Washington Journal., 1943-05-07
GLIMPSES OF SOME CONTEMPORARIES
My Cousin Lloyd
My Cousin Lloyd

put on Lloyd. So they sat in silence till they
reached Trondhjem.
There Lloyd ended the embarrassment by
suggesting that they both sally forth together
to replenish some of their depleted stores
from the shops in ~Trondhjem. This they did.
From Iwasaki's lavish purchases, done with
out questions of prices or bargaining, Lloyd
suddenly realized that his modest japanese
fellow student, who had lived so economically
during his undergraduate days in Philadel-
phia, must be the son of very rich parents,
as indeed he was.
AT the later time, whereof | write, Hisaya
Iwasaki, then dwelling at Tokyo in a palatial
mansion surrounded by a vast park, was re-
puted to be the richest merchant of Japan.
Marking Time in Tokyo
Thanks to Lloyd's recommendations Of me
as a neutral correspondent / was accredited
to the japanese Army's general staff and was
assigned by its chief to the Second Army, al
ready modified and under the leadership Of
General Oku about to follow the First Army
under General Kuroki to Manchuria. Where
as the Second Army's general destination was
obvious, its chosen landing place only was
kept secret. Meanwhile there was little for
me to do as a correspondent but to await my
ultimate summon from General Oku's chief
Of staff.
During the interim of marking time Lloyd
in early Spring got me an invitation to an
Imperial Garden party in Tokyo, where [
met Prince and Princess Kanin, the Counts
Katsura and Matsukota with other high Japa-
nese dignitaries.
Lloyd also put me up as a guest member
at the Toky Club, a swank international club,
i'll whose reading room the latest leading Eng
fish, American, French and German news
papers could be read. There | met the
younger members of Tokyo's diplomatic set
and several Of my rival war correspondents.
Among them were Captain Brinkley of the
London Times, Villiers of the London Tele-
graph, Melton Pryor of the London Illus
trated News, Baron Krieglstein Of the Berlin
Lokalanzeiger and others who had made their
mark as special correspondents.
Apart from them | knew but few outstand-
ing persons in Japan. Those | knew from
former times were Count Arco de Valley, the
German Minister, whom | had met in Munich;
Lafcadio Hearn, the writer, whom / had known
in the West Indies; Yone Noguchi, the Japa-
nese poet whom | had met in New York; Miss
Helen Hyde, a Californian who was study
ing japanese art; and DR.. Nitobe, the author
of a famous book on Bushido, the japanese
Chivalry, translated into excellent English by
his wife. She introduced me to Baroness
Uriu, the wife Of a japanese admiral, who,
like those ladies, had been to college in
America.
By way of entertaining the numerous for
eign military and naval observers, war cor
respondents and illustrators, who had focked
to Nippon for the war, the japanese mill
tary authorities got up an international
"Schttzenfest' during which / had the luck
to hit the BULLS eye several times in success
sion. Lloyd transmitted to me therefor a
handsomely engraved Japenese medal encased
in a precious lacquer box, both of which | still
prize.
When Prince Kanin was about to go to the
Manchurian front Lloyd gave a farewell din
ner at his legation in honor of their Imperial
Highnesses during which | was seated be-
ween Dick Davis and Melton Pryor. Davis
was piqued because the japanese general
staff had assigned him to the Third Army
under General Nogi, whose departure to the
Manchurian front, so Davis feared, would
come later than that of the Second Army
under General Oku.
A Diplomats Troubles
Lloyd spoke to me about the matter, con
corning which Davis had inportuned him, and
got me to yield my assignment with the Sc
cond Army to Davis on my understanding
that | would then be assigned to- the Third
Army. That army, so | hoped, might pre-
cede the Second Army after all, or it might
at least leave Japan about the same time as
the Second Army. My act of ~abnegation
failed to appease Davis, for he sent a p~etulant
cablegram to the publisher of Golfers Week
ly, whom we both served, complaining that
my presence in Japan hindered his chances
of going early to the front.
During a war session of the Japanese Diet,
opened by Emperor Mutsohito in person,
Lloyd, who then wore his captains uniform.
spoke to me f~eelingly about the many
embarrassments occasioned in his diplomatic