The Treaty of Frankfort (May 10, 1871), in which France submitted to the demands of the new-born German Empire, opened a fresh era of European diplomacy and international competition.  The German Empire became at once, and has ever since remained, the predominant Power in Western Europe.  The public opinion of this new Germany has been captured to no small extent by the views of such aggressive patriots as Treitschke, who openly avowed that ’the greatness and good of the world is to be found in the predominance there of German culture, of the German mind, in a word of the German character’.  The school of Treitschke looked for the establishment of a German world-empire, and held that the essential preliminary to this scheme would be the overthrow of France and England.  But until 1890, that is to say so long as Prince Bismarck remained Chancellor, no such ambitious programme was adopted by the German Government.  Bismarck was content to strengthen the position of the Empire and to sow disunion among her actual or suspected enemies.  In 1872 he brought about a friendly understanding with Austria and Russia, the other two great Powers of Eastern Europe, the so-called Dreikaiserbuendnis, which was designed to perpetuate the status quo.  But the friendship with Russia quickly cooled; it received a sharp set-back in 1875, when the Tsar Alexander II came forward rather ostentatiously to save France from the alleged hostile designs of Germany; it was certainly not improved when Bismarck in his turn mediated between Russia and her opponents at the Congress of Berlin (1878).  On the other hand, a common interest in the Eastern Question drew closer the bonds between Germany and Austria.  The latter felt herself directly menaced by the Balkan policy of Russia; the former was not prepared to see her southern neighbour despoiled of territory.  Hence in 1879 was initiated that closer union between Germany and Austria which has been so largely responsible for the present situation.  The Treaty of 1879, which was kept secret until 1887, was purely defensive in its character; but the terms showed that Russia was the enemy whom both the contracting Powers chiefly feared.  Neither was bound to active measures unless the other should be attacked by Russia, or any Power which had Russian support.  In 1882 the alliance of the two great German Powers was joined by Italy—­a surprising development which can only be explained on the ground of Italy’s feeling that she could not hope for security at home, or for colonial expansion in the Mediterranean, so long as she remained in isolation.  The Triple Alliance so constituted had a frail appearance, and it was hardly to be expected that Italy would receive strong support from partners in comparison with whose resources her own were insignificant.  But the Triple Alliance has endured to the present day, the most permanent feature of the diplomatic system of the last thirty-two years.  Whether the results have been commensurate with the sacrifices of sentiment and ambition which Italy has made, it is for Italy to judge.  On the whole she has been a sleeping partner in the Alliance; its prestige has served almost exclusively for the promotion of Austrian and German aims; and one of its results has been to make Austria a formidable rival of Italy in the Adriatic.