Extracts from a handwritten letter from Desmond FitzGerald to Mabel FitzGerald (Dublin)

My Dear M.[abel],

[matter omitted]

The Committee is the Second Committee. It deals with all sorts of things: settlement of Greek refugees, Hungarian finance, Austrian Economic Conference, Epidemiological Institutes etc. It is not so political as the first - but it covers some of the best work of the League such as the reconstruction of Austria and of Hungary. I think I have a good name as Chairman. Last night I was at dinner with Stresemann. It was quite interesting. Bernsdorf was there. When I went there Germans came up to me and told me they knew me from my photograph - that was from the 1915 days - they were [at] the Embassy in Washington at the time. So it was like being with old friends. I lunch today with another German. We give a dinner tonight.

[matter omitted]

I sleep very little, rarely going to bed before two o'clock and having something on at 10 in the morning. I have so many worries that when I wake in the morning I can't get to sleep again. I have been on the job for the last hour and a half and am writing this before going to Bureau at 10am. There is not much that I can tell in letters - at least there is too much to tell. But you know the way the day goes. Today Bureau at 10, Assembly 10.30, lunch with German Commission at 3. Our dinner tonight. After the dinner we shall possibly have a confab and get to bed about two am.

[matter omitted]

I may get time when my Commission is over to get to Freibourg. But you can't think the amount of work it gives me. On that job alone I have as much to do as Michael Hayes¹ in the Dáil and there are dozens of other things too. We sit solidly for four hours at a time - sometimes more than eight hours in the day. But I am very satisfied with our success this year - but that very success means more work - it means one is a prominent figure and therefore a sort of social asset. I write when I get the time, sorry it isn't often. But I'll give all the detail and news when I get back. We shall not finish before Saturday - if then.