the Allies--a story that we now know to have been an infamous calumny
circulated doubtless by enemy agents. This idea even obtained credence
in Conservative circles, misled by false information on the situation in
Russia. One must have lived through the spring of 1917 in London to
realize how completely not only the public but the authorities were
deluded. What else could be expected when the opinion of Socialists was
accepted on the matter? I know from personal experience that two of the
most important Government departments were completely mistaken even on
the subject of Bolshevism, with the result that measures were not taken
which might have checked its spread into this country.

In a word, then, the essential difference between the attitude of
Germany and England to Russia was that whilst England imagined that the
Kerensky revolution would be for the good of Russia as well as for the
advantage of the Allies, Germany deliberately introduced into Russia
what she knew to be a poison.

Always faithful to the maxim of _divide et impera_, Germany, after
bringing Russia to ruin, has at last succeeded in causing dissensions
between the Allies. This policy she pursued unremittingly throughout the
war. Thus whilst on one hand she was assuring the French that "the
English would fight to the last breath of the last Frenchman," General
Ludendorff was instructing the Imperial Chancellor that: "We must again
and again rub in the sentence in Kuhlmann's speech to the effect that
the question of Alsace-Lorraine is the only one which stands in the way
of peace. And we must lay special emphasis on the fact that the English
people are shedding their blood for an Imperialistic war-aim."[789]

So skilfully was this propaganda carried on after the war had ended that
whilst English officers returning to England from the occupied areas
were declaring that the friendliness of the Germans convinced them that
Germany was really our friend and that we should have an "entente" with
her rather than with France, French officers returning to France said
that the Germans had assured them that they were their best friends,
that England was the real enemy, and that it would be better to break
the Entente and form an alliance with Germany. At the same time no less
than three lines of propaganda concerning the causes of the war were
going out from Germany, one laying all the blame on the English, one on
the French, and one on the Jews, and pamphlets e