He was most hectic, and on the day of the armistice his anger exceeded all bounds.
“Why do you give us terms like this?” he said. “We have got rid of our roundheads, our Kaiser, our Ludendorf. Why do you not get rid of yours? Ah, but Bolshevism will come, and do you know what your soldiers’ councils have done, they have wired to us not to sign the armistice. But the wire came too late. Still, it will be all right in time, your soldiers’ councils will see to that.”
Where the Germans got the idea that there were soldiers’ councils in England, I do not know. It certainly did not appear in the Frankfurter Zeitung. But an enormous number of Germans were under the impression that a corresponding state of affairs existed in England. Probably it was a point of the revolutionaries’ programme.
By November 11th the revolution, as far as Mainz was concerned, had more or less adjusted itself; and the people’s attention was so occupied by the new regime that the news of the armistice was not received with as much excitement as might have been expected. The terms were a great deal harder than they had hoped for, but they were so glad the war was over that this did not greatly trouble them. They had ceased to care for collective honour. The only man I met who was really conscious of the defeat was the professor who used to take French and German classes. Of course, all his life it had been his business to instil imperialistic propaganda into the boys and girls under him, and no doubt he himself must have considerably absorbed the Pan-German doctrines, and he did feel acutely the ignominy of his country’s position.
“What hurts our pride more than anything else,” he said, “is the thought that we release prisoners instead of exchanging them. It shows us so clearly that we are beaten.”
But the people themselves were not at all worried about this. The only thing that troubled them was the doubt whether they would be able to get enough to eat after the surrender of so many wagons. The grippe was raging very fiercely among them, and the need for food was being very keenly felt. They had also hoped that one of the conditions of the armistice would have been the removal of the blockade.
“You have beaten us,” they said. “We cannot fight any more. Why must you continue the blockade? We have done everything you asked for; the Kaiser has gone; we have a new Government.”
For they have not yet realised the extent to which the previous deceit of their military rulers has discredited them in the eyes of Europe. They do not realise that every political movement they make has come to be regarded with suspicion.
With us the revolution produced fewer ludicrous situations than it did in some other places, and a most amusing story is told about the camp at Frankfurt. A few days after the signing of the armistice the senior British officer and his adjutant presented themselves before the German Commandant, with the request that they might be allowed out in the town on parole. There they found their late tyrant, sitting down in his shirt-sleeves, cutting the epaulettes off his tunic. On their arrival, however, he put on his greatcoat and made an attempt to recover his dignity.
“Yes, gentlemen,” he said, with his courtly foreign grace.