THE DRAMA OF 365 DAYS
soldiers' uniforms; orchestras striking up patriotic anthems; excited groups singing "Deutschland über Alles," or rising to their feet and jingling glasses; then the lights put out, and a general rush made for the railway stations—everybody equipped, and knowing his duty and his destination.
THE OLD GERMAN ADAM
It was the old historic story of German
duplicity, and the nations of Europe had no
excuse for being surprised. When the Prussian
Monarchy was first bestowed on the relatively
humble family of the Hohenzollerns, they found
their territory for the most part sterile, the soil
round Berlin and about Potsdam—the favourite
residence of the Margraves—a sandy desert that
could scarcely be made to yield a crop of rye or
oats, so they set themselves to enlarge and enrich
it by help of an army out of all proportion to the
size and importance of their State. The results
were inevitable. When war becomes the trade
of a separate class it is natural that they should
wish to pursue it at the first favourable opportunity
of conquest. That opportunity came to
Prussia when Charles VI died and the Archduchess
Maria Theresa succeeded to her father
by virtue of a law (the Pragmatic Sanction),
to which all the Powers of Europe had subscribed.
