Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/390

 380 Reviews of Books Deutsche Gcschichte von dcr Auflosung dcs alten bis cur Errichtung des neuen Kaiserreiches, {1806-1871). Von H. v. Zwiedineck- SiJDENHORST, Profcssor of History at the University of Graz. Dritter Band: Die Losung der deutschcn Frage und dai Kaisertmn der Hohenzollern, i84g-i8'/i. (Stuttgart and Berlin: J. G. Cotta'sche Buchhandlung Nachfolger. 1905. Pp. x, 504.) La Fondation de I'Einpire Allcmand, 1852-1821. Par Ernest Denis, Professeur d'Histoire Contemporaine a I'Universite de Paris. (Paris: Librairie Armand Colin. 1906. Pp. viii, 528.) The first of these books is the concluding volume of a work to which the author has given a decade of labor, and which has already been recognized as the most important effort at general treatment in this field since Sybel. The author, for some time back the chief editor of the reorganized " Bibliothek Deutscher Geschichte " (in which this work appears), may be regarded as the leading Austrian representative of the school of Sybel ; and those who look to his pages for any consider- able departure from the orthodox Prussian points of view will be dis- appointed. Austrian nationality and feeling are to be presumed in the alumnus and teacher of the University of Graz, and are indeed evident ; but it is " Das Herz Deutsch-Oesterreichs, das deutsche Herz " of which Hamerling sings that guides his pen — the German feeling that looks over the border with bitter regrets and could, we suspect, be brought with no great difficulty to sacrifice Magyar-Slav association to the blotting out of that border. Nor does'the author take any particular pains to conceal or moderate his political feelings; in his preface he tells us that der Darsteller, der darauf ausgehen wiirde, objektiv zu erzahlen, wiirde es niemandem recht machen und alle langweilen. Wir sind insgesamt mit so vielen intimen Fiiden an die niichste Vergangenheit gebunden, dass wir bei der Betrachtung der jiingsten Geschehnisse unser Gefiihl nicht ganzlich zum Schweigen bringen konnen. . . Es gibt keine Geschichte der Gegenwart. . . Indeni ich in diesem dritten Bande an die Ereignisse von 1866 und 1870 herantrat, erkannte ich mit Bestimmtheit, dass hier die Gewinnung des historischen Standpunktes nur zum Telle gelingen kann. This frank statement would be ill-requited by an undue insistence on the numerous instances in which the author's pen has betrayed his pre- dilections, and the reviewer feels more inclined to point out that the book is to be taken much more seriously than these words might lead one to suppose. If it is not a " definitive " history of the period (which its author disclaims any hope of producing), it is in the main a full and judicious treatment of the political development, guided by the most approved methods and based on thorough study. The proportioning indeed is not always satisfactory, but the facts are well marshalled, the emphasis good, the language clear and effective ; we doubt if there can