PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION
The outbreak of war in Europe is an event too momentous to be treated fully in this Preface. But I may point out that the catastrophe resulted from the two causes of unrest described in this volume, namely, the Alsace-Lorraine Question and the Eastern Question. Those disputes have dragged on without any attempt at settlement by the Great Powers. The Zabern incident inflamed public opinion in Alsace-Lorraine, and illustrated the overbearing demeanour of the German military caste; while the insidious attempts of Austria in 1913 to incite Bulgaria against Servia marked out the Hapsburg Empire as the chief enemy of the Slav peoples of the Balkan Peninsula after the collapse of Turkish power in 1912. The internal troubles of the United Kingdom, France, and Russia in July 1914 furnished the opportunity so long sought by the forward party at Berlin and Vienna; and the Austro-German Alliance, which, in its origin, was defensive (as I have shown in this volume), became offensive, Italy parting from her allies when she discovered their designs. Drawn into the Triple Alliance solely by pique against France after the Tunis affair, she now inclines towards the Anglo-French connection.
Readers of my chapter on the Eastern Question will not fail to see how the neglect of the Balkan peoples by the Great Powers has left that wound festering in the weak side of Europe; and they will surmise that the Balkan troubles have, by a natural Nemesis, played their part in bringing about the European War. It is for students of modern Europe to seek to form a healthy public opinion so that the errors of the past may not be repeated, and that the new Europe shall be constituted in conformity with the aspirations of the peoples themselves.
CAMBRIDGE,
September 25, 1914.