As both Herr von Bethmann Hollweg and Admiral von Tirpitz have devoted a good deal of attention to these and other conversations in their books, I have felt at liberty here and in the last chapter to state what, I am bound to observe, had better not, as it seems to me personally, have been held back for so long—­the exact nature of that which actually passed when I was sent to Berlin in February, 1912.  Accordingly, it is only necessary that I should add here a few words more about what indeed appears in most of its detail from the versions given by the two German Ministers concerned themselves.

I refused, not only because I had been instructed to do so, but because in my own opinion it was vital that I should refuse, to negotiate excepting on the basis of absolute loyalty to the Entente with France and Russia.  The German Government asked for a covenant of absolute neutrality.  This I could not look at.  I had the same feeling about such an agreement for unconditional neutrality as Caprivi had when he was asked to renew the Reinsurance Treaty which Bismarck made with Russia at Skiernevice in 1884, and under which, notwithstanding that Germany might come to owe a duty to Austria to support her as her military Ally, he bound Germany to observe neutrality in case Russia were attacked by her.  So far as appeared this Reinsurance Treaty probably had suggested the wording of the analogous formula which the Chancellor was proposing to myself.  But altho we were not under the obligation to France which Germany was under to Austria in 1884, I felt, to use the words of Caprivi himself, when he succeeded Bismarck, and was asked to renew the engagement with Russia, that the arrangement was “too complicated” for my comprehension.  It would have been not only wrong to expose a friendly France to the risk of being dismembered by an unjustifiable invasion, while her friend England merely stood looking on, but it would also have been prejudicial to our safety.  For to have allowed Germany to take possession of the northern ports of France would have been to imperil our island security.  The Chancellor was entitled to make the request he did, but I was bound to refuse it.  I also, at the same time, told him that if Germany went on increasing her Navy, any agreement with us meant to lead to better relations would be little more than “bones without flesh.”  Germany might, indeed, as he had said, need a third training squadron, in addition to the two she had already in the North Sea.  This we could easily meet by moving more of our ships to northern waters, without having to increase the number we were building independently.  But if she had the idea of adding to her fleet on a considerable scale we should be bound to lay down two keels to every one of her new ships, and the inevitable result would be, no proportionate increase in her strength relatively to ours, but of a certainty a good deal of bad feeling.