That the Revolution could have been prevented, or at all events could have been deferred until subsequent to the end of the war, I firmly believe. Our diplomacy has been severely criticized in connection with Near Eastern affairs in 1915; nor will any one maintain that it was successful, judged by results. But the situation in the Balkans was one of extraordinary perplexity in any case, and the problem was complicated by the fact that the Allies were not all of one mind as to what course to pursue on almost any single occasion. The position of affairs during the critical months leading up to March 1917 in Russia, on the other hand, was no puzzle, and the political situation had never been a puzzle since the outbreak of war. Our French and Italian friends, moreover, fully realized that this country, if it chose to do so, possessed the means of exerting a special and controlling influence within the governing clique holding sway at the head of the empire, and they were most anxious that that influence should be exercised. But before touching on this question some comments on the military conditions within the territories of our whilom eastern Ally previous to, and at the time of, the catastrophe will not be out of place. The potentialities of Russia for carrying on a war of first-class magnitude had been altogether overestimated at the outset in the United Kingdom and in France, alike by the public and by the military authorities--in France perhaps even more so than in this country. The armies of our eastern Ally did, it is true, accomplish greater things in some respects than had been anticipated, because they struck an effective blow at an earlier date than had been believed possible, and they thereby relieved pressure in the West at a critical juncture even if their enterprising and loyal action in East Prussia was later to lead them into a terrible disaster. During the first two or three months after the outbreak of hostilities their weakness in regard to equipment and to munitions was not, however, known, or at all events was only partially known. There was much talk in the Press about the "steam-roller" which was going to flatten the Central Powers out. We at the War Office had received warnings from our very well-informed Military Attache, it is true; but those warnings did not convey to us the full gravity of the position, a gravity which was probably not recognized even in high places in Russia for some time. Moreover, as far as we could judge, Paris had no idea that anything was seriously amiss beyond the Vistula, in spite of the Franco-Russian alliance having been in force for some years.