Reading the German comments upon these declarations, one is driven
to despair by the exactitude with which German history repeats itself. The overtures which in the opening days of this century were made to Germany by the Prime Minister's father were met by an almost identical response. True it is that in those days the rulers of Germany were men of education, and that they either pos- sessed or tried to emulate those conventions and courtesies which representatives of a Great Power were, in those old- fashionable days, expected to observe. Prince Billow in replying to Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's Leicester speech con- fined himself to the assertion that Germany " must be either the hammer or the anvil "—an assertion which sounded Bismarckian, but which in fact meant nothing at all. It is not, however, from past speeches, nor even from old Press articles, that I derive this appalling impression that Germany is repeating the sinister blunders which she made in 1901 ; it is after comparing the statements made in Germany today with despatches and minutes written forty years ago (and published almost in their entirety by the Weimar Republic) that I come to the dire conclusion that some nemesis hangs over the German people which drives their leaders to suspect an ambush where is in truth a generous opportunity.
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