A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
THERE can be nothing very conclusive in arguments about what King George V said in 1914, when all that is on written record is what someone said he said. But the story published in the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung on Tuesday, to the effect that King George assured Prince Henry of Prussia (then on a visit to England) as lately as July 25th, 1914, that " in the event of a European conflagration England will remain neutral," deserves some attention. It is on the face of it highly unlikely that the King would have used such language, for two years earlier he had told Prince Henry almost precisely the opposite. The King's general attitude, moreover, is perfectly well known. He was an ardent supporter of the Entente with France, and in any European conflagration— except one in which France was palpably the aggressor— he would unquestionably have wanted to see this country at France's side. The simplest explanation is that Prince Henry misunderstood the King, and this assumption, rather curiously, is borne out by a passage in a book The Kaiser on Trial, by G. S. Viereck, published this week. From this it appears that Prince Henry replaced his first report to the Kaiser by an amended report in which the words ascribed to King George were " we shall probably remain neutral." The basis for this is said to be the German official documents, which I have not had an opportunity of consulting. But it is unlikely that the King went even as far as that.
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