The war with Serbia lasted just three days. At the end of that time
the Serbians were flying, a panic-stricken mob, back across the
frontier toward Belgrade, the Bulgars at their heels. At their head,
in the midst of the flying bullets, rode Prince Alexander. The war
was won in spite of the fact that all the Russian officers, acting
on secret instruction from home, had resigned on the day before the
battle.

The Bulgarian army had already advanced to and occupied Pirot, and
was preparing to continue on to Belgrade, when Count Khevenhueller,
the Austrian Minister to Serbia, arrived at Bulgarian headquarters
and informed Prince Alexander that if the Bulgarians continued their
advance the Serbians would be joined by Austrian troops. The prince
yielded to superior force, and in March, 1886, a treaty of peace was
signed at Bucharest. Serbia did not cede a single yard of territory,
nor did she pay one cent of indemnity. Not only Russia, but Austria,
was beginning to fear Bulgaria; neither wanted a really formidable
power in the Balkans. But at any rate the union with Eastern Rumelia
was accomplished and remained a fact.

Again Russian intrigue had failed; again Bulgaria had not only shown
her capacity for managing her own affairs, but she had also shown
that her soldiers could fight. All Europe was surprised. It was not
supposed that the army of this little nation, whose people only
eight years ago had been all slaves, could meet trained troops in
action.

Russia now made immediately another mistake in attributing her
humiliation to Prince Alexander, the good-natured boy who was
supposed to rule Bulgaria. She was now determined to be revenged on
him. Nor did the Russian agents wait long before taking action.
Peace had hardly been declared between Bulgaria and Serbia when they
began laying their plans.

A rumor having been spread that the Serbians were going to resume
their attack, all the troops were taken out of Sofia and sent away
toward the frontier. Then a regiment, on which the conspirators, the
Russian agents and some Bulgarian officers whom they had bribed,
felt they could count, was smuggled into the capital. At two o'clock
in the morning on August 21, 1886, the Bulgarian officers in the pay
of the conspirators rushed into the palace, forced the prince at the
point of a revolver to sign his own abdication, then kidnapped him
in a carriage, taking him off to the Danube, where he was put on
board of a boat under h