besides, a service of special couriers, chosen among citizens of neutral States and among our own people who were returning home. In this way we established regular connections with the Entente countries. Towards the end of September Mr. Kosák, one of our fellow-countrymen living in England, brought me news from Mr. Steed. This news, which I supplemented soon afterwards by a personal meeting with political friends in Holland, was highly important for me and very serious.
It was that, in the opinion of Lord Kitchener, the war would last at least three or four years. For me this question was very weighty, since the character of the work I meant to do abroad depended largely upon the duration of the war. I heard also that the British military commanders thought the fate of Paris sealed, but that nevertheless England would hold out to the last man and to the last ship, and that we ought to keep our spirits up and hold out with the Allies.
Equally important was it for me to know approximately the military plans of the Allies. Their idea was that Russian armies should pass through Silesia, Moravia and Bohemia, so as to cut Austria-Hungary off from Germany strategically. The plan was to be carried out during 1914. The Russians, I was informed, could provide arms for our people so as to enable them to keep order at home.
As later developments were to convince me, the Allies stuck to this idea of separating Austria-Hungary from Germany. Indeed, as we shall see, they worked at it with the help of Austria right up to the spring of 1918. Neither militarily nor politically did I like it. Militarily I saw in it a certain lack of confidence in their own resources; and politically it meant coming to terms with the Hapsburgs, and the preservation, perhaps even the aggrandizement, of Austria. It seemed to me not a plan but planlessness, and it increased my fears about Russia.
Meanwhile I took advantage of my sister-in-law's visit from America to see her on to her boat at Rotterdam. This was between the 12th and the 26th of September, 1914. From Rotterdam I wrote to Professor Ernest Denis in Paris and to my friends Steed and Seton-Watson asking the latter to come from England to see me or to send me somebody trustworthy. But time was too short and I had to think of a second journey to Holland. Yet, as I passed twice through Germany and saw something of Holland, even this first trip was not in vain.
At home things were getting clearer. The anti-Austrian
