But the German looked up--grew white--and said slowly--"Monsieur--you are right! I am at your service.

What is your business ?" I asked about the amount of inter-marriage that had taken place during the forty years.

Dr.Bucher thought it had been inconsiderable--and that the marriages, contracted generally between German subalterns and girls of the inn-keeping or small farming class, had been rarely happy.

The Alsatian strain was the stronger, and the wife's relations despised the German intruder.

"Not long before the war I came upon two small boys fighting in a back street." The boy that was getting the worst of it was abusing the other, and Dr.Bucher caught the words--"dirty Prussian!" (_sale Prussien!_) The boy at whom this was hurled, stopped suddenly, with a troubled face, as though he were going to cry.