During the whole of the struggle, even when the military situation looked most desperate for the future of his country, Clemenceau never lost confidence. His faith in France and her steadfast ally Great Britain never wavered. That was a great service he then rendered to France and civilisation. But he did more. At a time when on the other side of the Channel, as in Great Britain, in Italy, and in Russia, the national spirit was clouded by deep suspicion of enemy influence, bribery and corruption in high places, with almost criminal weakness, when strength and determination were essential to success, Clemenceau did not hesitate to denounce treachery where he believed it to exist. Nothing like his courage in this respect has, unfortunately, been shown by statesmen in any other of the Allied countries. The fact that fomenters of reaction were, for their own ends, engaged on the like task of exposing the men who were unworthy of the Republic did not deter him, bitterly opposed as he was to the Royalist clique of which M. Léon Daudet was the chief spokesman, from demanding thorough investigation and the punishment of traitors, if traitors there were, in their midst. The time has not yet come to estimate the full value of the work he thus did, or the dangers from which, by his frankness, he saved the Republic. But already we can form a judgment of the perils which surrounded France in 1917. The feeling of depression and distrust was growing. The organisation of the forces of the Allies was inferior to that of the enemy. The effect of the collapse of Russia was becoming more serious each day. Great Britain, which had rendered France quite invaluable aid in all departments, had accepted Mr. Lloyd George's personal strategy, which consisted in breaking through to the Rhine frontier by way of Jerusalem and Jericho, owing to the apparent hopelessness of a favourable decision on the West front. The French Government itself, alarmed at the enormous sacrifices France was making in every way, discouraged at the progress of the defeatist movement which weakened the position of Socialists in the Cabinet, and alarmed at the manner in which German agents and German spies, whom they were afraid to arrest, pervaded almost every department--the French Government, itself shaken daily by attacks from the Right and from the Left, felt incapable of dealing with the situation as a whole. There was, for a moment, a sensation in Paris not far removed from despair.