to go to the United States as the head of a Commission to confer with
our Government. "Mr. Balfour is chosen for this mission," Page reported,
"not only because he is Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, but
because he is personally the most distinguished member of the
Government." Page tells the story in more detail in a letter to Mr.
Polk, at that time Counsellor of the State Department.

_To Frank L. Polk_

London, May 3, 1917.

DEAR MR. POLK:

... Mr. Balfour accurately represents British character, British
opinion, and the British attitude. Nobody who knows him and knows
British character and the British attitude ever doubted that. I
know his whole tribe, his home-life, his family connections, his
friends; and, of course, since he became Foreign Secretary, I've
come to know him intimately. When the question first came up here
of his going, of course I welcomed it enthusiastically. About that
time during a two-hour conversation he asked me why the British
were so unpopular in the United States. Among other reasons I told
him that our official people on both sides steadfastly refused to
visit one another and to become acquainted. Neither he nor Lord
Grey, nor Mr. Asquith, nor Mr. Lloyd George, had ever been to the
United States, nor any other important British statesman in recent
times, and not a single member of the Administration was personally
known to a single member of the British Government. "I'll go," said
he, "if you are perfectly sure my going will be agreeable to the
President." He himself recalled the fact, during one of our several
conversations just before he left, that you had not come when he
and Lord Grey had invited you. If you had come, by the way, this
era of a better understanding would have begun then, and half our
old troubles would then have been removed. Keeping away from one
another is the best of all methods of keeping all old
misunderstandings alive and of making new ones.

I have no doubt that Mr. Balfour's visit will cause visits of many
first-class British statesmen during the war or soon afterward.
That's all we need to bring about a perfect understanding.

You may remember how I tried to get an official report about the
behaviour of the _Benham_[58], and how, in the absence of that,
Lord Beresford made a disagreeable s