Owing to her alliance with France, and the complications
in the East, Russia has often supported the Anglo-French
Entente, so that we are justified in speaking of a Triple
Entente as a counterpart to the Triple Alliance.

In his new edition, published since the beginning of
the war, he adds:--

However, it was not till the outbreak of war that the
Triple Entente became a solid coalition. As late as April 24,
1914, Baron Beyens, the Belgian Minister in Berlin, stated
in connection with the rumor that the Russian Ambassador
in Paris, M. Iswolski, was to be transferred to London, that
M. Iswolski would be able to convince himself there that
public opinion in England had not the slightest desire to see
England lose her freedom of action by a formal treaty which
would bind her fate to that of Russia and France. It was the
London Protocol of September 5, 1914, that changed the
hitherto more or less loose connection between the three
powers into a close alliance.

When the war broke out, it was an anxious and
terrible question in France as to what England would
do. And as the days passed and France faced her
critical hour, the uncertainty as to England became
agonizing.

The general feeling the world over of those who
favored France and were friendly to Great Britain was
expressed by Admiral Mahan during the days after
war was declared, and while England still remained
out. I quote from a dispatch to the London "Times,"
dated New York, August 3, 1914:--

In a highly important interview to-night, Rear-Admiral
Mahan declared that England must at once throw her pre-
ponderating fleet against Germany for the chief purpose of
maintaining her own position as a world-power. For Eng-
land, Admiral Mahan said, it was a question, if she remained

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