94 



NATURE 



[September i6, 1920 



water with the Black Sea, the North Sea, and the 

 Baltic, and some of the most important land routes 

 of the Continent already run through it. On the 

 other hand, its access to the Adriatic is handicapped 

 by the fact that in order to reach that sea its goods 

 will have to pass through the territory of two, if not 

 three, other States, and however well the doctrine 

 of economic rights of way may sound in theory there 

 are undoubted drawbacks to it in practice. It is 

 probable, therefore, that the development of internal 

 communications will in the end be to the advantage 

 of the German ports, and more especially of Ham- 

 burg. But the other outlets of the State will cer- 

 tainly tend towards the preservation of its economic 

 independence. 



The excnt to which Rumania has improved her 

 position as a result of the war is for the present a 

 matter of speculation. On one hand she has added 

 greatly to the territory which she previously held, 

 and superficially she has rendered it more compact ; 

 but on the other she has lost her unity of outlook, 

 and strategically at least weakened her position by 

 the abandonment of the Carpathians as her frontier. 

 .Again, whereas before the war she had a fairly 

 homogeneous population — probably from 90 to 95 per 

 cent, of the 7,250,000 people in the country being of 

 Rumanian stock — she has, by the annexation of 

 Transylvania, added .-in area of 22,000 square miles 

 of territory, in which the Rumanians number less than 

 one and a half millions out of a total of two and two- 

 third millions. In that part of the Banat which she 

 has obtained there is also a considerable alien element. 

 It is in this combination of geographical division and 

 ethnic intermixture that we may foresee a danger to 

 Rumanian unity. The position in the Dobruja is 

 also open to criticism. Geographically the region 

 belongs to Bulgaria, and the Danube will always be 

 regarded as their true frontier by the Bulgarian 

 people. Ethnically its composition is very mixed, 

 and, whatever it was originally, it certainly was not 

 a Rumanian land. But after the Rumanians had 

 rather unwillinglv been compelled to accept it in 

 exchange for Bessarabia, filched from them by the 

 Russians, their numbers increased and their economic 

 development of the region, and more especially of the 

 port of Constanza, undoubtedly gave them some 

 claims to the northern part of it. As so often 

 happens, however, when a country receives part of 

 a natural region bovond its former boundaries, 

 Rumania is fertile in excuses for annexing more of 

 the Dobruja. To the southern part, which she 

 received after the Balkan wars, and in the possession 

 of which she has been confirmed by the rieace terms 

 with Bulgaria, she has neither ethnically nor 

 economirallv anv manner of right. Her occupation 

 of it will inevitably draw Rumania on to further 

 intervention in Bulgarian affairs. The arrangements 

 which have been made with regard to the Banat 

 must be considered in relation to the Magyar position 

 in the Hungarian plain. The eastern country of the 

 Banat, Krasso-Sz6r6nv, has a population which is 

 in the main Rumanian, and as it belongs to the Car- 

 nathian area it is rightly included with Transylvania 

 in Rumanian territory. In the remainder of the 

 Banat, including .Arad, the Rumanians form less 

 than one-third of the total population, which also 

 comprises Magvars, Germans, and Serbs. But 

 Rumania has been permitted to descend from the 

 mountains and Jugo-Slavia to cross the great river 

 which forms her natural boundan.-, and both have 

 obtained a foothold on the plain, where it may be 

 onlv too easy for them to seek occasion for further 

 advances. For the extension of Jugo-.SIavia beyond 



NO. 2655, VOL. 106] 



the Danube two pleas have been advanced, one 

 ethnical and the other strategic. Neither is really 

 valid. The Danube is certainly a better defensive 

 frontier than the somewhat arbitrary line which the 

 Supreme Council has drawn across the Hungarian 

 plain. 



In fact, it is in the treatment of the Hungarian 

 plain that we feel most disposed to criticise the terri- 

 torial settlements of the Peace Treaties. Geographical 

 principles have been violated by the dismemberment 

 of a region in which the Magyars were in a majority, 

 and in which they were steadily improving their 

 position. Ethnical principles have been violated, both 

 in the north, where a distinctly Magyar region has 

 been added to Slovakia, and in' the south, where the 

 western part of the Banat and Badka have been divided 

 between the Rumanians and the Jugo-Slavs, who to- 

 gether form a minority of the total population. For the 

 transfer of .Arad to Rumania and of the Burgenland 

 to -Austria more is to be said, but the position as a 

 whole is one of unstable equilibrium, and can only 

 be maintained by support from without. In this part 

 of Europe at least a I^-ague of Nations will not 

 have to seek for its troubles. 



When we turn to Austria we are confronted with 

 the great tragedy in the reconstruction of Eurojie. 

 Of that country it could once be said, ■" Bella gerant 

 alii, tu felix Austria nube," but to-day, when dynastic 

 bonds have been loosened, the constituent parts of 

 the great but heterogeneous empire which she thus 

 built up have each gone its own way. .And for that 

 result -Austria herself is to blame. She failed to 

 realise that an empire such as hers could only be 

 permanently retained on a basis of common political 

 and economic interest. Instead of adopting such a 

 policy, however, she exploited rather than developed 

 the subject nationalities, and to-day their economic, 

 no less than their political, independence of her is 

 vital to their existence. The entire political re- 

 orientation of .Austria is necessary if she is to emerge 

 successfully from her present trials, and such a re- 

 orientation must be brought about with due regard to 

 geographical and ethnical conditions. The two 

 courses which are open to her lead in opposite direc- 

 tions. On one hand she may become a member of 

 a Danubian confederation, on the other she may 

 throw in her lot with the German people. The first 

 would really imply an attempt to restore the economic 

 position which she held before the war, but it is 

 questionable whether it is either possible or expedient 

 for her to make such an attempt. .A Danubian con- 

 federation will inevitably be of slow growth, as it is 

 onlv under the pressure of economic necessity that it 

 will be joined by the various nationalities of south- 

 eastern Europe. Moreover, -Austria has in the past 

 shown little capacity to understand the Slav peoples, 

 and in any case her position in what would primarily 

 be a Slav confederation would be an invidious one. 

 For these reasons we turn to the suggestion that 

 -Austria should enter the German Empire, which, 

 both on geographical and on ethnical grounds, would 

 appear to be her proper place. Geographically she is 

 German, because the bulk of the territory left to her 

 belongs either to the .Alpine range or to the -Alpine 

 foreland. Ethnically, of course, she is essentially 

 German. Now, althoug:h my argument hitherto has 

 rather endeavoured to show that the transfer of terri- 

 tory from one State to another on purely economic 

 grounds is seldom to be justified, it is equally inde- 

 fensible to argue that two States which are geo- 

 graphically and ethnically related are not to be 

 allowed to unite their fortunes because it would be 

 to their interest to do so. .And that it would be to 



