Furthermore, M. Caillaux, holding the eminent position already referred to in the world of finance, had the whole-souled and entire-pocket backing of the French and German-Jew international money-lords. These magnates of plutocracy, marvellous to relate, found themselves on this issue hand in glove with the most active international French Socialists. Nobody who was in the least afraid of political cliques, of journalistic coteries, of financial syndicates, or of Socialist rancour, could put Caillaux under lock and key. And the military outlook lent itself to the encouragement of the leading advocate of surrender and his acolytes. The word was assiduously passed round that, now Russia was out of the fray, a drawn battle was the very best that the Entente could hope for. France was bled white, Great Britain was war-weary and her workers were discontented, Italy--think of Caporetto--while, as to the United States, America was a long way off, President Wilson was still "too proud to fight" in earnest, American troops could never be transported in sufficient numbers across the Atlantic, and, to say nothing of dangers from submarines, there was not enough shipping afloat to do it. All pointed, therefore, to prompt "peace by negotiation," and what better man could there be to negotiate such a peace than M. Joseph Caillaux? It was because he was the one political personage in France who could secure fair terms for his distressful country, at this terrible crisis, that he was so persistently attacked by the Chauvinists as a pro-German and accused of the most sordid treachery by men who envied him his power at the international Council Table! Such was the situation. So long as M. Caillaux was at large, and able to direct the whole of the forces of defeatism, no genuinely patriotic Ministry could be successfully formed, or, if formed by some fortuitous concurrence of circumstances, could last for three months. Treachery breeds treachery as loyalty engenders loyalty. When Clemenceau took office, therefore, everything depended upon what he did with Caillaux. Paris and all France held their breath as they awaited the event. Patriots were doubtful: defeatists were hopeful: soldiers were on the look-out for a man. On January 15th, then, M. Caillaux was arrested and put in prison by Clemenceau and his Ministry. All the predictions of upheaval and disaster, indulged in by M. Caillaux's friends, were falsified. The country breathed more freely. Thenceforward, France knew whom to back. But, supposing that M. Caillaux had still been within the precincts of Parliament and carrying on his political plots when the terrible news came of the disasters of Cambrai and St. Quentin, and when the German armies were within cannon-shot of Paris--how then? Those who knew best how things stood believe themselves that counsels of despair and pusillanimity might have prevailed, to the ruin of the country.