"injured innocence" and very skillfully
he played that part.

This at least is clear that in this correspondence the Kaiser was
either guilty of insincerity or he betrayed a fatal incapacity to
grasp the essentials of the quarrel. I prefer the latter construction
of his conduct. Against the bellicose efforts of his Foreign Office
and his General Staff, I believe that for dynastic reasons he strove
for a time to adjust the difficulty, but his egomania and his
life-long habit of personal absolutism blinded him to the fact that he
was taking an untenable, indeed an impossible, position, in contending
that Russia should effectually tie its hands while Germany and Austria
should be left free to prepare for eventualities. Had there been a
breathing spell and the Kaiser had had more time for reflection,
possibly the unreasonableness of his contention would have suggested
itself, but he found on his sudden return from Norway that his
country, through the fatuous folly of its military party, was almost
irrevocably committed to war. Probably he did not dare to reverse
openly and formally its policy. His popularity had already suffered in
the Moroccan crisis. This consideration and the histrionic side to his
complex personality betrayed him into his untenable and fatal
position.

The Kaiser has hitherto been regarded as a man of exceptional ability.
Time and the issue of this war will tell. The verdict of history may
be to the contrary. The world for a time may easily confuse restless
energy and habitual meddling with real ability, but its final verdict
will go far deeper. Since the Kaiser dropped his sagacious pilot,
Germany's real position in the world has steadily weakened. Then it
was the first power in Europe with its rivals disunited. The Kaiser
has united his enemies with "hoops of steel," driven Russia and
England into a close alliance, forced Italy out of the Triple
Alliance, and as the only compensation for these disastrous results,
he has gained the doubtful cooperation of moribund Turkey, of which he
is likely to say before many months are over: "Who shall deliver me
from the body of this death?"

In the meantime, Germany was not idle in its preparations for
eventualities.

The Kaiser and his counsellors were already definitely planning for
the war, and were taking steps to alienate England from her Allies and
secure her neutrality. To insure this, the German Chancellor, having
visited the Kaiser at Potsdam, sent