The Two Maps of Europe, and Some Other Aspects of the Great WarBelloc, Hilaire
History
The Two Maps of Europe, and Some Other Aspects of the Great War
Belloc, Hilaire
Europe -- Politics and government; Military art and science; World War, 1914-1918
(3) Holland, in its turn, both on account of its long independent
existence, its strong national feeling and its peculiar experience
as a commercial seafaring power, makes a third individual group. The
populations immediately to the east of Holland in German territory
speak a language of the same sort as the Dutch, and have the same
social conditions and habits, but they have no desire to be Dutch,
nor the Dutch to be incorporated with them.
(4) The Scandinavian countries, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, form
an equally distinct unit, and are quite clearly divided into three
separate national groups. And here we have two anomalies: A quite
small belt of Denmark, much smaller than the total original extent
of Schleswig-Holstein, annexed by Prussia fifty years ago, is really
Danish, and maintains to this day its protest against the annexation.
One may go so far as to say that this really Danish belt is no more
than a tenth of the whole, but its protest is a proof of the vigour
which national feeling has maintained against artificial political
boundaries. On the other hand, the Finnish provinces of Russia are,
in their articulate spirit, their governing class, their religion,
and almost in their entire social life Swedish in tone. Norway is
intact, neither suffering a portion of her population under alien
rule nor pretending to govern populations alien to herself.
(5) The fifth great group is the German, and here there is so much
complexity that what we have to say must only be taken very generally
and roughly. But, roughly and generally, the German group is as
follows:
All German-speaking men and women with the exception of:
(_a_) The bulk of the annexed provinces of Alsace-Lorraine
(a matter of sentiment), and
(_b_) The German-speaking cantons of Switzerland (a matter
of political boundaries).
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