THE ANNIVERSARY OF SEDAN.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2991, 26 October 1882, Page 3

THE ANNIVERSARY OF SEDAN.

The anniversary of Sedan has this year, says an English paper, been celebrated by the German nation with an absence of provocation which does credit to the good sense of the German masses, and which is all the more commendable in view of some recent exhibitions of pettiness and bad taste on the part of a section of French opinion. The day may come when the memory of Sedan will be something like the memory of Waterloo—a, proud reminiscence which' can never pass into oblivion, but which excites no particular sense of triumph or superiority in the breasts of the many cpnqimrq l ' 3 of the day. Sedan is fioo near and the German Empire, is too recently a, creation. Alsace and Lorraine are too newly annexed and are util I too far from real incorporation or assimilation into the unity of their new Fatherland, . for it to be possible for Germans or for Frenchmen to regard the commemoration of. tbe surrender of Napoleon ill and his army quite from the point of view of mere, patriotic students of history. Within the twelve years which have passed since the famous victory, however, there has been lime'enough to allow of a good deal 'of the old bitterness calming down, and if it has not ceased to exist, at any rate a great deal is gained for mutual peace find charity in the fact of its having returned to a latent and quiescent condition.