BIARRITZ TO MONT-DE-MARSAN
Our three days in Biarritz had grown to three short weeks before we were
able to break the spell of the alluring Grande Plage and shape our
course in a northeasterly direction, along the foothills of the
Pyrenees, through the picturesque regions of Périgord and Limousin to
Tours and the châteaux country. Bayonne, the fortress city, looked
peaceful enough with its tapering cathedral spires rising above the
great earthen ramparts, now grass-grown and long disused to war. Not far
from Bayonne the road forked; we were in doubt whether to continue
straight on or to turn to the left. A group of workingmen near by ceased
their toil as we drew near to ask for information. The answer to our
question was very different from what we expected. One of them
approached the car, brandishing a scythe in a manner more hostile than
friendly, and asked if we were Germans. This question concerning our
nationality came with all the force of a threat. The restless scythe
cut a nearer airy swath. He had recognized the German make of our car,
and was convinced that we belonged to the hated _nation allemande_. A
German motor car is not the safest kind of an introduction to these
French peasants, especially when the _vin du pays_ has circulated
freely. If appearances counted for anything, this particular peasant was
quite inclined to use his scythe for more warlike purposes than those
for which it was originally intended. But his companions, more peaceably
disposed, seizing him, drew him back from the car and gave us, although
reluctantly, the necessary information.
It was not our first experience of this kind. In France there is a
strong sentiment against Germany. Our German car was often the target
for unfriendly observation. This fierce ill feeling appears to be
increasing. Never since the war of 1870 has there been such a period of
military activity in the two countries. Germany is raising her army to a
total of nearly nine hundred thousand men, at an initial cost of two
hundred and fifty million dollars, and a subsequent annual cost of fifty
million dollars. France has decided to meet these warlike preparations
by keeping under the colors for another year the soldiers whose term of
service would have expired last fall. This measure adds about two
hundred thousand soldiers to the fighting strength of the French army.
This increase of armament involves necessarily the admission of the
increase of suspicion and antagonism.
At such a time of tension and suspense it was for us a rare privilege to
motor through the French provinces, to stop in the small towns and
villages and to hear from the lips of the people themselves an
expression of their attitude toward Germany. Rural France is
conservative; opinions and ideas form slowly, yet there can be no doubt
but that their views represent the sentiment of the French nation which
is so largely agricultural. No feature of our long tour through France
was more instructive than this opportunity to study at first hand the
influences at work to widen the gulf between the two nations. We
conversed with soldiers, officers, peasants in the fields, and casual
French acquaintances whom we met in the cafés and hotels. Every one
admitted the gravity of the situation, and said that nothing short of
the actual shadow of German invasion could have induced France to submit
to the tremendous sacrifices incident to the large increase of the army.
The enthusiasm with which France has consented to the enormous
sacrifices entailed by increasing the army on so large a scale shows how
widespread is the impression of impending conflict. France realizes that
there is only one way to prevent war, and that is to be so strong that
Germany will hesitate to take the fatal step. There have been past
menaces of invasion, and while it is true that Germany has not made war
for over forty years, she has repeatedly threatened it. William I and
Moltke wanted to attack France in 1874 and again in 1875, before she had
recovered from the effects of 1870, to make it impossible for her again
to become a power of the first rank. Russia and England supported
France; Germany drew back to wait for another chance. Professor
Lamprecht, the great German historian, regrets that Germany did not
hurl her armies against France at that time. In the Delcassé crisis of
1905 France was again threatened. We know now that the Morocco
negotiations between France and Germany in 1911 kept Europe on the verge
of war for months.
This movement toward a more vigorous expression of French national
spirit, while gathering strength for the last ten years, actually dates
from the sending of the gunboat _Panther_ to Agadir in 1911. This was
the igniting spark. It was in that moment that the French nation found
itself. The generation that lived through and followed the disastrous
war of 1870 was saddened and subdued. There was little of that spirit of
national self-confidence; politics played a larger role than patriotism.
But now a new generation is to the front. Young France is coming into
power, and the result is a rebirth of self-confidence and aggressiveness
along patriotic lines. It will no longer be possible for Germany to be
successful in a policy of intimidation against France, as she was in the
Congress of Berlin in 1878. The new France is too patriotic, too proud,
too conscious of her own strength, to concede to any unreasonable demand
for economic compensation that Germany or Austria might make.
If there were no other reason for possibility of war, the internal
situation in Germany itself would be enough to place France on her
guard. In spite of Germany's industrial progress, the struggle of the
masses for bread is nowhere more bitter. The intense competition in the
markets of the world, the necessity of paying interest on borrowed
capital, the fact of a vast and rapidly increasing population--all this
spells low wages in a country where taxes are high and where the burdens
of armament are fast becoming unbearable. Such conditions make for
socialism. Already the socialists form the most powerful party in the
Reichstag. The Kaiser wishes peace, but he is, above all, a believer in
monarchical institutions. If socialism continues to spread with its
present rapidity, no one doubts that he would stake Germany's supremacy
in a foreign war in order to unite the nation around him and to divert
the people from their struggle for a more democratic form of
government. A successful war with France would not only mean rich
provinces, a big war indemnity, but it would also mean a new prestige
for the Hohenzollern government, sufficient to carry it through the
socialistic perils of another generation.
In view of these facts, it is not surprising that the French nation
considers a conflict inevitable, and especially when they see the Kaiser
appealing to his already overtaxed and discontented people to make a
supreme sacrifice. With Germany the question is one of economic
existence. She can feed her population for only a fraction of a year.
More and more she finds herself dependent upon rival nations for
foodstuffs and raw materials. She has built up great steel and iron
industries, but the supply of ore in the province of Silesia will be
exhausted, at the present rate of consumption, in about twenty-five
years. Germany will then be totally dependent upon France, Spain, and
Sweden for iron ore. But France has an eighty per cent superiority over
Spain and Sweden in her supply of this material. Her richest mines are
situated in Basse-Lorraine, hardly more than a cannon shot from the
German frontier. By the conquest of a few miles in Lorraine, she would
secure enough iron ore to supply her iron and steel industries for
centuries. A suggestive commentary upon Germany's aggressive plans may
be noted in the German atlas of Steiler. It writes the names of
different countries and their cities in the spelling of each country.
The French cities and provinces are written in French, with the
exception of provinces of Basse-Lorraine, Franche-Comté, and Bourgogne.
These are written in German.
Another force in Germany making for war is the Pan-German League. This
is the war party of the armor-plate factories of the officers of the
army and navy, of a large part of the German press, of the Crown Prince,
of many who have intimate relations with the Kaiser. The spectacular
demonstrations of the Crown Prince in the Reichstag against the too
peaceful policy of the Chancellor at the time of the Morocco
negotiations, the sending of the _Panther_ to Agadir, the enormous
increase of the army and navy in recent years, the arbitrary suppression
of French influence in Alsace-Lorraine, have all been the fruits of its
efforts. There can be no question of the tremendous power of this
organization which is so close to the heart of the Crown Prince. If the
Kaiser should die to-morrow, France might well have reason to distrust
the warlike and impulsive young ruler who would ascend the Hohenzollern
throne. The Crown Prince has recently written a book called _Germany in
Arms_. Its warlike fervor shows how little he is in sympathy with the
emperor's loyalty to peace. What makes the influence of the Crown Prince
all the more dangerous is the great discontent to-day in Germany with
the government's foreign policy "of spending hundreds of millions upon a
fruitless and pacific imperialism."
Added to all these influences which are straining the relations between
France and Germany, is the question of Alsace-Lorraine, for more than
two centuries a French province and ceded to Germany after the
Franco-Prussian War as a part of the price of peace. It is now a
generation and more that Germany has tried to assimilate the province,
but with so little success that to-day the people persist more than ever
in their sympathy with French culture and their hostility toward
Germany. There has been immigration; probably two fifths of the
population are Germans, but the two peoples do not mix. The silent
struggle between two civilizations goes on. The reason for the failure
of German government in Alsace-Lorraine is due to its refusal to
recognize this dual civilization. Alsace is largely French in sympathy;
but instead of letting the people cling to their local customs, Germany
has tried to make them think and speak German, and adopt the German
ways. Instead of enjoying an equality with the other states in the
regulation of local affairs, the province is treated as a vassal state,
the governor being responsible to the Kaiser. Naturally such a system of
government means the continual clash of the two nationalities. The
teaching of French and French history has been almost suppressed in the
schools, and the younger generation compelled to learn German. "But
they are French at heart, and after leaving school return again to the
traditions of their family. After forty years, no music stirs them like
the _Marseillaise_." It is said that the little Alsatian schoolboys,
when on a trip to the frontier, decorate their hats and buttonholes with
the French colors. No one can be long in Strassburg without realizing
the futility of Germany's campaign against French influence. It is true
that there is a certain veneer of German civilization; the policemen
wear the same uniform as the Berlin police; German names appear over the
principal shops; but in the stores and cafés one hears the middle-class
Alsatians speaking French; French clothes, French customs prevail. In a
word, the people, without French support, have gradually become more
French in feeling and in culture than at the moment of annexation. One
effect of this struggle against Germany's brutal and arbitrary policy
has been to start a strong undercurrent of sympathy in France. In many
of the French towns one sees Alsace postcards in the store windows. The
picture on one card was a reproduction of a French painting. A soldier
appears on the lookout in a forest. Not far away is a captive bound to
a tree. He is watching with expectant joy the coming of the soldier. One
can easily guess that the captive is Alsace, the soldier, France. We
might also speak of the petty annoyances practiced by the German
authorities in Alsace upon any one suspected of French sympathy.
Sporting clubs have been dissolved. One reads of French sportsmen who
have been refused permission to rent "shootings." The most recent
measure of oppression gives the governor of the province absolute power
to suppress all French newspapers, as well as all societies supposed to
favor French culture.
This is only a part of the evidence at hand, which gives the impartial
observer reason to believe that the friction of nationalities in Alsace
is the prelude to the larger and more terrible struggle to-day is
regarded in France as inevitable. At the School of Political Science in
the sorbonne at Paris, where the superiority of German methods used to
be accepted without question, it is said the professors can now hardly
mention them, for fear of hostile demonstrations.
This question of Franco-German relations has already overshadowed
Europe. All attempts to promote a more friendly understanding have been
fruitless. Even though the present tension be only temporary, it is very
doubtful if there can be any approach to better relations until Germany
has solved the question of Alsace-Lorraine, abandoning her policy of
rough-shod assimilation, recognizing the existence of a dual
civilization, granting autonomy of local affairs, and welcoming the
province, on an equal footing with the other German states, to the
brotherhood of the empire. With this source of discord removed,
Alsace-Lorraine might become a bond instead of a barrier between France
and Germany. Such a solution, however remote, would be an important step
toward a more auspicious era of friendly feeling, of good faith.
Unfortunately, the Kaiser is opposed to this conciliatory policy. The
fact that Alsace-Lorraine belongs to the empire as a whole, and is
therefore a bond of unity between the German states, makes him unwilling
to disturb the present arrangement and to recognize anything approaching
a dual government in Alsace-Lorraine.
In the light of the above facts, our encounter with the French peasant
was of deep significance. We could see behind it the forces--economic,
political, and sentimental--that are at work to divide France and
Germany. Naturally, we were on the lookout for any incident of this kind
which would give us a clearer view of the great question which is
placing such terrible burdens upon the two countries.
We shall not easily forget our experience in one French town. It was
Sunday evening, and the street was crowded with peasants and artisans.
One of us had stuck in his hat a Swiss feather, such as is commonly worn
in the Tyrol of southern Germany. He purchased a French newspaper, and
after glancing through it, dropped it in the gutter. This harmless act
very nearly involved us in serious trouble. A burly Frenchman, noticing
the feather and taking him for a German, resented the apparently
contemptuous way in which the journal had been thrown in the street.
"_Vous avez insulté la patrie_," he said in a loud voice. Like a flash
the rumor spread in the street that three Germans had insulted
France, and a threatening crowd surrounded us. A restaurant offering the
nearest refuge, we stepped inside to order _une demi-tasse_ and to wait
until the excitement had subsided. The _garcon_ refused to serve us.
Outside, the crowd grew larger. Then a policeman appeared. Upon learning
that we were Americans, he quickly appreciated the humor of the
situation, and explained the misunderstanding to the crowd pressing
around the door. The excitement abated as quickly as it arose, and we
were allowed to continue our walk without further interruption.
[Illustration: Copyright by Underwood & Underwood
_A familiar village scene in provincial France_ _page 157_]
Mont-de-Marsan has little to relieve the monotony of its narrow village
life. We bumped over cobbled streets to the Hôtel Richelieu, securing
pleasant rooms which opened on an attractive little court, enlivened by
a murmuring fountain. Dinner was hardly over when the silence of the
country began to settle along the deserted streets. Such a soporific
environment was sleep-compelling. An alarm clock was not necessary, for
at early dawn the street resounded with a medley of noises, the varied
repertoire of the barnyard,--a hundred of them, in fact. Geese,
chickens, goats, and sheep were all tuning up for the village fair. It
is a mystery how we motored through that maze of poultry and small
wooden stands heaped with fruits, poultry, game, even dry goods--a kind
of open-air department store. The clerks were grizzled peasant women,
some of them eating their breakfast of grapes and dry bread, others
displaying tempting fruit to entice us into a purchase.