THE IMPERIAL FAMILY, COURT, AND GOVERNMENT.

I.

IT is generally admitted that the family and personal associates of a sovereign, either by their counsels and intrigues, or merely by the fact of living together with him and constantly exchanging ideas, often exercise an influence, for good or evil, on his political decisions. To this rule, however, there are notable exceptions; among recent rulers, Leopold II. is a case in point. The old Belgian monarch, with his haughty and unsocial spirit, his scorn of advice and his consciousness of superiority, loved to work out his boldest African designs in the seclusion of his palace, without any help from civil or military officials. But the difference between the founder of the Congo Free State and the German Emperor is the difference between a great man and one who is merely talented, and they cannot be said to resemble each other in any particular. Did the family of the Kaiser, the old dignitaries of his Court, the chosen companions of his travels and his shooting parties, wield any influence upon his decisions before the war, and can they be made to some extent answerable for its origin? An interesting question, which to-day we are at Liberty to discuss.

Women, with the sole exception of the Empress, play no part in the Emperor’s life. His marriage was due to reasons of State, having been suggested by Bismarck as an act that would soothe the feelings of the bride’s family. It will be remembered that in 1864, with a view to supporting the claims of her father, the Duke of Augustenburg, to the Schleswig-Holstein succession, the Diet of the Germanic Confederation declared war on Christian IX. of Denmark. By the final settlement of the Treaty of Prague, Prussia acquired the two Duchies for herself. Later on, the Duchess of Augustenburg had the barren honour of seeing her daughter invited to share the Hohenzollern throne. This political match has proved a well-assorted one, in the middle-class sense of the term. Its happiness seems to have been assured by the usual law of contrasts, by temperamental differences: the one partner being entirely lacking in reserve, passionately fond of noise and publicity; the other, quiet, modest, and well-balanced.

Neither in her physical nor in her mental attributes does the Empress bear any resemblance to the celebrated Louisa, the wife of Frederick William III. of Prussia, that vain and commonplace ruler, of whom Napoleon, always contemptuous of the Hohenzollerns, said that he looked like a tailor in the midst of kings. The two queens are alike only in the large number of princes with whom they have enriched a stock that is nowhere near extinction. Madame de StaËl, while staying in Berlin, described Queen Louisa in a letter to her father as the most beautiful woman of her Court. Yet some years later this beauty, more appealing than ever through the unkind strokes of fate, was unable to soften the marble heart of the victor of Jena. No figure is more popular in modern Germany, more glorified by her admirers, historians and poets, painters and sculptors. Will the same fortune befall the Empress Augusta Victoria? We may be pardoned for doubting this. At the utmost, she will attract only the official brush or chisel. But should dark days come for the Imperial house, should Germanic CÆsarism, after a premature blaze of glory, suffer a “Twilight of the Gods” and a stormy downfall, the Empress, with her steadfast devotion, will no doubt, like Queen Louisa, find words of comfort for her disconsolate husband; she will help him to endure the misfortunes that he will have deserved only too well.

It is in the vast white ball-room of the palace, when a Court ball is being given, that the “august lady” (as the Berlin newspapers reverently call her) shows up to the best advantage. The function is drawing to a close. The couples, officers of the Guards and high-born damsels, who have been performing the intricate old-world dances with military precision, assemble for a last figure, before dispersing merrily into the supper-rooms. At the sound of the royal march they bow several times respectfully, each time drawing closer together in their semi-circular rows, in front of the platform on which stands the solitary figure of the Empress. She gives no little impression of majesty as she receives the homage and thanks of her youthful guests—still erect in bearing and well-proportioned, with her white hair set off by a diamond tiara, a rope of priceless pearls around her neck, the yellow ribbon of the Black Eagle athwart her bosom, and a kindly smile playing on her lips.

At the same time she is an excellent mother and a good German housewife, carefully looking after her husband’s health, and more absorbed in her children than in her subjects. As mistress of the house she has a great deal to do. Her task it is to allay the petty storms that arise at Court, to reconcile the Crown Prince with his father after each fresh escapade of that unruly heir, or to secure the Emperor’s consent to the morganatic marriage of another son, who has fallen madly in love with a mere maid-of-honour. Every December it is her chief delight to prepare the Christmas tree in the Muschelsaal, the grotto in the rococo palace at Potsdam. Her great aim is to make the family life in the royal residences as cosy and homely (gemÜtlich) as that of a humble Prussian squire. Like other royalties, she looks upon works of patronage and Christian benevolence as a formal duty, and this duty she carries out to the full. She even presides at charity bazaars, where her presence adds a spur to the generosity of the more laggard purchasers. But it is no use to expect from her any of those charming acts of impulse or of delicate sympathy that distinguish such a sovereign as the Queen of the Belgians, when some misfortune or some talent has attracted her notice. The Empress’s artistic tastes are faithfully modelled on those of her husband; she sees only through his eyes, and cannot sincerely admire anything unless he deigns to signify his approval.

The distinctive feature of her character is a rigid, uncompromising Protestantism, which will not tolerate the presence of any Catholic, either among her ladies-in-waiting or among the household servants of the palace. As a staunch defender of a creed that is steadily losing ground even in the country of Luther, she has set herself to stem the rising tide of atheism, to combat the free thought that wraps itself like a winding-sheet about the expiring faith of the great cities. The uprooting of the religious sense is partly due to Social Democracy, which pursues the work with great success among the labouring classes, while at the same time it undermines monarchical institutions. The Empress endeavours to beat back this relentless foe of the old German beliefs by building a large number of churches. One sees them rising in the principal squares of the new quarters of Berlin, red brick temples of a vague or distorted Gothic, hopelessly void of architectural distinction. In no single instance does the architect succeed in giving a faithful reproduction of the beautiful Christian models. The finest modern church in Berlin, the “Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church” (this edifice, for once in a way, is built entirely of stone), is nothing but a rather unwieldy mixture of Roman and Byzantine. Nor can it be said that, with all this wealth of new sanctuaries, religion has gained what art has lost. In the manufacturing towns, to the great grief of the Empress, the march of atheism and of indifference in matters of faith keeps pace with that of Socialism.

It would be a mistake to suppose that this admirable wife and mother, this incarnation of Protestant Germany on the Imperial throne, is in any way a pacifist. When the Emperor, after twenty-five years of his reign had passed, abruptly left the straight and tranquil path that he had marked out for the happiness of his subjects, his consort, we may be quite sure, made no effort to hold him back. In spite of her placid femininity, German patriotism, with its dreams of domination, continually haunts her brain. The horrors of war, that bane to mothers—bella matribus detestata—do not dismay the wife of William II. During the crisis of Agadir, when the Court of Berlin was chafing with impatience to measure its strength with France on another field than that of diplomacy, the Empress shared the impulse which she felt throbbing in the air around her. In a tone of reproach she said to Herr von Kiderlen-WÄchter, whom she disliked: “Are we always going to retreat before the French and put up with their insolence?”

II.

For some years past the Crown Prince has been talked about a great deal, a fact which has certainly not been displeasing to him. He has been credited with a decisive influence on the course of events at the moment when the threatenings of war became critical. It was alleged that this young man of thirty-two, acting behind the scenes, was the real deus ex machina of the whole drama; that he, the idol of the army, had imposed his will and that of the officers’ corps on his father, while the latter’s mind was not yet made up. The Crown Prince deserves

In physique, he is an officer of light infantry: slender of waist and narrow of chest, he cuts a smart figure, especially on horseback. He does not in any way resemble the usual Hohenzollern type, with its broad shoulders and regular features. His face is extremely youthful, with a certain vagueness in its outlines; his forehead recedes; his eyes show no sign of a lively intelligence, and his body has a look of suppleness rather than of strength and fitness for war. Appearances in this case are deceptive. The Prince is a tough soldier and an ardent sportsman. Polo, tennis, football, hockey, golf, yachting—there is no sport that he does not practise. Before the war, he liked to imitate the English, and posed as a German Anglomaniac. His father had to forbid him to ride in steeplechases, because an heir-apparent must on no account run the risk of a dangerous fall, but was unable to prevent him from going in for aviation. Of all William II.’s sons, the Crown Prince seems to be the most soldierly; but this does not mean that he will ever make a capable army leader.

At a first glance he does not seem to bear any resemblance to the Emperor, but after a time one finds out several parallel traits in their characters. Less well-informed, less cultured, less versatile, but just as self-willed, the son has inherited his father’s impetuous spirit and incurable propensity for freely uttering his thoughts. A line of impulsive rulers is what the modern Hohenzollerns, very different from their ancestors, have given to Germany.

The Crown Prince has the soul of a fighter, or at any rate he prides himself on that quality. At an official dinner, where he sat next to the wife of an ambassador from one of the Entente Powers, he could not think of anything more clever and gallant to say than that it was his cherished dream to make war and to lead a charge at the head of his regiment. His militarism, however, does not prevent him from venturing into certain intellectual and even literary fields. A diary of his hunting-tour in India, published in his name, has given us a detailed account of his feats as a Nimrod. Less commonplace and more personal is a brief passage, eagerly reproduced in the German Press, in which, on leaving Danzig, he bade farewell to his regiment of Death’s Head Hussars. His spirit reveals itself here in a certain vein of martial poetry. If any German pacifists—of whom there is a very large number, whatever the world may think—read this rhapsody in honour of Bellona, they must have felt considerable misgivings.

The relations between the Emperor and his son ceased to be very cordial from the day when the young Prince, brimming over with ambition and desire for popularity, tried to get himself talked about by dabbling in politics. His first open interference in State affairs is worth recalling, because it is a striking testimony to his feelings with regard to France. It took place in 1911, at that meeting of the Reichstag where Herr von Heydebrand, the spokesman of the Prussian Junkers, delivered a trenchant criticism of German policy in Morocco, of the treaty of 4th November, and of the way in which the Chancellor had defended the interests of the Empire. During this philippic, the Crown Prince, sitting by himself in the Imperial box, made repeated signs of approval. Since then he has become the hope of the reactionary party and of the military caste. Encouraged by this success, he has never omitted, on any important occasion, to express his ideas or to convey them by some mouthpiece, even when these ideas were in conflict with those of his father, as represented by the Chancellor. It would be superfluous to quote these various demonstrations. A congratulatory telegram to the hero of the Zabern affair finally won for the Prince the hearts of those who in Prussia wear the “King’s garb”—in other words, the officers of the army.

If only he had always remained on the neutral ground that lies between politics and the army! His want of tact and good feeling in this respect is shown by the way in which he tried to baulk the efforts of the Imperial Government in the settlement of the Brunswick succession. The oath of loyalty to the Emperor tendered by Duke Ernest of Cumberland, heir to the Duchy and son-in-law to His Majesty, on entering the army, did not seem to the Crown Prince (or, for the matter of that, to a good many typical Prussians) sufficient reason for admitting his brother-in-law to the last Guelph inheritance, to which he was the legitimate successor. The Crown Prince held that Duke Ernest should further be required to make a formal renunciation of his claims to the Hanoverian throne. The Emperor proved more shrewd and more politic, and the young ducal couple was enabled to enter Brunswick amid general acclamation. A section of the German Press, disgusted at the Crown Prince’s perpetual meddling with affairs that did not concern him, drily reminded him that he had no special status under the Prussian or Imperial constitution, and that he could only claim the right, enjoyed by every citizen, of stating his opinion as a mere private individual.

This endless hunting after personal popularity led to family scenes which the palace walls in Berlin and Potsdam, impenetrable though they are as a rule, could not altogether keep secret from an inquisitive public. The banishment of the Crown Prince to Danzig was solely due to his intemperate language in speech and writing. The Emperor sent him, for his sins, to a remote corner of Prussia, under the pretext of making him learn his duties as a regimental commander. After a time it became evident that in his distant fortress he was more embarrassing and less easy to watch than in Berlin. He was therefore recalled and put upon the General Staff, nominally that he might be initiated into the mysteries of Prussian strategy and tactics, really that he might remain under his father’s eye. In point of fact, we must not make too much of his escapades, which are traditional among heirs to the Hohenzollern throne. Frederick the Great, famous before his accession for his quarrels with his brutal sire, was not the first Prussian heir-apparent who rebelled against paternal authority. Later on, in the last century, the Emperor William I., when he was next in the line of succession to his brother, Frederick William IV., held, during the latter’s reign, a little princely Court that was a hotbed of criticism and opposition. And the present Emperor? Who will believe that in his passionate self-assertiveness he would not have caused just as much vexation and embarrassment to his father, if the Emperor Frederick had reigned for more than a few months?

We should misjudge William II. if we attributed to him any jealousy of his son’s growing popularity. He has too exalted an idea of his own worth for that, and he cannot cherish any illusions as to the real capacity of his heir. To insinuate that the Emperor took time by the forelock owing to his fear of this popularity, which threatened to eclipse his own, would be tantamount to saying that the Crown Prince was the causa causans, the prime mover of the appeal to arms; and this would be assigning to him an importance and an influence which he has never at any time possessed. His incitements to war and his martial ardour would never have succeeded in making any impression on the Emperor, if the latter had not himself resolved to forge ahead, and to risk the great gamble in which the fate of Germany and of Europe was at stake.

The German Empire as Bismarck conceived it, with a single minister bearing on his own shoulders, like some Atlas, the whole weight of the vast governmental machine, was cut to the measure of its founder. If this system is to last, the nation must always have at its head either a great Chancellor, or a great monarch under whom the Chancellor merely acts as his deputy. So long as Bismarck was at the helm, he steered the ship of Empire with an unfaltering hand through all the reefs of internal politics—Kulturkampf, anti-Socialist legislation, party divisions, unstable majorities in the Reichstag. After the dismissal of the great man, and under the powerful impetus that he had given her, the vessel kept on her course for some time, having for her pilot the Sovereign himself, who made up for his lack of genius by his ample self-confidence. In this way she safely passed many rocks, borne along by the swelling tide of national prosperity, but occasionally threatened with disaster for want of a submissive majority to vote credits in the Imperial Parliament.

It is not difficult to imagine what would become of the Empire under the Crown Prince’s rule. He too, like his father, but with less intelligence, will wish to be at the helm, and, by the sheer force of his will as monarch by divine right, to stem the rising tide of popular demands, growing ever hungrier and stormier under the sweeping blast of Socialism. The conception of liberty that Treitschke shadowed forth for his countrymen about 1870—a liberty having its roots in the idea of duty, that is to say, where politics are concerned, in obedience to the powers that be—will not prevail in the Germany of the future. In my opinion, it is not even accepted by the majority of Germans to-day. Their conception is that of a liberty based on the idea of justice rather than of duty: in other words, on the nation’s right to share, through its representatives, in the government of the Empire. Thus there is a prospect of bitter struggles between a ruler of the Crown Prince’s type and a Reichstag that is half or three-fourths Socialist, assuming indeed that these struggles do not begin long before he comes to the throne.

III.

The five remaining sons of the Emperor give little food for public discussion. Like happy nations, they have no history. Political ambitions and the chase for popularity they leave to their eldest brother. Their lives are passed in a pleasant round of military service (less arduous for princes than for ordinary officers), social amusements, and sport. Only one of them has entered the navy, where work is certainly harder than in the army. Three others, as officers of the Guards, used to do garrison duty at Potsdam, spending the season of festivities in Berlin. One, on leaving the University of Strassburg, was sent off to a provincial station.

From time to time, in winter, one or more of the young princely couples were to be seen in diplomatic drawing-rooms. It must not be imagined, however, that they were anxious to consort with ambassadors and foreign ministers. They have no particular respect for those who represent the countries of the Old World or the New, and in general, like Alfred de Musset’s hero, they profess

Their horizon is bounded by Germany, nay it is even restricted to the frontiers of Prussia. The idea of gaining enlightenment, from good sources, as to the political institutions, the internal situation, or the state of public opinion in other countries, leaves them entirely cold, just as it fails to attract the Crown Prince. As a rule, a quick hand-shake, without words, was all that they accorded to the heads of foreign legations. But as soon as one of our confraternity got together a small band of musicians for a ball or an informal dance, the princes were glad to do him the honour of letting themselves be invited. The diplomatic drawing-rooms were in their eyes nothing but rendezvous for dancing and flirtation.

Their stiffness showed itself most plainly of all in their relations with the other German princes. Any one who watched them at official functions, weddings, funerals, the unveiling of monuments or the laying of foundation-stones, when members of the royal or princely families of the Empire were present, must have been struck with their attitude. They did not mix with the others, but formed a group apart, as if to impress the public with the fact that they were the dominant race, and the rest mere vassals or creatures of the herd. This lofty opinion that they had of themselves and of the greatness of their house did not indeed prevent them from sometimes behaving quite humanly towards the scions of certain families that enjoyed the inestimable privilege of being connected by blood with the Hohenzollerns.

The foreigner who is interested in the future of Germany is naturally inclined to raise the question: Is it an advantage or merely a burden for the Prussian State to possess so large a royal family? He need only ask any honest German who is not afraid to say what he thinks, whether princes who live a life apart, cut off from modern ideas and interests, and antagonistic to every Liberal tendency, are a blessing or a curse to their dynasty and their country. There can be little doubt as to the answer he will receive.

A more interesting personality is that of Prince Henry, the Emperor’s brother. One can say of this capable second fiddle to the Kaiser, that he is a model of fraternal devotion. In appearance he exhibits a striking contrast with his brother, and in mental qualities the difference between them is still more marked. Taller, slimmer, and stronger, with a complexion tanned by the Baltic breezes, he is simple and frank in intercourse. He has a natural affability, and shows no trace of haughtiness or affectation. He never stayed long at Court; hardly had he been announced there before he was off again to resume, at Kiel, his duties as Grand Admiral and Inspector-General of the Fleet, since the sedentary life of the capital has no charm for his active spirit.

Sailor, diplomat, and sportsman—these are the three phases in which he has appeared before the world. As squadron commander, he devoted himself chiefly to training the infant German navy, to making the “High Sea Fleet” of Dreadnoughts, torpedo-boats, and submarines a formidable arm in the power of its ships, the efficiency of its officers, and the discipline of its crews. His connection with the royal family of Great Britain afforded him a pretext for frequent visits to the neighbour island; there he learnt something of the strong and the weak points of that British navy which he was preparing to fight one day. He liked to call himself the comrade and admirer of English sailors—until he had a chance of torpedoing their vessels and of attempting to destroy their maritime supremacy.

In sending Prince Henry on a special mission to the United States, under delicate circumstances—a coolness had arisen between the two countries, owing to an incident in the Philippines during the Hispano-American War—William II. entrusted him with the task of inaugurating his American policy of conciliation and friendship. No other Prussian royalty would have been so skilful as Prince Henry in winning the sympathies of the journalists of New York and Chicago by his democratic simplicity and frankness of manner. He acquitted himself with equal success in his difficult missions to Russia and Japan. Quite recently the Emperor sent him to the South American Republics, this time to prepare the way for flooding the markets of Brazil, Argentina, and Chili with the innumerable products of German industry.

The Prince has also become a zealous propagandist of the sports which aim at training the German youth for war. A motorist from the earliest days of motoring, he has applied himself to spreading the use of this rapid means of transport. His alert brain was one of the first to grasp the military value of aviation. While he has had no obvious place among the Emperor’s advisers, all his efforts have been directed towards equipping the nation for a struggle which he himself regarded as imminent. In this way he has borne his share in making it inevitable.

IV.

When a ruler, like some conspicuous star, rivets the attention of the civilized world, his satellites, careful not to shed any light that may dim the radiance of their lord, are content to remain in modest obscurity. This principle holds good at the Court of Berlin. The high executive posts are filled by competent men of suave manners. None of them enjoys any special prominence, although they all are or have been members of the army, and belong to the landed gentry. They have always espoused the doctrines of the Prussian military caste and Conservative party, and share the hatred of these reactionaries for France and for the Powers that have thrown in their lot with the Republic. In their conversation with their master, it was inevitable that Delenda est Gallia should be the perpetual refrain. This harmony of feeling among those around him would have impressed the mind of William II., even if he had not been so ready to assimilate their views. The Court functionary who, before the war, was said to possess most credit with the Kaiser was the Mistress of the Empress’s Household, a stern guardian of Prussian etiquette and tradition. There is no likelihood that she used her power to counteract the baneful influence of her fellow-courtiers of the other sex.

The same truth applies to a high-born aristocrat of Austrian origin, Prince Max Egon von FÜrstenberg, who to-day, in the Emperor’s circle of friends, holds the place formerly occupied by the fascinating but depraved Philip von Eulenburg. He is the obvious favourite, the Kaiser’s indispensable confidant, addressed by his master with the “thou” of intimacy. He was given one of the great ornamental Court posts, that of Grand Marshal, as a prelude, it was whispered, to a far more important position in the Government. But how could this newcomer, half German and half Austrian, who migrated to Berlin after inheriting vast estates from Karl Egon, his cousin of the elder branch, ever have undertaken anything but a sinecure, since he was unable to manage his own property? Instead of quietly enjoying the princely income derived from his patrimony, Prince Egon took it into his head that he had a genius for business, like Herr von Gwinner, the director of the Deutsche Bank, or Herr Ballin, the king of Germany’s mercantile marine. With another moneyed grandee of equal inexperience, Prince von Hohenlohe-Oeringen, he founded the famous Princes’ Trust, a unique example, I believe, of an aristocratic ring boldly competing with the lords of finance, industry, and commerce. In a few years this trust piled one enterprise upon another, beginning with magnificent hotels in Berlin and Hamburg. The crash was not long in coming; to-day, Prince von Hohenlohe is ruined, and his associate has been compelled to mortgage his ancestral estates to the tune of over £1,000,000.

Like many of his peers—laughter being an attribute of kings as of other mortals—William II. requires to be amused. Prince Egon is a sparkling companion, with a happy knack in telling good stories; he has all the untiring fluency of the Viennese. This, obviously, is enough to explain his success. In certain circles, however, people persist in crediting him with a mysterious sway over his Imperial master, and in regarding him as the power behind the throne who whispers advice into the Sovereign’s ear. That he may have served now and then as a link between Vienna and Berlin, between the Archduke Ferdinand and William II., is not unlikely. At the close of the Balkan War, the Kaiser seemed to have abandoned his ally during the latter’s vain efforts to secure the revision of the Treaty of Bucharest. FÜrstenberg may have been used immediately afterwards to set the connection upon its former footing of intimacy and confidence; before the murder of the Archduke, he may have acted as a go-between for the two cronies, when they drew up the plan of a war of revenge which, while compensating Austria for her disappointments, was to set up the supremacy of Germany in Continental Europe. To assign Prince Egon a more important rÔle would be overrating his mental capacity. We may safely acquit him of any share in the direct responsibility for the war.

V.

By the terms of the 1871 Constitution, the Empire is a congeries of federated States. The Emperor, at the head of the other reigning princes, should properly be nothing but the primus inter pares, the first among his peers, invested with very wide prerogatives and powers. At a banquet given by the German Chamber of Commerce on the occasion of Tsar Nicholas’s coronation, the present King of Bavaria (Prince Ludwig as he then was) made a vigorous attack upon a speaker who had alluded to the royalties attending this function as being in the retinue of Prince Henry of Prussia, representing his august brother. In emphatic terms, Prince Ludwig reminded his hearers that the German princes were not the vassals, but the federal partners of the Emperor. The incident has not yet been forgotten in Berlin, and this spirited protest won great popularity for its author in South Germany. But was he justified in what he said?

In sober truth, the King of Bavaria, who under a homely exterior hides a most keen and subtle mind; the King of Saxony, with his loud voice, sonorous laugh, and martial gait; the King of WÜrtemberg, that model of a polished gentleman; the amiable Grand Duke of Baden, and the other lesser gods of the modern German Valhalla—all these rulers are the very humble servants of the Kaiser. In vain do they assume a tone of equality when exchanging with him telegrams in which the affectionate “thou” is part of the official style; in vain do they flit like busy bees about their dominions, make a vast quantity of speeches to their subjects, and honour public ceremonies with their presence; in the eyes of German statesmanship, they are mere instruments of the will of their master who lives in Berlin. Similarly, in the Federal Council, their delegates receive the word of command from the Chancellor and the Imperial Ministers, and on every important occasion vote submissively with their Prussian colleagues. The shadow of the Emperor lies over all Germany; the work of unification proceeds, gradually draining the life-blood from the moribund body of separatism, while the Reichstag, by its encroachments on the powers and privileges of the local Diets, strives to become the sole deliberative assembly that can boast any real authority.

Must we infer from this that the reigning houses are useless, and that the first Emperor would have done well to suppress them, if such had been his will and pleasure, after the victories of 1870? I do not think so. When Bismarck, setting his face against the plea for centralization put forward by the Prussian heir-apparent, succeeded in inducing old King William to adopt his plan of a federal Empire such as exists to-day, he did not foresee, perhaps, that these potentates, although retaining but a shadow of their sovereignty, would be the solid pillars of the monarchical principle in the new Germany. If they had been entirely dispossessed, the Socialist and republican propaganda would have made giant strides wherever the Prussian rÉgime was detested. The peoples of the different States, having been governed in paternal fashion for some centuries by these local dynasties, have for the most part maintained their loyalty to the ruling houses. The Hohenzollerns, in their capacity as Emperors, have not yet struck their roots deep into the country; they are loved only as Kings of Prussia, in their ancestral provinces to the east of the Elbe.

It is difficult to believe that the news of the declaration of war was received with delight by all these pseudo-sovereigns, who had not been consulted as to its necessity. For form’s sake, the rulers of Bavaria, Saxony, WÜrtemberg, and Baden were apprised throughout of the hurried march of events. For some, the war interfered with old, comfortable habits; so long as it lasted, there was no possibility of travels abroad, of visits to watering-places, or even of hunting parties. Almost all were faced with the prospect of family losses. Yet each of them, from discipline or from a thrill of genuine patriotism, thought it his duty to hail the news with enthusiasm. The Kings of Bavaria and Saxony delivered speeches no less warlike than those of the Emperor. All hastened to swim with the stream. It is worth while pointing out, indeed, since some have wrongly held the contrary view, that the war was greeted with no less acclamation in the rest of Germany than in Prussia itself. The earliest demonstrations in Munich were as noisy as those in Berlin. In Dresden, the mob, with at least as much frenzy as the good folk of the Prussian capital, broke the windows of the British legation. This state of feeling shows, in the first place, that in southern Germany, with its placid inhabitants, a section of public opinion (the section that made itself so prominent) had been quite as much perverted, quite as deeply tainted with the pan-Germanic virus, as the corresponding class in northern Germany, who had long been infatuated with the notion of their own military superiority; and, in the second place, that German unity is now considered by all Germans to be an essential condition of their national existence.

It was Bismarck who, in order to win popular approval for that German unity which he had forged, conceived the masterly idea of tempering it in a war with a foreign enemy. An attempt to break the chain would, in my opinion, be unwise; the links, if snapped asunder for the moment by an external force, would become welded again of their own accord. In a conquered Germany, however, the federal rulers, who yesterday bowed down low before the Emperor, would to-morrow perhaps be the first to raise their heads, and to deny their humbled CÆsar that pre-eminence which he had used so ill.

VI.

The rise of Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg to the position of Chancellor of the Empire has been a triumph for the bureaucracy. In looking for shoulders strong enough to bear the massive heritage of Bismarck, the Emperor, after applying in turn to the army, to the higher aristocracy, and to diplomacy, was bound to fall back upon the Prussian official caste. The fifth Chancellor has passed his whole career in the Civil Service, beginning as assessor, and advancing through the grades of district president, Prussian Minister of the Interior, and Imperial Secretary of State for Home Affairs, a post that carries with it the duties of Chancellor’s deputy. In less than twenty-five years he has thus managed to climb every rung of the administrative ladder, and to become the greatest man in the State after the Emperor. The fact that he was a fellow-student of William II.’s at Bonn University has presumably done nothing to retard this rapid promotion. Just as in France every conscript carries a field-marshal’s baton in his knapsack, so in Prussia, if the example of Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg is anything to go by, every official at the outset of his career will be able to say that he carries with him his nomination to the post of Chancellor.

What are the striking qualities that determined the Emperor’s choice and gained for this favoured mandarin the honour of succeeding the brilliant Prince von BÜlow? So far as his mind is concerned, when we have praised his honesty, his application to work, his intellectual culture and his strict religious principles, there is nothing more to say. If we add to this a frank, open face, a gigantic frame, and a genial manner, the portrait will be complete. Friend and foe alike declare that his private life is irreproachable, and all were sincerely sorry for the Chancellor when his wedded bliss was cut short by death. It must be admitted, however, that for a statesman who has to play the leading part among his colleagues in Europe, all the above qualities are of secondary importance. Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg is certainly not without his personal views on politics, although they are far from easy to discover. They might perhaps be defined as follows: for home affairs, a Conservatism tempered with doctrinaire leanings, or, if you prefer, a Conservative system that does not exclude some very moderate Liberal tendencies; and as regards foreign policy, an extensive development of German influence, culture, and language, in rivalry with the French and the English, who—as he stated in an “inspired” letter published by the Berlin newspapers—know better than the Germans how to spread their national civilization beyond their own borders. The Chancellor lacks two gifts that would seem to be essential to his functions: a native eloquence and a firm will.

He is first and foremost the Emperor’s right-hand man, or rather the Emperor’s proxy; for the real Chancellor, although the fact is disguised by constitutional fictions, is the Sovereign himself. Caprivi, with his independent nature, and BÜlow, with his keen desire to maintain his personal prestige, had disappointed William II. From Bethmann-Hollweg, it would seem, there is nothing of the sort to fear. He will always attempt to shield the Emperor’s actions with his own constitutional responsibility. He would cheerfully go to the stake and become a burnt-offering to public opinion, if such a sacrifice were needed for the saving of his master’s reputation. In Berlin he is known as the philosopher of Hohen-Finow, this being the name of his estate. A philosopher, if you will, in the equanimity with which he bears the failures of his administration, and with which he will arm himself in his retirement, when the hour of disgrace has struck; but above all a philosopher in his indifference or want of resolution where ethics and politics are concerned. His readiness to bow to the fiats of the Imperial will might more properly earn him the name of courtier-philosopher. For the matter of that, they are all courtiers in Berlin—all, that is to say, who on any rung of the ladder seek to be honoured with the favour or the confidence of the Sovereign.

In his position with regard to the Reichstag and his influence on that heterogeneous assembly, Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg cannot be compared with his predecessor. He has lived and still lives as a being apart, amid the indifference or hostility of the middle-class (otherwise known as monarchical) parties. The Liberals expected him to carry out a promised reform of the Prussian electoral law; but, finding the measure indefinitely postponed, they view him with suspicion, in the Landtag (or Prussian Diet) no less than in the Imperial Parliament. The Catholic Centre cannot forgive this unbending Protestant for his refusal to restore the right to teach to the Jesuit Order, and on the other hand he is not reactionary enough to please the Conservatives. The latter reproached him most bitterly of all, three years ago, for the weakness with which he abandoned his scheme for the financial working of the recent military law and supported the Radical counter-scheme put forward by the Reichstag Committee. In fact, at the beginning of 1914, it seemed that Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg’s days as a minister were numbered, when suddenly the war came to interrupt all party strife, and the roar of the guns drowned the voice of criticism both in Press and in Parliament.

Officially, the Chancellor is Foreign Minister for the Empire. But the domain of world-politics as conceived by Prince von BÜlow is so vast that his successor, better versed in the handling of home affairs, would have lost himself in it, had he not let himself be guided by an expert professional diplomat invested with the title of Secretary of State. The first of these guides was Baron von Schoen, followed by Herr von Kiderlen-WÄchter, and the present Foreign Secretary is Herr von Jagow. On certain occasions, however, the Chancellor was compelled to make a statement on the foreign situation in the Reichstag. He painted his pictures with a broad brush, and presented the leading events of the day in a carefully thought out chiaroscuro well distributed over the canvas. His speeches, which he had learnt by heart, seemed tame and colourless, as is no doubt inevitably the case with this type of literary effort. They were entirely lacking in that singular clearness and note of sincerity that marked the kindred utterances of Sir Edward Grey in the House of Commons.

Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg is a man of conciliatory temper, and a large blend of pacifism certainly enters into his nature. The need of a long spell of peace, to complete the splendid commercial and industrial expansion of Germany, could not have escaped his clear vision. This explains why he was the object of frequent appeals, outside the formal discussions, from the eminent diplomat who opposed Herr von Kiderlen-WÄchter in the dangerous game that was being played in connection with Morocco. The French Yellow Book for 1911 contains a report of some conversations that M. Jules Cambon had with the Chancellor, and the impression they give is that the latter really wished to arrive at a final understanding. It was to the Chancellor, again, that the Ambassador turned when the time came for settling other thorny questions, such as the delimitation of railway concessions and spheres of influence in Asia Minor, and when the German negotiators proved too refractory. In other quarters, a genuine improvement in his country’s relations with Great Britain was Bethmann-Hollweg’s most cherished dream, without any latent thought (such as would perhaps have occurred to Prince von BÜlow) of afterwards giving the death-blow, at the favourable moment, to England’s naval supremacy. There is no reason to believe that Herr von Jagow was not speaking the language of sincerity, when he expressed to Sir Edward Goschen,5 in the course of their last, painful interview, “his poignant regret at the crumbling of his entire policy and that of the Chancellor, which had been to make friends with Great Britain, and through Great Britain to get closer to France.”

Is this regret compatible with Bethmann-Hollweg’s wavering attitude in the Austro-Serbian crisis? I think so. His personal preferences made him lean towards a peaceful solution, but this weak man let his hand be forced by the war party, and bowed, as usual, to the will of the Emperor. He was all the more ready to take this course in that he was nothing but a tool, and probably unaware of the real designs at the back of the Imperial brain. When he saw where this reckless policy was leading Germany, he should have stood out and protested; instead of this, his wrath turned against England, who had shattered the fond illusions of Berlin by refusing to look on quietly while the neutrality of Belgium was violated. The philosopher of Hohen-Finow was transformed into an irascible Teuton; all the Prussian violence that ran in his veins, mingled with his Frankfort blood, suddenly came to the surface, and the professional calm of the statesman, accustomed to control his nerves, gave place to a dramatic outburst of anger.

From the spirited account given by Sir Edward Goschen in his dispatch to Sir Edward Grey, we can readily picture to ourselves the historic scene that took place in the Chancellor’s room at the German Foreign Office on the 4th of August 1914, after England had declared war. We can call up the attitude of the two actors: the Chancellor, his gray-bearded face purple with rage, his tall form leaning towards the British Ambassador, while the latter’s pale features maintain the habitual coolness of his race. In voicing his indignation, the German hit upon phrases more vivid and picturesque than would have been expected from him.

“Belgian neutrality, a scrap of paper!” These unlucky words will stick for ever to the memory of Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg. This man of wide culture, with a more exalted sense of justice than many of his countrymen, has shown us that respect for treaties no longer existed for him, so long as strategic considerations demanded that they should be broken. The inviolability of small States, their independence and their right to live, had no more value in his eyes than the international agreements that sanction these principles. On the same day, in the Reichstag, the Chancellor admitted, without any subterfuges—a frankness which he regrets to-day—that the Imperial Government, by the invasion of Belgium, had transgressed the law of nations. But, he pointed out, necessity knows no law, and he tried to excuse himself by attributing, without any probability or material proof, a similar design to the French. Belgium should quietly have let herself be invaded; she would have been indemnified later on!

It was a sad disillusion for those who, thinking that they knew Bethmann-Hollweg, would never have regarded him as an unscrupulous politician. If he could not be a great minister, he might at least have endorsed Prussia’s signature and guarded the honour of the young German Empire. A mere nod from the Emperor was enough to make him the zealous vindicator of a crime. His language in this tragic crisis was that of a court sycophant without courage or conscience, not that of a statesman. In spite of his philosophy, he resigned himself to an act that disgraced Germany, and thus played the part, not of a patriotic and independent thinker, but of a courtier-philosopher.

VII.

To leave Rome for Berlin; to exchange the fine Caffarelli Palace on the Capitol for the modest residence that houses the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; to pass from the cloudless skies and bright sunshine of the Roman Campagna to the chill mists of the Spree; and, worst of all, to lose an almost independent position, and become the hard-working servant of the Kaiser and the recognized mentor of the Chancellor—all this is a severe test of self-denial for a German diplomat who, while still in the prime of life, has reached the height of his ambitions and the zenith of his career. We can realize, therefore, that Herr von Jagow did not accept ministerial honours without a struggle, and that he only assumed the mantle of Kiderlen-WÄchter in obedience to repeated orders from his master.

The new Secretary of State appears to have been the spoilt child of Roman society. One may question, however, whether he possessed the difficult art of reading the souls of Italian statesmen and fathoming their secrets. The expedition to Tripoli was planned without the knowledge of the ambassador from the most important member of the Triplice. Like his colleagues, he did not learn of the scheme until it was beyond the range of discussion, so greatly did the Consulta dread that the Imperial Government would place its veto upon this first step towards the dismemberment of Turkey, the client and protÉgÉe of Germany. In spite of this, after Herr von Jagow’s return to Berlin, the credit of Italy there seemed on a firmer basis than ever. She now possessed, it was said, two representatives in Berlin instead of one: the ambassador of His Majesty King Victor Emmanuel, and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, who adhered faithfully to his Italian sympathies.

This great friendship between Rome and Berlin did not prevent the Cabinet of the Quirinal from remaining neutral at first in the world-war, before resolutely opposing the Central Empires. It is true that Herr von Jagow had paid the Italians in their own coin, by not informing them of the plot hatched against Serbia, a plot that was certain to endanger their interests in the Balkan Peninsula, and to disturb the balance between Austrian ambitions and their own aspirations. Vienna and Rome were bound by a clause in the alliance to come to an understanding beforehand with regard to any alteration of the status quo in the Balkans. Italy protested against this neglect of treaty obligations, while at the same time pleading that the defensive character of the Triplice justified her in holding aloof from a struggle in which the aggressors were indubitably her allies.

At the Wilhelmstrasse, Herr von Jagow at first appeared to be slightly out of his element. His manner towards the foreign diplomatic corps was reserved; he almost stood on the defensive, as if fearing indiscreet questions. In point of fact, the European situation was full of uncertainty and danger. The Balkan War was at its height. The Imperial Government, in response to German public opinion, seemed anxious to maintain harmony between the Great Powers, which were acting as uneasy spectators of Turkey’s collapse. The Foreign Secretary’s wits were set vigorously to work, first of all in restraining and reprimanding Austria, and then in helping her, in concert with Italy, to obtain compensations that would look like diplomatic triumphs: the exclusion of Serbia from the Adriatic, the abandonment of Scutari by Montenegro, and the setting-up of an independent Albania. He did not part company with Austria until the moment when she tried in vain to raise trouble once more in the Balkans, after the treaty of peace had been definitively signed at Bucharest.

In relation to France Herr von Jagow, presumably in compliance with orders from above, showed himself far from cordial. When a question was asked in the Reichstag about the Nancy incident, his reply went beyond the legitimate tone of official displeasure. In his hasty and uncharitable judgment of facts that were not yet established, we may perhaps trace a secret desire to humour the hostile feelings towards France entertained by the majority in the Reichstag, and to win the favour of that majority. The maiden speech of the new Secretary of State fell rather flat. He himself openly confessed his nervousness at having to speak in public. Like most of his colleagues in the diplomatic profession, he lacks the gift of eloquence, and is readier with his pen than with his tongue.

This sagacious little man, with his strikingly youthful appearance (although he is now well on in the fifties), his carefully groomed person, his marked politeness of manner, and his artistic tastes, is the antithesis of Herr von Kiderlen-WÄchter. The latter, a broad-shouldered Suabian, very deficient in breeding, but thoroughly good-natured, had a disconcerting abruptness that was sometimes redeemed by a flash of genial humour. In one aspect of their characters, however, these two Germans, the Prussian and the WÜrtemberger, were alike: in their disregard of small nationalities and their profound contempt for second-rate Powers. Punctually every Thursday, there used to arrive at each legation a letter written by the Secretary of State’s own hand, expressing his deep regret that he could not receive the minister on the Friday, which was the day set apart for the reception of envoys extraordinary. In other countries, no distinction is made between ambassadors and ministers plenipotentiary; the latter have the same access as their great colleagues to the head of the Foreign Office, whose time is quite as precious as that of the Foreign Secretary for the German Empire. “What is the use,” Herr von Jagow no doubt said to himself, as Herr von Kiderlen-WÄchter had said before him, “of receiving this small fry of the diplomatic world? If they have any urgent business to transact, let them telephone to ask for an audience. But when it comes to discussing the condition of Europe with them every week, having to listen to their questions and to make replies—what a waste of time! How can the broader aspects of politics interest these gentry? As for asking them about what is going on in their paltry capitals, there is no need for me to do that; I get all I want from the excellent reports sent me by our agents at the inferior Courts.”

“No, sir,” one of those diplomats might object, “you were wrong in relying solely on those agents of yours. If you had been better acquainted with the state of feeling in Belgium, with the passionate devotion of the Belgians to their free institutions, with their unflinching resolve to resist all external pressure, from whatever source it might come, and to fight to the death for their neutrality and their independence, as precious in their eyes as national unity in those of the Germans—if you had known all this, you would perhaps have put your Emperor on his guard against miscalculations, against the danger of hastily invading a friendly little neighbour-country. You, personally, are not supposed to be of a pugnacious turn. On the other hand, you have too much insight and experience not to have seen, better than the professional soldiers of the General Staff, to what developments in the European crisis their policy would lead. You will say, perhaps, that you were not summoned to Berlin in order that you might give advice. Your function was to carry out the instructions of your Sovereign. It is just because you consented to play so self-effacing a rÔle in the world-wide upheaval set in motion by the Emperor’s statesmanship, that you will be severely blamed, when the responsibility of each actor in the drama is finally settled.”

There is one matter on which Herr von Jagow could never see eye to eye with the representative of Belgium—to wit, the colonial question, which gave the German Foreign Office much food for anxious thought. One day, some months before the war, the Secretary of State, in the course of an informal conversation, expressed the opinion that King Leopold had been treated too indulgently over the partition of Central Africa at the Berlin Conference. Bismarck had been too generous; Belgium was not rich enough properly to develop the vast empire bequeathed her by her great king; it was an enterprise beyond her powers of expansion and her financial means, and she would find herself compelled to give it up. Germany, on the other hand, in view of her capacity for colonizing, her boundless resources, and her commercial requirements, had obtained far too small a share of African territory, and a fresh partition therefore seemed to be necessary. Herr von Jagow, in dilating upon this theme, tried to imbue his visitor with his own contempt for the title-deeds of small States. According to him, only the great Powers had the right and the ability to colonize. He even revealed what lay at the back of his mind—that in the changes which were passing over Europe to the advantage of the stronger nationalities, the small States could no longer enjoy the independent existence that they had hitherto been allowed to lead; they were doomed to disappear, or to gravitate towards the orbit of the Great Powers.

These disquieting suggestions were not made, of course, to the Belgian minister, but to the ambassador of another country. At the back of the diplomatic stage in a great capital, however, everything leaks out sooner or later; the personal views of the man who nominally directs foreign policy cannot be kept secret from interested parties. This was especially the case in Berlin, where, among the heads of legations, a certain number held more or less closely together, according as their countries were more or less exposed to the menace of the German colossus, whose growth and appetites they watched with a very natural vigilance.

If we append these remarks of Herr von Jagow to those made at his final interview with Sir Edward Goschen, in which he lamented the bankruptcy of his plans for friendship with England and reconciliation with France, we can readily guess what terms he and Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg, those two pacifists, would have demanded for the formation of such an agreement. The two Western Powers would have been forced cheerfully to abandon to Germany the little States which obstruct her development along the North Sea coast and prevent her from breathing freely. They would have been compelled to allow Germany eventually to make these States, willing or unwilling, enter the Germanic federation, which would thus have become the great Empire, the heir of its remote mediÆval prototype, ever present in the dreams of the German intellectuals.

VIII.

As you walk along the Wilhelmstrasse, coming from Unter den Linden, you see, to the right, a long building of only one story, in the obsolete style of the early nineteenth century. It looks very bare and unpretentious by the side of the eighteenth century mansions that flank it right and left and the palatial Government offices, of more recent construction, that lie opposite. This venerable edifice is no other than the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the AuswÄrtiges Amt, of the Empire. Here, fifty years ago, were planned the changes that the Hohenzollerns wrought with their swords in the map of Europe; here is the real starting-point of their Imperial power. As you enter and go up the marble staircase, you catch the musty smell that comes from masses of papers and documents in an old and ill-ventilated building. Follow the main corridor which cuts it in half, and a polite attendant will escort you to a room that is scarcely any larger than a monastic cell. You go in, and find yourself face to face with the Under-Secretary of State.

Herr Zimmermann is a blond Teuton, with a military moustache and a pleasant smile that gives promise of a cordial welcome. This high official is a self-made man in the full sense of the term. He won such distinction by his services as consul in the Far East that the authorities recalled him and gave him an appointment at Foreign Office headquarters. Here, by sheer merit, he has risen to the exalted post in which his capacity for work and his sound judgment have won him the confidence of the Chancellor and of two successive Foreign Secretaries, as well as the good graces of the Emperor. Every one in Berlin thinks that Herr Zimmermann, who has gone so far, is likely to go still further.

He might reasonably be called a godsend to diplomats. Heads of legations and chargÉs d’affaires, looking for news or short of information, apply to him, in order to be able to apprise their Government of matters in which they are interested. The Under-Secretary of State merely says what has to be said, without betraying any secrets of the Imperial Chancellery; but this is enough to put his hearers on the right track, for his communications are always accurate.

Is it possible for us to divine his personal feelings with regard to the war? Would it be impugning his patriotism to doubt whether he was firmly convinced of its necessity? These questions are not easy to answer, for on this topic no German capable of frankness, unless he is hopelessly saturated with Pan-Germanism, will speak out nowadays before a stranger. What I can say, without fear of contradiction, is this: that the Under-Secretary of State was not a wholehearted supporter of the policy of alliances bequeathed by Bismarck, since he realized all the entanglements and dangers that they involved. How often, during the Balkan crisis, was he seen to express his impatience with the Cabinet of Vienna, when the latter turned a deaf ear to the good advice telegraphed from Berlin! When I took leave of him, before returning to my unhappy country, which had already been invaded by the advance-guard of the German army, he said to me, in a tone of unfeigned regret: “Ah, this war means the end of the policy of alliances!” What a world of sorrow and disappointment lay in this avowal!

His constant relations with the directors of great companies, with commercial and industrial magnates, who were invited to his bachelor table together with foreign diplomats, led the latter to suppose that their host shared the pacific ideas of their fellow-guests. A prolonged era of peace was required, if the vigorous development of the national resources was to continue. This is an incontestable truth, which cannot be repeated too often. Moreover, a prolonged era of peace would have enabled the Germans, by virtue of their genius for organizing, their methodical ways, and their capacity for hard work, to become the leading nation in almost every sphere of international competition, owning the main sources of industrial production, and holding the unquestioned economic supremacy of Europe. Yet they have been mad enough to make a bid for this supremacy by a war that is utterly at variance with the progress of civilization! It is difficult to see how so enlightened a man as Herr Zimmermann, one so closely in touch with the needs of industrial Germany, could have been anything but a pacifist.

The principal task of those who direct foreign affairs is the same in all great capitals. One must be a Bismarck to plan one war after another a long time in advance, while conducting the foreign policy of the State. Bismarck’s excuse lies in the fact that these wars were essential for German unity. Once his end was gained, the all-powerful minister put Prussia’s sword back in its sheath, and devoted himself to consolidating the glory and the conquests that had been won. The Berlin Foreign Office cannot really be suspected of having worked in the dark against the maintenance of a peace policy, such as was pursued during the last twenty years of the Iron Chancellor. To avoid needless conflicts, to scatter the clouds as soon as they gathered at any point on the horizon, to ward off the frightful perils of a European conflagration—this has been the noble duty and the thankless task of diplomats throughout the last few years, in the positions of watchmen or pilots which they have held in foreign countries or at the head of the home department. At the Wilhelmstrasse, as elsewhere, the officials were faced with the duty of trying to fulfil these lofty moral obligations; they did so with a mixture of civility and gruffness, and their changes of mood were too obvious, but they undoubtedly meant well.

Here arises a difficult question. In view of the definite aspirations of a large element in the German nation, with their manifest desire for expansion, how did the Foreign Office propose to satisfy them? Was it merely aiming at a vague peace policy, or had it any tangible schemes in view?

A book and a pamphlet published in 1913, when a festival was held to celebrate the twenty-fifth year of William II.’s reign, gives us the key to the riddle. They throw a discreet but sufficient light upon the policy of expansion recommended at the Wilhelmstrasse.

The book—Imperial Germany—is by Prince von BÜlow, who thus broke the silence he had observed since the day of his retirement. He reviews the political history of the Empire for the past quarter of a century, and points to the path which it ought to follow in the future both at home and abroad.

According to the ex-Chancellor, the Germany of to-day can no longer cling to Bismarck’s Continental policy or obey the precepts handed down by him to his successors. She must open out for herself new and broader tracks, corresponding to the progress achieved in the last thirty years. During this period, the population has increased by twenty million souls, and her industry, fostered by an enormous growth in labour-power, has crossed the seas in order to distribute over the entire globe those products which the home markets were no longer capable of absorbing. This vast industrial output has made it necessary to build a mercantile marine, to which more and more units are added every year, and this commercial fleet has brought in its train the construction of an imposing navy. The last-named enterprise was fraught with difficulties; for we could not avoid exciting the jealousy of England, and in order to succeed it was essential to beware of arousing her hostility. England looks with no friendly eye on the rise of a foreign naval power, which might seek one day to contend with her the mastery of the seas. Germany has no intention of issuing such a challenge to England, as the France of Louis XIV. and the United Provinces did in days gone by. Although the German navy has become, in the course of a few years, the second in the world, its sole mission is to watch over German trade and German interests, to see that they are not obstructed in any way. Just as German industry, after being exclusively domestic and national not long since, has become world-wide, so German statesmanship, which was exclusively European in the days of Bismarck—for it then had no other object than to secure for Germany her rightful place in the first rank of Continental Powers—has likewise been raised to a world-wide plane. Prince von BÜlow is careful to insist upon the purely defensive rÔle that the Imperial fleet has marked out for itself, and, in order to reassure us as to the peaceful aims of the new statesmanship, he quotes the following passage from a speech made by him in the Reichstag on 6th November 1906: “It is the duty of our generation to uphold our position on the Continent, which is the basis of our international position; to protect our interests abroad; and to pursue a sober, judicious, and far-sighted international policy, limited in such a way that the safety of the German people shall incur no risks and the future of the nation shall not be jeopardized.”

Sage counsels these! But to our Latin mind, with its passion for clearness, the phrases “international policy,” “transmarine policy,” “world policy,” which are so plentifully sprinkled about the ex-Chancellor’s pages, convey no very precise meaning. Was it world-policy that involved, for instance, the sending of a few cruisers to the Mexican coast to protect German trade and German residents during the war between Huerta and Carranza? Was it the same policy that brought about the dispatch of a squadron to the China Seas, in order to seize Kiauchau and Tsingtau, and to obtain by main force from the Chinese Government the concession of a naval station and a rich mining territory, with the right of erecting formidable defence-works? Prince von BÜlow has himself felt the need of throwing a little light for his readers upon the dark recesses of his thought. He gives us to understand that Germany now possesses the means, not only of safeguarding her interests, of resisting any attack, but also of extending her influence everywhere, especially in Asia Minor and Africa.

The pamphlet entitled Die Weltpolitik und kein Krieg (“A World-policy without War”) is more explicit. It bears no signature, but according to the view generally accepted in the best-informed political circles in Berlin, it was issued under the auspices of the Foreign Office. The latter has not denied its paternity.

The nameless author first of all sets forth the reasons why a Continental war is apparently no longer to be feared. The Balkan League has dissolved in blood, and, no less than Turkey, those allies of yesterday who are implacable foes to-day will need time for healing their wounds and recruiting their strength. France has her hands so full with the pacification of Morocco that she does not wish to cause any complications in Europe. Russia is turning her eyes more and more towards Central Asia. Anglo-German relations are improving every day. Germany is devoting herself to the expansion of her commercial and industrial power; she has invested large sums of capital in her railway enterprises in Asia Minor, but she must not extend these enterprises indefinitely, since it might not be feasible for her to protect them in the event of war. Germany is not yet a Mediterranean power; to defend the concessions granted to her subjects in Syria and Asia Minor, her fleet would have to pass under the guns of Gibraltar, Malta, and Bizerta.

There remains Africa. Sir Edward Grey has stated in Parliament that Britain will not oppose the advance of German colonization, for she herself has no thought of acquiring fresh colonies. Portugal and Belgium are not in a position to colonize their African territories: the former, because of her financial weakness and her internal dissensions; the latter, because she does not wish to spend the sums needed for developing the Congo, which she annexed in the delusive hope that it would cost her no sacrifices. German capital and the aptitude of the German race for colonizing, its commercial ability, and its spirit of enterprise, are the only factors capable of spreading civilization in the heart of the Dark Continent and exploiting its wealth. The co-operation of Germany, therefore, is essential both for the Belgians and for the Portuguese. She might occupy a position in their colonies similar to that of France in Tunis and Morocco, or to that of Russia in Persia. It would be a peaceful penetration and development, in which the Belgians, with their keen business instinct, would be willing to take part, even if the Portuguese did not clearly understand its necessity.

This is something definite to go upon. The international or world policy, as conceived by the Wilhelmstrasse in 1913, was a colonial expansion, proceeding on peaceful lines.

In the ensuing winter the Imperial Government opened negotiations with the London Cabinet for the demarcation of British and German spheres of influence in the African colonies of Portugal; the former was to have comprised Mozambique, the latter Angola. Without waiting for the conclusion of these negotiations, a committee of research was formed in Hamburg, for the purpose of investigating the agricultural and mineral wealth of Angola, and great German banks tried to obtain control of the Lobito Bay railway, which runs from the coast of the Portuguese colony to Katanga in the Belgian Congo.

In the foregoing pages, while sketching the portraits of those who direct Germany’s foreign policy, I have tried to summarize the views of each, as they appear to me in the light of their acts, their private statements, and their occasional public declarations. We have seen how the Chancellor nursed the hope of maintaining friendly relations with England, come what might; how Herr von Jagow set little store by the national life of small States; and how the more practical minds of the Under-Secretary and the Foreign Office staff contented themselves with immediate colonial expansion and the opening up of new fields for the activities of the German race. All these individual aspirations, however, were overshadowed by the will, as yet inscrutable, of the Emperor. When that will was revealed in the tragic last days of July, these men all hastened to obey its bidding with equal alacrity.