Crook, and one or two other active radicals, it soon adjourned to the Rainbow Tavern in Fleet Street for its gatherings. After a year or two, owing, I believe, to shortcoming in its consumption of the more profitable forms of drink, it left this tavern and availed itself of the generous hospitality of Mr. (later Sir) Richard Stapley, who placed at its disposal a large room in his private residence, together with post-prandial amenities. Here for some twenty years I enjoyed the advantage of discussions carried on in an atmosphere of complete freedom, by politicians, journalists, civil servants, lawyers, clergymen, mostly men of conspicuous ability and extending from orthodox Liberals in the House of Commons to members of the Fabian Society and even the Social Democratic Federation. Among the most regular attendants were men of such diverse attachments as J. M. Robertson, Herbert Burrows, G. P. Gooch, Herbert Samuel, J. R. MacDonald, the Rev. A. L. Lilley, Russell Rea, Sydney Olivier, William Clarke, Percy Alden, Murray MacDonald, W. P. Reeves. Though several members of the Circle were Socialists, one or two revolutionists, the general atmosphere of complacency, to which I have alluded, enabled us to conduct our debates even on matters of high moment with good temper and reasonable argument.
Here again the War came as a disturbing revelation. Though no open breach in our good relations occurred, it became difficult for such anti-war men as Ramsay
