This short work opens in 1815, at the close of a period of twenty-five years of almost continuous war. The Congress of Vienna assembled to consider the restoration of the old order. Our author writes, "they rejected the ideal of 'nationality', the principle of the 'rights of peoples', opposing to it the principle of 'stability', founded upon recognition of the 'rights of sovereigns' and upon the establishment of a balance of power." This was the Metternich system, which fell before the revolutions of 1848. Participation in the Crimean War earned nascent Italy a seat at the diplomatic table and Cavour began the campaign for Italian Unification. The Prussian junker Bismarck emerged and, through deft diplomacy and short wars, engineered the downfall of Austria and France, and created the modern German state. (Summary by Pamela Nagami, M.D.)