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Shouting into his mouthpiece, Il Duce wanted to know if his Geneva delegate remembered what day this was. It was the 20th anniversary of Italy's entry into the War. Throughout Italy since dawn it had been as fine a fiesta of flag waving as any Fascist could remember. From Naples 2,200 more troops had sailed for East Africa. There were parades and speeches in every provincial capital. In Rome gnarled little King Vittorio Emanuele presented new colors to 16 new regiments. Celebrating the ninth Fascist levy 150,000 young men throughout Italy joined the Fascist Militia. And addressing 100,000 soldiers and Blackshirts, Benito Mussolini had cried:
"We Italians are very circumspect before reaching any decision, but once we have made up our minds, we march straight toward our objective and never turn back. . . . An unknown infantryman [Mussolini], one of many who fought, suffered, died and won to give Italy a radiant victory in the World War, wrote on the wall of a house near the banks of the Piave River: Better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep. This motto, more than any other, is our gospel!"
On this day of days did Baron Aloisi want the Italian Dictator to crawl back and cravenly accept League dictation in the Abyssinia dispute?
Baron Aloisi went back to the table with small appetite for the roast. Doing his best, Capt. Eden arranged to keep the League Council in session on the Abyssinian question for a week if necessary. Meanwhile Pierre Laval got a call from headquarters: Things were going very badly at home. Crowds were nervous. Everything pointed to the fall of the Flandin Cabinet when parliament reopened early this week. The Foreign Minister had better hurry home. The last train for Paris left at 10:45 p.m. What time was it now? Nearly 9 o'clock. Mon Dieu!
The statesmen looked sourly at their plates of striped ice cream. In their own rooms members of the League Council sat patiently waiting, paring their nails.
Shortly after 9 o'clock the telephone rang again. This time it was Signer Mussolini calling. Capt. Eden spilled his coffee. Il Duce had thought of a compromise. He would agree to arbitrate the Abyssinian question—in principle—if Britain and France would let him continue to send troops to Africa. Italy was perfectly agreeable to Abyssinia's two chosen arbitrators: Professor Albert de la Pradelle of France and Professor Pitman Benjamin Potter of Long Branch, N.J., onetime instructor in political science at Harvard and in history at Yale.
With a great pouf of relief Foreign Minister Laval leaped from the table. Eager to help, Maxim Litvinoff, President of the League Council, summoned his colleagues at 12:47 a.m. At 1:37 a.m. the Council passed two interlocking resolutions. They provide that four arbitrators (Abyssinia's two and two appointed by Italy) must reach a decision by July 25, failing which a fifth arbitrator will be chosen by the League Council. All five will be given until Aug. 25 to reach agreement, after which the League Council will take things over, scratch its head, ponder.