forth. The line trees are arrayed in tender green, and anon blossom
along the length of the Unter den Linden, but it is not Germany's new
summer, and it has that irrelevance which the murderer remarks when he
is being led some beautiful spring morning to the scaffold to be
killed. It was a fine morning, but not for him.
It is only too natural for the educated man to look out morbidly from
the eye-gate of the soul. Thus R----, whose fine work on Central Asia
was published gratis by some learned society in England before the war,
says, "I will renounce my German nationality and become English as soon
as your Home Office will let me. Germany is going to be no place for
men of brains." Thus the famous theologian Harnack, having completed
his latest work, speaks of circulating it only in manuscript as he is
in no position to have it printed. Thus Z----, the chemist and
metallurgist, has taken his laboratory and his assistants to
Switzerland to escape the spiritual paralysis which has overtaken his
native land.
Doubtless this black will-to-the-nothing is reflected in many lives in
Germany, and in many spheres of activity. Nietzsche anticipated it,
though of course, he did not ask for Germany the psychology of one who
has been beaten, the evil resentful frame of mind. This latter is
strongly exemplified on the serious stage, not serenely and
universally, but tinged and circumstanced by Germany's downfall--the
what-does-it-matter-that-Sophocles-was-great-if-Germany-is-no-more
point of view.
"Richard III" at the State Opera House was a strange performance. It
was about the time of the Shakespeare Day celebration which Germany
keeps once a year. All the newspapers devoted articles to Shakespeare,
and one felt truly that a great master of words and of men was more
honoured in ex-enemy Germany than in the land of his birth. And that
should have been good for Germany; Shakespeare is universal, and it
takes the universal to cleanse the national. As a German philosopher
has said, it needs an ocean to receive such a muddy stream as man.
"Richard III," however, showed what the war-spirit can make of
Shakespeare. It was interpreted in the pedantic historical vein, and
was given as a bloody, brutal mediaeval piece without a thought or a
smile or a tear. Richard was shown as a "Hun" of the worst kind. His
murderous career was facilitated by his characterless victims. Anne
was a "characteristic English hypocrite," pretending to mourn her
husband, and yet quite ready to marry Gloucester as "the average
Englishwoman would do if the proposal were made." Clarence had no
poetry in his soul, and was not even allowed to touch you by his dream
in the Tower. Richard said his conscience-stricken, soul-torturing
speech--"Richard loves Richard, that is I am I." in a matter-of-fact
way. It is a great tragic note in Shakespeare, but in Berlin it was
quite a playful matter. Just as the murderers played at murdering
Clarence, so Richard joked with himself over, "is there a murderer
here--Yes, I am."
The only way to explain such a Richard III to the audience was to
suggest--That is the sort of people the English are--thank their God
for their humility whilst in reality they stick at nothing to gain
their private ends, and are not troubled with conscience.
This production was entirely modern in its presentment. There was a
remarkable simplification of scenery. This was, perhaps, due to the
new poverty of Berlin. But it comprised merely a wall, a hole in the
wall called the Tower of London, a platform on top of the wall called
Tower Hill, carpeted stairs against the wall called the Court at
Westminster. Clarence mopes in the hole with one electric light--his
butt of malmsey wine is even out of view. Richard appears between the
two archbishops on the top of the wall, and finally he fights the
battle of Bosworth Field up and down the carpeted stairs. Indeed, he
suddenly appears at the top of the stairs naked to his middle and then
runs down the red carpet carrying his crown in his hand whilst he
shouts, "Mein Konigsreich fur ein Pferd,"--my kingdom for a horse.
This last was deservedly hissed by the audience as a palpable absurdity
being foisted on the half-stunned _intelligentsia_ of Berlin.
At the Lessing Theatre a few days later, "Peer Gynt," that poetical
drama of the Teuton's destiny--much better done because really nearer
to the German soul than Shakespeare. Solveig had faith; though it was
not quite certain that she was the sort of woman to whom one _had_ to
return. Peer's romantic return to his mother was, however, much
stressed, as in the Greig music. The sentiment that Peer "had women
behind him and, therefore, could not perish" appealed strongly to the
German mood, though the application of the button-moulder idea to the
plight of Germany just now appeared to have been missed. Peer ought to
have been a shining button on the vest of the Lord, but has missed his
chance, and now is to be melted down with other buttons into something
else--into a Polish button, a Czech button, an Alsatian button. There
was much scope for meditation looking at "Peer Gynt" at Berlin in 1921.
In lighter vein the traveller finds much more to delight him in the
operettas of Berlin. As at Vienna, they are better done than classical
drama. That is not a slight on the stage. The vulgarity of English
musical comedies and imported operettas is lacking on the Berlin and
Vienna stage. German pieces of this kind are often extremely charming
and diverting, and they impart that light-heartedness which is a first
condition of a healthy mind. The audience is in no sense "highbrow,"
it is the general level of German humanity. It forgets and responds,
and is ready to sing choruses with the leaders of song and dance.
Three or four evenings spent listening to operetta leave very pleasant
memories, and the last of these was on the occasion of the first night
of "Morgen wieder lustik," a humorous presentation of the time when
Napoleon was splitting up Germany much as the French wish to split her
up now--and there was a King of Westphalia who is still memorable for
that one phrase, "_Morgen wieder lustik!_"--To-morrow we shall be happy
again!
I visited Strasbourg, now outwardly Frenchified, but inwardly German
enough. At the time of the commencement of the armistice and the
German retirement "Simplicimus" published a picture of a "Farewell to
Strasbourg." It was a stormy sunset and late evening, and the black
silhouette of the very memorable cathedral, the stark and ragged
grandeur of that cathedral and its spire which looks as if nothing
exists in Strasbourg but it, stood for the significance of the city.
Some German horse-soldier symbolized the last to go, and lifting his
hat, took one last look at the place, and said, "_Auf wiedersehen_."
And Alsace became French once more.
What a thing to graft two French provinces to the living body of
Germany for fifty years and then dispart, when the blood has learned to
flow strongly from the new flesh to the heart! You feel the break, the
interruption, when you go there now.
And now the same two provinces, heavily Germanized, are re-grafted back
to the original flesh of France. It would be absurd to say that the
circulation of the blood and the spirit have been re-established at
once. There is a great deal of mortification in Alsace and Lorraine.
It will be a long while before French life permeates the whole and
surges through every vein. Meanwhile the new process of
Frenchification proceeds.
We seldom hear that the Germans dare claim to hold Alsace and Lorraine
on any grounds, and yet, in fact, quietly and persistently, they do
dare. It is frequently urged in conversation that if a plebiscite had
been taken in the two provinces, the majority would have been found
desirous of remaining under German rule. This, no doubt, is partly
vanity, and springs from belief in the supposed preferability of German
civilization to French civilization--even French people who knew what
it was to live under a French as well as a German regime might prefer
the latter as more efficient and comfortable and up-to-date. But the
belief that a plebiscite would have gone in German favour is based even
more on the German population and on the strong business interests
which link the industrial part with the industrial whole. Alsace and
Lorraine through commercial development had become an exceedingly
important constituent of modern Germany before the war. Germany,
moreover, claims to have converted them from poor departments of France
to wealthy industrial communities.
Naturally no one on the Allied side of the peace-table ever dreamed of
considering such arguments. And they are so lacking in practical
cogency that they find no place in the current consideration of modern
Europe. They are useless arguments for a Germany who lost the war, and
they are assumed to be quite dead. Germany has enough trouble to save
Westphalia and Silesia and the Ruhr valley, let alone think about the
irrecoverables of the war. She might as well argue that the fleet she
sank at Scapa Flow should be restored to her as think of Alsace now.
Nevertheless, the arguments remain for another day to become the
arguments of pretension and justification. France naturally is taking
care that there shall never be another day of reckoning. But let
France make a mistake in her diplomacy and "get in wrong," as they say
in America, and it will all be fought over again. It was only fifty
years after the Franco-German war that this new war came. Who knows
what re-grouping of power there may be, or how Germany will stand in
1970!
In our reckonings and prognostications we should keep in mind that the
German is the centre body of the Teutonic race. He is down, but he is
not finally beaten. His mind is resentful, and indeed full of the
revenge instinct. He has not learned the lesson of humility and
obedience in the great war. Who has? He believes he is meant to be
master in the vast European plain which he has fitly named "Central
Europe--_Mittel Europa_," and identified with himself.
EXTRA LEAVES
(v) _On "Clay Sparrows" and the Failure of Freedom_
France and Germany are hazardously in agreement in regard to English
and American liberal idealism. They think it moonshine and the League
of Nations a failure, and that Freedom has been tried and found wanting.
We are at school with Christ and have made our clay sparrows. Wilson's
birds fly--ours won't. France is an obstinate clay sparrow who sits
perched on the wall. And what shall we say of the other clay sparrows?
Do they look like flying? The peoples won't take the freedom and the
light that is offered them. We sing to them and tempt them, but they
do not respond.
Germany, however, does not believe in "free countries," and she is
edified by the failure of freedom.
"Your gods fail you," said a Bavarian to us at dinner. "You'll have to
try our gods after all."
"But it is not so. The little nations are all using their Freedom,"
some one rejoined.
"Abusing it," said the German.
"That is only their high spirits, the natural first excesses of people
who have got free."
"Russia?" queried the Teuton. "Poland? Roumania?" and he smiled
indulgently. "Human nature shows up badly when you give it a chance,"
said he. "You cannot trust individuals yet, and you cannot trust
nations. For example: you are all lined up waiting to receive tickets
for the theatre or a train. Some have a sense for order and keep their
turn, but others edge past them and get to the ticket window first.
And then the orderly individuals are forced to do the same or lose
their temper. Now, to meet human nature we have invented a grill, and
if you go to our State theatre in Munich you will see this iron control
which allows a large crowd to assemble but makes it impossible to go
out of your turn."
"An emblem of German civilization," I thought, "but it has its use."
"We are all going back to preventatives," said another. "After all it
is the foundation of Mosaic law--the prevention of evil. America has
adopted the idea. Prohibition is not freedom. It is taking the bottle
away and not giving you a chance. It is the same with other human
sins. The best way to reduce the numbers of murders is to reduce the
number of weapons and exact a heavy gun licence. The best way to stop
robbery is to use more steel locks. Make it difficult to commit crime
and then crime won't be committed. But beware of Freedom."
The conversation was side-tracked on to the subject of the "dryness of
America." But it provided an insight into the German point of view.
Coming into line with the rest of Europe Germany accepted the idea of
Freedom in November, 1918. She watched how it worked and then very
quickly turned her back on it. In truth, Freedom is not congenial to
Germans. Had Germany won she hoped to impose her type of civilization
everywhere, and she saw little harm in the fact of imposition.
Inferior nations ought to be raised to Germany's cultural level by
force, and they ought to be prevented from running amuck
internationally, also by force. The German mind viewed complacently
the bondage of the small nations in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It
did not think that Czechs or Poles lost anything by being governed from
Vienna. Its only reservation was that it might be still better for
them if they were governed from Berlin. Berlin still believes that
Alsatians and Danes and Poles and Russians and Czechs are better in
health under German discipline. Europe organized militarily was the
German conception of the future--that some one should order and some
one should obey everywhere.
Great Britain caught the idea through Carlyle, though it was more
congenial to the Germanic type of Southern Scot than to English or
Irish. We talked of "captains of industry," and the "aristocracy of
talent," and "benevolent autocracy," though we could not realize them.
But to modern Germany this idea was society's cement. It was preached
from the Lutheran pulpit, it was taught by sergeants in the Army, it
was unfolded and beflagged by politicians on election day. There were
rebels against it but no national movement opposed it. It was even
rooted in the home where husband ruled wife, and father ruled children
with complete authority, and a man could point to his _frau_ or his
_kind_ with his index finger, and say "To-morrow you will do that. Now
you shall do this!"
The opposite note of liberty was at Moscow where the children not
infrequently, even under Tsardom, went on strike against their
teachers, where servants tell masters what they ought to do, where a
Rasputin is asked advice on imperial policy, the land of the Slavs
where obedience is at its lowest ebb, and all the parks and gardens and
country-sides languish naturally in disorder. "Love to Russia is
really love to the old mother-pig," said Suvorin. "But no matter, you
get used to it." The German, however, never gets used to it. That is
why in the old days the farms of the German colonist in Russia used to
be neat patches of an entirely orderly pattern, looking like islands in
the wild waste of Slav disorder. It might almost be said that Germany
made war to make the Russian _muzhik_ wash his face, and the Russians
made war so that people could go about with dirty faces if they wanted
to.
The question has not received a final answer. Greece is fighting for
an empire over Turks. Ireland is fighting the British Empire to obtain
the right to do what she wants in the world. The business penumbra of
the United States has begun to cover Mexico. Five or six constituents
of old Russian have cut free. But France has become imperial and would
impose a superior will on several nations.
Our curious clay sparrows stand on the wall. Wilson's sparrows, it is
reputed, fly; ours won't. As we made them, so they stand looking at
us, waiting apparently. If some one does not sprinkle holy water on
them soon they will either go to bits or have to be kneaded into the
common lump once more.
LETTERS OF TRAVEL
XIV. FROM ROME
All roads lead to Rome. It would doubtless be tedious at this point to
describe the obstacles on the road, and, when Rome has been achieved,
the all-night hunt for a room in a hotel, an adventure which now
commonly befalls the traveller to Rome. But it is a wonderful
impression which you receive of this mighty city in the silent watchful
hours, when all are sleeping, and the living are nearer to the famous
dead. The scenery seems laid for some great historical drama--but it
is in truth only laid for you and the poor fellow shouldering your bag,
and for a restless knocking at closed doors, trying to awaken
slumberous porters who, like the man at Macbeth's castle, swear they
will "devil-porter it no longer." You settle down at last for a few
hours sleep on a couple of chairs in a waiting-room, but are prevented
by a loquacious gentleman who calls himself a "_chasseur des hotels_,"
and says that when a man has sought all night and found nothing, he is
generally ready for a proposition. The _chasseur_ conducts you to a
room in a house in a back street, a chill, red-tiled room, let by a
buxom Roman, whose little girl of twelve is in the capacity of general
servant and makes the bed and empties the slops and serves the coffee
without one self-conscious smile. Rome indeed, and room enough! When
you are lodged it does not matter much how you are lodged.
Rome, the capital of capitals, still continues to be a place of destiny
in Europe. It is not in the glare of light in which Berlin and Paris
find themselves, but the fates of Berlin and Paris are secretly
dependent on it. For Rome sways the balance of power after the war.
If Rome backs Germany, France at once feels isolated; if Rome backs
France, Germany must come to terms. The French are victors and have
the winning forces in their hands, but the Italians are psychologists
and know how to win without material force. Hence has arisen the
curious after-the-Paris-conference situation. Italy has been despised
by France; Italy, therefore, has renounced that war-after-the-war, dear
to the French heart; Italy has communed with Dr. Benes and planted
another thorn in the side of the Hapsburgs; she has secretly opposed
French policy in Hungary. With Germany she has made a commercial
entente--not a political or military one, but a pacific _laissez-faire_
for the purposes of trade. France envisages the complete ruin of
German industry and commerce, and believes that Foch is the man to do
it. At this the Italians smile quietly and counsel the timorous
Germans not to despair. Rome chooses to hold to the thesis that a
prosperous Italy depends on a prosperous Germany, and no outsider is
qualified to dispute such a point of view. Somehow Italy manages to
suggest a similar thought to England. A prosperous England depends on
a prosperous Germany. The British trade depression is thought to be
due to the destructive policy of the French. The question of the
taking of the Ruhr basin becomes a test case: _Very bad for English
business_, say the English manufacturers in chorus. We are back to the
Treaty of Versailles: Votes count. England and Italy are in the scale
against France, and France must yield. The cup of hemlock is taken
from Germany's shut mouth and a cup of merely disagreeable medicine is
placed there instead. Italy and England sing to her a new song quietly
and secretly, and she decides to take it so as to escape the hemlock.
So Italy has stopped France on the Ruhr. It is an easier task to stop
her in Upper Silesia where she is pushing the Poles into a similar
assault on German industries. Lloyd George makes his violent
anti-French speeches, and the British battalions follow after his hot
words to enforce what he has said. The Italian was despised but he can
afford to smile. O Julius Caesar, thou art mighty yet!
Italy's main danger has been internal. Her Socialistic ferment was so
great at one time that it did not appear likely that the old Italy
could long continue without revolution. "W Lenin" [1] is scrawled in
black on many walls, and also, "Down with the betrayers of the Army,"
and "Vote the full Socialist Programme." The idea of revolution is
popular among the masses, and the efforts of the anti-Communist
volunteers have several times suggested a general outbreak of civil
war. Of all the Allies Italy has had the stormiest after-the-war
period, and the outlook has seemed blackest for her. Given time, she
could, however, right herself--and the time has been given. If the
working class had been impoverished and threatened with unemployment it
is doubtful whether Italy could have weathered all the trouble. But
the proletariat was rich. The provincial banking accounts had become
full. The peasants now are especially well-off, and if the proletariat
wanted to fall upon the rich they would have to fall upon themselves.
"The principal phenomenon of our life," said Signor S---- at one of the
Ministries, "is a complete economic inversion. The number of our poor
does not increase, for the wealth of the country has been exceedingly
well shuffled and dealt out afresh to all."
"Do not be deceived by appearances of unrest," said B---- of the
"Messagero." "It is caused chiefly by the ex-soldiers who will not
settle down. You have the phenomenon as well as we. It is common
after war. Only our men are more turbulent than any other in Europe.
You have seen them, large, full-blooded, and excitable heroes, not so
sluggish and obedient as the French, more nervous and clamorous than
the English. But we are working. The women and children are more
industrious than formerly, and make up for the men's defection. Italy
will right herself."
Undoubtedly, external policy has helped Italy greatly. Whilst France
and England have played a fitfully obstructionist and generally
uninspired policy towards the restoration of European trade, Italy has
been steadily working in a positive direction. She has received
substantial help from Germany, help in return for help. The wasteful
process of using Switzerland as a fence for German goods has largely
been abandoned in favour of a direct commercial exchange. Italian
shipping, augmented by its Austrian spoils, has obtained considerable
help and advice. Quite surprising how many Germans have posts in the
Italian shipping companies! Germany has lost her own ships, but she
has a large business executive in the background, the administrative
organization of what was once a great mercantile marine. She has still
a preponderant power in allocating business. The Italian benefit and
the success of Italy's new policy have been reflected in the phenomenal
appreciation of the lira which during the spring of 1921 actually
gained 33 1/2 per cent in value, mounting from 110 to the pound
sterling in January to 73 in May. Such a rise in the value of the
currency naturally helps Italian industry, facilitating the import of
raw materials and coal and oil. In the summer of 1921 Italy became
glutted with coal.
Such progress is not good news in Moscow. The chief external hope of
Moscow must for long have been in Italy. And conversely the chief hope
of the Socialists in Italy must have been in the progress of Moscow's
international ideal. Not that the proletarian leaders of comfortable
Italy realized what they were advocating. They are not such idealists
in Italy as to be ready to commit national suicide for the good of
humanity as a whole, or even for the good of humanity as a class, as a
working class. But, be that as it may, the moral authority waned when
the Russo-British trading treaty was signed. Krassin killed the Third
Internationale. You do not trade with a capitalistic State in order to
destroy it. Moscow began to set up a new bourgeois class, started
shops again, and banks and private trading, and generally speaking,
having buried the devil, dug him up again.