clumsy, and to plume ourselves on our own as
tactful and dignified. Well, if one were charged with the defence of
this thesis, the last source to which one would turn for evidence in
support of it is our diplomatic negotiations with M. Bratiano's
Cabinet.

In the light of this _expose_ the severe judgments that have been
passed on the policy of the Roumanian Cabinet may have to be revised.

The crux of the situation was the attitude of Bulgaria. Bulgaria, a
petty country with a population inferior to that of London,
impregnated with Teutonism and ruled by an Austro-Hungarian officer
who loathes the Slavs, had throughout this sanguinary clash of peoples
rendered invaluable services to the Teutons and indirectly inflicted
incalculable losses on the civilized nations of the globe. This
tremendous power for evil springs from her unique strategic position
in Eastern Europe. At any moment during the conflict her active
assistance would have won Constantinople and Turkey for the Allies,
and if proffered during one of several particularly favourable
conjunctures might have speedily ended the war. But so tight was
Germany's grip on her that she not only withheld her own aid, but
actually threatened to fall foul of any of the Balkan States that
should tender theirs. It is, therefore, no exaggeration to affirm that
the duration of this war and some of the most doleful events
chronicled during the first year of its prosecution, are due to the
insidious behaviour of Ferdinand of Coburg and his Bulgarian
coadjutors. One may add that this behaviour constitutes a brilliant
and lasting testimony to the foresight and resourcefulness of German
diplomacy. It is one of the products of German organization as
distinguished from French and British individualism.

While Bulgaria was thus holding the menace of her army over Roumania's
head, and M. Bratiano stood irresolute between belligerency and
neutrality, the German and Austrian armies were effectively
co-operating with German and Austrian diplomatists. They compelled the
Russians to withdraw from Eastern Prussia,[87] and from a part of
Galicia,[88] later on from Lodz, from the Masurian Lakes and
Bukovina.[89] Gradually Roumania saw herself bereft of what would have
been her right wing and cover, and her military men, the most
influential of whom had been against intervention from the first, now
declared the moment inauspicious on strategical grounds. Thereupon the
oratorical representat