The Planters' banner. [volume] (Franklin, Attakapas Co., Lou.) 1849-1872, 1871-02-15
WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY Is 1871
Prussia and France.

Prussia and France.
Ernest Faydeau one Of the most popula
OF French novelists, sends TO q New Yor
paper long and bitter letter in regard (
the perfidy of Prussia and the harbarism q
the present war. He says:
One OF the things which have most con
tribute to give especial character of hat
and fury to the present war is tho Machia
v~llian hypocrisy with which it was pre-
pared by the Prussians against the French
For twenty years, with that careless cando
which is one of the most prominent and mos
excusable faults of the Gallo race, VI,
haYe been happy to receive the Germans
US. They lacked little of beng considered
and treated, throughout France, as citizen:
of she county,. They were found every.
where veil established in every grade o,
society. Our workshops. our dwellings
our hearts-everything was open TO them.
They lived, reared families, accumulated
fortunes, more safely and more agreably
among Us than they could ever have done
at home or anywhere else. We may ALMOST
say that frequently, other things being
equal; when there was question of we'll paid
positions. the Germans were preferred to
the French.
They had made for themselves in their
Journals and their books such reputation
of honesty. of gentleness. of pure and patri-
archal morals, of tolerance, Of candor
Never did mortal race have under heaven
such fame. We saw them through Goethe,
through Schiller. those great lying magi-
clans. All their girls were to us Gretchens.
Their soldiers appeared to us. barring the
leather hamlets. SO many Goetz Won Ber-
lichingen. There seemed to US, in each of
their sovereigns, certain mixture of burgher
good mature and chivalrous poiiteness. 1t
was absu d evidently, but it was perfect.
p Nevertheless, installed in our houses, our
Kitchens. our stores, our workshops. our
theatres, our arsenals, our posts, our tele-
graphs, our railroads. in our administrative
bureau. in our journnls-what we're they
about! Nothing wrong. l assure you.
They were innocently taking the dimensions
of our doors, of our windows, casts of our
ksyholes. the. plans of our cities, of our
eewers. Of our fOrtresses. making cata-
logusl of our warehouses, of our dock yards,
drawing up the minutest maps of every can
ton, and. above all. keeping all our cash ac-
counts.
b. In the meantime the prudent Minister of,
the King of Prussia, Count Bismarck, al
ways gay, and. like Mr.. Emile Olivier.
light hearted" was casting great guns.
manufacturing muskets. storing up shells,
bombs aud cartridges. buying even in
France everything he could find, OF picrate
Of potassium and nitro-glycerine; in fine,
vas slyly preparing every sort of destruc-
live engine to prove to Europe and America
that making war upon France did not enter
at all into his plans for the unification of
Germany.
What this war has been, which, to use
Me expression of Carl Vost, one of the
pfaces of German science. ..is crime
.sans. s'si'i:"fissfes: hi. infa%9ef
inc the breaking up of the Roman Empire |
has been seen in Europe such food of
atrocities, Of excesses, of brutal violence, of
Irson and rapine, and cruelty. 1t would be |
to go back to the invasion of the |
Huns and the Vandals to find in history
'uch crimes against humanity. These
nonstrosities were possible-or could Mt
east be admitted in principle in the time of
he Sesostxis and the Cyruses. Since the
eligion Of Christ, assuming as its mission
he ameliorotion Of morals, has established
tself in all the countries of the earth, they |
eem to as like abominable anachronisms. |
They shock all human sentiments
IS we'll as good sense. They are as stupid |
IS they are horrible. In one word they ex-
lite as much contempt as horror.
1t is in vain to deny, to explain, to dis
,uss, in attempting to extenuate the lament |
lble effect produced by these savage pro-
,eedings--it remains nevertheless proven
hat. even if some ofthem have been exag-
,erated, as would necessarily happen in |
uch moments of tumult and Of popular |
passion, the greater part of those which are
elsted are unfortunately only too real |
This pillage of public and private treasures,
his burning Of houses, this shooting of |
'eaceable citizens, this slaughtering and
wen violation of women. this bombarding
# open towns-in fine, this great country,
hitherto so prosperous, now ravaged, robbed,
rampled and burned, monuments DESTROYED |
md ruined-all this bears witness loudly |
gainst these modern barbarians. And
vhen Count Bismarck. with that wellxnown |
,ool and devilish gayety Of his, defends him
elf from the charge of having said IL at be
Wished to reduce France to the rank of a |
econd-class power, he commits simply a |
monumental naivete. For in their style of
making war, worthy of Mozambique, the |
Germans have conducted themselves like |
he band Of Cartouche in the environs of
Paris in the last century.
s fr a. Z. "a E.s--L /