ip
and alliance impart to your counsels, and we by dint of example, ought
to succeed in averting this awful peril." In this tone, Herr von Schoen
delivered his daily exhortations and found some willing listeners. His
specious pleading made a deep and favourable impression, and would
perhaps have led to representations by the French Government
calculated to wound the susceptibilities and perhaps estrange the
sympathies of France's ally at the most critical hour of the alliance,
had it not been for the presence at the Foreign Office of a man whose
eye was sure and whose measurement of forces, political and personal,
was accurate. That man was M. Berthelot. Gauging aright this
insidious appeal to the centrifugal forces of the political mind, he
turned a deaf ear to von Schoen's suasive efforts and kept the ship of
state on its course, without swerving. In this way what seemed to the
Berlin politicians the line of least resistance was adequately
reinforced and a formidable, because crafty, attack repulsed.

But besides attack, the Germans had also a problem of defence to
engage their attention. And, curiously enough, it appears to have been
particularly knotty in Austria. At that moment Count Berchtold was
Minister of Foreign Affairs in name, but Count Tisza, the Hungarian
Premier, was the man who thought, planned and acted for the Habsburg
Monarchy. He it was who had drawn up the ultimatum to Serbia and made
all requisite arrangements for co-operation with Germany. He was
backed by the Chief of the General Staff, Konrad von Hoetzendorff,
whose eagerness to provide an opportunity for displaying the martial
qualities of the army was proverbial. But there were others in high
places there who had no wish to see the Dual Monarchy drawn into a
European war, and who would gladly have come to an agreement with
Russia on the basis of such a compromise as Serbia's reply to the
ultimatum promised to afford. Whether, as seems very probable, this
current bade fair to gain the upper hand, it is still too soon to
determine with finality. There are certainly many indications that
this was one of the dangers apprehended in Berlin. Russia's moderation
was another. And the interplay of the two might, had Germany held
aloof, have led to a compromise. For this reason Germany did not stand
aloof.

The date fixed for the German mobilization was July 31. The evidence
for this is to be found in the date printed on the official order
which was p