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Canadian Club. Regina. November, 1936.

Three Friends.

1. The difficulties of a Governor-General. He cannot speak
about current Canadian politics. He cannot speak about Canada just
at present for he does not know enough. He cannot speak about world
politics without straying into controversial matters. Therefore he
is apt to be driven back on what I call Goveror-Generalities! I want
to avoid that today.

I thought we might have a talk about three famous men
whom I have had the opportunity to know well. These three are Lord
Haig, Lord Balfour and Colonel Lawrence of Arabia. I have selected
these three because just lately ±mportant books have been written
upon them. There has been an edition for the general public of
Colonel Lawrence's great work The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, which is
practically a spiritual autobiography. Mr. Duff Cooper, the British
Secretary of State for War, has written the official Life of Lord
Haig, and the first volume has been published of Lord Balfour's Life
by his niece, a very intimate and wonderful record. No doubt many of
you will have read, or will read, these books, and I thought I might
venture to supplement them by offering you some recollections of these
three outstanding figures.

I will take Lord Haig first. I knew him well ever since the
South African War, though he was very considerably my senior. He had
been a member of my old College at Oxford, he was a neighbour in Scotland,
and he was a fellow Elder of the Kirk. When I first
knew him he was a very fashionable polo-play1ng cavalry officer, extraordinarily
goodlooking, extremely well turned out, and with a rapidly
increasing reputation in his profession. But that was only on the