From now on the Ambassador exerted a round-about pressure—the method of "gradual approach" already referred to—upon the Foreign Office for Carden's removal. An extract from a letter to the President gives a hint concerning this method:
I have already worked upon Sir Edward's mind about his Minister to Mexico as far as I could. Now that the other matter is settled and while Carden is behaving, I go at it. Two years ago Mr. Knox made a bad blunder in protesting against Carden's "anti-Americanism" in Cuba. Mr. Knox sent Mr. Reid no definite facts nor even accusations to base a protest on. The result was a failure—a bad failure. I have again asked Mr. Bryan for all the definite reports he has heard about Carden. That man, in my judgment, has caused nine tenths of the trouble here.
Naturally Page did not ask the Minister's removal directly—that would have been an unpardonable blunder. His meetings during this period with Sir Edward were taking place almost every day, and Carden, in one way or another, kept coming to the front in their conversation. Sir Edward, like Page, would sacrifice much in the cause of Anglo-American relations; Page would occasionally express his regret that the British Minister to Mexico was not a man who shared their enthusiasm on this subject; in numerous other ways the impression was conveyed that the two countries could solve the Mexican entanglement much better if a more congenial person represented British interests in the Southern Republic. This reasoning evidently produced the desired results. In early January, 1914, a hint was unofficially conveyed to the American Ambassador that Carden was to be summoned to London for a "conversation" with Sir Edward Grey, and that his return to Mexico would depend upon the outcome of that interview. There was a likelihood that, in future, Sir Lionel Carden would represent the British Empire in Brazil.
This news, sent in discreet cipher to Washington, delighted the Administration. "It is fine about Carden," wrote Colonel House on January 10th. "I knew you had done it when I saw it in the papers, but I did not know just how. You could not have brought it about in a more diplomatic and effectual way."
And the following came from the President:
From President Wilson
Pass Christian,
January 6, 1914.
MY DEAR PAGE: