, but far less efficient and inhuman bureaucracy of Russia, has
been wholly sinister[1], both for Russia and for Europe. Bismarck's object,
of course, was not so much to keep down the Russian revolutionaries as to
check the aspirations of the Panslavists, whose designs for the liberation
of the Slav nationalities, as we now see them unfolding, threaten the
stability both of Prussia and of Austria-Hungary.

[Footnote 1: The same remark applies to the influence of Germany on
Turkey.]

Throughout the 'eighties Bismarck succeeded in keeping on foot a secret
understanding with Russia. How deeply he had implanted the necessity of
this policy in the mind of William I. is brought home by the fact that it
was the thought uppermost in the old man's mind as he lay on his deathbed.
"Never lose touch with the Tsar," whispered the old man to his grandson,
when he was almost too weak to speak. "There is no cause for quarrel."

The old Emperor died in 1888. In 1890 the young Emperor "dropped the
pilot." In the same year Russia refused to renew her secret treaty. In 1891
the first Franco-Russian Treaty was signed, and the diplomatic supremacy
of Europe passed from the Triple Alliance to be shared between the two
opposing groups with which we have been familiar in recent years.

The disappearance of Prince Bismarck marked the beginning of a new phase in
German policy and in German life. The younger generation, which had come
to maturity, like the Kaiser, since 1870, had never known the old divided
Germany, or realised the difficulties of her statesmen. Every one wondered
what use the young Kaiser would make of the great Army bequeathed to him.
He was believed to be a firebrand. Few believed that, imbued with Prussian
traditions, he would keep the peace for twenty-five years; fewer still
that, when he broke it, Germany would have the second Navy in the world.

But we are not now concerned with the baffling personality of the Kaiser
himself. What is important for us here is the general attitude of mind
among the German public of the Kaiser's generation, which has rendered
possible the prosecution of the cherished ideas of their ruler.

The school of thought which has been steadily gaining force, under official
encouragement, during the last twenty-five years is best summed up in
the popular watchwords, "Germany's place in the sun" and "World-Policy"
(_Weltpolitik_). These phrases embody, for Germans, who always tend to be
abstract in t