Turning now to Austria-Hungary, we find in her the Power to whom the immediate occasion of the war was due, the Power, moreover, who contributed in large measure to its remoter causes. Austria-Hungary is a State, but not a nation. It has no natural bond to hold its populations together, and it continues its political existence by force and fraud, by the connivance and the self-interest of other States, rather than by any inherent principle of vitality. It is in relation to the Balkan States that this instability has been most marked and most dangerous. Since the kingdom of Serbia acquired its independent existence it has been a centre drawing to itself the discontent and the ambitions of the Slav populations under the Dual Monarchy. The realization of those ambitions implies the disruption of the Austro-Hungarian State. But behind the Southern Slavs stands Russia, and any attempt to change the political status in the Balkans has thus meant, for years past, acute risk of war between the two Empires that border them. This political rivalry has accentuated the racial antagonism between German and Slav, and was the immediate origin of the war which presents itself to Englishmen as one primarily between Germany and the Western Powers. On the position of Italy it is not necessary to dwell. It had long been suspected that she was a doubtful factor in the Triple Alliance, and the event has proved that this suspicion was correct. But though Italy has participated in the war, her action had no part in producing it. And we need not here indicate the course and the motives of her policy. 7. _Germany_.