GERMANY AND BLACK TROOPS.
[To the Editor of the ScEer.troa.] Sra,--May I suggest that the Hon. Secretary of the Friends of Fiance should take a trip to the Rhineland before repeating the statement that the last black troops left Germany in 1921 ? One can dispute endlessly what constitutes perfect blackness. Possibly the coloured troops whom I have so often seen in Bonn, Dfirc n, Trier, and many another Rhineland town could not rank as:—
" Black, but such as in esteem Prince Memnon's sister might bescem."
I gladly grant that some among them were of an inoffensive cafe au halt hue, while others, of a deep chocolate, could still be differentiated by the naked -eye from the ebony skinned West African in colour as well as in physiognomy. But surely this is quibbling. hi the towns I have mentioned and scores of others there were, anyway until a few weeks ago; large garrisons of Africans whom in ordinary conversation an Englishman or a German would at once classify as " niggers."
German propaganda portrays these non-European troops as hideous and vicious monsters. I did not find that the ordinary German regarded them as such. In fact, he often said they behaved better then the " White Frenchman," being less arrogant and bullying. At the same time the simpler folk and children are- naturally frightened of these outlandish creatures with their thrill; guttural dialects and barbaric uniforms. - Any rape or assault committed • by one of these Africans naturally raises a -commotion and a horror among ordinary, uneducated and helpless people quite out of proportion to the offence, and far in excess of the impression when a similar crime is perpetrated, as happens probably much oftener, by a " white Frenchman."
When English people read about black troops in German towns they must visualize those towns as they ame—places like Born, Coblenz and Trier, comparable with Oxford, York and Bury -St. Edmunds in Our own country : • ancient and beautiful cities with a tradition of learning, culture- and
modest prosperity dating from Roman times. - It is extra- ordinary to emerge from a beautiful Romanesque cathedral like that of Trier and to run into a patrol of black (or, let us say, mahogany-complexioned) Moslems with fixed bayonets, who run at yop (AS one did at me) if you do not immediately make way for them with a large margin. Think of York Minster Close garrisoned by Madagascans !--I am, Sir, &c.,
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