f
the restoration were centred in General Wrangel. The only Grand Duke
with any claim to military authority also sent to tell me that this
was a serious attempt with probability of success. General Wrangel, in
fact, reunited the scattered forces of the old regime and occupied a
large territory in power. France not only recognized in the government
of Wrangel the legitimate representative of Russia, but nominated her
official representatives with him. In November, 1920, even the army
of Wrangel, which appeared to be of granite, was scattered. Poland,
through alternating vicissitudes, claimed the power of resistance, but
has shown that she has no offensive power against Russia. So all the
attempts at restoration have broken, one after another.

One of the greatest errors of the Entente has been to treat Russia
on many occasions, not as a fallen friend, but as a conquered enemy.
Nothing has been more deplorable than to have considered as Russia the
men of the old regime, who have been treated for a long time as the
representatives of an existing State when the State no longer existed.

Let us suppose that the Bolshevik government transforms itself and
gives guarantees to the civilized nations not to make revolutionary
agitations in foreign countries, to maintain the pledges she assumes,
and to respect the liberty of citizens; the United States of America,
Great Britain and Italy would recognize her at once. But France has an
entirely different point of view. She will not give any recognition
unless the creditors of the old regime are guaranteed.

In June, 1920, the government of Moscow sent some gold to Sweden to
purchase indispensable goods. Millerand, President of the Council of
Ministers and Minister of Foreign Affairs, declared to the Minister of
Sweden at Paris that if his Government consented to receive Russian
gold _ferait acte de receleur_. He then telegraphed to the Minister of
Finance at Stockholm regretting that the Government and public opinion
in Sweden were tending to consider the _revendications juridiques_ of
the French creditors of the ancient Russian regime to be such that
they did not stop the consignment of Swedish goods against Russian
gold. He added at the end that the syndicates of creditors could
utilize the news in telegram No. 355, in which the Swedish Government
gave notice of the trade and put a sequestration on Russian gold sent
to Sweden.

This telegram, better than any speech, shows the d