Sunday, 12 March

Dry, sun

I went with Counsellors Liu, and Attachés Li and Qian to the second-hand bookshop. The said shop had an old Soviet man who was originally a Soviet poet and could speak seven languages and has translated many foreign poems. According to him, after the war the Soviet Government was unable to publish his poems and he could not starve to death, so now he works in the store as a salesman. His situation is lamentable.

The American Government urged Ireland to repel the Axis representatives saying that the German and Japanese representatives in Ireland the actions of the American army in Britain to their countries. For the sake of relations between the United States and Ireland, Ireland should do this. But the Irish Government declined. The selfishness of the European small nations should be reformed thoroughly. If Britain and the United States lose, Ireland cannot live on its own. This type of country only looks for protection from others but is not willing to sacrifice even a little bit. I just felt puzzled.

I received newspapers sent from China. With regard to the Four Powers Declaration, Minister Song have given speeches on it. He praised the representatives of Britain, the United and Soviet Union, but did not mention me. Jingchen thought that it was not inappropriate. For the goodness of the country, we have no choice but to admit that our side has also joined this declaration, and cannot let people outside view this as decided by the three powers of Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union with China only tagging along. I thought this was reasonable. Personally I think the less mentioned my work in China the better. Because human sentiment is such that if people see a person achieving too much, they will turn against them, so I felt a bit uneasy after the Four Powers Declaration, because I was concerned that if I received too much attention, I would make many enemies. I never mentioned this when I wrote to friends either in or out of the country. I did not even send a photograph of me signing the Declaration back to my country so it would not be published. In our work, we only hope for the thing to be accomplished and then we will feel relieved and we should forget it immediately. We should forget about own achievements and successes. Jingchen agreed with me.