sumedly tender flora of German industry from the supposed deadly
blasts of British, Austrian, and Russian competition. He certainly hoped
to strengthen the fabric of his Empire by extending the customs system
and making its revenue depend more largely on that source and less on
the contributions of the federated States. But there was probably a
still wider consideration. He doubtless wished to bring prominently
before the public gaze another great subject that would distract it
from the religious feuds described above and bring about a
rearrangement of political parties. The British people has good reason
to know that the discussion of fiscal questions that vitally touch every
trade and every consumer, does act like the turning of a kaleidoscope
upon party groupings; and we may fairly well assume that so far-seeing a
statesman as Bismarck must have forecast the course of events.

Reasons of statecraft also warned him to build up the Empire four-square
while yet there was time. The rapid recovery of France, whose milliards
had proved somewhat of a "Greek gift" to Germany, had led to threats on
the part of the war party at Berlin, which brought from Queen Victoria,
as also from the Czar Alexander, private but pressing intimations to
Kaiser Wilhelm that no war of extermination must take place. This affair
and its results in Germany's foreign policy will occupy us in Chapter
XII. Here we may note that Bismarck saw in it a reason for suspecting
Russia, hating England, and jealously watching every movement in France.
Germany's future, it seemed, would have to be safeguarded by all the
peaceable means available. How natural, then, to tone down her internal
religious strifes by bringing forward another topic of still more
absorbing interest, and to aim at building up a self-contained
commercial life in the midst of uncertain, or possibly hostile,
neighbours. In truth, if we view the question in its broad issues in the
life of nations, we must grant that Free Trade could scarcely be
expected to thrive amidst the jealousies and fears entailed by the war
of 1870. That principle presupposes trust and good-will between nations;
whereas the wars of 1859, 1864, and 1870 left behind bitter memories and
rankling ills. Viewed in this light, Germany's abandonment of Free Trade
in 1878 was but the natural result of that forceful policy by which she
had cut the Gordian knot of her national problem.

The economic change was decided on in the