The First Edition of this book appeared in October 1913. In the preface to the Second Edition, issued last May, I wrote, "No important event has occurred to render necessary the employment of the past tense where in the First Edition the present tense was used. ... If Francis Joseph's successor be granted health and the mental stability that goes with health, it is probable that the transition from the old reign to the new will take place without hitch or shock." Since then there has happened much to render necessary the use of the past tense not only in regard to the late Heir-Presumptive, the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, and his wife the Duchess of Hohenberg, who were assassinated at Serajevo on June 28, but to suggest doubt whether the past tense may not soon have to be used in regard to the Hapsburg Monarchy itself. In these circumstances I have thought it better to make no change whatever in the text of the Third Edition, This book, in its present form, must stand as what I believe it to have been - an approximately accurate account of the Hapsburg Monarchy as it was, or seemed to be, before the murder of the Archduke and his wife.
