tidings of the capture of Bagdad; and at the house of one of the most
distinguished of European publicists, M. Joseph Reinach, of the
_Figaro_, I met, on our passage through, the lively, vigorous man, with
his look of Irish vivacity and force--M. Painlevé--who only a few days
later was to succeed General Lyautey as French Minister for War. At our
own headquarters, I found opinion as quietly confident as before. We
were on the point of entering Bapaume; the "pushing up" was going
extraordinarily well, owing to the excellence of the staff-work, and the
energy and efficiency of all the auxiliary services--the Engineers, and
the Labour Battalions, all the makers of roads and railways, the
builders of huts, and levellers of shell-broken ground. And the vital
importance of the long struggle on the Somme was becoming every day more
evident. Only about Russia, both in Paris and at G.H.Q., was there a
kind of silence which meant great anxiety. Lord Milner and General
Castelnau had returned from Petrograd. In Paris, at any rate, it was not
believed that they brought good news. All the huge efforts of the Allies
to supply Russia with money, munitions, and transport, were they to go
for nothing, owing to some sinister and thwarting influence which seemed
to be strangling the national life?

Then a few days after my return home, the great explosion came, and when
the first tumult and dust of it cleared away, there, indeed, was a
strangely altered Europe! From France, Great Britain, and America went
up a great cry of sympathy, of congratulation. The Tsardom was
gone!--the "dark forces" had been overthrown; the political exiles were
free; and Freedom seemed to stand there on the Russian soil shading her
bewildered eyes against the sun of victory, amazed at her own deed.

But ten weeks have passed since then, and it would be useless to
disguise that the outburst of warm and sincere rejoicing that greeted