The conquest of Serbia has unquestionably greatly heartened the Austrians, who are more anti-Serbian than anti-Russian. Since the war broke out there have been periods when the Berlin taskmasters found themselves in some difficulty as to how to maintain the enthusiasm of their Austrian allies. Upon this I am absolutely convinced, there is no such difficulty now. It is so many years since unhappy Austria has had cause to celebrate a victory that the novelty of the sensation has had a remarkably stimulating effect upon the whole country. Their history has been a story of retreat and defeat. Prussia crushed them in a few weeks in 1866, now they begin to regard themselves as the equals of their overlords. In addition to their new port of Antivari on the Adriatic, they confidently anticipate securing Venice and Northern Serbia. For the moment they are intoxicated with victory which they fondly imagine to be their own, but underneath there is the same hatred of the Prussian that existed before the war. The compulsion campaign in England has aroused great interest in Austria, and has been the cause of innumerable heated arguments in the thousands of cafés throughout the land. The popular idea that Englishmen fight only when they are paid to do so, with extra for battles, has been so assiduously fostered by Berlin propagandists that it has become almost an article of Austrian faith. It is practically impossible for them to understand the spirit of the new British armies, to which men have flocked from all parts of the Empire. In Vienna, as in other places, I was solemnly assured that the rich would stay at home and play football, or live in their castles, hunting and enjoying themselves. Not even eighteen months of war have dispelled the Austrian belief in English “sportkrankheit” (sport disease). The day after I arrived in Sofia, I had an interesting talk with two Bulgarian officers who were staying in the same hotel. They told me of the retreat of the Franco-British forces from Serbian territory into Greece. The Bulgarian soldiers liked very much to fight the English, for the reason that when they defeated them the booty they find is so considerable. For instance, many of those Bulgarian farmers had never seen or eaten chocolate in their lives, and were delighted to find, when the English had to evacuate the camp, that they left behind them considerable quantities of chocolate and marmalade.