the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII) that an Emperor who could not talk and discuss things should not be allowed to reign, and so on.  The Prince of Wales, the Empress said, told Herbert that if it were not that he valued good relations between England and Germany, he would have thrown him out of the door....  Waldersee was a false, unprincipled wretch, who would think nothing of ruining his country if he could only satisfy his own personal ambition.”

Prince Hohenlohe finally called on the Prince of Wales, who “spoke prudently, but showed his disgust at the roughness of the Bismarcks, and could not understand their policy of irritating France.”

The particular question concerning France that was agitating Germany at the time of the accession was the state of affairs in Alsace-Lorraine, and particularly Bismarck’s measure requiring French citizens entering the provinces to provide themselves with a pass from the German Ambassador in Paris.  The amiable and conciliatory Statthalter, Prince Hohenlohe, had to make a reluctant journey to Berlin in connexion with this question.  There was another question also weighing on his mind—­the question whether or not he should have a sentry guard before his official residence in Strasburg.  The military authorities, whose rivalry with the civil authorities everywhere in Germany for influence and power still continues, wanted to have the sentries abolished, but the Prince eventually had his way.  He showed Bismarck that they were necessary for his reputation with the population, which had already begun to think less of his influence as Statthalter owing to his one day at a review having incautiously and gallantly taken a back seat in his carriage in favour of some lady guests.

In normal times the composers of speeches from the throne are accustomed to describe the relations between their own and foreign countries as “friendly.”  When the relations are not friendly, yet not the opposite, they are usually registered on the political barometer as “correct.”  The attitude on both sides is formal, rigorously polite, reserved; such as would become a pair of people who had once been at feud and after their quarrel had been fought out agreed, if only for the sake of appearances, to show no outward animosity, but on the other hand not give an inch of way.  The position of France and Germany is “correct”; it has never been friendly since 1870; and it must be many a long year before it can be friendly again.  Apart from the difference between the Latin and Teutonic temperaments, apart from the legacy of hate left in Germany against France by the sufferings and humiliations the great Napoleon caused her, apart from the fact that one people is republican and the other monarchical, there is always one thing that will prevent reconciliation—­the loss by France of the fair provinces Alsace and Lorraine.  It is of no use for Germany to remind France that up to the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 this territory