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and for that he deserves a certain recognition as against his opponents, the hesitating Herzen and the calculating Marx. It was doubtless in this sense that Annenkov called him “the father of Russian idealism.”

⁂ The first article in the above series appeared in last week’s number.—Editor.

[It is unnecessary to remind our readers that, owing to the hostility of the Austrian Slavs to war with Russia and Serbia, the Austrian Parliament was not allowed to meet from March, 1914, till May, 1917, and then only under the stimulus of the Russian Revolution. As a result, the Austrian and Hungarian Delegations (the two Parliamentary Committees by which alone the Joint Foreign Minister can be called to account for his foreign policy) met on 4 December, 1917, for the first time during the war. Count Czernin made three statements of very considerable importance, but as the first has already been fairly fully reported in the British press, we limit ourselves to reproducing the second, which illustrates very clearly the fundamental difference of views between the statesmen of the two rival groups in the vital question of self-determination.

The note struck throughout is that of the Speech from the Thron—“We mean to remain masters in our own house”; and those who know anything of Austria-Hungary know very well that “we” are the two dominant racial minorities of the Germans and Magyars, who jointly rule the other races.

For the benefit of those ignorant sentimentalists who still hanker after a separate peace with the House of Habsburg, it may be well to add that, both in the Speech from the Throne, in the Addresses of the two Delegations, and in the speeches of the Foreign Minister, and other prominent statesmen like Counts Tisza and Andrássy, quite unusual stress was laid upon the closeness of the Dual Monarchy’s ties with Germany and the need for strengthening them still further. In particular, the Hungarian Delegation expressed its conviction that above all the alliance which, concluded nearly forty years ago with the German Empire and loyally maintained by us, has assured to us the blessings of peace, is the proper foundation for the defence of our interests, as the successes of this war so brilliantly demonstrate. But also the re-organisation (Umgestaltung) of our Monarchy fifty years ago on a Dualist basis has justified itself, since during this period we were able to make splendid progress in every sphere, alike of intellectual and economic development.”]

“We are at one with Germany, on the basis of a defensive war—a basis of which this House unanimously approves, which was laid down by the German Reichstag as the Richtlinie of its war aims and which Dr. von Kühlmann defined very clearly when he said: ‘There is no