A Short History of Europe from the Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire to the Outbreak of the German War 1806-1914 (English Edition)

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This seminal history is a comprehensive account of Europe during the 19th century leading up to World War I. From the intro:
“IN build and consequence the nineteenth century (1815-1914) differs from its immediate predecessors. On the whole it provided an expanse of international calm. It inherited a legacy of strife from the eighteenth century, laid the foundations of a settlement rapidly (1815), and thereafter gave Europe international quiet for a generation. The Crimean War (1854-6), breaking in upon a peace of almost unprecedented duration, inaugurated the century’s brief storm-period, which disturbed seventeen years (1854-71) in five short outbreaks:—the Crimean War (1854-6), which engaged France, Great Britain, Russia, Turkey, and Sardinia; the Italian War (1859), which involved France, Austria, and Sardinia; the Danish War (1864), in which Denmark, Prussia, Austria, and the Germanic Bund took part; the Austro-Prussian War (1866), in which the protagonists were joined by the Germanic Bund and Italy; and the Franco-German War (1870-1), in which France was opposed by the North German Bund, Würtemberg, Bavaria, and Baden. The combatants in the brief war-cycle were, principally, France and the German States. But all the Powers were belligerent, and Russia contributed a prologue and epilogue to the main cycle—Turkey being her enemy in both—which belong less to the general life of Europe than to the stubborn Eastern Question, whose consideration the Powers shirked in 1815, and of which the Treaty of Berlin (1878) afforded a tentative solution merely.
Upon the conclusion of the Franco-German War in 1871, the international life of Europe settled again to a calm which, persisting for forty-three years, was broken by the German Zweikaiserkrieg of 1914. The interval witnessed the premature building of a Palace of Peace, constructed in the mistaken hope that European Democracy no longer would tolerate war, which conscription and the horrid ingenuity of science had made so destructive that its incidence was deemed impossible, at least between the Powers. The latter, none the less, continued to amass armaments on a scale unprecedented, and to condone and even glorify them as the surest foundation of peace. Yet, during the forty-three years, only two Powers drew the sword in Europe—Russia in 1877, and Italy in 1911. Both challenged Turkey, and successfully.”