Be to my faults a little blind.
Two great Personalities came across my path when I commanded the Mediterranean Fleet for three years—the Sultan Abdul Hamid and Pope Leo XIII. They each greatly admired the astuteness of the other. Wily as Abdul was, the Pope was the subtler of the two. I did not have the interviews with the Pope which I might have had. There was no real occasion for it, as was the case with Abdul Hamid; and also, though by the accident of birth I was of the Church of England (nearly everybody’s religion is the accident of his birth), yet by taste and conviction I was a Covenanter, and therefore dead against the Pope. I would have loved to participate in the fight against Claverhouse at the battle of Drumclog.
I happen to be looking at the battlefield of Drumclog now, and I hope to be buried in Drumclog Church—that is, if I die here; or in the nearest Church to my death bed. I am particular to say this, as it avoids so much trouble; and I don’t have any more feeling for a cast-off body than for a cast-off suit of clothes. The body, after he’s left it at death, is not the man himself, any more than his cast-off clothes. The only thing I ask for is a white marble tablet made by Mr. Bridgman of Lichfield (if he’s still alive), with the inscription on it to be found in Croxall Church as written of herself by my sainted Godmother, of whom Byron wrote so beautifully: “She walks in beauty like the night.” She deserved his poem.
That was a big digression; but being dictated, as it is, this is a conversation book and not a classic. Classics are dry. Conversation, taking no account of grammar or sequence, is more interesting. However, that’s a matter of opinion. To talk is easy, but to write is terrific. Even Job thought so, that patient man.
To resume Abdul Hamid and the Pope.
Neither rats nor Jews can exist at Malta. The Maltese are too much for either. A Maltese can’t get a living in the Levant. The Levantine is too much for the Maltese. No Levantine has ever been seen in Armenia. His late Majesty, Abdul Hamid, was an Armenian. He massacred more Armenians than had ever been massacred before. I’ve no doubt that can be explained. It is supposed that the Armenian coachman of the previous Sultan was his father. He certainly was not a bit like his presumed father, the Sultan. When I dined several times with the Sultan, his father’s picture hung behind him and he used to ask people if they traced the likeness—there wasn’t even a resemblance.
The Sultan paid me a very special honour in sending his most distinguished Admiral with his Staff down to the British Fleet lying at Lemnos, to escort me up to Constantinople. This Admiral was known to me; and it afforded me an opportunity, in the passage up the Dardanelles, of making a thorough inspection of the Forts and all the particulars connected with the defence of the Dardanelles. Nothing was kept back from me; and incidentally it was through this inspection I became on such terms with the Pashas that a most amicable arrangement was reached between us as to our ever having to work in common. A very striking incident occurred illustrating Kiamil Pasha’s remark to me of how every Turk in the Turkish Empire trusted the English when they trusted no one else. Kiamil’s argument was that such trust was only natural after the Crimean War, and after the war with Russia—when Russia was at the gates of Constantinople, and the British Fleet, coming up under Admiral Hornby in a blinding snowstorm, encountering great risks and not knowing but what the Forts, bribed by Russia, might open fire—that British Fleet, by its opportune arrival, hardly a minute too soon, effectually banged, barred and bolted the gates of Constantinople against the Russians and produced peace. And Kiamil’s emphasis was that, notwithstanding all these wonderful things that England had done for Turkey, England never asked for the very smallest favour or concession in return, whereas other nations were all of them notoriously always grabbing; and I told Kiamil Pasha that I felt very proud indeed, as a British Admiral, that England had this noble character and deserved it. The incident I referred to was this: Upon an observation being made to the Turkish Commander-in-Chief in the Dardanelles as to whether some written document wouldn’t be satisfactory to him, he replied he wanted no such document—if a British Midshipman brought him a message, the word of a British Midshipman was enough for him.
The views I formed at that period of the impregnability of the Dardanelles stood me in good stead when the Dogger Bank incident became known on Trafalgar Day, 1904—the very day I assumed the position of First Sea Lord of the Admiralty. We were within an ace of war with Russia; the Prime Minister’s speech at Southampton, if consulted, will show that to be the case; and I then drew up a secret memorandum with respect to the Dardanelles, which I alluded to at the War Council when the attack on the Dardanelles was being discussed, also in my official memorandum to Lord Cromer, the Chairman of the Dardanelles Commission, and in my evidence before the Commission.
Personally I had a great regard for Abdul Hamid. Our Ambassadors had not. One who knew of these matters considered Abdul Hamid the greatest diplomat in Europe. I have mentioned elsewhere how greatly he resented Lord Salisbury throwing over the traditional English Alliance with Turkey and Lord Salisbury saying in a memorable speech that in making that alliance in past years we had backed the wrong horse. For were not (was Abdul Hamid’s argument) England and Turkey the two greatest Mahomedan nations on Earth—England being somewhat the greater? Kiamil—the Grand Old Man of Turkey—told me the same. He had been many times Grand Vizier, and I went especially with the Mediterranean Fleet to Smyrna to do him honour. He was the Vali there. His nickname in Turkey was “The Englishman”; he was so devoted to us. He lamented to me that England had had only one diplomatist of ability at Constantinople since the days of Sir Stratford Canning, whom he knew. His exception was a Sir William White, who had been a Consul somewhere in the Balkan States. No other English Ambassador had ever been able to cope with the Germans. I remonstrated with Kiamil by saying that Ambassadors now were only telegraph instruments—they only conveyed messages, and quite probably from some quite young man at the Foreign Office who had charge of that Department. I venture to remark here in passing what I have very frequently urged to those in authority—that the United States system is infinitely better than ours. Their diplomatic representatives are all fresh from home, with each change of President; ours live all their lives abroad and practically cease to be Englishmen, and very often, like Solomon, marry foreign wives. Another thing I’ve urged on Authority is that some Great Personage should annually make a tour of inspection of all the Diplomatic and Consular Agents (exactly as the big Banks have a travelling Inspector), who would ask how much he had increased the trade of the great British Commonwealth of Nations; and if it weren’t more than five per cent. would give him the sack. This Great Travelling Personage must be a man independent in means and station of any Government connexion and undertake the duty as Sir Edward (now Lord) Grey goes to Washington. The German Ambassador at Constantinople used to go round selling beetroot sugar by the pound! The English Ambassador said to me at a Garden Party he gave by those lovely sweet waters of the Bosphorus: “You see that fellow there with a white hat on? He’s the President of the British Chamber of Commerce; he’s an awful nuisance. He’s always bothering me about some peddling commercial business!”
Abdul Hamid was exceeding kind to me and invited me to Constantinople, and he descanted (the Boer War then being on) what a risk there was of a big coalition against England. Curiously enough, his colleague the Pope had the same feeling. It is very deplorable, not only in the late War but also in the Boer War especially, how utterly our spies and our Intelligence Departments failed us. I was so impressed with what the Sultan told me that I set to work on my own account; and through the patriotism of several magnificent Englishmen who occupied high commercial positions on the shores of the Mediterranean, I got a central forwarding station for information fixed up privately in Switzerland; and it so happened, through a most Providential state of circumstances, that I was thus able to obtain all the cypher messages passing from the various Foreign Embassies, Consulates and Legations through a certain central focus, and I also obtained a key to their respective cyphers. The Chief man who did it for me was not in Government employ; and I’m glad to think that he is now in a great position—though not rewarded as he should have been. No one is. But as to any information from an official source reaching me, who was so vastly interested in the matter, in the event of war where the Fleet should strike first—all our Diplomats and Consuls and Intelligence Departments might have been dead and buried. And how striking the case in the late War—the Prime Minister not knowing at the Guildhall Banquet on November 9th, 1918, that the most humiliating armistice ever known would be accepted by the Germans within thirty-six hours, and one of our principal Cabinet Ministers saying the Sunday before that the Allies were at their last gasp. And read now Ludendorff, Tirpitz, Falkenhayn, Liman von Sanders, and others—they knew exactly what the Allies’ condition was and what their own was. And if the Dardanelles evidence is ever published, it will be found absolutely ludicrous how the official spokesmen gravely give evidence that the Turks had come to their last round of ammunition and that the roofs of the houses in Constantinople were crowded with people looking for the advent of the approaching British Fleet. Why! it took our Admiral, on the conclusion of the Armistice, with the help of the Turks and all his own Fleet, several weeks to clear a passage through the mines, on which Marshal Liman von Sanders so accurately based his reliance against any likelihood of the Dardanelles being forced.