On no other supposition can we account for the irrelevant
but striking insertion of Mr. Lloyd George's memorandum on Rumania. That memorandum, the effect of which was to show Mr. Lloyd George as the far-seeing strategist, dealt with a matter which had already been decided when Mr. Asquith and Mr. Lloyd George exchanged their letters. Besides, in this country the correspondence was circulated privately, not among the friends of Mr. Asquith, but among the friends of Mr. Lloyd George. The Manchester Guardian—a supporter of Mr. Lloyd George—stated that it had seen the letters, and that the text of them as reproduced in the Atlantic Monthly was correct. The culmination of all the improper leakage of confidences in this country was that the Atlantic Monthly published the °erre. spondence with its own comments, those comments being of a kind, as we now know, which are extremely disagreeable to those who were responsible for the original betrayal of the secret. The Atlantic Monthly says explicitly ; " Mr. Asquith and Mr. Boner Law certainly had not communicated with the Press, so that the leakage must have been through Mr. Lloyd George." In fairness to Mr. Lloyd George, however, it most be added here that he has denied any knowledge of the matter. We must attribute the dishonourable act to some underling who believed himself to be serving Mr. Lloyd George's cause.
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