ere justified and our demand for a
guarantee was absolutely indispensable." [19]

France, through M. Delcasse, and England, through Lord Crewe, sought to
dispel these fears by formally disclaiming any intention to press upon
Greece a mutilation to which she objected, and explaining that the
eventual cession of Cavalla was only envisaged on condition that she
should consent of her own accord. M. Zographos, however, who had done
his best to bring Greece in on reasonable terms, convinced of his
failure, resigned; and after his departure the Gounaris Government
would permit itself no further discussion upon the subject of
intervention.

During the lull that ensued, the Greek General Staff once more, in
June, approached the Servian Government with detailed suggestions for a
common plan against Bulgaria, dwelling on the necessity of a
preliminary concentration of sufficient Servian troops along the
Graeco-Serbo-Bulgarian frontier to counterbalance the Bulgarian
advantage in rapidity of mobilization. These steps proved as barren as
all the preceding: while Servia would not try to conjure the Bulgarian
peril by the sacrifices which the Entente recommended, she could not
provide against it by entering into arrangements with Greece which the
Entente disapproved.

{42}

Matters came to a head on 3 August, when the British Minister at Sofia
made to the Bulgarian Government a formal offer of Cavalla and an
undefined portion of its hinterland, as well as of Servian territory in
Macedonia, stating that Great Britain would bring pressure to bear on
those countries, and make the cession to them of any compensations
elsewhere conditional on their consent to this transaction.

The shock lost nothing of its intensity by being long anticipated. M.
Passitch, the Servian Premier, in an interview with the Greek Minister
at Nish, expressed his profound dismay at the corner into which Servia
was driven; much as she resented this proposal, the fact that she was
entirely dependent on the Entente--whose high-handed methods he did not
fail to criticize--forced her to give it consideration.

If Servia had been dismayed, Greece was enraged. M. Gounaris addressed
a strongly-worded remonstrance to the British Minister at Athens,
reminding him that in May his Government had protested against the
offer of Greek territory to Bulgaria, and that both Lord Crewe and M.
Delcasse had disavowed any intention to bring the least pressure to
bear upon G