sult which is most
to be dreaded, since it inevitably involves fresh wars in the immediate
future. Whatever happens, the effete Dual System in its present form is
doomed, for while an Austrian defeat means dissolution, an Austrian victory
means the absorption of Serbia and Montenegro, and in either case the
balance between Austria and Hungary will be fatally disturbed and a new
constitutional arrangement rendered inevitable. It is thus a tragic paradox
that while the attempt to bolster up the Dual System was undoubtedly one of
the great underlying causes of the war, its first effect is likely to be
the collapse of that very system.

The Dual System once abolished, it might seem reasonable to aim at a
reconstruction of Austria-Hungary on a modified federal basis. But this was
essentially a peace-ideal. The war, far from kindling a common patriotism
which in Austria-Hungary was so conspicuous by its absence, has placed a
gulf of blood between race and race, and rendered their continued existence
under the same roof not only difficult but undesirable. Even in the event
of only relative failure on the part of Austria-Hungary a much more radical
solution may be expected, while the effect of her complete defeat would be
to place the solution of the whole "Austrian problem" in the hands of the
Entente Powers and of her own disaffected populations. In that case there
are two probable alternatives, one more radical than the other. Both depend
to a large extent upon the development of the military situation and upon
as yet incalculable economic influences, but it is possible to indicate
their broad outlines. Indeed, this is the best means of illustrating the
conflicting fears and aspirations which the great conflict has still
further intensified in the racial whirlpool of Central Europe. Let us
consider the less drastic of the two first.

Austria, as distinguished from Hungary, consists of seventeen provinces,
of which Galicia is the largest and most populous; yet there are many
Austrians who have long regarded its possession as anything but an unmixed
blessing for the Monarchy as a whole, and would scarcely regret its loss.
It has always occupied a peculiar autonomous position of its own; its
political, social, and economic conditions are at least a century behind
those of the neighbouring provinces, and have given rise to many gross
scandals. It has been a hot-bed of agrarian unrest, electoral corruption,
and international espi