for a base and
line of communications for this force which was about to be projected
suddenly across the narrow seas. Enquiries elicited the startling
information that nothing whatever had been done in the matter; some of
those most concerned in such questions in Whitehall had not even heard
that the force was preparing to start. The problem, such as it was,
was promptly solved as soon as it was grappled with. The Directors
dealing with such subjects met in my room, and in a few minutes the
requisite staff had been selected, arrangements had been decided upon,
and orders had been despatched--it was as easy as falling downstairs
once machinery had been set in motion. But how came it that this had
not been thought of before? Now, I can quite understand Sir C. Douglas
holding that this particular phase of the Antwerp project, sending
Generals Capper and Byng with their divisions to sustain the Belgians
and the Naval Division by a landing at Zeebrugge, was a sound one from
the strategical point of view--such questions are necessarily
questions of opinion. But I cannot understand a master of military
administration such as he was, a soldier equipped with exceptional
knowledge of organization and with wide experience of the requirements
of a British army in the field, sending a considerable body of troops
off oversea to a theatre of operations, where fighting might be
expected almost as soon as they landed, without making provision for
their base and communications.

Actually, what turned out to be a tragic episode was not without some
little comic relief. There was consternation in Whitehall one evening,
just before the dinner-hour, when tidings arrived that a couple of the
transports conveying this force to its destination had passed the
rendezvous where the convoy was mustering, and were at large, heading
without escort or orders for a water-area known to be mined by both
sides, and where enemy destroyers and similar pests were apt to make
their appearance unexpectedly. Fortunately the panic was of short
duration. On returning to the office after dinner one learnt that the
straying vessels had both fetched up on the Goodwins--luckily about
low water--and were under control again.

In any criticism of H.M. Government's action in connection with the
Antwerp affair (as regards the prosecution of the war in the field,
H.M. Government for all practical purposes then meant Mr. Asquith,
Lord Kitchener, and Mr. Churchill) it mu