DISCOVERY 



301 



which should be read to the Assembly. It was couched 

 in a note of triumph : " To-day we arc certain that a 

 I foreign prince will not sit on the throne of Spain. 

 This victory is the more precious because it has been 

 ' won by the force of reason and of right, and has not 

 cost the sacrifice of hfe. . . . We asked your support 

 against a Prussian candidate for the throne of Spain. 

 That candidature has been withdrawn. We can now 

 take up again with confidence the work of peace." 

 Here let OUivier speak for himself : "I was going on 

 to speak of the part played by Olozaga and by Spain, 

 when the door was opened and the usher announced 

 ' His Excellency the Minister of Foreign Affairs ' (the 

 Due de Gramont). As soon as he had passed the door, 

 before ever he had reached the middle of my room, 

 he exclaimed, ' My friend, you see a man who has 

 just been struck in the face.' I rose. ' I don't under- 

 stand you ; explain yourself.' He held out to me a 

 little sheet of yellow paper which I shall see for ever. 

 It was a telegram from Lcsourd, sent from Berlin 

 thirteen minutes after midnight, and ran, ' A supple- 

 ment to the Gazette of Northern Germany which came 

 out at ten o'clock contains the following announce- 

 ment.' There followed Bismarck's telegram. . . . Never 

 was a vessel wrecked so near to harbour. I remained 

 a few minutes silent and crushed. ' There is no room 

 for any further illusion,' I said ; ' they mean to force 

 us to war.' " I am not here discussing the wisdom 

 of OUivier's policy, nor the soundness of his judgment, 

 but merely considering the effect which Bismarck's 

 telegram produced in France. There can be no doubt 

 that Ollivicr was devoted to the cause of peace. He 

 says : " Drops of sweat, the result of my mental 

 anguish, stood upon my brow. Et in agonia ego. . . . 

 But I always came to the same conclusion. France 

 had been insulted intentionally and grossly, and we 

 should be faithless guardians of her honour if we 

 tolerated it." The news had meanwhile spread to 

 the boulevards, and on all sides were heard cries of 

 " Vive la guerre ! A Berlin ! " The decision of the 

 Assembly and the declaration of the Emperor did but 

 ratify the opinion of the Ministers and of France. 



It is, then, certain that the publication of the telegram 

 was the occasion which inflamed the war fever in 

 Germany (where the incident at Ems was regarded 

 as an insult to Prussia) and ruined the hopes of the 

 French Chancellor. But that is far from saying that 

 it was the cause of the war. If the telegram had not 

 been published, what course would events have taken ? 

 There would have been a precious moment in which 

 the basis of a real pacification might have been laid, 

 especially if Bismarck had carried out his threat of 

 resigning office. OUivier might have shown himself 

 possessed " of the genius of Cavour and Bismarck com- 

 bined " (the phrase was used of him by a correspondent. 



and he quotes it with characteristic naivetd). On the 

 other hand, it is possible — and probable — that a new 

 crisis would very soon have arisen — there had been a 

 series of Franco-Prussian crises since iS66 : that 

 OUivier, who only possessed half of Napoleon's con- 

 fidence, would have failed to deal with it, and that 

 war would have entered a little later by a slightly 

 different gate. 



The ethical aspect of the incident may be briefly 

 dealt with. Bismarck's action has been represented 

 as an unparalleled act of diabolical cleverness. No 

 diplomatic incident has acquired such celebrity. During 

 the Great War it was constantly used as a weapon 

 wherewith to beat the policy and diplomacy of Ger- 

 many. Now that the passions of that time are dying 

 down, it is possible again to see the incident in its true 

 light. Bismarck had in his hands at that moment 

 peace and war : he chose war ; and he obtained it 

 by falsifying the account of the interview between his 

 King and the French Ambassador. That is a terrible 

 responsibility. But European history would not be 

 the crime-laden record that it is if his action stood 

 out in solitary infamy among the doings of statesmen 

 and diplomatists. It is not difficult to understand 

 how Germany can forgive a statesman who by a stroke 

 of the pen brought on, at a moment favourable to his 

 own country, a war which he believed to be necessary 

 and inevitable. There are far worse incidents in the 

 career of Frederick the Great. Arc not many incidents 

 quite as bad to be found in the records of English 

 statesmen, crowned and uncrowned, whom posterity 

 has made up its mind to honour ? 



The Structure of the Atom 



By A. S. Russell, M.A., D.Sc. 



Reader in Chemislry al ClirisI Church, Ox/ord 



In chemistry an element may be defined as a distinct 

 kind of matter that has not yet been shown to be com- 

 posite. Pure gold, for example, is caUed an clement 

 because no one has yet succeeded in showing that it 

 is really made up of two or more other substances. 

 Brass, although, like gold, a metal and resembling it 

 somewhat in appearance, is not an element, because 

 it is made from copper and zinc, and may be easUy 

 changed back into these metals. Oxygen gas, although 

 about as different from gold as anything could be, 

 resembles it in one respect at least. It is an element. 

 Water, on the other hand, which contains oxygen and 

 hydrogen in combination, can easily be shown to be 



