Well, the rough draft as originally drawn up by Count Tisza did not obtain the Emperor’s unconditional approval. The versatile monarch suggested a certain amendment to the wording and fixed the time-limit, the alleged object of which was to leave no room for evasion, no loophole for escape. And as a matter of course the verbal modifications he proposed--I only know that their purpose was to sharpen (scharfmachen) the terms--were embodied in the ultimatum which, thus amended and sanctioned, was duly presented. I further had it on the same indisputable authority that the time-limit of forty-eight hours was the result of a proposal coming direct from Kaiser Wilhelm, who held that Servia must not be allowed to deliberate or to take counsel with Russia, but should be confronted with the necessity of giving a categorical answer at once. His own mode of action towards Russia and Belgium, to each of which States he allowed but twelve hours for deliberation, was conceived in the same spirit and prompted by a like calculation. CHAPTER VI THE POSITION OF ITALY Why this differential treatment as between Germany and Italy? one may ask. Both being Austria’s allies, each might reasonably claim the same degree of confidence as the other. Whence, then, this one-sided distrust? To this query the answer came pat and plausible. There was no difference in the degrees of confidence displayed by Austria towards the Governments of her allies, no more information having been vouchsafed to one than to the other. To the Berlin Foreign Office was dealt out the same meed of intelligence as to the Consulta. Consequently there is no ground for complaint. The matter being a concern of Austria’s, with no direct bearings on the Triple Alliance, was communicated to the other two members of the Alliance in exactly the same measure. And I have good grounds for believing that the _Berlin Foreign Office_ did not receive directly from the Ballplatz in Vienna the text of the ultimatum to Servia. The Kaiser was the sole direct recipient.