Note 124 — Chapter XII · PREPARATIONS FOR DEPARTURE.

I leave these words as they were written in 1857, a time when German nationality did not exist, and when the name of German had perhaps reached its lowest appreciation. Throughout the history of the nineteenth century there is nothing more striking than the change which the last decade has worked in Europe, than the rise of the mighty power, which in a month crushed the armies of France, and which tore from her side the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. By an Englishman who loves his country, nothing can be more enthusiastically welcomed than this accession to power of a kindred people, connected with us by language, by religion, and by all the ties which bind nation to nation. It proves that the North is still the fecund mother of heroes, and it justifies us in hoping that our Anglo-Teutonic blood, with its Scandinavian ‘baptism,’ will gain new strength by the example, and will apply itself to rival our Continental cousins in the course of progress, and in the mighty struggle for national life and prosperity.