the whole Moroccan question, and the tension between the Powers was for some time acute.  Nor did Mr. Lloyd George make it much better by a fiery speech at the Mansion House on July 21, which considerably fluttered the Continental dovecots.  The immediate problem, however, was solved by the cession of about one hundred thousand square miles of territory in the Congo basin by France to Germany in compensation for German acquiescence in the French protectorate over Morocco.  I need not, perhaps, refer to other more recent events.  One point, however, must not be omitted.  The issue of the Balkan wars in 1912 caused a distinct disappointment to both Germany and Austria.  Turkey’s defeat lessened the importance of the Ottoman Empire as an ally.  Austria had to curb her desires in the direction of Salonica.  And the enemies who had prevented the realisation of wide Teutonic schemes were Servia and her protector, Russia.  From this time onwards Austria waited for an opportunity to avenge herself on Servia, while Germany, in close union with her ally, began to study the situation in relation to the Great Northern Empire in an eminently bellicose spirit.

MILITARISM

Now that we have the proper standpoint from which to watch the general tendency of events like these, we can form some estimate of the nature of German ambition and the results of the personal ascendancy of the Kaiser.  We speak vaguely of militarism.  Fortunately, we have a very valuable document to enable us to understand what precisely German militarism signifies.  General von Bernhardi’s Germany and the Next War is one of the most interesting, as well as most suggestive, of books, intended to illustrate the spirit of German ambition.  Bernhardi writes like a soldier.  Such philosophy as he possesses he has taken from Nietzsche.  His applications of history come from Treitschke.  He has persuaded himself that the main object of human life is war, and the higher the nation the more persistently must it pursue preparations for war.  Hence the best men in the State are the fighting men.  Ethics and religion, so far as they deprecate fighting and plead for peace, are absolutely pernicious.  Culture does not mean, as we hoped and thought, the best development of scientific and artistic enlightenment, but merely an all-absorbing will-power, an all-devouring ambition to be on the top and to crush every one else.  The assumption throughout is that the German is the highest specimen of humanity.  Germany is especially qualified to be the leader, and the only way in which it can become the leader is to have such overwhelming military power that no one has any chance of resisting.  Moreover, all methods are justified in the sacred cause of German culture—­duplicity, violence, the deliberate sowing of dissensions between possible rivals, incitements of Asiatics to rise against Europeans.  All means are to be adopted to win the ultimate great