mplicity. In spite of all his tremendous undertakings he preserves the
heart of a boy." With a twinkle in his eyes, and in a soft inquiring
voice, "Have you ever tried to buy glycerine from him?" asked Lord
Inverforth.

This story has a sequel. I mentioned it to Lord Leverhulme. "One day
two Englishmen," he replied at once, "were passing the Ministry of
Munitions. They saw Lord Inverforth going in. One who did not recognize
him said, 'Anyone can tell that man; he's a Scotsman.' To which the
other, who did recognize him, replied, 'Yes, but you couldn't tell
_that_ Scotsman anything else.' You might repeat that story to Lord
Inverforth the next time you meet him."

I did, and the Minister of Munitions accepted the compliment with a good
grace.

It is a fortunate thing for this country that a man of so remarkable a
genius for organization as Lord Inverforth should be found willing to
serve the national interests in spite of an almost daily campaign of
abuse directed against his administration. I sometimes wish he would
bring an action for libel against one of these critics. It would be an
amusing case. He might claim damages of, let us say, L7,000,000 or even
L10,000,000, for he is a man of gigantic interests, claiming these
damages on the score that his alleged libellers have injured his
reputation as a man of business in all quarters of the world. They would
have him the craziest muddler and the most easily swindled imbecile
outside Fleet Street--where alone wisdom is to be found. How one would
enjoy a verbatim report of the cross-examination of these critics _in
their own newspapers_.

I will endeavour to show that Lord Inverforth is not quite so consummate
an ass as his critics would have the public to believe, but rather one
of the very greatest men, in his own particular line, who ever came to
the rescue of a chaotic Government.

Let me not be supposed to insist that a great man of business is a great
man. I regard Lord Inverforth as an exceedingly great man of business,
one of the very greatest in the world, and this fact I hope to make
clear in a few lines, but I do not regard him as a national hero in the
wider sense of that term. He has too many lacks for that, and some of
them essential to true and catholic greatness.

He could never fire the imagination of a people, nor does he convey a
warm and generous feeling to the heart. His enthusiasms are all of a
subdued nature. The driving force in his character