All the measures tending to force Austria-Hungary into the German _Zollverein_, which would make its political absorption inevitable, must be looked upon as a farce, a simple act of criminal violence done to the wishes of the immense majority of the populations in the Hapsburg monarchy. So true is this, that certain Magyar noblemen, who up to the present have been decided allies of Berlin, are already uttering protests against the Prussian yoke, understanding at last that it is to be imposed upon them. Count Theodore Batthyany, vice-president of the Independent Left of the Hungarian Chamber, declared at the end of March, 1916: “It is often said among us that the future Customs-Union would create in our country better economical conditions. This is much more true for Germany, who will hold both the reins and the whip in the combination.... Besides the Germans make no secret of it that in the proposed compact there will be other agricultural states which will be our future competitors (in allusion to Turkey and the Balkan States). Certainly, from the time that the union is concluded, all capital will come to us from Germany and never from elsewhere. The Germans will have the monopoly of capital among us, and you know what a monopoly is and what it costs. The money will cost us dear” (_Le Temps_, 1st February, 1916). In Austria, M. Nemetz, President of the Chamber of Commerce at Prague, declared: “None of the arguments adduced in favour of a Customs-Union with Germany will for a moment bear the light of criticism. An insuperable obstacle is opposed to an intimate Customs-Union between the two empires: their interests are not identical but on the contrary competitive” (quoted by _Le Temps_, 9th February, 1916). These categorical declarations prove what resistance the Pangerman manœuvre has already to encounter. The Allies have much to gain from these statements, for they prove the reality of the deep opposition existing between the interests of Pangerman Germany and those of the majority of the Austro-Hungarian peoples. But there remains an essential point to prove, for it gives rise to special anxiety in the minds of that part of the public in the Allied countries which still harps on the false idea that Austro-Hungary is a specially German country. This section of the public doubts whether the application of the principle of nationalities, which the Allies demand, would not have the effect of necessarily and considerably increasing Germany by incorporating in it the Germans of the Hapsburg empire.