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Island to be even stronger than I had known realized. The Foreign Office naturally knew
a great deal more than I did about the actions and assertions of the Russian
Government, who had talked even more and done even less than my previous information
had led me to believe.

Although my original introduction had been to the Colonial Office,
it soon became clear that the subject really belonged to the Foreign Office.
Nevertheless, the practical sides of the question came under the Admiralty and
the Air Ministry. In that connection I had constant dealings with the First Lord
of the Admiralty, Colonel L. S. Amery, and various of his admirals and captains
in an official and semi-official capacity. I always had the feeling that much
Col. of what progress I made was due to Mr. Colonel Amery's constant interest and his thorough
grasp of the arctic situation both in its economic and political aspects.

Although my personal and social contact with the officers of the
Navy was uniformly delightful, my frequent meetings with Rear-Admiral J. W. L.
McClintock made on me an especially lasting impression in which were blended my
liking for himself and my great admiration for his father. I have few heroes;
Sir Leopold McClintock is one of the few. With Parry's, his is one of the two
really great names that the British Empire has given to arctic history.

But more interesting than any of my summer's experiences were the
frequent long talks with Commander J. G. Bower. I had met him first at Washington
a year before when he accompanied Balfour in connection with the Conference on the Limitation
[in margin: singular is official] of Armaments. We had been brought together by Sir Robert Borden, the great war
premier of Canada. I had long been urging upon Sir Robert the feasibility of
polar exploration by submarine and the importance of a craft that can occasionally
dive under the ice to the maritime commercial development of Canada and of every
other country some or all of whose harbors or coasts are blocked by ice in winter.
Bower was with Balfour as submarine expert and was said to have/had more experience
than any man in the British Navy with the actual operation of submarines under ice -