M. Sturdza, sometime leader of the Liberal party and Prime Minister; of M. Carp, sometime leader of the Conservative party and Prime Minister; of M. Maiorescu, ex-Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, who presided at the Bucarest Conference of 1913; of M. Marghiloman, till recently leader of the Conservative party, to name only the more important.  M. Sturdza, the old statesman who had been one of King Carol’s chief coadjutors in the making of modern Rumania, and who had severed for many years his connexion with active politics, again took up his pen to raise a word of warning.  M. Carp, the political aristocrat who had retired from public life a few years previously, and had professed a lifelong contempt for the ’Press and all its works’, himself started a daily paper (Moldova) which, he intended should expound his views.  Well-known writers like M. Radu Rosetti wrote[1] espousing the cause favoured by the king, though not for the king’s reasons:  Carol had faith in Germany, the Rumanians mistrusted Russia.  They saw no advantage in the dismemberment of Austria, the most powerful check to Russia’s plans in the Near East.  They dreaded the idea of seeing Russia on the Bosphorus, as rendering illusory Rumania’s splendid position at the mouth of the Danube.  For not only is a cheap waterway absolutely necessary for the bulky products forming the chief exports of Rumania; but these very products, corn, petroleum, and timber, also form the chief exports of Russia, who, by a stroke of the pen, may rule Rumania out of competition, should she fail to appreciate the political leadership of Petrograd.  Paris and Rome were, no doubt, beloved sisters; but Sofia, Moscow, and Budapest were next-door neighbours to be reckoned with.

[Footnote 1:  See R. Rosetti, Russian Politics at Work in the Rumanian Countries, facts compiled from French official documents, Bucarest, 1914.]

Those who held views opposed to those, confident in the righteousness of the Allies’ cause and in their final victory, advocated immediate intervention, and to that end made the most of the two sentiments which animated public opinion:  interest in the fate of the Transylvanians, and sympathy with France.  They contended that though a purely national policy was not possible, the difference between Transylvania and Bessarabia in area and in number and quality of the population was such that no hesitation was admissible.  The possession of Transylvania was assured if the Allies were successful; whereas Russia would soon recover if defeated, and would regain Bessarabia by force of arms, or have it once more presented to her by a Congress anxious to soothe her ’sentiment de dignite blessee’.  A Rumania enlarged in size and population had a better chance of successfully withstanding any eventual pressure from the north, and it was clear that any attempt against her independence would be bound to develop into a European question.  Rumania could not forget what she owed to France;