Rodd, the English Ambassador. Of these three the only one who was not satisfied with the results was Barrère. From Paris he had received instructions to support me in the scheme for transferring our prisoners to France. When I gave him an account of my first interview with Sonnino, he was indignant. He rightly regarded the attitude of the Italian Government as indicating opposition to the military and political anti-Austrian movement in France. He promised that he would tell Sonnino this, and advised me not to accept the Italian scheme, but to insist that our troops should be sent to France.(30) Seeing the situation in Rome, I did not agree with Barrère. Giers, on the other hand, declared that the results of the negotiations were a great success, and he added that, considering the Italian opposition towards the Jugoslavs and Sonnino’s sceptical opinions as to the fate of Austria-Hungary, he had not expected that matters would turn out so favourably for us. He advised me to accept as a first step whatever concessions the Italian Government might now make. The general trend of affairs would then show what could be done later.
A similar opinion was expressed by Sir Rennell Rodd, to whom I was introduced by Sir Samuel Hoare, then head of the Military Mission in Rome. Sir Samuel Hoare had first occupied a similar post in Russia, where he had met Professor Masaryk, to whom, I believe, he had rendered assistance. We were staying in the same hotel in Rome, and so I made his acquaintance and we began to work together. Throughout the period of my stay in Rome, and also subsequently, I kept him supplied with information and memoranda on the progress of our movement and on the situation in Austria-Hungary. I kept in touch with him from that time onwards, and we continued a fruitful co-operation until the end of the war.
Sir Samuel Hoare rendered valuable services to our cause in Rome, and later on also in London. I kept him informed about everything that I was doing in Rome, and he passed this information on to his Ambassador there, from whom these details reached the Government circles in London. Through him, too, I make an attempt from Rome to secure the consent of the British Government to our military enterprise, and he it was who suggested that I should visit London for the purpose of taking the same measures there with regard to the recognition of the National Council as I had done in
O
