And it is only natural that the individual parent should feel like this, and I do not think that in England we quite realise all that Germany has suffered. I remember one morning after the signing of the armistice that some small boys of about seven years old climbed up the outside of the citadel, and asked us for some food. We gave them a few biscuits; they were very hard and dry, but I have never seen such excitement and joy on a child’s face before. It was a most pathetic sight. A child of that age cannot feign an emotion, and those children were absolutely starving.
And the knowledge that this was so must have had a very saddening effect on the German soldier at the front. For one of the very few consolations that were granted to a British soldier in the line was the certainty that his wife and family were well and safe. But the German soldier must have been faced continually with the thought that, whatever sufferings he might himself endure, he could not protect those he loved from the hunger that was crushing them, and for him those long cold nights and lonely watches must have been unrelieved by any gleam of hope.
It is not natural that any nation should bear such hardships for an instant longer than they appeared absolutely needful, and when it became quite clear that the Entente had not only survived the March offensive, but had emerged from it with undiminished powers, the Germans began to agitate for an instant peace. At the beginning they were not aware of their weakness in the field, and when the first armistice note was sent the terms expected were very light.
“We shall probably have to evacuate France and Belgium,” they said, “and perhaps Italy and Palestine. That’s all the guarantee that will be required.”
And at this point, as far as we could gather, there was very little animosity against the Kaiser.
“Of course,” they said, “this sort of thing must not happen again. We shall have to tie him down a good deal. Ministers will have to be responsible to the Reichstag and not to him. That should ensure us.”
There was hardly any talk of a republic.
But when the Austrian and Bulgarian armies crumpled up, and Foch began to threaten invasion from every side, it was as if a sort of panic seized the Germans. They felt that they must have an armistice at any cost, and were terribly afraid it would not be granted them. They thought that the French would demand revenge for every indignity and injustice they had suffered in 1871; and when they realised that the Entente was not prepared to treat with the Kaiser, they clamoured for his abdication. It was an ignoble business. Even the Frankfurter Zeitung joined in the tumult. There was a general terror which gave birth to the revolution.
§ 2
The revolutionists arrived at Mainz on Friday, November 8th, and the first intimation we received of their presence was the arrival on morning parade of the German adjutant in a civilian suit. He had apparently spent the previous evening at Köln, where all officers had been advised either to leave the town as speedily as possible, or else change into mufti. This gallant officer did both, and for the first time since we were captured, we were dismissed without an appel.