I suppose we all like, in a childish way, to wear placards of our prowess in the form of orders and decorations, but the evening attire of this bureaucratic nobility often looks as though there had been a ceramic eruption, a sort of measles of decorations. Men's breasts are covered with medals, stars, porcelain plaques, and their necks are hung with ribbons with a dangling medallion, all distributed from the patriarchal imperial Christmas-tree for every conceivable service from cleaning the streets to preaching properly on the imperial yacht. Men collect them as they would stamps or butterflies, and some of them must be very expert.
The officers and the officials who are recognized as giving their services as a family tradition, as a patriotic service, or out of sheer love of the profession of arms, are rather liked than disliked, and give a tone and set a standard for all the rest. Both these officers and their men are respected. Of no German soldier could it be written:
"I went into a theatre as sober as could be, They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me; They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls, But when it comes to fightin', Lord! they'll shove me in the stalls."
On the contrary, every effort is made to keep the army pleased with itself and proud of itself. The chancellor of the empire is always given military rank; officers are not allowed to marry unless they have, or acquire by marriage, a suitable income; the dignity of the officer is upheld and his pride catered to; officers are made to feel that they are the darlings of the Fatherland by everybody from the Emperor down.
This artificial stimulant goes far to keep them contented, and the fact that the scale of comfortable living in Germany was twenty years ago far below, and is even now not equal to, that of the equivalent classes with us makes the task easier. They have not been taught to want the things we want, and are still satisfied with less. And back of and behind it all is the feeling among the leaders, that the army furnishes no small amount of the patriotic cement necessary to hold Germany together. Ulysses lashed himself to the mast as he passed the sirens of luxury and leisure, and for the German Ulysses the army supplies the cords. It is not the foreign student of German life alone who notices that the Germans, even now, seem to be tribal rather than national. The best friends of Germany in Germany also recognize this weakness, comment upon it, and favor every possible expedient to overcome it.