he had a
century ago won, and held at the point of the sword, until a Great Power
had, under a wrong conviction, handed it over to her neighbouring
Goliath; when the Sandjack of Novi-Bazar was threatened with the fate
which seemed to have already overtaken Bosnia and Herzegovina; when
gallant little Montenegro was already shut out from the sea by the
octopus-like grip of Dalmatia crouching along her western shore; when
Turkey was dwindling down to almost ineptitude; when Greece was almost a
byword, and when Albania as a nation--though still nominally subject--was
of such unimpaired virility that there were great possibilities of her
future, it was imperative that something must happen if the Balkan race
was not to be devoured piecemeal by her northern neighbours. To the end
of ultimate protection I found most of them willing to make defensive
alliance.

And as the true defence consists in judicious attack, I have no doubt
that an alliance so based must ultimately become one for all purposes.
Albania was the most difficult to win to the scheme, as her own
complications with her suzerain, combined with the pride and
suspiciousness of her people, made approach a matter of extreme caution.
It was only possible when I could induce her rulers to see that, no
matter how great her pride and valour, the magnitude of northern advance,
if unchecked, must ultimately overwhelm her.

I own that this map-making was nervous work, for I could not shut my eyes
to the fact that German lust of enlargement lay behind Austria's advance.
At and before that time expansion was the dominant idea of the three
Great Powers of Central Europe. Russia went eastward, hoping to gather
to herself the rich north-eastern provinces of China, till ultimately she
should dominate the whole of Northern Europe and Asia from the Gulf of
Finland to the Yellow Sea. Germany wished to link the North Sea to the
Mediterranean by her own territory, and thus stand as a flawless barrier
across Europe from north to south.

When Nature should have terminated the headship of the Empire-Kingdom,
she, as natural heir, would creep southward through the German-speaking
provinces. Thus Austria, of course kept in ignorance of her neighbour's
ultimate aims, had to extend towards the south. She had been barred in
her western movement by the rise of the Irredentist party in Italy, and
consequently had to withdraw behind the frontiers of Carinthia, Carniola,
and Istria.

My