In 1871, when the last Prussian troops marched out of Paris, crowds of bourgeois housewives expectorated lustily. Great bonfires of straw were burned to "purify" the Place de la Concorde. From German Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) and Coblenz the last Belgian and French troops marched out last week. There were bonfires on the Rhine hillsides, but no expectoration. Rhinelanders waited until the last troop trains had gone, then young folk danced in rain wet streets, old folk breathed an earnest Gott Sei Dank! The Second Zone of Allied Occupation...
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