Second in authority upon the War Council and with the nation, but only second, stood Mr. Asquith. For six years he had been Prime Minister--years marked by the restlessness and turbulence of expanding liberty at home, and abroad by ever-increasing apprehension. Yet his authority was derived less from his office than from personal qualities which, as in Lord Kitchener’s case, the English people like to believe peculiarly their own. He was incorruptible, above suspicion. His mind appeared to move in a cold but pellucid atmosphere, free alike from the generous enthusiasm and the falsehood of extremes. Sprung from the intellectual middle-class, he conciliated by his origin, and encouraged by his eminence. His eloquence was unsurpassed in the power of simple statement, in a lucidity more than legal, and, above all, in brevity. The absence of emotional appeal, and, even more, the absence of humour, promoted confidence, while it disappointed. Here, people thought, was a personality rather wooden and unimaginative, but trustworthy as one who is not passion’s slave. No one, except rivals or journalistic wreckers, ever questioned his devotion to the country’s highest interests as he conceived them, and, as statesmen go, he appeared almost uninfluenced by vanity. Balliol and the Law had rendered him too fastidious and precise for exuberant popularity, but under an apparent immobility and educated restraint he concealed, like Lord Kitchener, qualities more attractive and humane. Although conspicuous for cautious moderation, he was not obdurate against reason, but could sing a palinode upon changed convictions.[16] Unwavering fidelity to his colleagues, and a magnanimity like Cæsar’s in combating the assaults of political opponents, and disregarding the treachery of most intimate enemies, surrounded him with a personal affection which surprised external observers; while his restrained and unexpressive demeanour covered an unsuspected kindliness of heart. In spite of his lapses into fashionable reaction, most supporters of the Gladstonian tradition still looked to him for guidance along the lines of peaceful and gradual reform, when suddenly the war-cloud burst, obliterating in one deluge all the outlines of peace and progress and law. The Tsar who, with assumed philanthropy, had proposed the Peace Conferences at The Hague; the ruler to whom the ambition of retaining the title of “Friedenskaiser” was, perhaps honestly, attributed; the President who had known how passionately France clung to peace; the Belgian King who foresaw the devastation of his wealthy country; the stricken Emperor who, through long years of disaster following disaster, had hoped his distracted heritage might somehow hang together still--all must have suffered a torture of anxiety and indecision during those fateful days of July and August 1914. But upon none can the decision have inflicted deeper suffering than upon a Prime Minister naturally