The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-01-20
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

I am not ven geful, but l do discrin- mate between mawkish sentiment and justice, and in the pacific chorus vail ing that Germany be not humiliated or unnecessarily penalized for her mis- deeds it may be well to see how she acted when France was prostrate.
  ~ Germany imposed such terms after taking AIsace and Lorraine as to pre- clude the power of France to rise out of her sad and desperate plight, but the swift restoration of the French re- public after 1871 amazed the world and alarmed the new empire on the other side of the Rhine.
 Germany took both territory and de- manded a great indemnity, but France might have forgiven her both of these fruits of war if she had been spared the army of occupation and the tr!- umphal entry of soldiers into Paris. It was the continued presence of Ger man soldiers which ranked.
 Let the mealy- mouthed pacifists re- member this before wasting any sym pathy on Germany, because the fatherland is resounding to the tread of the victorious armies of the allies. which have won the right to go straight to Berlin and to march down Unter den Linden-and no one should deny the Freneh this pleasure, for 1t is according to eternal justice.
 
 Just keep in mind that the terms imposed upon France by Germany were both insolent and harsh. France was to be mutilated, enfeebled and above all the shame of her humiliation was to be branded upon her. But if all these things were lawful to the man of "blood and iron" all things were certainly not expedient and the dragons teeth sowed so lavishly by Bismarck on French soil sprang into life and the steady hostility of the French at last got it's revenge over the naughty Prussians,
 have no tears to shed over the ! plight of Napoleon III, as he stood | waiting for the interview which rob- bed him of his crown. I take the de- scription of Dr. Moritz Busch, the Ger man historian and correspondent, wha says: His whole appearance was a little unsoldierlike. The man looked too soft, might say too shabby, for the uniform he wore," and he might we'll have added. which he disgraced. According to the irreverent Busch, Napoleon twas a little thick-set man | wearing red cap with a gold border, black paletot lined with red. red 1 trousers and white kid gloves"
 It was into a cottage of Belgian ! weaver, a one-storied house, painted yellow, with white shutters and vene- 1 tian blinds, that he and Bismarck ! entered They went up to the first | floor where there was "a little room | with one window. It was the bes' 1 in the house, but had only one dea! table and two h-bottomed chairs y ! Here they talked for three-quartey of an hour. The German official nar- | rative Of the war states lHdt NdpoiSon | expressed the wish that the army might be permitted to enter Belgium but of course it was denied. The thing which the German victors denied de- feated France as an asylum they cid I in the midst of war against the wishes ! of the Belgians and in defiance of their treaty obligations.
 l The interview closed. We read that 1 the Emperor fingered about in the l garden of the weaver's cottage, pos l sibly to get a bit of fresh air after i his unpleasant talk with the grim | chancellor, who did not wish for his i imperial guest to see the German King until the matter of the equalization had been arranged by the hard mili- tary men. He did not care for royalty | to settle the terms. We take leave l for the moment of Louis walking alone up and dowg potato field in
 flower. with his white-gloved hand