Kühlmann, who was working at the agreement with Mr. Parker, in having our last proposals incorporated, so that the whole agreement could be paragraphed by Sir E. Grey and by me in August, 1913, before I went on leave.

But now fresh difficulties arose which prevented its being signed, and I did not obtain the authorisation to conclude it till a year later—that is, shortly before the outbreak of the war. It was, however, never signed.

Sir E. Grey was only willing to sign if the agreement were published together with those of 1898 and 1899. England had, as he said, no other secret treaties besides these, and it was contrary to established principles to keep binding agreements secret. Therefore he could not make any agreement without publishing it. He was, however, willing to accede to our wishes with regard to the time and manner of publication, provided that such publication took place within one year from the date of signature.

At our Foreign Office, where my London successes had caused increasing dissatisfaction, and where an influential personage, who acted the part of Herr von Holstein, wanted the London post for himself, I was informed that the publication would endanger our interests in the colonies, as the Portuguese would then not give us any more concessions.

The futility of this objection is apparent from the consideration that the Portuguese, in view of the closeness of Anglo-Portuguese relations, were most probably just as well aware of the old agreement as of our new arrangements, and that the influence which England possesses at Lisbon renders their Government completely impotent in face of an Anglo-German agreement.

Another pretext had therefore to be found for wrecking the treaty. It was suggested that the publication of the Treaty of Windsor, which had been concluded during the time of Prince Hohenlohe—though it was only a renewal of the Treaty of Charles II., which had always remained in force—might endanger the position of Herr von Bethmann Hollweg, as a proof of British hypocrisy and perfidy!

I pointed out that the preamble of our agreement expressed the same thing as the Treaty of Windsor and as other similar treaties, namely, that we would protect the sovereign rights of Portugal and the inviolability of its possessions. In vain! In spite of repeated discussions with Sir E. Grey, at which he made many fresh suggestions for the publication, the Foreign Office persisted in its attitude, and finally arranged with Sir E. Goschen that matters should be left as they were!

The treaty, which offered us extraordinary advantages, the result of more than a year's work, was thus dropped because it would have been a public success for me.

When I mentioned the subject to Mr. Harcourt at a dinner at the Embassy in the spring of 1914, the Minister for the Colonies told me that he was placed in a difficult position, and did not know how to act. The present position was intolerable—he wished to safeguard our interests, but was in doubt whether he should proceed on the terms of the old or the new treaty. It was therefore urgently desirable to clear up the situation and to settle the matter, which had dragged on for such a long time.

In reply to a dispatch in this sense I received instructions couched in terms which showed more emotion than civility, telling me to abstain from any further interference in the matter.

I now regret that I did not immediately travel to Berlin and place my post at the disposal of the monarch, and that I had not lost faith in the possibility of arriving at an understanding with those in authority, a sinister mistake which was to take its revenge a few months later in such a tragical way.

However little I even then enjoyed the goodwill of the highest official of the Empire, as he feared that I was aspiring to his post, yet I must in justice to him say that during our last interview before the outbreak of war, at the end of June, 1914, to which I will refer later, he gave me his assent for the signature and publication of the treaty. In spite of this it required repeated applications on my part, which were supported by Herr Dr. Solf in Berlin, before sanction was finally obtained at the end of July, 1914. As the Serbian crisis at that time already imperilled the peace of Europe, the completion of the treaty had to be postponed. It also is one of the sacrifices of this war.

The Bagdad Treaty

At the same time I was negotiating in London, with the able support of Herr von Kühlmann, about the so-called Bagdad Treaty. The real object of this was to divide up Asia Minor into spheres of influence, although this term was anxiously avoided in view of the rights of the Sultan. Sir E. Grey also repeatedly stated that there were in existence no agreements with France and Russia about the partition of Asia Minor.

In consultation with a Turkish representative, Hakki Pasha, all economic questions concerning German undertakings were settled in the main according to the wishes of the Deutsche Bank. The most important concession Sir E. Grey made to me personally was the continuation of the railway as far as Basra. We had dropped this point in favour of the connection to Alexandretta; up to that time Bagdad had been the terminal point of the railway. An international commission was to regulate navigation on the Shatt-el-Arab. We were also to have a share in the harbour works at Basra, and received rights for the navigation of the Tigris, which hitherto had been a monopoly of the firm of Lynch.

By this treaty the whole of Mesopotamia as far as Basra was included within our sphere of influence (without prejudice to already existing British navigation rights on the Tigris and the rights of the Wilcox irrigation works), as well as the whole district of the Bagdad and Anatolian railway.

The coast of the Persian Gulf and the Smyrna-Aidin railway were recognised as the British economic sphere, Syria as the French, and Armenia as the Russian. If both treaties were executed and published, an agreement with England would be reached which would preclude all doubts about the possibility of an "Anglo-German co-operation."

The Question of the Navy

The Naval question was and is the most delicate of all. It is not always regarded rightly.

The creation of a powerful fleet on the other side of the North Sea—the development of the greatest military power of the Continent into the greatest naval power as well—was bound to be felt in England as at least "inconvenient." There can be no doubt about this in any reasonable view. In order to maintain her advantage and not to become dependent, in order to secure the rule over the seas which is necessary for her if she is not to starve, she was compelled to undertake armaments and expenditure which weighed heavily on the tax-payer. England's international position would be threatened, however, if our policy created the belief that warlike developments might ensue—a state of affairs which had almost been reached during the time of the Morocco crises and the Bosnian problem.

Great Britain had become reconciled to our fleet within its then appointed limits, but it was certainly not welcome, and was one of the causes—though not the only cause and perhaps not the most important—of her adhesion to France and Russia; but on account of the fleet alone England would not have drawn the sword any more than on account of our trade, which has been alleged to have produced jealousy and finally war.

From the very beginning I maintained that, notwithstanding the fleet, it would be possible to