es, whether in town or
country, has remained throughout these forty-eight years strongly and
passionately French. "Since when did you expect the French to come
back?" asked M. Mirman, the present Commissioner of the French
Republic at Metz, of an old peasant whom he came across not long ago
on an official inspection. The old man's eyes kindled--"_Depuis
toujours!_" he said--"I knew it would come, but I was afraid it
mightn't come till I was dead, so I used to say to my son: 'If I am
dead, and the French come back, you will go to the cemetery, you will
knock three times on my grave--I shall hear!' And my son promised."

My present concern, however, is not with the Alsace-Lorraine question,
but with the brilliant Army Commander who now occupies what used to be
the Headquarters of the German Army Corps which held Alsace. My
acquaintance with him was due to a piece of audacity on my part. The
record of General Gouraud in Champagne, and at the Dardanelles, was
well known to me, and I had heard much of his attractive and romantic
personality. So, on arriving at our hotel after a long day's motoring,
and after consulting with the kind French Lieutenant who was our
escort, I ventured a little note to the famous General. I said I had
been the guest of the British Army for six days on our front, and was
now the guest of the French Army, for a week, and to pass through
Strasbourg without seeing the victor of the "front de Champagne" would
be tantalising indeed. Would he spare an Englishwoman, whose love for
the French nation had grown with her growth and strengthened with her
years, twenty minutes of his time?

The note was sent and I waited, looking out the while on the gay and
animated crowd that filled the Platz Gutenberg in front of the hotel,
and listening to the bands of children, shouting the "Marseillaise,"
and following every French officer as he appeared. Was there ever a
more lovely winter evening? A rosy sunset seemed to have descended
into the very streets and squares of the beautiful old town. Wisps of
pink cloud were tangled in the narrow streets, against a background of
intensely blue sky. The high-roofed burgher houses, with their
decorated fronts, had an "unsubstantial faery" look, under the strange
rich light; and the front of the Cathedral, with its single delicate
spire, soared, one suffusion of rose, to an incredible height above
the narrow street below.

"_Allons, enfants de la patri-e!_" But a motor-car