It appears, however, that the contention of the Chancellor was strictly in accord with one of the fundamental laws of the Empire.  His attitude towards France throughout the later phases of the Boulanger affair was coldly “correct,” while he manifested the greatest deference towards the private prejudices of the Czar when the Empress Frederick allowed the proposals of marriage between her daughter and Prince Alexander of Battenberg to be renewed.  Knowing the unchangeable hatred of the Czar for the ex-Prince of Bulgaria, Bismarck used all his influence to thwart the proposal, which was defeated by the personal intervention of the present Kaiser[266].  According to our present information, then, German policy was sincerely peaceful, alike in aim and in tone, during the first six months of the year; and the piling up of armaments which then went on from the Urals to the Pyrenees may be regarded as an unconsciously ironical tribute paid by the Continental Powers to the cause of peace.

[Footnote 266:  Bismarck:  Some Secret Pages, etc. vol. iii. p. 335.]

* * * * *

A change came over the scene when William II. ascended the throne of Germany (June 15, 1888).  At once he signalised the event by issuing a proclamation to the army, in which occurred the words:  “I swear ever to remember that the eyes of my ancestors look down upon me from the other world, and that I shall one day have to render account to them of the glory and honour of the army.”  The navy received his salutation on that same day; and not until three days later did a proclamation go forth to his people.  Men everywhere remembered that “Frederick the Noble” had first addressed his people, and then his army and navy.  The inference was unavoidable that the young Kaiser meant to be a Frederick the Great rather than a “citizen Emperor,” as his father had longed to be known.  The world has now learnt to discount the utterances of the most impulsive of Hohenzollern rulers; but in those days, when it knew not his complex character, such an army order seemed to portend the advent of another Napoleon.

Not only France but Russia felt some alarm.  True, the young Kaiser speedily paid a visit to his relative at St. Petersburg; but it soon appeared that the stolid and very reserved Alexander III. knew not what to make of the versatile personality that now controlled the policy of Central Europe.  It was therefore natural that France and Russia should take precautionary measures; and we now know that these were begun in the autumn of that year.

In the first instance, they took the form of loans.  A Parisian financier, M. Hoskier, Danish by descent, but French by naturalisation and sympathy, had long desired to use the resources of Paris as a means of cementing friendship, and, if possible, alliance with Russia.  For some time he made financial overtures at St. Petersburg, only to find all doors closed against him by German capitalists.  But in the spring of the year 1888 the Berlin Bourse had been seized by a panic at the excessive amount of Russian securities held by German houses; large sales took place, and thenceforth it seemed impossible for Russia to raise money at Berlin or Frankfurt except on very hard terms.