Page:Victory at Sea - William Sowden Sims and Burton J. Hendrick.djvu/238

220 at the giant figure of the First Lord; in their opinion he had sadly missed his calling. His mighty frame, his hard and supple muscles, his power of vigorous and rapid movement, his keen eye and his quick wit—these qualities, in the opinion of those best qualified to judge, would have made this stupendous Briton one of the greatest heavyweight prize-fighters in the annals of pugilism. With a little training I am sure that Sir Eric would even now make a creditable showing in the professional ring. However, the paths of this business man and statesman lay in other fields. After returning from America he had had a brilliant business career in England; he represented the type which we call "self-made men"; that is, he fought his way to the top without the aid of influential friends. His elevation to the Admiralty, in succession to Sir Edward Carson, was something new in British public life, for Sir Eric had never dabbled in politics, and, until the war started, he was practically unknown in political circles. But this crisis in British affairs made it necessary for the Ministry to "draft" the most capable executives in the nation, irrespective of political considerations; and Sir Eric, therefore, quite naturally found himself at the head of the navy. In a short time he had acquired a knowledge of the naval situation which enabled him to preside over an international naval council with a very complete grasp of all the problems which were presented. I have heard the great naval specialists who attended say that, had they not known the real fact, they would hardly have suspected that Sir Eric was not a naval man. We admired not only his ability to direct the course of discussion, and even to take an important part in it, but also his skill at summing up the results of the whole proceeding in a few terse and masterly phrases. In fine, the First Lord was a man after Roosevelt's heart—big, athletic, energetic, with a genius for reaching the kernel of a question and of getting things done.

When it came to facility of exposition, however, we Anglo-Saxons made a poor showing in comparison with most French naval officers and in particular with Admirals Lacaze and de Bon. Both these gentlemen represented the Gallic type in its finest aspects. After spending a few moments with Rear- Admiral Lacaze, it was easy to