I at any rate cannot believe that the Entente, after losing Paris and Calais, would refuse to treat for peace as _inter pares_--it would at least be necessary to make every endeavour in that direction.

Up to now Hindenburg has done all that he promised, so much we must admit, and the whole of Germany believes in his forthcoming success in the West--always taking for granted, of course, the freeing of the Eastern front; that is to say, peace with Russia.

The Russian peace, then, _may_ prove the first step on the way to the peace of the world.
I have during the last few days received reliable information about the Bolsheviks.

Their leaders are almost all of them Jews, with altogether fantastic ideas, and I do not envy the country that is governed by them.

From our point of view, however, the most interesting thing about them is that they are anxious to make peace, and in this respect they do not seem likely to change, for they cannot carry on the war.
In the Ministry here, three groups are represented: one declines to take Lenin seriously, regarding him as an ephemeral personage, the second does not take this view at all, but is nevertheless unwilling to treat with a revolutionary of this sort, and the third consists, as far as I am aware, of myself alone, and I _will_ treat with him, despite the possibly ephemeral character of his position and the certainty of revolution.