weariness
by its very excesses), every manifestation of a wistful friendship
which proclaims itself misunderstood.

The whole Germany of tradition displayed itself before the eyes of the
Tzarewitch, all its treacherous appearance of good nature, all its
dishonest methods, composed of a mixture of vanity and apparent
simplicity, whose object it is to make people believe in a sort of
unconsciousness of great strength. The German Emperor made an appeal
for a union of princes to resist the restless democracy of our times,
and repeated it with urgency, and in the usual stock phrases. In a
word, William II laid under contribution, to charm the son of the Tzar,
all his arts and spells of fascination. Why wonder that he succeeded,
when we remember that M. Jules Simon, a French Republican, member of
the Government of National Defence in 1870, came back from Berlin
singing the praises of the King of Prussia? Also, that the entire
Press of our country, with the sole exception of the _Nouvelle Revue_,
was wont, at the commencement of William's reign, to speak with
sympathy of the genial character of the "young Emperor," to praise his
schemes of social reform, and to express its belief in the superiority
of a mind which, as a matter of fact, is remarkable only for its
excesses and disorder? But all Germany, like M. Jules Simon and the
French Press, will find out the truth. The country may have gone into
ecstasies over the first acts and first speeches of its young
sovereign, but it will soon learn to know how little connection there
is between the words and assurances of William of Hohenzollern and his
deeds.

At the outset, during the sojourn of the Tzarewitch at Berlin, whilst
he was being carefully coddled by the Emperor, the chancellor, Von
Caprivi (who boasts of having no initiative of his own and of acting
only under the orders of his master), was inspiring accusations, and
making them himself before the military commission, charging the war
party in Russia with secretly plotting against Germany. One would like
to know where the war party in Russia can possibly be at the present
moment?

At the same time that William II was endeavouring to recover and
restore amicable relations with the Tzar, he had every intention of
carrying through his schemes of military re-organisation and the
increase of the army, which, as Von Caprivi was wont to say after His
Majesty, constitute essential safeguards against a Russian invasio