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 splendour were laid by the Great Elector, by the time of whose death (1688) the population had risen to some 20,000. During this period several suburbs had begun to grow up, Friedrichswerder in 1667 and the Dorotheenstadt, so named in 1676 after the electress Dorothea its founder. In 1688 Frederick III. (afterwards King Frederick I.) began the Friedrichstadt, completed by Frederick William I. Under Frederick I., who did much to embellish the city as the royal Residenzstadt, the separate administrations of the quarters of Berlin, Kölln, Friedrichstadt, Friedrichswerder and Dorotheenstadt were combined, and the separate names were absorbed in that of Berlin. The fortifications begun in 1658 were finally demolished under Frederick the Great in 1745, and the Neue Friedrich-strasse, the Alexander-strasse and the Wall-strasse were laid out on their site.

Twice during the Seven Years’ War Berlin was attacked by the enemy: in 1757 by the Austrians, who penetrated into the suburbs and levied a heavy contribution, and in 1760 by the Russians, who bombarded the city, penetrated into it, and only retired on payment of a ransom of 1,500,000 thalers (£225,000). After the disastrous campaign of Jena, Berlin suffered much during the French occupation (24th October 1806 to 1st December 1808). In spite of these misfortunes, however, the progress of the city was steady. In 1809 the present municipal government was instituted. In 1810 the university was founded. After the alliance of Prussia and Russia in 1812 Berlin was again occupied by the French, but in March 1813 they were finally driven out. The period following the close of the war saw great activity in building, especially in the erection of many noble monuments and public buildings, e.g. those by the architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel. The most notable event in the history of Berlin during the 19th century, prior to the Franco-German War, was the March revolution of 1848 (see : History, and, king of Prussia). The effect of the war of 1870–71 on the growth of Berlin has been sufficiently indicated already.

. The events that led up to the assembling of the congress of Berlin, the outcome of which was the treaty of the 13th of July 1878, are described elsewhere (see : History; : History; ). Here it must suffice to say that the terms of the treaty of San Stefano (3rd March 1878), by which the Russo-Turkish War had been brought to a conclusion, seemed to those of the other powers who were most interested scarcely less fatal to the Ottoman dominion than that Russian occupation of Constantinople which Great Britain had risked a war to prevent. By this instrument Bulgaria was to become a practically independent state, under the nominal suzerainty of the sultan, bounded by the Danube, the Black Sea, the Aegean and Albania, and cutting off the latter from the remnant of Rumelia which, with Constantinople, was to be left to the Turks. At the same time the other Christian principalities, Servia and Montenegro, were largely increased in size and their independence definitively recognized; and the proposals of the powers with regard to Bosnia and Herzegovina, communicated to the Ottoman plenipotentiaries at the first sitting of the conference of Constantinople (23rd December 1876), were to be immediately executed. These provisions seemed to make Russia permanently arbiter of the fate of the Balkan peninsula, the more so since the vast war indemnity of 1,400,000,000 roubles exacted in the treaty promised to cripple the resources of the Ottoman government for years to come.

The two powers whose interests were most immediately threatened by the terms of the peace were Austria and Great Britain. The former especially, refusing to be bribed by the Russian offer of Bosnia and Herzegovina, saw herself cut off from all chance of expansion in the Balkan peninsula and threatened with the establishment there of the paramount power of Russia, a peril it had been her traditional policy to avert. On the 5th of February, accordingly, Count Andrássy issued a circular note, addressed to the signatory powers of the treaty of Paris of 1856 and the London protocol of 1871, suggesting a congress for the purpose of establishing “the agreement of Europe on the modifications which it may become necessary to introduce into the above-mentioned treaties” in view of the preliminaries of peace signed by Russia and Turkey. This appeal to the sanctity of international engagements, traditional in the diplomatic armoury of Austria, and strengthened by so recent a precedent as that of 1871, met with an immediate response. On the 1st of April Lord Salisbury had already addressed a circular note to the British embassies refusing on behalf of the British government to recognize any arrangements made in the peace preliminaries, calculated to modify European treaties, “unless they were made the subject of a formal agreement among the parties to the treaty of Paris,” and quoting the “essential principle of the law of nations” promulgated in the London protocol. By Great Britain therefore the Austrian proposal was at once accepted. Germany was very willing to fall in with the views of her Austrian ally and share in a council in which, having no immediate interests of her own, Bismarck could win new laurels in his rôle of “honest broker.” In these circumstances Russia could not but accept the principle of a congress. She tried, however, to limit the scope of its powers by suggesting the exclusion of certain clauses of the treaty from its reference, and pointed out (circular of Prince Gorchakov, April 9th) that Russia had not been the first nor the only Power to violate the treaties in question. The answer of Lord Beaconsfield was to mobilize the militia and bring Indian troops to the Mediterranean; and finally Russia, finding that the diplomatic support which she had expected from Bismarck failed her, consented to submit the whole treaty without reserve to the congress.

On the 3rd of June Count Münster, in the name of the German government, issued the formal invitation to the congress. The congress met, under the presidency of Prince Bismarck, at Berlin on the 13th of June. Great Britain was represented by Lord Beaconsfield, Lord Salisbury and Lord Odo Russell, ambassador at Berlin; Germany by Prince Bismarck, Baron Ernst von Bülow and Prince Chlodwig von Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, ambassador at Paris; Austria by Count Andrássy, Count Louis Károlyi and Baron Heinrich Karl von Haymerle, ambassador at Rome; France by William H. Waddington, the Comte de Saint-Vallier, ambassador at Berlin, and Félix Hippolyte Desprez, director of political affairs in the department for foreign affairs; Russia by the chancellor, Prince Gorchakov, Count Peter Shuvalov, ambassador to the court of St James’s, and Paul d’Oubril, ambassador at Berlin; Turkey by Alexander Catheodory Pasha, minister of public works, All Pasha, mushir of the Ottoman armies, and Sadullah Bey, ambassador at Berlin. The bases of the conferences had, of course, been settled beforehand, and the final act of the congress was signed by the plenipotentiaries mentioned above exactly a month after the opening of the congress, on the 13th of July.

The treaty of Berlin consists in all of sixty-four articles, of which it will be sufficient to note those which have had a special bearing on subsequent international developments. So far as they affect the territorial boundaries fixed by the treaties of Paris and San Stefano it will be sufficient to refer to the sketch map in the article : History. By Art. I. Bulgaria was “constituted an autonomous and tributary principality under the suzerainty of H.I.M. the Sultan”; it was to have “a Christian government and a national militia,” Art. II. fixed