once more set on the issue of war. It is not inconceivable,
therefore, that some or all of those States may be drawn into the
present colossal conflict. In 1912-1913 the first war showed
Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro, and Servia allied against Turkey; and
in the second war Greece, Montenegro, and Servia were joined by
Roumania in the war against Bulgaria, who was also independently
attacked by Turkey. What may happen in 1914 or 1915 no one can
predict. But if this terrible conflagration, which is already
devastating Europe and convulsing all the continents and vexing all
the oceans of the globe, spreads to the Balkans, one may hazard the
guess that Greece, Montenegro, Servia, and Roumania will stand
together on the side of the Allies and that Bulgaria if she is not
carried away by marked Austro-German victories will remain
neutral,--unless indeed the other Balkan States win her over, as
they not inconceivably might do, if they rose to the heights of
unwonted statesmanship by recognizing her claim to that part of
Macedonia in which the Bulgarian element predominates but which was
ceded to her rivals by the Treaty of Bukarest.

But I have said enough to indicate that as in its origin so also in
its results this awful cataclysm under which the civilized world is
now reeling will be found to be vitally connected with the Balkan
Wars of 1912-1913. And I conclude with the hope that the present
volume, which devotes indeed but little space to military matters
and none at all to atrocities and massacres, may prove helpful to
readers who seek light on the underlying conditions, the causes, and
the consequences of those historic struggles. The favor already
accorded to the work and the rapid exhaustion of the first edition*
seem to furnish some justification of this hope.