After four years of war, the bloodiest and most determined war the world has ever seen, and in the midst of the greatest revolution ever known, this excitement is only too easily understood.

But the result of this excitement is that all those rumours which go flying about, mingling truth and falsehood together, end by misleading the public.

It is unquestionably necessary to arrive at a clear understanding.

The public has a right to know what has really happened, it has the right to know why we did not succeed in attaining the peace we had so longed for, it has a right to know whether, and if so where, any neglect can be pointed out, or whether it was the overwhelming power of circumstances which has led our policy to take the course it did.

The new arrangement of relations between ourselves and Germany will make an end of all secret proceedings.