12 
LAND 6? WATER 
October 31, 1918 
Poles, and Ukrainians, in favour of the unity and inde- 
pendence of their respective nations. At this stage it was 
thought tactful to include a few perfunctory phrases about 
the sceptre of the Hapsburgs ; but then, as previously, the 
national representatives firmly resisted every official effort 
to extract from them a repudiation of the exiled Czecho- 
slovak and Jugo-Slav committees organised in Entente 
countries by such trusted leaders as Masaryk, Tnimbitch, 
and Supilo. As the disintegration of Russia proceeded, those 
in power in Vienna and Budapest showed less disposition 
towards compromise, and insisted that any constitutional 
reform must respect not merely the Dual system which 
separates Austria from Hungary, but even the boundaries 
of the seventeen "Crown-lands" into which Austria herself is 
divided. 
On such a basis it was, of course, impossible for 
the various nati6nal units even to re-group their forces 
inside the Monarchy, much less to achieye complete racial 
uiiity with their' kinsmen beyond the frontier ; hence, despite 
the discouraging situation of the Entente throughout the 
ensuing winter, the Slav leaders in Austria repeatedly rejected 
the overtures of Vienna. In January of this year, the 
Czechs publiclv asserted the right of their elected repre- 
sentatives to be present at Brest, and in a great demonstra- 
tion at Prague drafted a "National Oath," pledging the 
nation to work for Czecho-SIovak independence. Through- 
out the spring a parallel action was undertaken among the 
Slovene and Croat populations, the women conducting a 
house-to-house plebiscite in favour of Jugo-Slav imity and 
independence. The informal Jugo-Slav agreement con- 
cluded in London last March between Signor Torre and 
Dr. Trumbitch, paved the way to a Congress of Oppressed 
Austrian Nationalities on the Roman Capitol in April ; and 
these two events had an immediate and powerful repercus- 
sion among the Slav and Latin peoples of the Dual Monarchy. 
At once the answer came in the memorable May Congress at 
Prague, at which Czecho-Slovaks, Jugo-Slavs, Poles, Italians, 
and Rumanians proclaimed their vmity of purpose and their 
insistence upon sel'-determination. 
Meanwhile, both the Austrian and the Hungarian Cabinet 
have been in a state of chronic crisis for months past, and 
owe their survival only to the increasing difficulty of finding 
anyone willing to take over such a legacy. The situation has 
been still further complicated by the fact that while among 
the Slavs all parties from the Clerical Right to the Socialist 
Left present a united front on the national question, a wedge 
of social discord has been driven into both Germans and 
Magyars, splitting them into two irreconcilable groups of 
bourgeoisie and proletariat. 
The situation is not unlike that which arose in 1848. Each 
race of the Monarchy is summoning its national Constituent 
or Commission and asserting its right to control its own fate. 
But whereas in those days the overwhelming military forces 
of the Tsar were placed at the disposal of Austrian autocracy, 
to-day Charles of Hapsburg faces a world in arms, which 
stands committed to democracy and self-determination. 
Instead of Nicholas I. upholding legitimacy, we have 
President' Wilson pledged to the liberation of the Austrian 
Slavs. ^ 
After four years we have reached bedrock in the Austrian 
question. The hegemony of the Germans in Austria and of 
the Magyars in Hungary rested in reality upon the force of 
Prussian bayonets — as expressed before the war in the 
Austro-German Alliance and since 1914 in naked military 
force. Thus it is but logical that as Prussian militarism at 
last totters to its fall, the minor tyrannies which flourished 
under , its protection should at once reveal their incapacity 
to stand alone. 
The War Scare of i 8 7 5*: By Winifred Stephens 
^ MONG the war rumours which have discon- 
^m certed Europe during the last half-century none 
/ ^ was more startling than the war scare of 1875. 
/ ^ On the fourth of May in that year, Londoners 
-^ -^^ awoke to read in the columns of the Times the 
electrifying news that a German invasion" of France was 
once again imminent. 
Most of the events which led up to this announcement and 
the motives that prompted them remain shrouded in mystery. 
Such, however, as it is possible to discern are not without 
their significance for the present world crisis. 
Throughout the months preceding those anxious May 
days, France and Germany had been growing more and 
more persuaded that the one was preparing to attack the 
other at no distant date. 
Germany was concerned by the rapidity of the French 
recovery from the defeat of 1871, by the resignation of the 
peaceable Thiers and the succession as President of the 
French Republic of the warlike MacMahon, who was bent 
on military reorganisation. France, on her side, was alarmed 
by the magnitude of the German Army; "better prepared 
for war than any army in the world, and at ten daj's' notice," 
wrote Lord Odo Russell, the British Ambassador in Berlin, 
to our Foreign Minister, Lord Derby. Feehng herself at 
the mercy of this formidable force, France not only streng-' 
thened her army, but cast about for allies, and Germany 
therefore began to fear encirclement. 
Consequently, throughout 1874 and during the following 
spring, we find Germany infected by a fever of military- 
activity— reorganising the Landsturm, by a measure which 
placed every German between the ages of sixteen and forty- 
two at the disposal of the War Department, provisioning 
troops, purchasing horses, and storing up fresh ammunition 
close to the very frontier of France. 
That country repUed by passing an Army Bill, which 
gave her a total force of a little less than two million men, 
still inferior to 2,800,000 which the Landsturm Bill had 
given Germany, and to the 3,300,000 which the Russian 
steam-roller might bring into action. At the same time, 
the French Government was ordering from German horse- 
* The following are among the authorities consulted by the present 
writer: "Lord Lyons, a Record of British Diplomacy," by Lord 
Newton; " Un Diplomate k Londres, Lettres et Notes," Charles 
Gavard, 1871-1877 ; "Memoirs of Prince Hohenlohe," Vol. II ; "My 
Memoirs," H. S. de Blowitz ; "Queen Victoria: A Biography," by 
Sir Sidney Lee. Other authorities are cited in the course of the article. 
dealers 10,000 military horses to be dispatched without 
delay, with ,a commission of fifty francs on each horse and 
no reserve price. On hearing this from Prince Hohenlohe, 
the German Ambassador in Paris, Bismarck forbade the 
export of any horses from Germany. The French constnied 
the measure as a threat of war. Hohenlohe tried to represent 
it as purely economic. The French had been buying too 
many German horses for Paris fiacres, he told our Ambas- 
sador. Think what a revolution it would have meant in 
Paris streets ! Ten thousand chargers to replace the familiar 
boney jades in the shafts of the little victorias ! What a 
shock for British tourists. Lord Lyons passed on to his 
chief, Lord Derby, this economic theory. And Derby tried 
to reassure with it the French Charge d'Affaires in London, 
M. Gavard, addiyg that German horse-dealers would be the 
only sufferers from the prohibition, which doubtless pro- 
ceeded from one of Bismarck's fits of bad temper. 
Poor puzzled diplomatists, when they failed to fathom 
the depths of the German Chancellor's strategy, were wont 
to attribute his actions to the effect of insomnia, to attacks 
of nerves, bursts of ill-temper, and even to a touch of insanity. 
To the Russian Ambassador, Schouvaloff, Bismarck appeared 
"a little out of his mind at times."- But he probably did not 
object to being thought a little mad. And the wily old fox 
of Varzin must have grinned to see his puzzled prey blinded 
by the dust of this theory of his neuroticism, which he 
stealthily threw in their eyes, and driven to adopt a merely 
superficial explanation of those motives he so cleverly 
concealed. 
Not entirely a pose, however, was the. discontent which 
impressed ambassadors and journahsts in Berlin. It arose 
from causes domestic and foreign. At home, ''the founder 
of the German Empire," as Bismarck regarded himself, 
winced under the ingratitude of his imperial master, who 
insisted on retaining for himself and Moltke control of the 
Army. Abroad, Bismarck's campaign against the CathoHc 
Church in Germany had brought him into conflict with 
Catholics throughout Europe. And he considered himself 
aggrieved both by France and Belgium when, as he thought, 
insufficient measures were taken for the punishment of the 
Belgian Duchesne, who had written to the Archbishop of 
Paris offering to murder the German Chancellor in return 
for a certain sum of money. 
This discontent and suspiciousness probably inspired a 
sensational article ,"Is War in Sight ? ", which appeared on 
April 9th in the Government organ The Berliner Post. 
