The History of England

The continent of Europe presented no peaceful scene. German gestures continued, war flickered in the Balkans and, on 28 June 1914, a Serbian national­ist shot the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, at Sarajevo, capital of the recently annexed Austrian province of Bosnia. Aus­tria, determined to smash Serbian expansionist nation­alism, presented, [...]

When Queen Victoria died in January 1901 a whole age passed. Enormous changes had taken place like the urbanization of Britain and a rise of population from about 25 million to some­thing like 41 million, but a monarchy which had been discredited was now felt to be not only a symbol but part and parcel [...]