When the Alsatians were permitted by Germany to send deputies to the Reichstag, the fifteen who were elected protested on their side against annexation February 18, 1874. We find in their declaration the following passage: "In choosing us all, just as we are, our electors before everything else wish to affirm their sympathy with France and their right to govern themselves." These solemn declarations have never been revoked by any equivalent or contrary statement. Not even during the actual war and reign of terror established in the annexed provinces has the German Government succeeded in forcing from the representatives of Alsace-Lorraine a statement expressing the desire to remain German. The attempt to make such a manifestation by the votes of the council-generals, of whom the suspected members had previously been deported to Germany, saying that the economic interest of Alsace-Lorraine necessitated the maintenance of the _status quo_, only served to demonstrate the insecurity of the political situation of the German Empire in Alsace-Lorraine. What lamentable drivel in comparison to the dignified and generous language of the magnificent protests of Bordeaux. It accords well with the philosophy of German diction which the Baron de Bulach, Secretary of State, jeeringly dared recommend to his compatriots as a line of conduct: "_Wess Brod ich ess des Lied ich sing_" (Whose bread I eat, his song I sing). Nothing, moreover, would be less exact than to think that the Alsatians lived on the Germans or that their material well-being depended in any way on the economic life of the German Empire, or that the prosperity of the country was in all, or even in great part, to be credited to the Germans. It is not within the scope of our essay to present a study of the economic situation of the country, which, if she has been prosperous in some directions, has often been hindered by the predominance given to rival interests of other German countries. The project of constructing a canal from Ludwigshafen to Strasbourg was abandoned because contrary to the interests of the town of Mannheim. The canalling of the Sarre and of the Moselle was basely sacrificed to the interests of the Prussian industries of la Ruhr, which looked with an enemy's eye on any progress in the industry of Lorraine.