In fact, each
member was explicitly told that much of what he would see could not be
revealed either personally or in print.

The party embarked in August amid all the attendant secrecy of war
conditions. The steamer was known only by a number, although later it
turned out to be the White Star liner, Adriatic. Preceded by a powerful
United States cruiser, flanked by destroyers, guided overhead by
observation balloons, the Adriatic was found to be the first ship in a
convoy of sixteen other ships with thirty thousand United States troops
on board.

It was a veritable Armada that steamed out of lower New York harbor on
that early August morning, headed straight into the rising sun. But it
was a voyage of unpleasant war reminders, with life-savers carried every
moment of the day, with every light out at night, with every window and
door as if hermetically sealed so that the stuffy cabins deprived of
sleep those accustomed to fresh air, with over sixty army men and
civilians on watch at night, with life-drills each day, with lessons as
to behavior in life-boats; and with a fleet of eighteen British
destroyers meeting the convoy upon its approach to the Irish Coast after
a thirteen days' voyage of constant anxiety. No one could say he
travelled across the Atlantic Ocean in war days for pleasure, and no one
did.

Once ashore, the party began a series of inspections of munition plants,
ship-yards, aeroplane factories and of meetings with the different
members of the English War Cabinet. Luncheons and dinners were the order
of each day until broken by a journey to Edinburgh to see the amazing
Great Fleet, with the addition of six of the foremost fighting machines
of the United States Navy, all straining like dogs at leash, awaiting an
expected dash from the bottled-up German fleet. It was a formidable
sight, perhaps never equalled: those lines of huge, menacing, and yet
protecting fighting machines stretching down the river for miles, all
conveying the single thought of the power and extent of the British Navy
and its formidable character as a fighting unit.

It was upon his return to London that Bok learned, through the
confidence of a member of the British "inner circle," the amazing news
that the war was practically over: that Bulgaria had capitulated and was
suing for peace; that two of the Central Power provinces had indicated
their strong desire that the war should end; and that the first peace
intimations had gone