This was the way it looked in France. How was it in Germany? There was no north and no south German. Men and states sprang together as a unit, showing how vital was the bond which had existed only for four years. It was no longer a German race combining with a common purpose, but a German nation instinct with one life, and solemnly resolved to defend it or to perish. In only eleven days an army of four hundred and fifty thousand soldiers was under the command of Moltke, with the Crown Prince Frederick William leading one of the three great divisions. In less than three weeks, instead of waging an aggressive war in Germany, the French were fighting for their existence on their own soil. In less than a month the French Emperor was a prisoner, and in seven months his empire was swept out of existence; the Germans were in Paris--and King William, Unser Fritz, Bismarck, and Von Moltke were quartered at Versailles. France had given up Alsace and Lorraine, had agreed to pay an indemnity of _five thousand millions_ of francs, and was glad to have peace even at that price! The surrenders of Metz (August 4), and of Sedan (September 2), were monumental disasters, and history would be searched in vain for such a crushing defeat of a proud and strong nation as was consummated by the Treaty of Peace signed at Paris on the 10th of May, 1871. Even the three southern states, Bavaria, Wurtemberg, and Baden, had participated in this Franco-Prussian war. So the last barrier to a completed union was removed, and a dramatic climax occurred in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles on the 18th of January, 1871. In that very hall where Richelieu, and Louis XIV., and Louis XV. had schemed to entangle and cripple and rob Germany, and where Napoleon I. had plotted the destruction of the German Empire, Ludwig II., King of Bavaria, in the name of the rest of the German states, laid their united allegiance at the feet of King William of Prussia, begging him to assume the crown and with it the title of "Hereditary Emperor of the German Empire." It is a curious fact that Bavaria, which had always been a thorn in the side of the Empire, which from the time of the first Duke Welf had stood for all that was conservative and despotic and reactionary, should have taken the initiative in the final act which set a seal upon the triumph of liberalism in Germany. It was recompense full and ample for the trouble she had given in the past! The return to Germany was a march of triumph. The popular enthusiasm knew no bounds. It was less than ten years since those days of gloom and depression. What a change had been wrought! Was it all done by blood and iron? They had been mighty factors certainly, but they had been used by a masterful intelligence, which had also recognized the power of _patriotism_. The empire which was immediately organized was simply a renewal of the _North German Union_. The dream of Hermann had at last been realized. There was a United Germany.