offered, he has displayed
sentiments hostile to Greece and favourable to the Sultan. For these
reasons, Abdul Hamid is devoted to William II. He is tied to him, and
bound by all his sentiments, by all his admiration and his fear, to the
Germans. Messrs. Cambon and de Nelidoff believed that they had
detached the Sultan from Germany, but illusions on that score are no
longer possible. Germany possesses his entire confidence. Did not he,
the most nervous and suspicious of men, allow on one occasion the
German military mission to take _effective_ command of his troops,
whereas no other military mission has ever been allowed anything more
than the right to put them through their drill? Germany, which in case
of need can count upon the Turkish army, is fundamentally interested in
preventing Turkey from being either weakened or divided up. A war in
the East, in which Germany might get Russia deeply involved, at the
same time that she kept her busy in Asia, is too great an advantage to
risk losing, without doing everything possible to protect it. . . .

April 28, 1897. [6]

William II, the God of war and of force, is in every way responsible
for events in the East. Only his friendship, and the many consequences
of that friendship, have given to Abdul Hamid the courage of his
massacres, of his resistance to all efforts at reconciliation, and of
his military proceedings in Greece. The German Emperor had been able
to persuade the simple-minded Government of France of his peaceful and
humanitarian intentions. It only needed a few of us to revolt and to
express our indignation, to unmask him, and to show in its true, lurid
light, the real nature of his actions, so as to enable the nations to
know him for what he is. To-day he is the master of Europe; but let
the power of the Kaiser be what it may (and it is a power no more
capable of honesty than that of Bismarck, who lied without ceasing,
forfeited without ceasing his honour, and accepted responsibility for
crime), whatever conquests hereafter William II may achieve, even
should we be defeated again, we shall be able to stand up before him
and to his face to say, "You will never achieve greatness!" Material
greatness turns again to dust, like all matter, but moral greatness is
eternal, an intangible thing, which surrounds men, invisible, and which
emanates from the best amongst them.

We will leave to history, which shall surely record it, the judgment of
_human