I was surprised by the spirit of optimism which seemed to pervade the French press during the period immediately following the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. For three weeks the telegrams from Vienna repeated over and over again the statement that the ultimatum which Austria-Hungary intended to present at Belgrade as a result of the Sarajevo assassination would be so worded that Russia could not take offence. This optimistic opinion, which seems to have been given almost official sanction by the Ballplatz, was shared by the French Government. France is a country in which the inmost thoughts of her statesmen are voiced freely in the daily newspapers of Paris. If there had been any serious misgivings, the protocol for the visit of President Poincaré to Petrograd and to the Scandinavian capitals would certainly have been modified.
The President of France sailed for the Baltic on July 15th. At six o'clock in the evening of the 23d, the note of the Austro-Hungarian Government concerning the events of the assassination of Sarajevo was given to the Servian Government. It commenced by reproducing the text of the Servian declaration of March 31, 1909, which we have quoted above. Servia was accused of not having fulfilled the promise made in this declaration, and of permitting the Pan-Servian propaganda in the newspapers and public schools of the kingdom. The assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was stated to be the direct result of Servian failure to live up to her declaration of March 31, 1909. Austria-Hungary claimed that the assassination of the heir to her throne had been investigated, and that ample proof had been found of the connivance of two Servians, one an army officer and the other a functionary who belonged to the Narodna Obrana; that the assassins had received their arms and their bombs from these two men, and had been knowingly allowed to pass into Bosnia by the Servian authorities on the Serbo-Bosnian frontier. Being unable to endure longer the Pan-Servian agitation, of which Belgrade was the foyer and the crime of Sarajevo a direct result, the Austro-Hungarian Government found itself compelled to demand of the Servian Government the formal assurance that it condemned this propaganda, which was dangerous to the existence of the Dual Monarchy, because its final end was to detach from Austria-Hungary large portions of her territory and attach them to Servia.
After this preamble, the note went on to demand that on the first page of the Journal Officiel of July 26th the Servian Government publish a new declaration, the text of which is so important that we quote it in full.
"The Royal Servian Government condemns the propaganda directed against Austria-Hungary, i.e., the entirety of those machinations whose aim it is to separate from the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy territories belonging thereto, and she regrets sincerely the ghastly consequences of these criminal actions.
"The Royal Servian Government regrets that Servian officers and officials have participated in the propaganda cited above, and have thus threatened the friendly and neighbourly relations which the Royal Government was solemnly bound to cultivate by its declaration of March 31, 1909.
"The Royal Government, which disapproves and rejects every thought or every attempt at influencing the destinies of the inhabitants of any part of Austria-Hungary, considers it its duty to call most emphatically to the attention of its officers and officials, and of the entire population of the kingdom, that it will hereafter proceed with the utmost severity against any persons guilty of similar actions, to prevent and suppress which it will make every effort."
Simultaneously with the publication in the Journal Officiel, Austria-Hungary demanded that the declaration be brought to the knowledge of the Servian army by an order of the day of King Peter, and be published in the official organ of the army. The Servian Government was also asked to make ten promises:
1. To suppress any publication which fosters hatred of, and contempt for, the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, and whose general tendency is directed against the latter's territorial integrity;
2. To proceed at once with the dissolution of the society Narodna Obrana, to confiscate its entire means of propaganda, and to proceed in the same manner against the other societies and associations in Servia which occupy themselves with the propaganda against Austria-Hungary, and to take the necessary measures that the dissolved societies may not continue their activities under another name or in another form;
3. To eliminate without delay from the public instruction in Servia, so far as the teaching staff as well as the curriculum is concerned, whatever serves or may serve to foster the propaganda against Austria-Hungary;