Prince Max Egon Fürstenberg.
Prince Max Egon Fürstenberg was one type of the Kaiser’s familiars. Count Tchirsky, the German Ambassador at Vienna, was the prototype of the others. The German Ambassador in Vienna was the doyen of the Diplomatic Corps. Cold-blooded, calculating, deep, he was the very embodiment of the Kaiser’s ideal politician. Tchirsky did not know what scruples meant, and his many years’ experience of the Court of Vienna enabled him to put his fingers upon every weakness there. He saw only the defects and missed much that was fine in the character of the men with whom he had to deal. They spoke of him as the “Old Spider” of the Metternichgasse, where he had his palace. He did not play a leading rôle in society; visitors to Vienna knew but little about him, if indeed they realised his existence at all. He carried on a bitter warfare against the members of the diplomatic body who tried to oppose the Triple Alliance. His machinations were less openly, but none the less fiercely, directed against Italy, the nominal, but unwilling, ally of the Central Empires. Tchirsky, a man of dark plots, contrived to acquire interest in one of the leading Vienna papers. This interest developed into the effective control of the organ. He was able, thus, under the guise of a newspaper attack, to render Vienna almost intolerable for any diplomatist whose presence he considered detrimental to the welfare of Germany. When the Emperor “conspicuously turned his back upon the Russian military attaché” at a Court ball, the fact was recorded with great gusto in Tchirsky’s paper. The attaché, who was compromised in a spy case, would have left Vienna by the first train on the morrow in any case. Emperor Francis Joseph was a soldier and no courtier, and when he turned his back upon a foreigner there was no mistaking the action. It was done squarely and openly. The record of the German-owned Press did not improve the strained relations between Russia and Austria-Hungary, for the fact that Germany directed the paper’s policy was an open secret. A pro-English American Ambassador was subjected to attacks of a kind that could only be conceived by the fertile brain of Count Tchirsky. The Ambassador was accused of being parsimonious, and his personal habits were described with an acrimony that showed he had a powerful enemy. The coarseness of the language used, too, exposed the source; only a Prussian could employ such machinations against an enemy. How the Austrians, who prided themselves on their hospitality and their courtesy to strangers, could allow such an attack to appear can only be explained by the growing helplessness of their statesmen when confronted by the powerful German. Tchirsky further distinguished himself by making an attack through the Press upon the wife of the British Ambassador. How far he was responsible for the famous Cartwright interview it is difficult to say. The blow, it was known at the time, came from Germany. Austrians might have listened to a private conversation at a table in Marienbad, and put the words uttered by various members of the British Colony into shape as their views upon the Morocco question, but it needed the unscrupulousness of a German to conceive the plan of putting the pronouncements into the mouth of the British Ambassador. The latter was too astonished by the impertinence of the act to realise what it meant. Indeed, it is possible that the Ambassador’s indignant denials of ever having entered into any discussion with the man who claimed to have obtained the interview were suppressed like many other items of news and facts. The only denial that did appear was late and inadequate. The British, bound by traditions, never even suspected that German diplomacy could resort to such means for gaining an advantage. No one realised their absolute deadness to all sense of morality. When Count Tchirsky did sally forth from his chilly palace in Vienna, it was to compass the undoing of the frivolous Austrians. He would exact the payment of a pledge, given over wine. Bargains, made in the ball-room, were reduced next morning to writing, then stored away among the archives at Berlin, and the carrying out of the conditions—conditions favourable to Germany and disastrous to Austria—would be exacted with the cruelty and callousness of a Prussian politician. Had Tchirsky himself hung back, there were others to egg him on. The ideal condition of a Europe in which Germany was supreme must be realised. Any remnants of conscience that Tchirsky might have possessed had long been stifled by intercourse with his Imperial master, who regarded himself as far above all moral law. He was the supreme War Lord. His word had established a new morality quite different from that generally accepted. The military training enjoyed by almost all Germans made them the more ready to accept this point of view. Discipline, enforced until the power of independent reflection has been lost through want of use, relieved them of the necessity of considering the morality of their acts. The hymns of praise of Germany’s successful policy, sung by philosophers and by the pastors of religion, who were foremost, as usual, in advocating the policy of expediency that Germany might be exalted, lulled any scruples felt by Tchirsky’s subordinates. He, himself a survival of a former age, was incapable of imagining anything of the kind. Truth was what the supreme lord decreed to be truth. Honesty was merely another word for expediency. The Ambassador was surrounded by a number of men, with no reputation to lose, who brought him news of every fresh turn of events in Austria-Hungary. They cared little that they were betraying their country to a hard taskmaster. The present benefits of a flourishing banking account were ample compensation for their treachery. These causes all combined to render Tchirsky the least popular man in Vienna. When his name was mentioned, every tongue was suddenly frozen into silence. Was the inquirer a spy? Did he wish to sound the secret feelings of someone present? The Viennese felt a distrust that was rather instinctive than realised. It was the premonition of the closing of the brutal hand of German power upon the crowd of gay butterflies on the banks of the Danube.
CHAPTER XI
THE “GREAT SERVIA” IDEA—SERVIAN ORGANISATION
While Austria-Hungary, with Germany behind her, was discussing the tearing up of the Treaty of Berlin with the rest of Europe, both Powers failed to observe developments that were taking place under their very eyes. The Austro-Hungarian official sent off to Bosnia or Croatia cared very little about the people entrusted to him. His one and only idea was to scheme and plan until he obtained his move to Vienna. He took no means to detect and watch the conspiracies against the Government that were being constantly hatched in the cafés of the town where he lived. In a fit of sudden and uncalled-for energy, he would make a search for cups and saucers decorated with the Serb colours or vindictively punish the parents of a small child for permitting her to wear a Serb sash round her waist, instead of a simple piece of ribbon. This unexpected activity naturally raised the wrath of the Serbo-Croats, the more so because really seditious acts frequently escaped notice, or, if the administrators knew about them, they avoided taking cognisance of them, as it meant the opening up of large questions and much trouble with the central authorities in Vienna. Thus the Serbs, who lived under Austrian or Hungarian rule, were often permitted to go to great lengths without any interference. The sudden swoops of an enraged magistrate, who took action rather because the plotters had interfered with his personal convenience than because it was really incumbent upon him to do so, produced a feeling of insecurity among the subject races. They regarded the local governor somewhat in the light of a dangerous but slumbering beast, and they prayed that his slumber might continue undisturbed. Some, however, went the length of trying to twist his tail, when they knew that he had been sent to the provinces in disgrace, as was generally the case. If a man had been exiled for more serious offences than uncouthness of manner, or a failure to respond to the friendly advances of the chief’s elderly wife, and her invitation to shine at her somewhat monotonous afternoon teas, the Serbs, who were always well-posted in the reasons that led to an official being sent to the provinces, felt that he was not in a position to injure them without damaging himself, and behaved accordingly. The eight million Young Slavs, as they call themselves, under the dominion of Austria or of Hungary have always been well organised. When one of their number arrives at either Vienna or Budapesth he calls round at his Union. Although he may not know a single word of German or Hungarian, the society find him a job. Accustomed to heavy labour, the Serb or Croat is much sought after, especially in the lower ranks of service. Time goes by, the man-servant or maid-servant has learnt the language and is firmly established in the household. There is trouble in the home because of the failure of a German tailor to keep his word. The Slav servant has a relative who is willing to undertake the job, although it is nearly midnight. He is hastily fetched, and by the advice of his friend within the camp fixes his charges a trifle below those asked by the German. He remains master of the situation, the German being ousted. Gradually the household needs are supplied by Slavs, who carry out orders promptly and carefully, and have none of the supercilious “take it or leave it” manner of the German purveyor. The Austrians always say “Let one Slav into the house, and they rule the ingoings and outgoings for the future.”
The Slav is always an enigma, which years of close intercourse cannot solve. His aspirations, his outlook on life are a sealed book to the West European. The all-pervading and very distinct impression which remains is that the Slavs have very distinct national aims, which they are prepared to pursue with an utter persistence and ruthlessness, of which no other peoples are capable.
Just at this period the Young Slavs within the Austro-Hungarian realm were making a determined effort for liberation. They felt, and felt justly, that they were oppressed. They thirsted for education and paid large taxes to secure that same education in order to enable their children to take their places as equals with the dominant races. Austria and Hungary both dreaded the rise of the Slavs, and restricted their education as much as possible, devoting the funds voted for the purpose to other objects.
Things were so bad in this respect that a commission was sent over from the States to ascertain how it could be possible at this date in the civilisation of the world that such a large proportion of emigrants to America should be illiterate. In some provinces it appeared from the Government statistics that 69 per cent. of the annual recruits could neither write nor read. The lack of education was most felt among the Serbs, Croats, Poles and Little Russians. The Slavs, who possess an uncommon amount of commonsense, felt that this withholding of education was immoral, and that it served some deep ulterior purpose. The Bohemians, who inhabited a rich manufacturing district, by force of much agitation, were able to enforce their demands for education. The Poles were miserably neglected, their representatives who attended the Vienna Parliament were fêted and made much of, and, aristocrats themselves for the most part, they were easily persuaded to forget the wrongs of their people at home. In the Bukowina the people were on a low level, and hardly realised their position. In Croatia, Dalmatia, and especially in Bosnia, things were different. Italy was close by, and the Slavs learnt how things were managed in that very progressive and modern State. Servia and Montenegro were governed on lines that contented the peoples there, and the Serbs across the frontier felt that they would be better under the rule of King Peter than subject to a governor who was so far from the centre that he could practically deal with them as he pleased. It was seldom that the governor really understood the vernacular. Being entirely German in his sympathies, he naturally felt no interest in the Slav aspirations, except a desire to crush them. While Vienna was using up her strength in arguing with Europe, the Slavs considered that their opportunity had come for the establishment of a vast Slav Empire, consisting of all the countries inhabited by Slavs in Southern Austria and Hungary, which was to be placed under the rule of the King of Servia.
Negotiations for a union between Montenegro and Servia, for the establishment of a common customs tariff, a common army, and for the pursuance of a common foreign policy, were being carried on. Servia hoped to extend her territory to the sea. Whether she thought to incorporate the Slavs of Austria and Hungary among her people is difficult to say, but she, like the rest of South-Eastern Europe, was aware that Austria-Hungary was rotten to the core. It must in the near future follow Turkey and share its fate. As events move much more quickly to-day in the epoch of telegrams and railways than they did in the period of coaches and couriers, a much more rapid dissolution of the Empire was to be expected than in the case of Turkey that had been tottering for centuries. While the Austrian and Hungarian Slavs were looking to King Peter to deliver them from Austrian and Hungarian tyranny, Austria was intriguing, and encouraging the Serbs in Servia to rebel. She had as little success with the Serbs as with the Italians across the Italian frontier, as both peoples are ardently patriotic, and even the poorest scorned Austrian gold. The determination of the Young Slavs to live under the rule of a monarch of their own race became strengthened at every fresh proof of the effeteness of Austro-Hungarian rule. Themselves strong and virile, they felt that they required administrators who could deal with the problems that came to them for settlement in the rough-and-ready manner peculiar to the other side of the border; they had always completely misunderstood the shelving of petitions, the cumbersome multiplication of documents, peculiar to Austro-Hungarian officialdom. Rapid justice, even if less correct in the matter of form, was preferable, they felt, to the long and unprofitable dilatoriness of the proceedings under an administration more especially careless in dealings with things that concerned people living far from the capital.
Austria-Hungary heard but little of the growing discontent in her outlying provinces. Assassinations and attempts on the lives of administrators multiplied, but the rulers in Vienna, busy with things nearer home, simply suggested “that a heavier weight should be placed upon the safety-valve.” After an outrage some few ringleaders were hanged, half a dozen newspapers suppressed, and then the incident was put away with other events of grave portent, signs of the times which, however, were not allowed to disturb the gaiety of the capital.