The Hungarians, despite the oppression of non-Magyar elements, were good stewards. They developed the country materially with skill and energy, and the prosperity of Budapest is well deserved. Not because it was favored by legislation but because of its key position on the Danube did Budapest become a railway-center. The railway lines exist, and the city is equipped to serve the population of the whole region. The Succession States have neither the large cities in annexed territory nor the geographical position to do as well economically by the regions over which they are now ruling as Hungary did. And they suffer equally with her the loss of unhampered access to the sea. The Succession States are as much afraid of giving Budapest its old-time accessibility to the regions that used to depend upon it as the French are afraid of allowing Germany to rehabilitate herself by the free play of economic laws. Unless Hungary finds, then, that she can get along alone she must try to form a union with Rumania or to overthrow by force the Treaty of Trianon. The first possibility is advocated by many Hungarians, who argue that it is better for Hungary to look to the east than to the west. The one benefit of the disaster of 1918 was freedom from German overlordship. The Hungarians have too vivid a memory of being weighed down by Vienna and latterly by Berlin through Vienna to look forward with satisfaction or equanimity to a new _Drang nach Osten_. It is pointed out that the Rumanians need Hungarian friendship to make Transylvania and the Banat of Temesvár contented under Rumanian rule. Transylvania is shut off from Rumania by high mountains and looks naturally to the west. All the outlets from the Banat are to the west. Another argument in favor of a close understanding with Rumania is that the Rumanians are, like the Hungarians, an island of radically different nationality from the surrounding Slavs. Rumania does not receive Hungarian overtures any too cordially. Nothing short of a Russo-Bulgaro-Turk combination would induce Rumania to advocate a revision of the Treaty of Trianon and the entry of Hungary either into the Little Entente or into an alliance and customs union with Rumania. That may come, of course, but it is not probable. Practical-minded Hungarians realize that Rumanians object to them for much the same reasons that they object to the Germans. The West knows how to impose political domination through cultural superiority. And as Berlin and Vienna are to Budapest, so Budapest is to Bucharest. The alternative is what has always been the lot of Hungary, the decision to find her support in Teutonic Central Europe at the price of industrial inequality and political vassalage. It is probable that when Russia returns to her old self she will resume her Balkan policy. This will drive Italy once again, with sounder reason than last time, into an alliance with Germany. Then Hungary, mourning her lost provinces, will be a valuable ally.