was made.  There is, in fact, abundant evidence that it was so.  The scheme failed only because Germany was foolish enough to threaten England before settling accounts with Russia.  But this, again, was the result of internal pressure.  Hamburg, and all the interests which the name stands for, cared less for expansion in the East than for the capture of markets overseas.  For this important section of conservative Germany, England was the enemy.  So the gauntlet was thrown down to the whole civilised world at once, and the odds against Germany were too great.

For the time being, the world has no example of a strong monarchy.  The three great European empires are, at the time of writing, in a state of septic dissolution.  The victors have sprung to the welcome conclusion that democracy is everywhere triumphant, and that before long no other type of civilised state will exist.  The amazing provincialism of American political thought accepts this conclusion without demur; and our public men, some of whom doubtless know better, have served the needs of the moment by effusions of political nonsense which almost surpass the orations delivered every year on the Fourth of July.  But no historian can suppose that one of the most widespread and successful forms of human association has been permanently extinguished because the Central Empires were not quite strong enough to conquer Europe, an attempt which has always failed, and probably will always fail.  The issue is not fully decided, even for our own generation.  The ascendancy will belong to that nation which is the best organised, the most strenuous, the most intelligent, the most united.  Before the war none would have hesitated to name Germany as holding this position; and until the downfall of the Empire the nation seemed to possess those qualities unimpaired.  The three Empires collapsed in hideous chaos as soon as they deposed their monarchs.  In the case of Russia, it is difficult to imagine any recovery until the monarchy is restored; and Germany would probably be well-advised to choose some member of the imperial family as a constitutional sovereign.  A monarch frequently represents his subjects better than an elected assembly; and if he is a good judge of character he is likely to have more capable and loyal advisers.  President Wilson’s declaration that ’a steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations; for no autocratic government could ever be trusted to keep faith within it,’ is one of the most childish exhibitions of doctrinaire naivete which ever proceeded from the mouth of a public man.  History gives no countenance to the theory that popular governments are either more moral or more pacific than strong monarchies.  The late Lord Salisbury, in one of his articles in the Quarterly Review, spoke the truth on this subject.  ’Moderation, especially in the matter of territory, has never been a characteristic of democracy.  Wherever it has had free play, in