With the impending retirement of von Maybach, Minister of Public Works and Railways, von Boetticher will be the only remaining Minister of eleven who held portfolios when William I died in March, 1888. It seems probable that the present year will outlive even this exception. The change in governmental spirit and methods of which Berlin is more and more conscious, is not wholly a matter of new men. The weight of militarism is being lifted. Generals no longer play the part they did in purely civil affairs. Count Waldersee’s retirement from his great post as Chief of the General Staff is popularly ascribed to his having attempted to interfere with the amount and distribution of the military budget. Five years ago such an interference would have seemed to everybody the most natural thing in the world. The Emperor, too, grows less fond of obtruding the martial side of his training and temperament. From a beginning in which he seemed to think that Germany existed principally for the purpose of supporting an army, he has grown to see the true proportion of things and to give military matters hardly more than their legitimate share of his attention. The death of Moltke has removed the last great soldier who could speak authoritatively for the army in the Reichstag. In that sense at least he has left no heir. In the more troubled domain of foreign affairs, the year without Bismarck has been marked by fewer visible changes. We are well along into “a year without Crispi,” also, but the Triple Alliance, if less demonstrative in its professions of mutual affection and pride than formerly, seems no whit diminished in substantial unity. At the moment, peace appears to be as secure as it has been during any year since 1880--which is another way of saying that the weight of force and determination is still on the side of the Triple Alliance.