As regards the League of Nations, jour case differs from yours, You are not confronted with the problem of your representation at Geneva—whether you are to be represented by your Minister for Foreign Affairs in person or by a professional or per~ msnent delegate. The great distance of Geneva from this country renders it out of the question that your [Minister for Foreign Affairs. should proceed there. In our country, this fused to be, and T think still is to some extent, a hotly debated question, Except, I think, for putting appearance at the first formal meetin, lof the Council of tke League in Paris Lord Curzon never attended a Leagus meeting. On his advent to power in 1024, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald made 3 point of' attending the Assembly. of that year, though, owing to his hold: ing concurrently the posts of Prime Minister and Secretary of State, be had not leisure to attend the Counnil meetings. With the advent to power of the Conservative Administration at the end of 1924, Sir Austen Cham= berlain made a point of attending all the Important meetings at Geneva and, in fact, except during a period of breakdown In health, he never missed a. meeting and that example has been followed by his successors.
This practice, and the necessity for British Ministers to attend numerous conferences which have taken place ince the war, has given rise to the complaints of what is known os peripatetic diplomacy". In the old days, British Secretaries of State had only very rarely an acquaintance with statesmen in other countries. 1 believe T am right in saying that Lord Grey of Fallodon never went abroad, certainly during his tenure of once,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.