ABSTRACT
Germany received her five milliards, a sum quite beyond everyone's conception at that time. Yes, Germany, the land of frugal lower middle class, of officers, dreamy professors, and musicians, had become rich. The consequence was a gigantic crash on the Exchange. That 9th of May 1873 on which it happened is known as 'Black Friday' and is as terrible a memory to the financial world as was the battle of Kossovo to the Serbs and that of Cannae to the Romans. The French elections of 1871 had yielded a large Monarchist majority. In 1883 Roumania was admitted to the Triple Alliance, and in 1887 Bismarck crowned the structure by his 'Reinsurance Treaty', by which Germany and Russia guaranteed each other an attitude of friendly neutrality in case of attack from any other power. It may be said without exaggeration that during the second: decade of its existence the German Empire stood politically at the head of Europe.
