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Many of those left are in very poor condition, so that the shortage is even more serious than is indicated by the falling off in numbers. Belgium, Serbia, and Roumania are in the worst condition. Practically all the animals in those countries have been killed or confiscated by the invading German and Austrian armies. This is one cause of their terrible famine conditions.
Serbia was thus left entirely to its own resources in the great propagandist activity which filled the years 1903 to 1908. The financial means at its disposal were exiguous in the extreme, especially when compared with the enormous sums lavished annually by the Austrian and German governments on their secret political services, so that the efforts of its agents cannot be ascribed to cupidity.
England is felt to have cooled a little towards Serbia. France is a source of bewilderment. The decoration of Belgrade with the Cross of the Legion of Honour was accepted in very good part, and the French Marshal who brought it was lauded to the skies. But the after-thought was, when he went away What did he come for?
When it will be possible to examine carefully the diplomatic documents of the War, and time will allow us to judge them calmly, it will be seen that Russia's attitude was the real and underlying cause of the world-conflict. She alone promoted and kept alive the agitations in Serbia and of the Slavs in Austria; she alone in Germany's eyes represented the peril of the future.
If, on the other hand, Bulgaria were recalcitrant and inexorable, the Tsardom which protected her might to some good purpose have become equally so, and displayed firmness and severity. It has been said that Russia cannot find it in her heart either to coerce Serbia or to punish Bulgaria.
In every room one finds portraits of the King of Montenegro, the queen, the princes, the King of Italy, his queen, the Tzar of Russia, the grand dukes and duchesses, the King of Serbia and his princes, and to cap all a sort of comprehensive tableau of all the male crowned heads of Europe including Turkey balanced by another commemorating all the queens of Europe excluding Turkey the spaces left between these august people are filled with family portraits, framed samplers, picture postcards or a German print showing the seven ages of man over a sort of step-ladder.
The two previous wars had, without exaggeration, deprived the Serbian fighting forces of one-tenth their number a tenth that was of the very best of first-line troops. Added to this was another serious handicap, possibly even more serious. Serbia had, indeed, emerged victorious from the two wars, with a large stretch of conquered territory at her backdoor.
The Bulgarian Government then issued a manifesto to the nation, announcing its decision to enter the war on the side of the Central Powers. The manifesto reads as follows: The Central Powers have promised us parts of Serbia, creating an Austro-Hungarian border line, which is absolutely necessary for Bulgaria's independence of the Serbians.
During the two years I was in Europe I visited every nation at war except Serbia, Bulgaria and Turkey. I saw conditions in the neutral countries of Holland, Denmark, Switzerland and Spain. The one big thing which impressed me upon my arrival in New York was that the United States, in contrast to all these countries, has, as yet, not been touched by the war.
It was felt in Serbia that Prince Nicholas's autocratic rule acted as a brake on the legitimate development of the national consciousness, and Montenegrin students who visited Belgrade returned to their homes full of wild and unsuitable ideas.
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