But it is not necessary to obscure the issue by reference to the Prussian Polish problem.  An Ireland annexed to the German Empire (supposing this to be internationally possible) as one of the fruits of a German victory over Great Britain would clearly be administered as a common possession of the German people, and not as a Prussian province.  The analogy, if one can be set up in conditions so dissimilar, would lie not between Prussia and her Polish provinces, but between the German Empire and Alsace-Lorraine.  What, then, would be the paramount object of Germany in her administration of an overseas Reichsland of such extraordinary geographical importance to her future as Ireland would be?

Clearly not to impoverish and depress that new-won possession but to enhance its exceeding strategic importance by vigorous and wise administration, so as to make it the main counterpoise to any possible recovery of British maritime supremacy, so largely due as this was in the past to Great Britain’s own possession of this island.

A prosperous and flourishing Ireland, recognizing that her own interests lie with those of the new Administration, would assuredly be the first and chief aim of German statesmanship.

The very geographical situation of Ireland would alone ensure wise and able administration by her new rulers had Germany no other and special interest in advancing Irish well-being; for to rule from Hamburg and Berlin a remote island and a discontented people, with a highly discontented and separated Britain intervening, by methods of exploitation and centralization, would be a task beyond the capacity of German statecraft.  German effort, then, would be plainly directed to creating an Ireland satisfied with the change, and fully determined to maintain it.

And it might be remembered that Germany is possibly better equipped, intellectually and educationally, for the task of developing Ireland than even 20th century England.  She has already faced a remarkable problem, and largely solved it in her forty years’ administration of Alsace-Lorraine.  There is a province torn by force from the bleeding side of France and alien in sentiment to her new masters to a degree that Ireland could not be to any changes of authority imposed upon her from without, has, within a short lifetime, doubled in prosperity and greatly increased her population, despite the open arms and insistent call of France, and despite a rule denounced from the first as hateful.

However hateful, the Prussian has proved himself an able administrator and an honest and most capable instructor.  In his strong hands Strasburg has expanded from being an ill-kept, pent-in French garrison town to a great and beautiful city.  Already a local Parliament gives to the population a sense of autonomy, while the palace and constant presence of an Imperial prince affirms the fact that German Imperialism, far from engrossing and centralizing all the activities and powers of the empire in Berlin, recognizes that German nationality is large enough and great enough to admit of many capitals, many individualities, and many separate State growths within the sure compass of one great organism.