The German Emperor has been moving through Alsace- Lorraine and
Baden, nominally, to witness certain manmuvres, really, to say all the encouraging things he can in the provinces most exposed to French invasion. The Alsace-Lorrainers have been heartily thanked for their unexpectedly genial welcome, but have been told that they are, and must remain for ever, German. They have, too, to the great irritation of the French, been shown the Prince of Naples, the heir to the Italian Throne, as a favoured guest of the Emperor,—a visible proof that the Triple Alliance is a reality. In Baden, the Emperor, at a parade dinner on September 11th, spoke in the warmest terms of the share the Grand Ducal House bad had in making the German Empire, and declared that it was this House which, in the spring, had spread "a new thought" among the old soldiers of the German Army. and thus had carried the Military Bill. "As once," said the Emperor, "that old hero, Heimdal, stood sentinel over the peace of the earth, so stands Ger- many at the door of the temple of peace not only of Europe, but of the whole world." No such sentence could have been uttered in England without ridicule; but the Germans have not, like us, forgotten everything, and to them Heimdal, the old watchman of the Norse gods, who hears the grass grow in the fields and the wool on the sheep's back, is still an intelligible illustration. If our Queen spoke of Odin, from whom, in legend, she is descended, she would be supposed to be ma xing some unintelligible allusion to something Indian.
