oward and I know much more about him
than I knew before; and we are at peace. The newspapers never got the
story, but his friends about town still laugh at him for trying first to
blow up Westminster Abbey and then his own Ambassador. He was at my
house at dinner the other night and one of the ladies asked him:
"Lieutenant, have you any darling little pet lyddite cartridges in your
pocket?" Think of a young fellow who just loves bombs! Has loaded bombs
for pets! How I misspent my youth!

_February, 1915._

This is among the day's stories: The British took a ship that had a
cargo of 100,000 busts of Von Hindenburg--filled with copper.

Another: When Frederick Watts was painting Lord Minto he found it hard
to make the portrait please him. When he was told that Lord Minto liked
it and Lady Minto didn't and that So-and-So praised it, he exclaimed: "I
don't care a d--n what anyone thinks about it--except a fellow named
Sargent."

And the King said (about the wedding[80]): "I have the regulation of the
dress to be worn at all functions in the Chapel Royal. I, therefore,
declare that the American Ambassador may have any dress worn that he
pleases!"

E.M. House went to Paris this morning, having no peace message from this
Kingdom whatever. This kind of talk here now was spoken of by the Prime
Minister the other day "as the twittering of a sparrow in a tumult that
shakes the world."

Lady P. remarked to me to-day, as many persons do, that I am very
fortunate to be Ambassador here at this particular time. Perhaps; but it
isn't easy to point out precisely wherein the good fortune consists.
This much is certain: it is surely a hazardous occupation now. Henry
James remarked, too, that nobody could afford to miss the experience of
being here--nobody who could be here. Perhaps true, again; but I confess
to enough shock and horror to keep me from being so very sure of that.
Yet no other phenomenon is more noticeable than the wish of every sort
of an American to be here. I sometimes wonder whether the really
well-balanced American does. Most of them are of the overwrought and
excitable kinds.

A conservative lady, quite conscientious, was taken down to dinner by
Winston Churchill. Said she, to be quite frank and fair: "Mr. Churchill,
I must tell you that I don't like your politics. Yet we must get on
together. You may say, if you like, that this is merely a matter of
personal taste with me, as I might not like your--well, you