ease the national revenue, in
order to provide for an ever-swelling military expenditure. On the
contrary, in her political constitution Prussia has remained a
medieval and feudal State. She is the Paradise of the Junker. But
Prussian Junkerthum is not merely a squirearchy of independent
landowners. Mr. Bernard Shaw, in his "Common Sense about the War," in
which one ounce of common sense is mixed with three ounces of
nonsense, would make us believe that there is little difference
between German Junkerthum and British Junkerthum, and that there is
little to choose between the English Junker, Sir Edward Grey, and a
Pomeranian squire. Mr. Shaw must have studied Prussian conditions to
very little purpose when he makes so ludicrous a comparison. To call
such a quiet, silent country gentleman, such a law-abiding
Parliamentarian as Sir Edward Grey, to call even him a typical
Prussian Junker is a travesty of the facts. A more striking contrast
to the complete Junker of Pomerania than the "Complete Angler" of the
Foreign Office could not well be imagined. The glorified Prussian
Junker is Bismarck. The typical Junker is Prince Bluecher. A perfect
modern type is that fiery Freiherr von Oldenburg, who advised the
Kaiser to send a troop of Uhlans, as in the old Cromwellian days, to
clear out the politicians of a disloyal Reichstag.

The Prussian Junkers are the lieges of the war-lord. They are all the
more loyal to the throne as they are poor, and therefore dependent on
the King for their very subsistence. There are few large estates in
Prussia, and they yield but a meagre revenue. The relations of the
Junkers to the Hohenzollerns are the relations of William the
Conqueror to his companions-in-arms. The Junkers originally held their
broad acres, their _Rittergut_, by military tenure. Some of their
feudal privileges have gone, but they continue to be the leading
political power in the State under the Kaiser's Majesty. They are the
pillars of the throne. They owe military service. To recall the words
of the Sergeant-King, they are "_dem Regiment obligat_." And they are
rewarded for their military services by privileges innumerable. They
are the controlling influence in the Landtag, which is a
representative assembly only in name. They occupy the higher posts in
the Civil Service and in the Diplomatic Service. In each district the
Landrat is the supreme authority, the electioneering agent of the
Government and the representative of th