We had taken our stand with France at the Revolution.

Her spirit and her traditions were ours.

We were not affected by her passing fits of reaction, which never really interfered with us or our local life.
Substantially the revolutionary and Napoleonic era laid the foundations of modern France, and on them we stand.

They have little or nothing in common with an aristocratic and militarist Germany.

Our sympathies, our traditions, our political tendencies are all French--you cannot alter them." "But, finally--what do you expect or wish for ?" said the German man of letters, after he and Dr.Bucher had talked through a great part of the night, and the German had listened to the Alsatian with an evident wish to understand Alsatian grievances.
Dr.Bucher's answer was prompt and apparently unexpected.
"Reunion with France," he said quietly--"no true Alsatian wishes anything else." The German first stared and then threw himself back with a good-natured laugh.
"Then indeed there's nothing to be done." (_Dann ist ja freilich gar nichts zu machen!_) The tone was that of a strong man's patience with a dreamer; so confident did the Germans feel in their possession of the "Reichsland." But whatever chance the Germany of Bismarck and William II.