The violent storm of indignation sweeping upon my unfortunate head, I confess, staggered me. The book, which had cost me eighteen months of hard work, and a journey of ten thousand miles in a motor-car, was declared to be the exaggerated writing of a Jingo, a sensationalist, and one who desired to stir up strife between nations. I was both puzzled and pained.
Shortly afterwards, I met Mr. (now Lord) Haldane—then War Minister—at dinner at a country house in Perthshire, when, in his breezy way, he assured me over the dinner-table that he knew Germany and German intentions better than myself, and that there would never be war. And he waxed humorous at my expense, and scorned Lord Roberts's warnings.
The Kaiser's cleverness in ingratiating himself with certain English Statesmen, officers, and writers is really amazing, yet it was—though at that time unsuspected—part of the great German plot formed against us.
As an instance how the Emperor was cleverly misleading the British Cabinet, Lord Haldane, speaking on June 29th, 1912, at a public dinner, at which Baron Marschall von Bieberstein, the German Ambassador, was present, said:—
"I speak of one whom we admire in this country and regard as one of ourselves.
"He (the Kaiser) knows our language and our institutions as we do, and he speaks as we do.
"The German Emperor is something more than an Emperor—he is a man, and a great man. He is gifted by the gods with the highest gift that they can give—I use a German word to express it—Geist (spirit). He has got Geist in the highest degree. He has been a true leader of his people—a leader in spirit as well as in deed. He has guided them through nearly a quarter of a century, and preserved unbroken peace. I know no record of which a monarch has better cause to be proud. In every direction his activities have been remarkable.
"He has given his country that splendid fleet that we who know about fleets admire; he has preserved the tradition of the greatest army the world has ever seen; but it is in the arts of peace that he has been equally great. He has been the leader of his people in education, and in the solution of great social questions.
"That is a great record, and it makes one feel a sense of rejoicing that the man who is associated with these things should be half an Englishman. I have the feeling very strongly that in the last few years Germany and England have become much more like each other than they used to be. It is because we have got so much like each other that a certain element of rivalry comes in.
"We two nations have a great common task in the world—to make the world better. It is because the German Emperor, I know, shares that conviction profoundly that it gives me the greatest pleasure to give you the toast of his name."
The Government, having sought to point the finger of ridicule at my first warning, must have been somewhat surprised at the phenomenal success which the book in question attained, for not only were over a million copies sold in different editions in English, but it was translated into no fewer than twenty-six languages—including Japanese—and, further, was adopted as a text-book in the German Army—though I may add that the details I gave of various vulnerable points around our coasts were so disguised as to be of little use to the enemy.
I had had a disheartening experience. Yet worse was to come.
A couple of years later, while making certain inquiries in Germany with a view to continuing my campaign, and my endeavour to disclose the real truth to the British public, I discovered, to my surprise, the existence of a wide-spread system of German espionage in England.
Just about that time Colonel Mark Lockwood, the Member for Epping, asked a question in the House of Commons regarding the reported presence of spies in Essex. For his pains he was, of course, like myself, promptly snubbed.