ld, and when the
first three months of war were over, the German Empire, the British
Empire, the Republic of France and her colonies, and above all, the
Russian Empire, were welded by the grim forces of necessity into
homogeneous units. Moreover, mobilization and the conditions of war
bring into high relief the powers and the characters of the several
nations, and as the story of the war is told, its developments
portray the changing appreciations of the national combatants for
each other, and of the neutral nations for all.

PART IV--DIPLOMATIC PAPERS RELATING TO THE ORIGIN OF THE WAR,
COLLATED FROM THE OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS

Realizing the importance of presenting its case to the neutral
world, each of the warring nations published its diplomatic
correspondence leading up to the outbreak of the war, at a period
during hostilities when the publication seemed best calculated to
serve the end in view.

THE OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS

British White Papers, July 20 to September 1, 1914.

Belgian Gray Book, April 7, 1914, to September 30, 1914.

German White Book, July 23 to August 4, 1914.

French Yellow Book, March 17, 1913, to September 4, 1914.

Russian Orange Book, July 23 to August 6, 1914.

Serbian Blue Book, June 29 to August 4, 1914.

Austro-Hungarian Red Book, June 29 to August 24, 1914.

Official publications in the press by Great Britain, Russia,
Germany, and Italy, July 30 to December 6, 1914.

Various speeches by officers of the Governments.

It is from these official documents, cast into one form by
rearranging all letters, telegrams, proclamations, speeches, etc.,
in their chronological order, that the following history of the
diplomatic controversy is compiled.

It will be observed that, from the necessity of the case, the books
of the six principal allies against the Teutonic Powers are
threefold in number the books of those powers; and that, from choice
of their promulgators the books of the Teutonic Powers are also
disproportionately less in total volume, owing to the almost entire
absence in them of communications between Austria-Hungary and
Germany; while the correspondence between their adversaries is
presented by these with a fulness which gives the neutral reader the
impression that nothing of importance has been withheld--indeed,
that the Allies (to use for convenience the popular designation of
the anti-Teutonic powers) have laid