92 RUSSIA THEN AND NOW 



to ask for some further light on this new, and to me 

 startling, teaching. 



Complying with my wish, he related how, a few 

 years back, a well-known French agitator visited him, 

 while on his mission to Russia to prepare the ground 

 for a Franco-Russian alliance. This visitor frequently 

 referred, with sentimental pride, to the sacred pledge 

 he had given himself and his country never to cease 

 agitating for war with Germany until France redeemed 

 her lost military glory. He pleaded for the Count's 

 espousal of the proposed alliance, claiming that, as a 

 patriotic Russian, he must recognize the wisdom of 

 crushing or weakening so powerful a neighbour as 

 Germany. His pleading met with no success. Tol- 

 stoy showed him the absurdity of his arguments. 

 Germany defeated France at Sedan, he said, because 

 France had defeated Germany at Jena; and if France 

 were to defeat Germany now, it would only mean 

 that Germany would have to defeat France sometime 

 in the future. To his argument that France was 

 duty-bound to liberate the people of Alsace and 

 Lorraine, and to restore them to where they belonged, 

 Tolstoy answered that these two provinces had 

 belonged to Germany seven hundred years, and that 

 that country had only reconquered what was her own. 

 As far as the people are concerned they are no less 

 free and happy under German government than they 

 were under French. Barring a few hot-heads, they 

 would rather be left at peace than see their lands 

 again made the scenes of horrible war. Tolstoy then 

 asked the Frenchman whether he considered himself 



