or the moment in an impossible mood. Even
Fitzgerald was in despair. At last the name of Colonel Le Roy Lewis
occurred to me, whom I somehow had not thought of before; but on
repairing to the Chief's anteroom, where Fitz always was, a restful
air was noticeable in the apartment, and Fitz acquainted me in a tone
of relief that the boss had gone off home. He moreover counselled me
to keep Le Roy Lewis up my sleeve and to lie low, as the whole thing
might have blown over by next day, and that is exactly what happened.
One heard no more about it; but several weeks later I began myself to
find that the military work in Paris was getting so heavy that we
ought to have an attache of our own, instead of depending upon the
Admiralty's man, Hodges. So I went to Lord K., proposed the
appointment of a second Military Attache, and suggested Le Roy Lewis
for the job. "Certainly," said Lord K.; "fix the business up with the
Foreign Office, or whatever's necessary." The fuss there had been a
few weeks before had apparently been forgotten.

His intimate acquaintance with the French language stood him in rare
stead, and this undoubtedly represented an asset to the country during
the period that he was War Minister. His actual phraseology and his
accent might peradventure not have been accounted quite faultless on
the boulevards; but he was wonderfully fluent, he never by any chance
paused for a word, and he always appeared to be perfectly familiar
with those happy little turns of speech to which the Gallic tongue so
particularly lends itself. The ease with which he took charge of, and
dominated, the whole proceedings on the occasion of one or two of the
earlier conferences on the farther side of the Channel between our
Ministers and the French astonished our representatives, as some of
them have told me. He thoroughly enjoyed discussions with foreign
officers who had been sent over officially to consult with the War
Office about matters connected with the war, and he always, as far as
one could judge, deeply impressed such visitors. I do not think that
the warmth with which some of them spoke about him after such pow-wows
when I ushered them out, was a mere manifestation of politeness. He
was gifted with a special bent for diplomacy, and he prided himself
with justice on the skill and tact with which he handled such
questions.

Quite early in the war--it must have been about November 1914--a small
Portuguese military mission turned up,