Administration, to be satisfactory, must correspond with the real facts of any given situation. The Allied Armies are in Germany as conquerors, and by right of conquest only. No civilian government set up under such conditions can be in a sound position, for civilian government is rooted in the consent of the governed--a consent which is certainly not forthcoming in this case. The long term of military occupation imposed by the Peace Treaty is open to very grave objection. Five years coupled with conditions under which Germany could have made a real effort to pay her indemnity would have been reasonable. Fifteen years, the period provided for in the French area, is very like an attempt at annexation. Security is never achieved through a régime of alien domination, and the temper bred in turn by alien domination destroys all hope of security. Occupation for a short period was not only inevitable but desirable. Prolonged for years, it is oppressive and mischievous. This being the case, the presence of foreign gentlemen in frock coats and top hats will not sweeten the unpalatable fact of occupation to the Boche. The officials of the Rhineland High Commission, many of whom are soldiers, appear sometimes in uniform, sometimes in civilian clothes; a blending of garments typical perhaps of the anomalies which beset the Commission in doing its work. Meanwhile, Coblenz must benefit by the foreign influx into the town. The Americans fly a colossal flag over the famous fortress which crowns the summit of Ehrenbreitstein. It is quite the largest flag in the Occupation. The Stars and Stripes are no less conspicuous over every public building in American occupation. If the technical position of the United States in Europe is a little uncertain at the moment, at least there is no doubt about her flag. We English adopt a different policy, and are not given to making our flag too cheap--a fact for which some of us are grateful. There is a great deal to be said for the Zulu custom of not allowing your most sacred things to be spoken about. At Coblenz we left the river to attack the high land lying between the Rhine and Wiesbaden. We first went up the valley of the Lahn through Ems and Nassau. Both towns, watering-places of a conventional and familiar type, were at that season of the year deserted, but Ems, with its memories of the Franco-Prussian War and the intrigues of Bismarck, has a painful interest of its own. The Germans, with their mania for monuments, had commemorated the spot where the French Ambassador in 1870 received an answer from the Emperor William which was the prelude to hostilities. Is this slab one, I wonder, that Republican Germany will care to preserve when ridding itself of other souvenirs of the Hohenzollerns?