarist of The Globe, " but his Conservative
environment from youth up does not prevent him from being
the truest kind of democrat."

To put up a son of a great Conservative Prime Minister
to address the readers of The Globe on the virtues of the
League of Nations was a sound beginning to a policy of
bringing a Die-hard organ round to a more progressive policy
without repelling old readers.

But Donald, ardent politician that he was, did not over-

PROPRIETOR OF " THE GLOBE " 203

rate the value of the political appeal of any newspaper. He
knew, too, that no paper which made party service its raison
d'etre could secure a large following in the new era that was
now opening. He aimed, first and foremost, at making The
Globe a good newspaper. That involved a considerable re-
inforcement of the staff. Few men knew the resources of pro-
fessional skill as Donald did. He enlisted a number of new
men, enlarging both the reporting and the sub-editorial staffs.
The sales of the paper responded to these measures, but
though progress was substantial, it fell far short of what was
required to make the paper self-supporting. Early in 1920
it became evident to Donald that he could not carry the paper
financially until the day when it would stand upon its own
feet.

Someone who knew that he was contemplating a sale of the
property introduced to Donald a prospective purchaser in
the person of Laurence Lyon, a Member of Parliament, who
had entered the House in 1918 as the Coalition-Unionist
representative of Hastings.

In 1929, shortly before his death, and long after he had left
Parliament and Great Britain, Lyon revealed his adventurous
career in an autobiography entitled By the Waters of Babylon.
He was a Canadian lawyer who had dabbled in journalism
and who had migrated to Europe. During the war he acquired
the weekly review (now defunct) called The Outlook. " I
can hardly say I bought it," he confesses in his autobiography,
" since I paid little or nothing for it."

Encouraged, perhaps, by that experience, Lyon opened
negotiations for the acquisition of The Globe. He expressed
a desire for a speedy cash transaction. Donald was agreeable,
and arrangements were made for Lyon to assume control of
the paper late in February, 1920.

It seems, however, that there were financial difficulties on
Lyon's side from the day on which the first payment became
due. Still, Donald, always disposed to think the best of a
man until the worst was evident, allowed control to pass, but

204 ROBERT DONALD

retained a substantial interest in the property as a debenture
holder. Uneasiness about the financial situation was a feature
of Lyon's proprietorship of the paper, so much so that the
manager, Mr. Albert Laker, was often uncertain whether
money to meet salaries and wages would be available on pay
days. On these occasions the manager would tell Donald of
his anxiety, and although ultimately the necessary sum was
always produced by Lyon, there was already lying in the
safe, unknown to him, a similar sum, provided by Donald
against a possible default.

Such a condition of affairs could not continue for long.
Eventually, Lyon seems to have disappeared from view,
displaced by a new proprietor. His name was Clarence
Hatry.

At this time Hatry enjoyed the reputation of being a man
of great wealth, with a considerable future in the City. Some
of the staid financial authorities did not regard him with
unqualified admiration ; but then, the man was young and
successful, a condition which the elders of the City always
view with a certain degree of suspicion. He was handling
ambitious projects, and to outward seeming, handling them
effectively. To such a man the control of a paper like The
Globe offered advantages other than the prestige that comes
of owning a metropolitan newspaper. But there may have
been a more specific purpose in Hatry's action.

The real explanation of this interesting phase of his career
may, or may not, reside in an incident which Lyon recounted
in his autobiography. According to this story, Hatry, in the
spring of 1920, " conceived the idea that he would like to be
a baronet." Lyon mentioned the matter to Sir George
Younger (later Lord Younger), then Chairman of the Unionist
Party organization. Says Lyon : "I told Younger in answer
to his queries that I knew little about the person in question
. . . and that my only relations with him were that some
time before he had taken over an option on a newspaper
property in which I had some interest." Hatry was introduced

PROPRIETOR OF "THE GLOBE" 205

to Younger, and, though the impression made by Hatry
was not unfavourable, Younger was not prepared to submit
for an honour the name of a relatively young man who had
not borne arms in the war and who seemed to have no record
of public service. Some months later, according to Lyon,
Younger was examining a list of nominees for honours put
forward by the Liberal wing of the Coalition when he came
across the name of Clarence Hatry. The Tory chairman
wondered by what process it came there, but he remarked to
Lyon, " I can promise you that his name won't stay there."
And it did not.

That Hatry's ambition to own a newspaper coincided with
his alleged aspiration to a baronetcy, and waned when the
honour seemed to be beyond his grasp, is a possibility.

At all events, Hatry did little to exploit his new possession.
He, or his nominees, promoted a company to acquire The
Globe, and Donald, who desired to be relieved of his interest
in the paper, was given to understand that considerable
developments were contemplated. But no enterprise was
shown. Though he continued to meet the loss on its pro-
duction Hatry allowed the paper to continue on its course
in a pedestrian fashion. After a time it returned to its old
home in the Strand, and was conducted with extreme
economy.

Early in 1921 Donald, who was very uneasy about the
position, was given short notice of the proprietor's intention
to stop publication on the paper. He made efforts to find a
purchaser, but the time available was too restricted. Soon
the future presented a choice between allowing the paper to
die or of Donald resuming responsibility for the loss. It
was very much to the detriment of Donald's interest to allow
the paper to cease publication, but he could not resume an
indefinite financial responsibility.

Seemingly, the end of the paper could come about in two
ways — either by Hatry ordering a cessation of publication, or
by Donald, as the debenture holder, selling the copyright in

2o6 ROBERT DONALD

the title. It is interesting to note that Hatry was most anxious
to escape the stigma of having signed the death warrant of this
old London institution. He preferred that Donald should sell
the title, but Donald felt that the only offer that had been
made for the copyright (from the Pall Mall Gazette) was not
sufficient. The prospective purchaser would not increase his
bid, and in the end Hatry handed over to the purchaser a
sum sufficient to make up the difference between what had
been offered and the figure which Donald would accept.

So on Saturday, February 5th, 1921, The Globe made its
last appearance after an existence of nearly 120 years. It
was amalgamated with the Pall Mall Gazette, and two years
later the Pall Mall was merged in the Evening Standard.
About the same time as the Pall Mall Gazette came to an end
the Westminster Gazette became a morning paper, but did not
have a long life in its new incarnation. Thus, in the space
of a few years, London lost three evening newspapers.

The final scenes in the office of The Globe were a mixture
of pathos and drama. For some old servants the end of the
paper was virtually the end of everything. Others were
restive concerning the pay due to them in lieu of notice, and
there was wild talk of a demonstration outside Hatry's prin-
cipal establishment in the City, the Commercial Bank.

It must be stated to his credit that Hatry met the situation
fairly. He made terms with everyone to whom notice was
due, and he kept his bargains. Mr. Laker, who saw the settle-
ment completed, declares that in this matter he has no cen-
sure to pass on the man whose career ended, some ten years
later, in the most sensational and the most far-reaching
collapse the City of London has ever known.

Donald's ownership of The Globe was his last association
with a London daily newspaper. In later years he became
interested in two Sunday newspapers, firstly The People, and
secondly The Referee. But though he was nominally the
controller of both these papers for a period, his association
with each was transitory. He seems to have been little more

PROPRIETOR OF "THE GLOBE" 207

than an intermediary by which the properties passed from one
ownership to another.

In retrospect, his purchase of The Globe appears to have
been a great mistake. Directing the paper on behalf of a
wealthy proprietor he might have made it a most valuable
property. But he chose to become a proprietor, and, closely
as he had been associated with Frank Lloyd in the pro-
prietorship of the Daily Chronicle, his gifts were not the gifts
of a successful proprietor. Nor were his resources.

CHAPTER XIII
IMPERIAL SERVICE

IT was a characteristic of Robert Donald that he was
never frightened by the magnitude of a project. In the
jargon of the day he " thought big." While the war was
still in progress his mind found relief from the anxious and
sometimes depressing events of the day by contemplating the
great developments that should follow the restoration of
peace. Post-war reconstruction was a topic of vast interest
to him, and had he remained in control of the Daily Chronicle
there is no doubt that he would have employed it extensively
as an advocate of great projects for national and imperial
advancement.

Even while the war dragged its way indecisively through
the year 1917, Donald was expounding a scheme that would
effect a considerable improvement in continental and imperial
communications and which, at the same time, would develop
and beautify a congested corner of London. In an elaborate
brochure, published by the Daily Chronicle under the title
" Charing Cross to Bagdad," he outlined an ambitious scheme
which linked the familiar project of a tunnel under the English
Channel with a new bridge and international railway terminus
at Charing Cross. Donald had always favoured the Channel
Tunnel project, and this scheme was an effort to bring the
subject again to public notice in an atmosphere that might
be more favourable to its success.

He had some hundreds of copies of the brochure circulated
among public men, and solicited their opinions for publica-
tion in the Daily Chronicle. Many of the replies were interest-
ing examples of the art of evasion. The Prime Minister (Mr.

208

IMPERIAL SERVICE 209

Lloyd George) considered the booklet " a most interesting
document." Bonar Law was " glad to have the opportunity "
of reading it. Balfour found it " very interesting." General
Sir William Robertson said it was " admirably got up."
There were, however, several eminent men who expressed
definite opinions for or against the scheme. Lord Curzon
" remained to be converted " ; Lord Harcourt was similarly
unconvinced, while Lord St. Davids thought the scheme
" should be put in hand without a day's delay." The most
interesting response among the scores which Donald retained
was from Sir Robert Perks who, as the only survivor of the
original subscribers to the Channel Tunnel Company of 1881,
had followed the vicissitudes of the Tunnel project for
more than thirty years. He declared that he could write a
book upon the history of the Tunnel, and his letter moves one
to regret that he has not done so.

Donald did not live to see even a fragment of his dream
realized. He saw the Tunnel project rejected once again, and
the proposal for the improvement of Charing Cross relegated
to the obscurity of the distant future. But these set-backs did
not discourage him. He took long views, and in some matters
he moved far in advance of his time.

Shortly after the war he had the satisfaction of seeing a
long step taken by an Imperial organization of which he was a
founder-member. In 1909 he had joined with a number of
distinguished journalists in establishing the Empire Press
Union, with the aim of giving cohesion to the Press of the
British Empire. To-day it seems surprising that, until 1909,
no organization existed for that purpose ; but such is the fact.

In 1907 Sir Harry Brittain, who had newspaper associations
but was not a professional journalist, suggested to a gathering in
Winnipeg that it would be good if editors representative of the
Empire could be brought together. The idea was well received
by an audience which included many journalists, and, on his
return to London, Sir Harry explained it to Donald. At
Donald's instigation, Sir Harry saw the first Lord Burnham,
Q

210 ROBERT DONALD

and before long a committee was formed, with Lord Burnham
as president, to carry the project into effect.

Two years later, in 1909, there was held in London the first
Imperial Press Conference, an event of such importance that
the late Lord Rosebery described it as marking " a distinct
epoch in the history of the Empire." Useful as were the
discussions of newspaper problems, the contact established
between the editors and statesmen in London was the more
important feature of the meeting, for it resulted in a conception
of mutual responsibility, particularly in relation to imperial
defence, which was of inestimable value during the Great War.

As an immediate sequel to this great parley, the Empire
Press Union was brought into existence to continue the work
begun by the Conference and to promote similar meetings in
various parts of the Empire.

From its inception, Donald took an active part in the work
of the Union. During the war he became chairman in suc-
cession to the Hon. Harry Lawson (the second Lord Burn-
ham), who had been elected President of the Union on the
death of his father. With the second Lord Burnham as its
president, Donald as its chairman, and Lord Northcliffe as its
treasurer, the Union had an exceptionally strong and vigorous
trio to direct its activities, and, during the war, it rendered
very valuable service to the Press of the Empire.

It had been intended that the second Imperial Press Con-
ference should be held in Canada in 1915 : but the inter-
vention of the war made that impossible. With the restoration
of peace, however, the plans for a Canadian conference were
resuscitated, and in July, 1920, a party of eighty journalists
sailed from Liverpool for the Dominion. Half of the number
were representatives of the United Kingdom, and half were
overseas journalists who had assembled in London. Other
overseas representatives travelled to Canada without coming to
Britain, and these, with the Canadian contingent, gave the
opening session at Ottawa an attendance of three hundred
journalists drawn from every part of the British Empire. Lord

IMPERIAL SERVICE 211

Burnham acted as chairman of the Conference, and Robert
Donald as vice-chairman.

The story of that remarkable gathering, of its deliberations
and its tour of the Dominion, was told by Donald in a book1
which he wrote soon after his return.

In addition to taking an active part in many of the dis-
cussions, Donald made several speeches at public and pro-
fessional functions held in connection with the Conference.
Some of these utterances made a lasting impression.

Before sailing for Canada he secured from official and other
sources details of Canada's part in the war. It would seem
that these facts had never been collated before Donald
addressed himself to the task. Consequently, when he
presented them to Canada in a speech at Halifax, Nova Scotia,
soon after the party landed, they received wide publicity. He
astonished Canadians by telling them " your shells supplied to
the British Army were more than double the total bought from
the United States, and were more than one-third of the whole
shell production of the British factories, although before 1914,
Canada had not made a single shell." On other occasions
Donald spoke of the immensity of the entire imperial contri-
bution to the war, of the enormous potentialities of the Empire
and of the Empire's evolution as a free association of self-
governing nations. It is noteworthy that in his speeches
Donald did not allow his personal differences with Mr.
Lloyd George to prevent him from according to the then
Prime Minister generous praise for his labours for the Empire
and for the pacification of Europe. " Mr. Lloyd George," he
declared on one occasions, " remains the outstanding per-
sonality in international politics to-day."

At Quebec Donald won the regard of the French- Canadian
journalists by a felicitous address delivered in French : " Mr.
Donald," said the Montreal Daily Star, " met with an imme-
diate response from his audience, struck a welcome chord in

1 The Imperial Press Conference in Canada, by Robert Donald. Published
by Hodder & Stoughton.

212 ROBERT DONALD

his friendly thoughts and met with a great demonstration when
he closed."

When the Conference visited Toronto, a special meeting of
the Convocation of Toronto University was held for the
purpose of conferring the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws
upon four of the distinguished visitors, namely, Robert
Donald, Sir Gilbert Parker, Sir Robert Bruce (editor of the
Glasgow Herald), and Mr. Geoffrey Fairfax, of the Morning
Herald of Sydney, Australia. After the ceremony Donald,
called upon to speak on behalf of the four new doctors,
delivered an address on the necessity for regulating the
development of the English language and safeguarding of its
purity. To his surprise, this theme aroused widespread
interest, quotations from the address being reported by the
Press in most parts of the Empire.

Donald was always very proud of his honorary degree and
his association with Toronto University, so much so that it is
doubtful whether the knighthood conferred upon him some
years later gave him greater satisfaction. Equipped for life
with nothing more than a parish school education he was
conscious of what he had missed in being denied those oppor-
tunities for intellectual development which the collegiate life
only can afford. That loss could never be made good, but he
felt, no doubt, that the honour conferred at Toronto was a
recognition that, in the larger university of life, he had
graduated with some degree of distinction.

Donald was not able to accompany the delegates through-
out their tour of the Dominion. He saw the business of the
Conference through to its termination, made a presentation to
the chairman, Lord Burnham, on behalf of the Conference,
indulged in a little sight-seeing, and then was obliged to leave
for home. He hoped on a later occasion to see Western
Canada, but the opportunity never came.

To his great regret he was prevented from attending the
third Imperial Press Conference which was held in 1925 in
Australia, but he took a prominent part in the fourth Con-

IMPERIAL SERVICE 213

ference, held in London in 1930. He continued to the end of
his life his work for the Empire Press Union and maintained
contact with journalists in almost every part of the Empire.

In the fourteen years of his association with this notable
Imperial work, Donald was privileged to assist in bringing
about a great change in the status and inter-relationship of the
Press of the Empire. Through the conferences large numbers
of editors and journalists from the ends of the British Com-
monwealth were brought in touch with one another, with
statesmen and leaders of thought, and on two occasions with
the Sovereign. The interchange of news between certain
parts of the Empire and with the British Press was greatly
improved. The London representatives of overseas news-
papers were accorded access to official sources of news
hitherto closed to them ; the gallery of the House of Commons,
and even the Lobby, were opened to them. Cable and wire-
less rates were reduced and facilities improved, and in all that
related to imperial communications the Empire Press Union
came to exercise an important influence. Donald took a lively
interest in all these developments, but it was perhaps the
improvement and cheapening of wireless and cable communi-
cations throughout the Empire that appealed to him most, and
upon these subjects he came to be regarded as an authority.

Before he left for the Empire Press Conference in Canada
Donald's interest had been engaged by another great imperial
project which had been mooted in pre-war days and which
now seemed capable of realization, namely, the plan for the
British Empire Exhibition which came to fruition in 1924 and
1925. In June, 1920, when the Exhibition was little more than
a bundle of typescript, Donald was discussing the subject with
interested parties. Under official encouragement the scheme
was rapidly developed. The King gave his patronage ; the
Prince of Wales accepted the Presidency of the Exhibition ;
Parliament bestowed its blessing and supported the guarantee
fund to the extent of £ 100,000.

So soon as the organization was set up Donald was invited

214 ROBERT DONALD

to join the Management Committee. Later he was appointed
chairman of the Publicity Committee.

Few of the projects in which he interested himself during
his busy life appealed to him so strongly as this ambitious
demonstration of the Empire's resources and opportunities.
For four years he was tireless in his efforts to ensure the
success of the Exhibition. He gave generously of his time and
his knowledge, often to the detriment of his professional
affairs, and he neither sought nor received the smallest
pecuniary reward. Much of his exertion was labour in vain.

Unfortunately, the directive organization of the Exhibition
was not wisely planned at the outset. The governing body,
known as the Executive Council, which was technically respon-
sible for the arrangements, consisted of about 120 persons,
many of whom appear to have taken their duties lightly. Too
much was left to officials, who had no precedents to guide
them, for no exhibition of the kind had ever been held.

To catalogue the weaknesses of the British Empire Exhibi-
tion is too easy a task to be worth undertaking. In considering
the event in retrospect it is important to remember the cir-
cumstances of the period in which the enterprise had its
inception. In the years immediately following the war,
leaders of industry and others whose support was essential to
the success of a project of this kind were deeply absorbed in
their own affairs, adapting themselves to the tasks of the new
epoch. But the reckless extravagance which had characterized
the war period still perverted judgment. Leaders thought, and
erred, in millions. The unbounded optimism with which the
nation had addressed itself to reconstruction still lingered.
What could withstand a generation that had emerged trium-
phant from such a test as the war ! Great tasks were under-
taken in a manner which to-day would be regarded as
irresponsible.

Thus, the British Empire Exhibition which, first and last,
cost a round twenty millions sterling, and ultimately relieved
its guarantors of about two millions, appears to have been

IMPERIAL SERVICE 215

planned, in some respects, without adequate thought, and
even where correctly planned it did not always follow the
lines laid down.

By the middle of 1922 Donald had grown distinctly uneasy
about several aspects of the policy and work, and by the
autumn of that year he was contemplating resignation.

There were two major matters upon which he was unable
to see eye to eye with the Exhibition authorities. One was
the admission of foreign timber into the construction of the
Exhibition buildings at Wembley Park, and the other was the
failure of the governing body to exclude foreign foodstuffs
from catering contracts. As Donald visualized the Exhibition
one of its primary purposes was to teach the people of Great
Britain that the Empire could supply their every need. It was
in the belief that this object underlay the scheme that the
Dominions were subscribing to its funds and arranging exhibits.

At one time Donald seems, with the majority of his col-
leagues, to have accepted as inevitable the provision of a
cosmopolitan cuisine in the restaurants, but he soon awakened
to the fact that, no matter how awkward it might be for catering
contractors to abandon traditional practices, this unique oppor-
tunity of showing the public that they could be fed excellently
and entirely from the resources of the Empire must be seized
and exploited to the full. But, to quote his own words, " it
seemed to me that the members of the committee were con-
sidering supplies to an exhibition rather than supplies to a
British Empire exhibition."

Similarly, he advocated a rigid exclusion of all foreign
timber. The buildings being largely of concrete, the amount
of wood needed, in relation to other materials, was small.
Nevertheless, Donald felt that to demonstrate in 1920, by an
Empire Timber Exhibition, that the Empire could supply all
timber from its own resources, and then, four years later, to
invite the Sovereign to stand on a dais of American pitch-pine
to open this vast imperial fair, would be a betrayal of the
whole purpose of the enterprise.

2i6 ROBERT DONALD

He represented his views to those in authority, but he made
no progress. They replied that no caterer could be found to
purchase the catering concession if restrictions so rigid as
Donald wished to impose were incorporated in the contract.

As regards timber, they wished the fullest use to be made
of Empire woods, but it was not always possible to obtain, at
short notice from stocks of imperial material available in the
country, certain kinds of timber that were urgently required.
(This the Dominion agents stoutly denied.)

Donald was not satisfied with these answers ; nor, he felt
sure, would the Dominions be satisfied when they knew the
facts. He came to the conclusion that resignation and a public
disclosure of the state of affairs had become a duty.

He did not care to take a step so serious without consulta-
tion with someone whose opinion he respected, and soon a
suitable opportunity occurred. On a Saturday morning early
in October, 1922, Donald, who was kept indoors by indifferent
health, had a visit from Bonar Law. At that time Bonar Law,
recovered from the illness which had obliged him to resign
the Conservative leadership and his office in the Coalition
Government, had the status of a private member of Parliament.

Although in pre-war days the Daily Chronicle, under
Donald's editorship, had criticized Bonar Law with all the
acerbity common to political controversy at that period, when
the two men had met in 1915, in the friendly atmosphere
produced by the truce to party warfare, there had grown up a
mutual regard which ripened into friendship.1

In his home at Rutland Gate, Donald told Bonar Law all
that was in his mind about the British Empire Exhibition, and
showed him a letter he had drafted, resigning his offices.

The nature of Bonar Law's advice can be deduced from a
note which Donald addressed to the statesman on October
1 7th, in the course of which he said :

1 Being ^conducted by Bonar Law's most intimate friend, Lord
Beaverbrook's Evening Standard may be accepted as an authority on Bonar
Law's relationships ; and the Evening Standard has described Donald as " 3
great personal friend " of the Conservative leader,

IMPERIAL SERVICE 217

As I have not been able to go out yet, I have not seen
Mr. Baldwin,1 but I wrote to him sending him a copy of
my letter (of resignation) and also of the evidence which I
printed in support of it. ... I modified my letter con-
siderably and I think I improved it.

In this note Donald proposed to see Bonar Law a few days
later, but it is doubtful whether the meeting ever took place,
because in the three following days the political crisis of 1922
moved swiftly to a climax, taking Bonar Law from his retire-
ment and elevating him to the Premiership — a sequence of
events of which he had not the smallest expectation when he
sat with Donald a few days previously, discussing the problems
of the British Empire Exhibition.

The fall of the Third Coalition Government overshadowed,
but by no means obscured, the news of Donald's retirement
from the Exhibition. From Donald's letter (which he circu-
lated to the Press), the public, overseas as well as at home,
learned for the first time that there was serious dissension in
the councils of the Exhibition. Following the publication of
Donald's charges, the policy of the governing body was
defended vigorously in letters to the Press, but, ably as the
other side of the case was stated, it failed to satisfy public
opinion. Press comment was almost wholly against the policy
of the Exhibition. The London representatives of the
Dominions were among Donald's most staunch champions :
some of them came out publicly in support of him. The
Canadian Government flatly declined to proceed with its
plans for participation in the Exhibition until a solution of the
difficulties had been reached. As indicative of Australian
feeling, a highly placed Australian in writing to Donald con-
gratulating him on his courageous action said : " Were I
Prime Minister of Australia, I would politely but firmly tell
the committee that if they adhered to the decision taken,
Australia would have nothing to do with the Exhibition."

1 Then President of the Board of Trade,

2i8 ROBERT DONALD

Indeed, throughout the many letters which Donald received
from representative men of the Dominions, the same note of
indignation is sounded. The writers were all of opinion that
in an exhibition whose purpose was to reveal the resources of
the British Empire, nothing of foreign origin, however trivial
the quantity, should be admitted if similar material could be
obtained within the Empire.

On the Management Committee of the Exhibition Donald's
protest had no effect. Acknowledging it, the Chairman wrote
tersely :

I laid your letter before my colleagues at the Manage-
ment Committee this afternoon. In accepting your
resignation they desired me to express their regret that
you should have effected it in a manner liable to prejudice
the interests of the Exhibition."

That was all. Not even a formal word of thanks for
the work he had done was dropped in to dilute the acidity
of the communication.

Donald, however, was confident that the action he had taken
was in the best interests of the Exhibition, and that, in the end,
events would justify him. Justification came swiftly. Soon
after the general election which confirmed him in the
Premiership, Bonar Law took steps to deal with the Exhibi-
tion's troubles.

He deputed Sir William Joynson-Hicks,1 the new Secre-
tary of the Department of Overseas Trade, then enjoying his
first and belated experience of office, to make an inquiry into
the various matters which were the subject of controversy,
and in this inquiry Donald was one of the most important
witnesses.

Before Sir William began his report, the ground of Donald's
principal criticism was removed. The Exhibition authorities
promised the Government that provision would be made " in
all contracts and in every other way possible " for Empire

* ILater I^ord Brentford,

IMPERIAL SERVICE 219

materials to be used exclusively in the construction of the
Exhibition buildings ; and for Empire products only to be
used in the restaurants. No exception whatever would be
made unless the British authorities and the Dominion repre-
sentatives certified that such Empire products were not
available.

The only other point in the terms of reference which con-
cerned Donald intimately was the relationship of the Publicity
Committee to the actual work of advertising the Exhibition,
and here Sir William Joynson-Hicks's report met his criticism
in a wholly satisfactory way.

Finally, Sir William expressed a view long held by Donald,
that an executive committee of " something like 120 members
is quite incapable of exercising effective control over the
management," and he recommended considerable changes in
the organization of the Exhibition.

Donald emerged from the inquiry in a highly creditable
manner. " I should like to say," observed Sir William in
his report, " that Mr. Donald was actuated by a desire to do
everything in his power to achieve the object of making the
Exhibition a thorough success from the Imperial point of
view, and by a fear that if matters were allowed to go on as
they were going, the full Imperial possibilities of the Exhibi-
tion would not be realized."

Joynson-Hicks followed up this comment by a letter to
Donald appealing to him to do all in his power to further the
success of the project.

The appeal was scarcely necessary. With the purposes of
the Exhibition thus clarified, Donald was only too willing to
help, and when the Management Committee, after what
seemed to be a moment of hesitation, accepted the recom-
mendations of the report, he withdrew his resignation and
returned to the work.

Donald would not wish it to be claimed that his action
saved the Exhibition, but it needs little imagination to
visualize what would have happened had the authorities

220 ROBERT DONALD

pursued the policy against which he protested. Inevitably,
at some later date, when perhaps it would have been too late
to correct the mischief, the Dominions would have dis-
covered what had been done, and their indignation might
have resulted in abstentions and withdrawals such as would
have wrecked, or seriously injured the undertaking, besides
bringing the Empire into derision in the sight of the world at
large.

As it was, although the Exhibition was far from being a
financial success, it did achieve its purpose in demonstrating
the immense resources of the British Empire, and it con-
tributed greatly to that better understanding of the potentiali-
ties of Imperial co-operation which now obtains in Great
Britain.

Though, in his career, Donald had waged many a fight, he
had fought hitherto as the editor of a newspaper, aided by the
great influence which a newspaper can wield. On this
occasion, however, he had no artillery at his command. It
was a hand-to-hand encounter in which the forces ranged
against him at the outset seemed overwhelming. The history
of the controversy showed, however, that although Donald
had lost the powerful help which control of a newspaper
affords, he remained a person of considerable influence and
authority.

Genial and urbane though he was, Donald could be very
tenacious and combative in controversy. He was never over-
awed by the strength of the forces arrayed against him.
" Peace at any price " was not his motto. He was not one of
those individuals who, in order to win a reputation of never
making an enemy, will sacrifice their own judgment, com-
promise on any principle and trim their sails to every breeze
that may bring them to that harbour where — in public at all
events — all men will speak well of them.

CHAPTER XIV
COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES

THERE can be few forms of public service more
altruistic than membership of Royal Commissions
and those committees which are appointed from time
to time by the Cabinet or by departments of the Government.
Commissions and committees are notoriously too often a
means by which an administration obtains relief from the
pressure of some problem, tedious and long standing, with the
details of which the Ministry and Parliament are imperfectly
acquainted. Yet such bodies never fail for lack of able and
public-spirited persons, prepared to do the prescribed work
without so much encouragement as the assurance that their
conclusions will be accepted by the Government, still less that
their recommendations will be carried into effect.

In seven years Robert Donald gave his services to four such
bodies, in some instances with useful results, and in others
without any discernible effect.

His first appointment came in 1917 when he was busily
engaged in editorship and in propaganda work on behalf of
the Government. Nevertheless, he found time to sit upon a
departmental committee set up by Dr. Addison, then Minister
of Reconstruction, " to consider and report upon the steps
to be taken to secure the better co-ordination of public
assistance in England and Wales, and upon such other matters
affecting the system of local government as may from time to
time be referred to it." The chairman was Sir Donald
Maclean, and the members included such diverse and inter-
esting personalities as Lord George Hamilton, Sir Robert
Morant, Mr. J. H. Thomas and Mrs. Sidney Webb.

221

222 ROBERT DONALD

The report of this committee was notable not only for being
unanimous, but also for recommending the abolition of
Boards of Guardians and the Poor Law Union, and the
merging of all the functions of the Poor Law authorities in
those of the County Councils and County Borough Councils.
It advised the creation of " Home Assistance Committees "
for the administration of outdoor relief. The Government of
the day accepted the policy recommended by the Committee,
but to the Conservative Ministry of 1929 remained the task
of abolishing the Boards of Guardians and bringing into being
the Public Assistance Committees.

Whether the title recommended by the Maclean Committee
was a better one than that finally selected is a matter of
opinion ; but there will be some who will consider that the
first designation, Home Assistance Committee, goes a little
farther towards removing the stigma of the old Poor Law
system.

In October, 1921, the Coalition Ministry caused a Royal
Commission to be set up to examine the system of government
for Greater London. According to its terms of reference, the
Commission was to " inquire and report what alterations are
needed in the local government of the administrative county
of London and the surrounding districts with a view to
securing greater efficiency and economy in the administration
of the local government services and to reducing any inequali-
ties which may exist in the distribution of local burdens as
between different parts of the whole area."

Robert Donald was one of those who were appointed to this
large task, and among others were Mr. Neville Chamberlain,
Mr. G. J. Talbot, K.C. (later Mr. Justice Talbot), Mr.
Stephen Walsh (who became Labour's first Secretary of State
for War), and Sir Albert Gray, K.C.

For the chairmanship the Government secured the services
of Lord Ullswater, who, as Mr. William Lowther, had recently
retired from the speakership of the House of Commons after a
long and distinguished tenure of office.

COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES 223

In the course of its deliberations, extending over a year and
a half, the commission lost two of its members, one of them,
Mr. Neville Chamberlain, resigning on appointment to Mr.
Bonar Law's administration.

The eight survivors were far from being agreed in their
recommendations. Four members only signed the main
report, and one of these was constrained to add a separate
memorandum embodying views of his own. The other four
paired off and made two minority reports, Donald associating
himself with Stephen Walsh. The various recommendations
of the Commission are of small interest to-day, but it is worth
noting that Donald and Walsh, in their advice on London's
transport system (which was the only subject on which the
Commission's work proved to be of practical value), arrived
nearer to the policy ultimately carried into effect by the
National Government of 1933 than did their colleagues.
Writing of the transport recommendations made by Walsh
and himself, Donald said, in 1931, " While I thought I was
looking ahead, our recommendations in regard to transport are
already out of date. . . . Nothing but the complete unification
of all the means of transport in greater London — electric and
tube railways, suburban services of main line railways, tram-
ways and omnibus services — will solve the problem."

Membership of the Ulls water Commission was Donald's
last official service in the cause of better local government in
London. Through his periodical, the Municipal Journal, and
in many unostentatious ways, Donald continued to be actively
concerned with the subject, so that it may be said that his
interest extended from 1888, when as a reporter on The Star
he was assigned the task of " cleansing the Augean stables of
London's local government," down to the end of his life, a
period of forty-five years. " His death," wrote Sir Edward
Hilton Young, Minister of Health, in a foreword to the
Municipal Year Book which Donald founded, " was the loss
of a man whose services to local government were many an<J
great,"

224 ROBERT DONALD

Yet local government was but one of several spheres of
service in which Robert Donald was profoundly interested
and to which he devoted a considerable amount of thought and
energy.

The application of wireless telegraphy to the needs of the
country and to the development of the Empire was a question
that engaged his attention almost from the time that radio
communication became a commercial possibility. The Im-
perial Press Conference of 1909 found him an eager auditor
of the opinions of overseas delegates upon the advisability of
establishing a chain of wireless stations between the units of
the Empire. The Conference urged such a project upon the
Government " both for the cheapening of electrical com-
munications and for the safety of the mercantile marine."

That the Government's response was scarcely satisfactory
is plain from the disadvantage in which, at the outbreak of
war, the Empire found itself in relation to Germany in the
matter of wireless communication. According to one of
Donald's statements on the subject, Germany, in 1914, had
the most efficient wireless service in the world, and was so
far in advance of British equipment that the first war news
received in India consisted of German messages arriving by
wireless several days ahead of British news.

During the war wireless telegraphy developed rapidly, and
it became the obvious duty of the Empire Press Union to
bring the subject of imperial communications prominently to
the notice of Governments throughout the Empire at the
earliest opportunity. Thus, at the Imperial Press Conference
at Ottawa in 1920, the urgent necessity of linking the Empire
by wireless was the subject of one of the most important
debates. Donald spoke upon it in a manner which showed that
he had followed all developments with an informed mind and
a critical eye. The Government, he said, had muddled the
business from beginning to end. Its departmental committee
on the subject had produced a " small, peddling scheme,"
proposing a system that was already obsolete,

L. N. A.

AT GOLF WITH THE BISHOP OF LONDON

: He was the most good-tempered and kindly adversary," the Bishop has written.

COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES 225

A suitable resolution was passed unanimously, but it is
doubtful whether that action would have stimulated the
authorities but for the manner in which a few ardent advocates
of the ideal, of whom Donald was one of the most prominent,
had pressed the subject incessantly upon the notice of the
British Government.

One of the chief obstacles to progress lay in the question of
ownership, the Government having, in 1911, established the
principle that Empire wireless should be owned and operated
by the State, a principle which appears never to have been
brought into proper relationship with the fact that private
enterprise, in the form of the Marconi Company, was bearing
the burden of research and development of the new science.
With the rapid progress made in the decade following the
Government's decision, a considerable conflict of interest
arose.

In 1923 Bonar Law as Prime Minister announced a change
of policy. " The Government," he said, " are no longer pre-
pared to exclude private enterprise from participation in
wireless telegraphy within the Empire." In the interests of
national security, however, the Government had decided that
there must be one wireless station, owned and operated by the
State, capable of communicating with the Dominions ; and to
that extent there would be competition.

To translate this policy of compromise into a working
arrangement proved impracticable. At all events, after nine
months of negotiation between the Post Office and the
Marconi Company, no settlement was reached.

In the meantime, however, the first Labour Government
had attained office, and according to the late Vernon Hartshorn,
who became Postmaster-General, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald
in asking him to take that office told him that " the one thing
that he desired to impress upon him, above all, was the
importance of setting up an imperial wireless service.

Within a fortnight the new Postmaster- General appointed
a committee to advise him on the subject, and to the chair-

226 ROBERT DONALD

manship he appointed Robert Donald, the other members
being Sir Henry Slesser (then Solicitor- General), Sir Drum-
mond Fraser, Professor W. H. Eccles, and Mr. F. J. Brown v
(then Assistant Secretary of the Post Office).

The terms of reference charged the committee to consider
and advise " without delay " on the policy to be adopted
"as regards imperial wireless services, so as to protect and
facilitate public interest/'

It is doubtful whether any official committee ever discharged
its duty in a matter of such importance with such celerity.
The Donald Committee held its first meeting on February
8th, 1924, and presented its report — a unanimous statement —
on February 22nd, a feat upon which the Committee was
warmly congratulated by the Press, which, by depressing
experience, had begun to associate the imperial wireless
question with dilatory procedure and abortive negotiations.

The report of the Donald Committee recommended a
reversal of the Bonar Law policy. It advised that the State,
through the Post Office, should own all the wireless stations
in Great Britain for communication with the overseas Domi-
nions, Colonies, Protectorates, and Territories : and that the
Post Office should operate directly, " under an improved
business organization," all the Empire stations in Great
Britain.

Except by the Marconi Company, whose objections were
natural and expected, the report was well received, both at
home and overseas. Even the Postmaster- General of the
preceding Government, Sir Laming Worthington-Evans,
admitted that the recommendations of the Committee were
inevitable, having regard to the history of the controversy.

After due consideration, the Government adopted the main
recommendations of the Donald Committee, and the necessary
legislation was passed by the House of Commons.

One phrase of the recommendations necessitated a further
inquiry. The " improved business organization " of the
Post Office, which was considered essential to the successful

COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES 22?

operation of the wireless stations, was destined to give trouble.
Many of those who looked askance at the ideal of State owner-
ship did so primarily because they lacked faith in the ability
of the Post Office to manage the new development with that
enter prise * and courage which, obviously, it demanded.

The Morning Post stated succinctly the fear of large numbers
of business men when it observed, " Permanent officials, even
if they are accessible to new ideas, are reluctant to take risks."

Hence it was that in May, 1924, the Cabinet decided that
a committee should be set up to advise upon what the
" improved organization " of the Post Office should be.
Donald was appointed to the chairmanship, but when he
surveyed the names of the Committee he was not happy about
his new and difficult task. As he revealed later, the committee
" originally consisted of three Civil Servants, Sir Alfred
Mond and myself. Had the membership not been enlarged it
was our intention to resign."

When at Donald's request the Committee was extended, the
Government added to it Sir Arthur Balfour, the Sheffield
industrialist, Sir Edwin Stockton of Manchester, Sir Campbell
Stuart of The Times, and Mr. W. J. Bowen of the Union of
Post Office Workers.

Whether a committee of nine, of whom three were Civil
Servants and one an official of a postal workers' union, was
the ideal body to deal with the subject, was a question about
which much controversy proceeded after the committee had
come to an inconclusive end. Sir Alfred Mond held strongly
that it was not. Borrowing the terminology of the card-room,
he complained in a speech : ' We were euchred all the time
by having internal administrative difficulties hurled at our
heads."

The Committee devoted much time to its task, sitting
regularly throughout the summer of 1924, but it had not
reached agreement when the Labour Government resigned
and a Conservative administration came into office. Auto-
matically, that change put the Committee into suspense for a

228 ROBERT DONALD

time, and ultimately the new Government decided not to
reappoint it, a decision which was influenced by Donald's
opinion, communicated to the new Postmaster- General (Sir
William Mitchell-Thomson), that the prospect of the Com-
mittee reaching any agreed conclusions was remote. Donald
had, however, drafted a report which had received a substantial
measure of support from those of his colleagues who repre-
sented business interests, and that document he submitted to
the Postmaster- General for consideration. With the decisions
taken ultimately by the Minister, involving a relatively small
readjustment of Post Office organization, Donald was unable
to agree. He expressed his disagreement publicly and with
such effect that Sir William Mitchell-Thomson was obliged
to defend his action in the matter.

It was scarcely likely that Donald's conception of what was
needed would accord with what the official mind was disposed
to approve, for Donald was thinking, not so much of the state
of development which the science of wireless had then
reached, but of its potentialities. To him, the problem was
not one of coping with the service that wireless was then able
to give, or might be required to give in the immediate future,
but of laying the foundations of an organization that would be
related to the large developments that were certain to come,
an organization that would be capable of easy expansion to
conform with every development. Moreover, his mind was
much engaged by the probable consequences of an increasing
conflict of interest between cable and wireless services. He
was thinking of how that conflict could be averted or miti-
gated, and how the best service to the Empire could be
extracted from both cables and wireless. " To merge wireless
in the general administration of the telegraphs and telephones,
and to place it under the control of officials who have neither
expert knowledge nor experience of this highly specialized
business, is to make failure inevitable," was the view he
expressed to the Empire Press Union. The traditional
methods of the Civil Service would, he maintained, be

COMMISSIONS AND INQUIRIES 229

" especially baneful in the case of the developing science and
expanding business of wireless."

Four years later, under pressure of inevitable developments,
the Government were moved to summon an Imperial Wireless
Conference, whose recommendations resulted in the merging
of British wireless and cable interests in the Imperial Commu-
nications Company with a capital of £30 millions.

The rapid development of the Beam system between 1924
and 1928 had changed the problem in some respects, and the
varying policies of the Dominions in the matter of ownership
of wireless had affected the position as it existed in 1924.
Consequently, when the recommendations of 1928 were made
Donald was able to give them cordial support.

It would be idle to claim that Donald foresaw all the subse-
quent developments, but it is undeniable that he visualized in
1924 — vaguely, perhaps, but with sufficient clarity to make him
bold and confident in his advocacy — the immensity of future
developments.

For about eight years, from 1920 onwards, Donald's agita-
tion for a more intelligent handling of the question of imperial
wireless services scarcely ceased. By articles, letters and
speeches he pressed the subject upon the attention of the
Government and the country. Others might tire of the
agitation, but he did not. Critics might trip him now and then
on questions of detail or detect minor inconsistencies in his
many speeches and letters, but he was never diverted from his
principal objectives by such checks, nor did he relax his efforts
until he saw the problem solved in a manner that gave a large
degree of satisfaction.

In the course of the struggle, his work received recognition.
On the King's birthday in 1924 he was appointed a Knight
Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire, for his public
service in general, and particularly in recognition of his
Chairmanship of the Imperial Wireless Committee.

The bestowal of this honour upon Donald evoked many
generous tributes from the Press. There were allusions to

230 ROBERT DONALD

his public work in the leading articles of the principal news-
papers ; and journalists all over the country and overseas
used the occasion to recall personal associations.

For the second time in six years Donald was made the guest

of honour at a public luncheon. On July, 1924, at the

Criterion Restaurant, a large body of journalists joined with

distinguished representatives of politics, literature, public

services and business in entertaining him. The Prime

Minister (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald), prevented from attending,

sent a letter paying tribute to Donald's public work and " to

the honest independence of which all his journalistic activities

bear the hall mark." To Lord Burnham's felicitous speech,

T. P. O'Connor and the Marquis of Lincolnshire added their

encomiums. Donald replied briefly, and it was characteristic

of him that, of the short time which he occupied in replying

to the speeches, he devoted several minutes to commending to

the generosity of the company a scheme for enabling young

journalists to travel the Empire.

CHAPTER XV
BOOKS AND SPEECHES

MANY men whose gifts would be of value to the com-
munity decline to follow the path of public duty for
the reason that they are unable to retire from their
gainful occupations. The wisdom of this attitude cannot be
questioned ; and yet it is plain that public life would be much
the poorer were every man to adopt it.

At no time was public service easy to Robert Donald.
Never during his whole life was he free from professional
labour. Had he chosen to do so, he might have retired from
journalism when he resigned the editorship of the Daily
Chronicle. Then, with a comfortable degree of economic
independence assured, he might have devoted himself entirely
to public life. But journalism, practised as he practised it, is a
public service, and evidently he believed that he could best
advance the causes that interested him by continuing his pro-
fessional life. In the sequel, by sinking his capital in a news-
paper that was doomed, he impaired his usefulness in other
directions. Thereafter he could not abandon journalism, even
if he had desired to do so ; and he would not abandon those
causes which interested him.

From 1925 onwards his professional position was peculiar.
He remained proprietor of the Municipal Journal and its
allied publications, but, for the rest, his work was that of an
adviser on newspaper production. In that capacity he held
certain directorships, but in many instances his services were
enlisted without any such association being set up. The
presence among his papers of copies of two lengthy and
critical memoranda on the Sunday News (owned by the Daily

231

232 ROBERT DONALD

Chronicle) suggests that one of the later controllers of the
Daily Chronicle had recourse to Donald's experience. If the
advice were sought, it was not followed. Reform at that period
might well have prevented the demise of the paper in 1931.

It is, however, a fact well proven that those who know most
are always ready to learn more ; and it is, therefore, not sur-
prising to find that among those who availed themselves of
Donald's experience was Viscount Rothermere, whose life-
long association with newspaper production might well have
produced in him the conviction that he had no more to learn.
Lord Rothermere had a high opinion of Donald's journalistic
capacity, and always gave serious consideration to his views.

In this Lord Rothermere followed the example of his
brother, Lord Northcliffe. Some time before Donald became
editor of the Daily Chronicle, Northcliffe had recognized
Donald's ability. " A first-class descriptive reporter and as
accurate as a stop watch," was the opinion of Donald which
Northcliffe (then Alfred Harmsworth) expressed to Mr. R. D.
Blumenfeld when those two remarkable men were associated
in the production of the Daily Mail in the 'nineties. About
that time Alfred Harmsworth wished to enlist Donald as one
of his coadjutors, and offered him his own price. But while
Donald recognized Harmsworth's journalistic genius and
foresaw a great future for him, he felt that their political ideals
could never be reconciled and would render their co-operation
impossible.

Donald's fears were well founded. In later years, when he
was editing the Daily Chronicle, there were many angry
exchanges of journalistic musketry between that paper and the
Daily Mail. There was a time when some personal sniping
from the Carmelite House side entered into these engagements.
An attempt was made to belittle Donald's journalistic prestige
by describing him as " formerly advertising manager of the
Gordon Hotels," but the shot rebounded from the target at
which it was aimed, and whistled through the camp of the
advertising community, who, though less assertive and self-

BOOKS AND SPEECHES 233

regarding than they are to-day, strongly resented the use of
such a fact as a term of disparagement.

But such incidents (and there were others) left no rancour.
Northcliffe and Donald met on the common ground of the
Empire Press Union and were subsequently associated in the
work of national propaganda during the war.

Thus it happened that when Donald no longer had a
newspaper under his own direction, the Daily Mail and
other papers under Lord Rothermere's control frequently
called upon him for articles, or offered him a platform when
he wished to engage public attention.

In spite of the many claims upon his time Donald con-
trived to accomplish a surprising amount of free-lance writing
during the last years of his life. And he displayed all the
versatility of the born journalist, contributing weighty
sociological articles to reviews, lively political comments on
topics of the hour to the daily and Sunday newspapers, and
light, informative essays to the popular periodicals. On one
occasion, soon after the conferment of his knighthood, he
attended a meeting of the Council of Nations at Geneva and
wrote a series of messages on its proceedings for a group of
newspapers.

For the first time in his career he was able to find time to
write books. In his early days he had written some pamphlets,
the first being a little work of some thirty pages, published in
1895 and entitled Six Years' Service for the People, which
set forth the record of the newly constituted London County
Council. Donald had compiled several reference books also ;
and, as related, he edited, in 1920, the story of the second
Imperial Press Conference.

He has been credited with the authorship of a popular book
entitled, Lloyd George and the War, by " An Independent
Liberal," but his papers disclose no evidence to sustain that
belief. That he was concerned in its publication is certain,
but it is significant that in the contract for its publication he is
described, not as the author, but as " the owner," which

234 ROBERT DONALD

suggests that he was acting on behalf of someone who, for
good reasons, did not wish to reveal his identity.

In 1925, however, Donald made his first considerable effort
in authorship in a book entitled, A Danger Spot in Europe, in
which he gave a concise history of the French incursion into
the Saar Valley and of the government of that territory by the
League of Nations. His study of the problem and his pro-
longed investigations in the Saar Valley led him to criticize
vigorously the conduct of the League and of France. He took
a pessimistic view of the future, expressing the fear that, as
the plebiscitary period approached, France would find an
excuse for military intervention and continued occupation.
Forcible annexation might occur, and " if such a crime
against international law and treaty rights were committed,
the League of Nations would be a mere, helpless onlooker.
Such an outrage against humanity would mean the end of the
League and also of the Treaty of Versailles." These views
were expressed, of course, long before the Nazi movement
became dominant in Germany, and whether that subse-
quent development would have affected Donald's attitude to
the Saarois it is impossible to say. His political principles
would certainly have made him hostile to the Hitler policy
generally.

His next book, published in 1928, was The Tragedy of
Trianon : Hungary's Appeal to Humanity. Donald's interest
in this much-discussed subject was not a post-war irruption.
In January, 1914, he had visited the territory subsequently
affected by the Treaty, and had acquainted himself with its
political problems and racial antipathies. Consequently, when
the time of peace-making arrived he took more than a super-
ficial interest in the Treaty of Trianon and its effects.

In post-war years he paid occasional visits to Hungary and
Czecho- Slovakia, and in 1927 he travelled both countries, and
a little of the new Roumania, making investigations preparatory
to writing his book. His discoveries (spiced by the novel
experience of continuous surveillance of his movements

BOOKS AND SPEECHES 235

and correspondence in Czecho- Slovakia) made him an ardent
advocate of revision of the peace treaty in favour of Hungary.

Donald's friendship with Lord Rothermere, and the fact
that Lord Rothermere wrote a foreword to The Tragedy of
Trianon, have suggested to some who read his book that
Donald's work was part of the Rothermere campaign.

There is nothing in Donald's papers which justifies such a
deduction, and Lord Rothermere affirms that Donald acted
entirely on his own initiative. Donald's knowledge of the
country affected, extending over thirteen eventful years at
least, and his instinctive interest in any situation which sug-
gested oppression and injustice, are factors which go to show
that no inspiration was necessary to cause him to study the
subject.

The third and last of his books on European problems
dealt with a subject no less controversial than its predecessors.
It was entitled The Polish Corridor and its Consequences, and
was written in 1929 after a tour of three months in the dis-
puted territory. His survey was not, and could not be, a
comforting one to those who hoped for peace in Europe on
the basis of the post-war treaties. He sums up a painstaking
recital of facts and opinions with the statement :

' The grim realization of the situation is that to-day,
along the Eastern frontier (of Germany), conditions
resemble war-time more than did the state of things in
1914. Every element associated with the genesis and
provocation of war challenges you : distrust, jealousy,
the spirit of revenge, unjust treatment of minorities,
resentment, racial hatred."

Nevertheless, he considered that the inevitability of war
should be excluded, and he took heart from the " birth in
Germany of a new and fruitful spirit. The drill-sergeant," he
continued, " has given place to the philosopher. . . . Instead
of mobilizing armed forces whose ultimate function in dire
necessity is the destruction of life, this movement seeks to

236 ROBERT DONALD

mobilize the moral forces of the world to save humanity."
This reading of the situation has, of course, been voided by
subsequent events in Germany, but those changes, drastic
though they be, do not impair the value of Donald's work as
a survey of facts and as an exposition of possible solutions of
a problem which menaces the peace of Europe.

On the publication of this book Donald sent copies to a
few friends in high places, men who, in every instance, had
specialized knowledge of the problem. Their comments upon
the book and on the subject with which it dealt, were not
written for publication, and it would be improper to repro-
duce them here, but they constitute a tribute to the manner
in which Donald had grasped, not only the essentials, but
much of the detail of an admittedly intricate question.

Incidentally, this series of books is interesting for the
manner in which it demonstrates Donald's skill as an investi-
gator of facts and as a commentator upon them. In spite of
many diversions and distractions from the paths of journalism
he remained, pre-eminently, a journalist, and as Lord North-
cliffe had judged him more than thirty years previously, " a
first-class descriptive reporter."

At no time was there any diminution in Donald's interest
in journalists and journalism. Always a student of the
development of the profession and of the newspaper industry,
his authority upon these subjects grew with the passing
years. It was recognized soon after the war when Mr. J. L.
Garvin, addressing the formidable task of re-editing the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, asked Donald to write the chapter
on newspapers. " That chapter," declared Mr. Garvin, in an
obituary tribute to its author, " crammed with specific know-
ledge, yet indicating the choice of principles for the future,
remains the best existing survey of the subject."

Occasionally Donald delivered addresses on the Press, but
not often, for in later years public speaking seemed to become
less attractive to him. Listening to him it was difficult
to believe that he had once displayed great promise as a

BOOKS AND SPEECHES 237

parliamentary candidate, and at a time when the standard of
political speaking was higher than it is to-day.

Notoriously, journalists are indifferent speakers. The urge
of the trained writer to find the precise phrase, the inevitable
word, is constantly at war with the speaker's instinct to forge
ahead with his theme and to leave it free to inspire its own
form of expression. Donald suffered from this conflict, and
he was happier in reading a paper than in extemporary address.

Of his utterances on newspaper subjects during the later
years of his life, two are notable. One of these was an address
to the Manchester Luncheon Club in 1925, in which he dealt
with " The Future of the Press."

Here he devoted considerable attention to the growth of
newspaper-owning combines. He predicted (and subsequent
events justified the forecast) that the process of newspaper
consolidation was far from ended, but that, eventually, dis-
integration would set in. The difference between an indus-
trial combination and a newspaper combination, he pointed
out, was that an industrial combine dealt with material things,
while the other dealt with educational and moral things. The
newspapers stood in the relationship of moral trustees, and
the assembling of a vast number of newspapers under one
control was not, in his view, compatible with the independence
and freedom of the Press. A syndicate controlled by one
Press magnate was a gramophone press, with its editors either
part of the vast machine or having no responsibility for
editorial opinion. He took the opportunity of condemning the
proposal then before Parliament to restrict the publication of
reports of divorce cases, believing that it would be better to
give the newspapers the opportunity of co-operating in dis-
ciplining themselves in the matters to which the Bill referred.
Broadcasting would have its influence on the Press of the
future. The arrangement by which the newspapers were able
to restrict the news services of the Broadcasting Corporation
could not be maintained for ever. Wireless subscribers would
insist upon getting more news, and that development, he

238 ROBERT DONALD

believed, would constitute a check upon the accuracy of
newspapers.

A more adventurous address was the paper on the same
subject which he read to the Institute of Journalists in 1928,
and which is reproduced in full elsewhere.1

In the course of this lecture Donald made the prediction :
" In the near future there will be three fewer morning news-
papers in London, and two more evening papers." This
remark, taken in conjunction with his conviction that the
great combines would further extend their ramifications,
raised the ire of the Daily News. On the morning after the
lecture that newspaper barked a twofold challenge at the
lecturer. In its news columns, with a degree of asperity
unusual in a journal which so often contained homilies on
goodwill and tolerance, it described Donald's address as " A
silly speech." But it made up for that outburst by giving
Donald the opportunity of elaborating his point. Donald
explained that he meant " that within the next twenty years
there would be three fewer daily papers. I did not name
them ; in fact I did not have any particular three in mind.
They may go out by amalgamation, but they will go out. I
feel perfectly safe in prophesying that."

In its editorial comment the Daily News disclosed what was,
no doubt, the real reason for the attack, for it employed the
incident to proclaim its own independence of newspaper
trusts and its freedom from " chain control and opinion."

Donald was not perturbed, though it was the first time the
adjective " silly " had ever been applied to his opinions. He
had given himself twenty years for the justification of his
prediction. He was content to wait.

In less than two years one of London's great morning papers
disappeared by way of amalgamation. On June 2nd, 1930,
the Daily News made its first appearance as the " News
Chronicle," having absorbed, overnight, its contemporary and
rival, the Daily Chronicle.

1 See Appendix.

CHAPTER XVI
THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE"

ATER Frank Lloyd's retirement and Donald's resig-
nation the Daily Chronicle passed through three
phases of ownership.

The first was commonly spoken of as the Lloyd George
regime, for although Mr. Lloyd George occupied no office in
the proprietory company, it was evident that the paper was
Mr. Lloyd George's megaphone, and that, in political matters,
it amplified the voice of its master with unfailing fidelity.
Here was the subservience which Mr. Lloyd George had been
unable to command of Douglas Haig and Robert Donald.

For about four years following the purchase of the paper
by Mr. Lloyd George's friends, Sir Henry Dalziel was the
chairman and managing director of the company, but in 1922,
about a year after his elevation to the peerage as Lord Dalziel
of Kircaldy, the new recruit to the Liberal aristocracy divested
himself of all his newspaper interests. Thereafter, until 1926,
the board of United Newspapers (1918) Limited consisted of
the Right Honourable C. A. McCurdy, K.C. (Chairman),
Brigadier-General E. B. Cuthbertson, Major G. Lloyd George,
Mr. J. H. Parham, Mr. E. A. Perris, and Sir Howard Spicer.
During the Lloyd George regime there were several
developments. A number of newspapers published outside
London were brought into alliance with the Daily Chronicle,
notably the Edinburgh Evening News, which had been a sup-
porter of the Asquithian wing of the Liberal Party, and the
Yorkshire Evening News, whose offices and organization in
Leeds provided the nucleus of a northern publishing office
for the Daily Chronicle, where were produced each night

239

240 ROBERT DONALD

specially prepared editions for circulation throughout the
north of England and in Scotland. This extension enabled
the Daily Chronicle, in the leading article of its twenty
thousandth issue, to speak of its " ever-growing circle of
readers."

In 1925 United Newspapers (1918) Limited was converted
from a private to a public company. Previously, its issued
capital consisted of £1,225,005, in preference and ordinary
shares of £i denomination. Now its capital was rearranged,
and a public issue was made of £550,000 preference shares of
£i each, carrying 7! per cent interest.

It was about the time of this issue, according to the recol-
lection of a Chronicle journalist, that a meeting of the staff
was held, and employees of the company were invited to take
advantage of this opportunity of becoming partners in the
enterprise.

Meetings of the staff were of very exceptional occurrence,
and, inevitably, when the 1925 meeting was held, the minds
of many of those present went back to the series of gatherings
held seven years previously to inform the staff of Donald's
resignation and of the coming of the new regime. Those
were sad, November days. Now it was early summer ; sun-
shine flooded the room to reinforce the golden prospects
which were described to the meeting. The papers, it was
said, were entering upon a new phase in which former achieve-
ments, however notable, were to be outstripped. Further
capital was necessary. Of course, it would be easily secured.
The point for the meeting, however, was that if the staff cared
to participate, in large or small degrees, now was their oppor-
tunity. The details of the issue were recited . . . yj per
cent interest (6 per cent net). . . . Could it be beaten ? . . .
Security ? Well, look around — freehold property, plant, stock,
goodwill, and the Daily Chronicle ! And more. To those
who had the will, but not the ready cash, the proprietors
would advance the purchase money, the new shareholder
repaying the loan by instalments from his salary.

THE LAST PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN OF SIR ROBERT DONALD
With him is Major Sir Ralph Glynn, Bt., M.P.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 241

No one had greater faith in the Daily Chronicle than its
staff. Some of those present had seen it rise from its obscurity
as the Clerkenwell News and had travelled with it, through the
days of adversity in the early years of the century, and had
marched with it through the steady, unbroken advance to
prosperity under Donald's editorship.

The staff, mechanical as well as editorial, responded to the
invitation now extended. The total amount subscribed by
them is put by one of the subscribers at £25,000 — not an
immense sum in relation to the authorized capital of the com-
pany, but it incorporated many a man's hard-won savings.

For a time these new shareholders were satisfied. Dividends
were forthcoming. The scheme appeared to be working out
according to promise. The golden years seemed indeed to be
returning.

But little more than a year later — in November, 1926 —
came a change. Suddenly, the Lloyd George regime ended,
and the papers passed into the hands of two wealthy India
merchants, Sir David Yule, Bart., and Sir Thomas Catto,
Bart., with whom was associated the Marquis of Reading as
the leader of the enterprise, and the new chairman of the
company. The purchase price of the properties was reported
to be approximately £3,000,000, and the transaction was later
reflected in the formation of the Daily Chronicle Investment
Corporation Limited, with an authorized capital of £3,050,000.

The arrangement seemed to be an admirable one from Mr.
Lloyd George's point of view. The sale was regarded as
replenishing his political war chest after the elections of 1923
and 1924, and fortifying it for the next contest, at the same
time committing the newspapers to the control of an old
friend and former colleague. Mr. Lloyd George had the
ha'pence, and the cake was transferred to friendly hands.

Fleet Street, however, was surprised by the new develop-
ment. The great merchants who were associated with the
new regime were scarcely known in that street where, of many
subjects and persons, more is known than is published,
o

242 ROBERT DONALD

Research showed Sir David Yule to be a Scotsman who, going
to India in his teens, had made himself one of the great
magnates of the East. He had been made a knight in 1912, and
a baronet in 1922. His interests were said to extend to more
than a hundred companies, trading in transport, power, jute,
coal and other commodities. Banking, too, came within his
purview. Fleet Street noted, in its well-thumbed Who's Who,
that Sir David had staked out no more than six lines as his
claim to fame, and marvelled that a man so modest should,
within sight of his seventieth year, be venturing into newspaper
proprietorship.

The other baronet (created 1921) was a little better known,
for he had served on various missions during the war. After-
wards he had become associated with Sir David Yule in his
Indian enterprises. Though like Sir David, Sir Thomas was
a Scotsman, he was of another generation, a man still in the
forties.

Rufus Daniel Isaacs, Marquis of Reading, was in an
entirely different category. He was a great figure, a national
leader. His entry into Fleet Street was an event so excep-
tional that a brief survey of his history is not irrelevant to a
narrative intimately concerned with the newspaper history of
the period.

Lord Reading had long provided raw material for the
journalist's craft. Some Fleet Street men had no doubt
related, in the best Samuel Smiles manner, the story of the
youngster who had sailed up the Hooghly as a ship's boy,
holystoning the deck and burnishing the brass, and who, some
forty years later, had descended a gangway at Bombay, to the
thunder of a Royal salute, as Viceroy of India. If their narra-
tives omitted to state that the poor boy was actually the son
of a merchant and had been educated at University College,
London, and at two continental lycees, then, surely, it was for
the worthy purpose of encouraging the young and ambitious
who lacked those advantages.

But Fleet Street's distinguished recruit had known advei>

THE TRAGEDY OF THE " DAILY CHRONICLE " 243

sity more painful than the menial tasks of a ship's boy.
According to Lord Birkenhead's sketch of him,1 Rufus Isaacs,
" through no fault of his own, failed and was ' hammered *
upon the Stock Exchange for a large amount while still a very
young man." From that unhappy situation, " inexperienced,
penniless, almost friendless," he had struggled to qualify for
the Bar, and, once called, he worked with such assiduity and
skill in his new profession, and with such determination to
rehabilitate himself, that within five years he was able to
pay off every penny of his Stock Exchange liabilities.

Nevertheless, Fleet Street remembered Lord Reading best
as an eloquent advocate, as leader in many a cause celebre that
had provided columns of profitable copy, and as a law officer,
statesman, judge and pro-consul. Service, first as Solicitor-
General and then Attorney- General (with the unprecedented
privilege of a seat in the Cabinet), for no more than
three years was sufficient to carry him to the exalted post
of Lord Chief Justice of England, to which he was appointed
in 1913. But seemingly, so rare were his gifts that the
State could not leave him to concentrate upon the vital
work of his high office. In 1915 he was temporarily
relieved of his judicial duties to become President of the
Anglo-French Loan Mission to the United States. Later
he executed other important duties in Washington, and we
have the assurance of Mr. Lloyd George that his presence
in the United States was attended by " a further marked
improvement in Anglo-American financial relations." As to
what share, if any, Lord Reading had in the arrangement of
the loans which constitute the Anglo-American War Debt,
now supposed by the ignorant to be peculiarly Mr. Baldwin's
responsibility, it would not be pertinent here to inquire.
Sufficient to record that in 1918 he became Minister Pleni-
potentiary in Washington.

Ultimately he returned to the bench until, in 1921, the
Government under Mr. Lloyd George's leadership deemed

1 Contemporary Personalities, by the first Earl of Birkenhead.

244 ROBERT DONALD

him essential to India, and he accepted the vast responsibilities
of the Governor- Generalship.

From that magnificent post, having committed its manifold
problems to Lord Irwin, he returned in 1926, and if there was
curiosity concerning the quarter in which his diversified gifts
would find expression, it was soon satisfied by the announce-
ment that the new Marquis (the dignities of Viscount and
Earldom had been conferred upon him in quick succession
during the war) had joined the boards of a bank, an insurance
company, an electrical undertaking, and of the vast Imperial
Chemical Industries combine.

Then Lord Reading entered Fleet Street, the most exalted
personality ever to be associated with the newspaper industry.

Perhaps, too, he was the most awe-inspiring. To be sure,
men still spoke with reverence of Northcliffe, but Northcliffe
had grown up in the alleys of Fleet Street, and he was a jour-
nalist, whereas the newcomer had arrived from the Throne
Room of Delhi, to say nothing of the Cabinet chamber and
the austere dignity of the Lord Chief Justice's court, where
even editors had sometimes sat uneasily on the penitents'
bench, while highly paid counsel apologized fully and
unreservedly on their behalf.

The staff of the Daily Chronicle became conscious of a
superior feeling ; still more so, perhaps, the staff of the
Sunday News. What newspaper could boast a Marquis for
chairman, and a Marquis who could command three million
pounds ? From three million pounds to three million copies
would surely be an easy transition for so powerful a magnate !

Fleet Street hastened to do homage to the new-comer. The
Press Club was thronged for the dinner of welcome. Lord
Burnham presided, and Lord Riddell and Major J. J. Astor
came to greet the new colleague. Mr. R. D. Blumenfeld and
Mr. E. A. Perris represented editorship, and the company
was large enough and varied enough to speak for every grade
and every branch of journalism.

The occasion was not so glamorous as some by which the

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 245

great man had been welcomed in his State excursions east and
west ; but it did not lack cordiality or even, the critical might
murmur, adulation. Nothing could surpass Lord Burnham's
description of the guest as " one of the best-loved and most
distinguished of living Englishmen."

A graceful reply, correct throughout, terminated in a
peroration in which the Marquis observed :

" In spite of the fact (and indeed perhaps because of
it) that newspapers exist as a commercial proposition,
they have, nevertheless, great burdens to carry, and a
responsibility not only of giving the news, but of inform-
ing public opinion. I believe, in truth, that the higher
the attitude taken by the Press, the higher status it may
evolve as it proceeds — as it does from day to day and
strength to strength — so will it become more powerful
in informing and influencing opinion, in the impressions
that it will create upon the public, in the influence that
it will have upon the affairs of the country, and in the
authority with which it will help to mould the destinies
of the Empire."

With these profound thoughts and noble ideals to sustain
them, the company dispersed, feeling no doubt that there had
entered the newspaper industry an influence destined to have
far-reaching effects. But though Fleet Street watched the
Daily Chronicle in a spirit of high expectation, nothing notable
seemed to occur. The only surprise which it provided
occurred in July, 1928, about eighteen months after the entry
of the versatile Marquis, when news came that the Daily
Chronicle and its allied properties had been sold to Mr.
William Harrison acting on behalf of what was known as the
Inveresk combine. So far as the Daily Chronicle and its
Sunday paper were concerned, the price was variously stated
at the time as ranging from £1,500,000 to £2,000,000.

Thus closed the Reading regime, leaving Fleet Street a
trifle dazed. True, Sir David Yule had died recently, but he

246 ROBERT DONALD

was an elderly man at the time of the purchase by Lord
Reading, and it seemed strange that such a contingency had
not been contemplated and provided for in a transaction of
such magnitude. To submit an enterprise that was something
more than a " commercial proposition " to two upheavals in
two years did not seem consistent with the conception of the
Press expressed in Lord Reading's speech ; and the Newspaper
World voiced the opinion of journalists when it protested
against papers of this character being " bought and sold as if
they were a pound or two of butter."

There was no ceremonial farewell to the Marquis. He
faded out of Fleet Street without a valedictory word, and if,
watching Lord Reading's departure, an impious journalist
echoed the remark of Hans Andersen's small boy concerning
the nudity of the emperor, it could only be because he lacked
knowledge of the Marquis's past, and could not foresee the
future that awaited him.

For Lord Reading, destiny had in store, even for his
seventy-first year, the Secretaryship of State for Foreign
Affairs in the first National Government, and though that
Government was short-lived and his tenure was brief, there
was still to come to him the ancient office of Admiral of the
Cinque Ports, with the desirable tenancy of Walmer Castle,
and a salute of nineteen guns to greet him on his official visits
to the King's garrisons.

His successor, Mr. William Harrison, whose name is
associated with the final phase of the history of the Daily
Chronicle, had risen from obscurity to prominence in four
years. He was a solicitor by profession, practising first in
Yorkshire and later in the City of London. In 1924 he came
into the news by obtaining control of the Inveresk Paper
Company, a concern with a capital of over £2,000,000.
Scarcely pausing after that immense stride, Mr. Harrison
pushed forward into the adjoining sphere of periodical
publications, acquiring from Sir John Ellerman a large group
of well-established periodicals, including the Tatler, the

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 247

Sketch, and the Bystander. This deal was estimated to involve
£3,000,000. After an interval of about two years, in the course
of which he acquired interests in some provincial newspapers,
he entered Fleet Street proper by purchasing the Daily
Chronicle and its allied journals. Such was the man to whose
hands the Marquis of Reading passed the Daily Chronicle.

The series of changes of ownership which the properties
had undergone in three years had, inevitably, an unsettling
influence upon the papers. The political policy of the papers
remained unchanged (there was always a Liberal politician
on the board), but it must be remembered that, at this period,
the fortunes of the Liberal Party, or parties, were ebbing, and
this factor added to the difficulties facing the proprietors and
the staff of the Daily Chronicle. The general election of 1929
dissipated any hope of a Liberal revival in the near future,
for out of a total of 512 candidates, only 58 were returned.
It was evident that this result and the return of a Labour
Government, would accelerate the drift into the Labour ranks
of a section of the Liberal Party which had long provided
large numbers of readers for the Daily Chronicle.

Another menace to the Daily Chronicle was provided by
the resurgence of the Daily Herald. So far, that newspaper
had not been seriously regarded as a competitor by any of the
London daily newspapers. It was a large-sized Socialist
pamphlet rather than a newspaper. After the establishment
of the Labour Government of 1929 an arrangement was made
between the Socialist controllers of the Daily Herald and the
powerful newspaper house of Odhams Limited whereby the
Labour newspaper should be produced under conditions
more favourable to its progress. Fleet Street realized that
the resources of money and experience at the command of
the Odhams combine would make the Daily Herald, for the
first time, a powerful competitor. And the Daily Chronicle,
more perhaps than any other newspaper, would feel the
presence of the new rival.

Plans were made by the directors of the Daily Chronicle to

248 ROBERT DONALD

meet the assault ; considerable sums were spent on making
good the effects of past economies and in introducing new
attractions. The Daily Chronicle turned out to meet the new
Daily Herald was a better pennyworth than its readers had
seen for some time.

But, in the interim, the preliminary gale that announced
the approach of the economic blizzard, had swept through the
City of London, bringing down some top-heavy structures and
shaking others. Investors ran for cover, and it was no longer
possible to launch new issues with the assurance that the lists
would be closed ten minutes after opening. If, when he
purchased the Chronicle properties, Mr. Harrison had formu-
lated plans for raising new capital by a public issue, it was no
longer possible to put those plans into operation. Early in
1930 Mr. Harrison told Inveresk shareholders1 that in 1929
the Daily Chronicle and the Sunday News made only £25,000
profit, " and I think that the new editions of the Chronicle and
Sunday News cannot be expected to make anything but losses
for the next two years."

United Newspapers (1918), Ltd., was controlled by the
Daily Chronicle Investment Trust, which in turn was con-
trolled by the Inveresk Paper Co., Ltd., over whose board a
representative of one of the great banks now presided, in
place of Mr. Harrison. The same gentleman had also suc-
ceeded Mr. Harrison in the chair of United Newspapers, Ltd.,
which had now nine directors. In Donald's day it had four.

The profits of the United Newspapers Company and the
Daily Chronicle Investment Trust for the last five years of
the existence of the Daily Chronicle, are interesting. As
given in the Newspaper Finance Annual for 1930 they were :

United Newspapers ^5 *926 I(227 ^28 1929

(1918) Ltd. . . i2j% 5% 30% 30% NIL

Daily Chronicle Invest-
ment Corporation
(Registered July, 1927) NIL 5%

* Paily Mail, June 2nd, 1939..

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 249

The whole story of the financing of the papers from 1918
to 1930 would, no doubt, yield interesting material to those
who have the gift of following the intricacies of company
finance and the reaction of capital operations upon the market
value of shares. This narrative, however, cannot embrace
such an examination. The human side of the tragedy of the
Daily Chronicle is the more relevant to its purpose, for that
was the aspect of the subject which interested Robert Donald.

The staff, of course, were aware of what was happening to
the financial structure of the papers. Many of them were
shareholders, though it does not follow that they appreciated
the full significance of the events of the winter of 1929-1930
or the fall in value of the shares which they held.

Their faith in the stability of the papers was unshaken,
even when newspaper shares toppled from the high levels to
which they had soared during 1928, and when critical com-
ments were published in rival newspapers concerning Mr.
Harrison's enterprises. The worst that they anticipated was
another change of ownership, and having had three such
upheavals in twelve years they were becoming inured to such
vicissitudes.

The papers went their way as they had done for over half
a century. There was no sign of alarm or despondency
among the staff, whatever might be the emotions in the board-
room.

Late in May, 1930, rumours were current concerning the
future of the Daily Chronicle, and on the last days of that
month disquieting hints began to appear in rival journals.
Counter-statements were issued, and the staff were reassured.
But even while newly installed machines were turning out
with miraculous speed and efficiency what were destined to
be the last few issues of this great newspaper, there were two
or three persons in the office who were aware that the grave
of the Daily Chronicle was being dug. These individuals
were, however, pledged to secrecy, and they were obliged to
carry out their duties as usual, listening to suggestions that

250 ROBERT DONALD

would never be carried into effect, discussing dates for holidays
with men who were to have a much longer holiday than they
had ever experienced. Such painful, if necessary, deceit was
not practised for long. The coup de grace was administered
swiftly.

On Sunday, June ist, the staff attended as usual, and the
reporters, sub-editors, printers, and messengers went through
the familiar routine while the single bell of the adjacent
church of St. Bride's summoned the caretakers of Fleet Street
to evensong. Though the hundreds of men within the office
knew nothing of it, the monody from the steeple of St. Bride's
was the passing bell of the Daily Chronicle. The stories which
the reporters were .writing would never be put into type. The
news which the tape machines were chattering out would be
printed elsewhere, but not in the Daily Chronicle. The sub-
editors who were searching the early news for indications of
what might be the principal story of to-morrow's papers did
not guess that the chief feature would be the obituary notice
of the Daily Chronicle.

What happened is thus described by a member of the staff
who was on duty that fateful evening :

" An editorial messenger entered with a request for all
to go at once to the editor's room. Mr. Ferris, pale,
impassive, had well rehearsed his part, and was word-
perfect to deliver his brief lines. What he had to say,
he told us, would not take long. It was that the Daily
Chronicle now in course of preparation would not appear ;
copy would be transferred to another office, and there
dealt with. It had been made clear recently to the
directors, he said, that we could not go on in our present
form any longer. An offer had been made and accepted
from our contemporary, the Daily News. By to-morrow
morning a new construction of ownership would be
completed, having as its leading organ a journal called
the News-Chronicle, There was a pause, It seemed to

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 251

be intimated that the proprietors of the Daily News
would be willing to consider the application by Daily
Chronicle men for vacancies that might be on the new
paper. . . . But was that all ? * Yes, gentlemen, that is
all, thank you.' . . . The door opened, the actors filed out,
and the curtain came down, this time not to rise again.

" But it was far from all ; the worst was yet to be.
Men went back and looked towards the emptied desks
with dismay, some staggered their way into corridor or
lobby and talked of going home as something to be
feared. Blanched faces, nervous hands ; what does it
mean ?

" It was the thing come true that Philip Gibbs had
described in his Street of Adventure, but a million times
more horrible and real than the event on which he had
built. Here were men of fine capabilities, good fellows
of long experience, thrown out ; they knew it, and the
knowledge was bitter. Several were in their fifties and
sixties, and a faithful servitude was being rewarded with
the scrap-heap. Some went round to make terms with
the new enterprise, but the majority were left out, and
many to this day are out still. . . . Those present on this
lamentable occasion can never let it pass out of memory.
It was as foul a page as the history of Fleet Street can
produce."

But rarely to Englishmen can events be so overwhelming as
to extinguish every spark of humour. The gay courage that
can fling a jest in the face of disaster expressed itself in a
corridor in that office of gloom. A few members of the staff,
strolling aimlessly and dejectedly about the premises some
time after the news had been announced, encountered an old
servitor, Tom Cutler. Tom's place on the staff was a modest
one : he was the person to whom men of greater gifts would
appeal to repair a fused light or to cure a smoking chimney.
But he was " one of the family." He had spent his lifetime

252 ROBERT DONALD

in the Chronicle office, one of many who still thought of
Edward Lloyd as " the boss " and of his son as " Mr. Frank,"
though both were dead and gone.1

To Tom Cutler was put the question which everyone asked
of his neighbour that night — " What do you think of it ? "

" Well," replied Tom, with the air of one who had a special
grievance of his own, " if anyone had told me when I came
here fifty years ago that this wasn't likely to be a permanent
job, I'd never have taken it on."

Half a century's service in the one house was not the longest
record among the men who that night were consigned sorrow-
fully but certainly to the " scrap-heap." One of the editorial
messengers had entered the service of the Lloyds sixty years
previously and had continued on the staff of their suc-
cessors without a break. There were many men with forty
years' service, and thirty years was not a record of great
account.

It was for the staff that Robert Donald was most concerned
when he heard the news. There had been relatively few
changes since he left them, and he realized how cruel was the
blow that had fallen upon many whom he still regarded as old
friends.

1 The passing of the Daily Chronicle" he said in an
interview published in the Daily Mail, " is the greatest
tragedy which has happened in the chequered story of
Fleet Street. Never has there been a case of a newspaper
going out of existence by absorption, or otherwise, having
a sale of about a million. It shows what this terrific
pressure of competition in the modern newspaper field
has become.

" One's first thought at this journalistic calamity,
which came with such dramatic suddenness, must be for
the staff, over a thousand strong, who will be thrown out
of work. The paper had, all round, a very capable staff,
and there are few new openings in journalism to-day.

1 Frank Lloyd died in 1927.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 253

" I consider that in recent years the Daily Chronicle
has been struggling under handicaps which a competent
staff could not overcome. The first blow to its prestige
was when it became the organ of Mr. Lloyd George.
This meant that its political news had to be shaped to
suit his policy — in other words, that its political reports
lacked the true perspective — and that its independence
in opinion was sacrificed.

" Then it lost its distinctive character through the
disappearance or change of certain features. Juggling
with the * make-up ' was also another mistake — taking
the news off the front page and putting it back again,
changing the size of the page, etc.

' Then, it seemed to me in recent years, it had been
striving to imitate other papers instead of being itself and
developing its own characteristics.

" Lack of continuity in managerial direction was also
a weakness. I believe there have been seven or eight
different chairmen and managing directors in ten years.
A newspaper cannot be run successfully by a board of
directors — the chief of whom are not experts — and a
series of committees."

Of the possible causes of the disaster he said but little more
in an article which he was asked to write for the Newspaper
World. Though he praised the craftsmanship which the paper
displayed to the end, he regretted some of the changes. He
instanced the reduction of foreign news. The politician and
the financier, he said, did not think much of foreign news,
which was risky as well as costly, but it gave authority to a
paper and " no first-class journal is complete without a world
service of its own. But non -journalists would not see any
dividends in it."

" Immense sums," he wrote, " have been taken out of the
Daily Chronicle, not in dividends, but in deals, sales and re-
sales, compensations and fees. Under this financial policy no

254 ROBERT DONALD

adequate provision was made for building up reserves, for
retirement allowances, for reconstruction, for meeting fiercer
competition. The failure of the Daily Chronicle is not attribut-
able to the staff, although among them are the chief victims of
that calamity. . . . There seems to me to be a moral respon-
sibility lying upon somebody — I don't know whom — for
allowing so many old and loyal servants to be stranded in the
twilight of their lives."

About 30 per cent of the editorial staff were absorbed by
the News Chronicle, but that degree of relief was afforded only
by displacing a certain number of men from the staff of the
Daily News. In this painful adjustment the spirit of the
journalistic profession was seen at its best. Men who were
unmarried, or who had some subsidiary source of income,
refused to be considered for absorption by the Daily News in
order that colleagues whose need of employment was more
urgent might have a better chance. Some Daily News men
resigned voluntarily so that more Daily Chronicle men might
be absorbed. In short, men who could swim for their own
lives gave their places in the boats to those who had dependants
to keep afloat.

" I had seen in him, in that strange alloy which we call
human nature, a vein of purest gold." That tribute was paid
by Mr. Baldwin to Curzon of Kedleston, but the words
were equally true of many a humbler man in Fleet Street
during that black week of 1930.

But, as was feared, the end of the Daily Chronicle meant for
many the end of permanent employment. Some were too old
to be re-engaged, and their ability to withstand the consequent
hardships and anxieties was reduced, particularly among the
mechanical staff, by loss of the savings they had invested in
the company.

Donald did his best to help. Nothing pleased him more in
his last years than to be able to " place " an old colleague of
the Daily Chronicle, or to receive news that one of them had
found a niche in a structure in which niches were becoming

THE TRAGEDY OF THE "DAILY CHRONICLE" 255

increasingly rare. There is little doubt, too, that he assisted
by commissioning an old friend now and then to do work for
him which, at best, had only a prospective value.

About a year after the disappearance of the Daily Chronicle
the ranks of the displaced journalists were reinforced by the
cessation of the Sunday News. After the merging of the daily
paper, the Sunday News maintained an independent existence
and seemed likely to survive. But only a few months before
the major disaster, the character of the paper had been
entirely changed. It had entered the picture paper field, and
it had to win its place among powerful and well-established
competitors. In that it showed signs of succeeding, until the
economic upheaval of the summer of 1931 made the effort
vain.

Thus in 1931 disappeared the last trace of two famous
newspapers which, conducted primarily as newspapers, had
become national institutions and sources of prosperity to their
proprietors and staffs ; but which, losing their independence
and becoming " commercial propositions," crashed in ruins,
pinning beneath the debris those innocent of responsibility.

CHAPTER XVII
CLOSING YEARS

ONE day early in the nineteen-thirties Robert Donald
was talking politics with a friend.1 They were
discussing particularly the obsolescence of the old
party lines of demarcation, and Donald said :

" If you asked me what I am politically, I should find it
very difficult to answer. Perhaps I should describe myself as
a * social democrat.' '

Donald had never been a party zealot, even in the days of
his editorship of the Daily Chronicle. In selecting men for his
staff, the man's fitness for the post was the paramount con-
sideration. If the work were not intimately connected with
the political policy of the paper, the candidate's political views
were of small importance to the editor.

" Don't tell me if you'd rather not," was his reassuring
remark to one young journalist whom he was about to engage,
and who had hesitated to answer Donald's casual question
about his political convictions. * We're a Liberal paper, but,"
added the editor with a whimsical smile, " most of the staff
seem to be Tories or Socialists."

In times when the political loyalties of newspapers were
more rigid than they are to-day, it was not uncommon to find
that the private views of the members of the staff did not
always coincide with the opinions expressed in the leading
articles. One accepted explanation of this divergence is that
the members of the staff of a paper, in the course of their

1 Mr. B. B. Chapman, once his personal assistant, and for long afterwards a
Confidant,

2,56

CLOSING YEARS 257

duties, were privileged to see something of the workings of
the machinery of the party to which their journal was allied.
Such experiences did not always enhance their respect for the
party. It is said that the workers in chocolate factories are
not particularly fond of chocolates, and for the same reason it
was often found that a journalist, serving a newspaper of
pronounced political views, was not the most ardent admirer
of the party whose cause his journal espoused.

Some such process of disillusionment had been actively at
work in Donald's mind for many years. The war accelerated
it. He had always been in close touch with Labour, and,
during the war, the bridging of the gulf between the Liberals
and the Conservatives enabled him to reach the Tory camp
and to fraternize with leaders there.

Of the four post-war Prime Ministers, Donald could claim
to have known three intimately — Mr. Lloyd George, Mr.
Bonar Law, and Mr. Ramsay MacDonald. Nor were his
friendships with other Ministers less catholic.

Contacts so varied played their part in bringing Donald to
the state of mind in which he found it impossible to accept
the " ticket " of any party. He was for peace, for democratic
government, for social progress and imperial development ;
and he was prepared to support any movement to advance those
causes, from whatever party it might issue.

Consequently, when in 1931 the emergency Government
decided to seek the country's approval for a policy of sustained
party co-operation in a National Government, Donald
found, at last, a political banner under which he could
enlist and a political ideal which had long been in his own
mind.

The new Government included several Liberal friends,
notably Sir John Simon, Mr. Runciman, and Sir Donald
Maclean ; but it was towards the Labour wing that Donald
was drawn. Possibly this preference for the Labour section
is explained by the fact that, of recent years, his sympathies
had been tending more and more to the left, but one must

258 ROBERT DONALD

allow for his long friendship with Mr. Ramsay MacDonald
and the fact that the small Labour group was most in need of
the assistance which Donald could render.

The Prime Minister invited him to take the post of chairman
of the publicity committee of the National Labour Party.
Deprived of the powerful support of the party machine to
which they had been accustomed, the Labour candidates who
had remained loyal to Mr. MacDonald were at a disadvantage
which could be mitigated only by great industry and resource
on the part of those who undertook to provide an organization
to help them. Of Donald's part in that work the Prime Minister
paid tribute in a letter sent three days after the poll. " You
know even better than I do," wrote Mr. MacDonald, " what
the difficulties were with which our hurriedly improvised
organization had to contend, and I simply do not know how
they would have been surmounted without your experience
and whole-hearted help."

During the election campaign Donald had seen not only
the immediate difficulties but also the larger problems of
propaganda which would confront the new party in the future.
Although the Labour Party would oppose the new Govern-
ment on every section of the allied line, on the small and hastily
entrenched company of National Labour men its fire would be
concentrated and incessant.

The need for propaganda work was urgent. The friendly
aid of Conservative and Liberal newspapers was not enough,
and would be misrepresented. Small as it was, the party
needed a Press of its own. The difficulties of acquiring one
were immense, but a beginning should be made. Thus came
the News-Letter, the fortnightly organ of the National
Labour Party, a useful publication but one with obvious
limitations.

Something with a wider appeal was needed, and presently
Donald heard that an old-established weekly periodical, which
could be readily adapted to the needs of the party, might be
acquired.

CLOSING YEARS 259

The paper was Everyman, a periodical which for many
years had been stimulating popular interest in books and in
intellectual pursuits generally. The appeal of such a paper
might be extended and its scope enlarged so as to attract the
large public who were interested in the new ideal of broad-
based government.

In the summer of 1932 Everyman was secured, and Donald
became the Chairman and Managing Director of the new
proprietorial company. Pursuing a policy of gradual but not
slothful change, Donald proceeded to apply the paper to its
new purpose. In a few months, with his old skill and judg-
ment, he had attracted to the paper a band of gifted writers to
reinforce the established favourites of the old clientele of
Everyman. Some were men and women who had proved their
worth through the columns of the Daily Chronicle ; others
were writers of more recent achievement whose work had
interested him.

Donald himself gave much of his time to maintaining
liaison between the paper and the principal personalities of
the Government, particularly those of the Labour wing. He
contributed many of the topical notes, giving the paper a new
status as a medium of political news and comment, a status
quickly recognized by the daily Press, which began to quote
Everyman on current political questions.

He contributed articles also, the most notable being a
criticism of the report of the Bridgeman Committee on the
Post Office; in which once again he stressed the need for more
enterprising management.

Such discussions, however, were incidental to the work with
which Donald was principally concerned, namely; the task of
educating the public in the achievements and the potentialities
of the National Government. And he pursued his purpose
through media other than Everyman. A letter from the Prime
Minister thanking Donald for his booklets on Town Planning
indicates one of the many channels of propaganda he was
opening to the Government.

26o ROBERT DONALD

Mr. J. L. Garvin has written that Donald never did finer
work for the country than in his editorship of Everyman. If
the statement seems extravagant it is perhaps because that
work was terminated in its earliest stages. Donald had been
engaged upon it barely six months when death arrested his
industrious pen and his restless, resourceful, and undaunted
mind. But Mr. Garvin had perceived the quality of that work,
and knew how sorely the country needed the guidance " strong
and calm, deep-hearted and wide-hearted " which Donald
was capable of giving and was eager to give so long as his
strength permitted.

On the whole, his health was good, but as he neared the
seventies the strain of a busy life began to tell. At the end of
1932 he was threatened with a break-down, but rest and the
air of Devonshire seemed to restore him. Even while he was
still supposed to be resting, he contributed a long letter to The
Times, urging that Government support and protection be
given to a scheme for the production of petrol from coal on a
commercial scale, by the process known as hydrogenation.
Seven months later the Government adopted proposals
substantially identical with those Donald had made.

Early in 1934 he returned to London and his multitudinous
activities, and though obviously not robust, he went through
his usual routine, even to attendance at public luncheons and
dinners.

On the morning of February lyth, in his flat overlooking
Kensington Gardens, as he was occupied in what was
always one of the most enjoyable duties of the day — scanning
the principal morning newspapers — he had a seizure. The
end came swiftly. But in the brief interval between the onset
of the attack and its fatal climax, his mind was fixed upon the
affairs of the day, and, as he lay upon a couch, with the morning
papers scattered beside him on the carpet, he asked Lady
Donald to telephone to Downing Street and arrange for the
postponement of an appointment he had with the Prime
Minister on that day.

CLOSING YEARS 261

Instead of their meeting in the following week, the Prime
Minister came to Fleet Street to mourn the passing of his old
friend, at the customary service at St. Bride's, where gathered
a congregation of newspaper proprietors and politicians and
journalists of every type.

Because Donald was a journalist, it was natural, perhaps,
that, in the obituary notices, references to his professional
distinction and his services to journalism should overshadow
the record of his service to the public. His editorship of the
Daily Chronicle was the subject of many tributes. " He gave a
vital character to his own newspaper," said the Daily Express.
" When he left it, the spark died out of it, and nobody in the
new generation ever rekindled it."

Elsewhere, notably in Everyman^ friends tried to define the
character which imparted that vital spark. Mr. R. D. Blumen-
feld wrote of Donald's life as being " as simple, as blameless,
and as uncomplaining as a child's," and extolled his " fine
regard for the ethics of his profession." Mr. J. L. Garvin
found him " big in heart, and strong in grip," a man who saw
life " largely, equitably, kindly."

Mr. R. C. K. Ensor, who, as the Chronicle's principal leader
writer for several years, spent many an hour in discussing with
Donald public affairs and public men, wrote of " the penetrat-
ing (though kindly) shrewdness with which he appraised
personalities in the field of politics," and of his " unquench-
able public spirit." Another former Chronicle colleague,
Mr. James Milne, recalled him as " a tireless spirit, loving
his paper, and driving it in the service of high yet practical
ideals."

To those who knew the two men who were most closely
allied in the hey-day of the Daily Chronicle, there was a special
interest in the picture sketched in a few telling phrases by
Mr. E. A. Ferris who succeeded Donald in the editorial chair :
" He was a just man, a considerate man, and a born leader,"
wrote Ferris. " I never knew him weaken in his principle or
fail those who worked for him and loved him. He retained

262 ROBERT DONALD

his courage in troublous times and has left behind tender
memories and splendid examples."

If an epitaph be sought for Robert Donald it is to be found
in a line which Mr. Rudyard Kipling wrote for inscription
upon a memorial1 to the journalists of the Empire who fell in
the Great War :

" We have served our day."

Nor need it be transposed into the first person singular to
make it appropriate, for Donald never failed to recognize that
every journalist, however conspicuous his abilities, can
succeed in his mission only by the co-operation of his fellow-
craftsmen. In life he never failed to acknowledge that debt ;
in death he would have wished it to be recorded.

To serve the day is not to pander to the passing whims and
prejudices of the public, to debased appetites and mob
emotions, though too often journalism amounts to no more
than that. Journalism is a service only when, behind the
process of recording ephemeral things, and behind the
meretricious devices that are employed to arrest attention and
to coax the tired or lazy eye, there are minds anchored to
sound principles and resolved to employ the power of the
Press to worthy ends. To be of the public, understanding its
every mood, anticipating its demands, and yet to be its mentor,
is no easy role to play, but that is the part allotted to the
journalist, particularly the journalist engaged upon the daily
Press.

Robert Donald succeeded in that mission because he was,
at heart, a servant and not a careerist. " Such varied ability
as he possessed," wrote Lord Marshall of Chipstead, " would
have carried a self-seeking man much further than Robert
Donald travelled on the road to fame ; but his public record
shows a consistent refusal to seize the main chance for his own
advancement, and those of us in the inner circle of his friends

1 In the hall of the Institute of Journalists.

CLOSING YEARS 263

have known that in allowing opportunities to pass he did so of
set purpose, guided by his rule of life, and expressing his real
self."

It was because of this indifference to his own material
interests that he bore himself always with such serenity.
Rarely did the mean little tricks of mean little men succeed in
ruffling him. He could take even an unfair blow and count it
unworthy of so much as a protest. Bitterness found no
lodging in his character. He retained his faith in his fellows,
thinking the best of a man until the worst was evident, and
even then, to quote Lady Donald, " he would not be anything
but forgiving and gentle." His attitude toward others erred on
the side of generosity. In many instances he was too con-
fiding, and suffered as a consequence.

In an intensely competitive sphere like metropolitan
journalism, which attracts an abnormal proportion of those
individuals who are determined to succeed by no matter what
means, a man of Donald's temperament is certain to encounter
experiences calculated to breed suspicion, distrust, and even
a bitter cynicism. But it is not the least remarkable feature of
Robert Donald's life that such experiences had little effect
upon him. He regarded them as inherent in the occupation
in which he was engaged, as a kind of scum which a man should
not allow to sour the genial current of his soul. Thus immun-
ized against the worst that Fleet Street could do, the compar-
able effluents of the political world could not divert or repel
him.

To suggest that Robert Donald was devoid of the weaknesses
to which ordinary humanity is prone, would be absurd. It
would be idle to pretend that there were no actions he
regretted, no articles he wished he had not written, no enter-
prises or associations which, on reflection, he wished he had
avoided. But in relation to the amount of activity which he
crowded into his days, such lapses from the high standards
which his life reveal were few, and did nothing to impair the
regard in which he was held.

264 ROBERT DONALD

The journalist who serves his day is, in relation to history,
like the zoophyte who adds his tiny being to the coral reef.
His work is of the day, and however important it may seem at
noon, it is of small account after sunset. Whether any larger
measure of survival is permitted to him depends upon whether
he has surrendered himself utterly to ephemeral things, or
whether, in spite of being a journalist, he has remained a man.

APPENDIX

Three Addresses on Journalism delivered by Sir Robert Donald.
(Slightly abridged.)

NEW FORCES IN IOURNALISM

Address by Robert Donald, President of the Institute of Journalists y
Annual Conference, York, August i8th, 1913.

ATER touching upon matters of domestic interest, Mr. Donald
said :
Your President of twenty years ago, Dr. Charles Russell, a
most distinguished journalist and editor, delivered an able and far-
seeing address. He described the changes through which journalism
was then passing, and foreshadowed developments which were to come.
He warned the Institute to be prepared for the future, and to keep pace
with the tendencies of the time.

" As an Institute of Journalists," he said, " we are bound to provide
for the future so far as we can, and to observe tendencies which may be
indicative of great changes to come. Moreover, we must consider the
possible effects which the development of social and intellectual move-
ments and political and other institutions may have upon the Press."

He observed tendencies indicative of great changes to come, and
foreshadowed them with remarkable accuracy. He suggested that

" the newspaper will more and more become the daily magazine
in which all news capable of such treatment will be presented in a
brighter and more attractive form, and in which many subjects of
public interest formerly never touched will engage the attention of
the more capable journalists. In other words, the level of news-
paper work as a whole will be raised, and that, of course, implies
that the culture of journalists must be raised to satisfy the new
conditions."

I think you will admit that Dr. Russell, one of the high priests of
journalism, has earned a place among the prophets. Some unforeseen

265

266 APPENDIX

developments have taken place in the production of newspapers as a
business, and have affected the interests of journalism in a way which
he did not contemplate.

One outstanding effect of the changes which have taken place in the
newspaper world during the last twenty years is that there has been a
check in the increase of newspapers. During twenty years the total
number of newspapers, morning, evening, and weekly, in England has
only increased a little more than 6 per cent, while the population during
that period has increased 24 per cent, and the growth to the reading
public by a great deal more. In the chief centres of population there
are fewer morning and evening newspapers than there were twenty
years ago. Figures do not convey an adequate idea of the upheaval
which has taken place in the Press world. During this period some
papers have attained colossal circulations, and enjoyed unexampled
prosperity, while others of great reputation have disappeared, or are in
a state of senile decay, leading a precarious existence which may come
to an end any day. The existing papers are in the hands of fewer
ownerships.

Another far-reaching change, and one which is partly responsible for
the revolution which has taken place, is that the Press has become
commercialized. The proprietorial system has almost disappeared.
Instead of individual ownership we have corporations, public or private.
Nine-tenths of the leading daily and evening newspapers belong to
limited companies — corporations with " neither bodies to be kicked nor
souls to be damned." Twenty years ago the list of the London Stock
Exchange did not contain a single newspaper corporation. Now twelve
large companies representing many millions of capital, figure in the
quotations. Many other companies are dealt with publicly in a more
restricted market. Stock Exchange annuals contain a list of twenty-six
newspaper limited liability companies, all of which, except one, have
been registered during the last twenty years. These do not include
firms who are primarily printers and book publishers. Nor do they by
any means represent all the conversions from individual ownership to
companies. The majority of the remaining newspaper properties are
held by private limited companies controlled by Boards of Directors,
and these will, in process of time, by the forces of self-interest and new
legislation, be thrown on the public market. All this means, as I have
said, that the Press, like other departments of industry, has entered into
the region of corporate ownership. When I say that the Press has now
become commercialized, I do not wish it to be inferred that personal
ownership was a combination of paternalism and philanthropy. The
private owner was a business man who liked his profit and made it, but

APPENDIX 267

as he had no responsibility towards shareholders, preferred less profit
to compromise with principle. Under corporate ownership the main
concern of shareholders, who are investors and not journalists, is their
dividends, and dividends must be earned even if principle has to surfer
in the process. Along with the growth of the corporate-owned Press
has come as an inevitable part of the movement, multiple ownership.
Combination has been the chief characteristic of Industry all over the
world, and the Press could not remain outside this tendency. One
company sometimes owns or controls a series of newspapers. There
have been absorptions, amalgamations, alliances, with the result that
vast aggregations of capital have been built up in which thousands of
shareholders are interested. These agglomerations, piling up power
and wealth, are controlled by the same forces which operate in other
fields of industrial activity.

The coming of the corporation, and the nationalization of newspapers,
place enormous power to sway public opinion in the hands of a few
people. They can influence opinion by what is published, and mislead
it by what is omitted. Greater power over the public mind should
always be accompanied by a greater sense of responsibility.

The concentration of ownership is obviously not in the interest of
the journeyman journalist. Salaries are better, but the field is narrowed
because employers are fewer. There are more opportunities to become
heads of departments, but fewer chances of becoming chief. There is
less security of tenure, more changes, greater difficulty, when once out,
of getting back. The call is for new blood. Failing to find a place in
the profession which they love, some of the men displaced drift
into Press work in connection with business undertakings. At the
same time there are, as I have said, more opportunities for heads
of departments — for a place in the editorial hierarchy. There is
demand for journalists of administrative capacity and men of creative
ability.

Besides opening the door for more rapid promotion, the corporation
has given the successful journalists an opportunity of becoming share-
holders, thus enabling them to reap a small part the harvest of
dividends which their energies help to produce.

In a material sense, therefore, the position of the journalist has im-
proved. The quality of the work is also better. We are dealing with a
much more highly educated reading-public — a public impatient of dull-
ness, and critical, and also with many readers who insist on being
entertained rather than instructed. There is a greater demand for
original writing. The modern reporter must be more of a writer than a
recorder. Work is much more strenuous ; the pressure and the strain

268 APPENDIX

are greater, as the time during which reports have to be written and
sub-edited is shortened. More work has to be done in less time. Rates
of pay for contributions have increased, as well as salaries. There are
more brilliant writers contributing to the Press to-day than at any time
in its history — more thought is spent upon the contents of the paper,
more effort is made to make papers attractive.

As Dr. Russell foreshadowed, papers have become more like daily
magazines, bright and attractive. The popular journals feel it necessary
to introduce new features of the magazine kind to compete with the
prodigious output of the weekly variety Press, made up of snippety
bits, fiction, general articles, and competitions. Twenty or more years
ago the majority of the articles in newspapers were written by members
of the staff or by attached contributors ; now the contributors out-
number the staff. Work has become more highly specialized, and the
number of people who can write well has increased, but are an insig-
nificant few compared with those who think they can write better.
These contributors are not, strictly speaking, journalists ; they are
authors, professors, teachers, politicians, men and women of leisure,
specialists who can write in a popular style. The reporter or sub-editor
has an equal chance with others to become a contributor, and starts
with the initial advantage of inside knowledge.

If I were to attempt, like Dr. Russell, to forecast the future, and
prophesy what newspapers of twenty or more years hence are likely to
be, I would say with some confidence that daily newspapers will be
fewer, the tendency towards combinations will increase, and colossal
circulations will continue to grow. A paper which has not at least a
half-million readers will not be considered seriously as an organ of the
people. The weak newspapers which cannot spend huge sums on news,
on features, and on circulation, will, of course, be squeezed out, and the
paper run as a luxury or for a mission, and not as a business enterprise,
will become too expensive except for millionaire idealists. There will,
therefore, be fewer newspapers, but the total circulation will be greater.
The power of these national journalistic dreadnoughts in moulding and
influencing public opinion will not be less, in whatever direction their
influence is exercised. Besides the national newspapers, giving an
epitome of life, and presenting the human and picturesque side of news
collected from all parts of the kingdom and all ends of the earth, there
will be localized newspapers which will follow the method of the
national Press in presenting news. There will, I hope, be a revival of
the purely local country newspapers, much improved in form and style,
otherwise public life will suffer a serious loss. The more national
newspapers become, the less space will they give to sectional interests,

APPENDIX 269

and we shall have specialized daily newspapers to take the place of the
specialized weeklies which now exist.

The national newspapers will not contain less reading matter, but
the pages will be smaller. They will be printed better and neatly
stitched, and will, of course, include pictures in colour. The future
methods of distribution will be quicker, and circulations will cover
greater areas. Airships and aeroplanes will be used for the most distant
centres ; electric trains and motorplanes, running in special tracks,
will also be used. In all the chief centres of population papers will be
distributed by electric or pneumatic tubes. The morning and evening
newspapers will be merged, and editions will come out almost every
hour, day and night. News will be collected by wireless telephones
and the reporter will always have a portable telephone with him, with
which he can communicate with his paper without the trouble of going
to a telephone office, or writing out a message. At the other end the
wireless telephone message will be delivered to the sub -editor printed
in column form.

The chief competition to the national newspapers of the future will
not be from other newspapers, but from other methods of disseminating
news.

At the people's recreation halls, with the cinematograph and the
gramophone, or some more agreeable instrument of mechanical speech,
all the news of the day will be given hot from its source. People may
become too lazy to read, and news will be laid on to the house or office
just as gas and water are now. The occupiers will listen to an account of
the news of the day read to them by much improved phonographs while
sitting in their gardens, or a householder will have his daily newspaper
printed in column form by a printing machine in his hall, just as we have
tape machines in offices now.

Judging from the trend of events, the next generation will see the
activities of municipal and other public authorities very much extended.
Their meetings, including committee meetings, must, of course, be
public. Newspapers will not be able to report their proceedings,
consequently municipalities will have to issue official gazettes, daily or
weekly as the case may be. Government departments have already set
an example within the last few years, and Parliament now reports itself
and issues daily Parliamentary journals which will, by and by, be
published at a halfpenny and placed on the bookstalls.

Newspapers are taking much less notice of speeches in Parliament ;
and no one can know what the London County Council is doing from
the reports in the Press. The one-sided way in which some papers
already treat public authorities is another reason for the coming official

27o APPENDIX

gazettes. Clearly every public body must have its own organ. The
newspapers will act as watchdogs and critics of their proceedings and as
a check to bureaucracy.

One might think that I am overdrawing the possibility of invention
and progress. No bounds can be put to progress, and the future is full
of great possibilities. Everyone hopes that the next generation will see
the millions now wasted on wars and armaments let loose, and part of
these colossal sums devoted to the promotion of science, the endowment
of research, the spread of education, and the increase of social amenities.

After this flight into the future I will return to earth and practical
politics. Our business at this conference is to make the best of things
as they are. In view of the changing conditions in newspaper work, the
Institute was never more wanted to guard the privileges which it has
won, and to advance our professional interests.

We must strengthen and consolidate our forces, strive to raise the
standard of our work. Public taste is getting better, there are searchings
after a higher culture, and journalism should foster and guide every
upward movement, every elevating tendency. We cannot prevent or
even check the irresistible trend towards more concentration and keener
competition, but we can do our part to maintain the honour, the dignity,
and the reputation of the British Press. Capitalists may call the tune,
but we are still able to give the tone. Journalists should never forget
that the dignity of the most fascinating, the most powerful, and the
noblest profession in the world is in their keeping, and that in all their
actions and their work they should be worthy of the name : " Gentle-
men of the Press."

THE FUTURE OF THE JOURNALIST

Address by Robert Donald, President of the Institute of Journalists, to the
Glasgow and West of Scotland District of the Institute, December 6th,

DURING the last twenty years the British Press has undergone
many changes, and it is still in a state of transition. Many old
journals have been transformed, and have adopted the new
methods of their younger rivals ; but some cling to old traditions. It
is not my intention, however, to deal with newspapers, but with the
men who make them ; with their present status and their future
prospects. I would like to address myself to some practical questions
affecting the position of the individual journalist, more particularly the
members of the rank and file, and with the dignity and standing of our
profession.

I consider that our daily newspapers as a whole were never better
edited and better written than they are to-day. The journalist of to-day
shows more originality and initiative, possesses greater literary ability
than his prototype of any generation. The profession has been
strengthened by the introduction of fresh talent, generally in the higher
grades. More men trained at our Universities are becoming journalists.
There is great scope for original writing owing to the demand for special
articles on problems of the day or subjects of passing interest, and for
articles written for the entertainment rather than the instruction of the
reader, and also because of the widened definition of news. The link
between literature and journalism was never closer than it is to-day.

The commercial side of newspapers had kept pace with the advance
in editorial ability and enterprise, and in many cases has been the
stimulating agent in new developments. Specialization has also
provided more work for new writers ; variety has been given to the
contents of newspapers by the increased attention paid to matters of
feminine interest, and by the contributions of women writers, who have
discovered in the Press a new outlet for their intellectual energies. All
this is to the good of the journalist, the Press, and the country. There

271

272 APPENDIX

are more big prizes to be won in journalism at the present day, a clearer
road for advancement by merit, and higher rewards when success is
achieved. At the same time, the growing concentration of ownership
and the reduction in the number of newspapers make it much more
difficult for men who lose responsible positions in daily journalism to
secure other posts.

There is no profession in which there is a greater diversity of pay
than in journalism. The organizers and editorial men at the top, in
some cases, command salaries equal to those of Cabinet Ministers, while
their deputies receive the pay of Under-Secretaries of State ; but the
rank and file, and especially the men at the bottom, are no better off
than they were twenty years ago. There are many reporters in country
districts who do not receive more pay than unskilled labourers.1 In
dealing with this subject I confine myself to newspapers — daily, even-
ing, and weekly — and I exclude London, where the conditions are not
comparable with those which exist in other parts of the country. . . .

Reporters and sub-editors are miserably paid in many towns through-
out the country. I have been enabled to obtain precise facts which
refer to representative towns, but I will not indicate the newspapers or
name the towns. I will give the population of the towns approximately,
as the size of a town has an important bearing on the cost of living in it.
I am dealing with a condition of things, a system for which individuals
are not responsible, but it is a state of things which the whole profession
of journalism should determine to reform. It is not creditable to
journalists or employers that reporters who write the copy should be
paid less — as is too often the case — than the compositors who put it
into type.

I ought to add that none of the examples which I give refer to
newspapers of the first rank.

In a town with a population of 120,000 there are experienced senior
reporters who receive less than 303. a week. Linotype operators
working on the same newspapers get 405., and case hands 325. Postal
telegraphists reach a maximum of 525., and their average pay is higher
than that of the reporters.

Take another town, with a population of 170,000. Here reporters
are paid from 253. to 505., and sub-editors 505., and a few rise to the
Olympian heights suggested by £3 IDS. a week. On a bi-weekly the
highest paid reporter gets 305. a week. In the same town linotype

1 Conditions have improved substantially since this address was delivered,
although they are not yet satisfactory to the professional organizations. The
figures given herein may, however, be of interest as a contribution to the
history of journalism.

APPENDIX 273

operators' earnings are 403. 6d., and those of case hands 365. a week,
and expert postal telegraphists are paid 483. a week.

I have particulars from several towns with populations approaching
100,000 each where some senior reporters get 28s. a wC2k. Linotype
operators are comparatively wealthy on 455. a week, and case hands
receive 405. The pay of postal telegraphists ranges from 475. to 525.
a week.

In a town in quite another part of England, with a population of
more than 200,000, only two out of a staff of six reporters receive more
than 305., compared with linotype operators who are paid 475., and
425. paid to case hands. Postal telegraphists are better off than those
underpaid reporters to the extent of 2os. a week.

In a seaside town, having more than 100,000 inhabitants, experienced
reporters receive from 305. to 388. weekly, and sub-editors from 405.
to 553., and members of the staff are subject to a radius agreement.
The linotype operators on the same papers, who are under no such
handicap, earn from 345. to 383. The pay of postal telegraphists in the
town is equal to that of the sub-editors.

In a manufacturing city with a population of about 360,000, reporters
are employed on one daily paper at 303. a week, but linotype operators
command 505. a week. Senior postal telegraphists receive 563. . . .

These details of low salaries are painfully monotonous. I could add
other examples from equally well-authenticated sources, but I have
shown that reporting in some places almost comes within the sphere of
a sweated industry. I do not overlook the fact that sometimes reporters,
less frequently sub-editors, supplement their income by lineage, but
lineage is an element which keeps salaries down, while it raises the
income of a few. . . .

I would point out that the pay of the compositors mentioned is the
minimum, as they are paid for overtime ; so are the telegraphists, who
also enjoy pensions, which are in the nature of deferred pay.

It is not very encouraging to have to record that there are plenty of
men who are willing and ready to fill the positions I have mentioned,
and for less money than present holders receive, as one can see from
advertisements of journalists offering their services. A better test,
however, is to be found in the applications received for vacancies
advertised. I have examined hundreds of such applications which
have been passed on to me. They are melancholy reading. They are
almost all from men in positions, and they show that journalists of
great experience who have occupied responsible positions on daily
newspapers are ready to give their services for less than £4 a week.

Some applications point another moral ; they show that the

274 APPENDIX

candidates have begun their journalistic work when they ought to have
been still at school. One youthful gentleman of twenty-six claimed to
have had nearly fourteen years' experience in journalism. He demanded
a salary of £2 ics. a week. A man of nearly twice his age, who had
acquired a practical knowledge of printing in London and the provinces,
had a long experience in reporting and sub-editing, and was in charge
of a paper, offered his services for £3 a week. An applicant for a similar
position, involving both reporting and sub-editing work, and in which
the selected candidate would have to take charge occasionally, said that
he had had ten years' experience, although he was only twenty-seven
years of age. He required a salary of 325. 6d. a week.

A candidate for a position in the provinces had edited and managed
local papers, and was at the time of writing the editor of a bi-weekly.
He wanted only 355. a week, although he confessed to forty-one years
of age. Two others, aged respectively forty-two and forty-five, asked
for a salary of 455. One had been a senior reporter and advertisement
canvasser, while the other undertook to write leading articles, specials,
read proofs, and make up a paper. Another applicant who likewise
limited his value to 455. a week had had an all-round experience. His
age was thirty-five. A man who had a thorough practical knowledge,
and had been a journalist all his working life, aged thirty-four and
married, suggested 355. a week ; while another, whose experience of
journalism took the form of leader writing and political notes, was aged
twenty-three. He wanted 455., but was obviously prepared to accept
353. A young man of twenty-five years of age claimed nearly ten years'
experience in journalism, could report, sub-edit, write leaders, in fact
could do anything in the newspaper line, and was prepared to do it for
475. a week. Another candidate for a reportorial position had had
thirteen years' experience in the editorial, advertisement, and publishing
departments of various newspapers, and was twenty-eight years of age.
He placed his attainments and his ability at the disposal of the advertiser
for a modest 355. a week.

None of the particulars which I have given refer to reporters or
sub-editors on small country or local newspapers, nor, as I have said,
to newspapers of the first rank. I have few details of the remuneration
in the case of local journals ; but it is certainly less than the amounts
which I have mentioned. In any cases the duties of reporting or sub-
editing are combined with work in the advertisement and publishing
departments. . . .

If any further proof were needed to demonstrate that journalists
as a class, considering the attainments which they are supposed to
possess, and the responsible nature of the work which they have to

APPENDIX 275

perform, are about the worst paid of any professional body of men, it
is to be found in the operation of the National Insurance Act. No
fewer than 2100 members of the National Union of Journalists, out of
a total of 3600, are insured persons, which means that their income is
less than £160 a year. The membership of the National Union, great
as it is, does not include a majority of the worst paid reporters on the
staffs of local newspapers.

There are many causes of underpay and what appears to be the over-
crowding of the profession in its lower grades. In the first place, there
are many reporters and correspondents connected with local newspapers
who should not be in journalism at all. They have succumbed to the
glamour of the Press, or have been brought in by the apprenticeship
system. We must remember that the average intelligence of the public
has improved in recent years. People read more, and members of the
artisan class appreciate a well-written paragraph. They know the
difference between a well-informed and an ill-informed news article.
The style of writing in many local newspapers and in newspapers in the
smaller towns has not improved. After all, one cannot expect a finished
literary style for 303. a week.

The persistence of the apprenticeship system is a very harassing
factor, particularly in its effect on the lower ranks of journalists on
small newspapers. In very few cases is there a hard-and-fast rule as to
what proprietors shall teach their apprentices ; they consider their
obligations fulfilled by sending their young men out on reporting
engagements, and giving them proofs to read and correct when they are
in the office.

Another cause of low salaries lies in the fact that a large number of
local papers find the greatest difficulty nowadays in making ends meet,
owing to the increased competition of London and influential provincial
ournals which come within the category of national newspapers, and in
the growth of the evening Press. Properties which have a declining
revenue try to economise in all directions. The competition of London
and other papers is, however, only indirectly to blame. The primary
fault is due to the proprietors themselves, who ignore changing condi-
tions and run their papers on the old conventional lines. . . .

There are many obstacles to professional solidarity inherent in the
nature of the journalist's work. Journalism is not a closed profession
like medicine, or the law. It is not restricted by examinations, standards
or certificates, such as appertain to professional bodies like architects,
chemists, or accountants. There are about as many amateurs at work
on the Press as a whole as there are professionals. Attempts have been
made for many years by the Institute of Journalists, and more recently

276 APPENDIX

and more vigorously by the National Union, to keep off " blackleg "
reporters, and with considerable success ; but there are other columns
in newspapers — more now than formerly — than those occupied with
the news of the day. Special articles, expert articles, reviews, dramatic
and musical criticism, leading articles, magazine page contributions,
special correspondence, and other matter not strictly reporting, are very
largely written by non-professionals. The more space that is devoted to
these subjects and pictures, the less there is for news, which really
means less work for reporters. No one proposes that non-journalists
should not contribute to the Press, and it would be futile to suggest
that exclusion or the limitation of their work.

The contents of the weekly variety papers, which originated with
Tit-Bits, are chiefly made up of contributions by non-journalists, when
not written or prepared by the office staff. The profession is therefore
overrun with amateurs, and no professional body can be organized
strong enough to keep them out. And the amateurs are likely to
increase as education improves and popular knowledge spreads.

The capacity to report and collect news, as it is a question of training
and experience, is more limited, and so is the work of sub-editing ; but
even these two branches of the profession cannot be kept sacred
preserves.

One would be tempted to suggest, in view of the comparison between
the wages of the trade union compositor and of the reporter which I
have given, that the one remedy for low salaries and professional
grievances is trade union action. I do not object to the trade union
idea as a method of organization. It has some points in its favour.
But there are two possible developments of the trade union policy which
I do not think will tend to enhance the status of the journalist or improve
his material condition. . . .

Reformers have looked towards a special school of journalism, or
special training for journalists, as the means of raising the standard.

No subject has been more discussed at conferences of journalists
than the question of the education and training of journalists. It is
one of the " hardy annuals " of the Institute. Attempts have been made
to give courses in journalism in connection with university colleges, but
without much success. There are several schools of journalism in
America, and a department of journalism has been founded at Columbia
University, New York, which shows signs of being the most serious
attempt yet made to educate and train men for journalism. . . .

Education is not, of course, in itself a real test. Some good news
gatherers in this country and in America have been uneducated, in the
ordinary sense of the term. On the other hand, the more specialized

APPENDIX 277

and general the education that the student receives, the better journalist
he will make, provided he is born with an aptitude for the profession.
A man may fail to be a successful journalist after having received the
best possible education and absorbed all the knowledge in the world,
while another may succeed who has had no education in the academic
sense, but whose information, although superficial, is used with skill and
discretion. Dr. Charles Cooper, the late editor of the Scotsman, in his
reminiscences insists that journalism illustrates the great truth of the
survival of the fittest, and that the journalist is born, not made ; but
only in the sense that the poet is born, not made, that the wise doctor,
the successful merchant, the great lawyer, are all born, not made. It
does not follow, wrote Dr. Cooper, that there are none but born
journalists. " Many have been made, and badly made." He adds that
he remembers able newspaper men who had been tailors, doctors,
lawyers, and ministers of religion. . . .

I do not think, as I have already indicated, that trade unionism will
be the solution of the problem in journalism ; I believe that the best
•means of establishing satisfactory conditions for the rank and file is the
imposition of a compulsory test which will mean some degrees of fitness.
Membership of the Institute or of the Union is no test. It is no indica-
tion of capacity. It does not influence editors in making appointments.
Journalists recognize this themselves. I have received hundreds of
applications for vacancies, but not one of the applicants has mentioned
membership of Institute or Union as an element which should weigh in
his favour.

I look forward to the time when the two organizations which are
striving so earnestly to safeguard the journalist's interests will collaborate
to do something really big and effective for journalism. I foresee no
difficulty in setting up the machinery which will effectually sift the
potential journalist from the young man who drifts into the profession
without any qualification, and who is a factor in the prevalent low rate
of wages. If newspaper proprietors could rest assured of securing a
man who, while no actual guarantee was forthcoming of his ability as a
journalist — any more than one can be sure that the man who, having
passed his examination in medicine or the law, is necessarily competent
in practice — at any rate possesses some initial qualifications, there would
then be a sure prospect of ending the competition which keeps salaries
low,

THE FUTURE OF THE NEWSPAPER

Address by Sir Robert Donald, delivered in the Hall of the Institute oj
Journalists, London, October 2^th, 1928.

THE subject of this address was chosen for me perhaps because,
as President of the Institute in 1913, I made a forecast on the
future of the Press which, in some measure, has been fulfilled.
I predicted, for instance, that the movement towards combinations
which had begun would continue on a larger scale until, I said, twenty
years hence — I have still five years in hand and a lot is going to happen
in that time — daily newspapers would be fewer, but the aggregate
circulation would be greater. A paper, I said, which had not at least
half a million circulation would not be considered seriously as an organ
of the people. Papers which could not spend huge sums on news, on
features, and on circulation would be squeezed out ; and the paper run
as a luxury or for a mission and not as a business enterprise would
become too expensive except for millionaire idealists. These predic-
tions have been realized, and even the millionaire idealist has retired
from business. I foresaw the increasing nationalization of the Press
and a revival of the purely local country newspaper, both of which have
come to pass, I also said that newspapers would have to meet competi-
tion in the distribution of news by a new scientific device. That also
has happened, although radio did not begin until 1920 and broad-
casting has been operating in England for only five years. The news-
papers ridiculed my prediction at the time and headed it " News turned
on like Gas." As I foresaw, there has been an increasing rate of
mortality among morning papers in the provinces. A dozen have gone
under and only one has been started. In 1913 there were nineteen
daily morning newspapers in London, excluding specialist papers :
there are now fourteen ; there were six evening papers : now three.
More evening papers have disappeared in the provinces and only a few
new ones up to now have been established. Lord NorthclifTe, who was
interviewed on my forecast, made among other comments the significant
remark : "In the future there will be a further extension of local

278

APPENDIX 279

evening newspapers." This future extension is only now being made
by his brother, Lord Rothermere, with a company entitled " North-
cliffe Newspapers, Ltd." As most of the evening newspapers which
remain in provincial cities are firmly established and amazingly profit-
able, only a powerful corporation with practically inexhaustible
resources could ever hope to build up profitable rivals in the chief
centres of population.

In some respects the Great War assisted the trend of developments
which I foretold, but the death of Lord Northcliffe, Sir Edward
Hulton, and other newspaper owners, had a greater effect on the changes
in the newspaper world.

These changes since 1913 in newspaper ownership have been
dramatic and romantic. No such revolutionary transformation has
taken place in any other industry. Fifteen years ago Sir William Berry,
now at the head of a series of combinations — the largest affiliations of
the kind in the world — was a working journalist. Lord Rothermere
was concentrating his attention on his magnificent property, the Daily
Mirror, looking after the Amalgamated Press, and his newspapers in
Leeds and Glasgow. Lord Beaverbrook was a daring financier, piling
up millions in Lombard Street, and a modest Member of Parliament
prospecting the political outlook. Mr. William Harrison, whose
spectacular entry into journalism took place only two years ago, was a
young unknown solicitor. Yet these four newspaper magnates now
control between them over a hundred millions of capital invested in
newspapers and kindred enterprises. The capital of the Berry
group is itself between thirty and forty millions. The circulations of
the newspapers in these groups represent probably about two-thirds of
the total sales of daily, evening, and Sunday newspapers in the country.

Another big group is that which has been built round the Northern
Echo by Sir Charles Starmer, the Rowntrees, and Lord Cowdray.
This is widespread, including a dozen daily and evening papers and a
large number of country weekly newspapers.

The Berrys control twenty-six morning and evening newspapers
distributed over Great Britain from Bristol to Aberdeen, six Sunday
newspapers, twenty weeklies, and several hundred periodicals. The
Berry system is to allow a good deal of elasticity in their organization,
while keeping a firm grip over finance. While the Berrys are the biggest
owners, Lord Rothermere's properties are the richest. Apart from his
new enterprises, Lord Rothermere's three London properties have
repaid their Ordinary share capital twice over in four years.

The shrinkage of newspaper ownership is shown best perhaps by the
number of local monopoly ownerships, which include the following

28o APPENDIX

large cities : Liverpool, Hull, Dundee, Aberdeen, Plymouth, Cardiff,
Bradford, and middle-sized towns, including Middlesbrough, Preston,
Wolverhampton, Swansea, Stafford, Newport (Mon.), Gloucester, and
many other smaller towns, where a second paper would be redundant.

We have not yet reached the end of the chain newspapers. The rate
of trustification will depend partly on the human element ; but whether
the present forceful personalities who direct the big combines retire or
disappear, it is safe to predict that the combines, so far from breaking
up, will get bigger within twenty years. Ninety per cent of the daily
Press, measured by sales, will be under the control of two or three
groups working in co-operation, and of a few regional trusts. There
will not be more than six newspapers apart from a few country evenings
— which will be entirely independent units politically and commercially,
and one of these will be The Times, whose future is wisely safeguarded.
In the near future there will be three fewer morning newspapers in
London, and two more evening papers. London, with its population of
ten millions within a radius of ten miles of Fleet Street, is absurdly
under-papered in the evening field. Lord Rothermere is determined to
add to the evening newspapers in the country, and with his vast
resources he is quite able to do it ; but outside his enterprise, I doubt
whether anyone will challenge the position of the other combines or the
local monopolies.

There will be more Sunday newspapers. The colossal growth of
Sunday newspapers, which have now an aggregate sale of twenty
millions a week, was stimulated by the war and by big prizes for
competitions. They are becoming the recognized organs of finance,
and in millions of homes on Sunday morning the family devotion
consists in filling up coupons in football and racing competitions, in
wrestling with crossword puzzles, seeking solutions of other problems
or competitions, or in formulating financial speculations — following the
" bulls " or the " bears," or hunting with the stags. The new Sunday
newspapers will compete with the national papers which pour out their
millions from London and Manchester. The regional Sunday news-
papers are published in Glasgow, Newcastle, and Birmingham. There
will be more of these regional Sunday newspapers to defend districts
against the invaders, one of whose objects is to push their stable
companions in direct competition with the local journals.

Stupendous financial corporations have grown up and round news-
papers since 1913. Journalism has become a matter of finance. News-
papers have a prominent place in Stock Exchange lists, and shares are
given prominence by all the Press of the combines. The giants compete
with each other in enterprise and in expenditure ; but in spite of all the

APPENDIX 281

huge sums invested in newspapers, and of unprecedented profits and
sales, there has been little originality since the days of Northcliffe — no
startling innovations, no new models, no revolutionary advance. The
Daily Mail was a revolution in its general characteristics and in its
features. While the Mail was a well-planned discovery, the Daily
Mirror, which also inaugurated a new development, was an accident.
You will find tendencies in the Press, but no marked departure from
standards. The nearest approach to innovations comes from the Daily
Express. This lack of resource and originality is shown in more ways
than one. The Press is strangely imitative. If one paper alters its
make-up, introduces a new feature, starts a new stunt, or departs from
standard in any way, the others are in full cry after the daring adven-
turer. And then most of the popular features are imported from
America. The crossword puzzle and its variants, general knowledge
examinations, the comic cartoon strips, are all American importations.
The insurance system, without which big sales cannot be kept up, is
but an expansion of the system originated by the late Sir George Newnes.
The benefits are getting bigger, and that is only a matter of money.
Newspaper insurance will remain a permanent feature of journalism.
It has become part of the social structure of the country. An agree-
ment will be reached regarding the amount of benefits, as the present
mad rivalry cannot be kept up — simply because it won't pay. Com-
petitions will also be stabilized. A foreigner opening our most widely
circulated daily and Sunday newspapers would think that the owners
vied with each other in seeing who could give away most money for
nothing. The coupon and other competitions, in which huge sums are
offered, will peter out. This source as a circulation raiser will be
exploited until it is exhausted either by making the competitions too
difficult, when they will not be worth competing in, or too easy, when
they will not be worth winning.

Newspapers have not yet risen to my expectations by using air
taxis for distributing papers. It is done by several Berlin dailies on a
large scale, and will come here when air routes are better defined and
more aerodromes laid out.

You all know that we are on the eve of further marvellous achieve-
ments by wireless — transmission of pictures, throwing news on the
screen so that you can read it for yourself. You will leave your
receiver on at night, and find piles of pages full of news and pictures on
the floor in the morning. More news will undoubtedly be distributed
by radio, which is thought to be a providential safeguard against the
domination of newspaper trusts. The State has kept as a monopoly
all the possibilities of radio,

282 APPENDIX

What will happen when we have a Labour Government in power, as
well as in office, which finds the whole Press up against it ? In Italy
100 per cent of the newspapers support the Government with complete
freedom, according to Mussolini. In England 99 per cent of the Press
would be hostile to a Labour Government. What will the Govern-
ment do ? It cannot establish a censorship or suppress newspapers or
imprison editors. A Socialist Government might declare that the
prejudiced and hostile attitude of the Press misrepresents this country
abroad, and injures our national prestige and credit. It would seek a
counter-offensive. An instrument is ready to its hand. The Govern-
ment could make radio serve its interests. News collected by the
B.B.C. reporters, and from foreign radio services, would be broadcast
to subscribers, and amplifiers installed in public squares, halls, and
meeting-places, where news and entertainment would be given free.
The Radio Times, an official State paper, could be turned into a daily
published in several national centres, and all listeners would have to
buy it, as programmes would be published nowhere else. Its circula-
tion would run into many millions. The Government would develop
the news side of the paper and make it a medium of propaganda. In
face of a counter-offensive of this kind, the opposition Press would
become quiescent or neutral politically. Papers might follow the lead
of Lord Northcliffe, at a General Election, and give the Government two
or three columns a day in which to state its case. Under normal
conditions, the circulation of news by radio, which is bound to increase,
would not be detrimental to the interests of the newspapers. The
one service is complementary to the other.

The trend in journalism is all towards variety. The definition of
news has now no limit. Routine reporting takes up less space in the
popular Press and creative news more. One series of feature articles
succeed another, devoted to social, romantic, psychological, religious,
ethical subjects, and explorations into the unknown describing life in the
world to come. The personal note will become more conspicuous, and
public men and society women more eager to support this kind of
journalism and employ their own publicity agents.

The " magaziney " character of the Press will continue. This
development calls for higher literary ability than mere recording and
descriptive reporting. The Press will become more and more literary.
All the news will be illustrated and the pictures will become more
artistic. Newspapers with moderate sales like The Times, Daily
Telegraph, and Manchester Guardian will be able to issue supplements
in photogravure or colour. Machines are being perfected which will
feed re-reeled picture supplements into the ordinary issues at high

APPENDIX 283

speed. The papers with million sales will have to wait for this develop-
ment. Country weekly and semi-weekly newspapers will cultivate
their fields with more success, especially if they mark out well-defined
areas.

Some people may think that the fierce competition now going on
between rival groups for supremacy in size, competitions, insurance,
and sales will lead to disastrous results on balance sheets. Not at all !
The chief antagonists will hit the papers which are onlookers more than
they will injure themselves. This feverish expenditure of vast sums is
making competition for the less robust very expensive and may put
new permanent burdens on the most prosperous.

The commercial future of the Press, which represents millions of
capital provided by hundreds of thousands of investors, is in no danger.
The phenomenal prosperity of newspapers since the War has been due,
apart from the artificial stimulus given to sales, to the growth of adver-
tising. We are only beginning to realize the psychological effect of
advertising and to include advertising as a part of the indispensable
machinery of salesmanship. During the last ten years agencies have
developed advertising into a great science, employing the best experts
and the best brains to show merchants how to sell goods. This cam-
paign is beginning to tell. There is mass advertising for the first time —
advertising a whole industry, a town, a province, and the Empire.
More industries will combine to advertise, and individual firms in an
industry will advertise their own brand of goods. The best remedy for
unemployment is more advertising, as advertising creates demand on
retailers and stimulates manufacture. Businesses once running on an
increased scale must strive to keep up consumption by more advertising.
We are only just completing the circle — mass production at one end,
salesmanship by advertising at the other, and hustling the merchants
and retailers in between. An American banker, in a book on American
prosperity, puts down, as an element in fostering prosperity, advertising,
" which," he says, " in the first decade of the twentieth century was
crude and of pigmy dimensions in comparison with the billion dollar
advertising to-day." We are more than a decade behind America in
advertising, but we are beating our own record every year. And the
new millions which will pour into advertising will surely gravitate to
the Press, and the quickened movement in trade will find its readiest
response through the medium of the daily and Sunday newspapers.

[When this address was published later in a collection of Institute
lectures, Sir Robert Donald added the following postscript.]

The foregoing address on " The Future of the Newspaper " is given

284 APPENDIX

exactly as it was delivered two years ago. I refrain from accepting the
opportunity to make additions and amendments which would be easy
to do in the light of events which have since taken place. To do so,
however, in the case of a forecast, would be to assume prescience, which
I do not claim, and at the same time to mislead readers who had not
heard the address.

I would only observe that the trend of developments, which I said
were on the way, has been arrested, or diverted, by shattering world
events outside the newspaper business, but which have reacted upon
newspapers with crushing effect, leaving them for the time being
struggling against adversity.

While I had twenty years in mind as the period for the accomplish-
ment of the evolution I foreshadowed, I am tempted to point out that a
start has been made in the fulfilment of my prediction that there would
be fewer morning papers in London.

R. D.

In d e x

Addison, Rt. Hon. Dr. C., 106, 221
Alexander, Dr. W., n
Allenby, Lord, 172
Ashwell, Miss Lena, 195
Asquith, Mr. Cyril, 143
Astor, Major Hon. J. J., 244

Bacon, Admiral, 56, 65

Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley, 217, 243,

254

Balfour, Sir Arthur, 227
Balfour, Lord, 44, 62, 65, 67, 78,

80, no, 1 1 6, 122-124, 126, 129,

132, 133, 138, 145, 209
Barnett, Dame Henrietta, 195
Beatty, Earl, 64, 114, 122
Beaverbrook, Lord, 106, in, 129,

144, 158, 159, 161, 163, 176, 185
Begbie, Mr. Harold, 64
Bennett, Mr. Arnold, 195
Bennett, Mr. R. A., 41, 195
Beresford, Lord Charles, 57, 62, 72
Billing, Mr. Pemberton, 159
Birkenhead, Lord, 153, 243
Blumenfeld, Mr. R. D., 232, 244, 261
Bonham-Carter, Sir Maurice, in,

116, 117, 124, 126, 137, 140
Bott, Mr. Alan, 181
Bowen, Mr. W. J., 227
Brentford, Lord, 218, 219
British Empire Exhibition, 213
Brittain, Sir Henry, 209
Brooks, Mr. Sidney, 195
Brown, Mr. F. J., 226
Bruce, Sir Robert, 212
Buchan, Mr. John, 156
Bulloch, Mr. J. W., 195
Burnham, Lord, 195, 209-212, 230,

244, 245
Burns, Mr. John, 44, 47

Cadbury, Mr. H. G., 195

Canivet, Mrs. Mildred, 185

Carson, Lord, 69, 115, 121, 124, 125,

129, 136, 137, 139, 156, 158
Catto, Sir Thomas, 241, 242
Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. Neville, 222,

223

Chapman, Mr. B. B., 256
Chelwood, Viscount Cecil of, 133, 203
Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston, 24, 58,

59, 62, 67, 78, 80, 122
Clark, Mr., 183

Clemenceau, M. Georges, 100, 101
Conan Doyle, Sir Arthur, 101, 102
Cook, Sir Edward, 153, 174, 195
Cook, Mr. F. J., 96
Cowdray, Lord, 83, 195
Coxon, Mr. William, 45
Crewe, Lord, 126, 131, 138
Curzon, Lord, 116, 125, 209, 254
Cuthbertson, Brig.-Gen. E. B., 239
Cutler, Mr. Tom, 251, 252

Dalziel of Kircaldy, Lord, 178-181,
186-188, 239

Davenport, Lord, 70

Denbigh, Lord, 159

Derby, Lord, 126, 134, 136, 139

Dilke, Mr. Charles, 44

Dillon, Mr., 115

Dilnot, Mr. Frank, 201

Donald, Lady, 40, 43, 93, 260, 263

Donald, Sir Robert : Birthplace, 31 ;
schooling, 31 ; entry into business,
31 ; journalistic appointments, 33,
34 ; Pall Mall Gazette engagement,
36 ; promotions, 36-38 ; sojourn in
Paris, 40 ; marriage, 40 ; visit to
America, 40 ; appointment on The
Star, 41 ; founding of London,

285

286

INDEX

44 ; News-Editor Daily Chronicle,

45 ; publicity work, 45 ; political
activities, 47 ; editorship, 20, 48,
49 ; Managing-Director United
Newspapers, Ltd., 21, 49 ; Presi-
dency Institute of Journalists, 50 ;
war activities, 76-174 ; launching
of The Echo, 96 ; Chronicle resigna-
tion, 181 ; Directorship Bradford
Newspaper Co., Ltd., 199 ; pur-
chase of The Globe, 201-207 ;
founding of Empire Press Union,
209 ; visit to Canada, 212 ; British
Empire Exhibition Committee work,
214; Imperial Wireless Committee,
225 ; knighthood, 229 ; Everyman
connection, 259 ; death, 260

Drummond, Mr. Eric, 140

Eccles, Professor W. H., 226
Elibank, Lord, 24
Ellerman, Sir John, 246
Empire Press Union, 209
Ensor, Mr. R. C. K., 28, 261
Evans, Mr. W. J., 41

Fairfax, Mr. Geoffrey, 212

Fergusson, Sir John, 181

Fisher, Mr., 20

Fisher of Kilverstone, Lord, 54-75,

114, 122

Fletcher, Mr., 14
Foch, Marshal, 171, 172
Frank, Sir Howard, 175
Fraser, Sir Drummond, 226
French, Sir John, 70, 101, 173
Fyfe, Mr. Hamilton, 195

Gardiner, Mr. A. G., 93, 143, 144,

185, 195

Garvin, Mr. J. L., 236, 260, 261
Geddes, Sir Eric, 72, 73
Gibbs, Sir Philip, 22, 25 1
Gray, Sir Albert, 222
Greville, Lady Violet, 195
Grey of Fallodon, Lord, 23, 26, 120,

123, 126, 140, 141
Guest, Captain, 179
Gwynne, Mr. H. A., 194, 195, 197

Haig, F.-M., Earl, 155, 166, 167,

170-173, 189, 239
Haldane, Lord, 22, 159
Hamilton, Lord George, 221
Hamilton, Mr. J. G., 192
Hands, Mr. Charles, 43
Harcourt, Lord, 126, 131, 140, 209
Harrison, Mr. William, 245, 246, 248
Hartshorn, Mr. Vernon, 225
Hatry, Mr. Clarence, 204-206
Henderson, Rt. Hon. Arthur, 121

125, 138, 141

Hewart, Lord Chief Justice, 42
Heywood, Mr. Valentine, 185
Horniman, Miss E. A., 195
Hughes, Mr. Spencer Leigh, 186, 187
Hutcheon, Mr. W., 33
Hutchinson, Mr., 31
Hyndman, Mr. H. M., 195

Illingworth, Lord, 24
Institute of Journalists, 50
Irwin, Lord, 244

Jeans, Mr. William, 38

Jellicoe, Lord, 64, 67, 70, 72, 114, 122,

126

Joffre, Marshal, 70, 108
Jones, Mr. Harry, 114, 176, 177, 183,

185
Jones, Sir Roderick, 159, 195

Kitchener, Lord, 27, 70, 78, 80, 84,
90, no, 165, 200

Laker, Mr. Albert, 204, 206
Lambert, Mr. George, 65, 66
Lansdowne, Lord, 67
Laubat, Marquis de Chasseloup, 109
Law, Mr. Andrew Bonar, 110-116,
118-121, 123, 124, 128-133, 135,

137, 138, 140, 141, 143, 144, US,
149, 159, 209, 216-218, 225, 257
Law, Mr. Richard, 144
Le Gallienne, Mr. Richard, 42, 43
Leverhulme, Lord, 175, 176
Lincolnshire, Marquis of, 195, 230
Lloyd, Mr. Edward, 19, 50, 252
Lloyd, Mr. Frank, 18, 20, 45, 48, 96,
98, 99, 150, 175-184, 207, 239, 252

INDEX

287

Lloyd, Mr. NeviHe, 183
Lloyd George, Rt. Hon. David, 23-25,
47, 52, 55, 77-84, 89, 90, 92-94,

I08-IIO, 1 12-120, 123-141, 143-

145, 149, 154-157, 161, 163-175,
178-180, 186, T89, 190, 209, 211,
239, 241, 243, 257

Lloyd George, Major G., 239

Long, Mr. Walter, 88

Low, Sir Sidney, 195

Lyon, Mr. Laurence, 203-205

MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R., 23, 133-

135, 225, 230, 257, 258
Maclean, Sir Donald, 221, 257
Mair, Mr. G. H., 153
Mann, Mr. Tom, 44
Marlowe, Mr. Thomas, 41
Marshall, Lord, 262
Massingham, Mr. H. W., 20, 41, 44,

45, 82, 195
Masterman, Mr. C. F. G., 24, 48, 82,

83, I53> 155
Maurice, Gen. Sir Frederick, 165-

171, 185, 189, 195
Maxse, Mr., 195
McCurdy, Rt. Hon. C. A., 239
McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald, 24, 59,

69, 78, 79, 81-83, US, 120, 123,

126, 131, 140, 141
Melchett, Lord, 227
Milne, Mr. James, 54, 261
Mitchell-Thomson, Sir William, 228
Montagu, Mr. Edwin S., 127, 132,

136-142

Morant, Sir Robert, 221
Morrison, Mr., 56

Nankeville, Mr. Edward, 34, 35
Norman, Sir Henry, 107, 109
Northcliffe, Lord, 22, 38, 41, 46, 52,
65, 66, 68, 69, 126, 139, 159, 161,
163, 195, 210, 232, 233, 236,
244

O'Connor, Mr. T. P., 41, 43, 98, 115,

116, 195, 196, 230
Oxford and Asquith, Lord, 24, 44,

57, 60, 61, 65, 71, 78-82, 89, 106-

150

Painleve, M., 107-109

Paish, Sir George, 202

Parham, Mr. J. H., 239

Parke, Mr. Ernest, 41, 195

Parker, Sir Gilbert, 212

Passfield, Lady, 221

Passfield, Lord, 134

Pennell, Mr. Joseph, 43

Perks, Sir Robert, 209

Perris, Mr. E. A., 49, 157, 177, 178,

183, 185, 239, 244, 261
Pershing, General, 172
Phillips, Sir Ivor, 70
Pickburn, Mr., 19
Primrose, Mr. Neil, 175
Pringle, Mr., 186

Reading, Lord, 24, 127, 132, 241-244,

246, 247
Riddell, Lord, 24, 51, 76-79, 81, 82,

84, 92, 93, 94, ii7, 149, 153, 172,

177, 178, 244

Robbins, Sir Alfred, 149, 195
Robbins, Sir Edmund, 195
Robertson, Rt. Hon. John M., 33
Robertson, General Sir William, 70,

92, 109, no, 135, 136, 139, 209
Robertson-Nichol, Sir William, 195
Roch, Mr., 159
Rosebery, Lord, 67, 210
Rothermere, Lord, 161, 232, 233, 235
Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter, 120, 123,

126, 131, 139, 140, 191, 257
Russell, Sir Charles, 195

Shaw, Mr. George Bernard, 41, 42,

44

Shorter, Mr. Clement, 41, 42
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John, 191, 257
Slesser, Sir Henry, 226
Snowden, Lord, 134
Spender, Mr. J. A., 113, 143, 195,

196

Spicer, Sir Howard, 239
Springfield, Mr. Lincoln, 41
Spurgeon, Sir Arthur, 157, 195
St. Davids, Lord, 209
Stamfordham, Lord, 135, 140
Stead, Mr. W. T., 35-39
Steed, Mr. Wickham, 159

288

INDEX

Still, Mr. Alexander, 32
Stockton, Sir Edwin, 227
Stuart, Sir Campbell, 195

Talbot, Mr. Justice, 222
Thomas, Rt. Hon. J. H., 134, 221
Turner, Mr. Neil, 177, 178

Ullswater, Lord, 222
Unwin, Mr. Fisher, 195

Walkley, Mr. A. B., 42
Walsh, Mr. Stephen, 222, 223
Weir, Mr. Andrew, 181
Wells, Mr. H. G., 159, 195

White, Mr. Arnold, 195
White, Mr. James, 181
Whittaker, Sir Thomas, 82
Wile, Mr. F. W., 195
Wilson, Sir A. K., 59
Wilson, F.-M. Sir Henry, 170, 173
Withers, Mr. Hartley, 195
Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir
Laming, 226

Young, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward Hilton,

223

Younger, Lord, 204, 205
Yule, Sir David, 241, 242, 245

T N*

A 000 085 745 8