The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 Part 3

58.]

Before adverting to the proximate cause of the rupture, we may note that Beust's despatch of July 11, 1870, to Prince Metternich, Austrian amba.s.sador at Paris, displayed genuine fear lest France should rush blindly into war with Prussia; and he charged Metternich tactfully to warn the French Government against such a course of action, which would "be contrary to all that we have agreed upon. . . . Even if we wished, we could not suddenly equip a respectably large force. . . . Our services are gained to a certain extent [by France]; but we shall not go further unless events carry us on; and we do not dream of plunging into war because it might suit France to do so."

Again, however, the military men seem to have pushed on the diplomatists. The Archduke Albrecht and Count Vitzthum went to Paris charged with some promises of support to France in case of war.

Thereafter, Count Beust gave the a.s.surance at Vienna that the Austrians would be "faithful to our engagements, as they have been recorded in the letters exchanged last year between the two sovereigns. We consider the cause of France as ours, and we will contribute to the success of her arms to the utmost of our power[17]."

[Footnote 17: _Memoirs of Count Beust,_ vol. ii. p. 359. _The Present Position of European Politics_ p. 366 (1887). By the author of _Greater Britain._]

In the midst of this maze of cross-purposes this much is clear: that both Emperors had gone to work behind the backs of their Ministers, and that the military chiefs of France and Austria brought their States to the brink of war while their Ministers and diplomatists were unaware of the nearness of danger.

As we have seen, King Victor Emmanuel II. longed to draw the sword for Napoleon III., whose help to Italy in 1859-60 he so curiously overrated.

Fortunately for Italy, his Ministers took a more practical view of the situation; but probably they too would have made common cause with France had they received a definite promise of the withdrawal of French troops from Rome and the satisfaction of Italian desires for the Eternal City as the national capital. This promise, even after the outbreak of war, the French Emperor declined to give, though his cousin, Prince Napoleon, urged him vehemently to give way on that point[18].

[Footnote 18: See the _Rev. des deux Mondes_ for April 1, 1878, and "Chronique" of the _Revue d'Histoire diplomatique_ for 1905, p. 298; also W.H. Stillman, _The Union of Italy, 1815-1895_, p. 348.]

In truth, the Emperor could not well give way. An Oec.u.menical Council sat at Rome from December 1869 to July 1870; its Ultramontane tendencies were throughout strongly marked, as against the "Old Catholic" views; and it was a foregone conclusion that the Council would vote the dogma of the infallibility of the Pope in matters of religion--as it did on the day before France declared war against Prussia. How, then, could the Emperor, the "eldest son of the Church," as French monarchs have proudly styled themselves, bargain away Rome to the Italian Government, already stained by sacrilege, when this crowning aureole of grace was about to encircle the visible Head of the Church? There was no escape from the dilemma. Either Napoleon must go into war with shouts of "Judas" hurled at him by all pious Roman Catholics; or he must try his fortunes without the much-coveted help of Austria and Italy. He chose the latter alternative, largely, it would seem, owing to the influence of his vehemently Catholic Empress[19]. After the first defeats he sought to open negotiations, but then it was too late. Prince Napoleon went to Florence and arrived there on August 20; but his utmost efforts failed to move the Italian Cabinet from neutrality.

[Footnote 19: For the relations of France to the Vatican, see _Histoire du second Empire_, by M. De la Gorce, vol. vi. (Paris, 1903); also _Histoire Contemporaine_ (_i.e._ of France in 1869-1875), by M. Samuel Denis, 4 vols. The Empress Eugenie once said that she was "deux fois Catholique," as a Spaniard and as French Empress. (Sir M.K. Grant Duff, _Notes from a Diary, 1851-1872_, vol. i. p. 125.)]

Even this brief survey of international relations shows that Napoleon III. was a source of weakness to France. Having seized on power by perfidious means, he throughout his whole reign strove to dazzle the French by a series of adventures, which indeed pleased the Parisians for the time, but at the cost of lasting distrust among the Powers. Generous in his aims, he at first befriended the German and Italian national movements, but forfeited all the fruits of those actions by his pettifogging conduct about Savoy and Nice, the Rhineland and Belgium; while his final efforts to please French clericals and Chauvinists[20]

by supporting the Pope at Rome, lost him the support of States that might have retrieved the earlier blunders. In brief, by helping on the nationalists of North Germany and Italy he offended French public opinion; and his belated and spasmodic efforts to regain popularity at home aroused against him the distrust of all the Powers. Their feelings about him may be summarised in the _mot_ of a diplomatist, "Scratch the Emperor and you will find the political refugee."

[Footnote 20: Chauvinist is a term corresponding to our "Jingo." It is derived from a man named Chauvin, who lauded Napoleon I. and French glory to the skies.]

How different were the careers of Napoleon III. and of Bismarck! By resolutely keeping before him the national aim, and that only, the Prussian statesman had reduced the tangle of German affairs to simplicity and now made ready for the crowning work of all. In his _Reminiscences_ he avows his belief, as early as 1866, "that a war with France would succeed the war with Austria lay in the logic of history"; and again, "I did not doubt that a Franco-German War must take place before the construction of a United Germany could take place[21]." War would doubtless have broken out in 1867 over the Luxemburg question, had he not seen the need of delay for strengthening the bonds of union with South Germany and a.s.suring the increase of the armies of the Fatherland by the adoption of Prussian methods; or, as he phrased it, "each year's postponement of the war would add 100,000 trained soldiers to our army[22]." In 1870 little was to be gained by delay. In fact, the unionist movement in Germany then showed ominous signs of slackening. In the South the Parliaments opposed any further approach to union with the North; and the voting of the military budget in the North for that year was likely to lead to strong opposition in the interests of the overtaxed people. A war might solve the unionist problem which was insoluble in time of peace; and a _casus belli _was at hand.

[Footnote 21: Bismarck, _Reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. 41, 57 (Eng.

edit.).]

[Footnote 22: _Ib._ p. 58.]

Early in July 1870, the news leaked out that Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern was the officially accepted candidate for the throne of Spain, left vacant since the revolution which drove Queen Isabella into exile in 1868[23]. At once a thrill of rage shot through France; and the Duc de Gramont, Foreign Minister of the new Ollivier Ministry, gave expression to the prevailing feeling in his answer to a question on the subject in the Chamber of Deputies (July 6):--

[Footnote 23: The ex-queen Isabella died in Paris in April 1904.]

We do not think that respect for the rights of a neighbouring people [Spain] obliges us to allow an alien Power [Prussia], by placing one of its princes on the throne of Charles V., to succeed in upsetting to our disadvantage the present equilibrium of forces in Europe, and imperil the interests and honour of France. We have the firm hope that this eventuality will not be realised. To hinder it, we count both on the wisdom of the German people and on the friendship of the Spanish people. If that should not be so, strong in your support and in that of the nation, we shall know how to fulfil our duty without hesitation and without weakness[24].

[Footnote 24: Sorel, _Hist. diplomatique de la Guerre Franco-Allemande_, vol. i. p. 77.]

The opening phrases were inaccurate. The prince in question was Prince Leopold of the Swabian and Roman Catholic branch of the Hohenzollern family, who, as the Duc de Gramont knew, could by no possibility recall the days when Charles V. reigned as Emperor in Germany and monarch in Spain. This misstatement showed the intention of the French Ministry to throw down the glove to Prussia--as is also clear from this statement in Gramont's despatch of July 10 to Benedetti: "If the King will not advise the Prince of Hohenzollern to withdraw, well, it is war forthwith, and in a few days we are at the Rhine[25]."

[Footnote 25: Benedetti, _Ma Mission en Prusse_, p.34. This work contains the French despatches on the whole affair.]

Nevertheless, those who were behind the scenes had just cause for anger against Bismarck. The revelations of Benedetti, French amba.s.sador at Berlin, as well as the Memoirs of the King of Roumania (brother to Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern) leave no doubt that the candidature of the latter was privately and unofficially mooted in 1868, and again in the spring of 1869 through a Prussian diplomatist, Werthern, and that it met with no encouragement whatever from the Prussian monarch or the prince himself. But early in 1870 it was renewed in an official manner by the provisional Government of Spain, and (as seems certain) at the instigation of Bismarck, who, in May-June, succeeded in overcoming the reluctance of the prince and of King William. Bismarck even sought to hurry the matter through the Spanish Cortes so as to commit Spain to the plan; but this failed owing to the misinterpretation of a ciphered telegram from Berlin at Madrid[26].

[Footnote 26: In a recent work, _Kaiser Wilhelm und die Begrundung des Reichs, 1866-1871_, Dr. Lorenz tries to absolve Bismarck from complicity in these intrigues, but without success. See _Reminiscences of the King of Roumania_ (edited by S. Whitman), pp. 70, 86-87, 92-95; also Headlam's _Bismarck_, p. 327.]

Such was the state of the case when the affair became known to the Ollivier Ministry. Though not aware, seemingly, of all these details, Napoleon's advisers were justified in treating the matter, not as a private affair between the Hohenzollerns and Spain (as Germans then maintained it was) but as an attempt of the Prussian Government to place on the Spanish throne a prince who could not but be friendly to the North German Power. In fact, the French saw in it a challenge to war; and putting together all the facts as now known, we must p.r.o.nounce that they were almost certainly right. Bismarck undoubtedly wanted war; and it is impossible to think that he did not intend to use this candidature as a means of exasperating the French. The man who afterwards declared that, at the beginning of the Danish disputes in 1863, he made up his mind to have Schleswig-Holstein for Prussia[27], certainly saw in the Hohenzollern candidature a step towards a Prusso-Spanish alliance or a war with France that might cement German unity.

[Footnote 27: Busch, _Our Chancellor_, vol. i. p. 367.]

In any case, that was the outcome of events. The French papers at once declaimed against the candidature in a way that aroused no less pa.s.sion on the other side of the Rhine. For a brief s.p.a.ce, however, matters seemed to be smoothed over by the calm good sense of the Prussian monarch and his nephew. The King was then at Ems, taking the waters, when Benedetti, the French amba.s.sador, waited on him and pressed him most urgently to request Prince Leopold to withdraw from the candidature to the Spanish Crown. This the King declined to do in the way that was pointed out to him, rightly considering that such a course would play into the hands of the French by lowering his own dignity and the prestige of Prussia. Moreover, he, rather illogically, held the whole matter to be primarily one that affected the Hohenzollern family and Spain. The young prince, however, on hearing of the drift of events, solved the problem by declaring his intention not to accept the Crown of Spain (July 12). The action was spontaneous, emanating from Prince Leopold and his father Prince Antony, not from the Prussian monarch, though, on hearing of their decision, he informed Benedetti that he entirely approved it.

If the French Government had really wished for peace, it would have let the matter end there. But it did not do so. The extreme Bonapartists--_plus royalistes que le roi_--all along wished to gain prestige for their sovereign by inflicting an open humiliation on King William and through him on Prussia. They were angry that he had evaded the snare, and now brought pressure to bear on the Ministry, especially the Duc de Gramont, so that at 7 P.M. of that same day (July 12) he sent a telegram to Benedetti at Ems directing him to see King William and press him to declare that he "would not again authorise this candidature." The Minister added: "The effervescence of spirits [at Paris] is such that we do not know whether we shall succeed in mastering it." This was true. Paris was almost beside herself. As M. Sorel says: "The warm July evening drove into the streets a populace greedy of shows and excitements, whose imagination was spoiled by the custom of political quackery, for whom war was but a drama and history a romance[28]." Such was the impulse which led to Gramont's new demand, and it was made in spite of the remonstrances of the British amba.s.sador, Lord Lyons.

[Footnote 28: Sorel, _Hist. diplomatique de la Guerre Franco-Allemande_, vol. i. chap. iv.; also for the tone of the French Press, Giraudeau, _La Verite sur la Campagne de 1870_, pp. 46-60.

Ollivier tried to persuade Sir M.E. Grant Duff (_Notes from a Diary, 1873-1881_, vol. i. p. 45) that the French demand to King William was quite friendly and natural.]

Viewing that demand in the clearer light of the present time, we must say that it was not unreasonable in itself; but it was presented in so insistent a way that King William declined to entertain it. Again Gramont pressed Benedetti to urge the matter; but the utmost that the King would do was to state: "He gives his approbation entirely and without reserve to the withdrawal of the Prince of Hohenzollern: he cannot do more." He refused to see the amba.s.sador further on this subject; but on setting out to return to Berlin--a step necessitated by the growing excitement throughout Germany--he took leave of Benedetti with perfect cordiality (July 14). The amba.s.sador thereupon returned to Paris.

Meanwhile, however, Bismarck had given the last flick to the restive courses of the Press on both sides of the Rhine. In his _Reminiscences_ he has described his depression of spirits on hearing the news of the withdrawal of Prince Leopold's candidature and of his nearly formed resolve to resign as a protest against so tame a retreat before French demands. But while Moltke, Roon, and he were dining together, a telegram reached him from the King at Ems, dated July 13, 3.50 P.M., which gave him leave to inform the amba.s.sadors and the Press of the present state of affairs. Bismarck saw his chance. The telegram could be cut down so as to give a more resolute look to the whole affair. And, after gaining Moltke's a.s.surance that everything was ready for war, he proceeded to condense it. The facts here can only be understood by a comparison of the two versions. We therefore give the original as sent to Bismarck by Abeken, Secretary to the Foreign Office, who was then at Ems:--

His Majesty writes to me: "Count Benedetti spoke to me on the promenade, in order to demand from me, finally in a very importunate manner, that I should authorise him to telegraph at once that I bound myself for all future time never again to give my consent if the Hohenzollerns should renew their candidature. I refused at last somewhat sternly, as it is neither right nor possible to undertake engagements of this kind _a tout jamais_. Naturally I told him that I had as yet received no news, and as he was earlier informed about Paris and Madrid than myself, he could see clearly that my Government once more had no hand in the matter." His Majesty has since received a letter from the Prince. His Majesty having told Count Benedetti that he was awaiting news from the Prince, has decided, with reference to the above demand, upon the representation of Count Eulenburg and myself, not to receive Count Benedetti again, but only to let him be informed through an aide-de-camp: "That his Majesty had now received from the Prince confirmation of the news which Benedetti had already received from Paris, and had nothing further to say to the amba.s.sador." His Majesty leaves it to your Excellency whether Benedetti's fresh demand and its rejection should not be at once communicated both to our amba.s.sadors and to the Press.

Bismarck cut this down to the following:--

After the news of the renunciation of the hereditary Prince of Hohenzollern had been officially communicated to the Imperial Government of France by the Royal Government of Spain, the French amba.s.sador at Ems further demanded of his Majesty, the King, that he would authorise him to telegraph to Paris that his Majesty, the King, bound himself for all future time never again to give his consent if the Hohenzollerns should renew their candidature. His Majesty, the King, thereupon decided not to receive the French amba.s.sador again, and sent to tell him through the aide-de-camp on duty that his Majesty had nothing further to communicate to the amba.s.sador.

Efforts have been made to represent Bismarck's "editing" of the Ems telegram as the decisive step leading to war; and in his closing years, when seized with the morbid desire of a partly discredited statesman to exaggerate his influence on events, he himself sought to perpetuate this version. He claims that the telegram, as it came from Ems, described the incident there "as a fragment of a negotiation still pending, and to be continued at Berlin." This claim is quite untenable. A careful perusal of the original despatch from Ems shows that the negotiation, far from being "still pending," was clearly described as having been closed on that matter. That Benedetti so regarded it is proved by his returning at once to Paris. If it could have been "continued at Berlin," he most certainly would have proceeded thither. Finally, the words in the original as to the King refusing Benedetti "somewhat sternly" were omitted, and very properly omitted, by Bismarck in his abbreviated version. Had he included those words, he might have claimed to be the final cause of the War of 1870. As it is, his claim must be set aside as the offspring of senile vanity. His version of the original Ems despatch did not contain a single offensive word, neither did it alter any statement. Abeken also admitted that his original telegram was far too long, and that Bismarck was quite justified in abbreviating it as he did[29].

[Footnote 29: _Heinrich Abeken_, by Hedwig Abeken, p. 375. Bismarck's successor in the chancellory, Count Caprivi, set matters in their true light in a speech in the Reichstag shortly after the publication of Bismarck's _Reminiscences_.

I dissent from the views expressed by the well-informed reviewer of Ollivier's _L'Empire liberal_ (vol. viii.) in the _Times_ of May 27, 1904, who pins his faith to an interview of Bismarck with Lord Loftus on July 13, 1870. Bismarck, of course wanted war; but so did Gramont, and I hold that _the latter_ brought it about.]

If we pay attention, not to the present more complete knowledge of the whole affair, but to the imperfect information then open to the German public, war was the natural result of the second and very urgent demand that came from Paris. The Duc de Gramont in dispatching it must have known that he was playing a desperate game. Either Prussia would give way and France would score a diplomatic triumph over a hated rival; or Prussia would fight. The friends of peace in France thought matters hopeless when that demand was sent in so insistent a manner. As soon as Gladstone heard of the second demand of the Ollivier Ministry, he wrote to Lord Granville, then Foreign Minister: "It is our duty to represent the immense responsibility which will rest upon France, if she does not at once accept as satisfactory and conclusive the withdrawal of the candidature of Prince Leopold[30]."

[Footnote 30: J. Morley, _Life of Gladstone_, vol. ii. p. 328.]

On the other hand, we must note that the conduct of the German Press at this crisis was certainly provocative of war. The morning on which Bismarck's telegram appeared in the official _North German Gazette_, saw a host of violent articles against France, and gleeful accounts of imaginary insults inflicted by the King on Benedetti. All this was to be expected after the taunts of cowardice freely levelled by the Parisian papers against Prussia for the last two days; but whether Bismarck directly inspired the many sensational versions of the Ems affair that appeared in North German papers on July 14 is not yet proven.

However that may be, the French Government looked on the refusal of its last demand, the publication of Bismarck's telegram, and the insults of the German Press as a _casus belli_. The details of the sitting of the Emperor's Council at 10 P.M. on July 14, at which it was decided to call out the French reserves, are not yet known. Ollivier was not present.

There had been a few hours of wavering on this question; but the tone of the Parisian evening papers--it was the French national day--the loud cries of the rabble for war, and their smashing the windows of the Prussian emba.s.sy, seem to have convinced the Emperor and his advisers that to draw back now would involve the fall of the dynasty. Report has uniformly pointed to the Empress as pressing these ideas on her consort, and the account which the Duc de Gramont later on gave to Lord Malmesbury of her words at that momentous Council-meeting support popular rumour. It is as follows:--

Before the final resolve to declare war the Emperor, Empress, and Ministers went to St. Cloud. After some discussion Gramont told me that the Empress, a high-spirited and impressionable woman, made a strong and most excited address, declaring that "war was inevitable if the honour of France was to be sustained." She was immediately followed by Marshal Leboeuf, who, in the most violent tone, threw down his portfolio and swore that if war was not declared he would give it up and renounce his military rank. The Emperor gave way, and Gramont went straight to the Chamber to announce the fatal news[31].

[Footnote 31: This version has, I believe, not been refuted. Still, I must look on it with suspicion. No Minister, who had done so much to stir up the war-feeling, ought to have made any such confession--least of all against a lady, who could not answer it. M. Seign.o.bos in his _Political History of Contemporary Europe_, vol. i. chap. vi. p. 184 (Eng edit.) says of Gramont: "He it was who embroiled France in the war with Prussia." In the course of the parliamentary inquiry of 1872 Gramont convicted himself and his Cabinet of folly in 1870 by using these words: "Je crois pouvoir declarer que si on avait eu un doute, un seule doute, sur notre apt.i.tude a la guerre, on eut immediatement arrete la negociation" (_Enquete parlementaire_, I. vol. i. p. 108).]

On the morrow (July 15) the Chamber of Deputies appointed a Commission, which hastily examined the diplomatic doc.u.ments and reported in a sense favourable to the Ollivier Ministry. The subsequent debate made strongly for a rupture; and it is important to note that Ollivier and Gramont based the demand for warlike preparations on the fact that King William had refused to see the French amba.s.sador, and held that that alone was a sufficient insult. In vain did Thiers protest against the war as inopportune, and demand to see all the necessary doc.u.ments. The Chamber pa.s.sed the war supplies by 246 votes to 10; and Thiers had his windows broken. Late on that night Gramont set aside a last attempt of Lord Granville to offer the mediation of England in the cause of peace, on the ground that this would be to the harm of France--"unless means were found to stop the rapid mobilisation of the Prussian armies which were approaching our frontier[32]." In this connection it is needful to state that the order for mobilising the North German troops was not given by the King of Prussia until late on July 15, when the war votes of the French Chambers were known at Berlin.

[Footnote 32: Quoted by Sorel, _op. cit_. vol. i. p. 196.]

Benedetti, in his review of the whole question, pa.s.ses the following very noteworthy and sensible verdict: "It was public opinion which forced the [French] Government to draw the sword, and by an irresistible onset dictated its resolutions[33]." This is certainly true for the public opinion of Paris, though not of France as a whole. The rural districts which form the real strength of France nearly always cling to peace. It is significant that the Prefects of French Departments reported that only 16 declared in favour of war, while 37 were in doubt on the matter, and 34 accepted war with regret. This is what might be expected from a people which in the Provinces is marked by prudence and thrift.

[Footnote 33: Benedetti, _Ma Mission en Prusse,_ p. 411.]

In truth, the people of modern Europe have settled down to a life of peaceful industry, in which war is the most hateful of evils. On the other hand, the ma.s.sing of mankind in great cities, where thought is superficial and feelings can quickly be stirred by a sensation-mongering Press, has undoubtedly helped to feed political pa.s.sions and national hatred. A rural population is not deeply stirred by stories of slights to amba.s.sadors. The peasant of Brittany had no active dislike for the peasant of Brandenburg. Each only asked to be left to till his fields in peace and safety. But the crowds on the Parisian boulevards and in _Unter den Linden_ took (and seemingly always will take) a very different view of life. To them the news of the humiliation of the rival beyond the Rhine was the greatest and therefore the most welcome of sensations; and, unfortunately, the papers which pandered to their habits set the tone of thought for no small part of France and Germany and exerted on national policy an influence out of all proportion to its real weight.

The story of the Franco-German dispute is one of national jealousy carefully fanned for four years by newspaper editors and popular speakers until a spark sufficed to set Western Europe in a blaze. The spark was the Hohenzollern candidature, which would have fallen harmless had not the tinder been prepared since Koniggratz by journalists at Paris and Berlin. The resulting conflagration may justly be described as due partly to national friction and partly to the supposed interests of the Napoleonic dynasty, but also to the heat engendered by a sensational Press.