.0D0 RUSSELL AND BISMARCK
Ambassador to Bismarck. Lord Odo Russell. By Winifred Taffs. (Muller. 155.) STUDENTS of European history in the second half of the last century will welcome a volume which supplies so much direct information regarding the methods and moods of Bismarck in the twelve years from 1872 to 1884, during which Lord Odo Russell, first Baron Ampthill, occupied the position of Ambassador at Berlin. The great Chancellor, who had completed his task of uniting Germany, had rapidly acquired a controlling influence over a situation in Europe which presented many problems. The capital of the new German Empire was, therefore, a valuable centre for observation and probably, though it may not have been realised at the time of Odo Russell's original appointment, the most important of diplo- matic posts. It was for us an epoch of famous Ambassadors —Stratford de Redcliffe, Lyons and Ampthill himself, whose official reports, many of them now published for the first time, make this volume of first-hand historical value. These dis- patches, or extracts from them, are here presented in a co- ordinating narrative from the pen of an able exponent and guide. Besides the light they throw on the fluctuation of international antagonisms and combinations in a perplexing time, they reveal how important the work in capable hands of the old diplomacy could be in testing information and dia- gnosing symptoms for the instruction of authorities at home, not always readily disposed to follow it. Such a book will, however, probably be more appreciated by the student than by the general reader who may not possess the knowledge of antecedents and circumstance giving rise to problems now for the large majority passing out of living memory. Those alsci who might expect to find in it a complete biographical record of the service of a gifted and exceptionally attractive personality may be disappointed to find that it deals only with Odo Russell's activity in Berlin. There is merely a passing reference to the important though unostentatious part he played in the last phase of the Italian Risorgimento, when he was detached from the Legation at Turin or Florence to succeed Lord Lyons in the capacity of an observer at Rome. In conversation, however, with the present writer as a member of his staff in Berlin, he made it clear that the many years he spent at the Papal court, where though not officially accredited he became a favourite with Pius IX, were the happiest of his career.
• In the first section of this volume dealing with the initial stage of the new German Empire some light is thrown on the obscurities of the prosecution and fall of Arnim and on the long-drawn-out Kukurkampf, the struggle with the Catholic Church in which Bismarck somewhat rashly engaged without the support of the sovereign or a sufficient realisation of the stubborn spirit of Rome. He, however, clearly dreaded at that time the association of the Ultramontanes with France before he had been able to ensure the future of Germany through his new army Bill. Indeed, throughout the whole volume Odo Russell's reports reveal the Chancellor's genuine apprehension that French eagerness for the Revanche would bring about a challenge before he had completed the internal organisation of his country. Book II is almost entirely devoted to the so-called Eastern Question which monopolised the attention of Europe and aroused international rivalries after the Balkan upheaval in 1875 till after the settlement at the Congress of Berlin in 1878. Bismarck is shown assuming the role of the honest broker, only concerned in preserving peace when the old alliance of the three Emperors was being under- mined by the rivalry of Austria and Russia. But the Ambassador did not fail to perceive that he had his own interest to serve in conciliating the latter, the danger of whose attraction to France he foresaw. Any advantage which might accrue to her he was ready to counter-balance by encouraging Great Britain to occupy Egypt, Crete and Cyprus, while diverting the thoughts of France from Germany by facilitating her estab- lishment in Tunis.
The third section deals with the aftermath of the Peace Treaty in tedious negotiations for the delimitation of the new boundaries of Greece and Montenegro; Bismarck's con- cessions to Rome and the termination of the Kulturkampf necessitated by internal conditions in his own country; the growing sympathy between Germany and Austria which led to their alliance and the Egyptian crisis which brought about the British occupation. Odo Russell had been shrewd though to convince himself in 1879 that the Chancellor would supPort Great Britain in Egypt so long only as it served his interest to do so, a prevision of which we were to realise the justice later on. A chapter is also devoted to the premonitory symptoms of the colonial issue between Great Britain and Germany. Ampthill, as Russell became in 188o, having reason to know that Bismarck held that the expansion of the Reich had reached saturation, was, justifiably perhaps, reluctant to believe that he would support, as pressure from public opinion eventually compelled him to do, a colonial movement which led inevitably to certain contentious issues handled at the outset somewhat maladroitly on our part and later disingenuously by the Chancellor. The volume concludes with a sympathetic review of Ampthill's admirable service as an Ambassador, whose personal charm and tact enabled him to retain to the last the confidence of so suspicious a controversialist as the Chancellor and the esteem, not to say the affection, of the Imperial Court.
In reviewing a book which displays so much industry and ability on the part of the compiler one is reluctant to offer any criticisms. But it would certainly have assisted the reader's valuation of a situation under discussion if the text of the Berlin memorandum of 1876, several times referred to in Chapter VII, had been inserted. It is no doubt desirable to restrict superfluous interpolations, but that particular document would surely better deserve inclusion than a some- what superfluous plan of the seating at the Congress of Berlin. And is it pedantic to protest against the use in a serious work of such colloquialisms as "butted in " ? These, however, are minor considerations. The authoress is to be congratulated on having produced a volume which should have its place in all
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