On Feb. 4, 1917, an assembly composed of 200 Belgians speaking the Flemish language met and voted for the creation of a "Council of Flanders." On March 3, this body sent a deputation to Berlin, and the Chancellor announced to it that "the policy tending toward the administrative separation would be pursued with all the vigor possible during the occupation," and that "during the negotiations and after the conclusion of peace the empire would not cease to watch over the development of the Flemish race." The German decrees dividing Belgium into two administrative regions followed close upon these declarations, (March 21, 1917). At the end of 1917 the German authorities believed that the moment had come to consummate the enterprise by completing the administrative separation with a political separation. Thus the end would be attained: Belgium would be dismembered; one part of the country would fall under vassalage to Germany, and, in case there were no annexation, would become in a way a sphere of influence for the empire. The intrigues of the "Council of Flanders" are merely a comedy intended to mask this policy. The policy rests upon a clever juggling with the question of languages.

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