Page "Edward VII" Paragraph 33

As king, Edward's main interests lay in the fields of foreign affairs and naval and military matters.

Fluent in French and German, he made a number of visits abroad, and took annual holidays in Biarritz and Marienbad.

One of his most important foreign trips was an official visit to France in spring 1903 as the guest of President Émile Loubet.

Following a visit to the Pope in Rome, this trip helped create the atmosphere for the Anglo-French Entente Cordiale, an agreement delineating British and French colonies in North Africa, and ruling out any future war between the two countries.

The Entente was negotiated between the French foreign minister, Théophile Delcassé, and the British foreign secretary, Lord Lansdowne.

Signed in London on 8 April 1904 by Lansdowne and the French ambassador Paul Cambon, it marked the end of centuries of Anglo-French rivalry and Britain's splendid isolation from Continental affairs, and attempted to counterbalance the growing dominance of the German Empire and its ally, Austria-Hungary.