DRUSSLt never hesitated to strike hard for more power at
a suitable moment. Nor did she ever shrink from dishonourable means when it suited her purpose. To break solemn pledges or to falsify a telegram is all the same for those whose motto always was : "Necessity knows no law." Prussians have no thought of honour when their lust of power and aggrandisement is concerned. But we now may well wonder how Prussia could for more than half-a-century deceive nearly the whole world so successfully with respect to her unceasing preparations for conquering world-power, which culminated in the present war. The intervention of Great Britain in August, 1914, brought—happily for the whole world, hut especially for the. small nations—that object to judgment. Had the Powers likewise intervened in 1861, when the Germans made war on little Denmark, "scheming piracy under cover of pacific correspondence," as Gladstone wrote, this catastrophe might never have happened. The late Lord Salisbury clearly perceived then what the real object of that war was. And his remarkable essay on "The Danish Duchies," written apparently towards the end of 1863 (and with two other essays on "Foreign Politics," by the then Lord Robert Cecil, published in 1905 by John Murray), affords nowadays to us striking proofs that Prussians never change. After all that has happened since July, 1914, one is now forcibly struck by Lord Salisbury's sound judgment of the Prussians and their methods.
Before quoting his instructive comment, it is well to remember some remarks made by Bismarck at the height of the Danish affair. Speaking on September 30th, 1862, in the Prussian Budget Committee, the Iron Chancellor said : "It is not to Prussia's liberalism that Germany looks, but to her power. Prussia must keep her strength together for the favourable moment, which more than once was neglectel. The large issues of the time are not determined by speeches and majority decisions, but by iron and blood." Speaking on April 17th of the following year in the Prussian Parliaments Bismarck stated : "The fonner speaker tried to assure Denmark that she need fear no war from Prussia at a moment when the situation at home and abroad is unhinged. Gentle- men, abroad they are luckily less credulous, and I can assure you and assure foreign countries that if we find it necessary to go to war we shall do so either with or without tLex approbation." And on December 24th of the same year 1863, when the German States were already resolved to break their pledge concerning the Danish succession, the Prussian Chancellor declared quite frankly in a letter to the German Ambassador, Count Goltz, at Paris : "If the European treaties had to be measured according to morality and justice, then they ought nearly all to be .abolished.' Bismarck declared, further, that from the beginning of the quarrel about the Danish Duchies he "had kept annexation firmly in view." * Now these significant remarks prove fully how well Lord Salisbury dived into the Prussian soul when he, in his afore-- named essay, found the German reasons for quarrelling with Denmark but flimsy pretexts in order to hide the ulterior and real object. Nominally that little country was attacked in 1864 to secure the succession of the young Duke of Augustenburg to the Danish throne, instead of the rightful heir, Prince Christian of Gliicksburg. Lord Salisbury proved fully the justice of the latter's claim. But, whatis more, all the German States signed the Treaty of London of 1852, which recognized that Prince as the successor of King Frederick VII. who died in 1863. Bismarck himself nego- tiated at Frankfort with the senior Duke of Augustenburg, who by rebellion had forfeited all claims to his Danish estates, but received nevertheless more than £400,000 compensation, and pledged himself and his family, by his "princely word and honour, not to undertake anything whereby the tranquillity of his [Danish] Majesty's dominions and lands might be disturbed." On which Lord Salisbury commented : "Iii the vocabulary of the Duke of Augustenburg it is to be presumed that the word ' family ' does not include sons ; for it is [was] his son who is [was] now [then] revolutionizing Holstein under the wing of the Federal [German] army." And Bismarck himself supported that son, the Pretender_ Moreover, although all the German States had also pledged themselves by the Treaty of 1852 to "the maintenance of the integrity of the Danish monarchy" as "being connected with the general interests of the equilibrium of Europe" and "of high importance for the preservation of peace," yet they brutally tore the two Duchies from Denmark, just as Germany tore to pieces the Treaty guaranteeing Belgian neutrality. To the latter applies with equal force what Lord Salisbury wrote about the former : "Can the most hardened diplomatist among them [the Germans] repress a blush of shame for his country when he reads over again the pledge so solemnly, so recently made, and so shamelessly forsworn ? " Referring to the death of King Frederick VII., which brought the German-Danish crisis to a head, Lord Salisbury wrote :— " In conformity of the treaty [of 1852] France. England, Russia, and Sweden at once recognized Prince Christian as his successor. Austria
and Prussia hang back. They are not shameless enough openly to repudiate their plighted word [which by the war they afterwards didj, but they refuse to keep it. They will not re3ognize Prince Christian. though as yet they have abstained from recognizing the Pretender. [Which did not last long.] Saxony and Hanover, overjoyed at being
• An these four quotations are taken from a German book, published last year la Germany on the centenary of Bismarck's blzth, The Chancellor OW son Monarch in Ms Letters, Speeches, and Reminiscences, also is Stories and Anecdotes oi Ms rims.
allowed to play a conspicuous part of any kind, be it over so ignominious, loudly proclaim that they are not only willing, but eager, to dishonour the faith that they have pledged. Meanwhile, the great mass of Prussian and Austrian Radicals, with that curious indifference to morality [vide the words of Bismarck above] which is characteristic of sentimental politicians, are furiously calling upon their Sovereigns to enter upon the same dishonest course. They do not trouble themselves to argue. ' The London Treaty,' says von Sybel [historian and National Liberal politician of Prussia], 'is contra bonos mores. . . . It proposes to rivet a German population to the poisoned chain of Danish rule ; ' and therefore, by the light of this convenient standard of 'good morals,' he proposes to break the faith which Prussia has solemnly pledged, and in which for twelve years past she has suffered us implicitly to believe. This habit of political- repudiation appears to be ingrained In Prussian politicians. Along with his conquests and his glory, Frederick the Great has left them also the disastrous legacy of his treachery. Like most mere imitators, they follow chiefly the defects of their model, and overlook its beauties. There is little enough in their recent history of his military prowess, or his political sagacity ; but of his unblushing perfidy, of his cynical contempt for pledges given and treaties signed, they are admirable copyists."
Is that not a just description of the Germans of to-day ?
Lack of space prevents us quoting much more from Lord Salisbury's remarkable essay. But one or two other passages deserve quotation. He showed how hollow was the pretext that the German population of the two Duchies were oppressed. Indeed, the Danes were far too liberally governed for the German taste. "Denmark's very virtues were turned against her." Her "freedom was a deadly offence in the eyes of [German] despotism." The Germans of Slesvig wanted to hear sermons preached in German. "Happy are the people," wrote Lord Salisbury, "whose grievances are such as these ! It is necessary, in order to avoid forming too mean an opinion of the mental calibre of the Slesvig Estates, to keep in view the vista in the background—the German fleet riding in the harbour of Kid." There we have the clue to the whole German quarrel with Denmark. Lord Salisbury saw through the German game when he wrote about the real motives of that quarrel :— " The National party desires above all things that Germany should be a great naval power ; the dismemberment of Denmark is essential to that end; and we End, actually, that the National party are those who are urging on with the greatest vehemence tho dismemberment of Denmark. Upon these grounds alone it would not be uncharitable to conclude that the Germans were actuated in the [then] present dispute by very much the same motives as that which actuated Ahab in his celebrated controversy with Naboth. But this imputation, disgraceful as it is, is not matter of surmise ; it has been openly admitted —or, rather, loudly proclaimed—again and again, that the grievances of the Holsteiners and Slesvigers were only urged to give Germany an e xcuse for evicting Denmark out of the Duchies. To take but one testimony out of many, we will quote from the Report of the Committee of the House of Representatives at Berlin in 1860. Without these Duchies,' say the Committee, an effectual protection of the coasts of Germany and of the North Sea is impossible ; and the whole of Northern Germany remains open to a hostile attack as long as they belong to a Power inimical to Germany.' A more simply formulated reason for stealing your neighbour's property was never, perhaps, beforo printed In a State paper."
In exactly the same way leading Germans have, before and during this war, argued that the Dutch coast and Dutch rivers are necessary for Germany's safety, by which is meant Germany's world-power. That may form the subject of another article. From the high-handed manner in which Germany treated Denmark in 1864, we can safely conclude that the small European States are, and must be, grateful that this time British sea power stepped between them and her.
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