Then after 1900 the Germans "changed greatly." They became every year richer and more arrogant; Germany from beyond the Rhine developed every year an increasing appétit for the native wealth and commerce of Alsace; and the methods of government became increasingly oppressive and militarist. By this time some 400,000 native Alsatians had in the course of years left the country, and about the same number of immigrant Germans had taken their places. The indifference or apathy of the old population began again to yield to more active feelings. The rise of a party definitely "Anti-Allemand," especially among the country people, made itself felt. And finally came, in Dr. Bucher's phrase, the period of "la haine" after the famous Saverne incident in 1912. That extraordinary display of German military insolence seemed to let loose unsuspected forces.
"All of a sudden, and from all sides, there was an explosion of fury against the Germans."
And as the Doctor spoke, his sensitive, charming face kindling into fire, I remembered our slow passage the day before, through the decorated streets of the beautiful old town of Saverne, in the wake of a French artillery division, and amid what seemed the spontaneous joy of a whole population!
Through all these years Dr. Bucher was a marked man in the eyes of the German authorities, but he was careful to give them no excuse for violence, and so great was his popularity, owing clearly to his humanity and self-devotion as a doctor, that they preferred to leave him alone. The German prefect once angrily said to him: "You are a real poison in this country, Herr Doctor!"—and not very long before the war a German official to whom he was applying for leave to invite M. Andre Tardieu to lecture in Strasbourg, broke out with pettish exasperation: "For twenty years you have been turning my hair grey, M. le Docteur!"—and permission was refused. At the outbreak of war, he naturally escaped from Strasbourg, and joined the French army; while during the latter part of the struggle, he was French military attache at Berne, and, as I understand, the head of a most successful secret service. He was one of the first Frenchmen to re-enter Strasbourg, and is now an invaluable liaison official between the restored French Government and the population.
The practical difficulty of the moment, in January last, was how to meet the Alsatian impatience to get rid of their German masters, bag and baggage, while at the same time maintaining the ordinary services. Every night, meetings were being held in the Strasbourg squares to demand the immediate departure of the Germans. "Qu'ils partent—qu'ils partent tous—et tout de suite!" The French officials could only reply that if an immediate clearance were made of the whole German administration—"we can't run your trains—or carry your posts—or deliver your goods." But the German employés were being gradually and steadily repatriated—no doubt with much unavoidable hardship to individuals. Strasbourg contained then about 65,000 Germans out of 180,000. Among the remaining German officials there was often a curious lack of realisation of what had happened to Germany and to them. "The Germans are very gauche—their tone is still just the same!" And the Doctor described a scene he had witnessed in one of the bureaux of the prefecture only the day before. A German official was at his desk. Enter an Alsatian to make an inquiry about some point in a bankruptcy case. The German answered him with the curt rudeness which was the common official tone in old days, and finally, impatiently told the applicant to go. The Alsatian first opened his eyes in astonishment, and then—suddenly—flamed up. "What!—you think nothing is changed?—that you are the masters here as you used to be—that you can treat us as you used to treat us? We'll show you? We are the masters now. Get out of that chair!—Give it me!—while I talk to you. Behave civilly to me, ou je vais vous flanquer un coup dans le dos!" And the Alsatian went threateningly forward. But the German looked up—grew white—and said slowly—"Monsieur—you are right! I am at your service. What is your business?"
I asked about the amount of inter-marriage that had taken place during the forty years. Dr. Bucher thought it had been inconsiderable—and that the marriages, contracted generally between German subalterns and girls of the inn-keeping or small farming class, had been rarely happy. The Alsatian strain was the stronger, and the wife's relations despised the German intruder. "Not long before the war I came upon two small boys fighting in a back street." The boy that was getting the worst of it was abusing the other, and Dr. Bucher caught the words—"dirty Prussian!" (sale Prussien!) The boy at whom this was hurled, stopped suddenly, with a troubled face, as though he were going to cry. "No—no!—not me!—not me! my father!" Strange, tragic little tale!
As to the Church, a curious situation existed at that moment in Strasbourg. The Archbishop, a good man, of distinguished German birth, was respected and liked by his clergy, who were, however, French in sympathies almost to a man. The Archbishop, who had naturally excused himself from singing the victors' Te Deum in the Cathedral, felt that it would be wiser for him to go, and proposed to Rome that he should resign his see. His clergy, though personally attached to him, were anxious that there should be no complications with the French Government, and supported his wish to resign. But Rome had refused. Why? No doubt because the whole position of the Church and of Catholicism in these very Catholic provinces represents an important card in the hand of the Vatican, supposing the Papacy should desire at any time to reopen the Church and State question with Republican France. What is practically the régime of the Napoleonic Concordat still obtains in the recovered provinces. The clergy have always been paid by the State, and will be still paid, I understand, in spite of the Combes laws, by a special subvention, for the distribution of which the bishops will be responsible. And M. Clemenceau, as the French Prime Minister, has already nominated one or more bishops, as was the case throughout France itself up to 1905.
Everything indeed will be done to satisfy the recovered provinces that can be done. They are at present the spoiled children of France; and the poor devastated North looks on half enviously, inclined to think that "Paris forgets us!"—in the joy of the lost ones found. But Paris knows very well that there are difficulties ahead, and that the French love of symmetry and logic will have to make substantial concessions here and there to the local situation. There are a number of institutions, for instance, which have grown up and covered the country since 1871, which cannot be easily fitted to the ordinary cadre of French departmental government. The department would be too small a unit. The German insurance system, again, is far better and more comprehensive than the French, and will have, in one way or another, to be taken over.
But my own strong impression is that goodwill, and the Liberal fond, resting on the ideas of 1789, which, in spite of their Catholicism, has always existed in these eastern provinces (Metz, however, has been much more thoroughly Germanised than Strasbourg since the annexation), will see France through. And meanwhile the recovery of these rich and beautiful countries may well comfort her in some degree for her desolate fields and ruined towns of the North and Centre. The capital value of Alsace-Lorraine is put roughly at a thousand millions, and the Germans leave behind them considerable additions to the wealth of the province in the shape of new railway-lines and canals, fine stations, and public buildings, not to speak of the thousands of fruit-trees with which, in German fashion, they have lined the roads—a small, unintentional reparation for the murdered fruit-trees of the North.