mainly of the muddle
that the War Office had got into over the question of supplies for
Greece (of which armament only formed a small proportion), it was
decided, somewhat late in the day, that we should deal with supplies
of all kinds furnished by the War Office to the Allies. But it was
arranged at the same time that my branch, instead of remaining under
the Under-Secretary of State, its proper place, should be included in
the new-fangled civilian department of the Surveyor-General of
Supplies which had nothing to do with armament, a plan that set
fundamental principles of administration at defiance inasmuch as the
branch actually supplied nothing and merely acted as a go-between. It
simultaneously acquired a title that constituted a very miracle of
obscurantism and incongruity, warranted to bewilder everybody. Labours
in connection with Russia and Roumania were by that time, however,
virtually at an end, the importance of the branch had to a great
extent lapsed, and it was afforded a not unedifying experience. For it
became possible to compare the working of the military departments
within the War Office with that of a department set up within that
institution and run on the lines of the Man of Business, just as it
had been possible before to compare the working of those military
departments within the War Office with that of the Ministry of
Munitions. If the military departments of the War Office came out with
flying colours, it must in fairness be allowed that, as they were of
the old-established and not the mushroom type, their competitors were
giving away a lot of weight.

As a matter of fact, the branch had never in principle been supposed
to deal direct with the representatives of the Allies, although in
practice we were in close and constant touch with them. Official
business transactions with them were carried out, accounts kept, and
so forth, by the "Commission Internationale de Ravitaillement," and,
until we became entangled with the Surveyor-General of Supplies people
and were obliged to shift quarters, we were accommodated in the
building occupied by the "Commission," which constituted a very
important department, nominally under the Board of Trade but for all
practical purposes independent. This C.I.R.--departments and branches
are always described by their initials in official life; the day would
not be long enough nor would available stationery suffice to give them
their full titles--was an admirably