, and for the best
civilisation of all, the Franco-German, but so long as France pursues
this task single-handed, she will not attain her end, and will find in
Africa nothing but disappointment."

Such evidences of effrontery remind us that William II is the pupil of
Bismarck. We are, therefore, justified in concluding that the Germans
realise that it is not Aristides the Just who has been exiled, but a
master rogue, whom his pupil now imitates.

April 29, 1892. [23]

William II continues to expel from Berlin all unemployed workmen, quite
regardless of the cause of their temporary or continuous idleness. He
sends them back to their native parishes, without caring in the least
whether they will find there the work which they are unable to secure at
the capital. The "Workmen's Emperor" compels an emigration into the
interior of all the most discontented, the most irritated and wretched,
thus sowing throughout all the land the evil seed of the most dangerous
kind of propagandist. The spirit of Germany is full of surprises for any
one who takes the trouble to observe it carefully, and it is not only in
the acts of the Emperor that we perceive its contradictions.

To take one instance out of a thousand. Five non-commissioned officers
of dragoons have just been tried at Ulm, accused of having beaten
recruits with sticks until they drew blood. They have been acquitted,
after having proved that they acted under the orders of their captain.
In this connection it is interesting to read the following--

"The Court of Saverne has just condemned a carrier named Schwartz to six
weeks' imprisonment and a fine of ten marks for ill-treating his horse."

The unstable grandson of the steadfast William I threatens before long to
get between his teeth a fourth war minister; he has already devoured
three chiefs of the general staff, and, in a few years, as many ministers
as his grandfather had during the whole course of his long reign.

It remains to be seen whether, after the withdrawal of the scholastic
law, William II will still find a majority willing to accept his new and
disturbing schemes.

May 28, 1892. [24]

As the German Empire has no other force of cohesion except such as lies
in militarism, William is necessarily compelled to do everything to
magnify and increase it. Whereas we in France are free to develop the
quality rather than the quantity of our army, Germany, finding the
elements of cohesion only