Anglo-American Establishment полностью

It is more than likely that Milner, who had obtained the appointment for him, changed his

mind because of Buchan's rapidly declining enthusiasm for imperial federation. This was

a subject on which Milner and other members of his Group were adamant for many years.

By 1915 most members of the Group began to believe that federation was impossible,

and, as a compromise, took what we know now as the Commonwealth of Nations—that

is, a group of nations joined together by common ideals and allegiances rather than by

fixed political organization. Lionel Curtis remains to this day a fanatical believer in

federation, and some of the decline in his influence after 1922 may be attributed to

inability to obtain federation in the face of world—and above all Dominion—opposition.

The present Commonwealth is in reality the compromises worked out when the details of

the Milner Group clashed with the reality of political facts.

As a result of Buchan's failure to obtain the appointment of Egypt, he continued to

practice law in London for three years, finally abandoning it to become a partner in the

publishing firm of his old classmate Thomas A. Nelson (1906-1916). In 1907 he married

Susan Grosvenor, whose family (Dukes of Westminister) was allied, as we have seen, to

the Wyndhams, Cavendishes, Lytteltons, and Primroses (Earls of Rosebery and Lords

Dalmeny). As a result of this family connection, Buchan wrote a memoir on Lord

Rosebery for Proceedings of the British Academy in 1930 and a book Ol1 the Grosvenor

twins, who were killed in the war.

During the war, Buchan was a correspondent for The Times, wrote Nelson's History of

the GreatWar in twenty-four volumes (1915-1919), was the military intelligence in

France (1916-1917), and finally was Director of Information for the War Office (1917-

1918). During this period and later, he was a prolific writer of travel, historical, and

adventure stories, becoming eventually, by such works as Greenmantle, The Three

Hostages, and The Thirty-nine Steps, the most famous writer of adventure stories in

Britain. His connection with South Africa gained him the post of official historian of the

South African forces in France. He was a close friend of Lord Haldane and Lord

Rosebery, both of whom can be regarded as members of the Milner Croup. Of Haldane,

Buchan wrote: "What chiefly attracted me to him was his loyalty to Milner. Milner

thought him the ablest man in public life, abler even than Arthur Balfour, and alone of his

former Liberal allies Haldane stood by him on every count." Haldane, with Rosebery,

Asquith, and Edward Grey, had formed the Liberal League to support liberal imperialism,

with which Milner was closely associated.

Buchan was representative of the Scottish universities in the House of Commons for

eight years (1927-1935), Lord High Commissioner for the Church of Scotland in 1933-

1934, president of the Scottish Historical Society (1929-1933), and Chancellor of

Edinburgh University, before he obtained his last post, Governor-General of Canada

(1935 1940).

Basil Williams graduated from New College in 1891 and almost immediately became

clerk in the House of Commons, holding this post for nine years before he went

soldiering in the Boer War. He became Secretary of the Transvaal Education Department,

wrote Volume IV of The Times History of the South African War, and was The Times

special correspondent at the South African Convention of 1908-1919, which made the

Union. A major on the General Staff in 1918-1909, he was later Ford Lecturer at Oxford

(in 1921), Professor of History at McGill (1921-1925), and Professor of History at

Edinburgh (1925-1937). He wrote the very revealing article on Milner in the Dictionary

of National Biography and numerous other works, including Cecil Rhodes (1921), The

British Empire (for the Home University Library, 1928), Volume XI of the Oxford

History of England ( The Whig Supremacy, 1714-1760), Botha, Smuts, and South Africa

(1946), and edited The Makers of the Nineteenth Century (1915-1928).

Lord Basil Blackwood, son and heir of Lord Dufferin, went to Balliol in 1891 but

never graduated, being an adventurer of the first order. Taken to South Africa by Milner,

he was employed in the Judge Advocate's Department for a year (1900-1901), then was

Assistant Colonial Secretary of Orange River Colony for six years (1901-1907). He

became Colonial Secretary of Barbados in 1907 and Assistant Secretary of the Land

Development Commission in England in 1910. He would have been an important

member of the Milner Group but was killed in France in 1917.

Of the major members of the Kindergarten, Robert H. Brand (since 1946 Baron

Brand) stands close to the top. His father was second Viscount Brand, twenty-fourth