The guests are contemporary figures from the upper and professional classes, nine men and nine women,[2] all of whom have an interest in understanding how Empire might be a positive influence.

It is mostly serious discussion, but there is also a lot of fun especially in the portrait of Lady Flora Brume, based upon the real-life Susan Grosvenor who was later to become Buchan's wife.

[3] Writing for The John Buchan Society website in 2002, Edwin Lee noted that while the book has some aspects of a novel it is not a novel in the ordinary sense of the word.

Rather, he suggested, Buchan is using the imagined conference, via the utterances of his characters, as a means of defending the ideals and practical benefits of Empire.

The author's intention "was to rescue [Lord] Milner's best ideas from the wreckage of his South African policy when British politics lurched to the left in January 1906".