and thanks for valuable advice given by Mr. J.W.
Headlam, M.A., Mr. A.B. Hinds, M.A., and Dr. R.W. Seton-Watson, D. Litt.

J.H.R.

CAMBRIDGE,

_September_ 5, 1915.

PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION

The outbreak of war in Europe is an event too momentous to be treated
fully in this Preface. But I may point out that the catastrophe resulted
from the two causes of unrest described in this volume, namely, the
Alsace-Lorraine Question and the Eastern Question. Those disputes have
dragged on without any attempt at settlement by the Great Powers. The
Zabern incident inflamed public opinion in Alsace-Lorraine, and
illustrated the overbearing demeanour of the German military caste;
while the insidious attempts of Austria in 1913 to incite Bulgaria
against Servia marked out the Hapsburg Empire as the chief enemy of the
Slav peoples of the Balkan Peninsula after the collapse of Turkish power
in 1912. The internal troubles of the United Kingdom, France, and Russia
in July 1914 furnished the opportunity so long sought by the forward
party at Berlin and Vienna; and the Austro-German Alliance, which, in
its origin, was defensive (as I have shown in this volume), became
offensive, Italy parting from her allies when she discovered their
designs. Drawn into the Triple Alliance solely by pique against France
after the Tunis affair, she now inclines towards the Anglo-French
connection.

Readers of my chapter on the Eastern Question will not fail to see how
the neglect of the Balkan peoples by the Great Powers has left that
wound festering in the weak side of Europe; and they will surmise that
the Balkan troubles have, by a natural Nemesis, played their part in
bringing about the European War. It is for students of modern Europe to
seek to form a healthy public opinion so that the errors of the past may
not be repeated, and that the new Europe shall be constituted in
conformity with the aspirations of the peoples themselves.

CAMBRIDGE,

_September_ 25, 1914.

PREFACE

The line of Virgil quoted on the title-page represents in the present
case a sigh of aspiration, not a paean of achievement. No historical
student, surely, can ever feel the conviction that he has fathomed the
depths of that well where Truth is said to lie hid. What, then, must be
the feelings of one who ventures into the mazy domain of recent annals,
and essays to pick his way through thickets all but untrodden? More than
once I have been tempted