WAR MEMOIRS OF DAVID LLOYD GEORGE 1917

THE AUSTRIAN PEACE MOVE 223
brother-in-law, Prince Sixte. Hopwood had an audience on
March 6th, 1917, with the King of Norway, who told him
that Count Mensdorff, "who was triste, very worried, and
much fatter", had discussed with him the desire of Austria
for peace and had hinted at proposals. He had said, however,
that the Austrian Government was deeply disappointed with
the Allies' reply to the German Peace Note, especially with
that part of it dealing with the rights of small States and
various nationalities. Count Mensdorff had pointed out that
Austria was made up of small nationalities and of various
races, and said that the Austrians had read the Note as an
incitement to their people to rebel and bring about the breakup
of the Austrian Empire. This is an indication of the practical
difficulties which stood in the way of making peace with
Austria. It could only have been achieved at that time by
perpetuating the subjection of four fifths of the population
of the Hapsburg Empire to the Teutonic yoke.
Sir Francis Hopwood was thus forced to return without
making any direct contact with Austrian diplomats, or even
securing incontrovertible evidence that a peace move was being
sought from that quarter. But although his mission was
nugatory, I felt we ought not to neglect any opportunity
which seemed to offer itself for detaching any of our enemies
from the powerful combination we were fighting.
We were shortly to learn through another channel that
the Emperor Karl was sincerely desirous to open negotiations
with the Allies.
Prince Sixte of Bourbon, the son of the Duke of Parma
and brother of the Empress Zita of Austria, was a member of
the former Royal House of France, and for ten years before
the War he had been settled in Paris, and regarded himself
as a Frenchman. Such was the prejudice in France against the
Royalist connection that when war broke out, Prince Sixte
found himself unable to join the French Army; but through