nces.

To argue that the restoration of Alsace-Lorraine is not a vital
necessity to France; that without these provinces she has recovered her
prosperity and her prestige, and that it is mere illusion to think that
the reconquest of Alsace-Lorraine would add to her glory is pure
sophistry. It is just as if you said to a man whom you had robbed of
some valuable property: "What does it matter? You are just as well off
without it." Yes, Prof. Larson did voice the sentiment of the vast
majority of his countrymen when he stated that France could not and
would not recognize the treaty of Frankfurt. If I have an enemy who
takes me by surprise and with revolver leveled at my head compels me to
sign a paper by which I despoil myself to his advantage, what is the
validity of such a document?

That is the way that all Frenchmen of all classes look upon the treaty
of Frankfurt, wrung from them under duress.

The term "revanche" is a slogan. It simply typifies in one word the
reconquest of Alsace-Lorraine; but it does not carry with it the idea of
willfully laying waste the enemy's country, burning and pillaging,
shooting inoffensive non-combatants, and cleaning banks of all the gold
they contain.

Another statement which is misleading in Prof. Francke's article is the
one which refers to the "growing menace from France," in which he speaks
of the increasing armament that has been going on in that country since
1912. But what is called in Germany "the menace from France" is called
in the latter country "the menace from Germany." Who started these
enormous armaments? Each time Germany increased her army France was
forced to do the same; and when France recently increased from two to
three years the duration of military service, it was her only way of
meeting Germany's increase of 500,000 men.

The attempt to change the roles and present France to the world as the
aggressor, or even as premeditating an attack upon Germany, is futile.
It is a strange and yet not uncommon psychological fact that the hate of
the conqueror is often greater than that of the conquered; and it is
German, not French, hate which has forced Germany into this savage war.
France had recovered too rapidly from her disasters; she was too rich;
her colonies were too vast and too prosperous; she must be crushed. What
right had she to have large colonies when Germany, the superior nation,
had none worth mentioning? There you have the key to the Kaiser's
repeated