FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[1]The Kaiser is one of the largest shareholders in the great mercury mines of Italy.[2]Cf.L’Invasione tedesca in Italia. Ezio M. Gray. Firenze.[3]Op. cit., p. 113.[4]Cf.L’Invasione tedesca in Italia, pp. 118, 119.[5]1050 million francs.[6]Op. cit., p. 120.[7]An instructive article on the subject by Mr. Moreton Frewen appeared in theNineteenth Centuryof February, 1916.

[1]The Kaiser is one of the largest shareholders in the great mercury mines of Italy.

[2]Cf.L’Invasione tedesca in Italia. Ezio M. Gray. Firenze.

[3]Op. cit., p. 113.

[4]Cf.L’Invasione tedesca in Italia, pp. 118, 119.

[5]1050 million francs.

[6]Op. cit., p. 120.

[7]An instructive article on the subject by Mr. Moreton Frewen appeared in theNineteenth Centuryof February, 1916.

Itwas in congruity with those principles and methods that the Banca Commerciale, which had its headquarters in Milan, set itself to discharge the complex functions of a financial, industrial, commercial and political agency of German interpenetration in Italy.

To German customers and those Italians who imported German goods, the Banca Commerciale allowed long credits and easy means of payment. To all who were in need of implements, machinery, or materials for a new enterprise, the bank “recommended” German houses, and those who were wise construed the “recommendation” as an ultimatum. For if it was ignored, their names were inscribed on the black books of the bank, and by means of an efficacious system of secret dossiers, handled by a confidential information bureau,[8]they found themselves thrust into a “credit vacuum,” boycotted by finance and condemned to bankruptcy. All banks shunned them.Their bonds became mere scraps of paper. Every enterprise to which they set their hands was blighted, and nothing remained for them but to abandon their avocations or surrender at discretion.

But besides this executive of destruction there was another and still more important board, whose work was wholly constructive. It was commonly known as the “service of information.” Its functions were to collect at first hand all useful data about Italian commerce and industry, to draw up tabulated reports for the use of Germans at home engaged in trade and industry. These lists indicated current prices, the qualities of the goods in demand, the favourite ways of packing and consigning these, samples of manufactures, statistics of production, the addresses of all firms dealing with Italians—in a word, every kind of data calculated to enable German trade and industry to compete successfully with their rivals. The manner in which this body of information was drawn up, sifted, classified, and made accessible, deserves unstinted admiration. To say that commercial espionage was practised largely in the working of this comprehensive system is but another way of stating that it was German.

The Banca Commerciale, which was the head and centre of this organization, was, as a matter of course, called Italian. For every similar institution, commercial, journalistic or other, which has for its object the realization of the Teutonic plan of internationalization, invariably wears the mask of the nationality of the country in which it operates. And in this case the mask was supplied by Italians, on whom the bank bestowed all the highesthonoraryposts, while reserving the influential ones for Germans and Austrians. Thus the moving spirits of this vast organization were Herrn Joel, Weil and Toeplitz, men of uncommon business capacity, who devoted all their time and energies to the attainment of the end in view. And their zeal, industry and ingenuity were rewarded by substantial results, which have left an abiding mark on Italian politics and entered for a great deal into the attitude of the nation towards the two groups of belligerents. In a relatively short span of time foreign competition in Italian markets was checked, German products ousted those of their rivals, and at last the very sources of Italy’s economic life were in the hands of the Teuton, whose continued goodwill became almost a vital necessity to the struggling nation.

Already in the year 1912 Germany stood first among Italy’s customers, whether we consider the list of her exports or that of imports. Italy bought from that empire goods valued at 626,300,000 francs, and sold it produce worth 328,200,000 francs; whereas Great Britain, who supplies Italy with the bulk of her coal, exported only 577,100,000 francs worth, while her imports were valued at 264,400,000 francs. For France the figures were 289,600,000 and 222,600,000 francs respectively.

The method by which Italian industries were assailed, shaken, and then purchased and controlled by this redoubtable organization, bore, as we saw, all the marks of German commercial ethics. Sharp practice which recognizes as its only limitation the strong arm of the penal law, is a fair description of the plan of campaign. Against this insidious process none of the native enterprises had the strength to offereffective resistance. One by one they were drawn into the vast net woven by the three German Fates—Joel, Weil and Toeplitz. The various iron, mechanical and shipbuilding works, which represented the germs from which native industries were to grow, were sucked into the Teuton maelstrom. The larger and the smaller steamship navigation companies likewise fell under the direction of the Banca Commerciale, which permitted some of them to exist and even to thrive up to a certain point, beyond which their usefulness to the general plan would have turned to harm. In this way Italy’s entire mercantile marine became one of the numerous levers in the hands of the interpenetrating German. And the importance of this lever for political purposes can neither be gainsaid nor easily overstated.

In every little town and village which sends a quota of emigrants to the transatlantic liners, agents of the various steamship companies are always about and active. Being intelligent and enterprising, their influence on local politics is irresistible, and it was uniformly employed in those interests which it was the object of the Banca Commerciale to further. “This institution,” writes an Italian expert, who has studied the subject with unusual care, “being the mistress of the dominant economic organisms of the nation, makes use of them to carry out a germanophile policy. It employs them for the purpose of exercising a directive action in all elections, commercial, provincial and general. Every servant of a steamship navigation company, every purveyor of emigrants is at the same time and by the very force of things an electoral agent. The position of arbitress and mistress of the steamship companiescarries with it possession of the keys of the national wealth, and is consequently a formidable weapon of aggressive competition against all industries, Italian and foreign, which are not affiliated to those of Germany. The Banca Commerciale, having obtained that supremacy, forced the Italian companies to lead a languishing existence in straitened circumstances, whereas they might easily have grown rich and flourishing. It permits our steamship companies to subsist and even to earn somewhat, but only just enough to suffice for the declaration of a modest dividend. That is why Italian navigation companies levy such excessive rates of freight, why their service is not organized in accordance with rational and latter day standards, why they take no thought of winning foreign markets or of national expansion.[9]They have no means of consigning merchandise at the domicile, so that the consignees are put to enormous expense for collection and delivery. And to make matters still worse, Italian navigation companies are bound with those of Germany by special secret conventions, which oblige them to abandon to their rivals certain kinds of merchandise of the Near and the Far East.”

If we examine the peculiarly Teuton ways of trade competition in their everyday guise, and without the glamour of political ideals to distract our attention, we are confronted with phenomena of a repulsive character. For the German’s keen practical sense, his sustained concentration of effort on the furtherance of material interests, and his scorn of ethical restraints render him a formidablecompetitor in pacific pursuits and a dangerous enemy in war. His moral sense is not so much dulled by experience as warped by education. It may be likened to a clock which has not stopped but shows the wrong hour. He has been taught that there are times and circumstances when religious and ethical standards may or must be set aside, and he arrogates to himself the right of determining them. Without examining into stories of preternatural meanness and perfidy which have come into vogue since the outbreak of the war, it is fair to say that dirty tricks, destructive of all social intercourse, formed part of the German commercial procedure in France, Britain and Russia, the only proviso being that they were not penalized by the criminal law of the country.

An amusing but nowise edifying instance turns upon Paris fashions. That Berlin, like Vienna, should seek to vie with Paris in setting the fashion of feminine finery to the world is conceivable and legitimate. But that Germans should compete with Paris in Paris fashions connotes a psychological frame of mind which is better understood by the inmates of a prison than by a mercantile community. American ladies visiting the French capital to order their gowns are astonished to note that no fashions really new have been shown to them in the great Paris houses. They had just seen them all in the German capital. And the Paris models destined to be placed on the market next season turn out to be identical with those which the fair visitors had already inspected in Berlin and could have purchased there at a much lower price. How this could be is explained simply. A German merchant in continuous relations with the staffs of the Paris firmsclandestinely obtains from some of the members for a high price the models which are still being kept secret, has them copied in large numbers in Berlin and sold at a cheap price. True, the German workmanship lacks the dainty finish of the Paris article, but the difference is such as appeals only to the eye of a connoisseur.

In Italy similar phenomena were observed frequently. A firm in Florence celebrated for special types of wooden utensils which were never successfully imitated elsewhere was ruined by commercial espionage. One day the proprietor engaged the services of two foreign workmen who laboured hard and steadily for some time and then departed, to his great regret. Six months later Germany dumped on the Italian markets the very same articles in vast quantities, and at a price so low that the Italian firm could not hope to compete with them. At first, indeed, the Florence house made a valiant stand against the invasion, but had finally to give up the fight as hopeless. Later on the proprietor learned that the two honest-looking workmen were first-class German engineers, whose only objects in entering his service were to acquaint themselves with his methods, copy his models and then strangle his trade. And these objects they achieved to their satisfaction.[10]

Thus, in order to strangle concerns that compete with them successfully, the average German merchant sticks at nothing. His maxim is, that in trade as in all forms of the struggle for existence, necessity knows no law. And he is himself the judge of necessity. The history of German industry in Italy is full ofinstructive examples of this disdain of moral checks, but one will suffice as a type. It turns upon the struggle which the Teuton invaders carried on against the Italian iron industry, which for a while held its own against all fair competition. In their own country, the German manufacturers sold girders at £6 10s.the ton. The profits made at this price enabled them to offer the same articles in Switzerland for £6, in Great Britain for £5 3s.and in Italy for £3 15s.Now, as the cost of production in Germany fluctuated between £4 5s.and £4 15s.per ton, it is evident that the dead loss incurred by the German manufacturers on Italian sales varied between 10s.and £1 per ton. But this sacrifice was offered up cheerfully because its object was the destruction of the growing iron industry of Northern Italy and the clearing of the ground for a German monopoly.[11]The spirit that animates the Teuton producer, in his capacity as rival, was clearly embodied by one of the principal manufacturers of aniline dyes in Frankfort, who remarked to an Italian business man: “I am ready to sell at a dead loss for ten years running rather than lose the Italian market, and if it were necessary I would give up for the purpose all the profits I have made during the past ten years.”[12]To contend with any hope of success against men of this stamp, one should be imbued with qualities resembling their own. And of such a commercial equipment the business community of Great Britain have as yet shown no tokens.

In Italy the Banca Commerciale was wont to send to every firm, whether it had or hadnot dealings with it, a tabulated list of questions to be answered in writing. The ostensible object was to obtain trustworthy materials to serve for the Annual Review of the economic movement in the country published every year by the Bank. In reality the ends achieved were far more important, as we may infer from the use to which all such information in France was put. There the well-known agency of Schimmelpfeng, which was in receipt of a subvention from the German Chamber of Commerce, was a centre of secret information respecting the solvency, the prospects, the debts and assets of every firm in France, and its tabulated information about French commerce and industry, together with all the knowledge that had been secretly gleaned, was duly sent to Berlin.

Russians complain somewhat tardily of the prevalence of the same system among themselves. “Every day,” writes theNovoye Vremya, “fresh details are leaking out respecting a certain German firm, ideal in its resourcefulness, which succeeded in spreading a vast net over all Russia. It has been satisfactorily established that Germans occupied many responsible posts in the organization, and that these[13]officials were subjects of the German Empire. At the head of the entire business in Russia down to a recent date was also a German subject.” The kind of information gathered by the agents of the company, “for business purposes,” is clear from a circular issued by the firm just a fortnight before the outbreak of the war.

“Tula,“5/18 July, 1914.

“District Card for the Collectors of the Circuit.

“Form N 246.

“We have forwarded you to-day a number of cards of the printed form N 246, which you are requested to have filled in at once and placed at the head of form 490 of the corresponding district. We draw your attention herewith to the necessity of enumerating on the first table of form N 246 all the villages and other places of the circuit of each district collector, whether or no they contain debtors of ours, and of stating in the second table the number of inhabitants. The registration is to be done by the official charged with that part of the work: each circuit is to be entered separately and the villages and places it contains to be given in alphabetical order. These lists are to be verified every six months and fresh information set out respecting the growing number of our debtors. We request you to take this work in hand at once and without delay.

“The Control Department, Tula.”

When this circular was published in Moscow the general director of the firm wrote to certain provincial newspapers pointing out that the company is American, not German. “It is curious,” a Russian journal remarks, “that an American firm should need a map containing all the villages and hamlets of the districts, with the number of their inhabitants, irrespective of the presence there of the company’s debtors.”[14]

FOOTNOTES:[8]This secret information bureau is everywhere a potent engine of attack in German hands. It renders deliberate libellers and defamers immune against the action of the law. The victims feel the effects but cannot point to the cause. Thefiches, as the certificates are called, are couched in conventional terms and bear no signature. In the case of persons whom the bank desires to ruin, these documents are sentences of commercial death.[9]Cf. Preziosi,La Germania a la Conquista dell’ Italia, p. 57 fol.[10]L’Invasione tedesca, p. 147.[11]L’Invasione tedesca in Italia, p. 149.[12]Op. cit., p. 150.[13]It is an American Company for the sale of certain machines. The Russian organ mentions all the names. For my purpose this is unnecessary. The curious may find them in theNovoye Vremyaof 5/18 August, 1915.[14]Novoye Vremya, 5/18 July, 1916.

[8]This secret information bureau is everywhere a potent engine of attack in German hands. It renders deliberate libellers and defamers immune against the action of the law. The victims feel the effects but cannot point to the cause. Thefiches, as the certificates are called, are couched in conventional terms and bear no signature. In the case of persons whom the bank desires to ruin, these documents are sentences of commercial death.

[9]Cf. Preziosi,La Germania a la Conquista dell’ Italia, p. 57 fol.

[10]L’Invasione tedesca, p. 147.

[11]L’Invasione tedesca in Italia, p. 149.

[12]Op. cit., p. 150.

[13]It is an American Company for the sale of certain machines. The Russian organ mentions all the names. For my purpose this is unnecessary. The curious may find them in theNovoye Vremyaof 5/18 August, 1915.

[14]Novoye Vremya, 5/18 July, 1916.

Anotherinstructive example of the Annexation mania, as it displays itself in German commercial undertakings, comes to us from Russia.

It is only one of many, a typical instance of a recognized method. The Franco-Russian joint-stock company Provodnik is known throughout Europe. It manufactures tyres and other rubber wares. The capital, which amounted to only 700,000 roubles at the date of its foundation, in the year 1888, had increased to 22,000,000 by the time when war was declared. It is closely connected with another company named the Buffalo, which has its headquarters in Riga and was promoted by the President of the Provodnik, M. Wittenberg, together with several Austrian capitalists. M. Wittenberg is President of both companies, and the Provodnik has assisted the Buffalo on various occasions, even during the war, notwithstanding the fact that the shareholders of the Buffalo are mostly German subjects. On January 2, 1914, another company was created, this time in Berlin, and called the “German Provodnik.” Now, according to the instructions laying down the rights of the Board (Par. 24), wares may not be delivered on credit to any firm or institution for the value of more than 50,000 roubles, andnot even to this amount unless the solvency of the recipient is beyond question.

In spite of this clearly marked limitation the Board of the Franco-Russian Provodnik, which exerted itself with unwonted zest to supply the German Provodnik with motor-tyres shortly before the war, opened a credit of 498,000 roubles in favour of this firm. The manager of the warehouses of the Riga products in New York is a German subject named Lindner. The managers in Zurich and Copenhagen are also German subjects.[15]

It is not to be wondered at that countries like Italy and Russia, poor in capital and industry, fell an easy prey to the ruthless German invader, who, with the help of British, French, and even Italian and Russian savings, suffocated the nascent industries of the respective nations, killed foreign competition, earned large profits, obtained control of the country’s resources and an intimate knowledge of the political secrets of their respective Governments. “Many Germans,” wrote an Italian Review,[16]“serving in Italian establishments are in possession of lists of the fortresses, measurements, distances, positions of the roads and footpaths, they have found the points of triangulation and acquired all requisite data and information about them. And to-morrow, should war break out, they will accompany and guide the German or Austrian invaders.”

How keen they are to make themselves conversant with matters of political moment in the guise of honest workmen is becoming fairly well known to day, although it may be takenfor granted that if peace were concluded to-morrow these same commercial spies would find hospitality among some of the easy-going merchants of Great Britain, who still refuse to believe in the obvious danger or to act upon their belief. In November 1912 the Italian Minister of the Marine called for tenders for the supply of silver dinner-plate for the warships. At the critical moment, when the decision was about to be taken, the German firm of Hermann, which has its headquarters in Vienna, reduced its offer first by 18 per cent., then by 20, and finally by 20·13 per cent. in order to get the order. For the order carried with it, for the representative of the firm, Herr Forster,the permanent right of accessto all naval arsenals of Italy.[17]

Thenaïvetéof Italy in matters of this delicate nature stands out in jarring contrast to the habitual caution of that diplomatic nation, and has not yet been satisfactorily explained from the psychological point of view. One is puzzled to understand how, months after the present war had begun, the press of Genoa could announce that the supply of electric motors for the Italian marine and of ventilators for Italy’s fortified places on her eastern frontier had been adjudicated to two German firms, on the ground that their tenders were the lowest.[18]

One of the largest automobile and motor works in the German Empire is the Benz and Rheinische Automobil und Motoren Fabrik Actien Gesellschaft of Mannheim. It supplies the Kaiser with his cars and has branches everywhere. In Italy, too, it exists andflourishes. But there the great German firm is modestly disguised under the name of the Societá Italiana Benz. And it is so modest that in spite of its gorgeous warehouse in the Via Floria (Rome), of its luxurious head-office in the Via Finanze, of its well-equipped workshop for repairing and fitting and its little army of agents actively pushing the business all over Italy, its capital, all told, amounts only to 30,000 lire, or £1,000! The firm is managed by a German engineer whose kith and kin are fighting in the Kaiser’s army. And this German engineer, Herr Matt, has free access to the Italian War Minister, even now,[19]when it is question of manufacturing projectiles; and he has continuous relations with the Italian Airmen’s Brigade.

Electricity in Italy, together with all its auxiliary trades and industries, was, like every other lucrative enterprise, in the hands of Germans and German Swiss. The names of the various company directors had the usual familiar Teuton sound. When the European conflict broke out it seemed for a moment as if all these German concerns must come to a sudden and dire end. But just as the German engineer Herr Matt, whose relatives are officers in the Kaiser’s army, has free access to the Italian War Minister and carries on his business in Italy as usual, so the electrical concerns had merely to change one or two adjectives in their trading names and were forthwith shielded from harm. A case in point which is valuable because typical occurred recently. The Italian Electro-technical Association published a list of the manufacturers of electric machines andrequisites in Italy, and by way of introduction set down the following patriotic remarks: “This list is addressed to those who at the present moment feel it to be their duty to uphold and encourage the production and development of materials for electricity. Importation from abroad, which we favoured when Italian industry was still in an embryonic stage,degenerated especially in consequence of the action of the Germans, into a veritable conquest of the markets; and no weapon, licit or illicit, was spurned to destroy our sources of production, and suffocate our nascent initiative.”

These are pathetic words. They are calculated to appeal with force to the Italian who loves his country. But when one looks more closely into the list of Italian producers one is disappointed to find the same familiar names as before:[20]Allgemeine Electricitäts Gesellschaft, Thomson Houston, the Mannesmann Tubes Co., the Italian Brown Boveri Co., etc. The nationalist Italian press organ which first directed public attention to these German subtleties asks pertinently: “Were not and are not the real producers named in this list the same who were the prime movers in the deplorable foreign conquest of the Italian market?”[21]

The Banca Commerciale, which was admittedly an all-powerful German institution, and has the control, direct or indirect, of most of the industries, the silk manufacture, metallurgical and mechanical works of the country and of thirty-four electrical companies in Italy: which possess a capital of 434,000,000 francsand produce energy equal to 940,000 h.p.: found itself in an unpleasant predicament as soon as the King of Italy declared war against Austria-Hungary. But Teuton resourcefulness solved the problem with ease and seeming thoroughness by inducing certain German officials on the board to resign and appointing as Italian director a gentleman known for his philo-Germanism. But the three creators of the bank were left: Herrn Joel, Toeplitz and Weil, and although it was affirmed solemnly that Joel was no longer the director but M. Fenoglio, it has been publicly proved that after the resignation of the former, the latter, before sending aconsignment of gold to Berlin,[22]had to ask for and actually received the authorization of Herr Joel.[23]

The following brief summary of the companies and enterprises in which the Banca Commerciale is interested may enable the British reader to form an idea of its decisive influence on the economic and political life of the Italian nation: they include eighteen of the largest companies of textile industries; sixteen of the most important companies of chemical, electrical and kindred industries; six of the chief companies of alimentation; twenty-six transport companies; twenty-seven of the principal companies of mechanical industries and naval construction; six building companies; five of the chief mining companies; twenty-eight of the largest electrical companies; and twenty-two miscellaneous.[24]

Thus every artery and vein of the economic organism of Italy is swathed and pressed andchoked by this German isolator, which nobody dares to pull away. For if we turn from the economic to the political aspect of this curious phenomenon, we shall find that the companies enumerated give work to scores of thousands of operators and employees, through whose willing instrumentality they become vast electoral agencies. “It is obvious,” we are authoritatively assured, “that the influence of such companies in administrative and political elections is put forth in congruity with the interests at stake, a circumstance which explains how it comes that many Italian politicians and representatives are, directly or otherwise, chained to the chariot of the Banca Commerciale and indirectly to that of Germany’s policy.”[25]In Italy the deputies are, with few exceptions, the humble servants of their constituents, and are powerless to shake themselves free from local influences. “It is easy to infer from this what efforts have to be made and what compromises must be acquiesced in by those deputies whose election depends on such institutions which, aware that money is more than ever the nerve of political contests, subscribe to the election expenses, and assure in this way the respectful gratitude of the parliamentary recipients of their benefactions. And all this is executed with order and discipline. Examples could be quoted and names mentioned.”[26]

The unsuspected ways in which this remarkable organization destroys, constructs and draws its sustenance from its victims are a revelation. Imagine a few British bankers possessed of two hundred thousand pounds and conceiving theplan of wresting the economic markets of Italy from Britain’s rivals, building up an all-powerful organization with Italian money, throttling Italian industries and commerce with the help of Italian agents paid for the purpose out of the hard-earned savings of the Italian people, and then yoking the national policy to the interests of Great Britain. One would laugh to scorn such a mad scheme, and set down its authors as wild visionaries. Yet that was the programme of the little band of audacious Germans who conceived the design of teutonizing Italy. And they had almost realized it when the war broke out. Even the halfpence scraped together by poor emigrants and half-starved Sicilian working-men were diverted from the savings banks into banks of German origin, two of which held four hundred million francs of the nation’s economies a few months ago.

It was not to be expected that the domain of foreign politics should long escape the notice or be spared the experiments of this all-absorbing organization. What excites our wonder are the superiority of its method and the completeness of its success. To the thinking of Germany’s leaders international politics and foreign trade are correlates. In the Near East, where so many of Italy’s interests are now concentrated, the Societa Commerciale d’Oriente of Constantinople, being one of the agencies of the Banca Commerciale, was also one of the canals through which this influence passed. Under the Italian flag and with the co-operation of Italian diplomacy, that “little business” of Germany was conscientiously transacted which consisted in the adaptation and employment of Italian expansion as an instrument for Teutonic interpenetration.Whithersoever we turn our gaze we discern, lurking under the comely vesture of Italy, the clumsy form of the Teuton. It is amusing to reflect that the recent railway concessions in Asia Minor, for which Italian statesmen laboured so hard and so long, went in reality to the Banca Commerciale, which is but a roundabout way of saying to Germany. And in order to win their suit and have those advantages conferred on “Italy,” King Victor’s Government agreed to renounce their claims for the reimbursement of the expenses incurred during the administration of the occupied Turkish islands. This sacrifice meant tens of millions of francs, kept from the pockets of Italian taxpayers and handed over to the German bankers, who spent them in promoting anti-Italian projects. The Bank of Albania was also conceived originally as an organ of German propaganda, and was pushed forward by the same set of agents who induced the Italian Government to employ them as its own.

In those ways the seemingly modest little bank scheme which Friedrich Weil with Crispi’s help initiated in 1890, grew until it acquired the influence of a State within the State. And then it began to discharge functions unique in the history of the banking world. Its employees became diplomatists and statesmen at a moment’s notice, ended wars, and drafted treaties. The Banca Commerciale put a stop to the campaign against Turkey which was a thorn in the side of Teutonism and settled the terms of peace in accordance with its own judgment. It was not an ambassador or a minister who opened the pourparlers in Stamboul and continued them at Ouchy, but anagent of the Banca Commerciale. It was that same agent who immediately afterwards, in concert with colleagues of his bank, negotiated the treaty, reporting by telegraph to the headquarters of the bank in Milan every important conversation he had with the Turkish delegates.[27]At a later date important conversations between the British Foreign Office and the Consulta were entered into in the name and for the alleged interests of Italy, but the principal part in the drawing up of the terms of the settlement arrived at was taken by Signor Nogara of the Societa Commerciale d’Oriente,—the company which the concessions demanded were destined to benefit. In fine, the parasite had thus become almost equal in power to the body on which it battened.

A well-known politician and member of the Italian Legislature, Di Cesaró, narrated the following curious incident in a public speech delivered on March 17, 1915: “An Italian Admiral, having had the audacity to request the immediate delivery of an order for arms manufactured by the works which are under the control of the Banca Commerciale, was relieved of his functions within twenty-four hours, and his place was taken by another Admiral, who by chance happened to be the brother of one of the negotiators of the Italo-Turkish Peace of Ouchy.” And as we saw, the negotiators of that peace were officials of the Banca Commerciale. An authority on the subject[28]wrote: “For many years the Banca Commerciale has contrived, directly or indirectly, according to circumstances, to take a handin the formation of various ministries.... As a matter of fact, on its governing board there are seven senators, many deputies, and a numerous host of political notabilities. It has its tentacles everywhere, high up and low down, in Italy and abroad, in peace time and in war time, when our native land is elated with good fortune and when it is cast down with bad. Its hand lies heavy upon everything and everybody. It is the arbitress in the choice of good and evil and is under no obligation to render an account of its doings to any one.... In war time we are certain to feel greatly hampered by the meshes of such a firmly woven net.”[29]This anticipation has since come true.

Like the vampire that soothes its victim while drawing its life-blood, the parasitic German organism cast a spell over influential Italians of the community and imparted to them a feeling that things were going well with themselves and their country. Money passed from hand to hand. Labour found remunerative employment. Towns in decay were galvanized into new life. And all Italy was grateful. Milan, the “moral capital” of the kingdom, where a couple of decades before the name of Germany was execrated, became itself very largely Teutonic and was dominated by a rich and flourishing German colony. Venice, Genoa, Rome, Florence, Naples, Palermo and Torino, leavened in the same plentiful degree with pushing subjects of the Kaiser, turned towards Berlin as the sunflower towards the orb of day.

Against Austria, Italians might write andtalk to their hearts’ content, but towards Germany feelings of respect verging on awe and of gratitude bordering on genuine friendship were cherished by every institution and leading individual in the kingdom. And when the hour struck to wrench Italy from that monster vampire, the task was so arduous and fraught with such danger that no Cabinet without the insistent encouragement of the whole nation would have attempted it. The policy of every Foreign Secretary was and still is dominated by this unnatural relationship to the Teuton, and it came at last to be acknowledged as a political dogma that Germany must in no case be confounded with Austria. Indeed, it is fair to assert that the governing circles of both countries held and hold that nothing should be allowed to mar these friendly feelings, not even the circumstance that Germany as Austria’s ally is bound to stand by her during the war. Hence when the friction between Italy and Austria was growing dangerous, Germany was ready with two expedients for keeping her friendly intercourse with the former country intact. She first assumed the rôle of umpire between them, endeavouring to beat down the demands of the one while spurring on the other to a higher degree of liberality, and when her well-laid and skilfully executed plan unexpectedly failed, in consequence of the interposition of adeus ex machina, she produced a draft treaty, complete in all details, which was to rob war between Italy and herself, if circumstances should render it unavoidable, of all its frightfulness and savagery. The two nations virtually said to one another: “Whatever else we may do, we shall steerclear of mutual hostilities to the best of our ability. But as the action and reaction of alliances may thwart our efforts and force us into war against each other, we hereby undertake that that war shall be but a simulacrum of the struggle that we are at present waging against all our other adversaries. We shall respect each other’s property religiously, for we shall both stand in need of each other when the exhausting struggle is ended and the wounds it inflicted have to be dressed and healed. We Germans have invested thousands of millions of francs in Italy, the one foreign country for which we feel genuine affection. You Italians have thriven on our commercial and industrial enterprise. Spare our property now and you shall not rue your self-containment. After the war the Entente people will shun us as lepers, and our only hope of finding outlets for our commerce is through the neutral States. Now, of all the European Great Powers, Italy is the only one qualified to render us great services of this nature. And she will be glad of a partner whose help is free from the alloy of jealousy or hostility. For our interests do not clash, whereas those of Italy and the Entente Powers never can run parallel. In the Adriatic she will find the Slavs pitted against her, in Asia Minor the Russians, French, British, Greeks, and in the Eastern Mediterranean the three last-named States. But at no point does Germany cross her path. Our common hope in the future is based on our experience of the past. It is knowledge rather than trust. We Germans succeeded in laying the foundations of your economic strength. And now that Austria’s rivalryhas ceased, we will contribute to your political growth. With the help of our organizing talent you will become the France of the future. Your population is already well-nigh equal to that of the Republic. In ten years it will be more numerous, and will still go on increasing. Tunis has been built up by Italian toil. Nature has assigned the Mediterranean to Italy as her natural domain. The overlordship of the Midland Sea is yours by right, and in co-partnership with us you shall assert and enforce this right. Mind your steps, therefore, in performing the difficult egg dance which the European War may impose on us both. You are not, cannot be, friends of France, closely though you are related by blood. Neither can the French become our friends. Therefore you and we are natural allies, as your far-sighted politicians like Crispi perceived. Even Sonnino sees that and acknowledges it. The one political idea of his life was to solder Italy firmly to Germany. And that is still the desire of your aristocracy. Fight with Austria, if you must, but Italy and Germany must not become armed enemies.”

Nearly two milliards of francs of German money are invested in commercial and industrial enterprises and immovable property in Italy, besides the value of ships detained at Italian ports, some of which have cargoes valued at several million francs. The Kaiser is himself the largest shareholder in the Italian mercury mines of Monte Amiata, his Foreign Secretary, von Jagow, is another. And they are resolved not to relinquish their hold. That Prince von Buelow should move every lever to save this precious pledge wasnatural, and that Italian statesmen with their germanophile leanings should readily fall in with his scheme is not to be wondered at. The Kaiser’s ambassador proposed that in the case of war each contracting party should respect the property of the other. This formula sounds decorous. Its meaning is profound. A treaty embodying these stipulations was agreed to and secretly signed by Prince von Buelow and Baron Sidney Sonnino, whose admiration for Germany embodied itself in all the more important acts of his political career. This transaction, which the Italian Government wisely refrained from publishing, was announced by the Germans for reasons of their own. The impression produced by this display of eclectic affinities so pronounced that even the world’s most ruthless war could not impair them was considerable. And it would have been heightened if the alleged and credible fact had also been divulged that the diplomatic instrument was ratified when Italy had already decided upon war with Austria-Hungary. Between Italy and Germany stands a bridge which both peoples are resolved to keep intact at all costs. Against the facts it is useless to argue.

The struggle between Germany and Italy, therefore, should it ever break out, would differ not merely in degree, but also, one may take it, in kind, from the lawless and ruthless savagery which characterizes the warfare of the Teutons against the Entente Powers. A civilizing mute would deaden the resonance of bestial passion; and even private property—in especial that of Germany—would be safe from confiscation and wanton destruction, and when peace is restored therich mercury mines of Italy will again belong to the Kaiser and his advisers. Last summer[30]a series of private meetings was held for three days running in Switzerland, at which Germans of high standing took part, for the purpose of dealing with German capital in Italy and safeguarding it during the war. At one of the sittings it was computed that about two milliards of francs belonging to German subjects are buried in Italian undertakings or in house or landed property.

In November 1915 the Italian Government publicly applied one of the provisions of the secret treaty in favour of Germany. At that moment it was deemed necessary to commandeer German ships in Italian ports for the service of the navy and the mercantile marine. Had it been a question of Austrian vessels they would have been seized and utilized without any such precautions. In virtue of §4 of the Treaty the Italian authorities undertook to pay a monthly sum to the German owners for the use of their steamers. That clause lays it down that the two contracting states shall respect the enactment made by the concluding section of Article VI of the Hague Convention concerning the treatment of enemy merchant vessels.

This treaty, then, is no mere scrap of paper. It is a strong bridge spanning the chasm between Italo-German friendship in the past and Italo-German friendship after the war. To take due note of this and of like symptoms of the coming readjustment of political and economic forces is one of the primary duties of Entente statesmanship which one piously hopes are being efficiently discharged.

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