The acceptance and working of the Report which disillusioned both France and Germany, and excited bitter opposition in both countries, was dependent on one incalculable element—goodwill on all sides. The German nationalists denounced it as an outrage, French nationalists as a surrender; Poincaré was prepared to discuss it subject to many reservations, including the occupation of the Ruhr and the military control of the Rhineland Railways. Not in that political atmosphere between the two nations was there a ghost of a chance for the Dawes Report. But then two other events happened in the political world which by a kind of miracle changed the mental atmosphere of Europe, at least sufficiently to secure the adoption of the new scheme. They were the advent of the Labour Government in Great Britain and the downfall of Poincaré. THE SOCIAL REVOLUTION IN ENGLAND The Conservative Government under Baldwin, which succeeded the breaking-up of the Coalition under Lloyd George, deliberately committed suicide by appealing to the country for a mandate on Protection. Great Britain would have nothing of it at a time of unemployment, heavy costs of living, and diminishing trade. But the results of the election were unforeseen. The Conservatives lost their great majority, the Liberals were reduced to a minority, and Labour became the strongest single party in the new Parliament and received its call to office. It was the greatest social revolution that has happened in England in modern history. The highest offices of state and of the very Court itself were occupied by men who had begun life in factories, mines and workshops, or who had gained political notoriety by attack upon the privileges, traditions, social castes, and property rights of the most conservative country in Europe outside Spain. They were the leaders of that spirit of revolt which had surged below the surface of English life among ex-soldiers who had not received reward for service, unemployed men who were living on poor doles, and of all those inarticulate millions who rallied to the Labour cause because it stood solidly and squarely for anti-militarism and world peace, for democratic liberties, and for ideals of a world state in which the common folk should have security, more pay for less work, more joy in life, and social equality levelled up to high standards of education and home comfort. Those I am sure were the instincts and hopes—not yet to be fulfilled!—which brought Labour into office.