Chapter VII: William II. and his Naval Minister

The German Fleet, as it is to-day, may be regarded as the work of two men--the Emperor William II. and Admiral von Tirpitz.

Even for those who have lived long in Germany, it is difficult to form a judgment as to the aims and motives of the Emperor William's naval policy, and of the part which he has played in its carrying out. With regard to their sovereign, Germans are inclined to fly to one of two extremes; according to the class to which they belong, they represent him either as a heaven-born genius of universal gifts, or as a busybody whose meddlesomeness is rendered specially mischievous by mediæval delusions as to the functions of monarchs and their relations to the Deity. Everything that he does or says is set down as quite right by the one party and as quite wrong by the other. Moreover, the opinions of those brought into closest contact with him are vitiated by the prevalence of a type of sycophancy which is fortunately becoming extinct in other countries.

The patriotic German, who is familiar with his country's history, knows that, five or six hundred years ago, his forefathers monopolized the markets and policed the seas of Northern and Western Europe. He realizes keenly that Germany's maritime and industrial progress was first checked, and then retarded for centuries, by political division and internecine and foreign wars. Possibly he still remembers that great crescendo of victory in which Prussia smothered Denmark, then overthrew Austria in a single battle, and finally, at the head of the kindred Teutonic States, humbled France in the dust, and welded Germany together in one indivisible whole. Even if he does not remember it as part of his own personal experience, all its vivid and stimulating episodes have been a thousand times impressed upon his mind by schoolmaster, politician, historian, and journalist. That after this tremendous martial achievement he should regard his country as the mistress of the continent of Europe is no matter for surprise. But he sees, too, that the Germany of Luther and Goethe, of Ranke, Liebig, Helmholz, and Mommsen, of Bismarck and Moltke, has become also the Germany of Krupp, Siemens, Rathenau, Ballin, and Gwinner; that the products of German industry, the fruits of an unexampled application of the discoveries of science to the processes of manufacture, have been carried by German ships to the remotest ends of the earth; that the material prosperity of his country has been advancing in every direction by leaps and bounds. And he thus believes Germany to be strong, wise, and wealthy, and in every way fitted to stand at the head of mankind. But in one respect he has felt, to his bitter mortification, that she is powerless. Wherever he goes on the world's oceans, he is confronted by those iron walls of Great Britain, which mean that he is there only by the sufferance of one who is immeasurably stronger than himself.

The German patriot has never realized that no efforts on the part of Germany could materially alter the balance of sea-power to her advantage as against Great Britain, and that she would be compelled to fight for her pretensions long before she was in a position to give battle on anything like equal terms. He has believed that the British nation is unnerved and effete, that it has lost both its martial and industrial vigour, that its energies have been sapped by too much wealth and prosperity, and that it is rapidly following the downward path. Finally, he is convinced that the British Parliament, under the influence of an aggressive democracy, exclusively concerned with its own immediate material needs, is losing the capacity to realize and grapple with the larger problems of international politics, and that the Cabinets proceeding from it will, in timorous anxiety, procrastinate and vacillate till it is too late to strike. In this idea he has been only confirmed by the pacifist movement in Great Britain, by the British agitation for disarmament by international agreement, and by the well-meant but unfortunate attempt of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman to effect by example what much amiable precept had done nothing to accomplish. These phenomena he has looked upon not as evidence of good-will and peaceableness, but as symptoms of physical, moral, and financial exhaustion.

Such was the view of many in Germany to whom we cannot fairly deny the name of "patriot" if we are to claim it for an analogous disposition among ourselves. It was the view almost universally held by the officers of the German Army and Navy, and, with certain qualifications and reservations, it may be said to have been the view of the Emperor William. This will be evident if, with the help of his many spoken and written utterances, we attempt to follow the main lines which, with many sudden and violent deviations, his thought has taken on this subject. He has, for example, in his speeches repeatedly dwelt on the power and renown of the Hanse League--"one of the mightiest undertakings that the world has ever seen," which "was able to raise fleets such as the broad back of the sea had probably never borne up to that time," which "won such high prestige for the German name abroad," which "created markets for the German industrial regions," and which "only failed because it lacked the support of a strong united Empire obedient to a single will." At Hamburg, in June, 1911, he used these words: "I have only acted historically, for I said to myself on my accession, that the tasks which the Hansa attempted to solve by itself, and which it could not solve because the strong Empire was not at its back, and the defensive and executive power of the Empire did not exist, must unquestionably at once fall on the shoulders of the newly-arisen German Empire; and it was simply the obligations of old traditions that had to be resumed." It was in one former Hanse town that the Emperor spoke the familiar words, "Our future lies on the water"; in another that he declared "The trident should be in our hand"; in a third that he uttered the appeal, "We have bitter need of a strong German Fleet."

Again, he has repeatedly extolled the Great Elector--"the one among my ancestors for whom I have the most enthusiasm, who has from my earliest youth shone before me as a bright example," who, "looking far ahead, carried on politics on a large scale, as they are carried on to-day." In his great speech at Bremen in 1905, the Emperor said: "When as a youth I stood before the model of Brommy's ship, I felt with burning indignation the outrage that was then done to our fleet and our flag"; and these words undoubtedly referred to the injudiciously-phrased note in which Palmerston threatened that vessels which undertook belligerent operations under the colours of that greater German Empire, which then was not and was never to be, would render themselves liable to be treated as "pirates." The present realities of sea-power had been early revealed to him when, as he told the officers on board a British flag-ship in the Mediterranean, he "was running about Portsmouth Dockyard as a boy"; and, as he said in a speech made during the visit of King Edward to Kiel in 1904, "the stupendous activity on the sea at the headquarters of the greatest navy in the world impressed itself indelibly on his youthful mind," and made him, "as Regent, endeavour to realize on a scale corresponding to the conditions of his country what he had seen as a young man in England."

How far the Emperor has helped to realize his own naval ambitions, and how far his efforts have actually told against them, it is very difficult to determine with anything like exactitude. His agitation for a bigger fleet has been open and unwearying, and outside Germany the idea is very prevalent that he not only contrived the naval policy of the Empire, but also, almost single-handed, generated the degree of popular support without which it could not have been carried out. This idea will be seen to be erroneous. The Emperor's influence upon his own people is very greatly overrated in other countries, and even the crisis of 1908, in which the storm of discontent which had long been gathering burst with full force upon his head, does not seem to have been properly understood outside Germany. On that occasion, the Imperial Parliament listened without a protest, without a murmur, as a Liberal deputy, slowly, deliberately, and with dramatic emphasis, spoke the following words: "In the German Reichstag not a single member has come forward to defend the actions of the German Emperor." The incident was without a parallel in the history of parliaments. Even the Conservative party, which has always gloried in being the chief prop of the throne, passed and published a resolution expressing the wish that the Emperor should "in future exercise a greater reserve in his utterances," and declaring that "arrangements must be made to prevent with certainty a recurrence of such improper proceedings." It may be remarked, in passing, that this blow fell upon William II. because he had confessed to having had Anglophile sentiments, and to having performed friendly services to Great Britain, at a time when the general feeling of the German people was one of hostility to this country. Nor was it without significance that when, after holding aloof from public affairs for several weeks, he at last emerged from the solitude of his palace at Potsdam, it was in England that he sought the recuperation and rest of which he stood in need.

The dismissal of Bismarck and the subsequent attempts of the Emperor to depreciate the life-work of the man to whom he owed the Imperial crown, were, of course, the principal causes of the spirit of opposition which flared up with such startling suddenness in 1908. The popularity of William I. was in no small measure due to his absolute trust and confidence in his Chancellor, and the abrupt ejection of this incomparable statesman from his office will never be forgotten or forgiven till the generation of his contemporaries has passed away.

These things go far to explain why it was that, in spite of the vigorous naval agitation of the Emperor, the German Fleet, as was pointed out in the Memorandum attached to the Bill of 1898, became weaker instead of stronger during the first ten years of his reign. From the day of his accession he had lost no opportunity of manifesting his interest in the fleet and his desire that it should be largely increased. Among his earliest acts as monarch was his unheralded appearance in admiral's uniform at a parliamentary luncheon given by Bismarck, to decorate one of the guests who had displayed sympathies and wishes with regard to the Navy similar to his own. Year after year, tables of diagrams, showing the disparity between the fleet of Germany and those of the leading naval Powers, and prepared, it is said, by the Emperor's own hand, were sent out over his signature to the Reichstag, the Government departments, and all public institutions where it was thought they might meet the gaze of appreciative eyes. At a soirée given at the New Palace at Potsdam in 1895, he assembled round him a group of members of the majority parties of the Reichstag, and lectured them for two-and-a-half hours on Germany's need of sea-power. Bismarck's eightieth birthday was then approaching, and the Emperor concluded his remarks by urging upon his hearers that they should seize the opportunity of "doing the founder of our colonial policy the pleasure of passing the sum absolutely required for the Navy." A couple of years later, he delivered a similar address after a dinner given to members of the Reichstag by the Finance Minister, von Miquel, illustrating his arguments with the diagrams of warships mentioned above. About the same time, an English illustrated paper published a picture of the foreign war vessels on the East Asian station. Among them, as the sole representative of Germany, was a small gunboat, which, as was pointed out in the accompanying text, was "under sail only." Against these words the Emperor wrote, "What mockery lies therein," and the picture, with this comment, was laid before the Budget Commission of the Reichstag, then engaged in the discussion of the naval estimates. Moreover, the monarch had himself recourse to the paint-brush, and exhibited in the Berlin Academy of Arts a picture of an attack by a flotilla of torpedo craft on a squadron of ironclads. No doubt he hoped in this way to arouse sympathy for his ideas in some who were not accessible to the ordinary methods of political persuasion. The "Song to Aegir," the Scandinavian Neptune, of which he composed the music, was probably also intended to have a similar operation.

But all these pleas and cajoleries had little or no positive result. Indeed, taken in conjunction with other phrases of the Imperial activity, they seem rather to have excited opposition in the breasts of the members of the Reichstag, who possibly considered themselves just as well qualified as the monarch to estimate the degree and appreciate the needs of Germany's maritime interests, and at any rate half-suspected that his efforts directly to influence their deliberations involved an encroachment on their constitutional privileges. The first naval estimates submitted in the new reign, which provided for the laying down of the unusually large number of four battleships, were got through the Reichstag without much difficulty, but when Admiral von Hollmann became Minister of Marine in the following year, he found that quite a different temper had taken possession of the Parliament. It was not only that the Emperor's general governmental acts had begun to stir up opposition; his oratorical flights in praise of sea-power and world-empire had also generated strong suspicions that he was urging Germany along a path which would lead her to ruin at home and disaster abroad. Hollmann's by no means exorbitant demands were branded both in the Reichstag and the press as "unconscionable," his programme as "boundless," and on every side were heard contemptuous and impatient references to "the awful fleet." For a decade the naval estimates were ruthlessly and recklessly cut down to, on an average, not far short of half their original figure, and finally, in 1897, the ministerial career of Hollmann was terminated by the unceremonious rejection of three out of the four cruisers which, in a special Memorandum, he had sought to prove were indispensable for the protection of the Empire's stake on the seas. And all this time the Emperor had never ceased to agitate, by word and deed, for the ideas which he had so much at heart and to which the Reichstag nevertheless showed itself so completely indifferent, if not actually hostile.

The change that came with the appointment of Admiral von Tirpitz to the Ministry of Marine was as complete as it was sudden, and it is to this very able man that we must look if we wish to find not only the intellectual author of German naval legislation, but the statesman who devised and directed the means by which it was popularized and passed through the Reichstag. The transformation which he effected was one both of policy and of method. The three rejected vessels which brought about Hollmann's fall represented a principle--that of "cruiser warfare." At that time the imperfectly-thought-out strategy of the German Naval Ministry was based on the two ideas of coastal defence and commerce destruction. Pitched battles between ships of the line on the high seas played a very secondary part in its calculations. In the programme which he submitted to the Reichstag, Hollmann laid it down that fifteen battleships would be sufficient for Germany's purposes, and those who are best qualified to form a judgment of the Empire's naval policy at that epoch are of opinion that this number was intended to be not merely a provisional, but a final estimate of the country's requirements in this type of vessel.

There are good reasons for supposing that in the Hollmann era no clear idea existed as to the problems with which Germany might be confronted in a naval war, and that his programmes were the product rather of vague general principles than of calculated odds and chances. In fact, one of his main difficulties with the Reichstag was his inability to justify his estimates by numerical demonstrations.

On the other hand, Admiral von Tirpitz's strength always lay chiefly in this, that he knew exactly what he wanted and why he wanted it. When he came into office, it was generally stated that he had years previously already laid before the Emperor a Memorandum embodying his conception of Germany's maritime needs, and how they could be satisfied, and it is certain that the main outlines of his policy were at any rate clearly sketched out in his head long before he was given an opportunity of carrying it out. He was recalled from the command of the East Asian Squadron to take charge of the Naval Ministry, and he seems to have employed his leisure on the homeward voyage in drafting a programme, which he had worked out in all its details before he took over his portfolio. In its very fundamental principles it was a reversal of that of his predecessor, for it was based on the idea, probably adopted from Mahan, that battleships alone are the decisive factors in naval warfare. As he himself put it in the Reichstag: "If we have a strong battle fleet, the enemy will have to defeat it before he can blockade our coasts. But in such circumstances he will, before he declares war on Germany, consider very carefully whether the business will cover its expenses and justify the risk." It was this principle of risk which he took as his standard of the Empire's naval requirements. From the literature which he inspired it is evident that he was one of those who believe that Germany was destined to occupy the position on the seas which now belongs to Great Britain. It was, however, impossible for a Minister of State to argue this belief in public, for the open confession of it would have at once produced incalculable complications in international affairs which would certainly not have contributed to its realization. Besides, the consummation which he wished for could in any case only be reached by gradual stages over a long period of years. The defensive formula which he invented was quite as effective for his immediate domestic purposes, and, as the sequel showed, was not appreciated abroad in its true and full significance. It was that "the German Fleet must be so strong that not even the greatest naval Power will be able to enter upon a war with it without imperilling its position in the world."

It was only after a good deal of hesitation, and some resistance, in high quarters that Admiral von Tirpitz was able to make his view prevail. Even courtly panegyrists admit that at the commencement of his term of office deep-seated differences of opinion existed between him and the Emperor on cardinal points of naval policy. The monarch was then a firm adherent of the cruiser-war theory, and no doubt had been responsible for its adoption by his Ministry of Marine. It may be regarded as his most substantial contribution to the present strength of the German Fleet that he finally yielded to Admiral von Tirpitz's arguments.

In one other very essential respect the new Minister revolutionized the policy of his predecessor. In the Memorandum already referred to, Hollmann defined the needs of the navy only for the three succeeding years, and in the course of the debate on the estimates, he used these words: "Neither the Federated Governments nor the Reichstag will ever agree to be bound to a formal programme for years in advance. That is quite impossible, and even if both factors desired it, impossible, for the very simple reason that the art of war is changeable on sea just as it is on land, and that to-day no Naval Ministry can prophesy what we shall need ten years hence. It can only tell you what are our immediate requirements, and if the circumstances change, then our demands will change too. As to that there is no doubt whatever." Here again, Admiral von Tirpitz not merely modified, but diametrically reversed the policy of his predecessor, and, it may be added, of the Emperor. Starting from the conclusion that the main types of war vessel and their respective functions remain unaltered in principle throughout the ages, he induced the Reichstag to commit itself statutorily to a fixed warship establishment, a building programme of nearly twenty years' duration, and an automatic renewal of the units of the fleet when they had reached a prescribed age. This is the one absolutely new feature of German naval legislation, and it was undoubtedly the idea of the new Minister.

Admiral von Tirpitz has, in fact, been the Bismarck of German naval policy, and just as the Iron Chancellor fulfilled the hopes of the men of the Frankfort National Assembly, so the smiling and urbane Minister of Marine has gone far towards realizing the dreams of Friedrich List and Prince Adalbert of Prussia. It may be questioned whether he would not have done this work quite as effectually without the Emperor's loud and tempestuous advocacy of his schemes on the open stage of the world. The trumpet tones in which William II. proclaimed his dreams of world-wide rule and maritime dictatorship, not only exercised a disquieting effect in foreign countries, but conjured up in the minds of many Germans unpleasant visions of provocative and perilous adventure. Other nations were anything but delighted at the prospects of being swallowed up in a universal Teutonic Empire, however peaceful its conquests and however beneficent its rule, and they took steps by which the successive moves of German naval policy were successively counteracted.

If we may judge from the discretion which he has shown by keeping as far as possible in the background, Admiral von Tirpitz would, if left to himself, have built up the German Fleet with the same silent and systematic persistency with which Bismarck, Roon, and Moltke prepared to crush France, and to some extent he combines in his character the qualities of these three. He is at any rate the adroitest politician, the ablest organizer, and the most far-sighted strategist in the Imperial service. Long before he was thought of as Naval Minister, he had won for himself among his colleagues, by the skill and thoroughness with which he grappled with every problem allotted to him, the title of "The Master." It was he who, against the ignorant protests of the older school of naval officers, chiefly concerned for the smartness of their paint, the cleanness of their decks, and the brightness of their brasswork, forced the torpedo upon them, and brought the service of this weapon up to the high pitch of efficiency which it has to-day attained in the German Fleet. As Chief of the Staff to the General Command of the Navy, he evolved fresh rules of strategy and new tactical formations, and insisted upon Manoeuvres being carried out in such a way as to test the value of both. He has been no less successful as statesman, politician, and diplomatist. Here, too, he deserves the name of "Master" among his contemporaries, for what he has done has been the greatest ministerial achievement of our day. It is true that he was favoured by an extraordinary run of luck that was vouchsafed to none of his forerunners, and that he would never have been able to drive his machine but for the energy generated by a series of international dissensions, but at the same time it must be conceded that he took advantage of his opportunities with rare promptitude and address.

He at once took the measure of the Reichstag, and saw how he could make it obedient to his will. It is traditional in the higher ranks of the German official hierarchy to despise popular assemblies, and to treat them with an air of pedagogic superciliousness. Hollmann had become so impatient at the continual mutilation of his estimates that at last he thumped his fist menacingly on the table. That precipitate action sealed his fate. Admiral von Tirpitz recognized that it would be better for him if he disguised his contempt, and smothered his anger in his beard. In one of Rostand's plays, a lady is asked how she passed the sentries who were posted round a jealously guarded camp, and she replies: "I smiled at them." If the Naval Minister were to be asked how he induced the parties who had been so obdurate to his predecessor's demands to pass his own so much more expensive projects, he, too, might have replied: "I smiled at them." Completely breaking with the tradition of schoolmasterly superiority, he was all complacency and urbanity to the ignorant mediocrities who had it in their power to frustrate his designs. His beaming rubicund countenance was ever the brightest and most ingratiating feature in the debates on his bills and estimates. His good humour was inexhaustible, his courtesy unflagging, his patience undisconcertable. He knew exactly what he wanted, and thought only of that. His mind was not clouded, like those of so many of his ministerial colleagues, by religious or political prejudices. He was ready to accept ships from the hands of Catholics or Socialists. Whether they ranked the Pope above the Emperor, or preferred a republic to a monarchy, was quite indifferent to him, if only they would grant him the ships and the men he asked for.

In one of his many veiled conflicts with the Foreign Office, Admiral von Tirpitz is understood to have exclaimed: "Politics are your affair--I build ships!" and it was precisely because he attended strictly and conscientiously to his own business that he was able to do it so well. It was incumbent upon him as administrator of the Navy to make it as strong and efficient as possible, and it lay with the Chancellors to decide whether the line he was following was consistent with the general policy of the Empire. That, against their own convictions and what they conceived to be Germany's foreign interests, they allowed him to have his own way, only proved their weakness and his strength.

While he was amiable and polite to all parties and persons who could assist him in the carrying out of his ideas, flattered their vanity by pretended confidences from the region of high politics, took them for cruises in war vessels, and had them deferentially escorted round Imperial shipyards, the Admiral was quick to appreciate the importance of winning the good graces of the Catholics, without whose favour, as party relationships stood and were likely to stand, he could hope to effect little. Young and active members of the Centre party, who showed a particular interest in the details of naval policy, were singled out for special attention, and soon were numbered among his most devoted champions. He likewise realized the value of popular support, and this was secured through the instrumentality of the Press Bureau of the Ministry of Marine. This institution was administered in the same spirit which gained the Admiral his parliamentary triumphs. The naval officers by whom it is manned have always received all journalists, domestic and foreign, with open arms, and, according to the objects and nationality of their visitors, furnished them with ideas, information and directions. No German writer on naval affairs could afford to dispense with official assistance so profusely and willingly supplied. The Press Bureau placed at his disposal all the historical and statistical data which could be used to demonstrate Germany's need of a big fleet, all the articles from the foreign press which were likely to have a stimulating effect upon his readers, all the details of ship and gun types which could safely be made public, all the rules of naval strategy and tactics which might be of service to him in the formulation of his themes. If diffidence or a spirit of independence prevented him from coming to the Press Bureau, the Press Bureau went to him, as will be seen from the following document which found its way into print:

"Imperial Ministry of Marine, "News Office.

"Berlin,

"----, 1907.

"It has become known here that, some time ago, you published in ---- articles of a maritime nature. For this reason the News Office gladly takes the opportunity of enquiring whether you would care to receive occasional batches of service material and press comments for possible use in further articles. In view of the impending Navy Bill, your support in the Press might be particularly valuable in the immediate future.

"Your most obedient servant, "Boy-Ed."

By such means the Admiral succeeded in obtaining a control, gentle, persuasive, and veiled, but none the less effective, over practically the entire body of writers on naval topics in the German Press.

The unanimity of view on naval subjects which the Bureau imported into the German Press was naturally most effective. When the simple citizen found that all the papers to which he had access spoke with one voice, simultaneously adopting an identical attitude to a fresh situation or propounding a novel theory, he could only assume that they must be in the right. The proposal that Great Britain should abandon her Two-Power standard and accept in its stead a ratio of three to two, which appeared almost at the same moment in a score of different papers while the 1912 Navy Bill was under process of dilution, is an instance in point. Up till then all naval writers in Germany had been unanimous in protesting that agreements to fix a naval ratio between two countries were in their very nature impossible, and the suddenness and simultaneity of their conversion must have been due to the intervention either of Providence or the Marine Minister. Indeed, the Minister's statement a year later in the Reichstag Budget Commission definitely set at rest any doubt that might have existed as to the original source of the proposal. Since Bismarck, no one has shown such adroitness as Admiral von Tirpitz in the management of the Press.

In addition to controlling the naval views of independent publications, the Press Bureau also makes important direct contributions of its own to periodical literature with the annual _Nauticus_ and the monthly magazine _Die Marine Rundschau_. Both these publications are further testimonies to the energy with which the Admiral performs the duties of his office.

But with all his cleverness, perseverance, and patience, Admiral Tirpitz would never have reached his goal had not Germany been swept by successive waves of Anglophobia. Both speeches in the Reichstag and articles in the Press make it quite evident that the motive uppermost in the minds of most deputies when they voted for the Navy Bills was the desire to impress, annoy, or terrify Great Britain. The truth is that, but for the Boer War, the Bill of 1900 could never have been so much as introduced; but for the perpetual international friction over Morocco and the fantastic legend of King Edward's designs against Germany, the Bills of 1906 and 1908 would have had but small chance of acceptance; and but for Mr. Lloyd George's speech and Captain Faber's indiscretions--and, it should be added, the misrepresentations of both of them by Admiral von Tirpitz's Press--the Ministry of Marine would never have been able to win its last victory against the opposition of the Treasury and the misgivings of the Chancellor. The lesson of 1848 cannot be too thoroughly learnt. The naval movement of that year was almost entirely popular in its character. It arose out of a sense of wounded dignity, and fits of national temper, blind to all the prudential considerations of domestic and international politics, have given Germany to-day the second largest fleet and the largest Socialist party in the world. It may seem almost like a contradiction in terms to suggest that a national sentiment has contributed to swell German Socialism to its present dimensions. But this is--for Germany, at any rate--no paradox, for in no other country does so small a proportion of the population constitute what is in practice and in effect the "will of the people."

It should have become clear that the part which the Emperor William has played in the formulation and carrying out of Germany's naval policy has been quite insignificant in comparison with that played by his Minister. The really effective work which the monarch has done for his fleet has been that of which the wider public has heard least. The Emperor's brain is not an originating or creative one, but it is keenly apprehensive, appreciative, and assimilative, and its owner was quick to perceive the value of many of the forces and institutions which have made the British Fleet supreme, not only in numerical strength but also in _esprit de corps_ and organization. From his visits to England he took back much useful information as to the construction and handling of ships, and in many other respects he found British models which he considered worthy of imitation in his own country. Thus the Institution of Naval Architects was provided with a German counterpart in the Schiffbau-technische Gesellschaft, the ideals of self-discipline of sport were fostered in the Imperial Navy, and when the temperance movement in the British Fleet had developed sufficient strength to attract attention, the Emperor inaugurated a similar propaganda among his crews. As has already been seen, William II. has generously admitted the debt of the German Fleet to its British sister, and beyond all doubt he has done more than anyone else to incur it.

The Emperor has also been able to do a good deal towards the propagation of his naval ideas through his autocratic control over the official machinery of Prussia, which constitutes more than three-fifths of the area, and nearly that proportion of the population of Germany. In a country where the tentacles of the central authority reach to the remotest village this control means a great deal. In particular, through the Ministry of Education, the rising generation has been initiated into the mysteries of "world-policy" and sea-power. The teaching of history and geography has been used to impress upon susceptible minds the importance of colonies and fleets, and to suggest with more or less precision and emphasis that Great Britain is the jealous rival who chiefly obstructs Germany's path to that "place in the sun" which is her due. The process, commenced in the schools, has been continued at the universities. Indeed, here as elsewhere, Germany's professors have been the pioneers of her progress, and were putting forward her claim to sea-power long before the Emperor was born. Friedrich List, the father of German economics, urged, in 1840, that Denmark and Holland should be taken into the Germanic Confederation, which "would then obtain what it at present lacks--namely, fisheries and sea-power, ocean-borne trade, and colonies." In another passage he said:

"What intelligent citizens of those seaports (Hamburg and Bremen) can rejoice over the continual increase of their tonnage, when he reflects that a couple of frigates, putting out from Heligoland, could destroy inside twenty-four hours the work of a quarter of a century."

List also maintained that Germany was "called by nature to place herself at the head of the colonizing and civilizing nations," and "that the time had come for the formation of a Continental alliance against the naval supremacy of England." Treitschke, writing of the European situation in the later thirties, said:

"Against so absolutely ruthless a commercial policy, inciting and making mischief all over the world, all other civilized nations seemed natural allies. England was the stronghold of barbarism in international law. To England alone was it due that, to the shame of humanity, naval warfare still remained organized piracy. It was the common duty of all nations to restore on the seas that balance of power, long existing on the Continent, that healthy equipoise which permitted no State to do exactly as it liked, and consequently assured to all a humane international law. The civilization of the human race demanded that the manifold magnificence of the world's history, which had once commenced with the rule of monosyllabic Chinese, should not end in a vicious circle with the empire of the monosyllabic Britons. As soon as the Eastern Question was reopened a far-sighted statesmanship was bound to attempt at least to restrict the oppressive foreign rule which the English Fleet maintained from Gibraltar, Malta, and Corfu, and to restore the Mediterranean to the Mediterranean peoples."

At the same time the Professor was teaching his students at the Berlin University that "the settlement with England will be the most difficult of all," and that "the result of our next war must be, if possible, the acquisition of some colony."

The modern schoolmasters and professors of Germany have worked to produce a race inspired with the ambitions of List and the rancours of Treitschke, and imbued with the idea that an unexampled destiny awaits their nation. That the Emperor William early recognized what schools and universities might be made to do in this direction is clear from the speech with which he opened the Educational Conference convened by him in 1890, and in which he complained that the traditional curriculum "lacked a patriotic basis." "We should," he exclaimed, "rear patriotic Germans and not young Greeks and Romans." It was also with a political purpose that he recommended a reversal of the usual order in which history was taught--that is to say, that the most recent periods should be taken first, and the student led back step by step to the events of antiquity.

While the Emperor is not omnipotent in legislation, he is, in Prussia, at any rate, practically unfettered in administration--that more extensive and equally important branch of government--and so the impulsions of his will can be forced down through the reticulations of the bureaucratic system till they are felt by the humblest official. He thus has at his disposal a large body of zealous co-operators anxious to comply with his desires even if they should have no direct relation to their official duties.

To appreciate the operation of this force, it is only necessary to turn over the pages of the German Navy League Handbook and notice how prominent a part the provincial agents of the central authority and subordinate members of the official body have played in the propaganda of that organization. It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that, wherever difficulty has been experienced in forming a local branch of the League, gentle pressure has been brought to bear on the stationmaster, postmaster, or gymnasium-director of the town, and has compelled him to take the initiative. In numerous cases such persons have, of course, come forward and founded branches of the League without any prompting, knowing well that their zeal would be in accordance with the "wishes of the Emperor," and would be rewarded by preferment when a suitable opportunity arose.

The Navy League is the only instrument the Emperor possesses for systematically and persistently propagating his ideas on world-policy and sea-power among the German people as a whole. It was founded in 1898, at his personal instance, but in all probability at Admiral von Tirpitz's suggestion, with the assistance of funds principally furnished by the Krupp family, which, as the chief material beneficiary from any increase in the German Fleet, could well afford to invest a little money in this way. Even in Bismarck's time the head of the Krupp firm had been induced to start a number of newspapers to advocate the augmentation of those armaments from which he had derived a considerable proportion of his vast wealth, and it is one of the least edifying features of modern Germany that those of its citizens who show the most bellicose spirit have a direct personal interest in the waging of war. The financial founders of the Navy League included other prosperous manufacturers who were anxious to deserve decorations or titles, and who, in some instances, went so far as to compel their employees to join the organization and so help to swell its membership.

Three weeks before the League was constituted, the first Navy Bill had already received the Emperor's signature, and the order of these events is a plain demonstration that even then the measure was intended to be merely the thin end of the wedge. It is an interesting and significant fact that almost all the ruling houses of Germany have been induced to identify themselves with the League, though it is nominally an absolutely independent and unofficial organization. The Emperor's brother, Prince Henry of Prussia, has assumed the general protectorate, and among the protectors of the affiliated State federations are Prince George of Bavaria, the Kings of Saxony and Württemberg, the Grand Dukes of Baden, Hesse, the two Mecklenburgs, Oldenburg, and Saxe-Weimar, the Dukes of Anhalt, Saxe-Altenburg, and Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the Princes of the two Lippes, Waldeck-Pyrmont, and the two Reusses, the Statthalter of Alsace-Lorraine, the Regent of Brunswick, and the Burgomasters of Hamburg and Bremen. Thus the State governments have a direct interest in the League, are under a moral obligation to promote its work, and, it may be added, bear a certain amount of responsibility for the manner in which its agitation is carried on. The purposes of the organization are defined in the statutes as follows:

"The German Navy League regards a strong German Fleet as necessary--principally in order to ensure the sea frontiers of Germany against the danger of war, to maintain the position of Germany among the Great Powers of the world, and to support the general interests and commercial communications of Germany as well as the safety of her citizens at work in oversea countries. Accordingly, it is the aim of the German Navy League to awaken, cultivate, and strengthen the interest of the German people for the importance and functions of the fleet."

The members of the League are divided into two classes--"individual" and "corporative." The latter are members of branches of other societies which enrol themselves in the League _en masse_. The most fruitful sources of support of this kind are those kindred bodies, the Pangerman Federation and the Colonial Association. On December 31st, 1911, the corporative members numbered 756,000, the individual members 298,000. The qualifications for individual membership are the attainment of the sixteenth year and a money contribution, which, if not fixed by the branch, is left for the member to determine for him or herself. The pecuniary contribution of a corporation joining the League is fixed by special arrangement in each case. From the accounts published it would appear that the average annual member's subscription falls a good deal short of sixpence. A considerable number of the members are young persons of both sexes who send in their names because it is a cheap and easy method of gratifying the association instinct, so strong in Germans, or for the sake of the dances and other purely social entertainments which are arranged by the branches.

A monthly paper, _Die Flotte_, which is published in an edition of 350,000 copies, is the League's chief organ in the Press, but the Central Office also issues immense quantities of pamphlets and leaflets. These are largely distributed with newspapers owned or controlled by the iron and steel and shipbuilding industries--what the Socialists call the "armour-plate Press"--but naturally find their way to all quarters to which Government influence can give them access. Under the name of "Communications," items of naval news and controversial paragraphs are sent out about once a week to all the papers, and though little notice is taken of them in the metropolitan Press, struggling provincial journals are very glad to have their columns filled up with topical matter by expert and authoritative pens. The League also publishes a profusely illustrated _Naval Album_, of which the Emperor every year buys 600 copies for distribution as prizes in the schools of Prussia--a typical example of the inter-action of the wheels of the naval agitation and the Government machine. Lecturing, too, occupies a prominent place in the League's activity, and the Central Office keeps a stock of magic-lanterns and slides, which it lends out free of charge to the local branches. It also supplies uniforms, badges, and bunting for local festivities.

By far the most effective department of the League's activity is, however, the excursions to the German naval ports, which it arranges for the benefit of schoolmasters and their classes. The participants in these outings are, as far as possible, selected from the inland states and districts, in which it is most difficult to arouse enthusiasm for the sea and the fleet. They are taken to Kiel or Wilhelmshaven, received with effusive courtesy by the naval officers delegated to look after them, and escorted through the streets by a ship's band to the dockyards of war vessels, over which they are conducted by amiable guides, who supply them with all the information likely to stimulate their interest in what they have seen. If the distance they have travelled makes it impossible for them to return home the same day, naval barracks or storehouses which happen for the moment to be vacant are placed at their disposal as night quarters. So much official complaisance and amenity, especially in a country where neither of these qualities is particularly common in the public services, arouses in those on whom it is expended a flattering sense of their own and their national importance, and schoolmasters thus captivated naturally, in due time, convey their impressions to their pupils. Though the numbers of persons thus dealt with are inevitably somewhat limited, the League unquestionably gains more ground in this way than it can hope to win by pamphlets which are read and lectures which are listened to mainly by the already convinced.

The Emperor is the real director of the Navy League, and it puts forward no demand that has not already received his approval, in principle if not in detail. The League is, in short, little more than a Government department, the function of which is to carry on an agitation for more warships. It must, however, always be remembered that the League's demands represent not what the Government desires or expects to get, but what it wants to be asked for. In order that it may keep up the pretence that it is an unofficial and independent organization, the League must naturally avoid too close a correspondence between its own programme and that of the Ministry of Marine, and it is also guided by the principle that it is necessary to ask much in order to get little. Occasionally it makes a show of hurrying and worrying the Naval Minister, and of being positively objectionable to the Government, but no one suffers less than Admiral von Tirpitz from these "attacks" upon him.