Hoover enjoyed an extraordinary position in relation to the passport and border regulations of all the countries in and out of which he had to pass in his movements connected with the relief. He was given a freedom in this respect enjoyed by no other man. He moved almost without hindrance and undetained by formalities freely in and out of England, France, Holland, occupied Belgium and France, and Germany itself, with person and traveling bags unexamined. It was a concrete expression of confidence in his integrity and perfect correctness of behavior, that can only be fully understood by those who had to make any movements at all across frontiers in the tense days of the war. Governor General von Bissing once said to me in Brussels, apropos of certain charges that had been brought to him by his intelligence staff of a questionable behavior on the part of one of our men in Belgium--charges easily proved to be unfounded: "I have entire confidence in Mr. Hoover despite my full knowledge of his intimate acquaintance and association with the British and French Government officials and my conviction that his heart is with our enemies." As a matter of fact Hoover always went to an unnecessary extreme in the way of ridding himself of every scrap of writing each time he approached the Holland-Belgium frontier. He preached absolute honesty, and gave a continuous personal example of that honesty to all the C. R. B. men inside the steel ring. Each time he came to Brussels all of us came in from the provinces and occupied France and gathered about him while he told us the news of the outside world, and how things were going in the New York and London offices. And then he would talk to us as a brother in the fraternity and exhort us to forget our difficulties and our irritations and play the game well and honestly for the sake of humanity and the honor of America. After the group talks he would listen to the personal troubles, and advise and help each man in his turn. People sometimes ask me why Hoover has such a strong personal hold on all his helpers. The men of the C. R. B. know why. The Belgian relief and the American food administration and the later and still continuing American relief of Eastern Europe have been called, sometimes, in an apparently critical attitude, "one man" organizations. If by that is meant that there was one man in each of them who was looked up to with limitless admiration, relied on with absolute confidence, and served with entire devotion by all the other men in them, the attribution is correct. No man in any of these organizations--and Hoover gathered about him the best he could get--but recognized him as the natural leader. He was the "one man," not by virtue of any official or artificial rank but by sheer personal superiority in both constructive administrative capacity and effective practical action.