The New York herald., 1921-05-15
Reviewed by WADE CHANCE.


The reader who is looking for entertain
ment may not be wholly disappointed even
in earnest volume as this No doub.
that is partly because the chapters We're
prepared first to be given as popular talks.
Prof Give Day reports this Incident When
the Saar Valley plan concluded. Lloyd
George said to Wilson: Mr. President |
think we have got very good plan here"
Mr.. Wilson replied: "Well, why don't you
apply it to Ireland?"
This book by eighteen authors comprises
by far the most important contribution to
the literature of the great events at Paris
yet made, especially since it may be re-
garded as the final presentation of the part
played there by Mr.. Wilson, written as it is
by his advisers and Immediate assistants
including Messrs. Hoover Lamont and
Gompers. 1t throws great light on the sub
iect, even though some of the illumination
must be sought for between the lines. Judg-
ing from the respective chapters written by
the ten professors and three legal advisers
who accompanied Mr.. Wilson to Paris their
minds seem to have gone along with his
with marvellous unanimity, for there are
few admissions of disagreement or sugges-
tions of fallibity on his part, although we
get occasional hints that some things hap
pened at Paris which do not hear about
1t would sometimes appear that a correct
mitted only to posterity and denied to the
contemporaneous generation. Only when
personal dignity and justice called in
question, as in Mr.. Lansing's case is the
complete narrative forthcoming.
On President Wilson's instructions Col
House and DR.. Sidney Edward Mezes formed
The Inquiry" as early September 1917.
Oh the report of this body. January 2, 1918,
tho Fourteen Points We're based It's mem
has lot
Paris, and plainly took more part in assist
ing him than did his fellow delegates, save
Col House. Curiousy enough, we do not
find Mr.. Henry Whites name in the book
But Prof. Give Day pays this tribute to Mr..
Lansing, with unexpected frankness:
mo one could surpass Mr.. Lansing in the
logic and force with which he could present
a legal argument. But even first class
ability did not count when it was in the
second place in the delegation. Lansing
might convince every one in the room. but
II he did not convince Mr.. Wilson his argu
ment profited nothing"
Bulgaria and Austria Hungary surren
dered precpitately that there was no
time to insert the Fourteen Points but Dr.
Mezes relates that when Germany's turn
came President Wilson would not undertake
the task of making peace until he was
assured that the German Government ac-
cepted them
In Col. Houses chapter THE Versailles
Peace in Retrospect" we find little definite
opinion of Mr.. Wilson. for he walks very
gingerly: but may infer much especially
when he says:
Probably the greatest misfortune of the
conference was that it assembled too late
and took too long for prelminaries. Had II
convened Immediately after the armistice
and had IL dealt promptly tcith Germany the
long uncertainty. disorder and confusion
might in part have been avoided" House
knew well II Wilson's insistence on
INTERVIEWING the league with the treaty
which caused the main delay, as Lansing
declares in his book.
Col House condemns secrecy at Paris
adding: The failure to carry through