The train of powder, however, had been laid by the diplomatic engagements. Austria-Hungary and Serbia came into collision in the spring of 1913 over the Scutari incident. In December, 1912, M. Sazonov had urged Serbia to play a waiting game in order to "deliver a blow at Austria." But on 4 April, 1913, Baron Beyens reports from Berlin that the arrogance and contempt with which the Serbs receive the Vienna Cabinet's protests over Scutari

can only be explained by their belief that St. Petersburg will support them. The Serbian chargÉ d'affaires was quite openly saying here lately that his Government would not have persisted in its course for the last six months in the face of the Austrian opposition had they not received encouragement in their course from the Russian Minister, M. de Hartwig, who is a diplomatist of M. Isvolsky's school.... M. Sazonov's heart is with his colleagues who are directing the policy of the Great Powers, but he feels his influence with the Tsar being undermined by the court-party and the pan-Slavists. Hence his inconsequent behaviour.

The military activity which the Russian Government displayed in 1913 gives interest to this estimate of M. Sazonov's position. No doubt to some extent the estimate was correct; M. Sazonov, like Sir E. Grey, was probably, when it was too late, much disquieted by the events which marshalled him the way that he was going. In 1914, this military activity gained extraordinary intensity. The Russian army was put upon a peace-footing of approximately 1,400,000, "an effective numerical strength hitherto unprecedented," said the St. Petersburg correspondent of the London Times. From January to June, the Russian Government made immense purchases of war material. In February, it concluded a loan in Paris for the improvement of its strategic roads and railways on the German frontier. Russia, as was generally known at the time, had her eye on the acquisition of Constantinople; and in the same month, February, a council of war was held in St. Petersburg to work out "a general programme of action in order to secure for us a favourable solution of the historical question of the Straits." In March, the St. Petersburg newspaper which served as the mouthpiece of the Minister of War, published an article stating that Russia's strategy would no longer be "defensive" but "active." Another paper spoke of the time coming when "the crossing of the Austrian frontier by the Russian army would be an unavoidable decision." In the same month, Russia raised a heavy tariff against the importation of German grain and flour; thus bearing out the evidence of German trade-reports that even at this time Germany was still exporting grain to Russia—a most extraordinary proceeding for a nation which contemplated a sudden declaration of war before the next harvest. In the same month, the Russian Government brought in military estimates of £97 million. It exercised heavy pressure on the French Government in the protracted political turmoil over the maintenance of the Three Years Service law. In April, "trial mobilizations" were begun, and were continued up to the outbreak of the war. In May, M. Sazonov informed the Tsar that the British Government "has decided to empower the British Admiralty Staff to enter into negotiations with French and Russian naval agents in London for the purpose of drawing technical conditions for possible action by the naval forces of England, Russia and France." In the same month, a complete mobilization of all the reserves of the three annual contingents of 1907-1909 was ordered for the whole Russian Empire, as a "test," to take place in the autumn. In the same month the Russian Admiralty instructed its agent in London, Captain Volkov, as follows:

Our interests on the Northern scene of operations require that England keeps as large a part of the German fleet as possible in check in the North Sea.... The English Government could render us a substantial service if it would agree to send a sufficient number of boats to our Baltic ports to compensate for our lack of means of transport, before the beginning of war-operations.

This document, revealed by the Soviet Government in 1919, is pretty damaging to the assumption of an "unprepared and unsuspecting Europe"; especially as Professor Conybeare has given publicity to the fact that "before the beginning of war-operations" those English boats were there, prompt to the minute, empty, ready and waiting.

In June, the Russian Ambassador warned the Russian naval staff in London that they must exercise great caution in talking about a landing in Pomerania or about the dispatch of English boats to the Russian Baltic ports before the outbreak of war, "so that the rest may not be jeopardized." On 13 June, the newspaper-organ of the Russian Minister of War published an inspired article under the caption: "Russia is Ready: France must be Ready."

Two weeks later, the Austrian heir-apparent, the Archduke Francis Joseph, was murdered at Sarajevo, a town in Bosnia, by Serbian officers. The murder was arranged by the Serbian Major Tankesitch, of the pan-Slavist organization known as the Black Hand; and this organization was fostered, if not actually subsidized, by the Russian Minister at Belgrade, M. Hartwig, the pupil and alter ego of M. Isvolsky, and the architect and promoter of the Balkan League!