the European
powers are at war Italy is at peace with all the belligerents.
Consequently the citizens and subjects of the Kingdom of Italy are
obliged to observe the duty of neutrality." This declaration of
neutrality severed the bonds that held Italy to the Triple Alliance.
On the same afternoon, August 4, 1914, the Russian Ambassador at
Berlin was handed his passports and departed; this official
statement was given to the German press: "In consequence of a
Russian attack on German territory Germany is in a state of war with
Russia.

"The French reply to Germany's note has been received in the
meantime, and is of an unsatisfactory character. In addition France
has ordered the mobilization of her army so that the outbreak of war
between Germany and France must be awaited at any moment." The
outbreak of war between France and Germany was indeed near at hand,
for, as we have already seen, Germany declared war on France August
3, 1914, and on that very day served an ultimatum on neutral Belgium
and occupied Luxemburg preparatory to an immediate invasion of
Belgium. In view of the evident long and careful preparations for
just such a sudden stroke, by which to crush France and take Paris
before the French armies could offer adequate resistance, the clumsy
attempts of the Germans on August 2, 1914, to represent the French
as the aggressors seem ridiculous, though typical of German attempts
to influence opinion at home and abroad. The German Government
declared that French airmen had flown over Nuremburg, that French
officers in German uniforms had crossed the German frontier from
Holland, that the French were already in Alsace. These stories
deceived no one.

What the neutral nations saw and understood was that the autocratic
governments of Germany and Austria-Hungary had plunged the world
into a war of incalculable magnitude, almost without warning and
with comparatively trivial pretexts. There had been only a brief
mockery of diplomatic interchanges, for the most part by telegraph
and telephone.

On August 4, 1914, the last chance for averting war between England
and Germany went by. On that date the British Foreign Office had
telegraphed to its Envoy at Brussels: "You should inform Belgian
Government that if pressure is applied to them by Germany to induce
them to depart from neutrality, his Majesty's Government expect that
they will resist by any means in their power, and that his Majesty's
Government will support