ASQUITH MEMOIRS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20024, 14 August 1928, Page 6

ASQUITH MEMOIRS.

[THE FIRST COALITION. [CABINET AS RECONSTRUCTED. SOME OF THE CHANGES. [THE IRISH PARTY'S ATTITUDE. BY THS LATE EARL OF OXFOBD. (Copyright.) No. XXII. To-day's instalment of the Asquith Memoirs opens with a conclusion of the correspondence and notes regarding the formation of <he first Coalition Government in May, 1915. Then follow extracts from letters written to Mrs. Henley, on© of Mr. Asqnith's " most valued and intimate correspondents" at that time. These extracts, although not so full or frequent, form a continuation of the narrative of events embodied in the earlier war diary extracts. In his continuation of his remarks regarding the constitution of the Coalition .Government Lord Oxford says:— One great disappointment befell me on the threshold of my undertaking. Mr. 'Arthur Henderson consented to join the new combination as the representative of Labour. Mr. John Bedmond, the Nationalist leader, upon whom, remembering his fine speech in the House of Commons on the first day of the war, and his subsequent services in the promotion of Irish recruiting, I had counted with some confidence, felt obliged to refuse. His first message was as follows: Prime Minister— Your telegram received. "While thanking fou I feel sure you will understand when say that the principles and hist-ory of the party I represent make the acceptance of your oiler impossible. From the commencement of the war, the Irish party and myself have been anxious to do, and have done, all in our power to aid your Government in the successful prosecution of the war, and in the future you can fully relv on us for all the help in our power to give, but even if I was free to accept your offer. I am convinced my doing so would not increase my power to be of service.

REDMOND. Through Mr. Birrell, the Chief Secretary, I tried to press him to reconsider his decision, but unavailingly. In a subsequent message Mr. Redmond deprecated the inclusion of Sir Edward Carson, which, he said, "would make our efforts to help far more difficult." Supersession of Lord Haldane. There were two concessions of a personal kind which were insisted on by Mr. Bonar Law and his friends, and .which I made with the greatest reluctance. One was the substitution of another Lord Chancellor for Lord Haldane, against whom, on the strength of his having once referred to Germany * as his "spiritual home," there had been started one of those fanatical and malignant outcries which from time to time disgrace our national character. The other was the transfer of Mr. Churchill from the Admiralty, where he was to be succeeded by Mr. "Balfour, to an inferior office in the Cabinet. Lord Grey of Fallodon has described Sn his book his indignation at the supersession of Lord Haldane, and I insert here the letter which he wrote to me on the subject at the time ; Foreign Office, May 21. 1915. My Dear Asquith,— _ , . X think Bonar Law should be told that it 5s at least doubtful whether I should stay if Haldane goes: that the injustice of the inad and malicious attacks upon Haldane in the National Review and Harmsworth press have caused more resentment to Haldane s friends and those who know the truth about him than any political question has ever aroused; and that now when these attacks have come to a head in this way, it is impossible not to show how one resents them. If Bonar Law is really pressing the point, 1 think I had better see him and any of bis friends who share his view, and tell them what I think, and how the matter stands. , . _ If you don't object, I will write to Bonar Law and save you further trouble on this T> °^ nt " Yours sincerely. E. GREY. " A Hazardous Experience." The process of reconstruction under such conditions involved many nice and some invidious personal questions. At a very early stage, Mr.-Bonar Law wrote to me: "Lord Lansdowne is willing to join in view of the strong desire not only of his old colleagues but of yourself as expressed to me yesterday." He became a member of the Cabinet without portfolio. The most generally interesting of the changes were the appointment of Lord. Buckmaster to the Woolsack, and of Mr. Balfour to the Admiralty, the substitution at the Exchequer of Mr. McKenna, for Mr. Lloyd George, who undertook the newly-created office of Minister of Munitions, and the admission to the Cabinet as Attorney-General of Sir Edward CarB°n. [Sir Edward Grey (now Viscount Grey) continued in charge of the Foreign Office after the formation of the Coalition Government. Neither Lord Haldane nor Mr. Churchill were members of this Cabinet.] The formation of the Coalition Government was to the knowledge of all concerned a hazardous experience. But a sense of patriotic duty made them feel that they must face its risks, on the express understanding that participation in it involved no sacrifice or compromise in any quarter of settled convictions and principles.

Year of Dramatic Events. The year which followed the installation of the Coalition Ministry in_ May, 3915, was marked by a succession of ■ dramatic events both in the political and the strategic field. I will not go over them here, as they are already for the most part the property of the historian. One of my most valued and intimate correspondents at the time was Mrs. Henley. iW ; th her permission T have extracted from my letters to her some passages which, along with other contemporary notes, throw light upon matters which engaged the attention of diplomatists and soldiers in these critical months. Conference with the French, July b, 1915: I left London with my comrades, civil'and military, last night at 8, and crossed in a scout to Oalais, where we spent the night. The French arrived in the early morning, and we began our conference at 10; it lasted till 1. I opened the proceedings with a carefully typewritten harangue in French, and then we proceeded to a full and free discussion of all sorts of important things, which lasted for three hours by the clock. I have never heard so much bad French spoken in my life (I think deserved the prize). On the whole, the man who came best, not only linguistically, but altogether, out of the whole thing was Kitchener. Not one of the French could epeak a word of English. Ypres and Its Tragic Ruins. Visit to Ypres, July 15: We descended from the motors and took a long walk through the trenches and dugouts, and finally through the principal streets of the town: "We" being K. and myself, Plumer, ana a bevy of Second Army generals and officers, including Allenby, who I found the most intelligent of the lot. There was some little risk of shells (as it was the favourite German hour for that pastime) and still more from falling houses; they literally shake and totter in the wind; bu*- no evil befell us. It is one of the most wonderful and tragic sights in the world, or I should think in history, not a single house has escaped, and there is not an inhabitant ieft. The famous Cloth Hall is, as it stands just now, a most beautiful and picturesque ruin; some of the pinnacles quite untouched, and the tracery is still in a _ lot of the windows, and the statues m their niches. It is a hellish business, for Ypres is not of the slightest strategical value, either to the Germans or to us, and in my opinion ought long ago to have been abandoned—or indeed never attempted to be held. It must have cost vs already the best part of 50,000 casualties and the Germans probably manv more, and nothing can ever repair the damage. Unfortunately, it has now be--806310 s P oinfc honour with both sides*