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Within the Year After 
 
 BY 
 
 BETTY ADLER 
 
 M 
 
 Special Correspondent of The Lee Newspaper Syndicate in 
 France, Belgium, Italy and Germany. Registered 
 Correspondent of The American Commis- 
 sion to Negotiate Peace in Paris. 
 
 CHICAGO 
 
 M. A. DONOHUE & CO. 
 
 1920 
 
*$ 
 
 COPYRIGHT 
 
 1920 
 
 By BETTY. ADLER 
 
 ©CI.A570787 
 JUL ku 1320 
 
Co iWp IBrotfjer 
 
 Who Made the Trip Possible 
 
 And to 
 
 THE MEMORY OF OUR PARENTS 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I " Excuse, Please, the War " 1 
 
 II Inside the Gates at Versailles 10 
 
 III To Chateau Thierry, Belleau Woods, 
 
 Soissons, Rheims 21 
 
 IV In the Ambassador's Garden 49 
 
 V About Paul 57 
 
 VI The Victory Parade 65 
 
 VII With a House Party in the Citadel 
 
 of Verdun 80 
 
 VIII The Canteen Girl Who Listened 104 
 
 IX With the Watch on the Rhine Ill 
 
 X With the Fighting First 127 
 
 XI In Alsace-Lorraine 142 
 
 XII Hearing Egypt 's Cause 153 
 
 XIII When Our Jack Tar Came to Paree. . 161 
 
 XIV With the American Committee for 
 
 Devastated France 174 
 
 XV In Sacked and Burned Termonde, 
 
 Belgium 196 
 
 XVI At Belgium's Great Divide — The 
 
 Yser 207 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XVII Through a Kidnapped Louvain 
 
 Factory 230 
 
 XVIII Antwerp and Its Fort Waelhem 242 
 
 XIX In Martyred Dinant and Charleroi . . 256 
 
 XX Meeting the Commander-in-Chief. . . . 275 
 
 XXI When Austria Signed 280 
 
 XXII In Italy, on the Piave 293 
 
 XXIII On the Carso — and in Trieste 315 
 
 XXIV In Rome — Passport Worries 335 
 
 XXV A New Cult and An Old Quarter 353 
 
 XXVI Getting Through to Berlin 363 
 
 XXVII Where Fashions are Created 389 
 
 XXVIII Back to the U. S. A 406 
 
Within the Year After 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 ( i 
 
 EXCUSE, PLEASE, THE WAE ' ' 
 
 Pabis, June 23, 1919. 
 <S\ TELEGRAM? It could not get there be- 
 ■1 \. fore tomorrow, Madame. Maybe later. 
 All telegrams zay must go through za military 
 — you will be in Paris long time ahead of 
 telegram. Zis train, it makes stop now because 
 our coal is so bad. You must excuse, please — 
 here it is still za war. Madame, you will excuse, 
 please, za war? " 
 
 Leaning through the doorway of a compart- 
 ment, at the village of Rue, where the steamer 
 special, enroute from Boulogne-sur-Mer to 
 Paris, had been sidetracked yesterday after- 
 noon, I was imploring a train official to send 
 a dispatch for me, when he apologized thusly 
 for the war. In my best American-French I 
 replied, " Never mind — that's all right — it has 
 
 1 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 been my war as well as yours, and you need 
 offer no apologies." For " Bleeding France," 
 true to her breeding, regrets your inconveni- 
 ences in getting through her war-scarred re- 
 gions. Only now, instead of " C'est la Guer- 
 re " (It is the War), they remind you "C'est la 
 Paix," (It is the Peace). 
 
 But all the inconveniences for the traveler go- 
 ing abroad in these months after the armistice 
 are not in France. Mine began three months ago 
 when I first applied for a passport to the State 
 Department in Washington. Getting a pass- 
 port is equivalent to a liberal education these 
 days. Then every scrap of writing or printed 
 matter I carried had to be examined and sealed 
 up by the custom house officials in New York 
 before I could go on board the steamer, includ- 
 ing even my letter of credit and visiting cards, 
 and the seal was not to be broken until I had 
 been three hours at sea. For the peace is not 
 yet signed and I crossed on a Dutch liner, hav- 
 ing overlooked the fact, when my passage was 
 booked, that Holland was neutral. 
 
 Landing in the picturesque harbor of Bou- 
 logne by tender in the quiet of the Sunday noon, 
 
 2 
 
" EXCUSE, PLEASE, THE WAR " 
 
 I knew I was across at last when I saw on the 
 dock a tubby French peasant woman in holi- 
 day attire, with the quaint Boulognese cap, a 
 circle of stiffly starched, pleated muslin, like 
 a wheel, around her plump face. Our pass- 
 ports had been examined minutely by French 
 officials who came on board the liner in the 
 early morning. On the dock our hand luggage 
 had to be inspected before we were permitted 
 to enter the train. 
 
 And right there, when my heels first touched 
 French soil, it was a smiling-eyed American 
 soldier who came to my assistance. For a space 
 of three minutes I had taken my eyes from my 
 suitcase, after giving it into the hands of a 
 burly porter on the tender, and he had disap- 
 peared as if into thin air. The Yankee dough- 
 boy rushed to my aid. " Never leave your 
 hand baggage out of your sight, ' ' was his warn- 
 ing, ' ' we are here to see that baggage is not 
 stolen. ' ' 
 
 In the crowded customs office on the pier 
 there was great hurry and bustle. My inspec- 
 tion officer was a middle-aged Frenchwoman, 
 tall and gaunt in black. I waited while she con- 
 
 3 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 vinced a party of indignant men that it was ex- 
 pensive to bring cigars and tobacco into France. 
 They paid a franc duty on each cigar — or she 
 kept the cigars. 
 
 The steamer train to Paris had been heralded 
 to have a restaurant car and so it did. But 
 it was a very old car, owing to the necessity 
 of utilizing any rolling stock left, and there 
 was no communication between the diner and 
 the remainder of the train. This meant that 
 everyone must climb out at a station and dash 
 along the platform to the diner. It was an 
 exciting proceeding since there was always the 
 risk that the train might move on without you. 
 And being stranded on the French landscape 
 was not alluring. Many passengers refused 
 to leave their compartments and went without 
 luncheon rather than take the chance. Poor 
 coal and a tremendously heavy train for the 
 miniature engine, together with sidetracking 
 several times to allow troop trains to pass, pro- 
 longed what is usually a three hour journey 
 to eight hours. But no one complained. It was 
 good to get through at all, for much of the 
 route lay through the Somme, that shell-rocked 
 
 4 
 
" EXCUSE, PLEASE, THE WAR " 
 
 corner of the western theater of The War. 
 
 We had not left the peaceful harbor of Bou- 
 logne far behind when I first came face to face 
 with The War. Trains of Red Cross cars had 
 appeared and disappeared on the passing coun- 
 tryside, their emblems of mercy blazoned across 
 the side doors of the coupes, for the foreign 
 railway carriage is usually a series of coupes, 
 holding six or eight passengers, and opening at 
 the sides like a cab. These Red Cross trains 
 stood on sidings or passed us swiftly. Some- 
 times it was a train of box cars, their open 
 doorways filled with eager poilu or Tommy 
 faces, waving uniform caps or figures huddled 
 on the floor trying to find a comfortable posi- 
 tion. 
 
 Then like a drop curtain, it appeared — a 
 huge hospital camp — and beyond a cemetery. 
 I never knew crosses could be placed so closely 
 together — and the many, many rows! So this 
 was Sunny France and what the war had 
 meant ! 
 
 But today when I gazed at the statue of 
 Strasbourg in the Place de la Concorde — be- 
 fore the Hotel Crillon, the headquarters of the 
 
 5 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 American Commission to Negotiate Peace, 
 where at this hour world history is in the mak- 
 ing — the statue symbolical of the principal city 
 of Alsace-Lorraine, that for fifty years stood 
 here in the heart of Paris, draped in mourn- 
 ing, now gay with the colors of the Allies who 
 freed her, and they told me that the iron chains 
 that have shackled her since her separation 
 from France are now to be removed — I felt 
 that they who slept beneath those crosses in 
 Picardy must know and rejoice that they did 
 not make the supreme sacrifice in vain. 
 
 As we approached Amiens, the war came 
 closer at every mile. In a peaceful village, 
 nestling against a sunny slope, sometimes it 
 was the corner of a building shot away, laying 
 bare the mangled interior; again it was a top 
 story blown off entirely. Often it was a great 
 jagged hole torn into masonry that gave mute 
 testimony to the advance of the merciless Hun. 
 Paneless windows for blocks filled in the rest 
 of the story. 
 
 Then quite as unexpectedly we came upon the 
 trenches. In the bright June sunshine it was 
 impossible to realize them. Like harmless ter- 
 
 6 
 
" EXCUSE, PLEASE, THE WAR " 
 
 races they first appeared, as they arose in 
 waves over the softly undulating country in the 
 peaceful light of the summer Sunday afternoon. 
 Over many the tender grass was timidly, brave- 
 ly, trying to grow. Every few yards there was 
 the sheltered doorway of a dugout, now de- 
 serted. This was where the soldiers had dug 
 themselves havens of refuge during the recent 
 days of that cruel modern warfare. 
 
 And there, now, the poppies had come. Oh, 
 these poppies of Picardy — like the afterglow 
 of the noble young lives that gave just such 
 vivid blood to the Great Cause! Wide fields 
 of them swayed, fanned by the June breeze! 
 Their flaming color was like splashes of glow- 
 ing coals against the deep green foliage. For 
 miles and miles they colored the landscape. 
 They dared to go up to the very doors of the 
 dugouts. Once I saw — three red poppies set 
 in the arid waste before a dugout entrance, 
 proudly upright on their slim, green stems, 
 nodding and smiling in the soft winds. It was 
 not difficult to fill in the remainder of the pic- 
 ture, of a trio fighting there hand to hand. And 
 now three glowing red poppies whisper of the 
 
 7 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 hero souls who gave up the sunshine of life that 
 peace might once again reign over this earth. 
 I wish I might send to every American mother, 
 whose son sleeps on the sunny slopes of France, 
 the picture of those poppies as I saw them. 
 In their living flame they seemed a soul part 
 of those hardy young lives sacrificed. And 
 every year as long as Time shall last the pop- 
 pies will return to these battlefields, conse- 
 crated by the blood of our hero dead, as liv- 
 ing symbols of the new Brotherhood of Man 
 that has now reached around a world. 
 
 The train stopped at Amiens, and there in 
 the roof of the depot platform, almost directly 
 above our car, was a huge hole caused by a 
 dropping shell. The depot life moved unheed- 
 ingly around below it. French, English and 
 American soldiers chatted in groups about the 
 platform. And the sunlight streamed through 
 the ragged hole above their heads. 
 
 Between Amiens and Paris the train ran 
 closer and closer to the trenches. It is rolling 
 country, resembling that of our Middle West. 
 Were it not for the red roofed, quaint cottages, 
 snuggled among the trees, one might have been 
 
 8 
 
" EXCUSE, PLEASE, THE WAR " 
 
 on a road into Chicago, only for the swollen 
 scars that seamed across the open fields, mute 
 reminders of a land invaded. But already re- 
 construction has begun and it was good to see 
 that many fields have been ploughed over in 
 the trenched grounds in that sector of the 
 Somme. 
 
 And so at nine o'clock in the summer twi- 
 light — they have the daylight saving hour here, 
 — we slowly but surely steamed into Paris, 
 through its seething, rushing, Gare du Nord or 
 North Depot — into Paris — the Hub of the 
 Peace Universe — at last! 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Paris, June 28. 
 
 HOW I spent my first week in Paris pull- 
 ing wires to get to the Peace Signatory 
 ceremony at the Chateau of Versailles is a story 
 in itself. Getting past St. Peter at the Pearly 
 Gates must be easier. From fifth-under-secre- 
 taries and Y. officials up to our American Am- 
 bassador himself, the Honorable Hugh Camp- 
 bell Wallace, to whom I had a personal letter 
 of introduction from his old chum, Senator 
 Saulsbury of Delaware — Hon. Wilbur Marsh 
 of Waterloo, had given me a letter to him — I 
 approached countless officials daily. I gathered 
 that they felt it was presumption, to say the least, 
 for a correspondent just arrived in Paris to 
 Cherish such a hope. At the press bureau the 
 ticket committee was wild-eyed, with 120 en- 
 titled to admission and place for but sixty. 
 Finally, through Ray Stannard Baker, head of 
 the American Press in Paris, at 11 o'clock on 
 
 10 
 
INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 this morning of the signing clay I was given a 
 precious pink card to the terrace. 
 
 A taxi was out of the question at that hour 
 on this eventful day in Paris, so my cousin, 
 Mme. Arthur Blad, took me in her car. I had 
 been given at the press headquarters a letter of 
 instructions regarding the route and a special 
 yellow and green cocade, a yellow disk sticker 
 with a green center, the marker to be glued to 
 the front window or the wind shield of the car, 
 to the left of the chauffeur. This cocade was 
 the " laissez passer." Without it no car could 
 proceed over the special reserved route, which 
 lay through St. Cloud, the Ville d'Avray and 
 up Picardy Hill. 
 
 It was 12:15 when we left Paris for the 
 twenty-mile drive to Versailles. I had fastened 
 my two American flags to the car much to the 
 delight of one, Louis, who grinned in voluble 
 French when I informed him that he was now 
 a ' ' chauffeur Americaine. ' ' Out past the race 
 track of the Longchamps, where the Grand Prix 
 was to be run the next day, and across the 
 Seine we sped to show our cards at the Paris 
 
 11 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 gates and to be admitted to the route reserved 
 for the guests to Versailles. 
 
 Now all the way, every fifty feet, on alternate 
 sides of the smooth white road, stood a French 
 soldier, holding a red flag. Only the fact that 
 the flag was held downward permitted us to 
 proceed. These soldiers were in the French 
 horizon-blue uniform, always nattily pictur- 
 esque, and they wore the blue helmets. A few 
 had, slung over one shoulder, what appeared 
 like blue life preservers. The Ville d'Avray is 
 a charming little hamlet, nestling in wooded 
 hills, with its old stone buildings, straight and 
 severe, holding sentinel up each side of the 
 steep road. 
 
 The city of Versailles (and you must pro- 
 nounce it Ver-sigh-ee) was in gala attire. The 
 flags of the Allies were fluttering everywhere. 
 Eegiments of the Garde Republicaine in their 
 gorgeous uniforms, resplendent with gold trim- 
 mings, set off by wide saber belts of white and 
 epaulets of scarlet and gold, with their nodding 
 -red plumed helmets, looked like storied 
 ' ' knights of old. ' ' A deep hedge of blue clad 
 troops, both cavalry and infantry, lined the 
 
 12 
 
INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 way through which the cars of the peace delega- 
 tion approached the chateau. 
 
 Paris-American papers are frank in say- 
 ing that the ceremony itself lacked picturesque- 
 ness — just a few frock-coated men signing 
 the great document with modern fountain pens 
 on a table fitted up with modern inkstands and 
 blotters. But they claimed it was amply com- 
 pensated by the majestic setting of the scene 
 from the Court of Honor. Probably never, even 
 in the days of the Grand Monarch, did the Place 
 d'Armes, the open parade ground before the 
 palace, present a more imposing sight. 
 
 Our instructions included the parking of the 
 car in the Eue de Reservoir, which by this time 
 looked like an auto show. From there we ap- 
 proached the group of harassed guards sta- 
 tioned twenty feet from the high iron gates. It 
 was about 2 :30 when we were permitted to en- 
 ter. With all the red tape in regard to name- 
 inscribed tickets, there was a crush at the en- 
 trance moment. 
 
 Once inside the gates I blinked my eyes as 
 I recognized the great paved courtyard, so 
 familiar in picture to all of us, with the heroic, 
 
 13 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 mounted statue of Louis xiv ' * Louis Qua- 
 torze " high on a stone platform in the center, 
 the huge court enclosed by the palace build- 
 ings. 
 
 Hardly had we found a place behind the 
 single line of blue clad troops that circled 
 the vast courtyard when the order of "Atten- 
 tion " brought them into a motionless ring of 
 horizon blue. There were shouts of " Vive 
 Clemenceau" and the car of the French pre- 
 mier came into view and passed before us. 
 
 It was, above all, a Clemenceau crowd, for he 
 is the idol of France today. Every time the 
 dapper, little, white haired statesman appeared 
 he was given an ovation. ' ' They are all Clem- 
 enceau fans," an American soldier put it. For 
 France knows Clemenceau waited forty-eight 
 years for this hour when he could deal out 
 retribution to the Huns for their wrongs to 
 Alsace-Lorraine. It was peculiarly significant 
 that here, in this very palace he was entering, 
 in the selfsame room where he had heard Bis- 
 marck arrogantly proclaim the German Empire 
 and Wilhelm i its first kaiser, that M. Clemen- 
 ceau should be the dominating figure at the 
 
 14 
 
INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 moment when Germany met her just deserts at 
 the hands of the allied nations of the world, 
 and the German Empire disappeared ignomin- 
 iously. 
 
 The automobile of President Wilson followed 
 that of the French Premier and the crowd paid 
 him homage with salvos and cheers. Marshal 
 Foch was enthusiastically acclaimed. The cars 
 of the delegates of the Allied world followed 
 swiftly and as their flags, fluttering from the 
 wind shields, were recognized they were 
 cheered. 
 
 I wonder, now, what Louis the Fourteenth 
 would have thought had he been there in the 
 center, in place of his bronze statue, to see this 
 assemblage of diplomats come from the far 
 ends of the earth to sign a peace that shall 
 mean security for France. I wonder how he 
 would have looked upon this new altruism that 
 brought two million free men across the seas, 
 not in conquest, but for the sake of humanity. 
 And now the distinguished head of their nation 
 was within his palace gates, come to see that 
 justice shall prevail for all the earth. Surely it 
 would have been bewildering for the eighteenth 
 
 15 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 century to comprehend. And yet Lafayette 
 came to us in our great hour of need ! The cars 
 rolling swiftly toward the chateau doors proved 
 the words ' ' Every man has two countries ; his 
 own and France. ' ' 
 
 At a signal, the horizon-blue line of soldiery 
 in the ring around the courtyard gave way and 
 we hurried with the guests across the immense 
 stone square, over the base of the statue 's pedes- 
 tal, through an arcade, and out into the famous 
 gardens of Versailles. In the beautiful sunken 
 gardens, where the hoop-skirted belles and 
 satin-clad, powder-wigged, beaux of the days 
 of royalty promenaded and flirted in the Junes 
 of bygone centuries, I stood today a part of the 
 throng of several hundred spectators beneath 
 the high windows of the Hall of Mirrors where 
 in a few moments was scheduled to occur the 
 the " greatest event in history," the signing 
 of the " New Charter of Humanity." 
 
 Just in front of us was a line of the bril- 
 liantly garbed Garde Republicaine. Across the 
 driveway ahead the warm June sunshine fell 
 upon a miniature lake, the basin of Apollo, one 
 of the great fountains of the chateau. Here we 
 
 16 
 
Motor car of President Wilson crossing the Court of Honor to the entrance of 
 the Hall of Mirrors for the Signing of the Peace of Versailles. 
 
 At Versailles Chateau, before the Hall of Mirrors at Peace Signing. 
 
INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 waited for a sign from the arched, silent windows 
 of the Galerie de Glace that the dove of peace 
 had alighted, after fonr long years of frightful 
 war. Gradually the crowd moved nearer until 
 it surrounded the fountain pool. I stood just 
 across the paved terrace from the high col- 
 umned windows when the boom of the first 
 cannon at 3:50 gave the glad news that there 
 was peace again on this earth. 
 
 Eight huge airplanes that had been circling 
 restlessly over the palace and grounds for an 
 hour, since the entry of the peace delegation, 
 swooped lower to drone their song of victory 
 from the clouds. Birds flew about them. The 
 fountains in the gardens burst into play, the 
 first time since the war began. Together M. 
 Clemenceau, Mr. Lloyd George and President 
 Wilson, a few moments later, emerged from the 
 doorway through which the German delegates 
 had entered and the crowd closed around them 
 as they crossed the terrace to view the cascade 
 of the fountains. 
 
 The French crowd is delightfully naive. 
 Everywhere women, girls and even men carried 
 folding camp chairs and, when the monosyl- 
 
 17 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 labic guards would allow thera to go no farther, 
 they quietly unfolded their camp chairs and 
 rested calmly until the next advance, or stood 
 upon them to gaze over the sea of heads. No 
 one resented these chairs — they made room 
 for them as they envied them. At the climax 
 moment when the first of the 101 guns sounded 
 a pretty French mademoiselle of eighteen, 
 mounted on a camp stool at my side, was con- 
 tentedly munching a sandwich — and she kept 
 right on eating it. 
 
 Later an American officer commenting on the 
 incident, to me said, ' ' The French people know 
 these ceremonies take hours so they come pre- 
 pared to stay. They've got the right system. 
 I've been out here since the beginning and 
 couldn't get inside the gates. No, haven't seen 
 a thing and came all the way from camp for 
 it." We were part of a small group waiting 
 in the little street before the Senate chamber, 
 where our car had been parked, when it was 
 whispered that President Wilson, Clemenceau 
 and Lloyd George who had been strolling about 
 the chateau grounds had entered the arched 
 doorway to the Senate. So the American added 
 
 18 
 
INSIDE THE GATES AT VERSAILLES 
 
 ' ' Right here I stay till I drop — they must come 
 out sometime." And there we were joined by 
 a few hundred more, eager to get a closer view 
 of the Big Three. 
 
 There was a cry of ' ' Clemenceau ' ' and the 
 smiling face of (i The Tiger," as the French 
 affectionately call him, appeared at the window 
 above us, framed in his white hair. Then Pres- 
 ident Wilson was seen in the window with what 
 they call in Paris his ' ' Victory smile. ' ' The 
 Hon. Arthur James Balfour, easily recognized 
 from his pictures, waited near us in the narrow 
 cobbled street, where presently M. Deschanel, 
 president of the French Chamber of Deputies, 
 joined him to chat as they waited for their mo- 
 tor cars, both distinguished figures in their 
 black frock coats and high silk hats. And here 
 came, too, the delegates of many nations from 
 Brazil to Japan. 
 
 Gaily caparisoned regiments of soldiery 
 moved in glittering columns across the parade 
 grounds, cavalry with waving pennons and in- 
 fantry with the sun glinting on their bayonets, 
 making a brave spectacle, as we started back 
 on the road to Paris at six o'clock. 
 
 19 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 And so the New Peace came to earth and by- 
 its very simplicity dominated the sumptuous 
 splendor of its setting. Here in the palace of 
 the French kings we were leaving, almost in 
 the shadow of the tomb of Napoleon, the pleni- 
 potentiaries of the leading nations of the world 
 had, in a simple ceremony of less than an hour, 
 signed and sealed a document to make this old 
 earth safe for democracy — not pridefully, but 
 simply and reverently, as befit the sad mem- 
 ories of France and Belgium. 
 
 With full hearts Ave came back to grateful, 
 happy Paris, making ready to celebrate the 
 Peace Night. 
 
 20 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 TO CHATEAU THIERRY, BELLEAU WOODS, SOISSONS, 
 RHEIMS 
 
 Paris, July 3. 
 
 THERE are three ways in which I could 
 begin. 
 I should begin at the end, like this: 
 I have just seen a rainbow spanning the tor- 
 tured Valley of the Marne. A perfect bow of 
 promise it was, arched from the sky, its both 
 ends, " where there is always a pot of gold " 
 plainly visible as they dipped into the fertile 
 meadows by the roadside. And I saw tired- 
 eyed people, returned to the broken fragments 
 of what had once been home, clearing away 
 debris to begin life over. They were neither 
 bitter nor buoyant — just quietly accepting the 
 fortunes of war; looking ahead, not backward. 
 For slowly, but surely, this mutilated valley is 
 coming back. 
 
 Or I might begin at the beginning and tell 
 how, over the phone, at noon yesterday, Hon. 
 
 21 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Chas. Rawson of Des Moines, head of the Y. M. 
 C. A. foyer at 12 Rue d'Aguesseau (the place 
 familiar to every American soldier who came 
 to Paris) said to me : " If you can be ready by 
 4 o 'clock, Mr. Bickham, our Paris director, who 
 is motoring to Chateau Thierry and Rheims in 
 his private car, will take you along. ' ' 
 
 But the way I want to begin, if it would not 
 be too startling is this : 
 
 Last night I slept in Chateau Thierry! 
 
 To be entirely truthful I spent the night in 
 Chateau Thierry, since sleep would hardly have 
 been possible to anyone with a grain of imagi- 
 nation after the first sight of this great 
 American shrine in France. 
 
 Quartered in the remnants of a handsome, 
 old, residence, now the headquarters of the 
 U. S. Army Y, in their apartment specially ' ' re- 
 served for ladies," I tried to keep from think- 
 ing back one short year ago, when just across 
 the Marne, that flows past the high-porticoed 
 doorway — and the Marne, remember, is only 
 about half as wide as a city block — just on the 
 opposite bank of that motionless stream, in the 
 second story of the row of old buildings facing 
 
 22 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 us, seventeen of our American machine guns 
 played on the Hun horde that doggedly and 
 determinedly held the town on this side of the 
 river. I tried not to picture what must have 
 been the scenes in this very same, shrapnel- 
 pitted, mansion when the bridges out there 
 were blown up by our American engineers and 
 the Germans saw their doom. I tried not to 
 think of the ride we had taken at nightfall to 
 Belleau Wood, now and hereafter designated 
 on French military maps as the Forest of the 
 Marine Brigade, and of the pile of pine coffin 
 boxes against the Mairie fence at Torcy, where 
 the G. R. S., the Graves Registration Service 
 of our American Army, is still searching for 
 our hero dead, to inter their remains in Ameri- 
 can cemeteries. 
 
 I say I tried not to think of these things, 
 because they were hardly a good sleep potion, 
 and our day ahead was destined to be a strenu- 
 ous one, over that sector of French soil en- 
 graved indelibly in every American heart, the 
 triangle marked off by Soissons, Rheims and 
 Chateau Thierry. For it was here that America 
 made her first dramatic entry into the war. 
 
 23 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Here American divisions played a stellar role 
 in the great counter offensive that was the 
 crucial turning point, and here raged, for three 
 historic months last summer, such fighting that 
 in the end gave glorious victory to the Allies. 
 
 In justice to us much-maligned American 
 11 kickers " abroad I want to record right here 
 that Mile. Axler, the French girl who accompa- 
 nied me from Paris, was the first to object to 
 the primitive accommodations, since they are 
 scarcely prepared to care for tourists at Cha- 
 teau Thierry. ' ' Look, there are no sheets on the 
 cots ! ' ' was her horrified exclamation. The 
 door had just closed behind the Y canteen girl 
 who had ushered us up the stairs and through 
 the entrance, chalk-marked " Reserved for 
 Ladies," with the apology "It is the best we 
 have. " " You forget, ' ' I reminded the French 
 girl, ' ' your country has been in war. ' ' And 
 she, a born Parisienne, had shown me how 
 she had held her hands over her ears when the 
 Big Bertha shells crashed into Paris. 
 
 Lying there on the gray-blanketed army cot, 
 with the moon shining through the big double 
 window over the ghostly ruins beyond, the 
 
 24 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 wheezy piano sounding from the dance hall 
 below, I recalled an incident in the Times office 
 a week before I left. He was a young soldier 
 and he had stooped stiffly to pick up a scrap 
 of paper from the floor. " This weather makes 
 my wounds bother me," he had remarked. 
 ' ' Where did you fight ? " I asked. His answer 
 was "Chateau Thierry." Then, simply, he 
 related it, with the simplicity of the greatest 
 heroism. ' ' Asked my Captain if I could go 
 over and stop that Boche gun that was firing 
 at us. I had been lying in a miserable shell 
 hole for hours and the chap next to me was 
 dead. Captain said ' yes ' if I'd choose eight 
 men to go with me. We went all right. I was 
 the only one to come back. Oh, we got that 
 Boche gun, we did — and the whole nest. ' ' 
 
 And here in Chateau Thierry, which takes its 
 name from the eighth century chateau, a rem- 
 nant of which still remains — here in a quaint 
 little old house, La Fountaine, the master of 
 fables, was born back in 1621. They tell how, 
 when the Allied troops entered the town, they 
 found La Fountaine 's cellar transformed into 
 a handsome dugout, the abandoned, half -drunk 
 
 25 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 liquors and cigars revealing how hasty had been 
 the leave taking of the officers hiding there 
 from allied shells. I wonder if the fertile brain 
 of La Fountaine, who preached his philosophy 
 to mankind through the mouths of animals, 
 could have conceived the philosophy of this new 
 brotherhood that brought men from the far 
 corners of the earth to save his besieged city, 
 this ancient citadel on the Marne. 
 
 Chateau Thierry has been the stumbling 
 block of a hundred wars. It is scarred with 
 endless invasions that through the many cen- 
 turies have aimed at Paris as their goal, but it 
 has always blocked the way. And here in the 
 late Maytime of a year ago and into early June, 
 American troops successfully headed off the 
 biggest and last drive for Paris. The best of 
 American blood flowed through its cobbled 
 streets and into the silent blue waters of the 
 Marne on the last day of May, 1918. Here 
 Americans will always come to live over again 
 the scenes where their sons, the youth, the 
 ardor and the courage of the New World, turned 
 the tide of battle for the discouraged allied 
 host. Here sounded the knell of defeat for 
 
 26 
 
TO CHATEAU THIEERY 
 
 Might and came the first chime for the cause of 
 Right triumphant. 
 
 It was after six o'clock, owing to some auto 
 trouble, before we started from Paris in the 
 chill July evening. The tonneau of the car was 
 heaped with packages of cigarets, supplies and 
 reading matter for the isolated Gr. R. S. camps 
 in the 200 miles we were to cover, a tour of 
 inspection the Paris director makes weekly. 
 
 Out past the great Paris abattoir we sped, 
 through the high Pantin gate and over the 
 Paris-Metz road, hurrying through the suburbs 
 that cluster close to the very gates of Paris. 
 Through the village of Claye, passing barracks 
 that held many American soldiers during the 
 war. Here the Y. M. C. A. was for months 
 located in an old stable. 
 
 The War came out to meet us before we had 
 motored many miles. The grave of the first 
 French soldier to give his life in 1914 was 
 marked there by the roadside, very near to his 
 beloved Paris, that one soldier out of every six 
 in France gave his life to save. And a little 
 farther on the graves of a French and a Ger- 
 man soldier faced one another on the left of 
 the road. 
 
 27 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Soon over in the distance, to the right, was 
 visible the tower of the chateau where Gen. 
 Joffre, now Field Marshal Joffre, or better 
 ' ' Papa Joffre " as he is lovingly called by his 
 poilus, had his headquarters in 1914. 
 
 We entered the city of Meaux, the principal 
 headquarters of Gen. Joffre and there to our 
 right was the chateau from where he directed 
 the French troops that had been rushed from 
 Paris in taxicabs and defeated the Germans 
 in the first great victory for France. Here 
 was executed that famous strategic move when 
 these troops were hurled by Gen. Joffre on the 
 exposed flank of Von Kluck's army, then sur- 
 rounding Paris, and the Germans, had to, in 
 good western vernacular, ' ' beat it back. ' ' For 
 by breaking through just there Joffre had cut 
 off the enemy's supplies and got the Germans 
 " on the run." And then it was that the cables 
 told a breathless world that the Huns had been 
 turned back from the very gates of Paris. 
 
 From here the way led past trenches, now 
 filled in, marked like great, zigzag, white chalk 
 lines across the tender green fields. Under the 
 dark upper soil is a strata of white clay and in 
 
 28 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 turning back the earth into the trenches the 
 white of the clay follows indelibly their course. 
 
 Now we were in the Valley of the Ourcq 
 river. Along its banks to the north and east, 
 around Sergy Heights, the 168th Iowa left its 
 heroic record in red italics. Down here in this 
 Valley of the Ourcq were upstanding fields of 
 oats, wheat and sugar beets. 
 
 In the village of Lizy sur Ourcq, as w r e drove 
 through its winding streets, past shell-cut build- 
 ings, we noticed the first of the signs of cellars 
 ' ' Refuge from Shells ' ' and the number of 
 people each would hold. Later we were to enter 
 towns where the refuge cellar signs were in 
 both French and German, and finally one in 
 which these placards were printed in French, 
 German and English, telling of the succession 
 of occupations by the three different armies. 
 Barbed wire, in huge rolls, lined the roadside. 
 Over in a field a row of windbreak trees were 
 in full foliage. 
 
 Back into the Paris-Metz road we swung and 
 came upon Coupru, the headquarters of the 
 Second division in 1918. There were continu- 
 ous evidences here of hot shell fire on the 
 
 29 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 houses. Beyond the hamlet, where shell-decapi- 
 tated trees dotted the landscape, now placid, 
 white cattle were contentedly grazing. 
 
 Then, far to the left, we saw the shadowy 
 outlines of Belleau Woods against the horizon, 
 where most of that memorable June of 1918 our 
 boys fought savagely. But Belleau "Woods was 
 All- American before the Second division turned 
 it over to the Twenty-sixth. From here Ameri- 
 can valor is written on a fan-shaped area over 
 the landscape. 
 
 The car bumped along a shelled road, past 
 trees still strung with rusty barbed wire, and 
 trees, their whole tops blown off, bravely trying 
 to hide their sorrow in a fringe of green 
 around the blackened cut. The sunset glow 
 fell across ground, every inch of which had 
 been churned with shells. 
 
 Then to the right we caught the first view of 
 Hill 204, familiar to every American reader, 
 the peak of the German drive on Paris one 
 short year ago. 
 
 We gazed at the shattered remains of the city 
 of Vaux, the landmark of the Second division, 
 a little crumbled village where, in spots, not 
 
 30 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 one stone is left upon another. One small shop 
 showed signs of returning life. In this area 
 there is, it is claimed, no town so pulverized as 
 Vaux. Its every house was a nest of machine 
 guns and its every cellar was a German garri- 
 son that day last July when the Ninth infantry 
 captured the town. In its now debris-littered 
 streets, the Americans fought hand to hand, 
 for it was from here that they swept the Ger- 
 mans from Hill 204. 
 
 Out over the shell-hole-filled-in highway 
 again for two miles and then Chateau Thierry 
 appeared in the valley. We sped up a once 
 tree-lined avenue, past skeleton houses, tum- 
 bled piles of stone and mortar, to the heart 
 of the ancient city that stands as a beacon light 
 to far America — and stopped in the open 
 square, alive with American soldiers, on the left 
 bank of the storied Marne. 
 
 Only hesitating long enough to consume a 
 piece of delicious cake sent from the Y. mess- 
 hall, we started out again in the deepening 
 twilight for Belleau Woods. Coming in sight 
 of the historic battlefield it was not difficult to 
 conjure up in the dusk the shadowy figures 
 
 31 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 creeping across the open fields into what is now 
 left of the clumps of trees, nor to picture the 
 huge tanks waddling across to sit on enemy 
 gun nests. And we reached the line of these 
 few acres of dense woods skirted by the road- 
 way, and into the village of Torcy. It was here 
 that the wonderful counter-offensive was 
 launched in mid-July, less than a year ago, and 
 the Twenty-sixth took the ruined village of 
 Torcy in their forward rush. And right here 
 the gallant Twenty-sixth went over the top on 
 July 18, and for a solid week this Yankee divi- 
 sion followed at the heels of the Hun. Here I 
 knew I stood on hallowed ground. 
 
 We stopped at Torcy at a high gateway in- 
 scribed over its arch with the word " Maine." 
 Once the place of the Mayor or Town-Hall, 
 now it is the headquarters of the Gr. E. S. work- 
 ing in this region. " Their 's is a grewsome 
 task at best," commented the director as he 
 took in the great packages of reading matter 
 and smokes from the car. The bright-eyed 
 young American soldier who welcomed us so 
 happily, conducted us through the dark court- 
 yard and proudly showed off their quarters. 
 
 32 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 A great, barren, shadowy room it was, the sky 
 visible through a roof punctured by shrapnel 
 and big shells. 
 
 I tried to talk past the lump in my throat of 
 the wonderful service he and his comrades in 
 that lonely camp were doing for the mothers 
 and wives of the fallen heroes. "Well now, 
 you know, it's interesting at that," he replied 
 with the American lad's spirit of making the 
 best of it and dislike of being fussed over. 
 " We start out sometimes and find a body but 
 not a trace for identification. But we just won't 
 give up. We plough all over the ground again 
 and again and pretty soon some one yells 
 ' found a sock with J. A. on it ' and we keep 
 right on till we find the disk with his name." 
 The boyish face glowed in the flickering light 
 from two candles on the rough pine table. 
 " Then we know some mother back home will 
 be glad we stuck to the job." 
 
 ' ' How do the folks at home feel about taking 
 the remains back? " was his anxious query. In 
 response to my ' ' What do you think about 
 it? " he replied: 
 
 ' ' It should not be done. If the folks at home 
 33 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 had seen what I have they would not want it. 
 Our boys ought really to lie where they fell, 
 but as that is out of the question, we are plac- 
 ing them in American cemeteries and they 
 should be allowed to rest there. One grave that 
 we moved recently had been cared for con- 
 stantly by an old Frenchwoman who had lost a 
 son in the war. She was heartbroken when we 
 moved the grave of her American soldier. 
 These French people are devoted caretakers of 
 the American graves." 
 
 This opinion of a fellow-pal I found general 
 sentiment. There is a bill being introduced in 
 congress for the removal of our hero dead to 
 American soil that has been called l ' The Under- 
 taker 's Delight." But the Eoosevelts are set- 
 ting a good example by leaving in France the 
 body of their son, Quentin Roosevelt, whose 
 grave is only a few miles from here. 
 
 Back over another road we sped circling Bel- 
 leau Woods. Over there is La Loge Farm 
 from where General Harbord directed the 
 operations of the Marine Brigade. And across 
 that way they tell you the Twelfth Field artil- 
 lery dashed for the battle, strung their guns out 
 
 34 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 into the open fields and fired for seventy hours 
 straight without stopping for food or drink or 
 sleep. 
 
 It was cold and 6 :30 the next morning when 
 we climbed the steep hills of Chateau Thierry, 
 between sentinels of battered masonry to the 
 heights leading out over the highway for Sois- 
 sons. As we entered the car a straggling com- 
 pany of German prisoners was going to work. 
 They are clearing away the debris. Through 
 Bezu St. Germain and we jogged over a rough 
 road, lining which were masses of big shells and 
 huge piles of boxed ammunition, live ammuni- 
 tion still — left by the Boche in their speedy exit 
 from that territory. 
 
 The morning was yet young when the car 
 stopped and we started afoot through a clump 
 of trees at the edge of the Bois du Chatelet to 
 view the big gun emplacement secreted there, 
 the huge turntable built to hold the Big Bertha 
 that was never placed. Tourists will be told 
 that this is the site of the big gun that hurled its 
 terror-dealing shells into Paris, but instead it is 
 the more advantageous position selected later 
 and which, had its installation been accom- 
 
 35 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 plished, must have demolished the first city of 
 France. Around the emplacement's rusty turn- 
 table we could see cleverly camouflaged trees, 
 whole trees set in boxes to hide the gun from 
 prying airplanes. 
 
 In the next village we saw Austrian prisoners 
 at work carting away evidences of shelling over 
 a spur of railroad. Here and there people had 
 returned to their former homes, and boarded 
 up the windows of a single habitable room. 
 A peep within the open doors revealed how they 
 were pitifully trying to create home atmosphere 
 and begin life over again. Always it was the 
 old people and the very young children in the 
 littered streets. 
 
 Then to Seringes, which is another landmark 
 for the Mississippi Valley, the land of the 
 Ourcq and the Vesle. For in this area of the 
 salient is inscribed the immortal deeds of the 
 Forty-second of which our 168th was a part; 
 the Thirty-second, the Twenty-eighth, the 
 Fourth and the Seventy-seventh divisions. It 
 was to this area that the German troops were 
 driven in their great retreat from the Marne. 
 On the slopes above the river Ourcq, when 
 
 36 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 sweltering July turned into August last year, 
 the Americans met the arrogant battalions of 
 the Prussian Guard. The crossing of the Ourcq, 
 the fight that the Forty-second and the Thirty- 
 second put on here proved to a skeptical old 
 world the unconquerable spirit of the American 
 soldier. In the line between Seringes, Sergy 
 and Cierges, from those brilliantly defended 
 heights, our boys wrote a memorable chapter 
 of history, for it was the village of Sergy that 
 our splendid Iowa regiment finally captured 
 after it had changed hands time and again. 
 Right here it was that our Rainbow boys fought 
 through from Sergy Heights to Nestles. Prom 
 here on it is the ' ' Land of the Allied Pursuit, ' ' 
 for from Fere en Tardenois through the charred 
 Forest of Fere the Twenty-eighth and Thirty- 
 second pushed the Germans to Fismes. 
 
 At Seringes we visited the cemetery in which 
 rest 3,885 American soldiers. There are 
 straight rows of white crosses, each stenciled 
 with the name and regiment, holding at its head 
 the identification disk. The graves are evened 
 and the tender grass is beginning to grow upon 
 them. A beautiful, peaceful spot it was in the 
 
 37 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 light of the summer morning — a large Ameri- 
 can flag waving from the center above the field 
 of white crosses. In all of these cemeteries 
 there are groups of graves marked by the Star 
 of David, the resting place of the Jewish soldier 
 dead. On entering the Seringes cemetery I met 
 an Illinois boy, who was with the detachment in 
 charge. Like everyone I met from the home 
 states his first question was ' ' How is every- 
 thing back home? " 
 
 In the village of Fere en Tardenois we passed 
 a German officer in the street looking askance 
 after the big American car. There were no 
 guards visible. Evidently they had no fear of 
 his trying to make a getaway. We crossed a 
 bridge leading to the abandoned big German 
 supply station that was to have furnished sup- 
 plies to the German army right into Paris. 
 
 The road we took out from here ran through 
 fields of live shells just as they were left by the 
 fleeing enemy. These 75s were arranged in 
 close symmetrical oblongs, upright on the 
 ground. Embankments had been thrown up on 
 either side of each oblong shell bed, and these, 
 covered with foliage, served as screens for air- 
 
 38 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 planes and shielded surrounding shell beds from 
 air bombs. Barbed wire hung vines screened 
 the roadway we were traveling over, evidences 
 of the camouflage to shield the supply trains 
 that had rumbled over the route. Frequently 
 we passed groups of deserted camions left from 
 the fray. 
 
 It was about 9:30 when we reached poor 
 Soissons, the center of the land of the counter- 
 offensive. Up to the north-west are what have 
 been called the ' ' hills of decision. ' ' This dev- 
 astated country was the pivot of four terrific 
 days of fighting before the world received the 
 news of the German retreat. Here Marshal 
 Foch launched his great counter-offensive that 
 gave the initiative into the hands of the Allies. 
 From far up under Soissons the crushing blow 
 came on the enemy making the tremendous 
 effort to encircle Eheims. Under the cover of 
 storm and darkness that mid-July night the 
 American First and Second, with the Moroc- 
 cans in the center, began the drive that smashed 
 the German lines and saved Soissons. The 
 panorama of battlefield about Soissons saw the 
 turning point of the war. The first of the 
 
 39 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Allied offensives was begun from its heights 
 above and resulted four months later in the 
 armistice. 
 
 In Soissons, in the only building of its main 
 street miraculously left standing — we had 
 breakfast, poor fare in a room with many marks 
 of shelling. It was the town hotel but we 
 waited long for water to wash, since now all 
 the water must be carted from the Aisne river. 
 A group of Japanese officers added a pic- 
 turesque touch to the French and American 
 uniforms that appeared in the courtyard. 
 Across the ten-foot wide cobbled street, heaps 
 of mute, crumbled bricks and stone told of 
 former buildings. 
 
 The streets of Soissons were alive with hori- 
 zon blue clad French poilus and smiling-eyed 
 American doughboys, with an occasional resi- 
 dent carrying one of those incredibly long 
 loaves of French bread. 
 
 Here I met Andre Le Blanc. Andre had spent 
 a third of his life amid the harrowing scenes of 
 war, since his years numbered but twelve. And 
 his proud accomplishment was to imitate, fault- 
 lessly, the horn of the American auto car. He 
 
 40 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 gathered a grinning bunch of doughboys around 
 him as, pursing his lips, he would " honk " for 
 us. He remarked without emotion that he had 
 lived in a cellar all during the war, with his 
 mother and four younger brothers and sisters. 
 They had come back to what was left of their 
 home two months ago and now his father had 
 work as a mason. 
 
 On the road out of Soissons we passed close 
 to a German pill box, a concrete dugout where 
 the Germans placed their machine guns and 
 made them so difficult to dislodge. At Fismes 
 we stopped at one of the most beautiful Ameri- 
 can cemeteries which holds at present about 
 1,500 of our soldier dead. Services were held 
 at the American cemeteries on Memorial Day 
 in this region and they told me 5,481 wreaths 
 were sent out by the Paris Memorial Day Com- 
 mittee. 
 
 And then following the Vesle river, which 
 is about as wide as Duck Creek, we came 
 at high noon to Eheims and its martyred 
 cathedral. 
 
 At Eheims we lunched in the mess hall .of 
 the Y. hut which stands in a spacious square 
 
 41 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 in the center of the city, where the atmosphere 
 was as entirely U. S. A. as on the shores of 
 the Mississippi. And that reminds me that it 
 was a Bostonian in Paris who told me earnestly 
 only the other day that he understood the only 
 real Americans came from our middle west. It 
 hadn't occurred to me to brag that way, but the 
 idea coming from Paris, where they now have 
 a tremendous admiration for Americans, even 
 those from outside of New York, is rather pleas- 
 ant. Here I also found attractive Y. W. 
 quarters. 
 
 We wandered about Rheims for an hour, go- 
 ing first to visit the cathedral or what is left 
 of the majestic edifice. The streets leading to 
 the cathedral square are a mass of shattered 
 structures and powdered plaster. The build- 
 ings are leveled into heaps of debris with an 
 occasional hollow-windowed wall looking on dis- 
 mally. A movie house had nothing left of its 
 once imposing entrance but the sign above, 
 ' ' Cinema. ' ' The remnants of a handsome show 
 window is all that tells of a one time prosperous 
 store, all sacrificed to the god of war. Over 
 the cathedral itself you marvel. The magnifi- 
 
 42 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 cent front arched entrance stands mutilated but 
 unyielding, the skeletons of the twin towers 
 high above bearing tragic testimony to the aim 
 of the enemy gunners. The boarded-up door- 
 ways forbade entrance for the work of restora- 
 tion is begun. On the high, now barren, pedes- 
 tal outside the center doorway they point out 
 to you where once stood the golden statue of 
 Joan of Arc. It was in this cathedral that all 
 the Kings of France were crowned from the 
 time when Charles vn was led here by the 
 Maid of Orleans herself. Perhaps it was for 
 this reason or perhaps because its high towers 
 made it a conspicuous target for miles, that 
 on its matchless beauty was trained so often 
 the wrath of the German guns. But torn by 
 shells and consumed by fire it still stands — 
 who shall say is it not a wonder of the world? 
 Looking back from the road out of the city 
 we saw the pointed towers of another church 
 apparently unharmed and how most of the de- 
 struction had been in the vicinity of the ca- 
 thedral. Only once during the four years did 
 the Germans get into Rheims and that was but 
 for four days in the early months of the war. 
 
 43 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 It was a vineyard lined road to Savenay. 
 There were sad memories in the row of black 
 and white crosses by the roadside, while beyond 
 stretched smiling vineyards in which people, 
 bent and old, were tying up the vines. As the 
 afternoon sped a wondrous panorama of pic- 
 turesque countryside unrolled before us. From 
 the high road that coiled above the vine-clad, 
 sloping hills we looked upon a fruit valley 
 through which far below, like a narrow blue 
 ribbon, the Marne waters glistened. Into a 
 tree-lined drive and we descended the winding 
 road into the enchanting valley and into Eper- 
 nay. It is this fruitful valley of the Marne 
 that the enemy coveted and though the Marne 
 is but perhaps 200 yards here at its widest, the 
 Germans only succeeded in crossing it a couple 
 of times. From Epernay the road wound 
 farther down into the valley to the very shores 
 of the river, which we followed for miles, ex- 
 claiming at the beauty of the sloping hill-sides. 
 
 But swinging around we came upon ammuni- 
 tion stacked in the growing fields, only now it 
 was French ammunition placed there for the 
 Marne defensive. From here we viewed the 
 
 44 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 country like a battle map. Across there to the 
 right the Germans had come in hordes through 
 gaps in the hills and shelled across the defense- 
 less villages, whose quaint old stone buildings 
 are pock marked by spraying shrapnel. 
 
 Through Dormans we went, past many cruel 
 war marks, and into Crezancy at milking time. 
 Passing the quiet little farms it was difficult 
 to imagine that milking time of a summer ago 
 when this valley was a thing of air bombs and 
 gas and echoed with mighty guns. Here it was 
 that the Rainbows and the Third, the only two 
 American divisions in the long French line on 
 both sides of Rheims, opposed the landslide of 
 gray clad troops. It is of the Third that it 
 has been said that all through 72 hours its bat- 
 talions stood in their tracks and killed Germans. 
 On every inch of the ground history is written 
 in clear American English. 
 
 We returned to Chateau-Thierry in time for 
 supper and a very good meal it was in the mess 
 hall of the Y. M. C. A., the long frame building 
 in the open square on the left bank of the 
 Marne. " The United States Place," a grateful 
 people call it now. It swarmed with American 
 
 45 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 soldiers and Y. workers. J. Potts Brown, the 
 genial, big-hearted director of the Chateau- 
 Thierry " Y," welcomed us. He even climoed 
 on one of the shaky table benches to get us 
 souvenir shells from the strings of German mis- 
 siles overhead. Here the French girl talked 
 to Fritz, the little German waiter who has en- 
 deared himself to the whole " Y. " outfit by his 
 willing work. He liked it here, he told her, but 
 he had no time to talk even German to her. A 
 file of German prisoners, coming from the day's 
 work, had passed us as we stopped for gasoline 
 on entering the town. The man who brought 
 the ' ' petro ' ' to the car said he had been a 
 prisoner for four years — that he was as well 
 off here as in Germany now. The Germans 
 looked well-fed and not unhappy. 
 
 After supper I walked in the sunset over the 
 temporary bridge across the Marne. Many 
 American soldiers, their grave faces reflecting 
 memories, were on the bridge gazing into its 
 deep, greenish blue waters. I could shut my 
 eyes and see the hail of bullets from the hollow 
 windows of those buildings beside me. As I 
 
 46 
 
TO CHATEAU THIERRY 
 
 walked along, stamping its picture forever in 
 my memory, a dear old, white-haired grand- 
 mother smiled down at me from one of those 
 windows that had so recently framed a machine 
 gun. In her smile there was hope, the hope 
 these homeless people are taking to start life 
 over again. 
 
 Out on the high road we drove swiftly. A 
 backward glance showed Chateau-Thierry lying 
 in a pocket, deep in the center of the softly- 
 rising* hills. Safe at last with her Memories — 
 looking toward a new day. 
 
 This whole July afternoon had been one of 
 intermittent showers and sunshine and now 
 came a heavy downpour of rain. As the sunset 
 glowed it brought that perfect half-circle of 
 rainbow across the sky, as a symbol of hope for 
 this shattered Marne land. Down the wooded 
 road came a flock of sheep, and their shepherd, 
 in his blue flowing cape, might have stepped 
 from an old painting in the Louvre. 
 
 We followed the winding Marne into Meaux 
 and thence back to Paris — Paris on tiptoe at 
 her first celebration of the Fourth of July, the 
 
 47 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 birthday of the friendly neighbor beyond the 
 seas who had sent two million men to her rescue 
 — Paris, playing "The Star-Spangled Ban- 
 ner " first, followed by the " Marseillaise." 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 IN THE AMBASSADOR'S GARDEN 
 
 Paris, July 5. 
 
 YOU have read how the Glorious Fourth 
 was celebrated this year in Paris, as never 
 before and how President Poincare of France, 
 Gen. Pershing and Marshal Foch, with the 
 American ambassador, Hon. Hugh Campbell 
 Wallace, reviewed 3,000 American soldiers and 
 marines, with as many men from the French 
 army and navy, from the Place de la Concorde, 
 the great paved square with its marble statues, 
 around which Paris, the Beautiful, clusters. 
 
 But perhaps you didn't hear much about the 
 brilliant Fourth of July reception held by Am- 
 bassador and Mrs. Wallace for all Americans 
 in Paris yesterday. It was from 4 to 7 o'clock, 
 at their residence, I Avenue d'Eylau. I doubt 
 if the stately old trees in the embassy garden 
 ever before looked upon just such a scene. For 
 cosmopolite Paris, that reflects not France, but 
 the whole world, saw here the mingling of the 
 
 49 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 old aristocracy with the new democracy. And 
 they really mixed well. 
 
 Ambassador and Mrs. Wallace received alone 
 in a handsome salon. And then we passed 
 through its high French doors into the walled- 
 in garden. An American military orchestra 
 played down in one corner of the terrace and 
 lent a live background of khaki to the setting. 
 Gen. Tasker Bliss, tall and distinguished look- 
 ing, was there, the center of an animated group, 
 and near him were several French generals and 
 then came a Polish general, the purple trim- 
 mings of his uniform conspicuous against 
 the others. There were Eed Cross workers 
 with the U. S. insignia on their shoulders, in 
 their trim tailored Norfolk suits, and blue veiled 
 Red Cross nurses. Officials of the American 
 Y. M. C. A. were sprinkled about. One black- 
 frock-coated statesman was 'conspicuous be- 
 cause he kept on his high silk hat. 
 
 Someone pointed out the Duke of Montmor- 
 ency and reminded me he was a scion of one of 
 the proudest of the houses of the old French 
 nobility. 
 
 I was introduced to a gray -bearded, fine look- 
 50 
 
IN THE AMBASSADOR'S GARDEN 
 
 ing man who appeared every inch a French- 
 man, but he answered my " Do you speak any 
 English," with " Well, rather — I lived in Bos- 
 ton most of my life." He was B. J. Shoninger, 
 former president of the American Chamber of 
 Commerce in Paris and, so it was whispered to 
 me, the founder of the re-education work among 
 the wounded. I noticed on his coat lapel the red 
 rosette of the official of the French Legion of 
 Honor. I asked when the Americans in Paris 
 had organized for this splendid service and he 
 said, " Why in 1914 when the war began, "then 
 adding with a touch of pardonable pride, " we 
 did not wait, mademoiselle, until Washington 
 decided to go into the war. We Americans in 
 Paris went in at the start." 
 
 A New York buyer strolled up. He didn't 
 like Paris at all — was having a slow time, so 
 he said. He couldn't speak any French nor 
 understand it, so there was no use going to 
 theaters. He "hated movies" when I re- 
 marked they often have English translations 
 on the screen. "These French people are so 
 stupid," he complained, to the amazement of 
 my French cousin with me. " Now take these 
 
 51 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 cabbies — if you don't pronounce a word exact- 
 ly as they do they refuse to comprehend. I 
 simply couldn't make one of them understand 
 the other day that I wanted to go to the Place de 
 la Opera just because I didn't pronounce it 
 ' Oh-pair-ah ' ! " He told me he had fought at 
 St. Mihiel and had been discharged after the 
 armistice and had just come back over on a 
 business trip. He was disgusted with Paris. 
 
 Then a tall, quiet-voiced French nobleman 
 introduced to our little group approached me, 
 with, " You are American journalist — ah!" 
 adding, " Yes, I once was in New York " — and 
 with accents of pride, " Once I had my picture 
 in a New York newspaper — in the New York 
 Times." I asked him " Why? " since such pub- 
 licity might not always be flattering. I had 
 to put the query in French " Pourquoi? " be- 
 fore he got it. Then he explained he had gone to 
 New York to attend a Vanderbilt wedding and 
 was to be a guest at the Vanderbilt home, " Bilt- 
 more." He recounted, graphically, how the re- 
 porter had called on him and why they wanted 
 a story about him and his picture. Even a titled 
 Frenchman, as you see, was delighted with the 
 
 52 
 
IN THE AMBASSADOR'S GARDEN 
 
 attention. He told us, this suave nobleman, how 
 his chateau outside of Paris had been com- 
 pletely demolished in the war; that there was 
 nothing left of it. Even the private cemetery, 
 in which rested twenty- two of his ancient family, 
 had been desecrated by the Germans, who took 
 the lead from the caskets. Always there is that 
 echo of the war — its tragic undercurrent moves 
 through the gayest of throngs. He said he had 
 a small villa left close to Paris but the old 
 chateau was gone. 
 
 At a long buffet table under a red canopy, 
 there in the garden black-garbed, white-gloved 
 men deftly served a variety of frappes and ices 
 with the cunningest frosted cakes for which the 
 French are noted. There were little boat- 
 shaped tarts, filled with strawberries or cher- 
 ries, a favorite Parisian " bacquet." It is only 
 recently that they have these sugared confec- 
 tions again in Paris, for they were not to be had 
 during the war. 
 
 Among those approaching the tea table was 
 a palsied old gentlewoman who looked like she 
 must have lived through most of the last stren- 
 
 53 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 uous century. She was gowned in a once hand- 
 some, purple velvet, with a cape of royal purple 
 brocade falling diagonally from one shoulder, 
 and her black jetted small hat had plumes of 
 white. She was a member of the old aristoc- 
 racy, it was murmured. 
 
 " Guess they like antiques over here — imag- 
 ine going to a reception at her age ! ' ' comment- 
 ed the New York buyer. 
 
 The man who had lost his chateau bowed 
 most profoundly to the granddame in purple 
 brocade as he turned to leave us. 
 
 Several extremes in late Parisian modes were 
 interesting and the American woman who has 
 lived the last twenty years in Paris remarked : 
 ' ' You can recognize all the American women 
 who have just come over — their gowns are 
 longer than those of the women who live in 
 Paris." Her daughter who stood demurely at 
 her side told me she had spent much time in 
 New York, but could not call herself an Amer- 
 ican, unfortunately, because she had been born 
 in Paris. "And that over here makes her 
 French — even if we are Americans," re- 
 marked her mother. 
 
 54 
 
IN THE AMBASSADOR'S GARDEN 
 
 And so the wind whispered softly through the 
 great trees of the embassy garden, above the 
 changing throng of celebrities; whispered of a 
 historic past and a marvelous present. Offi- 
 cers of the army and navy of the allied world, 
 mingled with American welfare workers, states- 
 men and business men, brought together in 
 Paris through the great war, and for the mo- 
 ment a part of the Paris- American colony. And 
 here in the light of the peace, far from the 
 homeland, they seemed to symbolize the dawn- 
 ing of a new social day, when the culture of the 
 old world and the culture of the new world meet 
 on a common ground, all a part of the modern 
 world democracy. 
 
 "But the American who said we Parisians 
 are stupid — what you think of him?" asked 
 my French cousin as we left. 
 
 " Well, we could call him rude for saying that 
 to you," I told her frankly. 
 
 "Ah, then that was not American," was her 
 satisfied comment. 
 
 They are making such an effort to under- 
 stand us Americans over here, these dear 
 
 55 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 French people, and to think only the best of 
 us. And our ' l say what you think ' ' candor is 
 disconcerting at times to a people whose first 
 law is politeness. 
 
 56 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 ABOUT PAUL 
 
 Paris, July 11. 
 
 THIS is about Paul. 
 Paul is the tall, slim, eager kid, in the 
 black dining room clothes, high white collared, 
 at the first table to the right as you enter. Prob- 
 ably you would not recognize him by that name 
 if you stopped at this hotel. You would call 
 him " Garcon," which is the name he answers 
 to just as every American waiter responds to 
 the call of ' ' George. " " Paul, it is my little 
 name, ' ' he told me yesterday morning, after he 
 had served my coffee, from which I deducted he 
 meant his given name. You have to be good 
 at guessing over here, too. Our acquaintance 
 begun the first morning when Paul expressed 
 his unbiased opinion of water as a breakfast 
 beverage. I tried to draw him out about the 
 war gradually, but, like all French people, he 
 was very taciturn. Oh yes, he had served four 
 years. " But it is over now and I like not to 
 
 57 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 talk about it. I try to forget," he had side- 
 stepped the subject, with a shrug of his shoul- 
 ders. I felt sure he had courage, because if he 
 ever attacked the Boches the way he hurdles 
 over English he was some good soldier. 
 
 It was while I was searching vainly for a 
 wisp of west-of-New York news in the Paris 
 edition of an American paper one morning that 
 Paul's hesitation-English broke in. "Much 
 troubles in Italy," he observed. I was scan- 
 ning a three line item on some place in Illinois 
 that I'd never heard of, so murmured, absently, 
 "That so?" 
 
 " Oh, bad troubles there," he said. 
 
 "What's the matter with Italy?" I asked, 
 finding the cafe raid he referred to. 
 
 ' ' Maybe we have war with Italy now, ' ' he 
 remarked, blithely. 
 
 " Haven't you had enough war? " I observed. 
 He had told me how, when the weather was 
 damp, his throat still bothered him from the 
 gassing. 
 
 "Sure, I had enough," he answered, "but 
 comes another war, I go again." 
 
 " The Italians claim they won the war three 
 58 
 
ABOUT PAUL 
 
 times," I hazarded. Like a match Paul flared. 
 
 1 ' Italy not won the war — we could got along 
 without Italy." 
 
 ""Well, how about America?" I asked. 
 " Could you have gotten along without the 
 Americans ? ' ' 
 
 "If America not come to help us," he re- 
 sponded, earnestly, ' ' you and me not be here 
 today in this hotel — there be no Hotel Plaza 
 Athenee, maybe." 
 
 Then Paul started in to tell me about the 
 war as it came to him, a poilu in horizon-blue, 
 stationed with a battery back of the front line 
 trenches on the night of the big attack beyond 
 Rheims. He took a paper pad from his pocket 
 and drew a circle for Rheims and showed me 
 how they were holding the line against the on- 
 coming wave of Germans. 
 
 1 ' I never forget the night of Julie fourteen 
 last year — never," he said. " Two days be- 
 fore, my captain he say, ' The Germans they 
 attack us tonight,' and I wait and they not 
 come. I not officer — private, yes — but I carry 
 letters always — how you say it? Ah, messen- 
 ger — but I always with officers. And I laugh 
 
 59 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 at my captain and I say, ' You say Germans 
 they come yesterday night and they not come. ' 
 And my Captain he say, ' Wait. ' We been in 
 that sector now two weeks and the Germans 
 just across from us and we say to ourselves, 
 ' ah, we have fine sector, these Germans not 
 fight.' And I wait on the 13th and all day on 
 the 14th and nothing happen. And the Captain 
 he say, ' Wait. ' And that night when I sleep a 
 little — they call me — the Germans come ! 
 
 "And the captain he say, ' Quick get my 
 papers from the barracks — and take them back 
 to where safe. And tell them to bring up horses 
 for the guns. ' You see we fear we must go back 
 and we want to get guns to safety. 
 
 " So I go into barracks and get papers, the 
 shells falling all around. Hardly I out of bar- 
 racks two minutes when a shell hit just where 
 I take papers from. I climb on my horse and 
 ride back fast. And then I tell them to hurry, 
 bring up horses for our guns and I lead way 
 back. Twelve horses, you know, for each gun. 
 Eighty horses or more we must bring. A man 
 ride one and lead one. And always I go first to 
 show the way. Always we go along side of 
 
 60 
 
ABOUT PAUL 
 
 road — pick our way in dark, because always 
 Boche shell that road — they know we come that 
 way, to take our guns back. And airplanes 
 drop bombs on road and shoot at us. I come 
 back and Captain he say, ' Go look at your bed, ' 
 and where I sleep yesterday night all full of 
 wreck of building — terrible! No, they not get 
 our guns — but the Germans come four kil- 
 ometers that time (a kilometer is % of a mile). 
 Oh, how long? Four days that battle last." 
 
 ' ' How did you like the American soldiers 
 you met? " I asked. 
 
 " Oh, I like American soldier fine," he re- 
 plied, ' l but always they have not much money. ' ' 
 
 ' 'Well, you see, Paul, they 1 only get $30 a 
 month, our soldiers — how much did you get ? ' ' 
 
 " Twenty-five centimes a day," said Paul 
 (about five cents in our money), " but when we 
 at the front we get three francs a day ! "We get 
 one franc in money and two francs in stamps. 
 Later we get the money for the stamps! " 
 
 This morning when I went down to breakfast, 
 one of the head factotums was running the ele- 
 vator and he remarked, ''Quiet in the hotel 
 this morning — not? We have strike. Every- 
 
 61 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 body they go away, the valets de chambre, the 
 femmes de chambre, the waiters, everybody. 
 No one is work." 
 
 In the dining room a chap in a grey business 
 suit had Paul's place by the long window at 
 the right. The maitre d 'hotel tried to explain 
 it to me. Their employes were not dissatisfied, 
 they were well paid with their wages and tips, 
 but they belonged to a union and the order had 
 come to walk out. The union demands an eight 
 hour day and a percentage of the hotel receipts, 
 instead of tips. They ask that the hotels add 
 an extra ten or fifteen percent to the bill of the 
 guest for Ci porboire " or tips, and thus elimi- 
 nate the bane of the tourist abroad. 
 
 So the committee of the strikers had come 
 this morning and had taken Paul away with the 
 rest. I suppose he spent the day on the streets, 
 watching the progress of the elaborate decora- 
 tions along the avenues of the triumphal way, 
 through which the victorious poilus of France 
 will march under the Arc de Triomphe in the 
 Place of the Star in the Victory Fete parade 
 on July 14, Bastile Day, the anniversary of the 
 birthday of the French Republic. On the Grands 
 
 62 
 
ABOUT PAUL 
 
 Boulevards this afternoon it was a novel sight 
 to see the big cafes and restaurants closed, the 
 wide sidewalks in front of them bare of their 
 army of chairs and little tables. Of course it 
 is the psychological moment for a strike as 
 the city is filled with strangers come for the 
 great national holiday Monday. So today the 
 people living in the hotels ate pick-up meals 
 and found their rooms uncared for. It was 
 hardest on new arrivals who had to take rooms 
 just as they had been left by the previous occu- 
 pants. And many of these newcomers were 
 American, English, Italian and Spanish trav- 
 elers who had come to Paris expressly for the 
 Victory fete. 
 
 Tonight at dinner Paul was back on the job. 
 Not as dapper as usual, but smiling and serene. 
 Word has been posted in the hotel that dinner 
 would be served only at seven o'clock and 
 seated at one long table down the center of the 
 room the guests made the best of the situation. 
 As in most of the big hotels only the cold 
 viands from the buffet were to be had. Paul 
 regaled us with a description of the attack on 
 the Cafe de la Paix made by a mob of 500 
 
 63 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 people. Outside, the big iron gates were closed 
 before the entrance. It is a nervous strain fear- 
 ing a mob attack. If it were known that the 
 hotel help served there would be trouble. One 
 of the guests related how a couple of months 
 ago there was a strike which tied up all traffic 
 and he had to walk miles to a depot to get a 
 train ; no cars or taxis were running. 
 
 So you see there is something doing every 
 minute here. And one learns to smile and make 
 the best of it. The war taught these people pa- 
 tience and how to endure. And you must ad- 
 mire the splendid spirit of those living here 
 through those four years of war, as Paul did, 
 who are now trying to forget it and tackling the 
 harrowing problems of the present. 
 
 64 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 Paris, July 14. 
 
 THE flood tide of gratitude of five million 
 human hearts vent itself in stirring salvos 
 and cheers this morning in Paris when the 
 flower of the French army and her Allies 
 marched in triumph through the city. It was 
 the ' ' Day of Glory ' ' — the Day of Days. Paris 
 set a new standard in victory fetes. Never 
 before has there been equaled such a triumphal 
 pageant as this, of warriors returned from the 
 fiercest and noblest war in history, and never 
 has there been equaled the magnificence of set- 
 ting that Paris gave to the victors. And it will 
 never be equaled again. This is the greatest 
 joy day in the history of France. 
 
 It is sixty years since Paris last tasted the 
 sweets of victory over her foes. In 1859 she 
 last welcomed her sons home from war as vic- 
 tors. A life-long resident of Paris told me he 
 remembered when a little boy having been taken 
 
 65 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 to see the procession of the victorious French 
 army on its return from the war with Italy, and 
 ' ' Now I live to see this great day ! ' ' 
 
 Four long years of suffering and six months 
 of waiting crystallized into this one morning for 
 France, when here in the city of her pride the 
 homage of the nations could be paid to her de- 
 fenders. ! 
 
 But it was the poilu, the French private in 
 horizon-blue, who was the hero of the hour for 
 France. All honor was paid to the intrepid 
 leaders, but the millions of spectators demon- 
 strated repeatedly their affection for the man 
 in the ranks. The hearts of the multitude went 
 out to him as the symbol of the great, invisible 
 army he represented. As he marched under 
 the Arch of Triumph they saw in him all those 
 who could not be here to share in the victory, 
 those for whom the stately cenotaph had been 
 erected, a memorial to the glorious dead, that 
 they might be there in spirit, having a part in 
 the reward their sacrifice had made possible. 
 
 Paris had done herself proud in decorating 
 the line of march. The mile-long center motor- 
 way of the Champs-Elysees from the Arc de 
 
 66 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde is a rain- 
 bow of fluttering colors. Beautiful large me- 
 dallions, each bearing a symbolical figure and 
 the name of a battle in which French troops 
 fought gloriously, are upheld by high, white, 
 twin pillars all along the way. Between these 
 pylons swing in the breeze the French colors, 
 festoons of waving pennants, flags of the allied 
 nations and colored incandescent lights. The 
 imposing buildings on the thoroughfare, behind 
 the line of trees, are colorful with allied flags 
 and bunting and at night are jeweled with 
 lights. Everywhere the Stars and Stripes and 
 Union Jack wave with the Tricolor of France. 
 Half way down the avenue, in opposite parked 
 circles, known as Round Point, hundreds of cap- 
 tured German cannon had been piled in high 
 tangled heaps, like so much junk, and surmount- 
 ing each huge mass is the gold triumphant 
 " Coq Gaulois," the French cock, that repre- 
 sents France as the eagle does the United States 
 and the lion does England. 
 
 Tiers of wooden seats had been erected on 
 both sides of the avenue and last evening when 
 I passed them they were already filled with 
 
 67 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 people who had come to spend the night in order 
 to have good seats for the morning review. All 
 night they kept their vigil in the streets. The 
 patience of the Paris crowd is marvelous. Be- 
 fore them on the avenue impromptu balls and 
 singing groups made the night scene festive. 
 
 It was before six this morning when the young 
 French girl and I started for the Hotel Crillon 
 where, in the American Press headquarters, a 
 special card, obtained through miles of red 
 tape, entitled me to a place at a window. By 
 the time we reach Concorde, which is the way 
 you refer to it if you have lived close to its 
 majestic, statuary-circled and fountain-centered 
 atmosphere radiating from the Egyptian 
 column, it was a solid mass of people. Just 
 across this paved square was the entrance to 
 the Crillon, and at that moment as easy to 
 reach as the moon. The crowd was a stone 
 wall, impenetrable. We would get through for 
 a few feet only to come upon a camp-chaired 
 group that no amount of persuasion would 
 budge. The camp-chair parties were out in full 
 force. A folding camp-chair might be an ap- 
 preciated farewell gift for any one going 
 
 68 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 abroad. It is the only thing my friends for- 
 got to give me. And I didn't know there had 
 been so many stepladders made as I saw in the 
 throng this morning. One of the hotel em- 
 ployes told me he had a stepladder and had 
 refused two hundred francs for it. Windows 
 along the avenue brought fabulous sums. Those 
 of one building sold for 30,000 francs and the 
 money was donated to the work of wounded 
 soldiers' shop. One balcony brought as much 
 as 100,000 francs. I had been given another 
 card to a window near the Etoile,, but it would 
 have been impossible to reach there. 
 
 Finally for fifteen francs apiece, we pur- 
 chased standing room on one of those two- 
 wheeled, railed truckster's carts, you have seen 
 in French-life pictures, from where we had a 
 good view over the heads of the crowd at the 
 point where the Champs Elysees opens out into 
 the Place de la Concorde. Our fellow-truck- 
 sters turned out to be interesting people eager 
 to help the ' ' American Mademoiselle ' ' under- 
 stand the great spectacle. So I found more 
 atmosphere than at the press headquarters, 
 for I was in the midst of French life. There 
 
 69 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 was a charming Frenchwoman who spoke Eng- 
 lish well; a young French lieutenant (only gen- 
 erals and colonels got into the parade outside 
 of the picked companies of the regiments) ; a 
 Frenchman and his family from a hundred 
 miles distant who had come expressly for this 
 fete and had been there since 4 o'clock in the 
 morning — the eight-year old boy and his father 
 were the cheer leaders — and a middle-class 
 French couple, the man holding his Paris paper 
 before him and proclaiming the notables as 
 they appeared. It was a regular army and navy 
 ''Who's Who" that he read, since only the 
 most distinguished leaders were in the victory 
 procession. 
 
 Perched in the trees around us were as many 
 men and boys as each would hold. Every lamp- 
 post and statue was a vantage point and the 
 roofs and cornices of buildings were alive with 
 people. Near us stands, carts, trucks and step- 
 ladders held their full quota and more. Our 
 truckster had several carts and he did a land 
 office business, the price advancing as the hour 
 approached. 
 
 Every little while a platoon of the wounded 
 70 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 and maimed soldiers of France hobbled past 
 and the crowd expressed its sympathy in 
 cheers. Once it was a straggling group of blind 
 led by that was given an ovation. 
 
 The start of the great spectacle was heralded 
 by a salvo of guns from the Invalides and they 
 boomed continuously during the hours until its 
 conclusion. ' ' Voila ! Voila ! ' ' yelled the small 
 boy, which means " Oh, Lookee," and our ob- 
 servation cart almost turned turtle in the ex- 
 citement. But after the excess of hangers-on 
 had been extracted, by the irate truckster, from 
 its wheels and handles and sides, it righted 
 itself. 
 
 It was almost 9 o'clock when there came a 
 fanfare of bugles and the brilliantly-capari- 
 soned, mounted Garde Eepublicaine appeared. 
 Then ' ' Vive Foch ' ' rang out for the com- 
 mander-in-chief of the Allied armies and " Vive 
 Jofr* re ' ' as the great marshal 's distinguished 
 figure on horseback followed. Marshal Foch, 
 in courtesy to his senior, kept his horse 's head 
 just in the rear of that of Marshal Joffre. All 
 eyes followed them trying to realize what 
 their genius had accomplished in saving the 
 
 71 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 world. Close behind came the great general 
 staff. 
 
 And then the lone horseman in khaki, a 
 dominating figure, erect and soldierly he rode, 
 the commander-in-chief of the American armies. 
 1 ' Generale Pershaing, ' ' yelled the Frenchman 
 holding up the small boy. Then ' ' Une, deux, 
 trois," (one, two, three) " Rah, Generale Persh- 
 aing — Vive Armee Americaine." There was 
 no more distinguished figure in all that chivalric 
 procession than our General Pershing. He 
 looked like the stern-featured, kindly-eyed por- 
 trait we all recognize. And with him were our 
 Yankee boys. Proud stepping, heads up, and 
 looking straight ahead they were and how 
 splendidly they marched ! It was not with dry 
 eyes that I watched them, that inspiring com- 
 pany in olive drab with assuring swing, in per- 
 fect step with their march music, while all 
 around me the emotional French were express- 
 ing their admiration in that unspellable 
 monosyllabic ' ' Wall ' ' with which they cheer, 
 and with waving hats and handkerchiefs. And 
 the lump stayed in my throat long after the 
 American boys went by, after the blue of our 
 
 72 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 handsome, brisk-stepping Jackies had disap- 
 peared in the flutter of colors. "Ah, Marine 
 Americaine," came from all around me and 
 was echoed from the topmost branches of the 
 leafy trees and carried down the avenue. 
 
 " See, it is your marine," exclaimed the 
 French girl, " You know? " 
 
 " Yes, I know," I said, with a catch in my 
 voice, "they brought our soldiers over." 
 
 I wish that the people in every home in our 
 United States that sent a soldier or a sailor 
 to the colors might have seen them and heard 
 the homage paid to them at this moment. Nine- 
 teen months of heart anguish of loved ones 
 three thousand miles away was compressed into 
 that single moment for every American spec- 
 tator. What it had meant to the world that 
 they had braved submarine-infested waters to 
 come to the aid of a persecuted land in the 
 name of Democracy, in the name of Humanity ! 
 The last of the great world powers to enter the 
 fight it was a fitting recognition of their coming 
 from afar that they should be first at the head 
 of the line in the processional of Victory. 
 
 And then came the smiling Belgians with the 
 73 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 regimental flags that saw glory at Liege, the 
 Yser and Ypres. 
 
 Field-Marshal Sir Douglas Haig led the 
 British contingent, flanked by the Canadian, 
 New Zealand and Australian commanders. 
 Eight grave and turbaned Hindu warriors fol- 
 lowed Marshal Haig and his staff. Then came 
 Italy, Poland, Greece, Serbia, Czecho-Slavia 
 and the smaller nations in their order. Arabs, 
 Moroccans, Bedouins, Africans, Japanese, a 
 colorful picture they made in their varied uni- 
 forms and Oriental dress in the brilliant sun- 
 shine. Thus, the East and the West, they 
 marched together, foretelling the new day. 
 
 And then after her Allies came France ! And 
 a new and greater sea of enthusiasm broke 
 loose, wave on wave, as representatives of each 
 division with tattered and battle-scarred colors 
 went by. At their head rode the youthful Mar- 
 shal Petain, commander-in-chief of the French 
 army. Graceful and well he rode, acknowledg- 
 ing the continuous ovations with military salute. 
 
 " General de Castelnau," the Frenchman 
 shouted and the commanding figure was a sig- 
 nal for special cheers. " He lost three sons in 
 
 74 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 the war," one of my cart neighbors murmured. 
 Can you imagine what heartache it meant for 
 that distinguished father to ride through the 
 Arc de Triomphe up there at the Etoile, past 
 the glittering cenotaph with its heroic figures of 
 Victory inscribed " To the Dead for the Coun- 
 try " with its urns of incense burning in 
 memory, the monument whose base was hidden 
 with flowers? Erect he rode. A strain of 
 tender sympathy was felt through the ovation. 
 Yet not a one of the cheering throng but had 
 memories, too. 
 
 There were shouts of delight for square- 
 jawed General Mangin, who had tenaciously 
 held the Germans at the final phase of the war, 
 when he appeared at the head of the Colonial 
 troops. The one-armed General Gouraud was 
 given a great reception. And so each general 
 was recognized and his name passed from lips 
 to lips, and it surged into a sea of acclamation 
 as their poilus appeared. As the soldiers in 
 French uniform and those recently demobilized 
 in the crowd would recognize their regimental 
 colors there was a cheer started for the regi- 
 ment. 
 
 75 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 And among the shell-fringed and frayed 
 battle flags carried by there were those, too, 
 under which none now living fought. They 
 were the " Colors of the Dead." For during 
 the four years of slaughter, regiments had been 
 wiped out, reformed and again completely an- 
 nihilated. Only their number remained in 
 memory with that tattered flag carried now by 
 strangers. It was these flags that spoke 
 loudest of the two million who fell that France 
 might live. Is it any wonder they were the 
 signal for reverent cheers? 
 
 The French navy delegation came and Ad- 
 miral Ronarch on foot was specially acclaimed. 
 The French guns as they passed were the sig- 
 nal for glad outbursts and the camouflaged 
 tanks that brought up the rear, were given a 
 full meed of praise. 
 
 The parade was two hours passing us. 
 Twenty thousand picked men of the nations 
 were in the line of this final scene of war, 
 heralding the new world peace. 
 
 This afternoon the streets were thronged 
 with a mass of merry-makers, the side-walks of 
 the Grands Boulevards overflowing into the 
 
 76 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 streets. All Paris walked; since it was the 
 people's holiday. Both the use of phones and 
 telegraph were forbidden, unless official and 
 urgent. I walked several miles in order to 
 get my cable through from the Bourse. 
 
 The scene tonight is a repetition of the 
 night before, the streets ablaze with lights and 
 filled with happy people. 
 
 The Hotel de Ville or City Hall is magnifi- 
 cently decorated. In the open air stand at the 
 entrance, yesterday afternoon the Marshals 
 Joffre and Petain were presented with swords 
 of honor in the presence of President Poincare 
 and a brilliant company. 
 
 The wide square before this City Hall is gaily 
 adorned with Venetian masts and flags, out- 
 lined in colored lights. A monumental portico, 
 artistically draped, is at the entrance of the 
 Avenue Victoria. On the two circular graveled 
 places of the square people dance their joy 
 beneath the fluttering flags and bunting. Those 
 circular plots, tonight the scenes of rejoicing, 
 I was reminded were once the ' ' Place of 
 Graves," for it was on this spot, in olden 
 days, that criminals were pilloried, burned and 
 
 77 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 hung. But that was 200 years ago, long before 
 the guillotine was invented that did its deadly 
 work on what is now the Place de la Concorde, 
 now the Place of Concord and Peace. So joy 
 treads tonight in light measures where heavy- 
 footed tragedy once moved. The Paris Hotel 
 de Ville was almost destroyed by fire at the 
 time of the Commune that swept away the 
 Palace of the Tuileries. It is now an imposing 
 structure, there on the banks of the Seine, and 
 its square is one of the gala places of the 
 Victory fete. 
 
 The most marvelous of the city building 
 illuminations is perhaps that of the Louvre, 
 not the gallery of arts, but the department 
 store near by that bears the name. The block 
 long front is a mass of colored electric lights. 
 Over the entrance are the words ' ; The Glory of 
 France Eternal — In Glorious Memory of Those 
 who Died for Her." The Allied flags over it 
 are aflame in colored lights set around the seal 
 of Paris. Above is the Croix de Guerre in in- 
 candescents and at the cornice the chantecleer 
 of France blazes in triumph. Along its heights 
 are the names of battlefields that are now land- 
 
 78 
 
THE VICTORY PARADE 
 
 marks of French history, framed in light. This 
 typifies the modern commercial spirit paying 
 tribute to its historic setting and time. 
 
 This was how Paris celebrated the world vic- 
 tory, as befitted her place as the World City, 
 and rejoiced at the new era of Peace, the New 
 Day ahead. 
 
 79 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 WITH A HOUSE PARTY IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 July 23. 
 
 I HAVE been in the " Citadelle " of Verdun! 
 Yesterday I saw with my own eyes the 
 meaning of those charged- with-glory words that 
 Verdun gave to the world, " On Ne Passe 
 Pas " (They shall not pass). And I saw the 
 cost. The Germans came to within two and a 
 half miles of the citadel of Verdun and took 
 two of the grim, outlying forts that circle like 
 a fan to guard the underground stronghold. 
 But in all the four years they never were able 
 to reach the citadel itself. For a whole right- 
 eous earth today Verdun symbolizes " On Ne 
 Passe Pas." 
 
 Climbing over the top of the Fort de Vaux, 
 I saw the battlefield where the French distin- 
 guished themselves in its brilliant defense and 
 in its recapture and I descended through its 
 winding passages, banked with shells. In a 
 walk of over a mile across the field of Douau- 
 
 80 
 
Ruirii. of a Factory at Berry au Bac at the Foot of Hill 108. 
 
 Dugout we entered at Berry au Bac. 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 mont, on a two foot wide, trestled, ammunition 
 track, mud-slippery, I saw whitening human 
 bones and a dead man's shoe, on a landscape 
 that had been churned not once but many times 
 in battle. I was taken through the great fort 
 of Douaumont, which defended so valiantly the 
 key to the citadel, and I stood within its stone 
 walled room that only a few months ago was 
 a thing of harassed officers and of maps and 
 telephones and hurried couriers. And there 
 the maps and plans of battle still lay on the 
 desks. Trying to trace out that last attack, I 
 felt the thrill of what it must have meant with 
 the shells muffled shrieking overhead. I saw 
 the spot where seven French soldiers were killed 
 there in a corridor when a shell crashed in and I 
 looked through the jagged opening in a parti- 
 tion wall to a hollow where twenty-seven Ger- 
 mans were blown up by the explosion of one 
 French shell. And a little farther on they take 
 you up a road at the summit of which is a tall 
 cross, and point out where a French host, fight- 
 ing in the trenches, were all buried alive by 
 an explosion and show you their guns still stick- 
 ing up through the ground. For Verdun is the 
 
 81 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 great shrine of France today. And then, as one 
 of a party of guests of the Commandant of the 
 Citadel, Lieut. Colonel Sarot, I found out 
 what delightful hospitality could be dispensed 
 in an underground fortress. 
 
 Through the courtesy of the French Maison 
 de la Presse in Paris, I was privileged to be one 
 of a party of an official Norwegian Mission, on 
 a two days' trip to Verdun, as guests of the 
 French Government. 
 
 The party of nine, with the military inter- 
 preter, Lieut. Pierre Favary, included a former 
 Minister of Justice of Norway, a Norwegian 
 consul, a secretary in the ministry of justice, 
 two charming Norwegian women, and an Amer- 
 ican physician, Dr. Julien A. Gehrung of St. 
 Louis and New York, medicin aide major in the 
 French army, the inventor of a successful treat- 
 ment for gas used by the French government 
 and our own. The correspondent of the London 
 Chronicle was to have been a member of the 
 party, but evidently missed the train. Reserved 
 compartments in trains, the auto trip around 
 Rheims and on to Chalons, and thence by train 
 to Verdun, entertainment in the citadel, with a 
 
 82 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 luncheon at Rheims and dinner on the train 
 last night were among the many courtesies 
 shown the party by the French government. 
 
 Upon our arrival at Verdun Monday evening 
 at 8:15 we were met at the station by Com- 
 mandant Major Anirepoque, who was our dis- 
 tinguished guide throughout. Solicitous for 
 every member of the party from that moment 
 until he bade us adieux yesterday afternoon at 
 the door of the coupe of the Paris train, he left 
 nothing undone. He accompanied us on the 
 motor trips to the forts, explaining the engage- 
 ments simply and tersely. 
 
 Three French gray service autos were wait- 
 ing outside the Verdun depot to convey our 
 party to the citadel. Now, if you have a grain 
 of romance Verdun citadel will appeal to you 
 because it has a deep moat surrounding it, 
 crossed by a picturesque drawbridge, that is 
 reached through a towered old gateway. If 
 you remember your " Ivanhoe " you can visu- 
 alize the moated stronghold and the knights 
 of old riding across the drawbridge on pranc- 
 ing chargers. Today we whirled over it to the 
 wheezy cut-out of the gray autos and in through 
 
 83 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 a city of skeleton walls and tumbling buildings. 
 Verdun, the city, was almost entirely destroyed 
 in the attempts to force the citadel. Along the 
 narrow streets a few shops are bravely trying 
 to make a stand. Inside the broken shell of one 
 store room gleamed rows of bright tin-ware, 
 arranged for sale. Heads protruded inquir- 
 ingly from windows here and there along the 
 route as the cars whizzed by. Wherever a 
 whole shutter fitted to a window it was a sign 
 of a returned occupant, one who had crept back 
 to the old hearth. 
 
 The American doctor was saying ' ' I shall 
 never forget the first time I saw Verdun. By 
 George, it got me. I turned away thinking the 
 two French officers accompanying me wouldn't 
 notice my tears, but quietly one turned to the 
 other and remarked : ' Our good friend here 
 has just saluted Verdun. ' And they both saluted 
 me." Perhaps that little incident from an 
 American who saw much in his two years in the 
 French service as a chief surgeon will tell you 
 better than any words of mine how it feels to 
 enter Verdun. Cold-hearted, indeed, is he 
 who does not know the choke of sympathy 
 
 84 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 for this brave little city, with once its barracks 
 for 23,000 soldiers, that bore the brunt of the 
 enemy's guns,, but saved its beloved fortress. 
 
 Into a wide circle we whirled and then we 
 were before the huge vaulted doorway of this 
 grim sixteenth century fortification. It was like 
 a picture out of a volume of ancient knight- 
 hood — this vaulted doorway going into the side 
 of a steep, straight-up, stone bluff. This was the 
 place where modern knighthood had set a new 
 pace in chivalry. It blocked the path of Ger- 
 man might. It was the shield of France. It 
 gave us a new synonym for invincible. A couple 
 of horizon-blue clad sentries saluted the of- 
 ficers with us. Through the wide door, along 
 a narrow stone passage-way single file and then 
 into a great vaulted corridor, reaching into the 
 shadows of a dim distance, with an occasional 
 electric light piercing the gloom. This part of 
 the fortress is more modern than the remainder, 
 having electric light and steam heat. 
 
 We women of the party were conducted to a 
 suite of rooms in a side corridor where we 
 were pleasantly surprised at many little home 
 touches. There were white linen sheets on the 
 
 85 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 army cots, a large mirror over a simple table, 
 that held the bowl and pitcher, a writing table 
 and an armchair of quaint old pattern. A brass 
 shaded electric reading lamp on the table, a 
 counterpart of one on my desk in Davenport, 
 made me rub my eyes. But it was damp and 
 chill here for no sunshine had ever penetrated 
 these earthen and stone walls. And the tramp 
 of marching feet along distant corridors re- 
 minded me that I was in Verdun. 
 
 Called for dinner we were ushered into the 
 dining-room of the commandant of the citadel, 
 Lieut. Col. Sarot, who came in shortly after we 
 were seated and gave us a hearty welcome. In 
 delightful French lie told us to make ourselves 
 entirely at home and added that he would be 
 with us next day at luncheon. A delicious 
 dinner it was, and formally served on white 
 china, monogramed with the letters " V. C. M." 
 (Verdun Citadel Mess) in the French colors. 
 It was eleven o'clock when our party arose from 
 the table after toasting France, United States 
 and Norway, giving each such a rousing ' ' hur- 
 rah, ' ' ending with ' ' zip, ' ' that it brought the 
 startled face of the table orderly to the door. 
 
 Now, because it is unusual to be a member 
 86 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 of a fortress house party and in this fortress 
 whose glory will ring down the centuries to 
 come, and because a hasty glimpse, the next 
 noon, of names inscribed in the Colonel's guest- 
 book — President Poincare of France, King Al- 
 bert of Belgium and Henry Van Dyke, the lat- 
 ter with an original poem — told me that the 
 great of the earth had sat at this board, I want 
 to picture that wonderful dining-room to you. 
 
 It is not a large room — the table seats twelve 
 with just enough space left for service. The 
 bricked walls are tinted a soft white with a dado 
 of grey, edged with a stripe of gold at the base 
 and the ceiling is vaulted. The wall at the 
 left of the entrance door has a large gold- 
 framed mirror, above which is the motto, " On 
 Ne Passe Pas." And like a rainbow bower 
 over the words are grouped large silk flags of 
 all the Allies, their gold pointed tips meeting 
 in a bow topping the slogan. The flags reflect 
 themselves in the background mirror and again 
 in an exquisite six by nine foot mirror on the 
 opposite wall, that has a wonderful antique 
 gold frame. 
 
 To the right of this latter mirror hangs the 
 87 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Verdun Cross of Honor, a huge war cross in- 
 scribed with the words : " Honneur et Patrie " 
 (Honor and Country). To the left of the mir- 
 ror is a laurel wreath in metal with the words 
 " Valeur et Discipline," and above it, in brass, 
 the crossed cannons and the anchor. Before 
 this, a standard of flags fills the corner of the 
 room. The narrower Avails of the oblong apart- 
 ment bear each two shining cuirasses, the 
 sword hilt at the top of each surrounded by 
 gleaming bayonet points. On the wall, to the 
 right of the door, these cuirasses flank the coat 
 of arms of Verdun, surmounted by the " Coq 
 Gaulois," the French cock crowing in victory, 
 and over this, most significantly, were only two 
 flags, the French tricolor and our Stars and 
 Stripes. In a wall case at the opposite end of 
 the room I caught sight of medals and the guest 
 book. Above it, made attractive by the glitter- 
 ing breast plates at the sides, were two small 
 oils of Verdun scenes. And surmounting all 
 was a picture that held the eye — I don't recall 
 the artist — you have probably seen it — a dog 
 baying at dusk over the grave of his master, 
 that is marked by a simple cross on which hangs 
 
 88 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 a battered service hat. It seemed to fit so well 
 in this room where the effect is concentrated 
 patriotism, valor and loyalty. An electric fan, 
 high up in one corner, gave the twentieth cen- 
 tury touch. 
 
 It was here that we had luncheon (dejeuner 
 they call it) on returning from our visit to the 
 outlying forts of the citadel, and in compliment 
 to my country I was honored with the place at 
 the left of the courtly colonel, with the American 
 flag to my right. Colonel Sarot had been com- 
 mandant of the citadel since 1916, in command 
 through two of its strenuous war years. He is 
 a brilliant conversationalist, and was an admir- 
 able host. The Norwegian consul, Mr. Klingen- 
 berg of Tronjhem, Norway, at the conclusion of 
 the luncheon, arose, thanked the commandant 
 for his splendid hospitality, and spoke for Nor- 
 way, voicing the friendship of his people for 
 France and the hope that these friendly rela- 
 tions would continue and be ever strengthened. 
 Colonel Sarot responded. 
 
 During the course of the meal a big black and 
 white dog came in and up to my chair, looking 
 at me with great friendly eyes. " He is a good 
 dog, ' ' said the Colonel in English. ' ' Dick is 
 
 89 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 his name. " " Is lie the citadel 's dog? ' ' I asked. 
 ' l He is my dog, ' ' the commandant answered 
 proudly. I didn't get a chance to learn of 
 Dick's accomplishments, but I saw he was a 
 well-brought-up dog since he ate plain, dry, 
 dark army bread from the Colonel's hand with 
 apparent relish and waited politely to be of- 
 fered more. 
 
 When we said our hurried adieux to the 
 Colonel, he had a special word for each one. 
 He told me that when I came again he was going 
 to be able to speak nothing but English to me. 
 
 We whirled away in the grey motor cars with 
 the picture of the distinguished Colonel stand- 
 ing in the paved circle before the great entrance 
 door, in the rain, smiling, and saluting his 
 good-bye. 
 
 Forts That Protect Verdun Citadel 
 
 Now to go back to yesterday morning and re- 
 count the trip to the Fort cle Vaux and Fort 
 Douaumont that safeguarded the Citadel of 
 Verdun at such terrific cost, the scenes of the 
 most remarkable achievements of the French, 
 and on the soil of which is written in blood the 
 
 90 
 
IN THE CITADEL OP VERDUN 
 
 story of the noblest heroism in the history of 
 France. It is not rny intention to write of the 
 battles of Verdun, nor of the history of the 
 fortress. Every newspaper reader of the last 
 five years knows the former and the latter 
 can be found easily in every library. But I 
 want to show you this mighty stronghold as it 
 appears today. 
 
 I remember dreaming I was back home in 
 The Times building telling Miss Ade and Mr. 
 Kelly about Paris and fussing that none of 
 my articles had been published, when I opened 
 my eyes. The light was shining in above the 
 high, white board partition from the corridor 
 outside. Over my head dusky shadows lost 
 themselves in the vaulted stone roof. A distant 
 clatter of marching feet echoed along the gal- 
 leries — a far-away word or command. It is a 
 weird feeling to awaken in a fortress if you 
 have never tried it. From the next room I 
 could hear the soft breathing of Madame Hei- 
 berg, who called to me merrily in a few mo- 
 ments. 
 
 Realizing anything important is difficult — 
 trying at that moment to realize how for four 
 
 91 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 long years these vaulted corridors had echoed 
 only to the dread music of cannon and bombard- 
 ment was impossible — it was so peaceful now. 
 Involuntarily my thoughts returned to Ivan- 
 hoe. Rowena must have lived in just such a 
 place as this, probably just as damp and 
 gloomy. I saw her emerging from that great, 
 vaulted entry door in the cliff to mount her 
 white palfry in the circular court outside. All 
 mediaeval heroines always rode milk-white pal- 
 fries. The white palfry that was awaiting me 
 outside now I recalled was a gray, mud-spat- 
 tered French car, with a smiling poilu, speed- 
 demon driver at the wheel. 
 
 After breakfast in the picturesque dining 
 room, the three motor cars conveyed our party 
 to Vaux. It was pouring rain, raining as it only 
 can in France. All along the way we saw the 
 havoc of the guns. A few wall fragments and 
 a heap of brick marked where once stood a 
 village. Open trenches zigzagged through the 
 fields on both sides, fields that had seen the 
 most terrible carnage of the war. We passed 
 innumerable dugouts, where man had burrowed 
 in the ground to escape the shells. The earth 
 
 92 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 afforded more protection than walls of steel 
 and iron. Try to imagine living in a dugout 
 for weeks and months — yes, years — as men 
 had done here ! 
 
 Arriving at Fort de Vaux we descended from 
 the cars and climbed by a circuitous route to the 
 top of the fort. There we stood in a cold, driv- 
 ing rain to hear the story of the battles that 
 had raged in the tragic week of siege and in its 
 daring recapture by the French. The ground 
 at our feet was ploughed and torn and muti- 
 lated. Coming down from the summit we en- 
 tered a low door, turned sharply in dark, nar- 
 row passages and were in the interior of the 
 fort. An occasional wall light helped to show 
 the way through the corridors. Down dark 
 stairways we went, through caverns stacked 
 with shells in neat rows, and, where there are 
 still piles of sandbags. What tragedies the wet 
 stones at my feet had seen when the pendulum 
 of war swung back and forth over Vaux ! Out- 
 side I walked up to a cross bearing the French 
 cocade. Under this eight men lie buried in one 
 grave, Maj. Anirepoque told me. For three 
 months from March to June of 1916, Fort Vaux 
 
 93 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 was beleaguered and it was lost for a brief space 
 on June 7. Hand to hand fighting occurred in 
 its narrow galleries and finally after six clays, 
 the French were overcome. Thirst was the real 
 conqueror, it is claimed, since the plucky garri- 
 son was without water for two days. It was 
 during those six days, when the Germans at- 
 tacked with jets of flame and liquid fire, that 
 the fort, cut off from the world, sent out its last 
 carrier pigeon. 
 
 On Nov. 2 the enemy was compelled to aban- 
 don Fort Vaux. In that stubborn resistance of 
 Vaux is the crux of the French victory. The 
 battle of Verdun broke the back of the German 
 invasion and Fort Vaux was one of only two of 
 the great forts that defended the citadel that 
 were ever lost. 
 
 The other was Fort Douaumont that surren- 
 dered Feb. 25, 1916, but was regained by French 
 troops with irresistible dash on October 24 of 
 the same year. By the recapture of these two 
 forts, by the counter attack of General Mangin, 
 the battle of Verdun became a victory. Later 
 Verdun, the unshaken rock, saw barbarism 
 thrown back under the victorious thrust of our 
 
 94 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 American army at St. Mihiel and Montfaucon. 
 
 On the way to Fort Douaumont we saw a 
 heap of tumbled brick and stone, all that is left 
 of the town of Fleury which was utterly de- 
 molished by the tide of war. The autos stopped 
 by the roadside where a trail ran through the 
 tortured field, the path marked by a single nar- 
 row track, on which was run one of the little 
 ammunition trains. The track is scarcely a 
 couple of feet wide and we followed it single 
 file, for more than a half mile, across deep gul- 
 lies and ruts, treading the mud-slippery ties 
 gingerly. Signs at the entrance to the roads 
 caution people not to go out of the beaten track 
 and not to pick up anything on the battlefields ; 
 there is still danger from unexploded shells. 
 Along the way on both sides, shells, tangled 
 barbed wire, broken fragments of artillery, 
 trenches, dugouts, and shellholes wrote the 
 story of human sacrifice, in the grey light of the 
 morning rain. 
 
 With the driving rain in our faces and the 
 desolation on every hand it was not hard to 
 conjure up the discomfort through which those 
 soldiers lived, even when not actually fighting. 
 
 95 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 A Parisian who spent eleven months in the 
 front line trenches told me, when I finally per- 
 suaded him to speak of the war, that one didn't 
 think of the danger — it was the discomfort of 
 it all. I had firmly resolved to eliminate 
 weather reports from France but the rain pro- 
 trudes itself into the picture. I know now why 
 our doughboys wrote so often of rain — the 
 sunshine of France is very temperamental and 
 melts into tears at the most unexpected mo- 
 ments. We were spattered with mud almost 
 to our knees, every member of the party, and 
 a soggy looking bunch when we arrived at 
 Douaumont. 
 
 Fort Douaumont is larger and more fully 
 equipped than Vaux and contains many tur- 
 rets, cupolas and barracks. We went through 
 its vast subterranean caverns. In the head- 
 quarters room I looked upon the maps and 
 charts of the various drives. One, on a wall, 
 fastened over others, bore the date, " 10-11-18 " 
 — only last October. From here the troops had 
 been directed. We peeped in at the telephone 
 exchange, too, still a thing of wires and plugs 
 that carried the word from the great central 
 
 96 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 directing force. We went reverently through 
 the chapel, with its Red Cross at the altar, and 
 in a room beyond we saw a single stretcher. 
 Through a maze of dark, wet, passages there 
 came occasionally the light from an embrasure. 
 In one corridor I saw a gray cat, evidently the 
 pet of the garrison, but pussy refused to be 
 more than mildly interested in us. 
 
 The musee, or museum, of the fort we left 
 reluctantly. It is filled with war souvenirs, 
 enormous shells and belt festoons of little 
 shells, fragments of metal, a machine gun, a 
 German shotgun. Shelves are filled with 
 mementoes of the fateful history of the fort. 
 We saw the colonel's gas mask. Two huge 
 metal sombreros were the gongs that had 
 sounded the gas alarms. 
 
 Back through the battlefield we picked our 
 way carefully and were soon driving over the 
 rough road that had been shelled so many 
 times that little of its once hard, smooth sur- 
 face remained. The military chauffeur man- 
 aged to miss them if there were many smooth 
 places. What an ordeal it must have been for 
 the wounded to have been jolted over those 
 
 97 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 roads ! In the ruins of one village as we turned 
 a corner swiftly, the Bed Cross appeared on 
 a mangled building. Then along a road, from 
 which we could see an embankment sieved with 
 dugouts, now the empty caves of the modern 
 cliff-dwellers. We reached the citadel at noon 
 with just time for the dejeuner and to make the 
 2 o'clock train back to Paris. 
 
 And so we left the citadel of Verdun 
 which has been called the ' ' hinge insuperable 
 that Germany could not break." It was the 
 eastern bulwark of France, whose stubborn re- 
 sistance made possible the victory of the Marne 
 under Sarrail and Joffre in 1914. It was the 
 grave of the Kronprinz army and the heroic 
 town is decorated by President Poincare with 
 the star of the Legion of Honor and the war 
 cross. 
 
 En route to Verdun on Monday morning we 
 went by way of Rheims, of which I have written 
 briefly heretofore, and thence by motor to 
 Berry au Bac, which is destined to be visited by 
 millions of those who will travel far to see this 
 war zone in the years 'to come. Speak to a 
 Frenchman about Berry au Bac and he draws 
 
 98 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 his breath in quickly and says, ' ' Ah, yes, Berry 
 au Bac." Fifteen miles from Rheims, it is 
 known best perhaps to those who followed the 
 news of the war in America as Hill 108. 
 
 Berry au Bac is a white sepulchre. In the 
 light of the morning sunshine it was a huge, 
 white hill with enormous, jagged hollows and 
 gullies and fissures. The ground here has an 
 underlayer of white fire clay and stone forma- 
 tion that at a distance might be mistaken for 
 driven snow. The enemy was strongly en- 
 trenched on this hill and the French, tunneling 
 underneath, set off mines that made its capture 
 possible. The explosions caused this distorted 
 upheaval. A narrow, winding path coils about 
 over the white tumbled heap of landscape and 
 we followed it to its summit. But first we 
 entered a dugout at the base, stooping low to 
 avoid bumping against the rafters of its roof, 
 and turning sharp corners. Matches were 
 lighted to see the dark, crude interior in which 
 men had lived during long war days and nights. 
 
 Up on the summit of Hill 108 the scene was 
 one of glaring white desolation as far as the 
 eye could reach. Here and there in descending 
 
 99 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 we had to step carefully, not to become en- 
 tangled in the barbed wire that had fallen and 
 still lays across the narrow foot trails. At the 
 side of the path lay a couple of airplane 
 shells. At the foot of the hill, on the farther 
 side, was the remains of the shattered Aisne 
 canal bed. There is little left of the village of 
 Berry au Bac but remnants of walls. By the 
 side of the road is the ruins of a large factory, 
 the buildings leveled and the machinery a rusty 
 wreck, standing out nakedly against the blue 
 sky. 
 
 The scene that unwound before us as we 
 motored down the road was like a movie reel 
 of destruction. For miles just battered build- 
 ings, pieces of walls. It looked like pictures of 
 the ruins of Pompeii, this harvest of the twen- 
 tieth century war. And it was repeated in the 
 streets of Rheims. 
 
 Before leaving Rheims I had an opportunity 
 of entering the cathedral, to which I had been 
 unable to obtain admittance on the previous 
 visit. We joined a party of American soldiers 
 and sailors who were being taken into the edi- 
 fice. This jewel of France is a moving sight, 
 
 100 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 its magnificent interior now piles of debris and 
 scaffolding, for the workmen are busy saving 
 what they can. A railing keeps visitors in 
 the big rotunda. The high columns down the 
 center appear but little damaged but there are 
 great holes in the roof and all the beautiful 
 stained glass is gone. Nothing of the great 
 altar remained and I could not learn whether 
 its art treasures had been removed for safety 
 or had been demolished. The wonderful minia- 
 ture gems of statuary that stand in the niches 
 up the walls inside the great doorway are, 
 many of them, broken or damaged and the 
 great sculptured figures on the exterior seem 
 to each show, on closer examination, a different 
 mutilation. But you stand in awe before this 
 new grandeur that is visible in its artistry 
 through the fragments that remain. 
 
 The 35 mile trip from Rheims to Chalons we 
 made by auto. I don't believe they have any 
 speed limits here and the driver of the leading 
 car was a French woman. I noticed that the 
 chauffeur of our car cranked the motor for her, 
 but she managed to keep ahead all the way. 
 Along the route were many barbed wire en- 
 
 101 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 tanglements. In some places hoops of wire 
 stretched across a field. Through these men 
 had crawled in the perilous journeys across No 
 Man's Land. Ammunition still lay in heaps 
 along the roads, great crates of it, and beds of 
 live shells. 
 
 On the rail trip from Chalons sur Marne to 
 Verdun, we traversed a part of the Argonne 
 Forest, which is steeped in memories of the 
 heroism of our American army. At one place 
 was a wrecked tank. And on a track at a small 
 station nearby stood a carload of new farm 
 machinery that gave encouraging promise of 
 reclaiming the shell-rocked soil. The dense 
 Forest of the Argonne made a picturesque 
 background. 
 
 We passed one of those box cars, the inscrip- 
 tion on which so often infuriated our soldiers. 
 It read " Forty men or eight horses." 
 
 At one little station platform an American 
 with the Red Cross insignia on his coat sleeve 
 was standing. ' ' What would you give, Bud, to 
 be on Broadway this minute? " called out the 
 St. Louis doctor. The lad's eyes lighted up. 
 " Well, a good deal," he laughed, " but I'll be 
 
 102 
 
IN THE CITADEL OF VERDUN 
 
 there soon." He told us the Red Cross camp 
 was near and many mid-western boys — from 
 Wisconsin, Missouri and Kansas — had been sta- 
 tioned there. ''Didn't have any Iowa boys, 
 did you — all they did was to run," joshed the 
 American doctor. ' ' You mean they ran at 
 them — couldn't hold them back," was my in- 
 dignant Hawkeye defense. " Yes, we did have 
 lots of Iowans," said the Red Cross boy. And 
 our Norwegian friends in the compartment 
 looked politely puzzled at U. S. A. state rivalry 
 in France and wondered what the argument was 
 about. 
 
 103 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE CANTEEN GIEL WHO LISTENED 
 
 Paris, July 25. 
 /\ND so the charming young Princess listened 
 1 JL to the host of warriors brave — and as she 
 listened her dark eyes grew misty with under- 
 standing ! 
 
 No, this not a legend. 
 
 It is a cross section out of the actual life of 
 an actual American Indian princess, who came 
 overseas as a canteen girl with the A. E. F. 
 
 A whole regiment of American doughboys 
 fought their battles over for her on the banks of 
 the Moselle. From the cook to the colonel they 
 told her about them. 
 
 And she listened. 
 
 None of the Indian legends, handed down to 
 her from chieftain ancestry, compared with the 
 stories she heard from their lips — this attrac- 
 tive, gentle voiced, slim y young girl in the trim 
 blue-gray uniform with the sailor hat shading 
 her blue-black hair. 
 
 104 
 
THE CANTEEN GIRL WHO LISTENED 
 
 She was the only canteen girl with the entire 
 359th infantry of the 90th division when it 
 was stationed in Germany, the only American 
 girl those soldiers of the Army of Occupation had 
 seen since they landed the July before, boys 
 who had been in the worst of the fighting at St. 
 Mihiel and in the Meuse-Argonne. 
 
 She had charge of four canteens in as many 
 German villages. Gen. Pershing himself in- 
 vited her to a place beside him on the reviewing 
 stand at Wengerohr, when he reviewed the 
 troops of the division before they left. He said 
 she was the real American. The blood of two 
 Cherokee chiefs flows in her veins. 
 
 And her name? At the University of Okla- 
 homa, when she was graduated, her diploma 
 read Anne Ross, but in Cherokee her name is 
 " Princess Galilohi " and she is a daughter of 
 Hereditary Chief Robert B. Ross of Tahlequah, 
 Okla. Her paternal great-grandfather was 
 Gen. John Ross, first chief of the Cherokees, 
 when their possessions spread over Georgia, 
 North Carolina and Tennessee. The city of 
 Chattanooga was formerly Ross Landing and 
 the old chief's home in Georgia is still called 
 
 105 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Rossville, there in the shadow of Lookout 
 Mountain. President Jackson sent the Chero- 
 kees to Oklahoma in 1835. On her mother's side 
 she is descended from Chief Occonstata. Only 
 direct descent from chiefs through both parents 
 gives an Indian girl the title of princess. 
 
 It was Anne Ross who posed for Zolnay's 
 statue of Chief Sequoya, her great uncle, that 
 stands in the Hall of Fame in Washington, 
 D. C, and she herself unveiled the statue in 
 1917. Sequoya, you know, was the inventor of 
 the Cherokee alphabet. The Cherokees are the 
 only tribe to have an alphabet of their own. 
 Quite by accident I met Anne Ross and found 
 out who she was yesterday in the cafe of the 
 Hotel Petrograd, and coaxed her to tell me 
 something of her work with the army. 
 
 " I was stationed at Berncastle on the Mo- 
 selle, Germany, for five months — and for the 
 first three weeks, well, I just listened," she 
 said. " It was pathetic, their need of a girl to 
 talk to — they were dying to tell their wonder- 
 ful stories. They couldn't tell them to one 
 another because each man felt he had been in 
 the most thrilling part. So I listened. And 
 
 106 
 
THE CANTEEN GIRL WHO LISTENED 
 
 such stories as I have heard. Now, there was 
 the cook's stoiy. That was vastly different 
 from that of the courier — and then the ma- 
 chine-gunner — all of them saw their battles 
 from a different angle. 
 
 " The cook related to me how he was baking 
 pancakes for breakfast during one of those 
 terrific attacks and the shells were coming down 
 around him so fast that he crawled under an 
 embankment for protection. Every few min- 
 utes he would jump out and turn the pancakes, 
 then dodge back to cover. It was a plain case 
 of duty — he couldn't let the batter cakes burn, 
 could he?" 
 
 I could not but think of the women at home 
 who felt they had done much to save the flour 
 — I wondered if they guessed what one regi- 
 ment's cook had risked that their boys might 
 have pancakes. 
 
 1 ' I tried to get over before the armistice, ' ' 
 Miss Eoss said regretfully, "but I was not 
 allowed to come, because my brother was in 
 overseas service. He is Lieut. Robert B. Ross, 
 Jr., and was with the 307th infantry, the 77th 
 division. 
 
 107 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 " They were mostly Texas boys with our 
 regiment," she continued when I begged for 
 more of her experiences, " but there were later 
 many replacements from Iowa, Missouri and 
 Indiana. I had charge of the canteens at Ursig, 
 Kenheim, Rochtig and Reil, there in Germany. 
 
 "Besides listening," she laughed. "I had 
 to provide amusements and entertainments for 
 the boys. Often I told them Indian legends 
 and added Indian songs and dances. Yes, I 
 carry a native costume." Miss Ross was on 
 the lecture platform with Ernest Thompson 
 Seton for a season, interpreting Indian 
 legends. 
 
 At the end of May she returned to Paris and 
 was sent to the French port, St. Nazaire. " Our 
 canteen there was the last to serve our boys 
 before they went on board the transports to 
 leave France," she said. " Often we had as 
 many as 10,000 men a day embarking. There 
 were only fourteen of us canteen girls there 
 and we worked day and night before a boat 
 sailed. For a while, when the tide went out at 
 two o'clock in the morning, we were on duty 
 from ten at night until four o 'clock in the morn- 
 
 108 
 
THE CANTEEN GIRL WHO LISTENED 
 
 ing." Surely Anne Ross here has proved her- 
 self worthy of the noble ancestry of which she 
 is so proud. 
 
 With Miss Ross, that day at the Paris Y. W., 
 when I chanced to ask her to pass the salt and 
 so found out about her, was her team-mate, Miss 
 Cornelia Smith of St. Joseph, Mo., who has the 
 distinction of being the youngest overseas girl 
 in the U. S. canteen service, for she is just 
 " sweet and twenty." How she put it over on 
 the strict examining committee and gave the im- 
 pression of being twenty-five, she smiles mysti- 
 cally when you ask her. But she got across and 
 has been in the Paris office of the " Y " canteen 
 and assisting at entertainments and dances for 
 the soldiers who came to Paris on leave. Miss 
 Smith is an army child. She is a niece of Gen. 
 A. Leonard Smith of Missouri. She told, na- 
 ively, how she went from Paris to Brussels a 
 short time ago in an airplane, one of the pas- 
 senger planes that carried fourteen people. It 
 took them two hours and a half. " Oh, yes, we 
 had an accident," she remarked, " one of the 
 engines gave out and we came down almost to 
 the ground. But we reached Brussels all right. 
 
 109 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 It was wonderful flying over the battlefields. 
 The trenches looked like lace. At one city we 
 were brought down low enough to see the people 
 on the streets." 
 
 Having come over together I remarked how 
 pleasant that they could return on the same 
 boat, as they both leave next Friday for St. 
 Malo to await their sailing. 
 
 " Oh, yes," she answered, breezily, " you see 
 we came over together and they don't break 
 the set." 
 
 110 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 Aug. 3. 
 
 IT is all quiet along the Rhine tonight! 
 I have just come from Die "Wacht am 
 Rhine par les Allies. 
 
 That is the way our boys there say it, in three 
 languages, today. The old martial song that 
 has echoed down the centuries from its castled 
 hills has new words and a new tune. At 
 Coblenz it is " The Star Spangled Banner," in 
 Cologne it is " God Save the King," and at 
 Mayence it is the " Marsellaise." 
 
 Right there on the storied Rhine, where every 
 foot of shore line has its legendary tale to tell, 
 there is being enacted in this, our day, a bit of 
 world drama that has all its thrilling legends 
 " beat off the boards." The Lorelei fairy who 
 sat on the rock as you round the turn to Bingen, 
 to lure the sailors and fishermen to destruction 
 in the rapids at the foot of the precipice, has 
 ceased " singing her siren song as she combs 
 
 111 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 her golden hair ' ' and has given her place to the 
 Goddess of Liberty who is holding aloft the 
 torch of the New Day. Where back in the twelfth 
 century the robber barons and their hordes 
 swooped down from these high-perched castles 
 in their raids to show that Might was Right, 
 even as did their modern kaiser exponent, there 
 is today a firm-treading, quiet-eyed, horde of 
 olive drab and khaki and horizon-blue teaching 
 the gospel of the New Democracy. They are 
 not doing any of this conquering hero stunt, 
 either. Not a bit of it. Quietly, justly, firmly, 
 they are dealing with the situation and they are 
 having little trouble. They don't stand any 
 nonsense, this man's army of ours. And in 
 consequence it is so quiet they have time to 
 wonder what the folks are doing and thinking 
 back home. 
 
 What comes to mind sharpest in traversing 
 this beautiful Rhine valley, with its secure, com- 
 fortable villages and its cities untouched by 
 the horrors of war, is its contrast with the 
 mangled Valley of the Marne. Involuntarily 
 memory unrolls the reel of the shattered dwell- 
 ings, the shells of buildings, the sepulchred 
 
 112 
 
e ^dW 
 
 M • 
 
 nunc w ™™#«* 
 
 r "AS Prfss/CB £ ^ 
 
 Limit American Zone — 30 Kilometers from Coblenz — photo of sign post. 
 
 Group of German Children in American Zone on the Rhine. 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 cities of France. Here no one returned to find a 
 scrap of crumbling wall all that is left of home 
 and its treasures. 
 
 But there is one gratifying phase — the 
 knowledge that this impregnable stronghold 
 was forced to yield without a single shot. For 
 two thousand years this Rhineland has been 
 fought for, and Germany, as its most prized 
 possession, had fortified it so thoroughly you 
 do not have to be an expert in military tactics to 
 see that it would have meant great human cost 
 to have stormed Ehrenbreitstein's gun-bristling 
 heights. 
 
 If you want to know one of the biggest thrills 
 of life you must see Old Glory floating from the 
 fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, that blinks across 
 the Rhine from its rocky eminence, on the 
 Yankee-soldiered city of Coblenz. Your flag 
 and my flag ! You must have a storage battery 
 in the place of your heart if it does not jump 
 with pride at the sight. There it is, flung to the 
 breeze, on what the Germans believed was their 
 Gibraltar. There it flies to say that Chateau 
 Thierry and St. Mihiel and the Argonne were 
 not in vain. 
 
 113 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Reaching Coblenz (and you must now pro- 
 nounce it Koh-blahnss, dragging out the last 
 syllable) Monday night, we were met at the 
 train by Lieut. H. M. Jobes, head press officer 
 of the American Forces in Germany, who had 
 been wired of our coming by Colonel Moreno, 
 head of the Intelligence department of the A. 
 E. F. in Paris. Lieut. Jobes is from Iowa. He 
 has been over since September, 1917, first with 
 the French and British as an observation offi- 
 cer, then as instructor in the artillery school at 
 Langres, then with the fourth corps, F. A. in 
 the Toule and Metz sectors. He was in the 
 battles of Cantigny, Mondidier and Noyon and 
 spent Christmas, 1917, in the trenches. His 
 knowledge of the war has made him an invalu- 
 able press officer. 
 
 Mile Axler, the French girl, had accom- 
 panied me from Paris and we were billeted in 
 the Hotel Riesen Furstenhof, which is still 
 partly given over to the American Forces. The 
 hotel faces the Rhine promenade and the won- 
 derful bridge of boats or pontoon bridge across 
 the river. We were taken Tuesday morning to 
 Neuwied, the headquarters of the First Divi- 
 
 114 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 sion, out to the bridgeheads, and motored over 
 the entire American zone on the right bank of 
 the Rhine to its limit. Through the village of 
 Ehrenbreitstein, past our troops drilling in 
 open fields, through Montebaur with its camp of 
 American soldiers, past the wide fields that the 
 week of June 12 bristled with cannon all ready 
 to move on Berlin if the peace had not been 
 signed, where the knolls still bear the marks of 
 having supported machine guns. 
 
 And then we came to an outpost with a sin- 
 gle bough across the road. A corporal and a 
 couple of sentries were stationed there. On the 
 farther side of the bough was a sign, in both 
 English and German, reading that this was the 
 limit of the American Zone of Occupation. To 
 the left of the road the Stars and Stripes 
 floated from a flagpole and on the wooded ter- 
 race beyond were the tents of the outpost. Over 
 in the distance nestled a little, narrow streeted 
 German village and smiling fields were all 
 about. It was a scene of quiet content on that 
 midsummer morning, even if I was warned 
 1 ' don 't step over that bough — they would 
 have the right to shoot you if you did." 
 
 115 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 On the way back over another route we 
 passed through the exquisite Valley of the 
 Sayn. The Sayn river is so narrow you would 
 call it a creek; you could jump it without an 
 effort. This Valley of the Sayn is like a fairy 
 bower, especially at one spot where over high 
 wooded cliffs we had a glimpse of the spires of 
 the hunting lodge of Bertha Krupp, for whom 
 the Big Bertha was named. The roads through 
 Germany are like ballroom floors, making 
 motoring a joy. I could not but recall the roads 
 of France, punctured with shellholes. In the 
 villages we saw an incredible number of chil- 
 dren. " Germany has another army growing 
 up " was the observation of an officer in the 
 car. Occasionally these little boys would salute 
 the American car but more often they just 
 looked at it in wonder. Once we passed an 
 American car with tire trouble at the side of 
 a street and the soldiers were surrounded by 
 little German boys. 
 
 On Tuesday afternoon we were motored up 
 to the Fortress Ehrenbreitstein. Crossing the 
 Rhine from Coblenz to the right bank and 
 through the village that bears the name of 
 
 116 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 the fortress we were soon going up the steep 
 road. It is some twist, that road. The stone 
 wall on the river side is pierced every few feet 
 with embrasures for guns. There were mo- 
 ments when one felt the tugging auto, with its 
 skillful American doughboy at the wheel, never 
 would make it. An army trying to scale these 
 heights would never have a chance. We had 
 one breathless moment when, just at a sharp 
 turn under a trestle, we came in sight of a motor 
 lorry full of soldiers coming down and only ten 
 feet away. The hill back of our car was a 
 winding drop of a hundred feet and back of the 
 lorry a steep climb of more. For a moment 
 it was a question of who could give the road. 
 But the press car driver found a knoll to the 
 left and dug his front wheels into it while the 
 motor lorry wriggled past. When we backed 
 out it was a pleasant thought — what might 
 happen if the brakes didn't hold. But they did. 
 Into the open parade ground of the fortress 
 we drove and saw an upstanding troop of our 
 American soldiers at inspection. Descending 
 from the car my first impulse was to climb up 
 on the tower under the American flag. There as 
 
 117 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 we stood in the little railed enclosure that holds 
 the flag staff, the bugler came to sound the 
 recall. A trim-looking, boyish, soldier was 
 Private G. Eestifo, Battery G, 5th F. A. with 
 his bugle glinting in the sunlight as he stood 
 under the flag at attention for my kodak. 
 
 From the turrets of the fortress the view of 
 the fertile valley of the Ehine and of Coblenz 
 is a memorable one. There is only one dis- 
 cordant note. That is the ungainly statue of 
 one, Wilhelm, formerly kaiser of these parts, 
 that occupies the triangle just before the city 
 of Coblenz where the Rhine and Moselle rivers 
 meet. It is the most conspicuous point in the 
 landscape and the monument is so large that it 
 obtrudes itself into the picture from every 
 angle. It has what our American Ad clubs 
 would concede is the best position, or in other 
 words, preferred space. If it were artistic it 
 might be forgiven for its historic interest, but 
 is not. Before leaving we visited the kitchen 
 and mess hall of the fortress where everything 
 was wonderfully orderly, spick and span. 
 
 The Fortress of Ehrenbreitstein is 385 feet 
 above the Rhine on a precipitous rock and is 
 
 118 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 connected with the neighboring heights only on 
 the north side. The present fortress dating 
 from 1826 succeeded a very ancient stronghold 
 of the Electors of Treves, which played an im- 
 portant part in the Thirty Years' War and was 
 taken by the French in 1799. 
 
 On the hill south of Ehrenbreitstein is Fort 
 Asterstein, to which we climbed. There I stood 
 on an honest-to-goodness drawbridge that 
 spans the deep moat up to the big iron doors. 
 How many young German Lochinvars had 
 dashed across that drawbridge in days gone by 
 I wondered. Then a soldier in the party re- 
 marked ' ' you are right in line for a machine 
 gun in that first embrasure to hit you." But 
 who's afraid? I was with the American Army. 
 I could even walk with nose high right past 
 the big * ' Verboten to Enter ' ' sign before the 
 outer gate, though I read it is by " Kgl. 
 Commander ' ' — for all this is American zone 
 now. 
 
 Only the First and Third divisions are in the 
 area as I write. The Third division is to leave 
 this week and the First, with the exception of 
 about 6,000 men, had that day received wqrd 
 
 119 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 that they would leave Aug. 15. About 25,000 
 American troops are to be left as the American 
 Forces in Germany, I am told, and Major Gen. 
 Henry T. Allen is in charge. 
 
 I had a short talk with Major Geo. Cockriel, 
 provost marshal of the A. F. in G. and he told 
 me something of conditions in Coblenz. Out- 
 wardly there were no signs of suffering among 
 the people as the American army, through Mr. 
 Hoover, had been able to fill their immediate 
 needs and to sell them some supplies. So food 
 conditions have been much better for the people 
 since our Army of Occupation is stationed 
 there. Those who are suffering are not the ones 
 who are bitter against the Army of Occupation. 
 They are the old, the crippled and the little 
 children. The provost marshal told me of the 
 practice of people of means of buying up the 
 food cards issued to the poor and thus purchas- 
 ing army supplies for their own use. ' ' We 
 issue food cards that for a mark and a half 
 the poor get nourishing food with fats or milk 
 for the children, but instead they often sell the 
 cards and buy potatoes or some other food that 
 has not the nutritive value. Whenever I have 
 
 120 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 been able to get hold of these profiteers I have, 
 made an example of them — given them the full 
 extent of the law." Otherwise they have had 
 but little trouble at Coblenz — occasionally a 
 disturbance — nothing but what might happen 
 in any city of this size, he assured me. He did 
 not mention that he had been the target for a 
 bullet on the street only a short time before, but 
 intimated that our army has a firm hand on the 
 situation. Major Fernbach of the circulation 
 and civil affairs department told me the prob- 
 lems of the German people of the occupied zone 
 would be considered by the Interallied Rhine- 
 land Commission. We saw no signs of poverty 
 in the villages through which we passed. There 
 were the usual evidences of German thrift and 
 the children looked well fed. The fields are 
 growing and from their appearance the crops 
 will be large. "We were unable to buy chocolate 
 in Coblenz. 
 
 On Wednesday we motored to Cologne which 
 is the English zone, with Gen. Sir William 
 Robertson in charge. At a gasoline station on 
 the way I talked to Private Watson of Cedar 
 Rapids. There was a noticeable difference 
 when we passed from the American to the Eng- 
 
 121 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 lisli zone and we began to see squads of Eng- 
 lish Tommies on the streets of the villages. 
 Cologne is about sixty miles from Coblenz and 
 the way led through the University city of 
 Bonn. It was in Bonn that Beethoven was 
 born. 
 
 On arriving in Cologne we stopped before the 
 cathedral which is the finest Gothic edifice in 
 Germany. It was begun in the 13th century 
 and only finished in 1880. A guide took us 
 through, together with a group of English sol- 
 diers and English women welfare workers. He 
 pointed out where the stained glass windows 
 had been removed and plain glass substituted 
 saying: " The wonderful windows were taken 
 out during the war as a bomb could destroy in 
 a few moments a work of art that took years 
 to make. ' ' I wanted to ask, ' ' What about 
 Rheims? " Cologne dates back to 38 B. C. and 
 was founded by the Romans. 
 
 We called on the head of the English press 
 who was most cordial, but said : ' l Why, there 
 is absolutely nothing doing here, dontcher 
 know. It is so very quiet. All the correspond- 
 ents have left in disgust. Oh, no, we've had no 
 
 122 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 trouble to speak of. Well, I think the men 
 with families will be glad to go home, but the 
 others seem not to mind staying." The Eng- 
 lish Tommies have what they call a Rhine 
 Army Dramatic Club. " I don't know much 
 about it, you know," admitted the head of their 
 press, frankly. " They have given some Shaw 
 plays — I suppose it is like those things usually 
 are." The streets of Cologne fairly swarmed 
 with English soldiers and officers. At the Eng- 
 lish officers' club we found women are not ad- 
 mitted after tea-time, 5 o'clock, and it was top 
 much trouble to hunt up the English press of- 
 ficer, who had directed us there, for special per- 
 mission, so we started back to Coblenz at six 
 o'clock convinced that the English forces were 
 just having a nice quiet time at Cologne. 
 
 Thursday morning we motored to Mayence 
 (you must pronounce it "My-ahnss" now) 
 which is the headquarters of the French Army 
 in Germany and where 75,000 to 150,000 soldiers 
 of France will guard the Rhine bridgehead, 
 until the peace terms are met. It was after ten 
 o'clock that morning, following an interesting 
 visit to the general headquarters, where I met 
 
 123 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 officials of the American army and saw the 
 long waiting lines at the passport offices, that 
 we left Coblenz. In the party besides Lieut. 
 Jobes and the young Frenchwoman who accom- 
 panied me, were Capt. Bertrand, French intel- 
 ligence officer stationed at Coblenz and his 
 mother, Mme Vigne of Paris, who was on her 
 way to the south of France. It was through 
 Capt. Bertrand that we had obtained passports 
 to enter the French zone of occupation for we 
 had to have the official permit to go there as 
 well as the English passport to Cologne. Capt. 
 Bertrand wore several crosses of war and the 
 ribbon of the Legion of Honor. He had lost 
 one eye and had a deep scar in his face from 
 wounds. This intrepid little Frenchman knew 
 the name and history of every castle on the 
 Rhine and was a veritable guide book of in- 
 formation. 
 
 As we motored along he pointed out on oppo- 
 site promontories the two medieval castles, the 
 Cat and the Mouse. The Mouse was the castle 
 of the Archbishop von Falkenstein and was 
 socalled derisively by the Counts of Katzeneln- 
 bogen in contradistinction to their " Cat." 
 
 124 
 
WITH THE WATCH ON THE RHINE 
 
 Past the fortress of Rheinfels and then through 
 Bacharach. The French captain related Bacha- 
 rach 's claim to fame. Its wine is so noted that, 
 so the story goes, Archbishop Williges of May- 
 ence sold the city of Nuremburg for a single 
 cask of it. It is this same Archbishop of May- 
 ence who, on being ridiculed on account of his 
 humble origin as the son of a blacksmith, chose 
 the wheel for his coat of arms and later it was 
 taken as the design for the seal of the city of 
 Mayence. We passed the Mouse Tower, the 
 Lorelei Rock and then through Bingen into the 
 fertile Rhinegau. 
 
 Mayence was alive with French poilus and 
 we had luncheon at the French Cercle des Offi- 
 ciers. Red Fez capped Colonial troops added 
 to the colorful picture in the courtyard. 
 
 The American Army car took us to Worms, 
 a large and thriving city where we bought 
 plums in the market place. Some of the streets 
 were only wide enough for the car to get 
 through. At Worms we took the train for 
 Strasbourg to see the redeemed Alsace. 
 
 And how did I find our boys in Germany is 
 the question you want to ask! They are splen- 
 
 125 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 did. I have seen the contented and the discon- 
 tented ones — the grave and the merry ones. 
 The chap who hasn't heard from home for 
 three months naturally wants to get back. I've 
 had officers tell me they regret to leave and 
 others, like the man yesterday who said he was 
 the oldest inhabitant on the Rhine, having been 
 there since the armistice, the very thought of go- 
 ing home made his eyes sparkle. But I gath- 
 ered that the most of them, though living in a 
 storied land, are building new castles on the 
 Rhine — air castles of home — so keep the home 
 fires burning for them. 
 
 126 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 11 
 
 THEY call it " The Fighting First. 
 It was the first American division to 
 get overseas, the first to get into the fight and 
 it is going to be the last division to get home. 
 
 The Commander in Chief has noted in this 
 division " a special pride of service and a high 
 morale, never broken by hardship or battle. ' ' 
 
 But fighting from the first to the last and 
 sticking it out to the finish is not all the First 
 did overseas. It put on a circus with three 
 hundred performers and a real, live, elephant 
 from Hagenbaeck's, twenty big acts and a wild 
 west show, closing its series of three request 
 performances tonight in Cologne before the 
 British Army of Occupation ; it has written and 
 produced the cleverest musical comedy of the 
 year, "A. "W. 0. L.," which any soldier will 
 tell you means ' ' Absent Without Leave ' ' and 
 it publishes a scintillating newspaper at Monte- 
 
 127 
 
WITHIN THE YEAH AFTER 
 
 baur called " The Bridgehead Sentinel." Inci- 
 dentally one hundred and eleven members of 
 this division were cited by Maj. Gen. E. F. 
 McGlachlin this very past week for some act 
 of bravery or service performed during the 
 war! 
 
 Do you wonder that it is a distinction to be- 
 long to The Fighting First? 
 
 I sat in the office of its chief of staff, Col. 
 Guy S. Fuqua, at Neuwied, a few miles out of 
 Coblenz the other morning at the psychological 
 moment when The First received its orders 
 home. ' ' The biggest piece of news I have 
 today," said the Colonel to me, "is that the 
 First leaves for home on Aug. 15." And the 
 Bridgehead Sentinel issued an " extra " to that 
 effect a few hours later. All of the American 
 regiments did nobly, but the record of the First 
 overseas is such a splendid one that every 
 American must thrill with pride at the men- 
 tion of it. 
 
 It was Major Chas. S. Coulter, head of the 
 intelligence section, whom I coaxed to tell me 
 a little about the First division. It is much 
 easier to get Major Coulter to talk about the 
 
 128 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 First division than about how he won the seven 
 stars on his service ribbon, five gold stars which 
 stand for battles, major engagements, and two 
 silver stars for citations. He was the first 
 American intelligence officer in the French 
 lines and was trained by the French. He has 
 the distinction of having been on duty in front 
 of division headquarters, on duty at the battle 
 front, longer than any other American officer. 
 
 No more magnificent tribute could be paid to 
 the American soldier than that of Major Coul- 
 ter at luncheon that noon when we were his 
 guests at the First division mess at the head- 
 quarters. 
 
 " There is nothing better on earth than the 
 American soldier," he said. " I've seen him 
 go into battle. He is wonderful. My men never 
 stopped for anything. My scouts never knew 
 fear. I have had a messenger come to me and 
 ask for a certain officer. ' You will find him 
 right down that road, ' I 'd tell him. ' But I 
 can't find him,' the messenger would say for 
 the hail of bullets was thick on that road. In- 
 stantly one of my men would volunteer. ■ I'll 
 find him, sir.' And he always did. No, my 
 
 129 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 scouts didn't hang around listening posts. I 
 know that is what you folks at home think a 
 scout does. A listening post isn't necessarily 
 a dangerous place. My scouts got into the front 
 German trenches. The Germans learned very 
 soon not to keep many men in their front 
 trenches for they were too exposed." 
 
 He told quite simply of a raid one night 
 when he had his men stationed at the two 
 strong points with automatic rifles. The attack 
 had been carried out just as he had foretold it. 
 At one of these strong points was Sergt. W. B. 
 Norton. The Boche came down the trench 
 calling ''American dogs, come out." The 
 Sergeant's 45 sent three bullets and when they 
 found that Boche all three were in his heart 
 within a circle of a half -inch diameter. Sergt. 
 Norton got the first D. S. C. out of it. Major 
 Coulter related exploits of the two Lieutenants 
 Green, known as Dark Green and Light Green 
 to distinguish them. He liked to talk of Ser- 
 geant Pat Walsh, too, who got a D. S. C. out 
 of that fight. ' ' He is an old regular army man, 
 Sergeant Walsh is. He has the Croix de 
 Guerre," he said, "wears about fourteen rib- 
 
 130 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 bons — he is the most decorated man in the 
 A. E. F. now. He's a fine fellow, Walsh. He 
 was our color sergeant — all man and pure 
 gold. It is the American doughboy who de- 
 serves the great credit for the victory," the 
 major emphasized. " He went in unquestion- 
 ingly at all times. I have heard men joke going 
 into an attack when they knew most of them 
 would be carried off. Their courage is sub- 
 lime." 
 
 I listened to many interesting stories about 
 the First, some unpublished stories, too. The 
 First division was organized by a special tele- 
 gram from the war department on May 31, 
 1917, which designated the 16th, the 18th, the 
 26th and the 28th infantry as the First division 
 and the first expedition. The First included five 
 regiments of Marines and a base hospital corps, 
 the Johns Hopkins unit assembled in Balti- 
 more. For three weeks the government had 
 been trying to assemble a base hospital unit 
 but could not get it together. In just twenty- 
 four hours the Johns Hopkins unit was as- 
 sembled and on its way. The four infantry 
 regiments had been on the Mexican border and 
 
 131 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 they were ordered east, shipped at Hoboken 
 and landed at St. Nazaire. 
 
 En route east many men had tossed bits of 
 army bread, on which they had written their 
 addresses, out of the windows. There was Pvt. 
 Simpson now. The censor officer only had to 
 read one of his letters to sixteen different girls 
 and he could stamp ' ' censored ' ' on all the rest. 
 They were identical. There are other incidents 
 concerning the secrecy of that expedition that 
 they tell now. One battalion of the 18th in- 
 fantry was detained at a New York station, 
 and when they inarched to the docks, someone 
 gave the order for the musicians to uncase their 
 instruments. They started down the street to 
 the tune of " The Gang's All Here." The tune 
 was changed to ' ' Happy Heinie ' ' and they got 
 in a few bars of " Die Wacht am Rhine " as 
 they went through lines of 10,000 cheering peo- 
 ple. But the story was not used by the New 
 York papers. The First sailed officially June 
 14, but it was to sail June 9 or 10. As the 
 transports lay in the harbor excursion boats 
 ran around them and there seemed but little 
 secrecy about the farewells. 
 
 132 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 Not a single vessel was lost. Only one had 
 had a close call on the voyage. The old Prince 
 Eitel Frederick, re-named the " DeKalb " es- 
 caped five torpedoes. It had the closest call of 
 any ship of the expedition. 
 
 The division debarked June 26 at St. Nazaire 
 Camp No. 1, where they left July 1 and started 
 the first training area at Gondrecourt in the 
 Province of the Meuse. Their first sector was 
 the Sommervilliers sector and they went in 
 with the 66th and the 77th trench infantry. 
 They went in by battalions first, for ten days' 
 training. The trenches there were from 800 to 
 1,000 meters apart. This was a quiet sector, 
 though they had one raid on the 16th infantry, 
 in which company F had three men killed and 
 eleven captured. This was the first raid on 
 Americans in which casualties were suffered. 
 
 The division during the winter had gone into 
 training in open warfare in case the Boches 
 should fight out of the trenches. And this train- 
 ing was harder than any attack. They lived in 
 old shelters where the snow and rain would 
 come in at night. In January the French called 
 upon them to relieve them at the Ansonville 
 
 133 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 sector. It was taken over by the First infantry 
 brigade under Gen. Geo. B. Duncan, the 16th 
 infantry under Col. John L. Hynes, later 
 made general, and the 18th infantry under Col. 
 Frank Parker, later commander of the First 
 division and now commander of the First in- 
 fantry brigade. This was a quiet sector. 
 The First put over several raids in March, 
 1918, with four officers and seventy men. The 
 Germans put a raid over of four officers and 
 240 men on the morning of March 1. Only 
 eight Germans got past the front lines, five 
 of whom were killed and the rest captured. 
 But forty yards separated the trenches of the 
 Germans and the Americans. From there the 
 First went to the Montdidier front. They won 
 glory in the battle of Cantigny, at Soissons, in 
 the second battle of the Marne, at St. Mihiel, 
 in the Argonne and Meuse and were in the 
 finish at Sedan. 
 
 Then they came on to the Coblenz bridgehead 
 as a part of the Army of Occupation, where 
 they are now holding the bridgehead proper 
 and a radius of thirty kilometers from the 
 Rhine. 
 
 134 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 "In coming across Luxembourg into Ger- 
 many the First division had a wonderful time," 
 Maj. Coulter recalled. It was Nov. 21 when it 
 started its overland march to Germany. He, 
 with Capt. L. E. E. Marechaux, on horseback, 
 rode at the head of the column. " Through 
 Luxembourg they didn't notice me," Maj. Coul- 
 ter laughed, " but they ran out and kissed 
 Marechaux, brought him flowers, held up their 
 children to be kissed, and invited him to have 
 coffee. I was an interested spectator. They 
 paid no more attention to me than if I had not 
 been there. That held until we got to the town 
 of Esch where there was a great reception. 
 Large crowds had gathered and they called on 
 Gen. Frank Parker, commander of the division, 
 who talked to them in French. The flowers 
 completely filled an auto. The general was 
 obliged to make a second speech at an overflow 
 meeting. A band played the Luxembourg air 
 seventeen times and when it struck up the 
 "Stars and Stripes Forever" they wondered 
 why we didn't salute. 
 
 " The next day the 18th infantry marched 
 through the city of Luxembourg. Our arms 
 
 135 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 were filled with flowers. Why, when the horse 
 of one of our officers bucked none of us could 
 help him, we had our arms so full of flowers. 
 We rested eight days in and around Greven- 
 macher where they gave dances and entertained 
 us wonderfully. 
 
 " It was December 1 when we started the 
 march to Coblenz, and reached here December 
 12. The whole division was billeted at Coblenz. 
 The 18th infantry at the head of the first brig- 
 ade and the 28th infantry heading the second 
 brigade, crossed the Rhine on the morning of 
 December 13. The 18th infantry were the first 
 American troops to cross the Rhine. The time 
 was set for seven o'clock but all our watches 
 were three minutes fast." The major's eyes 
 seemed to twinkle as he remarked that it was 
 queer their watches should all be three minutes 
 fast. The 18th was his regiment. They had a 
 two days' march to their station on the bridge- 
 head. The women of Barnbach and Ransbach 
 he said came out with coffee and served our 
 troops as they went through. They couldn't 
 understand the Germans across the Rhine do- 
 ing it. The Second and Third divisions have 
 
 136 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 been with the First division in the area holding 
 the banks of the Rhine at Coblenz. 
 
 Maj. Coulter apologized for having to leave 
 us but he had to get out the * ' extra ' ' announc- 
 ing the date of the departure of the division. 
 He is editor in chief of the Bridgehead Sentinel 
 and boasts that he is the only editor whose com- 
 posing room is thirty kilometers from his office. 
 He was formerly connected with the Provi- 
 dence, R. I., Journal. He has led men into some 
 of the hottest engagements the division has 
 seen and from lieutenants I learned he was 
 one of its best-loved officers. 
 
 Now it must mean something to keep a bunch 
 of fellows as full of pep as that First from 
 getting lonely when they have no battles to 
 look forward to, so I asked Capt. R. W. Corri- 
 gan, the entertainment officer of the division, 
 how he did it. I knew they drilled in the 
 mornings and had athletics, ball games and 
 sports in the afternoons, as is the program for 
 the entire army on the Rhine, but what about 
 the evenings? He told me they had twenty- 
 three motion picture theaters in the 52 towns. 
 They also have several fine vaudeville teams. 
 
 137 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 The Cantigny Players, named after the first 
 important village captured by the division on 
 May 28, 1918, the first big American victory, 
 put on a successful show July 4 and are re- 
 hearsing again for vaudeville. It has a cast of 
 twenty. But the real First division show is 
 "A. W. 0. L.," which means " Gone but not 
 Forgotten." It was written by Musician 
 Robert Faulkner of the First engineers and is 
 a musical production. Of course the division 
 circus is the "Biggest in Europe," their dis- 
 play advertisement in the Cologne Post, the or- 
 gan of the British army, assured me, and with 
 twenty big acts and forty clowns and a live 
 menagerie, a concert and a side show it ought 
 to be. Col. Hervey, commander of the First 
 ammunition train, is director of the circus, and 
 its three-day performances this week must have 
 made the English Tommies open their eyes. 
 Unfortunately the circus was not on when I 
 was in Cologne, but I accepted an invitation to 
 attend the division play ' ' A. W. 0. L. " and we 
 went to Andernach Wednesday night to see it. 
 Andernach is about an hour's motor trip along 
 the Rhine from Coblenz, and the big tent, for- 
 
 138 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 merly a hangar, was filled with American soldier 
 boys when the curtain went up. 
 
 "A. W. 0. L." is a remarkably clever show. 
 It has more good laughs than anything pro- 
 duced in a year. Its fun is clean and crisp and 
 new and its music is tuneful. Its chorus is a 
 wonder. Of course it is all First division men, 
 but you wouldn't guess it were it not for the 
 husky, contralto voices. The cute little one 
 with the blond bobbed hair on the end at the 
 left kept the front rows in an uproar with her 
 flirtatious wiles. They sympathized audibly 
 with the Red Cross nurse, with a heavy basso 
 sob in her voice, when she caught her lieutenant 
 husband comforting a weeping French girl. 
 The plot is woven about a doughboy who is 
 absent without leave and is joined in the ad- 
 venture by an English Tommy. The dough- 
 boy's lieutenant takes the same train to elope 
 with the Red Cross nurse. 
 
 Opening in Coblenz, the scene rapidly 
 changes to a French village. It has plenty of 
 good U. S. slang in it which gets across without 
 an effort and a number of catchy songs, one 
 about home and mother having a special ap- 
 
 139 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 peal. The doughboy manages to get himself 
 hopelessly entangled in a couple of heart af- 
 fairs and then a French poilu and the English 
 Tommy come to his rescue, which is as it should 
 be, and does more than anything else to make 
 you understand the good feeling that is grow- 
 ing up between them there on the Rhine. The 
 arrogant young lieutenant didn't get much 
 sympathy from the spectators around me — 
 there was a served-him-right tone to their 
 grunts of approval when he ' ' got his. ' ' Of 
 course it ends happily with a burst of melody. 
 Briefly speaking, "A. W. 0. L." is one of those 
 shows you cannot afford to miss. It is made up 
 of good comedy, good music and good soldiers. 
 So this is what I learned about the First 
 division. They have not been Fighting the 
 Battle of Paris, which is the way they speak 
 over here of the chap who got himself to the 
 Capital during the war when there was work 
 at the front. They have been where bullets 
 were thickest. They are led by a group of 
 splendid officers. That can be said of all our 
 divisions that were over here, but probably 
 none has had so many brilliant, talented, re- 
 
 140 
 
WITH THE FIGHTING FIRST 
 
 sourceful men, who inspired those with them 
 with the highest courage and zeal for their divi- 
 sion. Furthermore they are all rooters for the 
 First. And this First can play just as hard as 
 it can fight. 
 
 For they are all Good Soldiers. 
 
 141 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 Aug. 3. 
 "T TOW did you get to go to Coblenz? " is 
 A A the question I answer most since my 
 return. Getting to Coblenz these days is not as 
 easy as it sounds. I had appealed to scores of 
 people, powerful and near-powerful, only to 
 meet a polite "Well, I don't know how you 
 could." It was Conger Reynolds, managing ed- 
 itor of the Paris Edition of the Chicago Trib- 
 une, whom I approached when ready to give up, 
 who electrified me by asking, "When do you 
 want to go? ' : His letter of introduction to 
 Colonel Moreno, head of the G 2 of the A. E. F. 
 in Paris, brought out the same direct question, 
 and with gratifying American speed, arrange- 
 ments were made for passports. The head of 
 the press section at Coblenz was wired to meet 
 us. Through the courtesy of my government I 
 was taken over the American area of occupa- 
 tion and obtained passports that permitted me 
 
 142 
 
IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 to go into the Rhine zone of the French and 
 British armies, at this time a rare privilege. 
 Mr. Reynolds is from Des Moines and this 
 Middle West spirit of ' ' help one another ' ' is 
 one of the joys I have encountered. I met it 
 again on the platform of the Paris depot the 
 morning I left when I was once more devoutly 
 grateful. 
 
 Obtaining official passports and making train 
 reservations for Coblenz a week ahead isn't all 
 you have to do, besides packing your grip and 
 arising at 5 o'clock in the morning to catch a 
 7 :50 train. You also have to purchase your 
 ticket and get into the train, and an hour does 
 not give you any too much time for that. I 
 don't know why buying a ticket in a French 
 railway station should be such a complicated 
 proceeding, but it is. After producing your 
 passport you struggle through wads of red 
 tape. You may get into a long queue line that 
 straggles out into the center of the huge, barn- 
 like waiting room, and when your turn finally 
 arrives at the ticket window, be sent to another, 
 as we were. Finding your train is the next 
 problem. At the A. E. F. headquarters I had 
 
 143 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 been told I was to leave Paris at 7:50 a.m. 
 and arrive in Coblenz at 8 o'clock that night. 
 No change. Very simple. At the depot no 
 one had ever heard of such a train ! We located 
 a train to Metz, but where it went after that 
 no one knew. Whether it met any train that 
 might be wandering to Coblenz was equally 
 problematical. I had sent the young French- 
 woman back to ask another official and I stood 
 on the platform guarding the baggage and hav- 
 ing an argument with a uniformed trainman, 
 who was waving his hands in excited French 
 from a coupe window. It was a monologue 
 rather than an argument. He was telling me 
 for the sixth time that that train went to Metz. 
 This has been considerable of a war over here 
 and the trains on this road have been back in 
 service for such a short time no one claims to 
 be familiar with their vagaries. I had just as- 
 sembled in my best French the question, " Is 
 there no through train to Coblenz that arrives 
 there about 8 o'clock," when a nice mid-western 
 voice at my elbow asked — ' ' Could I help you ? ' ' 
 There stood two American officers. They as- 
 certained there was no other train at that hour. 
 
 144 
 
IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 " We are going there ourselves — you have to 
 wait two hours at Metz, and you will be lucky 
 if you get to Coblenz by 11 o'clock," the senior 
 officer said. 
 
 ''Where are you from!" — the usual ques- 
 tion. 
 
 " From Michigan, Battle Creek — and you? " 
 
 ' ' Davenport, Iowa. ' ' 
 
 "Davenport? You don't happen to know 
 Al O'Hern, do you? What — he's manager of 
 one of the papers you represent! Used to be 
 sporting editor when I knew him. I have played 
 ball out there. Say, what coach are you in? " 
 
 He was Captain Fountain and with him was 
 Lieutenant Darrell of North Carolina. They 
 found places in the same compartment and that 
 is how we happened to have a special guard of 
 the American Army all the way. 
 
 Into this coupe there came a tall, distinguished 
 French general with keen, smiling eyes and a 
 high-bred face. We knew he was a general 
 from the stars on his sleeve, but we did not 
 learn his name. The French general gradually 
 entered into the conversation. He said there 
 would be another war between France and Ger- 
 many before twenty years — ' ' Avant vingt ans. ' ' 
 
 145 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 In his opinion the Germans were not beaten. In 
 answer to the question would it have been better 
 had the peace been signed in Berlin instead of 
 Versailles, he replied that the Germans might 
 then have recognized their defeat. He believed 
 America should keep a large standing army 
 over here. " The Americans do not realize 
 what the Germans are," he said. " But the 
 Germans have no army," someone remarked. 
 " They have many children growing up," was 
 his reply. ' ' It w T ould take a year to get Amer- 
 ican soldiers over again, and in the meantime 
 the French would bear the brunt of the first at- 
 tacks." I have heard this prediction many times 
 recently, only it was startling from such a high 
 source. They only differ in the time. Many 
 French people seem to feel that Germany is not 
 overpowered, and that France should have had 
 more at the Treaty table from Germany for all 
 she suffered through the war. 
 
 At Metz 
 
 Two hours in Metz, which is Lorraine, you 
 know, gave us a glimpse of the city where the 
 French were welcomed so enthusiastically on 
 
 146 
 
IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 their entry last November, after the signing of 
 the Armistice. Marshal Foch and Marshal Pe- 
 tain headed the troops into Metz, and it was a 
 glorious day for the city. They went in with 
 bands playing and colors flying. The immense 
 statue of Frederick in was dragged from its 
 oblong pedestal at the head of the principal 
 street, and for a long time the figure was left 
 lying prone on the pavement beside the empty 
 base. We went to the big Cathedral to see the 
 statue with its chained hands. On one of the 
 marble figures of the prophets set into niches 
 at the outer portal, the former kaiser's face had 
 been placed. The French did not remove the 
 statue — they simply handcuffed it. The statue 
 of the kaiser in the Park was removed and that 
 of a French poilu is in its place. On the Parade 
 grounds were groups of the Alpine regiment 
 stationed there — the wonderful Blue Devils. 
 We saw a few business houses closed — evi- 
 dently German sympathizers. Metz is today 
 wholly French. Tea in a quaint, wall-enclosed 
 cafe was very French in its atmosphere as well 
 as in the cakes. 
 
 On the way from Metz to Coblenz a young 
 147 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 French soldier in the coupe told us he had been 
 in Metz when the statue of Frederick in had 
 been dragged from its pedestal. We passed 
 through the town of Thionville which has two 
 names, Diedenhofen being its German cog- 
 nomen. At Sierck we reached the frontier of 
 Alsace-Lorraine where the customs officer came 
 through. Then we traversed the Saar basin, 
 the valuable coal country of which you have 
 read in the Peace Treaty. The French are to 
 control this for the next fifteen years. 
 
 In Strasbourg 
 
 En route back from Germany we stopped at 
 Strasbourg. Strasbourg is the principal city 
 of Alsace, and the war freed it after fifty years 
 of German rule, so the pilgrimage to Stras- 
 bourg is one that few travelers to the war 
 zone will want to forego. It is one of the bright 
 spots along what will be known as the Sacred 
 Way. En route to Strasbourg from Worms 
 we passed through Ludwigshafen, and just 
 by way of reminder, passed the huge plants of 
 the greatest chemical works in Germany, which 
 during the war, was used as a gas factory. 
 
 148 
 
IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 After some difficulty in finding a hotel, as 
 Strasbourg was very crowded, we, after din- 
 ner, went to an Alsatian Kermesse. The Ker- 
 messe is an institution of its own, resembling, 
 more than anything else, our county fair. It 
 was held in a beautiful park called the Orang- 
 erie. It has a fine orangerie and a kiosk 
 once belonging to King Louis n of Bavaria. 
 You remember every musical show for years 
 used to have a Kermesse somewhere in its 
 scenes, but the real thing here in Strasbourg 
 is even more picturesque. There were the most 
 wonderful swings and merry-go-rounds. On 
 the brilliantly illuminated grounds one mechan- 
 ical swing arrangement was fascinating. The 
 couples were seated in boats which swung 
 in mid-air from ropes. A French poilu at one 
 end and an Alsatian girl, in a bright red skirt 
 with a black velvet bodice and a huge black 
 head bow, was always at the other end of the 
 skiff. They would work up to dizzying heights 
 to blaring music and under a blaze of lights. 
 But the real fun of the Kermesse is the dance. 
 On a large open-air platform they waited in line, 
 in the center of the floor, hundreds of dancing 
 
 149 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 couples, for the music to begin. It cost a franc 
 to dance ten dances, and no one would think of 
 waiting in the side lines until the music started, 
 for no note was to be missed. The girls in 
 the Alsatian costumes and the girls in the white 
 fichu-collared Lorraine frock with the white 
 frilled hat were the dominant note. Often two 
 French soldiers danced together solemnly; 
 sometimes two girls ; again middle-aged women, 
 or men and women in the sunset of life, and 
 then again little children. It was just a big 
 family dance. And the music? An American 
 fox-trot. Imagine all that quaint scene to the 
 tune of an American fox-trot. A few did have 
 the step and for others, just a dizzying circular 
 whirl answered the same purpose, and everyone 
 was happy. Girls and women in Alsatian cos- 
 tumes presided at the refreshment and post- 
 card stands about the grounds and everywhere 
 the French poilu was the life of the picture. 
 
 The next morning we had several interesting 
 hours in Strasbourg, visiting the great Cathe- 
 dral with its harmonious interior effects. The 
 stores in Strasbourg display, for the most part, 
 French signs, while a few still use both Ger- 
 
 150 
 
IN ALSACE-LORRAINE 
 
 man and French as the one that had " Kaffee 
 — Salon." 
 
 Approaching pedestrians to ask directions, 
 we used French first, then German, and often 
 could get no response, because many of the peo- 
 ple know only their Alsatian dialect which dif- 
 fers from either. At times even our money 
 would not talk, for they refuse to take German 
 marks here and gave me back in change Stras- 
 bourg money, which was valueless outside of 
 that city. When I tried to use Coblenz money 
 in Cologne I had it refused. The various cities 
 during the war issued small paper currency 
 good only in their own city, and most confus- 
 ing to the tourist, so it takes some frenzied 
 finance to keep from having a collection of 
 souvenir money on hand in traveling about. 
 Bank of France currency was the only kind 
 that was accepted everywhere. 
 
 Leaving Strasbourg at ten in the morning, 
 with its picturesquely-garbed women on every 
 street — I got the dearest old fat lady, sitting 
 on a bench in a tree-shaded square on the river 
 bank with an enormous black-bow head-dress, 
 to pose benignly for my kodak — we had the all- 
 
 151 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 day trip to Paris. We passed through Lune- 
 ville where old men were stood up and shot in 
 the streets when the Germans went through, 
 and into Nancy which had seen many air raids. 
 It was at the station at Chalons sur Marne 
 that I spied a car of coal marked " U. S. A.," 
 and I gave a squeal of delight. " Oh, there's 
 a car of coal from home." You don't under- 
 stand how friendly you can feel towards just a 
 little old U. S. coal car on a siding, when in the 
 diner back of you the black-frocked and capped 
 French waitress is pulling corks with machine- 
 gnn rapidity, and home is just about 4,000 miles 
 away. 
 
 152 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 hearing Egypt's cause 
 
 Paris, Aug. 5. 
 
 IT IS a far cry from the banks of the Rhine 
 to the banks of the Nile. 
 Returning to Paris last Friday night from 
 Coblenz and the bridgeheads with the Allied 
 Armies, I remembered having accepted the in- 
 vitation of the president and the members of 
 the Delegation Egyptienne for "Dejeuner" 
 Saturday noon at the Hotel Claridge. Why 
 the Egyptian delegation should ask me to be 
 their guest was as much of a mystery to me 
 as it is to you. So curiosity, that same quality 
 supposed to have once been so disastrous to a 
 cat, decided me to go. American correspond- 
 ents are very popular at this time in Paris, 
 especially with the nations who feel they have 
 not had justice at the peace table, and they are 
 anxious to reach the American people through 
 the great American ear, its press. So much of 
 Italy's cause and Fiume, of Bulgaria and 
 
 153 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Greece and Thrace has been printed that it had 
 not occurred to me that Egypt might have a 
 cause. But it has and a good one. And it is 
 well for those of us who live on the farther 
 side of the Atlantic to know something of the 
 problems of our neighbors on the Nile, in the 
 shadow of the pyramids. 
 
 Now, I suppose you are wondering whether 
 they were all in trailing, white-silk kimono 
 robes, with turban headdresses and heelless 
 white sandals. They were not. The formal re- 
 ception line in the foyer of the Claridge, that 
 beautiful hotel on the Champs Elysees, was a 
 group of men in correct American business 
 suits, and I was led to a reception room where 
 the president of the delegation, Zegloul Pasha, 
 looking like the up-to-date president of any 
 American Commercial club, instead of an Egyp- 
 tian Prince, was greeting the guests. 
 
 The company included about ten women with 
 120 men, the Egyptian delegation numbering 
 thirty-five. Their guests were leading French 
 statesmen, together with members of the foreign 
 press. On my left at the big hollow square 
 table with its center trail of roses, sat an Egyp- 
 
 154 
 
HEARING EGYPT'S CAUSE 
 
 tian Bey. But as our French did not match 
 up well we did not get much farther than the 
 weather. At his left was Mrs. Herbert Adams 
 Gibbons, special writer for Century's. The 
 place card of the man at my right read Mo- 
 hammed Mahoud Pasha and he spoke English 
 as well as you. He made the only English 
 speech on the toast program and it was a con- 
 vincing one. He told me Egypt had been badly 
 used at the Peace Table. It seems Egypt linked 
 her fortunes immediately with the Allied cause 
 and gave her soldiers and her money. It was 
 the understanding that she should have inde- 
 pendence, her goal for centuries. But when 
 the time came Egypt was not allowed to send a 
 representative to the Peace Congress and she 
 is compelled now to remain under the protec- 
 torate of England. 
 
 " It isn't right," said this enthusiastic patriot 
 Pasha. " President Wilson promised so much 
 and then did nothing for us. Egypt is entitled 
 to her independence. France suffered so much, 
 she should have had more, too." I asked 
 " What would you suggest should be done about 
 it now? " " Tear up that Treaty of Peace and 
 
 155 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 make another in which the small nations will 
 have justice," was his rejoinder. "And send 
 our President over here again for four months, ' ' 
 I exclaimed. " Send another President," was 
 his laconic answer. 
 
 A few culled remarks from his speech that 
 sent that company into cheers, are enlightening : 
 
 " 'As the Lordliveth,' Lloyd George had said, 
 ' we wanted not one yard of Germany. ' Not less 
 then did we believe England wanted anything 
 of the Allied state. We fought side by side with 
 Great Britain and her Allies during five terrible 
 years. We never sided with one nation over 
 another. But we sided with Democracy against 
 Autocracy, with principles based on Right 
 against fiats based on Might. All we desired 
 was the restoration of our national right of In- 
 dependence. We saw a bright future in the in- 
 tervention of America, in American principles 
 as out-spoken by President Wilson. Our conclu- 
 sion from his fourteen points was that there 
 would be justice to all people and nationalities, 
 and that they would have the right to live their 
 lives in safety, whether strong or weak. But 
 these principles have not been applied. 
 
 156 
 
HEARING EGYPT'S CAUSE 
 
 " Egypt was not allowed to send representa- 
 tives to the Peace Congress. Egypt that has 
 had autonomy since 1841, has been reduced to 
 a position far less than that she held in the 
 last century. In vain her delegation protested 
 against condemning thirteen millions of people 
 unheard. We know President Wilson is very 
 busy just now. But Egypt wants Liberty and 
 progressive reforms, she wants the popular 
 form of Democratic government. 
 
 " We are perfectly willing to give England 
 all safeguards on her route to the East, pro- 
 vided these interests in no way violate the sov- 
 ereignty of the Egyptian people. But to hold 
 down a country that has contributed so much to 
 civilization can never be popular with the 
 thinking people of France, England and 
 America. We depend upon your support and 
 sympathy. Egypt will never accept anything 
 less than her Independence." 
 
 Doesn't that sound like 1776 from the Hud- 
 son, rather than 1919 from the Nile? 
 
 The president of the delegation made a stir- 
 ring address in which he touched on the high 
 character of the Egyptian, his broad culture, 
 
 157 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 his position socially and in politics. His clos- 
 ing " Vive Egypte Nationale " brought every- 
 one to their feet. The distinguished French 
 statesman, Anatole France, made a ringing 
 speech for Egypt's cause. 
 
 But it was left to an American journalist to 
 receive the high tide of ovations. Herbert 
 Adams Gibbons, a dean of the correspondents 
 in the Allied cause, connected with the New 
 York Herald and Century's, made a remarkable 
 speech in French. Convinced that Egypt is en- 
 titled to her freedom he touched the heart 
 strings of the delegation and thrilled the big 
 assemblage with his appeal that concluded with 
 the toast " Egypt independent and mistress of 
 her own destinies." 
 
 The flashlight and camera men did poor team 
 work, so the picture of the scene failed to take. 
 Thus I lost my one opportunity of being photo- 
 graphed with a Pasha, for the president of the 
 delegation, stepping between Mrs. Gibbons and 
 myself, had announced he would be taken with 
 "the American ladies." And the photogra- 
 pher, being French, had brought but one plate. 
 
 But Egypt is not the only small nation strug- 
 158 
 
HEARING EGYPT'S CAUSE 
 
 gling for her freedom. My morning coffee 
 often gets cold while I pore over long French 
 communications from the Bureau d 'Information 
 Coreen. Ten typewritten pages the other day 
 told me of the cause of Korea. It is said that 
 " both Eussia and Japan have been eyeing each 
 other across Korea, each waiting for an oppor- 
 tunity to snatch her. ' ' I believe there is already 
 much sympathy in the American press for un- 
 fortunate Korea whose people are longing pas- 
 sionately for liberty and peace and look to 
 America to help them attain their ideal. 
 
 After all it is a good sign,, this awakening 
 of the national consciousness among the small 
 nations of the globe, and of those a half a world 
 away from us. Wasn't it Ward of the Uni- 
 versity of Wisconsin who wrote : 
 
 " Men look to the East for the dawning things, 
 
 For the light of a rising sun, 
 But they look to the West, the crimson West 
 
 For the things that are done, are done. ' ' 
 
 The Great War created new standards, 
 among them the recognition of the rights of 
 the small nations, even the least of these. And 
 
 159 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 here in Paris they appeal for the sympathy and 
 understanding of New World. They are sup- 
 plicating to us from the Far East, from the 
 cradle of our civilization. And it has been 
 written ' ' In the West, the crimson West, the 
 dreams of the East come true." What are we 
 going to do about it? 
 
 160 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 Paris, Aug. 6. 
 "YT THERE is our wandering sailor boy to- 
 
 VV night? " 
 
 "Well, just about now," chuckles Father, 
 laying down his evening paper and consulting 
 the wall calendar, ' ' Hum, just about now, he 
 is in Paris — lucky kid ! ' ' 
 
 "You don't suppose," and Mother's wistful 
 sigh has a frightened catch, as her knitting 
 needles hesitate in their click, " You don't sup- 
 pose — he could be in any danger? Paris is so 
 big and I've heard it is so gay and there are so 
 many temptations — and Billie's so young — 
 and he's seen so little of the world " 
 
 Forty thousand American mothers are look- 
 ing anxiously Parisward these days, with the 
 same nameless fear in their hearts. 
 
 That is why I went out to learn something 
 of the plans for caring for and looking after 
 the forty thousand seamen from the U. S. trans- 
 
 161 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ports, who are each given five days' leave to 
 come to Paris, before returning home to be mus- 
 tered out. Many of these men enlisted and were 
 stationed at the Great Lakes Training Station 
 in Chicago before being placed in the transport 
 service. 
 
 The background is this: The men of the 
 cruisers and battleships have been on leave 
 heretofore, but the men on the transports and 
 supply ships have not been off duty since the 
 war began, serving constantly without inter- 
 mission, bringing troops over and getting them 
 back home. They have seen nothing of the beau- 
 tiful land of France, for the ports where they 
 docked are not typical of the country. These 
 lads would leave the service with no apprecia- 
 tion of France and possibly take back a wrong 
 impression of the French people, were it not for 
 the plan of our government and our navy to 
 give them a vacation trip to Paris. 
 
 So beginning July 15 and continuing until 
 Aug. 30 the U. S. Jackies are arriving in Paris 
 at the rate of from 1,000 to 1,200 a day. Each 
 ship's crew is given five days' leave, both of- 
 ficers and men, which gives them three full days 
 
 162 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 in Paris, besides the journey across France 
 from Brest. 
 
 1 ' I think that is the most wonderful idea of 
 your government," said my French cousin, 
 Cecile, to me the other day, when she admired 
 a group of our trim American Jackies on the 
 Champs Elysees, and I was telling her about it. 
 " No one thought of doing anything like that 
 for our French soldiers. They only saw the 
 districts in which they fought. Think what your 
 boys will see and what an education it will be 
 for them ! ' ' 
 
 The tremendous problem of housing and car- 
 ing for these sailors in Paris confronted the 
 navy. The Champs du Mars barracks and can- 
 teen, conducted by the Red Cross, for the hous- 
 ing of the personnel of the army and navy in 
 Paris, was slated to be closed July 15, when the 
 Bed Cross demobilized. The navy appealed 
 to the Paris Y. M. C. A., and the Y. immediately 
 jumped into the breach, took over the Champs 
 du Mars barracks, which accommodates 1,500 
 men, and began operations on July 15 without 
 a break in the service. 
 
 Arrangements for the transfer of the bar- 
 163 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 racks from the Eed Cross to the navy were 
 handled by Lieut. C. H. Husted, naval assistant 
 provost marshal in the Paris district. M. H. 
 Bickham, regional director of the Paris Y., 
 who conducted its negotiations, had the interests 
 of the sailor lads particularly at heart, having 
 been head of the Y. at the Great Lakes training 
 station before coming overseas. James G. Con- 
 nor, director of train service and information 
 department of the Paris Y., was installed as 
 director of the Champs du Mars, which will be 
 operated until the navy leave closes on August 
 30. Admiral Long is commander of the U. S. 
 naval forces in Paris and Commander Lawther 
 has charge of this phase of the work. 
 
 It includes, in addition to the Champs du 
 Mars barracks, the keeping open of three Y. 
 hotels, a theater and a sightseeing department 
 of twelve autos, together with tours to the 
 fronts, to give the navy boys a chance to see 
 the city and its environs. 
 
 So when your Jackie arrives in Paris, don't 
 imagine him standing helpless and confused in 
 the great seething depots. He is hardly out of 
 the railway carriage door, before he is grabbed 
 
 164 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 by a Y. man, shooed to one of the big army 
 trucks in waiting and whirled through the 
 streets to the Champs du Mars barracks. This 
 is right under the nose of the big Eiffel Tower, 
 in the most picturesque part of the city. 
 
 I stood within the tented walls of the Champs 
 du Mars the other morning when a delegation 
 of six hundred blue-clad sailor lads from Brest 
 filed in. I talked with a number of them, clean- 
 looking, fresh-cheeked American boys, who 
 wore their jaunty caps at a dashing angle and 
 with a salt-tar. air. One told me he had been 
 in the navy a year and a half. " Yes, this is 
 the first time I have gotten to Paris," he said 
 and his eyes sparkled in anticipation of the 
 great treat. 
 
 In a double row of twenty tents, back of the 
 main barracks, the boys are lodged for one 
 franc a night. The long rows of cots had 
 smooth clean white sheets and everything was 
 neat and in order. This barracks boasts of the 
 only shower baths in Paris. In the long mess 
 hall I caught sight of a bouquet of field flowers 
 stuck into a fruit jar, making a colorful table 
 adornment. At the farther end was a canteen 
 
 165 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 where a good lunch was to be had for fifty cen- 
 times. I got in line for an ice cream cone at the 
 canteen and it was real American ice cream. 
 
 In the big reading and lounging room of the 
 barracks soldiers and sailors w T ere reading and 
 talking. In an outer tented room, a steady 
 stream of Jack Tars was lined up, enroute to 
 the registration desk. Lieut. Husted, naval pa- 
 trol officer, constitutes himself an information 
 rather than a police department, and is en- 
 thusiastic that the navy boys should have the 
 time of their lives. Miss Van Dyke has charge 
 of arranging a series of social affairs between 
 the American forces and the French people. 
 
 His three days in Paris, if Jackie desires, 
 may run on this schedule : First day, sightsee- 
 ing tour of Paris in big army trucks with special 
 guide to the galleries, museums, and places of 
 historic interest. Second day to Chateau 
 Thierry, Eheims, over battlefields. Third day, 
 Versailles, palace and gardens. 
 
 Of course there are other trips conducted by 
 the Y. that he may take : To Fountainbleau, 
 the home of the French kings ; to la Malmaison, 
 chateau and grounds, the former home of Na- 
 
 166 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 poleon and Josephine ; to Chantilly, the chateau 
 of the Conde, with its museum and art treas- 
 ures, and the boat trip on the Seine. There is a 
 Hugo's " Les Miserables " trip, covering points 
 mentioned in the book, and another trip to the 
 Gobelin tapestry works, the famous 300 years 
 old state factory. A trip to the Paris sewers 
 is of special interest to engineers. A Sevres 
 pottery trip goes to the famous state pottery 
 factory and museum of Ceramics and one few 
 miss is to the Catacombs of Paris. From Jan. 
 18 to July 5 the Paris Y. handled almost 700,000 
 men and officers on sightseeing trips. At one 
 time they ran 21 cars on motor trips in Paris 
 alone and had 117 guides. There are still fifty 
 guides in the service. 
 
 Then if your Sailor Boy has an evening left 
 of his precious three days, he can go to the 
 Albert Premiere theater, a most delightful and 
 artistic place, where good shows, movies and 
 vaudeville are put on nightly expressly for him. 
 The theater has a seating capacity of 500. This 
 is the only one of the three theaters, operated 
 by the Paris Y., that is still open. The Champs 
 Elysees theater, the largest of these, and seating 
 
 167 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 4,000, closed a few weeks ago. Its rental was 
 $50,000 for the three months' season and after- 
 ward $300 a night. No soldier nor sailor paid 
 admission. His uniform was his pass. These 
 Y. theaters have been, on special occasions, 
 given over to the K. of C. 's and the Jewish Wel- 
 fare Board for entertainments. 
 
 From the Champs du Mars I was taken on 
 an inspection tour of the three hotels still 
 operated by the Paris Y. and where the over- 
 flow of sailor lads is cared for. We lunched 
 at the Garden, which probably is better known 
 than any other Y. place, excepting the general 
 foyer, to every American with the colors who 
 got to Paris. The Garden, as its name implies, 
 is an outdoor canteen, where you take your 
 cafeteria tray and sit at small tables in the 
 garden, under big, old trees, and enjoy a real 
 American meal, with a heaping soupdish full 
 of ice cream at the finish. 
 
 The history of this war will never be com- 
 plete until someone composes an epic to the 
 American ice cream abroad, vast amounts of 
 which were consumed over here by our Army 
 and Navy, and how much it had to do with the 
 
 168 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 ultimate victory. Someone with a keen knowl- 
 edge of psychology discovered that a lad could 
 not be actually unhappy and eat ice cream at 
 one and the same time. Next to letters from 
 home, ice cream was the chief panacea for home- 
 sickness and the champion consoler. 
 
 And had the Paris Y. done nothing else than 
 rush special mechanical freezers across the 
 ocean, and opened its own ice cream plant, with 
 a capacity of 2,000 gallons a day, it would have 
 rendered an incalculable service to humanity. 
 I was even allowed here to stand in awe before 
 the only ice cream soda fountain in Paris, prob- 
 ably in Europe, brought all the way from the 
 States, but there were too many in line ahead 
 to wait to be served. 
 
 But I am digressing from the Garden itself, 
 where J. H. Strawbridge, the general secretary, 
 with a force of thirty operates the quaint, high- 
 walled-in garden and its hotel. The hotel ac- 
 commodates 150 men and it has a "mother's 
 corner," where a kindly,, smiling, American 
 woman sews on buttons and listens to troubles 
 with an open heart and a sympathetic word. 
 Twelve hundred soldiers and sailors are fed 
 
 169 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 daily in this canteen and its lemonade and post- 
 card stand has a record of 2,300 individual 
 sales in one day. Its big lounging rooms are 
 attractive and its secretary may often be found 
 standing over a chap at a desk, who has a puz- 
 zled, faraway look in his eyes, and murmuring 
 to him: " It is spelled L-O-V-E, Boy." 
 
 From there we went to the Hotel Rochester, 
 which since opening on Dec. 1, has accommo- 
 dated 75,000 men. It is located in a modern 
 building and has rooms for 400. In June its 
 cafeteria served 11,806 men at an average cost 
 to the men of one franc, 41 centimes, not quite 
 30 cents. This is noteworthy considering the 
 high price of food today in Paris. 
 
 1 1 We try to break even on the cost of food, ' ' 
 said the manager, W. A. White. " The men 
 get lodging for two francs a night, a cot with 
 fresh linen, towels, soap and plenty of hot 
 water." Here the soldiers and sailors may also 
 get their money changed and are given any 
 service required. All of the soldier theatrical 
 talent has been billeted at the Rochester. One 
 company of 154 men, the cast of the 88th divi- 
 sion show, "Who Can Tell," was quartered 
 
 170 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 here while their performance was running at 
 the Champs Elysees theater. The hotel has an 
 American staff of fourteen, augmented by nine- 
 teen French help. They say it is some problem 
 to get them to work harmoniously together. It 
 operates also a dry canteen and a large check 
 room. 
 
 The Hotel Pavilion is the largest of the three 
 hotels now operated by the Paris Y., accommo- 
 dating 500, of whom 60% are now sailors. It 
 has excellent rooms for three francs a night. 
 Titus K. Witwer of Philadelphia is its director, 
 a splendid type of Y. secretary, earnest, en- 
 thusiastic and approachable. He tells a story 
 of the Frenchwoman who came to him recently 
 and asked him to find a husband for her daugh- 
 ter. ' ' But, Madame, ' ' he protested, ' ' I am 
 running a Y. hotel not a matrimonial bureau." 
 She was insistent — she wanted her daughter to 
 marry an American soldier and felt he was 
 just the person to choose the right kind. 
 
 General Pershing visited the Hotel Pavilion, 
 as did Mrs. "Wilson while she was in Paris. 
 It has a large assembly room with a stage for 
 entertainments and dances. There is vaudeville, 
 
 171 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 also movies nightly, with frequent matinees, 
 and Monday is dance night. There is a billiard 
 room, a big double dining room, a wonderfully 
 clean, modern equipped kitchen with big pan- 
 tries, wet and dry canteens, shoe shine chairs 
 and a barber shop. In a sunny library with 
 writing tables is its " mother's corner " where 
 a boy gets advice and mending and sympathy 
 all at the same time. One of the pleasant hotel 
 features is afternoon tea and coming in from 
 a long, cold, sightseeing tour it is a great favor- 
 ite with the boys. They have music, tea, cakes 
 and lemonade every day at 5 o'clock. On Sun- 
 day afternoons a French orchestra plays. The 
 hotel staff includes thirty Y. men and women 
 with 118 French help. The accommodation in 
 finance is one of its chief activities. Money 
 is exchanged and checks cashed at all hours, in- 
 cluding Sundays. From here the boys may send 
 money home without cost and there is a safety 
 deposit vault. 
 
 But the Hotel Pavilion's greatest service is 
 to the stranded soldier or sailor lad. Cots and 
 beds are provided and also meals furnished free 
 to those who cannot pay for them. They have 
 
 172 
 
WHEN OUR JACK TAR CAME TO PAREE 
 
 100 free cots and they are always occupied. 
 Special care is taken, when a lad has to avail 
 himself of these, to have him understand that 
 it is not a charity, but provided by the home 
 folks. The hotel has consistently shown a loss 
 which is its proof that it is measuring up to its 
 policy of the best service and no profit. 
 
 The Hotel Richmond, in the Rue d'Helder, is 
 an officers' hotel with 125 rooms and where 
 about 200 meals are served daily. I was con- 
 ducted through its ground floor. It did not ap- 
 pear more attractive than the hotels of the pri- 
 vates, though its dining room was larger and 
 the service more elaborate. 
 
 So from this you will gather that you need 
 have little fear for your Jackie Boy in Paris, 
 if he has had the right home training. Here is 
 a sign I saw that day in several of the barracks 
 and hotels : 
 
 Have You Kept Faith with the Folks at Home? 
 Watch Your Step, Buddy. 
 
 They are showing your sailor lad the time of 
 his young life in ' ' gay Paree ' ' these days — 
 and they are safeguarding him at that. 
 
 173 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE FOR DEVASTATED 
 FRANCE 
 
 Aug. 11. 
 
 SHE is the dearest little old Frenchwoman, 
 is Madame Monpriver. She resides at 
 Cutry. That is, if you would call a cave, that 
 was once part of a stone quarry, a residence. 
 She invited me into her damp, dark, ' ' carriere, ' ' 
 just a big barn of a room, hewn out of stone 
 and going straight into the side of a cliff. To 
 be sure there are no windows, only a few planks 
 up on the side walls where the tremble of earth 
 from the big guns had knocked out huge pieces 
 of stone. There is a, bed in one corner; near 
 the door is a stove and opposite it a wooden 
 table with the simplest of cooking utensils. Her 
 neighbors in the adjoining caves, sweet faced 
 old women, showed me through their apart- 
 ments. One had graced her walls with some 
 faded old prints. The most palatial of the caves 
 had been partitioned into a suite of four rooms, 
 
 174 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 that penetrated far into its cold, gloomy depths. 
 Twenty-two people had lived in this one cave 
 all winter. Very human sort of people, too. 
 Just the same as you and me. " Tres joli," I 
 said as I gasped at the thought. It is very much 
 warmer with the planks across the big holes 
 near the top, they assured me. 
 
 Madame Monpriver insisted upon showing 
 me her old home. Locking the rude door of 
 her cave habitation and dropping the big key 
 into her capacious pocket, she trudged ahead of 
 us up the winding road. A spry little grand- 
 mother she was in a full, dark, skirt and loose 
 blouse, with apron strings around the middle, 
 and a wide, downward-brimmed, old straw hat 
 shading what once must have been merry blue 
 eyes. Past a turn in the ruin-bordered street 
 and we came upon it. Heaps of stone and plas- 
 ter, a few feet of upstanding wall; a solitary 
 window opening, framed in jagged masonry, 
 was all that was left of her once proud domicile. 
 It must have been one of the pretentious homes 
 of the village, for it was built around a large 
 courtyard. 
 
 "Ma cuisine" (my kitchen), she said nod- 
 175 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ding to the right. Her lips trembled and the 
 tears ran down her wrinkled cheeks. All that 
 was left of her kitchen was a mass of tangled 
 debris, excepting the farther wall, where on a 
 fragment, still upright, hung three stewpans 
 on their separate pegs. One had a long handle 
 and two had short ones. She turned away from 
 them with mute suffering in her eyes. " I can't 
 look at it, ' ' she said. How many times she must 
 have placed those stewpans over the fire for 
 their evening meal when she came in from the 
 fields. 
 
 Across the courtyard she pointed to a tumble 
 of masonry — that had been her donkey's stall 
 — the donkey that had lived through a couple 
 of evacuations, too. A few German prisoners 
 were at clearing work on the place. Up the 
 path — and she pointed to their fields — she and 
 her husband had tended and cared for these 
 wide smiling fields of grain and potatoes. 
 Across the road in grounds where part of a 
 church tower still stood she led us to her garden. 
 There were onions and beets in straight rows. 
 At the end of the garden, were four crosses, 
 the French soldier graves she cared for. The 
 dates on the crosses were August and Septem- 
 
 176 
 
Marshall Petain thanking the C. A. R. D. chauffeur girls after decorating them 
 with the Croix de Guerre at Blerancourt, France. 
 
 
 Dn a French dugout, like an inverted metal tureen, that once held a periscope. 
 
 With Miss Converse of the Paris office (left) and Miss Rose Clark, chauffeur, 
 
 (seated) of the American Committee for Devastated France. 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 ber, 1918. Three of the graves have now been 
 claimed. The wife of one of the fallen heroes 
 had come only a few days before and was so 
 grateful to her. On that grave was an ornate 
 cluster of bead flowers that the French use for 
 such adornment. 
 
 Gradually she told me. They have suffered 
 three evacuations during the war. In 1914 the 
 Germans had gone through but had not de- 
 stroyed the village. In 1917, when the tide of 
 war again swept over them, they were forced 
 again to leave their home. On May 31, 1918, she 
 with her husband and a neighbor started on 
 foot down the road, driving the donkey-cart, on 
 which was piled a few of their more precious 
 worldly possessions. She took along a cock 
 and three hens. Her cow, she told me, her eyes 
 filling again, had died on the way. Down the 
 road they went, the noise of the big guns in 
 their ears. They were not very welcome in 
 some of the villages they passed through ; these 
 people had cares enough with the battle raging 
 just beyond their doorstep. Anyway, I learned 
 one lost social prestige by becoming an evacuee. 
 After some days they stopped in a village called 
 
 177 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Danville in the Eure et Loire, where she and 
 her husband obtained work in the fields of a 
 farm at three francs a day. On Sept. 8 they 
 came back to Cutry to find their house and be- 
 longings utterly demolished. 
 
 Since then they have lived in the cave. 
 
 * l You are brave, ' ' I tried to say. She turned 
 to the pretty blonde in the horizon-blue uniform 
 with the letters C. A. R. D. on her sleeve. ' ' We 
 should have starved without The Committee," 
 she replied. And the pretty girl patted her 
 wrinkled hand with " Madame, do you remem- 
 ber the day everybody in Cutry came to your 
 cave, and we had coffee and we brought the 
 graphophone and had music — and that day you 
 cooked us the two eggs your hens laid? " " Oui, 
 oui, Mademoiselle Rose," she laughed. " Oh, 
 she is the joy of The Committee," said Rose 
 Clark who had rushed me to Cutry to see how 
 they peddled groceries from a camion to the 
 villagers assembled in front of the caves. 
 
 And what does C. A. R. D. mean and who is 
 The Committee you want to ask? C. A. R. D. 
 stands for Committee Americaine pour les Re- 
 gions Devastees de la France. In English, 
 
 178 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 American Committee for Devastated France. 
 Every repatriate in the region knows " The 
 Committee ' ' and turns to it for everything from 
 goats to bridal veils and from baby clothes to 
 coffins. I had heard of it vaguely before com- 
 ing over, as Anne Morgan's committee. Anne 
 Morgan, its vice president, is the daughter of 
 the late Pierpont Morgan of New York and 
 millions. I have forgotten all the dire things 
 Miss Morgan threatened would befall me if I 
 dared mention her name with The Committee. 
 But how can I be blamed if a work is known by 
 its dominant spirit? Though two days in its 
 midst convinced me there were seventy-nine 
 other dominating spirits in that committee of 
 eighty women, who are sharing intimately in the 
 life of the people in the hundred villages in the 
 department of the Aisne, now directly under 
 their care. Mrs. A. M. Dike is commissioner for 
 France. It was she to whom I had a letter of 
 introduction from Miss Alice French (Octave 
 Thanet) with the injunction to find out about 
 shipping Iowa cows to help France. 
 
 That is how I happened to land at Vic sur 
 Aisne last Friday morning and a Ford camion- 
 
 179 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ette, speeded by the pretty blonde girl, swirled 
 me up the road and jerked up in the courtyard 
 in front of a green shuttered white house, that 
 is The Committee headquarters at Vic — as 
 they say for short. 
 
 Helen Converse of the Paris office, who had 
 been delegated to personally conduct me 
 through a few of The Committee's villages, is 
 from Columbus, Ohio, and was one of the two 
 girls sent overseas by the Ohio Federation of 
 Women's Clubs with the General Federation 
 unit furlough home fund. She was connected 
 with the leave area at Grenoble, France, until 
 it closed recently when she was transferred to 
 the C. A. R. D. 
 
 A cheery-facecl manager welcomed me at the 
 door, Isabel O'Connor, and taking my coat said 
 briskly, ' ' You had better go right out to Mon- 
 tigny if you want to see the baby clinic ' ' and 
 we were soon Fording over the shell-dented 
 road to the next village. 
 
 It would have done the souls of our American 
 baby week workers good to have stood in the 
 little cottage room in that battered French ham- 
 let, and to have seen the mothers, with their 
 
 It V 
 
 180 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 babies, listening eagerly to the American Red 
 Cross nurse advising each one in rapid French. 
 And the little golden haired, three-year-old 
 wailed bitterly when she was placed on the 
 scales, in her birthday clothes, just as do her 
 wee American cousins of that age. Mrs. Mary 
 Breckenridge Thompson, a graduate nurse of 
 St. Luke's, New York, is the devoted head of 
 this work here, holding baby clinics in five big 
 centers, which comprise fourteen communes. A 
 commune is made up of a cluster of villages, 
 sometimes as many as seven. In addition to 
 looking after the health of sixty-eight babies 
 under two years of age, she has weighed and 
 measured over 400 children from the ages of 
 2 to 6 years. 
 
 Over the door of Mrs. Thompson's office in 
 the dispensary at Vic, a wooden shack on the 
 grounds back of the green shuttered house, some 
 wag put the sign, found in a French trench, 
 " Boyau des Chevres " (goat trench), because 
 it was Mrs. Thompson who had sixty-three goats 
 brought into the district and distributed among 
 the families with little children. None of these 
 children, under the age of four years, had ever 
 
 181 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 before tasted fresh milk. Think of it! The 
 cows had been taken by the invading army. And 
 these children have had little canned milk. For 
 that reason most of them are below normal. 
 Mrs. Thompson has the cooperation of Dr. Ethel 
 Fraser of the American Woman's hospital, and 
 Dr. Ward, the Committee dentist at Vic, the 
 latter having already cared for the teeth of 
 600 children. 
 
 Down the sunny road I heard children's 
 voices singing " The Marseillaise," and, has- 
 tening, we came upon a pretty sight. Twenty 
 little folks, standing in the dusty roadway were 
 singing the hymn lustily, under the folds of 
 Old Glory and the fluttering tri-color of France. 
 It was the Jardin d'Enfants unit, the French 
 for kindergarten, and is one of the three out- 
 door schools conducted by Rachel Clark of 
 Holyoke, Mass., and Ada Milne of New York. 
 All organizations cooperate here in the work 
 of rehabilitating the war child. The French 
 peasant always comes back to his ancestral 
 acres, and this Aisne region being the richest 
 agricultural section in France, the government 
 is anxious he should return to till his fields. 
 
 182 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 But the growing child is of the first importance. 
 
 We came back to Vic for luncheon in the cool 
 green-shuttered house, The Committee head- 
 quarters. The tired doctor was called from 
 the table by word that an accident had happened 
 to one of the villagers. Every day someone 
 tries to pick up a loaded shell and then it is 
 either a hospital case or the population is de- 
 creased. A little French girl, with charming 
 manners, brought in a huge bunch of roses for 
 the nurse — all the mother had to send to show 
 her gratitude. 
 
 The afternoon trip took us to what is left of 
 Ambleny, with its ancient tower, through Laver- 
 sine, into Fontenoy with its destroyed chateau. 
 Near Nouvron we got out of the car to see a 
 French dugout, like an inverted metal tureen, 
 which had once held a periscope. At Nouvron 
 they are building barracks for the returning 
 people. At Tartiers I talked with a group of 
 refugees. They had been back since Easter, 
 trying to make the old place livable. Many of 
 these women and children had been carried 
 north by the Germans, then sent into Switzer- 
 
 183 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 land and thence to the south of France, and 
 are just sifting back to their native soil. 
 
 In the early evening at Vic we wandered out 
 on the village street, past the broken buildings 
 that form three sides of the town square, and 
 I listened to the story of the fete of the week 
 before, when 500 people assembled there on the 
 fifth anniversary of the declaration of war. All 
 the village shops had closed down that the peo- 
 ple might help The Committee decorate in 
 Allied flags and pennants. There were games 
 and races for the adults. A band from Com- 
 piegne had played for the dancing. The chil- 
 dren had their fete in the chateau grounds. 
 
 As we reached the chateau, the beautiful 
 young Countess de Riese, in a white frock and 
 wide-brimmed, white garden hat, came to the 
 big iron gates and invited us in. She took us 
 over the once magnificent grounds and gardens, 
 now wrecked through the fortunes of war. 
 Every few steps she would caution us to look 
 out for the deep shell holes that peppered the 
 open lawn. The century old trees are gashed 
 and torn. From the terrace the house, a stately 
 old castle, appeared a hollow shell, only its outer 
 
 184 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 walls standing. A handsome fountain was 
 crushed, but its statuary had been carried to 
 Paris as had many of the valuable paintings in 
 the home, she told us. The donjon, for this is 
 one of those medieval castles, had the upper 
 part of its tower shattered. It was her father, 
 the old Count de Riese, who on the night he 
 heard the bridge across the Aisne had been 
 mined by the Germans, took one of his men and 
 creeping out on to the bridge cut the wires. 
 Thus he had saved the people of his village, 
 enabling them to cross the river the next day 
 and escape toward Soissons. For that he wears 
 the decoration of the Legion of Honor. 
 
 I spent the night in The Committee head- 
 quarters at Vic, in comfortable barracks on the 
 grounds. The next morning, looking out of 
 the window, I saw a long line waiting at the 
 door of the dispensary across the lawn. The 
 French doctor of the village being ill had turned 
 his patients over to The Committee doctor. 
 Most of these patients were Germans from the 
 prisoners at work at Vic. 
 
 Before leaving I went through The Commit- 
 tee store on the headquarters grounds at Vic. 
 
 185 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Here a long string of people was waiting with 
 baskets and bags. Beans and lamps, and sugar 
 and clothes were being sold at cost or less, minus 
 the price of shipping. To the destitute neces- 
 sities are given outright. They are allowed to 
 give notes on their war indemnity in payment 
 for household supplies. The idea is to help 
 these people help themselves, not to pauperize 
 them. Miss O'Connor, the manager pro tern 
 in the unit quarters at Vic, was at the store 
 desk. She was in England when the war broke 
 out. " I was so ashamed of the Americans who 
 rushed back I just made up my mind to stay 
 over and help," she told me. She has done 
 everything from working in a canteen in Lon- 
 don's east end to making Red Cross dressings 
 at Cannes. She was listening sympathetically 
 to the account of the loss of a pig and trying 
 to count money when I came up to say good- 
 bye. 
 
 We reached the C. A. R. D. headquarters at 
 Blerancourt shortly before noon, the village in 
 which the American Committee did its first 
 work. It was here, hardly 50 miles north- 
 east of Paris, in June, 1917, that Field-Marshal 
 
 186 
 
"WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 Petain established a group of ten American 
 women. In 1914 the Germans had rolled over 
 this district in a rush that had carried them 
 almost to the walls of Paris. For long weary 
 months the .villagers had suffered under Ger- 
 man taskmasters. Then in 1917 came the great 
 advance in which the troops of the kaiser had 
 been pushed back and France set about rehabil- 
 itating the region. The Committee worked un- 
 der the French army and for that reason is 
 permitted to wear the French uniform of hori- 
 zon-blue. 
 
 Food was raised in the devastated areas, 
 utensils and implements provided, livestock and 
 poultry brought in, fruit trees planted and seed 
 distributed. In March, 1918, the Germans 
 surged forward again towards the Seine, and 
 the grey horde came so close to Blerancourt that 
 orders came for the evacuation of its people. 
 The C. A. R. D. motor corps girls carried refu- 
 gees day and night and the drivers slept in their 
 cars. For a week the women in the field never 
 took off their clothes. Many people brought 
 their children to The Committee for safety. 
 
 Then it was The Committee withdrew to Vic 
 187 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 sur Aisne, only in June to be obliged to fall 
 back to Jaignes. Along the way they opened 
 canteens for the soldiers and one has a record 
 of serving 45,000 men in a week. Now The 
 Committee is engaged in doing emergency re- 
 lief, transporting food and clothing and in per- 
 manent rehabilitation and has two other units, 
 at Laon and at Soissons. The children left in 
 their care are in their school at Boullay Thierry. 
 In Blerancourt I was taken into the only 
 workshop in the devastated regions. There 
 they have 30 French artisans and 40 German 
 prisoners at work making school desks, window 
 frames, doors and all the woodwork for the re- 
 pair of the buildings. It is a busy place, that 
 atelier, with great saws whirring and hammers 
 clicking. Here they make, too, a concrete build- 
 ing block of sandstone and cement and there is a 
 blacksmith's shop with its forge. I crossed the 
 street to see one of the little stores in its new re- 
 pair clothes, freshly painted, and just beside it 
 was a shell-smashed building waiting for its 
 turn. Blerancourt is a huddle of ruins, where 
 once 3,000 people lived, 1,000 are now back. 
 Here I also visited the American Women's 
 
 188 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 hospital with its ten wards. It cooperates with 
 the C. A. R. D. 
 
 At Saint Paul aux Bois, where we motored be- 
 fore luncheon, I almost saw a tragedy. St. Paul 
 aux Bois is a little smashed-up village a couple 
 of miles from Blerancourt where about 50 of 
 the 150 people are back. I was walking along 
 the road with a C. A. R. D. chauffeur, and she 
 was saying, " Right in this place a baby was 
 born a couple of months ago. We rushed our 
 doctor out here when we got the word — sure 
 you can go in. ' ' It was one of those corrugated 
 iron houses. The huge corrugated iron domes 
 the Boche used for dugouts have been taken 
 over by many of the French peasants. They 
 are placed against the remnants of an old wall, 
 needing nothing but an entrance to complete 
 a snug habitation. Of course there are no 
 windows, but who is fussy about ventilation 
 when a good roof is to be had? We had hardly 
 stepped inside when the chauffeur girl ex- 
 claimed in dismay, pointing to a squashy pack- 
 age on the table — "Look! They brought the 
 cakes to the wrong place. They were meant 
 for the wedding. Someone brought them here 
 
 189 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 instead. Isn't that the worst"? Now I suppose 
 the wedding's over and they didn't have any 
 cake! " Outside the door two hungry-eyed lit- 
 tle boys were watching the cake package. 
 
 Just down the road came the wedding party 
 from the church. The bride in her white dress 
 and the veil The Committee had found for her, 
 and the groom, a French poilu, in his bright 
 uniform with truly white kid gloves. And 
 streaming in their wake some twenty relatives. 
 In the group was the mother with the new baby, 
 the latter blinking in the sunlight. For its age 
 that infant hadn't missed much. They came 
 straight up to me, the smiling bride — most of 
 her front teeth were missing, but she looked 
 very happy, even if her veil appeared sus- 
 piciously like a window curtain. It was draped 
 with wonderful French art and she had a spray 
 of white flowers on her dress. The honors were 
 divided between the blushing bride and the 
 blinking-eyed baby in the arms of its proud 
 mother. Up the road the summer winds were 
 blowing four French flags over the bride 's home, 
 where they went for the wedding feast. Oh, 
 yes, The Committee had sent the flags too, but 
 
 190 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 there were two American flags that the family 
 had gotten elsewhere to show their apprecia- 
 tion. So the cakes were rescued from the home 
 of the St. Paul aux Bois baby and graced the 
 wedding breakfast after all. 
 
 From Blerancourt we went through Saint 
 Aubin, past a village whose houses were mined, 
 through Ghmy and up on the summit of a high 
 hill to Coucy le Chateau. Someone quoted, 
 11 King I cannot be, vassal I will not be, I am 
 the Count de Coucy." The old feudal chateau 
 dates back to the days of the Crusaders and all 
 the village was within its thick walls. It is 
 today another Pompeii. It was taken by the 
 French September 18, 1918, after it had been 
 mined by the Germans. 
 
 At Anizy we stopped for a drink of water and 
 were served tea by two delightful women in the 
 hut of the French Bed Cross. They cautioned 
 us to touch no shells on the battlefield, two men 
 having been blown up there the day before. 
 Through Pinon, we passed groups of Chinese 
 workmen and to Chavignan, over a terribly 
 battered road and then we were on the Chemin 
 du Dames. 
 
 191 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 I don't remember which one of the Louis 
 kings it was who had a chateau in the neighbor- 
 hood and, because he drove over this road with 
 his lady loves, it was called ' ' Road of the 
 Ladies " — the Chemin du Dames. Today this 
 road is hallowed with the best blood of America 
 and France. A sector of ghastly memories it is 
 with its trenches, its dugouts, with live ammuni- 
 tion and hand grenades, its shell-torn fields and 
 stark tree-trunks. You find a new heart-ache 
 wherever your eyes turn, looking to the right 
 and left, as you motor to Soissons over that 
 once pleasure highway, the Chemin du Dames. 
 
 And here I am reminded that to write of the 
 ' ' Card ' ' and to omit a tribute to its chauffeurs 
 is to overlook its real live wires. They make a 
 ride in a Chicago taxi seem like a moonlight 
 stroll in Yellowstone Park. It was Van who was 
 at the wheel all that sweltering August day. In 
 New York's blue book you will find her name — 
 Catherine Glen Van Rensselaer. She is a beau- 
 tiful type and I should judge she is all of 
 21. Her mother is vice-chairman of the Na- 
 tional League of Women 's Service. Persuading 
 her family to consent to her leaving boarding 
 
 192 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 school to come across and convincing passport 
 officials that she was old enough to come almost 
 brought a tiny wrinkle between her level brows, 
 but she got over in February after having 
 driven an army ambulance in New York for six 
 months. ''No,, we don't call ourselves motor 
 girls — just chaufs — it's the short for chauf- 
 feurs, ' ' she told me. I watched her change tires 
 on the road to Blerancourt where one on a 
 front wheel breathed its last. It was a new 
 tire and any mechanician can tell you what that 
 means — cutting the rubber to fit in the valve, 
 since that tire and a Ford were never made for 
 one another. These girls do all the work on 
 their cars. If any New York manicurist can get 
 their hands in trim for society in five years she 
 will be a wonder. Nothing ruffled Van but a 
 camion ahead. After passing the eighth in a 
 cloud of dust, she was saying "I'd just crawled 
 out from under my car the other day when a 
 limousine of notables with Miss Morgan dashed 
 up, and I was ordered to go with them to show 
 them the road. I was a sight — oil and grease 
 and smudge on my face, but they couldn 't wait 
 so I jumped in. We got to the Laon unit and 
 
 193 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 they were all dressed up in their best uniforms. 
 I looked like something the cat had dragged in. 
 They must have been disgusted with me. Say, 
 you wouldn't take a picture of the Jack Rabbit, 
 too, would you T " I looked around for the rab- 
 bit. Only wide trenched fields of flowers, wild 
 turnip, chicory, golden rod and red poppies 
 were in sight. ' ' Oh, that 's the name of my car. ' ' 
 Only she said it " Cah," as they do in New 
 Yawk. " It was Barbara's ; yes, Barbara Allen. 
 She won the Croix de Guerre with it. The Jack 
 Rabbit would ride lots easier if it hadn't beeu 
 through a couple of evacuations. Piling a car 
 full of people with a dozen or more hanging to 
 the outside and evacuating with it isn't really 
 good for it, but I just love the Jack Rabbit." 
 It was Marshal Petain himself who pinned the 
 Croix de Guerre on The Committee chaufs last 
 fall. 
 
 No better work is being done over here than 
 by this American Committee for Devastated 
 France, whose workers are all paying their own 
 way. It has cost $60,000 to carry the work this 
 far. They need $2,000,000 to finance it for the 
 coming year. It means food, clothing, the re- 
 
 194 
 
WITH THE AMERICAN COMMITTEE 
 
 claiming of the soil — I passed one of the Amer- 
 ican tractors they have brought in to help the 
 cooperative agricultural societies farm the land. 
 It means helping these brave-hearted people to 
 rebuild and re-establish their homes and 
 schools, building up the health of their children. 
 It means putting new hope and new strength 
 into shattered lives. 
 
 " Do you mean to tell me that you have lived 
 all your life in New York and are actually sorry 
 to leave these little deserted villages after six 
 months here ? " I asked Rose Clark, who had 
 been at the wheel of the camionette the day be- 
 fore. " Oh yes, I love it here," she said, with 
 glowing cheeks. And I recalled how far these 
 girls were from Paris with its theaters and 
 cafes, how far from the Rue de la Paix with its 
 show windows of beautiful gowns and costly 
 gems. 
 
 This is the enthusiasm with which they work 
 — this devoted band of women. If your heart 
 is with bleeding France, you must be interested 
 in the work of the C. A. R. D. 
 
 195 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE, BELGIUM 
 
 Brussels, Aug. 22. 
 
 YESTERDAY I sat in the battered office of 
 the Burgomaster of the Belgian city of 
 Termonde and heard from his own lips the 
 story of the firing of the town. Not by shells 
 from the big guns, but by wanton and system- 
 atic destruction had it been done. ' ' When 
 the Germans entered the city on Sept. 4, 1914, 
 only a few buildings had been wrecked by their 
 artillery," he said, " but on the following day, 
 the afternoon of Sept. 5, fifteen German en- 
 gineers were set to work to burn, one in each 
 street." And this quaint little city, in reprisal 
 for some fancied wrong or to terrify its popula- 
 tion, was made the victim of the torch. When 
 they finished their work, 1,252 buildings were in 
 embers. Only 98 houses remain unharmed in 
 Termonde today. 
 
 For twenty-six years has Oktaaf de Leye been 
 196 
 
IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE 
 
 Sekretaris der Stad, which is the Belgian for 
 chief civic officer of the city of Dendermonde, 
 the Flemish for Termonde. He wears the pur- 
 ple ribbon of the Order of King Leopold, in 
 recognition of his quarter century of civic serv- 
 ice. For four years, during the German occu- 
 pation, he had a bitter time. He had to work 
 for the Germans, so very hard, and he and his 
 family never had enough food. The enemy req- 
 uisitioned all their food supplies, their horses, 
 their cattle, everything. This kindly-faced, 
 white haired man, with his gentle voice, did not 
 complain, he just told about it simply. He 
 smiled sadly when I asked what they had done 
 to him, and holding out his thin, aristocratic 
 hands, said, ' ' I lost 23 kilos in weight during 
 the German occupation." (A kilo is something 
 over two pounds.) Three times they had come 
 to take him to prison — and then they found 
 they needed his services and each time he was 
 permitted to go back to his home. 
 
 Many of the women of the town had been 
 imprisoned because they had gone out to farms 
 to buy potatoes. Their provisions were taken 
 away from them and they were locked up. So 
 
 197 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 many children had died of malnutrition. They 
 had no milk. 
 
 About 7,500 of the original population of 
 10,000 are back and living in a most precarious 
 way in the remnants of the burned buildings. 
 The state pays 75 per cent and the town 25 per 
 cent of their actual necessities, but everything 
 is so high they have little besides food, even 
 now. 
 
 Though it was a busy day in his office and M. 
 de Leye was being constantly interrupted by 
 clerks, he took the time to tell us something of 
 what he had seen in the terrible years just past 
 and then, taking his hat, went with us to show 
 us how his people had to live. He said he did 
 not understand how many got along at all as 
 the sanitary conditions were often very bad. 
 There had been typhus this year. 
 
 From the windows of his office could be seen 
 a stately, ruined pile of what once must have 
 been a handsome home. He led us through the 
 courtyard into what had been the kitchen, the 
 only room now intact. Three beds, tables, 
 chairs, and a stove showed it to be the crowded 
 living quarters of a large family. Then the 
 
 198 
 
IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE 
 
 gendarme or police officer who accompanied 
 us on the tour took us to the home of his officer 
 friend in a couple of tiny back rooms in what 
 had once been a big house with a garden. The 
 mother, holding a plump, blue-eyed infant of 
 three months, told us she had seven children. 
 The place was incredibly neat. We even climbed 
 the ladder-like stairway to a room above, with 
 rows of sleeping cots, where the clean odor of 
 scrubbed floors came in spite of the cramped 
 living conditions. She had gone away with her 
 children when the Germans first came, the 
 mother told me, but she only remained a few 
 months. Her husband was working in Ter- 
 monde and she came back to be with him and 
 had lived here during the four years of German 
 occupation. 
 
 " You understand, they were not poor peo- 
 ple; they were in very comfortable circum- 
 stances before the war; her husband was a 
 friend of this gendarme with us," said Capt. 
 Raymond de Bisschop, attache of the Belgian 
 central office of information, who accompanied 
 us as guide and interpreter. Capt. de Bisschop 
 has seen distinguished service on all the Belgian 
 
 199 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 fronts and his knowledge of Flemish made it 
 possible to get the personal story from these 
 people who had been through the harrowing 
 years of the war and occupation. 
 
 Everywhere about the queer narrow streets 
 — Termonde is different from many Belgian 
 cities — everywhere the fine-looking old burgo- 
 master was saluted or greeted with the most 
 elaborate respect. I caught looks of devotion 
 following his slightly bent figure as he moved 
 energetically through the cobbled lanes. He 
 told us three factories — cotton mills — had 
 opened for work, but there would be no rebuild- 
 ing until next year. 
 
 One incident he related when asked of Ger- 
 man treatment of the people. The burgomasters 
 of the vicinity had called a meeting to consider 
 civic problems and had forgotten to ask permis- 
 sion of the German military authorities to hold 
 the gathering. They were fined 38,000 marks 
 for the oversight. 
 
 The American Red Cross had helped Ter- 
 monde so much, he told me; they had sent 
 50,000 francs. What they need now is furni- 
 ture, beds, tables, chairs, linens, as these articles 
 
 200 
 
IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE 
 
 are so expensive here. In most cases the houses 
 were looted before they were burned so there is 
 nothing left. 
 
 The offices of the city administration are still 
 in the remnants of a partly burned building 
 where they were removed from the Palace de 
 Justice, which the Germans ironically occupied. 
 Their windows look out on gaunt, crumbling- 
 walls and piles of brick and stone, what had 
 once been a prosperous city. Here in his office 
 the courtly old Burgomaster sat back in his 
 worn arm chair for a snapshot from my kodak, 
 the sunshine streaming over his white head that 
 had seen so many sorrows for his people. But 
 before he bade us goodbye I learned that the 
 war had pierced even a deeper wound into his 
 brave heart. Taking out his card case he 
 handed me a picture of his daughter, a charm- 
 ing girl looking like a spirited young American 
 type. She had died in 1915 in England. Then, 
 in a voice not quite clear, he told the Captain. 
 One night, up a dark street, he had been fired 
 upon and the shock of the attack on her father 
 had made the girl ill. They sent her to Eng- 
 land — but she had never recovered. And the 
 
 201 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 intrepid old man had stayed by his city to the 
 finish. He asked me to accept the picture of his 
 daughter. I tried to refuse but the captain as- 
 sured me that the father considered it an honor 
 if I would take it. Such is the friendly courtesy 
 of these people who have suffered so much. 
 No souvenir I could get holds such poignant 
 memories as that picture of the Belgian girl, 
 the daughter of Termonde's Burgomaster. 
 
 I came close to the Belgian invasion twice be- 
 fore reaching Termonde. And it was all due to 
 an English inner tube. The English novelist, 
 who, with his wife, completed the party in the 
 car admitted the tire was alright even though 
 it was an American tire. It was the inner tube 
 and that was English. 
 
 At the village of Aasche the automobile came 
 to its first forced halt and I talked to two peas- 
 ant women. With the captain as translator of 
 the Flemish, I learned something of what the 
 four years of German occupation had meant to 
 them. The building before which they stood 
 looked like it had been through an explosion. 
 They said that happened the day after the ar- 
 mistice when the Germans were leaving. They 
 
 202 
 
IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE 
 
 had some shells near the depot and they set 
 them off, blowing up the depot and several build- 
 ings in the town and shattering many windows. 
 About twenty Germans were killed. They had 
 been drunk, " drink Schnapps," the one woman 
 said and didn't get out of the depot in time. In 
 the next village, Lebbeke, they told us four men 
 trying to go into a house when the Germans 
 marched into the town were captured, made to 
 dig their own graves, and, then, their hands 
 bound behind their backs, taken out and shot. 
 Though only badly wounded they were buried 
 and could still be seen moving under the earth. 
 Then the soldiers fired down into the graves. 
 
 At Opwyck, where the car had more difficulty, 
 I went into the quaint white farm where I met 
 Mme. Marie Elpeec. Mme. Elpeec wore a pic- 
 turesque three cornered red shawl over her 
 head and was the old Flemish peasant type. 
 For four years they had housed German sol- 
 diers on their farm. Often when they came the 
 whole family had to give up their beds, she 
 said. Once they had protested. She has eight 
 children and with her three grandchildren there 
 were eleven of them in the house and she said 
 
 203 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 they had no room for the soldiers, for the cot- 
 tage is very small. ' ' We were told we could 
 sleep here," she said, pointing to the cobbled 
 stones of the courtyard. " They even took the 
 bread from our children and whipped the chil- 
 dren. When they left they took our clothes 
 along. And everything is so expensive. They 
 took away our horse and cow immediately. We 
 had six or seven soldiers quartered here all the 
 time. Once as many as fifty. ' ' She told me no 
 children of their village had been harmed but in 
 the next town a little girl of six and a boy 
 about fifteen had been shot. The children were 
 trying to carry food to their parents and had 
 protested when the potatoes and bread were 
 taken from them by German soldiers. 
 
 One of the men who came to watch the re- 
 pairs on the car said a German soldier had 
 shot himself in the village and four civilians 
 had been arrested for it. But the doctor found 
 it was suicide and they had been released. 
 
 So this is first hand incidents on German 
 terrorizing of the people, these simple Belgian 
 folk. Mme. Elpeec wanted to cook coffee for 
 
 204 
 
IN SACKED AND BURNED TERMONDE 
 
 us for they are wonderfully hospitable with the 
 little they have. And they are taking up their 
 lives again with a fine, simple, courage that 
 moves one to admiration. 
 
 At Termonde innumerable children with 
 wooden shoes clustered about us wherever we 
 went. On the road back to Brussels we met 
 family parties walking from one village to an- 
 other for fetes. In one, the old street lighter 
 trudged along with his long-handled torch over 
 his shoulder and the lamps in metal brackets, 
 fastened against the sides of buildings, blinked 
 their rays of hope into the deepening gloom. 
 The clatter of the wooden sabots was often 
 heard. Most of the women and children wear 
 these wooden shoes, for leather is so scarce 
 and high. 
 
 Brussels is said to be gayer than Paris these 
 days but if it is it certainly needs some gaiety to 
 forget the four years of its taskmasters. The 
 country about is wonderfully fertile, the crops 
 promise large and these people who have en- 
 dured hunger and unspeakable privation for 
 four years are doing their best to rebuild. If 
 
 205 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 it had not been for plucky little Belgium who 
 knows what the result might have been. Keep 
 your hearts open for Belgium — it will be many 
 long years until her scars of war are healed. 
 
 206 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 at Belgium's great divide — the yser 
 
 Brussels, Aug. 26. 
 
 WHERE occupied Belgium meets unoccu- 
 pied Belgium is today a desolate spot! 
 I stood on the rickety, temporary bridge span- 
 ning the River Yser, which there at Dixmude 
 is just thirty yards wide, and gazed at a tum- 
 bled panorama that for four long years was 
 the fought-for key to the coast, to Dunkirk and 
 Calais. It was the limit of the German in- 
 vasion, the Great Divide. Between the Belgian 
 trenches on one side and the German trenches 
 on the other bank of that 90 foot canal, there 
 is written in vivid Allied blood, " Not an inch 
 farther shall you go." The young Dixmude 
 lad, William Doheyn, who sold me postcards and 
 chocolate at his stand across the road from the 
 big German dugout, had been a soldier in the 
 trenches on the opposite shore of the river, 
 ninety feet from his home town, for four years, 
 
 207 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 and was never able to get over home until the 
 armistice. 
 
 I have just returned from two illuminating 
 clays at the Belgian front. 
 
 And I brought back a tremendous admira- 
 tion for gallant little Belgium and her heroic 
 people. 
 
 I have been to Ypres, where street after 
 street of skeleton walls is all that tells of once 
 handsome buildings and the cozy homes of 
 twenty thousand people. But here I found 
 gratifying reconstruction work in progress. 
 Sixty-seven new houses have been built of the 
 three hundred to be erected and two thousand 
 people are back occupying these temporary 
 homes, made possible through the King Albert 
 fund. The big, hopeful, sign in Belgium today 
 is these temporary cottages provided for the 
 returning people. I saw none living in cellars 
 and caves as in Northern France. Everywhere 
 there is wonderful cleanliness and a make-the- 
 best-of-it spirit. Then, too, Belgium has some 
 of the most beautiful cities in Europe and they 
 are now shaking off the lethargy of German oc- 
 cupation. Charming Bruges, during the war, 
 
 208 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 was transformed by the Germans into a sub- 
 marine base and U-boats were built, repaired 
 and supplied here. Through two canals, one to 
 Ostend and the other to Zeebrugge the U-boats 
 found their course to the open sea. And Bruges 
 is like an exquisite picture, with its quaint 
 houses dating from the seventeenth century; an 
 artist's dream. Ghent is set in the heart of the 
 greatest flower-growing region on the continent ; 
 Ghent with its magnificent churches, its ancient 
 castle of the Counts of Flanders in the center 
 of the city and its ' ' belf roi ' ' or city belfry with 
 the silver chimes that ring out the hours. These 
 belfries are one of the joys of touring Belgium. 
 Every city has one, an architectural gem, and 
 their bells are wonderfully musical. They 
 symbolize the freedom of the people. Ostende, 
 the Atlantic City of Belgium, shows the effect 
 of shelling from the warships, its famous prom- 
 enade along the beach now lined with ruins of 
 hotels and ravages of war. The wreck of the 
 English boat, the " Vindictive," lays there in 
 the harbor. 
 
 I was fortunate in being one of a party of 
 three, under the personal guidance of Maj. J. L. 
 
 209 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 J. Clinckenmaille of the Belgian Third In- 
 fantry, head of the trip section of the Office 
 Central d 'Information of the Belgium minis- 
 try of economic affairs, in this tour of the front. 
 The other two members of the party were an 
 English novelist and his wife. Major Clincken- 
 maille is a native of Ypres and saw seven years 
 of active service there and at Ostende before 
 the war. His left arm is paralyzed and he 
 bears the scars of eighteen shrapnel wounds 
 from the morning of April 25, 1915, when he 
 led his company in the attack at Steenstraat, 
 and his lieutenant was killed at his side. This 
 was the first gas attack of the Germans and the 
 Belgians had no gas masks, only handkerchiefs 
 to ward off the fumes. He has the Order of 
 King Leopold with palms, the Order of Con- 
 ronne with palms and the Croix de Guerre 
 with two palms, and other decorations that he 
 was too modest to talk about. The major was 
 with President Wilson and his party when 
 they toured Belgium with Marshal Foch. So he 
 could explain to me every phase of the historic 
 battleground. 
 
 We left Brussels at 8 o'clock Monday morn- 
 210 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 ing and in a few hours were in Ghent, or Gand, 
 as it is called in Belgium. For miles before 
 reaching the city and around the suburb of 
 Gentbruegge, we passed through a region of 
 nurseries, gardens of azaleas. A half million 
 dollars worth of live plants, bulbs and seeds 
 are exported to the United States and England 
 annually from this Ghent district. This is also 
 a large cotton spinning region. Cotton is im- 
 ported here from the United States, and their 
 ambition is for a greater Ghent port to make 
 it the " spot cotton " market of central Europe. 
 Flax is grown in large quantities in this region. 
 We passed many flax fields and saw thousands 
 of bundles of it along the banks of the Lys river, 
 where it is dipped in the process from the 
 grower to the spinner. There are many linen 
 and cotton mills in this vicinity. Ghent is near- 
 er by rail to the big spinning centers of central 
 Europe and hopes to establish herself as the 
 principal cotton distributing point. This is also 
 a great .tobacco growing region — we passed 
 many tobacco fields. 
 
 The hotel de ville in Ghent, the city hall, is 
 a marvel of architecture with wonderful statu- 
 
 211 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ary set into the niches of its outer walls. In 
 these European cities the show place is always 
 the city hall; it is invariably the architectural 
 triumph of the city and contains art treasures 
 of great value. Imagine taking visitors to our 
 city halls in America to show them off ! There 
 is an idea for some of our city fathers. Why 
 shouldn't the city or town hall be the center of 
 beauty, since it reflects the city itself? 
 
 A blown-up bridge greeted us near Courtrai 
 where back in the fourteenth century was fought 
 the Battle of the Golden Spurs. We stopped 
 in the battered town of Menin for lunch. Menin 
 is just on the border of France and across the 
 river is Halluin. We crossed the bridge, but 
 could not enter the town as the English novelist 
 had no French passport. In Menin the lunch- 
 eon menu was soup, made from tobacco leaves 
 and horse meat. Food is not very plentiful yet 
 in this part of the country. But you don't mind 
 — as the little English ' ' Fany ' ' girl at the 
 wheel of the car put it, ' ' you just carry on. ' ' 
 
 And then we came to Ypres. They say it 
 " Eeper," but the English Tommy persists in 
 calling it " Wipers," and as hundreds and hun- 
 
 212 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 dreds of thousands of his fellows gave up their 
 lives in the three great battles of Ypres in 1914, 
 in 1915 and 1916, he has a right, surely, to his 
 pronunciation. For this is England's greatest 
 shrine. The flower of the British army fell here 
 during the first year of the war. 
 
 Someone asked the major to show us his 
 home in Ypres and his reply was " I don't be- 
 lieve I can find it. ' ' But after traversing many 
 streets he located just a part of two walls — all 
 that was left. He showed us the remains of 
 the convent he had been sent to at the age of 
 six. On the cobbled streets he picked up pieces 
 of shrapnel for our souvenirs. 
 
 In the part of the city where the new houses 
 are being erected we were introduced to the 
 chef de section of the King Albert fund, Victor 
 Callens, who turned out to have been sergeant 
 major under Major Clinckenmaille when he was 
 lieutenant and there was a hearty reunion. 
 ''You can make faces at him now," said the 
 English novelist. " Oh, he was a fine lieuten- 
 ant, ' ' said M. Callens, in quick defense, and the 
 major blushed at the compliment. 
 
 M. Callens showed us through his home, one 
 213 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 of the new cottages which has eight rooms and 
 rents for twelve francs a month. And we met 
 his wife and six children. They had returned 
 to Ypres shortly after the armistice and M. 
 Callens is director of all the building. He has 
 now demands for 300 houses of four, five and 
 six rooms. The plan is to provide each family 
 with a separate home. The four-room houses 
 rent for six francs a month, which is less than 
 one dollar and he told me if people were unable 
 to pay that they were charged one franc a 
 month. There are five bakers and three butch- 
 ers among the returned people. These are 
 especially encouraged to come back in order to 
 relieve the food situation. 
 
 One school with an attendance of 123 children 
 has been opened under the direction of the Abbe 
 de Lahr. The Abbe de Neuville has established 
 a trades school for war orphans which will ac- 
 commodate three hundred children, and now 
 has an attendance of 115. The city ruins, in- 
 cluding the town hall, are to be left as they are, 
 but the homes are to be rebuilt as soon as the 
 people get their war indemnity. So Ypres is 
 trying to pull herself out of the debris of four 
 
 214 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 years of bombardment. The burgomaster came 
 back in February and the two thousand people 
 who have returned are trying to take up the 
 broken threads of life for the new start. 
 
 You will be specially interested in this King 
 Albert fund for 700,000 francs of it came in do- 
 nations from Americans I was told. It was 
 created by royal decree in 1916 to take care of 
 the people returning to the destroyed sections 
 of the country, to provide them with temporary 
 habitations. The Belgian government recently 
 allowed forty million francs to the fund, though 
 a hundred millions was asked for. Twelve thou- 
 sand of these wooden huts have been erected, 
 and as each hut cares for five people, 60,000 
 returned refugees will thus be provided for. 
 But as 300,000 people were homeless in Belgium 
 at the time of the armistice it is still a problem. 
 It is estimated that 25,000,000 francs are re- 
 quired to clean up the ground and give proper 
 homes to the returning people. The Belgium 
 office for the devastated regions is in charge of 
 the work. In the transportation of materials 
 they often use the narrow gauge ammunition 
 railroads abandoned by the Germans. There 
 
 215 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 is a repatriation fund from which adults are 
 allowed daily one franc, fifty centimes, and one 
 franc for each child, by the government. Also 
 an extra franc, fifty, is allowed for the return 
 of farmers, bakers and butchers. This office 
 looks after sanitary conditions, sewers and 
 canals. 
 
 Indemnity paid to refugees forced to quit 
 their homes and who do not seek to return 
 will be progressively repressed, so there is 
 every inducement to come back. 
 
 On the road out of Ypres we went through 
 Zandberg Wood called the Cemetery of Tanks. 
 The first attack of the tanks here by the English 
 was not a success and these huge implements 
 of war stand where they were left, many sunk 
 deep in the mud. We had all descended from 
 the auto here and were crossing the shell- 
 ploughed field to one of the large tanks. Half- 
 way, I turned back to put my coat in the car, for 
 it had become intensely warm. In starting to 
 rejoin the group I noticed the major in the fore- 
 ground. 
 
 " Just go on," I called. 
 
 " Thought I'd better wait — you might be 
 frightened," was his jocular reply. 
 
 216 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 " Of the tanks? " I laughed. 
 
 " No, of this," he said, pointing to a shell 
 hole over which he stood. I was picking my 
 way carefully over ground tangled with barbed 
 wire, abandoned shells, torpedoes and such. 
 
 " Oh ! " When I looked in the shell hole I 
 saw — just one leg still encased in a riding 
 boot, the blow-up remains of a German. His 
 leather shell pouch was still there. And it is 
 almost a year since the war. Beyond the tank 
 a group of German prisoners were at work. 
 Several came along carrying a stretcher on 
 which was a large, lumpy sack. The major 
 spoke to one of them. " This war was bad 
 business," was what the German said. The 
 peace treaty provides that Germany must send 
 civilian workmen to clear up the devastated 
 regions but as that has not been done German 
 soldiers are kept for the work, and groups of 
 them are seen in every town and all along the 
 roads. 
 
 We traversed a sector of Belgium outworks 
 to Oostvleteren from where we crossed for the 
 first time the flooded district now grown with 
 high weeds. From the locks at Nieuport on 
 
 217 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Nov. 2, 1914, this entire district was inun- 
 dated by a system prepared by order of the 
 Belgian G. H. Q. and maintained during the 
 whole war, keeping the Germans beyond the 
 Yser. 
 
 And then on to Furnes, the seat of the Bel- 
 gian G. H. Q. during the Yser battle. In Furnes, 
 a city of considerable size, we went through the 
 shattered courthouse on what had once been a 
 picturesque public square. In the wrecked 
 court room were beautiful old carved chairs 
 and benches, the seats of the magistrate and 
 members of the bar. On the floor lay smashed 
 stone carvings from the once handsome exterior 
 decorations. 
 
 It was dusk when we reached La Panne, where 
 we stayed for the night. It is a quaint village 
 on the windswept shore of the North Sea and 
 during the war was the residence of the king 
 and queen. Here at La Panne is the hospital 
 for the severely wounded, where the queen 
 helped as a nurse during the strenuous war 
 days. We had dinner at the Hotel Terlinck, 
 famed for its delicious sole, which goes from the 
 sea. direct to the kitchen. From its simple, red- 
 
 218 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 table-clothed, dining room in the morning we 
 watched the people going down the sands to 
 the fishing smacks to purchase fish for the 
 markets. 
 
 It was early and raining next morning when 
 we started for Dixmude, stopping at Adin- 
 kerke to walk reverently through a large Bel- 
 gian military cemetery most beautifully kept. 
 Between Wulveringhem and Alveringhem of 
 the Belgian outworks, we had pointed out to 
 us the schools of Vinckem, established by the 
 queen for the education of children of missing 
 or evacuated civilians. There is also a won- 
 derful field hospital at Vinckem. Through 
 quiet little Belgian villages, then past more 
 marsh and into the region of Belgian trenches 
 where rusty barbed wire entanglements were 
 still in a web across open fields. 
 
 At Dixmude you realize the war. Today it 
 is a picture of utter desolation and destruction. 
 This was the theater of the heroic resistance of 
 the Belgian troops and the marine fusileers of 
 Admiral Ronarch. East of the Yser, near the 
 bridge, is the remains of the corn mill that was 
 the strong German defensive redoubt. 
 
 219 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Climbing to the top of a little knoll on the 
 Belgian side of the Yser to get a better view 
 of the sweep of the river, I found myself in 
 front of a dugout of concrete. Every inch of 
 ground on both sides of the stream had been 
 shell-gashed again and again. Only that ninety 
 feet of water constituted No Man's Land, for 
 on the opposite shore I went into a German 
 dugout. Evidently only the shaky wooden 
 bridge on which we crossed has been added to 
 the landscape since the echo of the last gun 
 disappeared into silence. 
 
 Down the stream they point out to you the 
 " Boy an de la Mort,' r the ''Communication 
 Trench of Death." This trench was under 
 German enfilading fire notwithstanding the de- 
 fensive works and here the brave Belgian troops 
 suffered heavy losses. Here numerous raids 
 were executed by both sides. The trench has 
 had to be filled up for the reconstruction of the 
 river banks. The rippling Yser will always 
 stand for much in the great war for it marks 
 the border of the German occupation in Bel- 
 gium. Beyond its troubled banks I was told no 
 German set foot in four years. Though its 
 
 220 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 waters ran red with blood many times in those 
 long years, it was the unattainable land, the 
 " On ne passe pas " of Belgium. 
 
 Down the road from the bridge a few crumb- 
 ling walls are all that is left of the town of Dix- 
 mude, that boasted 6,000 inhabitants and was 
 famous for its butter. 
 
 Here the people returning are building up 
 homes from the stones of the dugouts that 
 marred their streets. " When the French 
 Colonials came to our aid here," said the major, 
 reminiscently, "we had just seven rounds of 
 ammunition left." 
 
 The next stop was Pervyse and the first thing 
 that greeted the eye on entering the town was 
 the grave of a Belgian soldier. Near the ruins 
 of a Pervyse church in a few foot plot are 
 buried 115 German soldiers, so the cross above 
 it states. It was on Oct. 25, 1914, that the Bel- 
 gians drove the Germans back beyond Pervyse 
 and established the Belgian line from Dixmude 
 to Nieuport which was never again crossed by 
 the enemy. On Oct. 27 the French Algerian 
 troops came to the aid of the Belgians and to- 
 gether they drove the Germans back to Rams- 
 
 221 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 cappelle. At Pervyse we entered what was 
 left of the stone cottage occupied all during the 
 war by two women, one a Belgian baroness and 
 the other an Englishwoman, who did so much in 
 caring for and nursing wounded soldiers. The 
 peasants now living in the cottage took us into 
 the cave cellar beyond the kitchen, where these 
 two courageous women lived through days and 
 nights of bombardment and showed us their 
 primitive cooking utensils. They have, I un- 
 derstand, written most interestingly of their ex- 
 periences in a book entitled tl Two Women of 
 Pervyse." The major told an incident in re- 
 gard to them. He was coming clown yonder 
 camouflaged road one dark night with a com- 
 pany of his men when a light loomed up ahead. 
 He was indignant for it would bring, he knew, 
 aerial bombs down on his men in a few mo- 
 ments, so he dashed up to learn the cause of 
 the light. He found the two women working- 
 over their motor car which had become stalled 
 in the road. Pervyse was a village of 1500 
 people of whom 150 are now back and others 
 will return as soon as homes can be provided. 
 Beyond Pervyse, the road lay through the 
 222 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 Belgian lines; to the right were the first lines 
 and to the left the second lines. The major 
 explained the composition of the lines. " First 
 there are the listening posts of four or six men 
 each," he said, " then the advance posts of one 
 or two platoons of forty men each; then the 
 first line of infantry with possibly field artil- 
 lery back of it ; then the second line of infantry, 
 then the field artillery, and then the heavy 
 artillery; with special batteries stationed 
 against airplanes." Dugouts, abris or shelters 
 and barbed wire entanglements punctuated the 
 scene as far as the eye could reach. 
 
 ' ' Over there is the Dammit farm, ' ' said the 
 major, pointing to a battered farmhouse across 
 the fields. 
 
 " Was that the owner's name? " I asked. 
 
 ' ' No, that is what we called it — we never 
 got into that farmhouse that the Germans didn't 
 start to shell it. Over there is Ramscappelle — 
 we called it Eamshrapnel because we got so 
 much shrapnel around here." The town of 
 Ramscappelle has little left. The trenches all 
 around it saw desperate fighting. Every little 
 while, along the way, we would pass a deserted 
 
 223 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 dressing station, where the wounded had been 
 taken, until they could be conveyed back to 
 hospitals behind the lines. 
 
 Then into Nieuport, the key of the inunda- 
 tion system which did so much to save Belgium. 
 The sluices of the five bridges were under con- 
 stant fire which destroyed them completely in 
 1918. Of special interest in Nieuport were the 
 underground passages which connect the city of 
 Nieuport with Nieuport Baths, the seaside re- 
 sort a mile and a half away and visible against 
 the horizon. This was the left extremity of the 
 western front. It was defended in October, 
 1914, by the Belgians, later successively by 
 French and British troops and again in 1917 by 
 the Belgians. I entered one of these under- 
 ground passages which are tunneled through to 
 the coast. It was a cemented tunnel, lighted 
 by small portholes to the streets and there was 
 an exit at the end of each block. 
 
 From Nieuport we motored through the de- 
 stroyed village of Lombartzyde which was the 
 advance post of the Belgian Second army divi- 
 sion during the battle of the Yser. It was oc- 
 cupied by the Germans until October, 1914. 
 
 224 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 All of this district was flooded. Then through 
 Westende to Middelkerke which was shelled by 
 English warships. Many of the Belgian towns 
 in this vicinity were shelled by the Belgians 
 themselves in order to dislodge the Germans. 
 What agony it must have meant to turn their 
 guns on their own home cities. The Germans 
 held this region until October, 1918, when they 
 retreated to Ghent where the Allies held the line 
 until the armistice was signed in November. 
 
 And then we came to beautiful Ostende, the 
 famous seaside resort for the English as well 
 as the Belgians, with its promenade along the 
 picturesque beach now a mass of stately ruins. 
 
 We lunched at Ostende in one of the beach 
 hotels that had escaped severe direct shelling 
 from the sea and had been restored. There 
 were many people about, for several of the 
 hotels are again opened. But along the pic- 
 turesque stretch of sandy beach, where fashion 
 and gaiety promenaded season after season, 
 battered cannon still stand and grim guns point 
 seaward from breastworks. In the harbor lays 
 the hull of the Vindictive and trenches and shel- 
 ters are before the Kursaal. 
 
 225 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 And then on to Bruges, the beautiful, that 
 saw four years of German occupation. And 
 Bruges is fascinating. It is difficult to tell you 
 about Bruges in a paragraph — it should have 
 an entire book. The art of past centuries un- 
 rolls before you as you traverse its narrow 
 streets. Row after row of quaint houses, dat- 
 ing from the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
 turies; and not just old but rarely beautiful 
 with such harmony of line. Every turn in the 
 street is a new delight. The motor on the car 
 was stalled many times when we would chorus, 
 " Please stop till we get a picture." I nearly 
 tumbled into the canal trying to kodak a row of 
 fluted top houses as we crossed a bridge. And 
 right there we almost lost the English novelist 
 who leaped from the car to follow a person 
 carrying an old table — his fad is antiques. 
 The churches of Bruges are lovely! In one we 
 were shown the magnificent Michael Angelo 
 sculpture of the Virgin and the Child carved 
 from a single piece of marble. In another the 
 Major's knowledge of Flemish or his war 
 crosses got the bent and mumbling old care- 
 taker to lead us to a mysterious door which he 
 
 226 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 opened with a long key and to admit us to some 
 holy of holies where hung pictures, old masters, 
 of the most marvelous colorings — the wife of 
 the English novelist was so enchanted here we 
 could hardly get her away. The bells of Bruges 
 are not the least of its enchantments, and the 
 quaint, steepled belfry on the Grand Place 
 throws its shadows across the monument of 
 Breydel and De Coninck that occupies the cen- 
 ter of the square. They were the leaders in the 
 factions of the Battle of the Golden Spurs that 
 I mentioned at Courtrai, where it was fought 
 way back in 1302. Breydel was the head of the 
 Butchers Corporation and De Coninck was 
 head of the Drapers, the Cloth Corporation, 
 and they were both citizens of Bruges. It was 
 a battle of the trades organizations against the 
 aristocracy, and the former were the victors. 
 And it was called the Battle of the Golden Spurs 
 because so many golden spurs were found later 
 on the battlefield. Evidently there were indus- 
 trial upheavals even then. However, Belgium 
 today has no strikes. Industrial difficulties are 
 handled through a joint employers' and work- 
 men's council to which all questions are sub- 
 mitted. 
 
 227 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Leaving Bruges most reluctantly — it is hard 
 to visualize that from its steeped-in-art atmos- 
 phere was waged the destructive U-Boat war- 
 fare against English commerce — we motored 
 out through its medieval gateway and on the 
 highroad to Ghent. In the twilight through the 
 villages we passed cottages where old women, 
 young women and little girls sat in groups be- 
 fore the doorways making lace, the wonderful 
 cobwebby Brussels and Bruges laces. Each lo- 
 cality has a lace of its own and these peasant 
 women are most skillful in its making. All 
 along the way it was novel even in the tiniest 
 of homes to see curtains at the windows edged 
 with these exquisite laces. And so back into 
 Brussels we came where the streets are torn up 
 in an elaborate repaving and remodeling, the 
 cleanup following the German occupation. 
 
 Brave little Belgium is making supreme ef- 
 forts to come back to normal. She does not 
 want charity but long time credit, help to re- 
 build her industries. Northern Belgium or 
 Flanders is a rich agricultural country, as I 
 have shown you in passing through. Southern 
 and south-eastern Belgium, the land of the Wal- 
 
 228 
 
AT BELGIUM'S GREAT DIVIDE 
 
 loons, is the mining and manufacturing region. 
 They want their own industries, that were de- 
 stroyed by war, rebuilt,, but above all they want 
 raw material and credit to buy raw material. 
 
 A visit to the front gives a glimpse of what 
 Belgium suffered and the world must applaud 
 her spirit in rebuilding homes from the stones 
 of dugouts. She is raising her shoulders above 
 the weight of sorrow of four long years and 
 looking ahead with new courage. Her country 
 is saved and she is going about starting over 
 with little fuss. 
 
 Plucky little Belgium! 
 
 229 
 
Y 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THROUGH A KIDNAPPED LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 Brussels, Aug. 27. 
 OU wouldn't believe a factory could be kid- 
 napped, Avould you? 
 
 You wouldn 't believe a factory could have an 
 unwritten chapter in its annals that eclipses 
 the imagination of a Conan Doyle or a Dumas ! 
 
 And you wouldn't dream that a factory 
 stripped, dismantled, its machinery dug out by 
 the foundations and carted off — yes, entire 
 warehouses taken, roof and all — and its of- 
 fices burned, could already be coming back! 
 That is why I want to tell you about this fac- 
 tory of Dyle & Bacalan. 
 
 This is a true reconstruction story about a 
 big factory and the factory is in Louvain, and 
 Louvain is one of the martyred cities of Bel- 
 gium. Just five years before, on the very day 
 I was there, Aug. 25, 1914, the Germans had 
 arrogantly taken possession of the huge plant. 
 They had lined up and shot to death 209 people 
 
 230 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 of the city, including twenty women and eleven 
 children. Germany is being scoured today for 
 the many priceless books carried off from the 
 University library, before this handsome struc- 
 ture with the Law Courts, the theater, the Uni- 
 versity consular and commercial school, the 
 Academy of Fine Arts and more than 2,000 
 houses were burned by German troops. Lou- 
 vain today is a moving sight. 
 
 Now the name of Dyle & Bacalan is as well 
 known in Belgium and France as that of the 
 Pullman Co. is in America. They are a car 
 building concern, manufacturing chiefly railroad 
 cars and boilers, and have another plant in 
 Bordeaux, France. Twenty-four hundred peo- 
 ple are employed in the Louvain plant and I 
 forget how many millions of dollars its output 
 amounted to on that day in August, five years 
 ago, when the Germans seized it. I have a 
 vision of j^ou looking politely bored, as I did, 
 when it was suggested that I go through this 
 plant, but after an hour of snooping around its 
 barnlike shops, I regretted there was not an 
 hour more. And I confess to being devoid of all 
 machinery instinct ; I don't know the philosophy 
 
 231 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 of what makes a wheel go around. But I dis- 
 covered that behind the motive power of the 
 vast machines that had driven this plant, be- 
 hind the facts and figures that constitute the 
 life of a factory, there was that indefinable thing 
 called personality which is the mainspring of 
 its revival. 
 
 I suppose a factory could go on for decades 
 prospering on income and output and paying 
 regular dividends, but once in every so many 
 hundred years there comes a time when it needs 
 something more — call it a keen initiative, a far 
 vision, a deep loyalty or a soul for the works. 
 The superintendent who took us through, told it 
 quite simply — it had been all in the day's work 
 with him. 
 
 When the Germans took possession they 
 asked him to work for them. He refused. 
 Singularly enough, they did not harm him; just 
 would not allow him to leave the country. So 
 he hung around the plant. Now this man knew 
 every machine in that vast works like Thomp- 
 son, The Times pressroom foreman, knows 
 every screw in the press in the big front win- 
 dow, and when every little wheel sings its swan 
 
 232 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 song. When the Germans took out the big ma- 
 chines and packed them for shipment to Ger- 
 many he, naturally, watched to see where they 
 went. He kept always on the lookout. I don't 
 imagine he even had to write it down. He 
 carried it in his memory, and the Germans paid 
 no attention to him because I suppose they 
 never thought about it and, anyway, they never 
 expected to give up the factory. One day, hav- 
 ing strolled into the Brussels office of the con- 
 cern, he, accidentally, saw a bill of lading for 
 a consignment of the machinery to Germany 
 and noted where it had been sent. That slip of 
 paper is now in the hands of the Belgian author- 
 ities. 
 
 So that is why Dyle & Bacalan were enabled, 
 immediately after the armistice, to locate so 
 many of their machines and to bring them back. 
 That is why today there are five hundred peo- 
 ple at work getting a new start in the big, 
 barren sheds that cover acres of ground there 
 in Louvain. The superintendent pointed out a 
 long, one story building. The entire structure 
 had' been carried off ; its side walls are of fitted 
 sections and it could be taken apart. They had 
 
 233 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 gone to Germany, located the kidnapped build- 
 ing and brought it back, every piece of it, and 
 set it up exactly where it had stood. ' ' We got 
 back all but the roof of that building," he re- 
 marked with a smile. 
 
 In one long, lofty shed not a scrap of machin- 
 ery is left. Only deep, square, holes, cut into 
 the earth floor, show where even the foundations 
 of the machines were dug out and carted away. 
 What they did not carry away was rendered 
 useless before they left. The plant was only 
 able to resume on its present scale because it 
 could obtain in addition 165 machines from its 
 Bordeaux house. And these 165 machines are 
 American machines, the superintendent added, 
 as he pointed them out. The Englishman in 
 the party wanted to know excitedly why they 
 did not purchase machinery from England, and 
 the answer was that the American machines 
 were, for their purpose, stronger. 
 
 " Is it a matter of price? " pursued the Eng- 
 lishman. 
 
 "No," was the reply, "the American ma- 
 chine is stronger." They keep an engineer in 
 the United States to purchase their machinery, 
 I learned. 
 
 234 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 The superintendent led ns up to one machine 
 recently recovered and remarked that it was 
 reinstalled on the exact spot from which it had 
 been taken. ' ' Now, you know, you should have 
 a plate, inscribed with those facts, fastened to 
 this machine, making' it a souvenir," remarked 
 the Englishman. 
 
 ''We have enough of souvenirs here," said 
 the Belgian smiling sadly, as his eyes swept 
 the dismantled shop, ' ' plenty of souvenirs 
 without such reminders, Monsieur." 
 
 Up to the present time, 300 of the 700 ma- 
 chines taken by the Germans, have been lo- 
 cated and brought back. The aggregate cost 
 of what was lost and destroyed will reach fif- 
 teen million francs. " But it will cost four 
 times that much, sixty million francs, to replace 
 the machinery at the present cost," the super- 
 intendent remarked. 
 
 The concern of Dyle & Bacalan hopes to have 
 its Louvain plant in full running order in five 
 or six months. I asked how they expected to 
 find skilled labor, since so many men were killed 
 in the war and Belgium is now recruiting its 
 younger men. His answer was that it would be 
 
 235 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 difficult; it was possible they would have to 
 employ women for the lighter work. The 
 owners of the plant were in France at the out- 
 break of the war and the Germans, on taking 
 possession, claimed they were running it for 
 its owners, " but we never saw any of the 
 profits," he said. At the time the office was 
 burned several adjoining buildings caught fire 
 and were destroyed. At present the chief ac- 
 tivity of the plant is repairing railroad cars and 
 we saw many in the process of remodeling. 
 
 So that is how a factory gives you a heart- 
 ache. Great, silent, empty, shops, ghostly with 
 memories — looted and the torch applied. But 
 here and there today is a humming machine, a 
 hopeful sign. Over there is a noisy carpenter 
 shop. Starting up again in this empty waste 
 is dreary business but they are going about it 
 in a matter-of-fact way, and insist they will be 
 going full blast before spring. The hero of the 
 plant, you will agree, is the man who watched 
 where the machines were shipped and who 
 knew just where to lay his hands on them when 
 the hostilities ceased. 
 
 236 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 " Where did you have to go after them? " 
 was asked. 
 
 " Well, now this one we found at Viezem 
 near Dusseldorf," he said. 
 
 I went, too, into the big steel works of the 
 Providence Company at Charleroi in southeast- 
 ern Belgium, a few days later, and saw the 
 wanton destruction of huge cranes and ma- 
 chinery in this plant. They are starting work 
 again — trying to clear away the debris. I 
 endeavored to get the wife of the old caretaker 
 of the plant to talk, but she would reveal noth- 
 ing. The Germans who had seized the factory 
 had treated her and her husband well. She had 
 cooked for them. They had not harmed her. 
 She seemed afraid to talk. Even the English 
 Fany girl couldn't draw her out. 
 
 I want to tell you about these English Fany 
 girls for they are one of the joys of my motor- 
 ing in Belgium. F. A. N. Y. stands for First 
 Aid Nursing Yeomanry, an organization of 
 English war workers, that saw some of the fore- 
 most of the women's service in the war. There 
 is Mary Bushby Stubbs, such a pretty, blue- 
 eyed Irish girl, whose home is in London, and 
 
 237 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 she drove the car to Louvain. She had enlisted 
 in the beginning of the war as a Red Cross 
 Nursing Aid, but contracted a septic throat 
 from nursing poisonous wounds — some of the 
 wounded had gone for five days before they 
 could reach the hospitals, she told me. For- 
 bidden to nurse, she entered the Yeomanry 
 motor car driving service and was sent to 
 Chalons sur Marne in February, 1917. She 
 drove an ambulance during the battle on the 
 Chemin du Dames, was in the drive of Chalons 
 and at Epernay. She has the Croix de Guerre, 
 has one citation from the Chemin du Dames 
 and one for the time they bombed the hospital 
 at Chalons. 
 
 ' ' We lived on the rations of the French sol- 
 diers and often we were hungry," she told me, 
 once. " Their rations were black bread, black 
 coffee, horse meat and beans." She was one of 
 the motor girls chosen to run the cars that 
 brought the prisoners back from Germany 
 after the armistice and had many thrilling mo- 
 ments. 
 
 Then there is dashing little Monica Cousins, 
 with her bobbed hair and shining black eyes, 
 
 238 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 who drove the Baby Benz the day we went 
 to Dinant and on the two days ' trip to the front. 
 1 ' He gets so flapped, ' ' she said, referring to 
 the feverish excitement of the officer in charge 
 of one trip. ' ' Flapped " is a new bit of Eng- 
 lish slang that is most expressive and it means 
 " gets all stirred up, you know," she told me. 
 She is Miss Stubbs' teammate and wears the 
 French Croix de Guerre for driving under shell 
 fire. She was in the French Army F. A. N. Y. 
 running a car, carrying the wounded during the 
 battle of Epernay. "We carried 17,000 
 wounded once in five days — never got to bed 
 at all — that was in the second Battle of the 
 Marne, that lasted during May, June and July 
 of 1918. The wounded were often terrified," 
 she said, ' ' when driving them back to the hos- 
 pitals the roads would be bombed and I'd have 
 to say ' now it is alright — it won't hit us ' — 
 poor chaps lying there so helpless." 
 
 One girl of their corps was badly wounded 
 when a shell burst on her car and the officer in 
 the seat beside her was killed. But Miss 
 Cousins had escaped injury. She had also 
 driven a car into Germany to bring back the 
 
 239 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 prisoners after the armistice. They would ar- 
 rive at a dreadful prison camp at night and 
 would be billeted there — have to sleep there — 
 she told me. They would start at dawn in the 
 morning for the long trip across the border 
 conveying the prisoners to French hospitals. 
 That was exciting, too, she said. Miss Cousins 
 comes from Yorkshire, England, and is twenty- 
 four, though she looks eighteen. Her one 
 brother was in the service, her oldest sister 
 with the American Y in Paris and her other 
 sister with the British Red Cross as a nurse 
 for three years. " You certainly are a plucky 
 family," I observed. 
 
 ' ' We were so lucky to get to go, ' ' was the 
 way Monica put it as she pulled her jaunty cap 
 over her bobbed hair and stepped on the starter. 
 
 These are a couple of the girl drivers for 
 the Central office d 'Information, a department 
 created last May by Henri Jaspar, minister of 
 economic affairs of Belgium, in charge of the 
 economic and industrial problems of the recon- 
 struction of Belgium, to make them known 
 to the United States. Capt. D. L. Blount of 
 St. Louis, but who has lived abroad many years, 
 
 240 
 
THROUGH A LOUVAIN FACTORY 
 
 is director general of the bureau. Burr Price, 
 formerly with the New York Herald as war 
 and peace correspondent, is director of its press 
 section and Major Prins has charge of the docu- 
 mentation. Through them I was enabled to 
 get information concerning the ' ' carrying on ' ' 
 of the various Belgian industries and how they 
 are recovering from the lethargy of the last 
 four years. The big manufacturing district of 
 the southeastern Belgium is trying heroically 
 to pull itself out from under the wreckage of 
 the invasion and occupation. It is not charity 
 but long time credit Belgium asks, credit to 
 buy raw materials with which to start her fac- 
 tories anew. 
 
 241 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 ANTWERP AND ITS FORT WAELHEM 
 
 Brussels, Aug. 28. 
 
 DOZENS of empty American flour sacks — 
 from Kansas City and Faribault, Minn., 
 to Seattle ! And they occupy a front position on 
 a rack in The Steen. Now The Steen is a 
 cupola-towered castle on the banks of the 
 Scheldt River at Antwerp, a picturesque old 
 pile, dating back to the Eighth century when 
 it was a fortress, and later the seat of the Span- 
 ish Inquisition. Through its shivery, under- 
 ground dungeons I went with a candle-bearing 
 group. Nothing in the way of horrible torture 
 chambers had been omitted from this cheerful 
 place. From 1540 to 1703 Spain, you remem- 
 ber, ruled Belgium. It is probable no other 
 building of its size has seen so much human 
 suffering as The Steen, and it has now been 
 converted into a museum of antiquities to illus- 
 trate, I suppose, how humanity has progressed 
 since. 
 
 242 
 
ANTWERP AND ITS FORT WAELHEM 
 
 But about the flour sacks! I am coming to 
 those — I stumbled on them by accident. They 
 were marked America's gift to the Belgians a 
 year ago when they were bulging with good old 
 American wheat flour, and today a grateful 
 nation keeps them as treasured souvenirs in 
 her greatest museum — just plain, coarse cot- 
 ton, flour sacks, printed with mill names from 
 the Mississippi to the Pacific, in glaring red 
 and blue letters. They would look out of place 
 next to a four-cornered post against which six- 
 teen Belgians had been stood up and shot, and 
 near the first German flag taken by the Bel- 
 gians, diagonally across from a Big Bertha 
 shell, and to the right of the glass case that 
 holds the actual order for Edith Cavell's execu- 
 tion — they really would look out of place if 
 high up on the wall to the left were not several 
 huge posters showing Uncle Sam in the act of 
 telling the Hun what he thinks of him. Hun- 
 dreds of years from now that rack of empty 
 flour sacks will remind coming generations of 
 a generosity from across the seas to Belgium 
 in her hour of need. What the American Com- 
 mission for Belgian Relief did to succor starv- 
 
 243 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ing Belgium fills weighty official records. It 
 expended hundreds of millions of dollars in re- 
 lief work during the war and saved the Belgian 
 children who were provided with special foods. 
 And the people are indeed grateful. 
 
 The first place I was taken in Belgium was 
 Antwerp. The Belgian Ministry of Economics 
 is boosting Antwerp as a world port and it is 
 not the fault of its information department if 
 Antwerp does not far outdistance Rotterdam 
 and take its place as one of the foremost ports 
 of Europe. It is rapidly regaining its shipping 
 industry destroyed by the war and is already 
 competing with Liverpool and Hamburg. Its 
 natural position at the mouth of the Scheldt 
 gives it great advantages. Emerging from four 
 years of German occupation with vim and 
 energy, Antwerp will, if Belgium obtains the 
 freedom of the Scheldt (both banks of which 
 now belong to Holland), be in a position to 
 figure largely in world shipping. 
 
 Antwerp or Anvers as they call it — and you 
 pronounce the " s " if speaking to a Belgian, 
 but you don't if speaking to a Frenchman — is 
 one of the quaintest of cities. You will be 
 
 244 
 
ANTWERP AND ITS FORT WAELHEM 
 
 interested in how it got its name. Antwerp in 
 Flemish means literally ' ' Hand throw. ' ' Once, 
 so the tale runs, there was a powerful giant 
 who required much gold as toll for every ship 
 that entered the harbor. If the captain of a 
 ship refused to pay this tribute he would cut 
 off his hands. Now the Duke of Balbo, deter- 
 mining to put an end to the toll graft, went to 
 plead with the giant one day ; the latter had to 
 leave him to intercept a ship entering the har- 
 bor. The giant boarded the ship and was just 
 reaching out his hand to take the captain 's gold 
 when Balbo, who had rowed out unobserved and 
 boarded the ship from the farther side, sprang 
 across the deck and with his sword cut off the 
 hand of the giant as it received the gold, and 
 threw it into the sea. I was just as skeptical 
 as you are about this story but the guide in the 
 hotel de ville, who showed us the metal picture 
 of the scene, was in solemn earnest as he related 
 it, and there, on the open square in front of the 
 city hall, in the form of a beautiful fountain, is 
 the statue of the daring Balbo in the act of 
 flourishing the cruel giant's hand as he throws 
 it into the sea. In the same room of the city hall 
 
 245 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 is a marvelous painting. In the foreground a 
 page is seated on steps and the eyes of this page 
 follow you and his entire figure seems to turn 
 toward you no matter where you go in the 
 room. It is an artist 's trick but in this painting- 
 is uncanny. 
 
 There is another Antwerp story you must 
 hear if you would know the traditions of this 
 ancient city. It is the career of one, Quentin 
 Matsys, and it is told in a wall of marvelous 
 paintings in one of the corridors of the city 
 hall. Matsys was a blacksmith. He fell in love 
 with the daughter of a renowned artist, but the 
 father refused to consent to the marriage of his 
 daughter with anyone but a great painter. So 
 Matsys forsook his forge and went to Italy to 
 study art. After several years he returned to 
 Antwerp and going to the studio of the father 
 of his sweetheart to plead his suit, found the 
 father away. On an easel stood a partly fin- 
 ished picture of a woman. Matsys seized a 
 brush and painted a fly on the slipper of the 
 figure on the canvas. When the father re- 
 turned he thought it was a live fly and in 
 attempting to brush it from the slipper, spoiled 
 
 246 
 
ANTWERP AND ITS FORT WAELHEM 
 
 his picture. Then he exclaimed that whoever 
 painted that fly was a great artist and could 
 wed his daughter. Of course you can guess the 
 sequel to the story and how they lived happily 
 ever after. The guide told this with great gusto 
 and I must admit almost had me convinced, but 
 the wife of the English novelist wanted to see 
 the picture of the fly. Anyway, there is some 
 fine iron grillwork on a pedestal in the public 
 square that bears Matsys' name and shows how 
 he combined his forge with his art. 
 
 This hotel de ville in Antwerp is a most inter- 
 esting place. We went into the big, council 
 chamber where the burgomaster and city 
 fathers meet. It has magnificent paintings on 
 the walls. " That picture was painted before 
 3 r our country was discovered," remarked the 
 Belgian officer. ' * But we Ve been moving 
 swiftly ever since," I retorted, to the " Fany " 
 girl's delight. 
 
 Into the marriage room we went. All wed- 
 dings in Belgium must have the civil ceremony. 
 There are the chairs for the bride and groom 
 directly in front of the magistrate's desk, the 
 chairs for the witnesses at one side and the 
 
 247 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 chairs for the parents on the other. The re- 
 mainder of the wedding party is seated farther 
 back. On the walls are paintings of wedding 
 scenes beginning with that of the ancient 
 Druids, then that of the early Eomans, next 
 the early Spanish ceremony and on down to the 
 present time. In the marvelous cathedral of 
 Antwerp we saw the statue de la Vierge with 
 its priceless collection of diamonds and precious 
 stones. The entire dress and elaborate head- 
 dress are made of jewels. 
 
 It was while in the museum at Antwerp that 
 a one-armed soldier spoke to the Belgian officer 
 conducting our party and he turned delightedly 
 to grasp the boy's hand. " He was in my regi- 
 ment," the officer said. The soldier told us he 
 had been taken prisoner at Vilvorde, a village 
 we had passed through between Brussels and 
 Marines, and had been held there 23 days by 
 the Germans when he managed to escape, re- 
 joining the Belgian army. " How did the Ger- 
 mans treat you? " I asked him. 
 
 " Nothing to eat but a piece of black bread 
 and black coffee in the morning; some thin soup 
 at noon and in the evening black bread and 
 
 248 
 
Capt. Colson, commandant of Fort Waelhem. At his home at Contich, Belgium. 
 
 Pine stake in center of picture marks spot where Nurse Edith Cavell was shot. 
 
 This is on the grounds of the Belgian shooting range in Brussels. 
 
 Targets of the range may be seen in the background. 
 
ANTWERP AND ITS FORT WAELHEM 
 
 black coffee again," was his reply. 
 
 Beyond Malines with its handsome cathedral 
 we stopped at Fort Waelhem, one of the fore- 
 most defenses of Antwerp and one of the many 
 forts that protect the city. Captain Colson, the 
 new commandant of the fort, showed us about, 
 after we had a few breathless moments crossing 
 the drawbridge over the moat. This bridge, 
 which was almost destroyed by the fierce attack 
 to which the fort was subjected, had a few 
 planks and pieces of sheet iron for flooring and 
 piloting the heavy auto over it was a hazardous 
 proceeding, but the Fany girl was equal to it 
 and we rolled under the grim entrance and out 
 into a big courtyard that had echoed to some 
 of the heaviest bombardments of the war. Com- 
 mandant DeWitt, the Belgian captain in charge 
 of the fort in those thrilling days, only sur- 
 rendered after four weeks of desperate fighting 
 and he was severely wounded. He was given 
 back his sword by the German commander in 
 recognition of his brilliant defense, one of the 
 rare instances of this kind. The Germans had 
 surrounded the fort but the heroic commandant 
 held out with his 1,500 men as long as possible. 
 
 249 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Captain DeWitt was promoted to the rank of 
 major in the Belgian army for his defense at 
 Waelhem. This big fort is underground and it 
 has novel cupolas, big circular metal disks that 
 crown various knolls and in which the guns are 
 placed. One of these cupolas could be raised 
 and lowered, while others moved only in a circle 
 in order to aim the guns. It was interesting 
 to hear from the military men how the churches 
 in two villages on either side of the fort fur- 
 nished the enemy their true aim on the fort 
 itself. The high steeples of the churches pro- 
 vided, unwittingly, the line that helped the 
 enemy sight their guns directly at the fort and 
 do such destructive work. 
 
 Commandant Colson invited our party to 
 stop at his home in the nearby village of 
 Contich, where we enjoyed superb Belgian 
 hospitality. It is a large beautiful old resi- 
 dence, the home of prominent Belgians who had 
 suffered much during the war, and had been 
 taken over only a few weeks before by the com- 
 mandant and his charming wife. The garden 
 with its many new varieties of dahlias was an 
 attractive place and one of my most enjoyable 
 
 250 
 
ABOUT BRUSSELS 
 
 hours in Belgium was spent in this home with 
 its lofty, spacious rooms that still retain speci- 
 mens of the quaint lavish furnishings of before- 
 the-war splendor. 
 
 About Brussels 
 
 We reached Brussels at 9:30 that night 
 motoring through Malines, the home of Cardi- 
 nal Mercier. The next day in Brussels we were 
 taken out to see the place where Edith Cavell, 
 the noble British nurse, was shot by official 
 German decree. Cardinal Mercier, you re- 
 member, had tried among the many to intercede 
 for her. The execution took place at the Bel- 
 gian shooting range on the outskirts of the city, 
 a large tract of ground where the Belgian sol- 
 diers were assembled for target practice before 
 the war and it was used in recruiting. The 
 wide, high-windowed building, set a couple of 
 hundred feet from the street, appears like any 
 ordinary American office building at first glance. 
 On entering it we were conducted down a stair- 
 way, through several locker-filled corridors and 
 out on to a rear, covered porch. There, not more 
 than fifteen feet from the porch, is a three foot 
 
 251 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 pine stake marking the spot where the martyred 
 nurse, blindfolded, was shot. On this porch 
 twelve German soldiers were lined up with rifres 
 for the deed. It is common belief, even in Eng- 
 land, that Nurse Cavell was killed in some dark 
 cell, but the truth is that she was shot here in 
 the open air. That morning when we stood 
 there reverently, with the sunshine throwing 
 shadows over the grass, it was hard to realize 
 the tragedy for which that simple pine stake 
 stood. Miss Cavell 's nursing home was in 
 Brussels. She was one of forty-one people shot 
 at that time by the Germans. Down the wind- 
 ing path of the big shooting range with its 
 variety of targets and through a pretty stretch 
 of woods and we came to the cemetery where 
 were interred the remains of the forty-one 
 martyred people. All the graves have since 
 been removed, that of Nurse Cavell to England. 
 The young Belgian soldier from the range told 
 me many Americans came to visit her grave. 
 A whole world now honors Nurse Cavell for 
 her noble sacrifice for the Belgians. 
 
 Brussels as a city is fascinating. Its queer, 
 narrow, streets wind around, up steep hills and 
 
 252 
 
ABOUT BRUSSELS 
 
 cut across in the most illogical fashion, only 
 to burst out every few blocks into beautiful big 
 squares. Of these the gem is the Grand Place, 
 circled by the magnificent Seventeenth century 
 corporation houses. Here is the house of the 
 Painters, where Victor Hugo lived, and the 
 House of the Tailors and one for every trade, 
 for in the early days trade guilds were im- 
 portant in the municipal life. Facing this 
 Grand Place is, too, the Brussels city hall, a 
 high spired structure of pure Gothic style that 
 dates back to 1402. The facades or fronts of 
 the buildings facing on this square can never 
 be changed; as it has been for three hundred 
 years it must remain, though the interiors of 
 the buildings may be reconstructed. The cen- 
 ter of the Grand Place is the flower market and 
 the bird market, and here I spent part of an 
 interesting Sunday morning. The flower stalls 
 with their Belgian flower sellers are attractive 
 but the bird market is the novelty. Here you 
 see birds of every kind from the plump, chipper, 
 little canary to the glum, grey parrot. But the 
 principal business is in carrier pigeons. Knots 
 of men were gathered here in eager consulta- 
 
 253 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 tion over pigeons, examining their wings and 
 beaks with canny understanding. 
 
 The remainder of that Sunday morning I 
 spent at the Brussels rag market, known as the 
 " Maronne." Now you cannot fancy having a 
 good time at a rag market any more than I 
 could, but if you go to Brussels, don't miss it. 
 The rag market is an institution of Brussels 
 whose origin is lost in the shadows of the past. 
 Here every day on a huge open square in the 
 heart of the slums of the city people come to 
 sell everything under the sun. It must be the 
 original White Elephant sale and is on a huge 
 scale. Everything from shoes to antique clocks 
 is offered to you. One stand had nothing but 
 old rusty keys, keys large and small. Another 
 had only small pieces of leather. These, I was 
 told, people buy and use to sole their shoes. 
 Nothing in Brussels evidently is allowed to go 
 to waste. China, glassware, old metals, bed 
 springs and auto lamps were there, with one 
 whole section devoted to the trade of bicycles. 
 Here, too, is where the lover of antiques comes 
 and I saw a gorgeous ebony dining table stand- 
 ing on the flagstones of the square awaiting a 
 purchaser. 
 
 254 
 
ABOUT BRUSSELS 
 
 But Brussels has no slums as we know the 
 word. Its poorer districts are remarkably well 
 kept and I wonder if this tendency to let noth- 
 ing go to waste has not something to do with it. 
 I was taken through a block of model tenement 
 houses built by the city and rented at a nominal 
 sum. They contain cozy, comfortable four and 
 six room apartments. Many of the balconies 
 were overrun with vines and had pretty flower 
 boxes. 
 
 This municipal care for the good of the peo- 
 ple is one of the strongest, most satisfying notes 
 in Belgium. The people themselves are most 
 engaging. They are always so frankly glad to 
 help a foreigner, especially an American. No 
 one is too busy to give you directions. They go 
 out of their way to do it with such evident 
 pleasure. And, of course, Brussels is the para- 
 dise of the woman who loves lace — and what 
 woman does not? Lace stores with exquisite 
 cobwebby Brussels and Flanders lace confront 
 you on every turn up the hilly streets and dodg- 
 ing them is the most difficult task of the woman 
 making her first trip to Belgium. 
 
 255 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 Translation of the Letter of Mile Degraa. 
 
 Dinant, Aug. 26, 1919. 
 8 Quai de Meuse. 
 Mademoiselle : 
 
 Faithful to the promise I made you I will give you 
 the details concerning little Bernadette Poncelet. 
 Her father, Mr. Victor Poncelet, the son of a lawyer 
 of our city, had married the daughter of the Notary 
 Laurent of Dinant. Victor Poncelet had founded a 
 dozen years ago a copper factory where was manu- 
 factured chiefly novelties known as Dinanderies. On 
 Aug. 23, 1914, the Bodies came to his home. He 
 was in the vestibule of his house with his wife and his 
 seven children, of whom the eldest was 10^ years 
 old and the youngest, little Bernadette, a year and a 
 half old. The little one you photographed was in the 
 arms of her poor father. Seeing that they were going 
 to shoot the father, the wife and children knelt down 
 and begged for mercy. Mr. Poncelet said to the offi- 
 cer : "You are not going to shoot a father of seven 
 children ! ' ' The officer put the little one in the arms 
 of the mother, then commanded the soldier accom- 
 panying him to fire. The soldier refused to shoot Mr. 
 Poncelet. Then the officer drew his own revolver and 
 shot poor Victor Poncelet in the presence of his wife 
 and seven little children. 
 
 256 
 

 
 
IN MARTYEED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 Mme Poncelet and her children were made pris- 
 oners and three days after, on returning to their 
 house, the poor family found, in the vestibule, the 
 body of the unfortunate father, which they buried in 
 the garden. This was one of the saddest scenes of 
 the massacres of our city. Therefore, little Berna- 
 dette was chosen from among the orphans who were 
 to present flowers to our Queen. 
 
 I regret I was so occupied and unable to give you 
 other details of the cruelty of our enemies. Our good 
 friends, the Americans, should know everything. 
 Nothing should be neglected to acquaint them with all 
 the evil the Bodies did to our homes. 
 
 You will be truly kind if you will send two photos 
 of the child, one for her mother and the other I will 
 treasure as a souvenir of that beautiful and sad day. 
 If I can be of service to you for further information, 
 you can address me. There are still so many other 
 interesting cases. 
 
 Receive, Mademoiselle, the very deep homage of a 
 Belgian who feels a great sympathy for the great and 
 noble American nation to which we owe all material 
 and moral life. 
 
 (Signed) M. Degraa. 
 
 Paris, Aug. 29. 
 
 ON returning from Brussels the above let- 
 ter awaited me. It is from the aunt of 
 the little girl who had presented flowers to 
 Belgium's Queen at the Dinant memorial on 
 
 257 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 the fifth anniversary of its massacre, little 
 Bernadette, whom I found sitting on the run- 
 ning board of the Belgian Crown Prince's car 
 sobbing bitterly for her Daddy, who would 
 never come back. Not even the tender words 
 of the Queen had consoled her. It is a ' ' close 
 up " on that tragedy which came to me most 
 unexpectedly as I stood in that throng. 
 
 That last Saturday in Belgium had been a 
 full day. I talked with people who lived 
 through the terror of the massacres, the little, 
 old, woman who had fled to the mountains, sub- 
 sisted for five days on raw vegetables — carrots 
 — was found by German soldiers, brought back 
 and imprisoned; twelve of her husband's peo- 
 ple had been shot. I attended the pontifical 
 mass on the public square of Martyred Dinant 
 and heard the ringing words of Cardinal Mer- 
 cier, the fearless old priest who dared defy the 
 Prussian high command. I was in the front 
 line of the cheering multitude that acclaimed 
 Belgium's devoted King Albert and Queen 
 Elizabeth when they, with the royal children, 
 passed through the Boy-Scout-bordered lane 
 from the great outdoor sanctuary, just to the 
 
 258 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 left of the portals of the ruined church. I 
 visited a wrecked steel works in Charleroi. 
 Standing in the rose garden of the Baroness 
 de Cartier de Marchienne, whose son, Baron de 
 Cartier de Marchienne, is our Belgian Ambas- 
 sador in Washington, I listened to her relate 
 what it meant to have troops of German sol- 
 diers forced-upon-you guests in this ivy-vined 
 old chateau de Marchienne. And motoring 
 back by the field of Waterloo, the British lion, 
 guarding the historic battleground, wagged his 
 tail at me. Quite a full day, you will agree, 
 even for a post-war correspondent. 
 
 Then there was the incident of the little 
 Bernadette and how my made-in-America 
 kodak proved the " laissez-passer " to the 
 hearts of these good people. 
 
 Two automobiles conveyed our party and at 
 seven that morning climbed the last Brussels 
 hill and dashed out on the high road, making 
 a speedy run to Namur — Namur with its high- 
 up fort that played such a prominent part in 
 the war. But my most vivid recollection of 
 Namur will always be the beautiful, tree-lined, 
 woodsy road that curled down into the city 
 
 259 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 from the heights above. In Namur it was mar- 
 ket day and the quiet animated scenes of the 
 market place were different from the Namur I 
 had pictured during war times. 
 
 In the other car was a movie actress with 
 temperament and a fussy manager, bent on 
 making a propaganda film, and they decided to 
 stop at Namur for breakfast. Convincing the 
 Belgian officer conducting the party that it was 
 imperative that I get to Dinant quickly or I 
 would miss the ceremony, our car was per- 
 mitted to go ahead. Stopped at the entrance to 
 the city we discovered we should have had a 
 ' ' coup feu ' ' or ticket, without which the car 
 had to^ be parked there and we could not get 
 through the guard lines. The Belgian conduct- 
 ing officer was with the other car at Namur and 
 the movie actress had ordered eggs for break- 
 fast. The prospects for being among those 
 present at the service were very poor at that 
 particular moment you will admit. 
 
 1 1 Dinant is perfectly sweet ' ' the English 
 Fany girl had said to me as we came along. 
 And nothing else quite so well describes it. 
 Dinant, and must pronounce it "Dee-no" if 
 
 260 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 you would have anyone understand the place 
 you mean, is a trusting little city, snuggling 
 close against high rocky cliffs, with the softly 
 sighing Meuse rippling between its principal 
 streets. Clustering at the base of the fort- 
 crowned, rocky, promontory it looks like a 
 fancy stage setting, like a bit of the brain land- 
 scape of an artist. Dinant was formerly a 
 favorite tourist resort of Belgium and today it 
 holds the most harrowing memories of the Ger- 
 man invasion. Six hundred and forty-two per- 
 sons were brutally shot at Dinant in August, 
 1914, by the hordes of William II. ; two-thirds 
 of the town, almost 1,200 houses, were burned 
 to the ground; all public buildings, the Palais 
 cle Justice excepted, all factories and all the 
 farms and chateaux situated on the heights are 
 now in ruins. 
 
 Crossing the temporary bridge that spans 
 the Meuse you blink your eyes at the picture. 
 On the summit of a sheer wall of rock, several 
 hundred feet high, forming part of the right 
 bank of the river stands the old citadel, with 
 its flat top and deep-embrasured walls, follow- 
 ing the curved sweep of the high road. The old 
 
 261 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 church, at first glance, seems built into the side 
 of the cliff and only on coming within a few 
 feet of the edifice you find that the cliff is the 
 drop curtain directly back of it. A steep stair- 
 way, with hundreds of steps cut into the cliff, 
 leads down from the fort to the right of the 
 church entrance. 
 
 On Aug. 15, 1914, the Germans had the cita- 
 del, having come in over the high road, and 
 held the high country east of the river. The 
 French troops occupied the west bank of the 
 Meuse against its steep hills. The attack of 
 the French, it is said, was so sudden that the 
 steps down from the old fort to the church were 
 clogged with dead Germans. At first it was a 
 French victory and the joy of the people en- 
 raged their enemies, who having witnessed the 
 manifestations from the dominating heights, 
 took their revenge in the massacres of Aug. 21 
 to 25. 
 
 The far end of the bridge and the public 
 square or Grand Place was a surging mass of 
 people as we walked toward it. Entering a 
 hotel, overlooking the Place, whose windows 
 and roof were packed with humanity, we tried 
 
 262 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 to get to a window, but it was hopeless. Out 
 through the crowd again we had pushed for- 
 ward to the line of guards. Turning to one 
 who seemed to have more gold on his uniform 
 than the others I pointed to the " C " on my 
 sleeve and in my best French told him I was a 
 " Journaliste Americaine," had come over 
 from Paris and must get through. He answered 
 with an affirmative nod. I was puzzled. If I 
 started across that open space would he fire 1 ? 
 Turning to another guard I repeated my story 
 and the English Fany girl tried some facile 
 French on him. So much Flemish is spoken in 
 Belgium, it is difficult to know how much 
 French the people understand and nodding in 
 the affirmative may mean nothing. Taking a 
 chance we dashed across the clear space and I 
 sprang on the running board of a parked auto 
 where I faced, above the sea of heads, the jme 
 strong figure of Cardinal Mercier, who had just 
 begun his address. The cardinal made a won- 
 derful picture in his brilliant red robes against 
 the heavy purple velvet of the side altar, be- 
 neath a canopy of black, fringed with silver. 
 At his right the black canopy stretched over an 
 
 263 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 improvised high altar with its tall waxen can- 
 dles flaring in the outdoor breeze. At the right 
 of this altar knelt the king and queen and their 
 three children. "With them were the high offi- 
 cials of the church, state and army to do honor 
 to Dinant. In the foreground was the huge 
 memorial catafalque draped in black. 
 
 I had just clicked my kodak when I heard a 
 sobbing at my feet and there on the running 
 board sat seven-year-old Bernadette Poncelet 
 in a white frock and purple sweater crying as 
 if her heart would break. Her aunt, Mile 
 Degraa, told me the cause of her tears. Forget- 
 ting that I wanted to get the gist of the speech 
 of Cardinal Mercier, the priest who had done 
 so much to intercede for his people in their 
 days of terror and whom the Germans had 
 made a prisoner in his home but had never 
 dared harm, I stepped down and brought back 
 the smiles to Bernadette 's pretty eyes by pos- 
 ing her for a picture, " for America." 
 
 At that moment over the great crowd the 
 strong, clear, voice of the old priest rang: " et 
 un peloton les abattait comme des chiens " (and 
 a platoon slaughtered them like clogs). " Hor- 
 
 264 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 reur! J 'en frissonne encore anjourd'hui " 
 (Horrors — I shudder still at them today). And 
 there stood little Bernaclette, the child who had 
 been in her father's arms a moment before he 
 was shot, and she was smiling up at me. 
 
 That little incident made the crowd about me 
 very friendly. The chauffeur of the auto, which 
 I learned was that of the crown prince, opened 
 the door and asked me to be seated, that I could 
 see better from there. I had no difficulty get- 
 ting through after that. 
 
 Among the notables present at the ceremony 
 were M. P. Deschanel, president of the French 
 Chamber of Deputies (now President of 
 France) ; M. Paul Hymans, Belgian Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs and the representative of the 
 Belgian government; General Cadoux, com- 
 mander of the 148th French Infantry at Di- 
 nant on that memorable occasion, French, Eng- 
 lish and Belgian generals and the governor of 
 the province of Namur. 
 
 There were such affectionate cheers for the 
 tall King and the petite Queen as together, fol- 
 lowed by their children, they walked down the 
 outdoor aisle to their cars. You never would 
 
 265 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 have known they were the King and Queen if 
 they had not resembled their pictures. They 
 are very democratic in mixing with their peo- 
 ple. The young crown prince, the Duke of Bra- 
 bant, was in the uniform of the English navy. 
 
 After the crowd had dispersed I wandered 
 up through the burned district of the town. 
 Accosting a woman who was coming down the 
 center of the cobbled street I learned she had 
 been through the massacre. She had escaped 
 with her sister and fled into the hills above the 
 cliffs where they hid in holes in the ground and 
 in caves for five days when the German soldiers 
 found them and brought them back to prison. 
 Her brother-in-law and his three children had 
 been shot. " I cannot remember all — it was so 
 terrible," she said and a dazed look came into 
 her eyes. That dazed look told volumes of 
 what memory refused to recall. What it must 
 have meant to be a hunted thing in such days 
 of terror! Everything is so high now she 
 complained. Pointing to the neat black waist 
 she wore she told us it was made from an old 
 sheet, dyed black. We were passing the ruins 
 of houses, every one of which held its tragedy. 
 
 266 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 Inside the broken doorway of one were shells 
 made into souvenirs. Before the war Dinant 
 had been the seat of an industry of copper and 
 brass novelties. 
 
 We had luncheon in the walled-in garden of 
 the picturesque old inn, the Hotel des Families, 
 just off the public square, from where, by just 
 raising our eyes we could see the old fort and 
 the cliffs below it. And the bustling inn keeper, 
 in his long-tailed coat was the counterpart of 
 the stage character you have seen in the role. 
 Only for the tragedy in his stern face. It was 
 a long time until I could get M. DeWyntei* to 
 tell me about it. His two sons had been put 
 against a wall four times to be shot — they had 
 been imprisoned — and only because he had in- 
 sisted that he must close his hotel if he didn't 
 have his sons' help were they spared. These 
 sons are now in America to tell Dinant 's story 
 to the New World. M. DeWynter told me he 
 had quartered 40,000 German soldiers and 3,000 
 officers, including nineteen generals, in his 
 hotel. " Everything we have here today," he 
 said, "is what we were able to hide from 
 them." He had been there through the battle 
 
 267 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 and pointing to the roof of an addition against 
 the garden wall on the right he related 
 how sparks from the burning honses had fallen 
 there and he had carried up buckets of water 
 to extinguish them. He had been there all 
 through the massacres. He repeated a state- 
 ment difficult to credit when I had heard it 
 earlier in the day that he had seen " Boche 
 foaming at the mouth with rage when they 
 entered the city." 
 
 There were harrowing stories at every turn 
 and I thought of the American woman who said 
 to me early in the war days, " You don't be- 
 lieve those things could have happened, do 
 you? " On the streets of Dinant they sold us 
 twigs of blue forget-me-nots as souvenirs of 
 this day. On our way out of the city we stopped 
 at a wall before which stood a reverent multi- 
 tude. A simple column tells that here 166 men, 
 women and children were shot just five years 
 ago. About the column and on the wall itself, 
 lay sprays of beautiful flowers, among which 
 was a wreath from the King and Queen. 
 
 I knocked at the door of a house across the 
 narrow street. A shrunken old woman an- 
 
 268 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 swered. Yes, she had lived there that tragic 
 day but she had run behind the house and hid ; 
 she did not see it. And her eyes reflected the 
 same horror, the same dazed helpless suffering 
 I had seen in those of the woman on the street. 
 
 Another incident of Dinant's tragedy was 
 related to me in the train enroute here to Paris 
 the following week, by an Antwerp man. He 
 had fled to England with his wife and daughters 
 the day before the bombardment of Antwerp. 
 He was an importer of raw materials and his 
 fortune, everything, had been swept away. His 
 eyes filled when he spoke of his son lost in the 
 war. He had gone to England where he worked 
 as a clerk for twenty-five shillings a week, and 
 such long hours. But he had to earn something 
 to support his family. I mentioned having been 
 in Dinant and he spoke of meeting a Dinant 
 friend quite unexpectedly while clerking in 
 England. " He told me something of what he 
 had been through — he escaped finally by hav- 
 ing himself put into a box." 
 
 " Tell me about it," I said. 
 
 This is the story he told me. The man was 
 a successful contractor. He was among those 
 
 269 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 stood up to be shot, but his knowledge of Ger- 
 man had saved him. Repeatedly he had tried 
 to leave the city but they would not permit his 
 departure. He had heard of people escaping 
 to Holland by being secreted in a box and 
 shipped as merchandise. He applied to a man 
 to make him a box but was warned that it was 
 extremely hazardous. Dinant was a manufac- 
 turing center for playing cards and he finally 
 had one of the large card packing cases padded 
 and supplied with food and water. Instead of 
 one day, which it usually took to ship these 
 cases across the frontier, his case was left four 
 days on the platform of the station. Imagine 
 his hours of torture and suspense! Finally it 
 was put on a train and in a few hours thrown 
 off at the destination. Then a man came to the 
 side of the case and whispered " Monsieur, you 
 are free." And pushing up the lid, which could 
 only be opened from the inside, he stepped out 
 into Holland. The Antwerp man assured me 
 this had actually happened. His friend had 
 drifted back to Amiens — where he was suc- 
 ceeding well in business and had established 
 his family when the bombardment of Amiens 
 
 270 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 began and they again had to leave. " I do not 
 know where he is now, ' ' he added, ' ' the last I 
 heard his wife's health had broken down from 
 all they had been through." 
 
 M. Verhoeven, who is now manager of an 
 importing house in Antwerp, explained, too, 
 why the freedom of the Scheldt is essential for 
 Belgium. Holland now controls both banks of 
 the river and could bottle up the harbor. Also 
 about Belgium's claim to Limburg on the east 
 border, which he referred to as " Maastricht." 
 This was Belgian territory until 1830 when it 
 was taken by Holland. After listening to the 
 claims of only a few nations one marvels how 
 the Peace commission arrived at any treaty 
 agreements at all. 
 
 From Dinant we motored to Charleroi. The 
 forts of Liege gave way after eleven long days, 
 the last one surrendering on Aug. 15. Liege be- 
 hind them, the Germans broke into two columns, 
 one marching under the orders of Von Kluck 
 upon Louvain and Brussels and the other, com- 
 manded by Von Bulow, advanced toward 
 Namur and Dinant. It was on Aug. 22 and 23 
 that the two streams united in a manner dis- 
 
 271 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 astrous for the British and the French at Mons 
 and Charleroi. 
 
 The battle of Charleroi is one of the great 
 tragedies of the early days of the war. Its 
 narrow streets, intersected by canals and 
 crossed by bridges, proved most treacherous. 
 The city itself, covering a large area, lies under 
 the slope of a hill. Poilus describing the battle 
 as it went on in the streets of Charleroi are 
 quoted as saying, " We were up to our knees 
 in the dead." 
 
 That day as we entered, Charleroi looked 
 strangely peaceful in the mid-afternoon sun. 
 We passed huge factories, in some of which the 
 wheels are beginning to turn, and on the out- 
 skirts were coal mines, high black heaps of coal 
 against the horizon. In 1916 from Charleroi 
 10,000 workmen were deported. 
 
 From Charleroi we went on to Marchienne 
 where our cars rolled under the high gates and 
 into the beautiful outer garden of the Chateau 
 de Marchienne. Here we were given a cordial 
 welcome by the Baron de Cartier de Mar- 
 chienne, brother to the Belgian Ambassador in 
 Washington, and his mother was a hospitable 
 
 272 
 

 
 <^^^^^^^^m ' 
 
 
 : ':,.*. " I? ' i 
 
 
 
 flkL Ww 
 
 
 
 Hre^f^. 
 
 
 
 ^^T' 
 
 \ < ^L-i_^^B 
 
 
 r*i^.I ■ W 
 
 
 
 i^ ^ j^" : 
 
 
 | . Mm ^Bmw 
 
 
 
 Little Bernadette Poncelet.. who was a babe in the arms of her father when the 
 
 German officer entered his home in Dinant, Belgium, to shoot him. One 
 
 of the children chosen to present flowers to the Queen on the 
 
 anniversary of the massacre. 
 
IN MARTYRED DINANT AND CHARLEROI 
 
 hostess. She is a charming Englishwoman. For 
 four years they had had German officers quar- 
 tered in their home, she told me. It was such 
 a relief to be rid of them. We were taken 
 through a hallway and vestibule, through a 
 stately living room and out into a rose garden 
 where century-old ivy curtained the chateau 
 walls. For two hundred years it has been the 
 family seat. There was such frank friendli- 
 ness for the Americans in the party, the reflec- 
 tion of the spirit of gratitude to the United 
 States for its help to the Belgians, that I found 
 everywhere in my ten days in that brave little 
 land. Here I also met Hon. Wm. L. Hounold, 
 formerly London director of the American 
 Commission for Belgian Relief, one of the four 
 noted men associated with Mr. Hoover in that 
 work. 
 
 The shadows of night were falling as we 
 drove past the historic field of Waterloo on our 
 way back to Brussels. There on a high bluff 
 as a reminder stands the British lion. He faces 
 Germany. I was told there is a movement on 
 foot to have him turn his back on Berlin now. 
 And as we rushed past in the bouncing car it 
 
 273 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 did look as if the beast were wagging his tail at 
 me. I may have been mistaken. But as Gen- 
 eral Pershing says : " We are all Anglo-Saxon 
 now." 
 
 274 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 MEETING THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF 
 
 Paris, Aug. 30. 
 
 THIS morning I had a little talk with Gen- 
 eral John J. Pershing, Commander-in- 
 chief of the American Army. 
 
 Word from the American Press bureau had 
 come saying that General Pershing would say 
 farewell to the American correspondents at 12 
 o'clock today at his residence; later the place 
 was changed to his office, in the A. E. F. head- 
 quarters in the Avenue Montaigne. He is to 
 sail tomorrow for home. 
 
 I arrived at the headquarters, which is only 
 a block from my hotel, fifteen minutes before 
 the appointed time and was waiting in an ante- 
 room. All was bustle and hurry in the halls 
 where huge packing cases were being nailed up. 
 People kept coming and going. Interviewing 
 Commanders-in-chief of victorious armies has 
 not been an every day occurrence in my life. I 
 had never talked to one before. I was thrilled. 
 I pictured myself one of a group of corre- 
 
 275 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 spondents in a shadowy private office before a 
 stern-visaged man, wearing a triple line of 
 medals across his coat, who was making a 
 formal statement. I took a calling card from 
 my handbag for, of course, a fmnkie would 
 soon be asking for one. 
 
 A door from an inner room opened and a tall 
 man in olive-drab entered the anteroom. He 
 walked to its center. An Englishman, seated 
 near the farther window, arose and hastened 
 forward. They shook hands warmly and stand- 
 ing there in the middle of the room chatted for 
 a few moments. I heard the "Englishman say 
 he had just returned from South Africa and 
 was going back. 
 
 I was wondering, vaguely, the rank of the 
 man in khaki. He wore no insignia; at least 
 none was visible from where I sat, near the 
 door. There was not even a wound stripe on 
 his sleeve and no mark on the side of the collar 
 toward me. By this time I am so accustomed 
 to war crosses that it takes a double row or 
 none at all to attract my attention. 
 
 The tall man in khaki stepped toward me. 
 " What can I do for you," he asked. 
 
 276 
 
MEETING THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF 
 
 Something in the way he held his head, some- 
 thing in the steady look in his eyes was familiar 
 — it reminded me of the lone horseman in khaki 
 in the Victory parade. 
 
 I was on my feet. < ' You are not — are you 
 General Pershing? " I stammered. 
 
 " I am," said the man without war decora- 
 tions. 
 
 T handed him my card. ' ' Now what does all 
 this mean? " he asked pleasantly as his eye 
 traveled down the list of names and cities of 
 the newspapers of the Lee Syndicate. He was 
 giving me a chance to recover my poise. "Ah, 
 Hannibal, Missouri," he breathed. "Well!" 
 Missouri claims General Pershing and the Com- 
 mander-in-chief has a soft spot in his heart for 
 Missouri. Hence the smile reminiscent that 
 came into his eyes. 
 
 " Tell me about our soldier boys," I begged. 
 
 A look of pride came over his face. ' ' They 
 are fine," he said. And I wish every dough- 
 boy's mother could have heard him say it — 
 yes, and his father and his sisters, his cousins 
 and his aunts. ' ' They are all fine soldiers, our 
 
 277 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 American boys," he emphasized. Then this: 
 
 " I don't know whether you know the thrill 
 of seeing him go into battle," he said, his eyes 
 shining. " He is wonderful, our American so.l- 
 dier ! " 
 
 " Out where I live, General, they have been 
 talking of you for president," I began. 
 
 He threw out both hands, as if warding off 
 something and laughed : ' ' Not a word on that 
 — not a word." 
 
 ' ' Can you look at a person and write a story 
 about them? " General Pershing put the ques- 
 tion to me, direct. I thought I could. " Then 
 go ahead about me," he said and the interview 
 was at an end. 
 
 I don't suppose the kaiser ever saw General 
 Pershing. But if he had he never would have 
 wanted to meet our Commander-in-chief with 
 that glint of steel in his eyes on a sultry after- 
 noon strolling along the Siegesalle in Berlin. 
 Then Wilhelm Hohenzollern would have had a 
 real reason for escaping to Holland — only he 
 would not have escaped. 
 
 He typifies our American soldier — all we 
 ever want him to be — does General Pershing. 
 
 278 
 
MEETING THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF 
 
 No higher praise could be given any man. And 
 France! With smiles of thanks and fondest 
 tears she is preparing to bid farewell to the 
 tall, serene man, who led the host of brave lads 
 from across an ocean wide to her rescue. 
 
 ' ' Zhenerale Parshaing ! ' ' You should hear 
 them say it: " Veeve, Zhenerale Parshaing! " 
 
 279 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 Paris, Sept. 10. 
 
 HE WAS a large framed, fat man, with a 
 bald head, chin whiskers, and heavy, 
 black rimmed spectacles. He stepped to the 
 center of the crowded, silent room, to an ornate 
 table on which lay a stack of papers, what ap- 
 peared to be the manuscript of a book. Push- 
 ing his glasses up on his forehead, he grasped 
 a pen and, examining it closely, he bent over 
 the table. A man in black at his left moved 
 aside a pace. The pen traveled across the 
 paper. It was a tense moment. Raising him- 
 self up, the fat man looked benignly over at the 
 seated line of statesmen, bordering the three 
 sides of the crimson velvet and white-blotter 
 covered continuous table line, that framed the 
 space about him. That was Carl Renner, chan- 
 cellor and sole plenipotentiary of the new Aus- 
 trian Republic, affixing Austria's signature to 
 the Treaty of Peace. Curiously pathetic he was 
 
 280 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 at that moment, the lone figure standing for a 
 powerful Empire, now by his signature reduced 
 to a small nation. 
 
 Directly facing Rentier, across the blotter- 
 topped, crimson velvet table and never taking 
 his keen eyes from the other's face, was a little, 
 wiry man with thinning white hair and droop- 
 ing, white mustaches. Yes, that was The Tiger. 
 He dominated that throng with a personality 
 so strong that, subconsciously, all eyes were 
 upon M. Clemenceau at that historic moment. 
 
 This morning I saw Austria take her medi- 
 cine — and it was Clemenceau who held the 
 spoon. 
 
 At the right of the French Premier, fine and 
 soldierly in his uniform, sat our Gen. Tasker H. 
 Bliss, who made a commanding figure as he 
 came forward to the treaty table to sign for 
 our own United States. Next to him sat Hon. 
 Henry White, and then Hon. Frank L. Polk, 
 the distinguished heads of the American Com- 
 mission to Negotiate Peace. Then came M. 
 Tardieu, M. Pinchot, and then the Italian dele- 
 gation headed by M. Tittoni. And rounding 
 the corner of the board the Belgian delegates 
 
 281 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 under M. Hymans ; then the Poland delegation 
 with M. Paderewski, his strong white face and 
 heavy sweeping locks making him its dominat- 
 ing figure. Across the table, at the inner rim, 
 were the Chinese, Cubans, and Nicaraguans. To 
 the left of M. Clemenceau was the Hon. Arthur 
 James Balfour, very tall, courtly and suave, 
 with a group of England's statesmen, and be- 
 yond them the delegates of Canada, Australia, 
 South Africa, New Zealand, India, Japan, 
 Greece, Panama, Portugal, and Siam. As each 
 went forward to sign the document there was a 
 shifting of the picture, but always the setting 
 remained the same. 
 
 It is a large, oblong room, this Stone Age 
 hall of the Chateau of St. Germain-en-Laye. 
 At the farther end is a tall brick fireplace, with 
 a white-columned mantel above, from which the 
 white marble busts of two distinguished French 
 savants looked down upon the throng. On its 
 walls are pictures of ancient mammals, and 
 mysterious colored prints that would gladden 
 the heart of any antiquarian. 
 
 The last time a treaty was signed in this 
 room was back in the sixteenth century, when 
 
 282 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 the state, which was Catholic, signed a treaty 
 with the Protestants. James n of England 
 was exiled here in 1689. Built on the site of an 
 ancient fortress, it has seen many vicissitudes 
 as the home of French kings. There is a white 
 lady who is supposed to haunt the chateau, 
 though when and why I could not ascertain. 
 Today the stately pile is used as a museum, 
 chiefly of prehistoric specimens, and the man 
 in charge of this particular hall only consented 
 to clear it for the treaty ceremony, because 
 he considered that rather important. The di- 
 rector of the museum, Solomon Reinach, is the 
 principal authority on the prehistoric in the 
 world today. 
 
 Only a few of the glass cases with their price- 
 less specimens had been left against the wall 
 at the entrance of the treaty ceremony hall. In 
 the center were two signing tables, with an- 
 other table set crosswise on which were other 
 treaties — some ten or twelve in all covering 
 minor matters — and the signers went from one 
 to another. The continuous blottered desk line, 
 on three sides, enclosed the center space, about 
 which numerous secretaries, carrying large 
 
 283 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 portfolios hurried to and fro. Glass inkstands 
 and pentrays were the only ornaments on the 
 blotters. 
 
 The fourth or open side of the oblong 
 was filled in by a standing, black coated throng 
 of men, about three hundred in all, with not 
 more than five women. Small groups of dis- 
 tinguished guests were seated on scarlet cush- 
 ioned, gold-backed chairs in the foreground, 
 and within the enclosed, red-carpeted space. 
 Prominent among these was Mrs. Frank L. 
 Polk, wife of the head of the American Com- 
 mission to Negotiate Peace, in a dove gray 
 costume and hat, who sat near the center cross 
 desk, where almost every signer stopped to 
 give her his autograph. Hon. Hugh Campbell 
 Wallace, our American Ambassador, was an 
 outstanding figure in that center group, as was 
 Colonel Wallace. The Hon. Harold Nicholson 
 of England, who wrote the financial clauses of 
 the treaty, was pointed out. And then from 
 among the group of English experts the man 
 who, it is whispered, hung up the treaty for so 
 long. 
 
 The entire end of the hall opposite the mantel 
 284 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 was given over to the press of the world, about 
 sixty correspondents, among whom I was the 
 only woman. Floyd Gibbons was a notable fig- 
 ure among the writers present. Behind me a 
 couple of Chinese journalists were trying to 
 kodak the scene. 
 
 It was almost nine o'clock this morning when 
 motoring out from Paris in a press car, we came 
 into the picturesque, reserved road to St. Ger- 
 main. It was a wonderful morning, full of 
 sunshine and bird song, as we rolled through the 
 beautiful, villa-lined route, past the Forest of 
 St. Germain and along the Seine. St. Germain 
 is a quaint, bustling little city, that manages to 
 look commercial until you round the turn to its 
 medieval, towered chateau in the heart of town. 
 Then you feel yourself transported back to the 
 times of the "Knights of the Round Table." 
 
 A magic card, with a green diagonal stripe 
 across its face, inscribed " Carte d 'invitation 
 donnant acces a la Salle de la Signature," 
 (invitation card giving access to the signature 
 hall) was the fairy wand. It allowed me across 
 a French-soldier bordered street, through a 
 high gate, past numerous suspicious function- 
 
 285 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 aries in medieval livery, over a moat bridge, 
 out- into a courtyard and on to the famous ter- 
 race, where there was a crowd behind another 
 horizon-blue, gun-bristling line of French Dra- 
 goons. Only hesitating for a moment I slipped 
 past two solemn figures in black, into a nar- 
 row doorway and then up and up what seemed 
 an endless wind of white stone steps. There 
 was an outer room with museum cases about — 
 and then the magic door itself. For the cour- 
 tesy of that card, which was one of only ten ex- 
 tended to the American press in Paris, I am 
 indebted to Charles Stephenson Smith, of the 
 Associated Press, better known as the Am- 
 bassador of American Journalism, to Miss 
 Catherine Groth, now director of the Paris 
 American Press Bureau and to Lawrence Hills 
 of the New York Sun bureau. 
 
 In the signing room at St. Germain chateau 
 at 9 :30 we were early enough to watch the celeb- 
 rities arrive. The American delegation ap- 
 peared first among the representatives of the 
 big allied powers. There was a pleasant at- 
 mosphere of handshaking and an informal buzz 
 of conversation. Men kept coming up to dele- 
 
 286 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 gates seated at desks, and shoving, at them au- 
 tograph books or postcards to be signed. 
 
 " I think that is low class business, doncher- 
 know, this rushing around getting auto- 
 graphs," jeered the famous English journalist 
 who had the chair at my left in the front row. 
 But it seems to be a feature of every treaty 
 signing program. " What do you suppose those 
 secretaries carry in those enormous port- 
 folios? " another asked. 
 
 Just at that moment there was a crash of 
 glass back of us and a daring spirit, climbing 
 over the high windowsill at our left, had stepped 
 through the glass top of one of the cases of 
 priceless stone age relics beneath it. When I 
 caught a glimpse of him he was disappearing 
 outside on the window ledge, clutching his 
 camp stool, the inevitable camp stool that is a 
 part of the scenic setting of every crowd in 
 France, whether at a picnic or a treaty cere- 
 mony. ' ' Must have been a movie man — I hope 
 no correspondent would have disgraced the 
 profession by such actions," commented the 
 journalist at my right. 
 
 Several members of the Chinese and Japa- 
 287 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 nese delegations were observed in close discus- 
 sion for a few moments. Was it Shantung, 
 do you suppose"? Or just the weather? 
 
 A man passed wearing the rosette of the 
 Legion of Honor. Another was carrying a silk 
 hat and a kodak. There were many carrying 
 canes and silk hats. A flurry — here comes a 
 gendarme in the blue uniform, with the red 
 stripes, bringing a telegram. He hands it to 
 M. Clemenceau. Someone suggests Rumania 
 has changed her mind and will sign. Perhaps 
 it is Serbia! Only these two are absent from 
 the treaty table. 
 
 Paderewski arrives and there is a stir — in- 
 voluntarily you look for the piano. But Pade- 
 rewski is more than a world musician now, he 
 is a world patriot. He shakes hands with his 
 delegation and then with a group of Americans. 
 His fine, dreamy face has not changed since he 
 played his minuet as an encore — only his wav- 
 ing hair seems to have much gray in it. Po- 
 land's sorrows have weighed heavily upon his 
 heart. " He was never going to play again 
 until Poland was free," a voice near me says. 
 
 Then there is a hush — Clemenceau has arisen 
 288 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 and is speaking. Just a few words in French in 
 explanation of the peace treaty. When the 
 Premier is seated, Carl Renner, the Austrian 
 delegate, comes out from among the group be- 
 fore the fireplace. Over my head the moving 
 picture machine grinds swiftly. 
 
 As the delegates of the big allied nations 
 come forward to sign, everyone is alert. It is 
 easy to recognize the men who have played the 
 leading roles in the world drama of today, the 
 allied and associated plenipotentiaries, as they 
 step into the spotlight of history by signing 
 their names to the voluminous document on 
 that spindle-legged table. M. Clemenceau is 
 vividly alive as he signs. M. Tittoni and the 
 Italian delegates are smiling. This is to Italy 
 what the signing at Versailles was to France. 
 
 The flaring interest flickers low as the smaller 
 nations come on in order. " Miss Adler, call 
 me when China signs," sighed the correspond- 
 ent of one of the foremost New York papers as 
 he wilted into a chair. He had been perched 
 high up next to the motion picture man at the 
 crucial moment. 
 
 A distracting incident right here. A stir at 
 289 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 the doorway and a girl in the C. A. R. D. French 
 blue uniform slips in and seats herself on one 
 of the glass specimen cases along the end wall. 
 There is much audible sympathy for the museum 
 man and his precious collection. But the glass 
 top holds. A moment later and a large French- 
 man boosts himself, silk hat and cane, on to 
 the adjoining glass case, swinging his spatted 
 ankles recklessly. " Oh, Boy, something is go- 
 ing to happen, ' ' exclaims a famous writer at my 
 elbow. And he, with the rest of us, miss a de- 
 tail of the ceremony in the center of the hall, 
 waiting breathlessly for that specimen case 
 to break. 
 
 " Perfectly disgusting — that autograph 
 hunting — my word it is," fumes the London 
 correspondent. Secretaries are hovering over 
 delegates in front of us, getting signatures. 
 " Wonder how many Mrs. Polk got," someone 
 remarks. 
 
 Right here I determined to enter the auto- 
 graph game for a few minutes first hand ex- 
 perience, since it has become such a treaty fad. 
 Our American delegates were charmingly ac- 
 
 290 
 
WHEN AUSTRIA SIGNED 
 
 quiescent. Gen. Bliss and the Hon. Mr. Polk 
 signed for me. M. Clemenceau passed by. ' ' I 
 forget how to sign my name," he said in very 
 good English, and then, smiling, grasped my 
 hand and shook it cordially. 
 
 I understood. Signing his name has been al- 
 together too serious a matter with M. Clem- 
 enceau these days. The hour was too sacred. 
 Who could blame him? He had laid the double- 
 headed arch enemy of France low at last. His 
 glorious France was now the cornerstone of 
 the peace of the world. Fifty years he had 
 waited to affix his name to a treaty that would 
 insure to France some retribution for her suf- 
 ferings — and this final scene — what signing 
 his name must have meant to that proud-spirit- 
 ed old premier. Commissioner Polk spoke, 
 " M. Clemenceau never gives his autograph 
 to anyone." Later I heard he had refused it 
 even to M. Tardieu. 
 
 The final moment of the peace ceremony was 
 impressive. Strongly, simply, the words of M. 
 Clemenceau rang through the hall, announcing 
 that the Treaty of St. Germain was concluded. 
 
 291 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 And here, where months before Austria had re- 
 ceived the treaty terms from the Allies, here 
 in the self-same hall, she was today signed up 
 to pay in full her price for the war. 
 
 292 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 Venice, Sept. 26. 
 
 IT WAS a stiff climb for the chugging gray 
 motor car, but each turn in the winding 
 road, densely wooded at either side, disclosed 
 new vistas of scenic grandeur ahead. Every 
 little while, through a break in the shrubbery, 
 there was a glimpse of a valley, where, in a 
 wide, stony bed, a blue, blue river winded sinu- 
 ously. Out from a shedlike structure at the 
 right of the road dashed a chubby-faced soldier 
 in a green-gray uniform with trimmings of black 
 and a visored cap; he shouted and waved his 
 hands. Behind him, from an entrance way 
 rushed two more green-gray clad soldiers, their 
 caps worn jauntily. They were wildly excited. 
 From their gestures it was evident we could not 
 go on. What a bore ! ' ' Fermato ' ' I shouted to 
 the chauffeur who was going on, anyway. 
 "Show them your official letter" suggested 
 Miss Bennett, the English girl traveling with 
 
 293 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 me. The seal on the official letter had awed peo- 
 ple before. The chubby-faced soldier was 
 breathless when he reached us. The English 
 girl understood his language. " He says we 
 can't go on — they are exploding mines ahead 
 — they are due to go off in a half hour," she 
 said. 
 
 Yes, this is Sunny Italy and we were on the 
 Piave River,, up on the Montello, where, less 
 than a year ago, was the front line of the Italian 
 Army. 
 
 Eleven mines, left by the English who had 
 been there in the big drive, had been set off. 
 In hardly twenty minutes they came, the first 
 a deep-throated intonation that made everyone 
 exclaim "Ah." By the time nine more rent the 
 September afternoon stillness I knew what it 
 must have sounded like up there on the hills 
 above the Piave when the Italians defended its 
 heights from the Austrian hosts on the hills 
 beyond the narrow blue stream that seemed so 
 motionless in its far-below rocky bed. Climb- 
 ing to a knoll, I had a wide view of the sweep 
 of the river that has a deeper significance for 
 Americans than any other Italian front, since 
 
 294 - 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 it was on the Piave that the only regiment of 
 American troops fought, the 332d, made up 
 chiefly of Ohio men. A deep square cut into 
 the turf, the Italian guard made me under- 
 stand, was where one of their cannon had stood. 
 There was still plenty of barbed wire about. 
 
 As the explosions of the mines came the 
 ground trembled. From the shedlike structure 
 there came the terrified cry of a child, the little 
 sick bambino of the farmhouse, which served 
 as the outpost for that squad guarding the road. 
 We counted ten explosions and as the eleventh 
 did not come and the Italian guard insisted 
 there were eleven, we decided to turn back. 
 In rounding the curve ahead to find a place wide 
 enough to turn the car we came upon the re- 
 mainder of the guard who had set off the ex- 
 plosions. They were evidently going to investi- 
 gate what happened to the eleventh mine. I 
 refused to be curious. Eleven never was my 
 lucky number. Anyway, I was keen to get 
 across the Piave, down to where our Yankee 
 lads had lent their splendid aid to Italy. 
 
 I came within fifteen minutes of not getting 
 to Italy. I had to have permission from four 
 
 295 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 different countries, the United States, France, 
 Switzerland and Italy. To get these four visaes 
 on my passport required infinite time, much 
 formality and much more patience. Train res- 
 ervations were the next obstacle. None were 
 to be had for ten days, but through the efforts 
 of Lieut. Stroppa, head of the press section of 
 the Italian Peace Delegation in Paris, and who 
 had gotten my passport visaed by the Paris 
 Prefecture of Police himself, we were finally 
 able to secure reservations for Monday night. 
 It was 11 :30 Monday morning when I stood 
 in the Swiss consulate in Paris, waiting to get 
 my visa, as the route to Verona lay through 
 Switzerland. The office for the ' ' wagon lit ' ' 
 or sleeper closed at twelve o'clock. And the 
 line into the room where the final stamp was 
 placed on the passports comprised some twenty 
 people ahead of me. As each required at least 
 ten minutes it began to look hopeless. I turned 
 to the young woman who had just stamped my 
 passport. " Can't you do anything for me 1 ? " 
 I pleaded. " Unless I leave tonight I shall be 
 compelled to give up my trip to Italy and the 
 wagon-lit office closes in a half hour." She 
 
 296 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 took the papers out of my hands and disap- 
 peared through a door back of her desk. In 
 five minutes she returned with everything com- 
 pleted. She refused pourboire so I tried to tell 
 her, in a burst of gratitude, that I hoped if she 
 ever came to my country someone would do as 
 much for her. She smiled happily. " I hope to 
 come to America some day, ' ' was what she said. 
 And I had been assured at the American pass- 
 port bureau that I could not get a Swiss visa 
 because my passport did not read for Switzer- 
 land. It was a wild taxi ride to the reserva- 
 tion 's office but we made it or I should not have 
 crossed the Piave three times yesterday, which 
 I believe is oftener than the Austrians crossed 
 it in any one day, though the cables had them 
 crossing and recrossing it innumerable times 
 a year ago. 
 
 Traveling in Italy is still very difficult. 
 Though we had our tickets from Paris to Ve- 
 rona, we were obliged to get out of the train 
 at Milan at 4 o'clock the following afternoon, 
 as the sleeper was taken off and there was no 
 place in the remainder of the train, though our 
 destination was only a couple of hours farther. 
 
 297 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 We had come on the Simplon-Orient Express, 
 through the marvelous Simplon tunnel that is 
 cut through the Swiss mountains, a gigantic 
 engineering feat. The tunnel requires about 
 twenty-five minutes to traverse its length, but a 
 defective air brake caused our train to stop 
 after we had traveled some ten minutes through 
 the dark cavern. We were delayed for the 
 longest ten minutes I ever expect to live 
 through, nothing visible from the compartment 
 windows but sheer walls of rock on either side. 
 There was no panic. Everyone waited. And 
 we discussed how long the air would last. It 
 was a blessed relief when the wheels began to 
 turn slowly. And the sunlight never before 
 seemed quite so good as when we emerged from 
 the tunnel at Iselle. 
 
 Crossing two frontiers we had to pass inspec- 
 tion of customs officers twice. The French 
 duane came at six in the morning and their 
 chief concern was whether we carried more 
 than a thousand francs in French money, the 
 maximum paper that may be taken from the 
 country. No gold may be taken at all. Five 
 august officials stood in the doorway of our 
 
 298 
 
IN ITALY. ON THE PIAVE 
 
 compartment and we had just shown them our 
 currency and answered that we had no gold 
 coin. One asked for my handbag and pro- 
 ceeded to search it. He was rummaging through 
 it when I saw what attracted his attention. It 
 was a gold pencil glittering in its depths, the 
 farewell gift of The Times editorial force, that 
 nearly got me into difficulty. When he found 
 it was a pencil he handed the bag back with 
 what sounded like an apology. At the Italian 
 frontier the customs officials came to ask if we 
 carried chocolate, sugar, coffee or cigars. 
 
 The early morning ride through Switzerland 
 carries the memory of the Jungfrau, snow- 
 capped, and another mountain lost in the clouds, 
 and a spired, little, white church rising straight 
 from the center of a nestling mountain village. 
 After the big Simplon we went through many 
 little tunnels until we reached the frontier town 
 of Domo d'Ossola and then we were in Italy. 
 Past Lago Maggiore,, or Lake Major, to trans- 
 late its musical name, with lovely little dream 
 isles in its center on which were clustered what 
 looked from the train distance like toy houses. 
 The villages in Italy are wonderfully pictur- 
 
 299 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 esque — everywhere one looks it is a picture. 
 We decided to remain in Milan for the night, 
 where after much difficulty we found room in 
 a hotel, for everything was crowded. In a 
 quaint one horse vehicle we drove about the 
 streets and then to the great cathedral which 
 is such a marvelous example of Gothic architec- 
 ture. It looked like a huge frosted cake in the 
 sunset, that Cathedral of Milan with its lacelike 
 exterior, the sun's rays glinting from its count- 
 less spires. The interior is noble in its pro- 
 portions with its huge marble columns and its 
 inlaid marble floors are worn uneven by the 
 many who have come and gone. There are no 
 seats in the massive body of the cathedral, giv- 
 ing the eye full sweep and adding to its mag- 
 nificence. 
 
 It was dark and rainy at 5 o'clock the next 
 morning when the funny little, one horse, Italian 
 cab,, with the driver, umbrella-shielded, on the 
 high front seat juggled us over the rough pave- 
 ment to the Milan depot where we caught the 
 train for Verona. Verona was the headquarters 
 of the American regiment in Italy and in addi- 
 tion it was the home of Juliet whom Shakes- 
 peare immortalized. 
 
 300 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 In the train compartment with us was an 
 Italian general and his wife. Miss Bennett 
 spoke Italian to them and the general inquired 
 what the " C " on my sleeve meant. She told 
 him I was an American correspondent and he 
 spoke in glowing terms of what the American 
 Red Cross had done in Italy and how grateful 
 they were to America for the supplies and 
 money given through the Red Cross. He told 
 me he had fought in the Grappa and Asiago and 
 modestly refused to talk of the three stars on 
 his croix de guerre. I tried to get him to ex- 
 press himself on d'Annunzio but he refused to 
 give an opinion further than that Fiume was 
 Italian absolutely and the only thing possible 
 was to give it to the Italians. He did not be- 
 lieve it was wise to give Italy the city and the 
 port to the Jugo Slavs. The Italians must 
 have both. He said Wilson was at the head of a 
 syndicate of American bankers, which was quot- 
 ing what the morning Italian paper, the Milan 
 Populo, had said. I asked about the feeling 
 of Italians against Americans on account of 
 Fiume. He insisted they were the best of 
 friends. Militarily, America had not been 
 
 301 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 largely represented in Italy and he had not come 
 personally in contact with American soldiers. 
 He said, however, that the American and Eng- 
 lish soldiers had been well provided for by 
 their countries, but the Italian soldier had suf- 
 fered great privations, since Italy had been too 
 poor to provide good food, shelter and clothing, 
 but the Italian soldier had never grumbled. I 
 liked the glowing terms in which he spoke of 
 the valor of the Italian soldier. 
 
 It was shortly after nine when we reached 
 Verona which is highly Italian with its quaint 
 old houses and statuary adorned buildings. To 
 my American eyes, exquisite statuary set 
 around on cornices, over doorways, and in wall 
 niches seemed the exuberance of art. And I 
 thought of my one and only highly treasured 
 Venus riding the snail and how carefully it now 
 was covered at home. Here they have so many 
 marble statues they set them around on the 
 outside of the houses and on the gateways. 
 Figures blackened with age they are but re- 
 taining their exquisite proportions, giving that 
 touch of art everywhere which is so distinctly 
 Italian. 
 
 302 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 In a rickety, one horse, cab we went in. search 
 of the house of the Capulets and here I was 
 destined to my first big shock. After having 
 thrilled at ' ' Romeo and Juliet ' ' in the Opera in 
 Paris, with Romeo sighing over a flower-hung 
 balcony looking out on a lovely garden, I was 
 wholly unprepared to see Juliet's balcony on 
 the third floor of an ugly, straight-up-from-the 
 street, stone building, where Romeo never could 
 have reached it unless he was a porch climber. 
 It would have baffled even a Douglas Fairbanks 
 — that balcony with its unattractive iron rail- 
 ing. Then as the little shop-lined street below 
 was only about ten feet wide the neighbors must 
 all have listened to Romeo's wooing. Of course 
 in those days there were no clanging street cars 
 winding down the narrow thoroughfare, as there 
 are today, that made the cab hug the two-foot 
 sidewalk. I might have refused to believe the 
 old cab driver if he had not pointed to the white 
 stone marker over the arched entrance, which 
 reads that " This is the House of the Capulets 
 from whom sprang Juliet, whose renown has 
 been sung by gentle hearts and poets." They 
 wanted to take me to the tomb of Juliet, but I 
 
 303 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 refused. That was enough romance smashed 
 for one day. 
 
 Verona has a wonderful old marketplace, with 
 an ancient statue-corniced palace at one end. 
 Next to it is an old place with half-obliterated 
 frescoes of marvelous hues still visible on its 
 outer walls and below, in the bustling market 
 square, were the white-umbrella shaded stalls, 
 with tomatoes and fruits and lettuce piled high 
 with the artist eye to color effects. Here and 
 there were rusty braziers of roasting chest- 
 nuts. An ornate tomb of a Fourteenth century 
 Veronese family is right in the heart of the 
 city. 
 
 On the way to the depot the cabdriver insisted 
 on our stopping to see the old Roman arena, 
 its tiers of worn stone seats holding 25,000 peo- 
 ple in the days when the gladiators held forth 
 there. When General Pershing went through 
 Italy before sailing for home a few weeks ago 
 an immense spectacle was given in this arena 
 in his honor. There is a large barracks in 
 Verona and we saw many Italian soldiers about 
 them, the Carabinieri, with their three cor- 
 nered Napoleonic hats, and the Bersaglieri, 
 
 304 
 
IN ITALY. ON THE PI AVE 
 
 with the tuft of cock feathers falling fetchingiy 
 over one side, being specially attractive. 
 
 On the train from Verona to Venice an Italian 
 captain tried to tell us the feeling for Amer- 
 icans in Italy was unchanged. That the ques- 
 tion of Fiume is a diplomatic one. The Amer- 
 icans have nothing to do with it — now the 
 Italians must settle it for themselves. At this 
 moment the situation in Italy in regard to 
 Fiume is very tense with d'Annunzio prepared 
 to hold out to the end and the dispatches in the 
 Italian papers saying President Wilson will not 
 change his decision, though Clemenceau and 
 Lloyd George are willing that Italy should have 
 Fiume. 
 
 We passed through Padua which recalls the 
 ' ' Merchant of Venice ' ' and reached the Queen 
 of the Adriatic, as Venice is called, at five in 
 the afternoon. 
 
 To be transported by gondola from the sta- 
 tion to the hotel was a pleasant experience 
 after the dirty train, for travel in Italy is still 
 suffering from the war and is anything but 
 sanitary and comfortable. Just as you see him 
 in pictures, minus the red sash and cap, the 
 
 305 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 gondolier stands at the back of the boat and 
 with one oar guides it magically over the smooth 
 waters, keeping up a running comment in patois 
 with the passing gondoliers. He has a peculiar 
 cry to announce his coming around the sharp 
 turns of the smaller canals, after he leaves 
 the Grand Canal, that sounds like " Wah hee " 
 and serves the same purpose as the honk of an 
 auto. The gondola is a long, narrow skiff, al- 
 ways painted black, which gives it a mysterious 
 air, with the prow end of a quaint iron design. 
 Gondoliering is dustless and most luxurious, 
 even if it is slow. So here in Venice, if you 
 belong to the F. F. V.'s you have your private 
 gondola and your gondolier. A few ultra- 
 moderns have steam launches but they lack the 
 Venetian charm. No, there are no automobiles 
 for there are no streets on which to run them. 
 In the soft sunshine of the late afternoon we 
 passed the Venice boat market with its boats 
 piled high with colorful fruits and vegetables, 
 arranged always like a picture, and through the 
 web of small canals, under the Bridge of Sighs, 
 the white marble enclosed bridge from the 
 Palais de Justice to the Prison, and into the 
 
 306 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 Grand Canal again and up to the dock of the 
 Hotel Royal Danieli, which is so cosmopolitan 
 that the room clerk speaks English. 
 
 I had been told at Cook's, where I had gone 
 as a last, resort, that it would be impossible for 
 me to get to the Piave battlefield. They have 
 no trips to the Italian battlefronts. Though I 
 carried letters with the seal of the Italian Peace 
 Delegation in Paris I was assured there was no 
 means of transportation. Italy has made no 
 feature of exhibiting her battlefields and they 
 are most inaccessible. It was the hotel con- 
 cierge who knew a garage at Mestre where we 
 might be able to rent a car, but it would cost 400 
 lire or more. 
 
 The next morning at nine o'clock we were 
 standing outside the little depot at Mestre, 
 which is an hour's rail trip from Venice, sur- 
 rounded by beseeching, chattering cabbies, 
 vainly looking for the promised car to take us 
 over the Piave. At last a purple-silk-sweater 
 attired damsel, wearing heavy jeweled earrings, 
 rings and necklace appeared to tell us some- 
 thing had happened to the car and it would be 
 ready in fifteen minutes — and would we ac- 
 
 307 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 company her to the garage. On the tramcar 
 into the town we passed a gipsy caravan. Senor 
 Tagliano, the owner of the garage, was one of 
 only fonr men who remained in Mestre when 
 the city was evacuated for the war. He pointed 
 out for us where a shell had fallen and where 
 he had stood on the road only one hundred feet 
 away at the time. In the station at Mestre 450 
 people had been killed during one attack. 
 
 It was after eleven when the auto with the 
 Italian driver, who wore a black band across his 
 forehead to hide an ugly wound scar, started 
 from Mestre for Treviso. The Austrians got 
 to within fifteen kilometers of Treviso at one 
 time, a quaint old city with arcaded buildings 
 along the crooked streets and a marvelous old 
 gateway. 
 
 On the road we passed a field full of old 
 camions, remnants of the war days and then we 
 came to Spresiano, the first ruined town and 
 which was the scene of a terrific battle in 1917- 
 18 that gave the Italians victory. In a wooden 
 shack, used now as a restaurant, I talked with 
 the engineer in charge of the buildings being 
 constructed by the government. He said about 
 
 308 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 half of the population of the village was back. 
 
 Then we came to the Piave river that here is 
 very narrow but lies in a wide rocky bed. This 
 is the dry season. We crossed to the opposite 
 bank to the village of Susegana, which had been 
 badly shelled. The bridge we crossed over was 
 a new temporary structure since the old stone 
 bridge had been destroyed by the Italians in 
 their retreat in 1917. As I tried to get a kodak 
 view it was difficult to distinguish where the 
 blue Italian sky and the blue waters of the Piave 
 met, they blended into one glory of color on 
 the horizon. 
 
 At Nervesa about fifty of the village people 
 surrounded us and were very friendly. It is a 
 terribly shattered town, just a few broken walls 
 and hollow exteriors greeting the eye at every 
 street turn. But several new houses were be- 
 ing erected and the half of the population, that 
 has wandered back from the south of Italy and 
 Sicily to where they had been evacuated, are 
 living as best they can in remnants of tumbling 
 down, shelled houses. Here it was that the vil- 
 lage belle came out to talk to us, a beautiful 
 Italian girl with dusky hair, piled high, and 
 
 309 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 stuck with fanciful pins, a radiant skin and such 
 pearly teeth. Her people had owned the town 
 inn. She confided to me that she wanted to go 
 to America, She had only been back in Nervesa 
 a few weeks. The grandmother of the village, 
 bent and old, came out too. They had been hav- 
 ing a hard time they said. No one seemed to 
 know what they were going to do this winter but 
 they were very philosophical about it. After 
 all, they were back in their own village. It is 
 home, if there is but little left. 
 
 From Nervesa we started up the winding hill 
 road on to the Montello which was the front line 
 in November, 1918, when the Italians made 
 their heroic stand on the Piave. We stopped 
 to talk at a farmhouse. The people had not 
 been back long but had planted their maize from 
 which is made the Polenta, the favorite dish of 
 this region, like nothing so much as our corn- 
 bread of the south. It tastes much like corn- 
 bread, too. 
 
 After we had been turned back by the mines 
 on the Montello, we returned through Nervesa 
 and crossed the Piave at Susegana to go down 
 on the farther bank of the river. Through spec- 
 
 310 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 tral ruined villages and past a roadside altar, 
 through Tezze and into San Polo where we 
 passed a couple of pretty Italian senoritas 
 carrying gay sunshades. They were a welcome 
 touch of youth and color in that street of 
 broken walls and hollow houses. 
 
 Now the road became densely wooded. Fields 
 were so completely covered with vegetation that 
 no shell holes were visible. This devastated re- 
 gion of Italy differs from France for Nature 
 has here already covered many signs of war 
 with knee-high vegetation. We passed the 
 ruined palace of the Senator Papadopoli, a 
 handsome old mansion that was in the track 
 of the attack on Oct. 26, 1918, not a year ago. 
 
 At Cimadolmo, where the American army 
 fought, we entered a house and talked with the 
 people. It had been a three story home but now 
 only the mark of the stairways was visible on 
 the walls of what was one high, barnlike room. 
 Two beautiful old beds were there, a part of the 
 furniture they had been able to carry with 
 them when they evacuated. The quaint old fire- 
 place with its huge stone hearth had not been 
 harmed. In the outer passage a white owl 
 
 311 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 blinked at us — it was the pet of the small boy 
 of the family. They were getting along as best 
 they could so the pretty girl and the tired old 
 mother told us. 
 
 It was between the Grave di Papadopoli and 
 the left bank of the river that the Italian Tenth 
 army had formed the third bridgehead, and 
 breaking through the enemy's defences ex- 
 tended into the Cimadolmo plain. Quoting from 
 the report of the Commando Supremo of the 
 Royal Italian Army on the battle of Vittorio 
 Veneto from Oct, 24 to Nov. 4, 1918, on ''A 
 Page of Glory ' ' and under the heading, ' ' The 
 Audacious Tenth Army," this must fill you 
 with pride : * ' The young and gallant 332d 
 American Regiment proved its valour, vying 
 in bravery with our infantry. ' ' 
 
 At Roncadelle we stopped in front of the vil- 
 lage tailor shop where twenty of the returned 
 refugees came out to talk to us. They said the 
 government allowed them 1 lire, 35 centimes a 
 day, which is scarcely twenty cents. A girl 
 stood knitting a sock with coarse yarn. She 
 said she had been taken prisoner by the Aus- 
 trians and kept a year, but they had not mis- 
 
 312 
 
IN ITALY, ON THE PIAVE 
 
 treated her. She did not get much to eat but 
 they did not make her work. These people were 
 profuse in their appreciation of the food and 
 clothing the American Red Cross had given 
 them. . 
 
 At Ponto di Piave, where we again crossed 
 the river, I went into the office of the military 
 commander of the zone. He was not in but I 
 was told they were erecting 400 rooms, place to 
 house 400 people, and repairing many of the 
 damaged houses. Most of the evacuated people 
 had returned. In this village the work of re- 
 construction was most encouraging, many new 
 homes and several large buildings being in 
 course of erection. An Austrian who entered 
 the office said he was foreman of the building 
 and that the work was going well. 
 
 There seems to be little bitterness between 
 the Austrians and the Italians — my impression 
 was that they had fought it out and now were 
 trying to get along. Quite a different feeling 
 from that of the French and Belgians against 
 the Germans. But then we heard of no civilian 
 atrocities by the Austrians. They always evac- 
 uated the cities in the path of a battle several 
 days before an attack. 
 
 313 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 On the way back to Treviso we passed several 
 wagonloacls of bedding going toward the dev- 
 astated region. Into Treviso we came, through 
 the handsome old Roman gateway, and back 
 to Mestre, catching the seven o'clock train for 
 Venice. 
 
 The Piave is slowly recovering from the hur- 
 ricane of war that swept over its peaceful vil- 
 lages. Its people are cheerful and hopeful 
 in spite of the hard winter ahead. What cour- 
 age they have to come back to rekindle the 
 fire on the shelled old home hearth, you will say 
 with me, but after all, they are home again. 
 And they did so miss their Polenta during their 
 evacuation, they told me. It is the staple 
 food of the Italian of the North. They have 
 home even if it is a broken shack and their 
 polenta — and the cold winter seems very far 
 away. 
 
 314 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 Venice, Sept. 29. 
 
 TWO Italian military police stood in the 
 doorway of the railway compartment ex- 
 amining passports. It was ten o 'clock Saturday 
 night and we traveling toward Trieste. "Ang- 
 lais? " one asked, as he reached out for mine. 
 " No, I'm Americana," I answered with a 
 proud toss of my head. " Essere Americana," 
 (All right, be an American then) he answered 
 with a short, hard laugh. Right there I ex- 
 perienced my first uncomfortable feeling about 
 being in Italy at this time. We had been warned 
 against coming. They told me I could not ex- 
 pect a people to be friendly when only the Presi- 
 dent of my country stood between them and 
 their beloved Fiume. Both Lloyd George and 
 Clemenceau were willing that Italy should 
 have Fiume. At every station along the way 
 we had bought Italian papers and their head- 
 lines proclaimed in two inch type that President 
 
 315 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Wilson was still holding out against Italy. It 
 was a dynamic moment in Italy and logically it 
 was no place for Americans. D'Annunzio bad 
 barricaded bimself in Fiume and bad announced 
 dramatically be would die tbere rather than 
 give up. The Italian government was in a 
 difficult position. You would expect feeling to 
 run high. But it was a new sensation, this 
 veiled scoff at my country. The Florentine 
 couple in the compartment with us tried to 
 laugh it off. They said nothing was meant — 
 but the feeling remained. 
 
 On the way to Monfalcone, which if your 
 memory serves you, will recall some of the 
 fiercest of Italy's battles in the world war, we 
 met an Italian singer in an American Y uni- 
 form. He was Umberto Sacchetti, who created 
 the tenor role in "The Girl of the Golden 
 West," when it was presented in America sev- 
 eral years ago. He gave me another version 
 of the story we had been hearing since we start- 
 ed, that the American flag had been fired upon 
 in Trieste. He would not admit there was any 
 feeling against Americans there — claimed Fi- 
 ume was a question the Italians must settle for 
 themselves. 
 
 316 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 It was Captain F. Maurice Ferrucci, an at- 
 tache of the Italian Peace Delegation in Paris, 
 whom I met in Venice, who was instrumental in 
 getting us to the Carso. The Carso is Italy's 
 great war shrine and means to Italy what Cha- 
 teau Thierry and St. Mihiel do to us, what Ypres 
 does to the English and what Verdun does to 
 the French. The majority of the one and a 
 half million sons that Italy gave to death and 
 disablement when she fought the cause of the 
 Allies made the sacrifice on the Carso. For 
 two years, from May, 1915 to 1917, Italy stub- 
 bornly clung to these rocky heights. Then 
 came the great retreat that pushed them back 
 to the Piave, where they again came to glorious 
 victory when October gave way to November 
 last year. 
 
 After the Piave, where America sent her 
 sons to help the land of Garibaldi, I knew I 
 must see the Carso to visualize even casually 
 the Italian phase of the war. At first it ap- 
 peared inaccessible. The Italian Peace Dele- 
 gation in Paris through its Chevalier Armando 
 Koch, had been anxious to help me, but could 
 assure me nothing. Their Lieut. Stroppa 
 
 317 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 wired to the headquarters in Rome, but with 
 no results. I was given a letter of introduction 
 from the peace delegation and Captain Ferruc- 
 ei in Venice added a personal note to the com- 
 mando supremo of the military zone at Gorizia, 
 the city nearest the famous battlefield. 
 
 My hopes had not been high when we reached 
 Monfalcone and the luncheon on the Italian 
 diner, especially that heaped-high plate of end- 
 less spaghetti, had not boosted them. We had 
 come out from Venice on the 9 o'clock train, 
 and if you had possessed a long distance tele- 
 scope you might have seen Miss Bennett and 
 me seated disconsolately on a stone wall at Mon- 
 falcone about two o'clock that afternoon trying 
 to decide whether to go to Gorizia and attempt 
 to get on the Carso, or take a through train for 
 Trieste. 
 
 Monfalcone is no place to lose one's nerve. 
 Tt is a wraith of a town with one street of ruins 
 after another and with a force of men trying to 
 repair the shell-punctured lanes and people liv- 
 ing drably in what is left of their domiciles, it 
 was discouraging in the hot midday Italian sun- 
 shine. I had just changed my mind for the fifth 
 
 318 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 time — with the Italian fondness for delays and 
 recalling that it took me ten days to procure 
 the necessary papers to get to Italy, I groaned 
 that nothing less than a miracle could get us to 
 the Carso within the time we had before dark 
 — when along came an old, one horse buggy 
 winding up the dusty road, and we hailed it for 
 a sight-seeing tour. Monfalcone gives you a 
 heartache. It must have been an important 
 center in its day, but after the pendulum of 
 war had swung back and forth over its twisting 
 streets for two long years it is full of shadows 
 and ruins. Of its population of 20,000 people, 
 5,000 had returned. I talked with a number of 
 them, both Austrians and Italians. This was 
 formerly Austrian territory and now belongs to 
 Italy. The girl at a postcard shop admitted 
 she was Austrian, but refused to talk. At a 
 fruit stand I talked German to an Austrian and 
 French to an Italian. The man in the depot 
 checkroom admitted he was Austrian, but was 
 taciturn. It seemed impossible to get these 
 people to express themselves on conditions — 
 evidently they feared it was not safe to talk. 
 Considerable building and repairing was going 
 
 319 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 on, but there is still much to do to reconstruct 
 Monfalcone. At 3 :30 we took the train for the 
 hour's ride to Gorizia. 
 
 We had a half hour's wait in the stately 
 building that was the military headquarters. 
 Then an officer came to say it would not be pos- 
 sible for them to send us over the Carso, since 
 they had no military cars. A charming major 
 entered, saluted with a dash, and I showed him 
 my credentials, asking whether he could send 
 along a conducting officer if I could hire a car in 
 a local garage. Miss Bennett, who is fluent in 
 Italian, acted as interpreter. There was a po- 
 lite exchange of compliments and he asked us to 
 wait a few moments, saluted again, and hurried 
 out. It was 5 :30 when his dashing young Lieut. 
 Ercolani Enrico came in with beaming eyes to 
 that reception room and said he had a car and 
 his driver and we could make the trip in two 
 hours. 
 
 Gorizia is a large and attractive city, clean 
 and orderly in the arrangement of its streets, 
 with the picturesque Julian Alps like a stage 
 curtain at its back. We motored out of the city 
 over a road that had been swept many times by 
 
 320 
 
Standing at the door of the Officers' Mess on the Carso. Miss Bennett at the right. 
 
 Royal Italian Army Car with Italian Conducting Officer, on our trip over the Carso 
 Battlefield in the Julian Alps, Italy. 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 Austrian artillery. I have ridden with military 
 drivers of many lands in these last few months 
 but the prize for reckless speed belongs to one, 
 Soldat Massimi Constatin, C. R. A. R., who took 
 us up on the Carso. I have a recollection of a 
 blur of battered walls dashing past as we round- 
 ed curves through San Grado, the first Austrian 
 town the Italians took and which is completely 
 destroyed. Through other demolished villages, 
 occasionally a few people would be seen moving 
 about. The place of an Italian battery was 
 pointed out. Austrian artillery had been most 
 active here. We passed an Italian military 
 cemetery and then began the climb over a won- 
 derful new road, the road the Italians had built 
 straight up through the rock of these dizzying 
 heights — a road that wound like a Colorado 
 trail and not much wider in places, circling and 
 dipping and climbing and turning. Every yard 
 brought a new vision of dugouts and shelters. 
 These were modern cavemen, truly, for they 
 had hewn here caves in the rock such as are 
 seen on no other battlefield of the war. This 
 Carso is an arid, rocky mountain-side. There 
 were no trees or shrubs for shelter, so the Ital- 
 
 321 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ians on the Carso had to hew for safety into its 
 stony depths. It was incredible, until I stood 
 within messrooms and kitchens on stretches of 
 tableland up the mountainside. The barbed 
 wire, with its cruel prongs, still formed a net- 
 work over the shell-tumbled earth and where- 
 ever the eye turned some new type of abri or 
 shelter was disclosed. This is the most mar- 
 velous battlefield of the war, and no one should 
 feel he has covered the war zone until he sees it. 
 You stand awed at the enormity of the under- 
 taking of fortifying these Carso heights. You 
 realize the tremendous sacrifice it must have 
 cost to hold them. The world gasped at the 
 Italian retreat — when you stand on the Carso 
 you wonder how they held on for two years — 
 what it must have meant to the Italian army to 
 regain those nobly defended crests with the 
 armistice ! 
 
 The conducting lieutenant, with boyish en- 
 thusiasm, took us to where his battery had been 
 housed. The roof was off of what had been 
 their mess, two rooms made out of solid rock, 
 plank lined. The camouflages still hung in their 
 places, hiding walls of rock, in this city of de- 
 
 322 
 
ON THE OARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 serted dugouts. We looked down upon the 
 quarters of the commander, in a deep, rock- 
 faced hollow, for the road we traveled wound 
 far above it. Rock-lined trenches snaked in 
 every direction. " This was the vestibule of 
 our quarters," said the lieutenant, pointing to 
 the path leading from the cave shack to the 
 main road. 
 
 Up and up the mountain heights the car 
 climbed. Of the village of Loquizza, over there, 
 a few broken walls are left. A heap of stones 
 mark the site of another mountain village. Then 
 up to Hill 380 and its observatory. One city of 
 10,000 is in ruins, Castagnevizza. Over there, 
 he pointed out from the final hilltop, was the 
 farthest end of the line. There the Italians 
 held their place from Nov. 1, 1916 to Oct. 27, 
 1917. Up here the days of that round year are 
 written in heroic blood. And then it was that 
 they fell back to the Piave. 
 
 Night was falling. The sun had sunk behind 
 the Julian Alps and the crescent moon arose 
 over a scene of desolation and memories. Shad- 
 ows wavered about the abris and brooded over 
 the cave shelters as we started down the twist- 
 
 323 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ing road, only the exhaust of the car breaking 
 the stillness of the Italian summer night. 
 
 This Carso is the sacred zone of Italy. It is 
 to be kept as it is as a monument to those who 
 fell defending it for Italy. Today there is no 
 means of bringing tourists here, but it is hoped 
 later to make it accessible. Right now Italy is 
 too occupied with her internal troubles. An 
 Italian officer remarked they did not approve 
 of making show places of their battlenedsj they 
 are too sacred. But later they hope to find 
 means of conveying those who will come in rev- 
 erence to this fought-for mountain top, where 
 the sons of Italy gave so much to save her. 
 With true Italian courtesy they refused pay for 
 the car, even when I insisted on reimbursing 
 them for the gasoline for I knew Italy was short 
 of " petro." " Happy to be able to do it for 
 you," they said. Evidently there is no feeling 
 in military circles against Americans and that 
 is why I was so astonished to encounter it that 
 night when we left Gorizia at 9 o'clock for 
 Trieste. 
 
 The Florentine couple proved delightful. 
 He is vice-president of the Italian national or- 
 
 324 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 ganization for the invalides of the war. From 
 him I learned briefly of the splendid re-educa- 
 tion work of Italy for war invalides, especially 
 in the schools for the blind. 
 
 Into Trieste we came at 11:30 that night to 
 find a sinister, silent throng clustered about the 
 entrance to the depot, men, women and children. 
 It had been rumored that d'Annunzio might 
 come into Trieste at any hour and if he did it 
 would be a signal for a great demonstration. 
 We found' the Hotel Savoia had not received 
 our telegram for rooms and was full. There 
 are pleasanter things than arriving at midnight 
 in a city trembling on the verge of war, and 
 we were thankful that the Florentine doctor 
 and his wife were with us as we drove about 
 in the wheezy cab, trying to get place in a 
 hotel. For a while it looked like we might have 
 to spend the night in the public square, over- 
 looking the beautiful Gulf of Trieste, where an 
 American destroyer rode at anchor. Trieste 
 is very cosmopolitan and at that moment was 
 seething with people from all over the globe, 
 together with many Italian soldiers. Finally 
 we found rooms in a weird, little, old hotel on a 
 
 325 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 dark, back street, where the coverlets on the 
 beds resembled red tablecloths, and one win- 
 dow, opening into a narrow corridor, provided 
 the only ventilation. There was no milk for the 
 breakfast coffee next morning and the bread 
 was dark and soggy. Italy is still on war ra- 
 tions. 
 
 Trieste retains much of its aspect as an Aus- 
 trian city — it has wide, clean, well-kept streets 
 and differs very much from the Italian cities. 
 On the streets we found people moving about 
 that Sunday morning restlessly, but quiet- 
 ly. In the Hotel Savoia where we lunched, 
 I talked to an American Red Cross dispatch 
 bearer on his way to Montenegro. He said 
 Americans in Trieste were keeping very quiet 
 — it did not take much to provoke trouble. 
 " Don't express an opinion," he cautioned me, 
 ' ' you can 't know who might be near you. ' ' 
 We were in the lounging room where was con- 
 gregated French, English and Italian officers 
 and Americans in Y and Red Cross uniforms. 
 This American related his experience in the 
 dining room a couple of nights previous with 
 an Italian soldier and a Y man. The Y man 
 
 326 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 had remarked jocosely, "What about Fi- 
 ume! " In a moment the Italian was talking 
 loudly and threateningly. The several hun- 
 dred people in the room centered their atten- 
 tion on that table. " I don't know what would 
 have happened if the Y man had not adroitly 
 changed the subject by asking the Italian about 
 his war decorations — it looked like we were in 
 for trouble," he said. 
 
 I walked over to the American Y rooms in 
 Trieste and learned the real facts of the flag 
 story. There had been a demonstration in 
 front of the Y a couple of weeks before. The 
 Italians, it seems, are given to demonstrations. 
 The crowd, assembled in the street below the 
 windows, began to hiss, but no one had any in- 
 tention of taking down Old Glory, which waves 
 over the entrance. Two carabinieri appeared 
 upstairs in the cozy Y assembly room and sug- 
 gested that they hang out the Italian flag with 
 the American. All of the Allied flags were 
 placed over the doorway with the Stars and 
 Stripes and the crowd dispersed. That is all 
 there was to the incident, a man who had been 
 there that night through it all assured me. 
 
 327 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Lieut. J. W. McCabe of Kentucky in charge 
 of the Trieste Y, was at the chocolate and post- 
 card stand at the farther end of the room when 
 we entered. He told me he was in Fiume on 
 Sept. 13, two weeks previous, when d'Annunzio 
 had just gotten in. Fiume is a three hour motor 
 trip from Trieste. He had been stopped ten 
 times on the way and ordered not to go into the 
 city, but he went ahead and reached Fiume safe- 
 ly, where they are working with the Casa del 
 Soldat Italian, the Italian Y. Last Thursday 
 he had been as far as Abbiza, just outside of 
 Fiume, and then had boarded the American 
 flagship, the Pittsburg, which with two Ameri- 
 can destroyers are at this time in the harbor 
 of Fiume. The English are on their ships in 
 the harbor. Only 500 French soldiers are barri- 
 caded in the city of Fiume. At the Y, I also 
 met the captain of the American destroyer, the 
 Foote, that is lying outside here in the Gulf of 
 Trieste, but of course he would say nothing. 
 The wireless operator from the destroyer 
 dropped in, and we talked to English and Amer- 
 ican jackies. Rumors of all kinds were plenti- 
 ful. 
 
 328 
 
ON THE CARSO — AND IN TRIESTE 
 
 On the streets that noon crowds of people 
 were walking about reading the Fiume bulle- 
 tins posted in windows. Miss Bennett and I 
 hurried out of a throng when we found we were 
 attracting indignant attention by speaking Eng- 
 lish to each other. 
 
 The port of Trieste is fascinating. Water- 
 craft of every description lay in the blue Gulf 
 of Trieste and along the shore curves a de- 
 lightful promenade. Outside is the Adriatic 
 Sea. The names on the business houses are 
 largely Italian though there are many Aus- 
 trian, and some take a middle road like the 
 sign that read " Leopoldi Haas." One street in 
 Trieste is peculiar. The foot passengers take 
 the center pavement and the vehicles drive at 
 the sides, with a two foot walk in front of the 
 shops. An Austrian in a little shop I entered 
 told me things were much worse there now than 
 before the war and feared it would be a terrible 
 winter for the people. 
 
 I was told we might get to Fiume, but it was 
 a dangerous undertaking, and if we reached 
 there we might not be able to leave. So we de- 
 cided to return to Venice. Taking the 5:30 
 
 329 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 train from Trieste it was about midnight, which 
 seems to be my favorite arriving hour in Italy, 
 when we were being gondoliered down the 
 Grand Canal, in the moonlight. The sunset 
 over the Gulf of Trieste as the train wound its 
 way along the picturesque shore was wonderful. 
 Far down on a jutting rock was the castle of 
 Maximilian, "Miramare," looking like a page 
 from a fairy story book. 
 
 In Venice 
 
 Today I had a glimpse of the war aftermath 
 in Venice. We were going through the great 
 Doges Palace. The Doges were the Dukes of 
 Venice, who were the presidents of the Vene- 
 tian Republic, so the Doges Palace is a sort of 
 ancient White House of Venice. The Doges 
 ruled from 4 B. C. to 1797, the guide informed 
 me. But I was most interested in the big council 
 chamber, where workmen were high on scaffold- 
 ing, replacing the- famous paintings which had 
 all been removed to Florence for safekeeping 
 when Venice was bombed. All these huge can- 
 vasses, marked as they fitted into the bare wall 
 spaces, were piled against the sides of the 
 
 330 
 
IN VENICE 
 
 spacious apartment. On leaving the building 
 we were permitted a peep at the bronze horses 
 of St. Marks, which were in a high boarded 
 stall in the palace courtyard, being prepared for 
 their return to their places before the great 
 cathedral. These bronze horses, which date 
 back to antiquity, had been removed from Ven- 
 ice for safekeeping during the early days of 
 the war and have only very recently been 
 brought back. 
 
 They stand on the balcony of the cathedral 
 overlooking the Piazza San Marco, with its 
 great Campanile, where every day at noon, at 
 the stroke of twelve, the pigeons swoop down 
 to be fed by the people in the square. They 
 are such fat, pudgy pigeons, but no visitor to 
 Venice fails to buy one or more of the wee cone 
 sacks of grain that the venders at the little 
 high desks at corners of the Piazza sell for the 
 purpose. 
 
 Of course here one goes through the Basilica 
 of St. Marks to marvel at the mural mosaics, 
 just as one stands in awe in the Doges Palace 
 before the Titian fresco of St. Christopher 
 carrying the child across the water. 
 
 331 
 
"WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Then a fascinating thing to do is to tea on 
 the Piazza, the great square with its attractive 
 shops, for it would appear as though all Venice 
 and its visitors meet here at tea time in the 
 little table groups outside the cafes and the 
 pigeons flutter about the children who are al- 
 ways feeding them. 
 
 One incident of the Venice Hotel : An Italian 
 officer approached an Austrian who was wear- 
 ing a tie of the old Austrian colors, red and 
 yellow. ' ' You will take off that tie, ' ' said the 
 Italian officer, his jaw set. " Oh, yah," said 
 the Austrian and he disappeared up the stair- 
 way to return with a less inflammatory neck 
 scarf. " I couldn't stand it," said the Italian 
 officer to me. " If it had been the colors of the 
 new Austrian Republic I should not have 
 minded, but the colors of old Austria we fought 
 against — think of the audacity of his wearing 
 them now — and in Venice." It was what the 
 French would call stupid. There are innumer- 
 able Italian soldiers in Venice and they are very 
 handsome in their uniforms with their pictur- 
 esque hats. And so are the women in their black 
 silk, long fringed, shawls. 
 
 332 
 
IN VENICE 
 
 "Americans are doing harm to both coun- 
 tries," said an Italian official to me a couple 
 of days ago, ' ' when they go to Italy with preju- 
 dice. Like the naval officer, dismissed by Ad- 
 miral Andrews after the report made by the 
 American Relief Committee in Trieste, that he 
 was working against the Italians. We have 
 no feeling against Americans nor against Pres- 
 ident Wilson," he emphasized, " we only resent 
 that Mister Wilson feels Italy should not have 
 Fiume. ' ' 
 
 Italy today finds herself in the position of 
 having fought against 69 millions of people and 
 she has made peace with only eleven millions. 
 All the others, in the small provinces into which 
 the Austrian-Hungarian Empire has divided, 
 are not responsible for the war, but have not 
 shown themselves friendly by fighting against 
 her. 
 
 Their figures show that 120,000 Italian sol- 
 diers fought in France, while 40,000 French, 
 30,000 British and 4,000 American soldiers 
 fought in Italy. 
 
 Italy bore the financial drain of the war 
 nobly. Besides submitting willingly to the in- 
 
 333 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 creased burden of taxation the people re- 
 sponded to every war loan, contributed to the 
 various reliefs and Red Cross, all classes giv- 
 ing millions upon millions. When the appeal 
 was made for the collection of gold from private 
 safes and jewel cases, Italian men and women 
 from every province vied with one another in 
 sending their treasures to feed the metal re- 
 serves of the state, much as the old Romans 
 did during the Punic wars. 
 Tonight to Rome ! 
 
 334 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 IN ROME PASSPOET WORRIES 
 
 Oct. 3. 
 
 WHEN in Rome I had always intended to 
 " do as the Romans do." Instead, I did 
 as all good Americans do. I " Followed the 
 Man from Cook's." It may have been the 
 fault of the Sirocco — the hot winds that sweep 
 in from the sea on which one blames every dif- 
 ficulty in Italy, much as we blame the ground- 
 hog, in season, when our plans go aglee. It 
 happened thusly : 
 
 " I hope," said Miss Bennett, raising her 
 English eyebrows in disgust, "I hope you 
 don't expect to see Rome in a day and a half! " 
 
 " You never traveled with an American cor- 
 respondent before, did you? Ho, hum, I ex- 
 pect to have time to do some shopping in 
 Rome, ' ' I had replied, airily. But I had figured 
 without a few vital forces, such as railroads and 
 governments. 
 
 We had a good running start out of Venice 
 335 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Tuesday night in the rain. About two o'clock 
 in the morning I awakened with a jolt of the 
 train and a feeling of being out in space. It 
 was a derailed carriage that kept us somewhere 
 on the landscape, halfway to Florence, for six 
 hours and brought us to Rome thirteen hours 
 late. 
 
 There was compensation, however, in going 
 through picturesque Tuscany at eventide, where 
 the wonderful vineyards of Italy stretch for 
 miles at either side, the vines heavily laden 
 with golden grapes, garlanded from one tree 
 to another in symmetrical rows. It resembled 
 the Louis xvi decorations, only in the center 
 of the festooned vines there was always a small 
 graceful tree. And in the background the 
 shadowy Appenines were turned to purples in 
 the sunset. 
 
 I had always fondly pictured myself standing 
 in the gateway of the Eternal City, gazing in 
 awe, as I murmured under my breath, "And 
 THIS is Rome, that sat on her seven hills and 
 from her throne of beauty ruled the world ! ' ' 
 
 It is what one would expect to do. 
 
 But instead of noon, Wednesday, it was an 
 336 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 hour past midnight when we trudged wearily 
 behind our baggage-hung, burly porter, across 
 the great Naiad fountain-centered square to the 
 Grand Hotel. And one third of my day and a 
 half in Eome was gone. 
 
 The next morning will always be unforget- 
 table. It started out so beautifully. The hotel 
 must have been a made-over palace for its mar- 
 ble stairways were so wide eight people might 
 have easily ascended abreast and our room was 
 so large you could have turned a dray in it 
 without marring the white Louis Seize furni- 
 ture. I was hardly up when three telegrams 
 were brought to me. One was a cable from 
 home and one that we had secured reservations 
 on the Rome-Paris express for the next morn- 
 ing. All was right in the world ! I waved the 
 telegrams gleefully. " Here's where we have 
 a real Roman holiday," I remember to have 
 said. 
 
 It was while buying the railway tickets an 
 hour later that someone dropped the word 
 ' ' Passports. ' ' Oh yes, we had attended to them 
 before leaving Paris. But hadn't they been 
 visaed in Italy for the return to France? With 
 
 337 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 a sinking heart I learned it was imperative to 
 have the visaes of the French, the American 
 and the British consulates and the Italian pre- 
 fecture of police. And some well meaning by- 
 stander added: " It always takes two days at 
 the Italian police, they have just made a new 
 rule. You might try tipping freely. " " Why, 
 I'd tip the statue of Marcus Aurelius to get 
 through," I moaned. I hope you are keeping 
 in mind that this was my one precious day in 
 Rome. 
 
 To the French Consulate we sped, saying 
 "Presto! Presto!" to the old cabman. The 
 French consulate is in the former Palace Far- 
 nese, to which I will refer later. There a kindly, 
 doddering old clerk listened while Miss Bennett 
 talked Italian and I English, simultaneously, 
 and tucked our passports into a nice big drawer. 
 We implored him to take our credentials to the 
 consul. It was twelve o 'clock when we emerged 
 from there with the visa for France. 
 
 All business ceases in Rome from then until 
 three in the afternoon we found, for those are 
 the siesta hours. There was no use trying to go 
 sightseeing because we might not get back in 
 
 338 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 time. At exactly three we stood in the Amer- 
 ican consulate. The man at the desk looked at 
 us strangely. "And you say you have no per- 
 messo and you have been in Italy for a week? 
 Don't you know you should have reported to 
 the police before you were in the country twen- 
 ty-four hours ! ' ' No one had told us. My sug- 
 gestion that he write a note to the Italian pre- 
 fecture of police explaining for us did not meet 
 his approval. He did not like notes telling 
 them what to do, so would not ask favors of the 
 Italian office. He was furthermore a ' ' press 
 agent for a hard winter," remarking that he 
 did not believe it possible for us to get the 
 Italian visa in time to take our train the follow- 
 ing day. He put the American visa on my pass- 
 port with much commiseration. 
 
 At the British consulate our case was too 
 complicated for the clerk and he took us to the 
 private office of the consul who became much 
 agitated about us. It appears it was a grave 
 matter that we had no " permesso," which is 
 the permission to remain in a country — your 
 passport is only the right to go in. So, offi- 
 cially, we were not in Italy — how could we ex- 
 
 339 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 pect to leave! It was dizzying, but I began to 
 see. Then Miss Bennett had no photograph 
 with her and a photograph must always accom- 
 pany the application for the visa. That and 
 your age are vital. The British consul was ex- 
 ceedingly kind and wrote us a letter to the Ital- 
 ian prefecture asking him to excuse our not hav- 
 ing a permesso and that Miss Bennett had no 
 photograph. 
 
 As the wheezy, creaky cab lumbered up the 
 cobbled hill street to the office of the Italian 
 police, I just pressed my rabbit's foot against 
 my heart and pra} r cd. I tried to think that up 
 this street the chariot of Messala must have 
 rolled and I tried to imagine Mark Antony 
 driving his chariot past us, his toga flying in 
 the wind. But it was no use. The present was 
 too harrowing. 
 
 We agreed to say nothing at the Italian of- 
 fice about our lack of permesso until we were 
 asked. I had heard it was best to let the other 
 fellow do the talking, sometimes. It was a large 
 room with a row of clerks at one long table at 
 the right. We walked up to the first and silently 
 
 340 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 handed him our passports. He opened his 
 mouth and uttered one word. 
 
 " Permesso." 
 
 I laid down my credentials, a letter from our 
 U. S. Acting Secretary of State and one from 
 the Italian Peace Delegation in Paris and Miss 
 Bennett handed over a personal letter from 
 Lady Derby, the British ambassadress in Paris, 
 for whom she is private secretary. The pass- 
 port clerk smiled, reached for a pink blank and 
 in very good English asked, " Where were you 
 born? " 
 
 " Chicago, Illinois," I answered. 
 
 " I have been there," he said. 
 
 " Then perhaps you can understand what it 
 means to me to have one day in Rome and to 
 spend it in having my passport visaed. It is up 
 to you whether I see anything of this wonderful 
 city of yours at all, because I must catch the 
 morning express to Paris in order to make the 
 steamer for home." " I'll do what I can," he 
 said, and he did. History to the contrary, not- 
 withstanding, I felt he was * ' the noblest Roman 
 of them all." In less than an hour we had the 
 official stamp of the Italian police. 
 
 341 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 The K. C. man whom we had met in the 
 Italian office descended the steps with us. ' ' You 
 ought not to leave Rome without seeing the 
 Pope," he urged. He had had an audience that 
 morning. " I hope to come back some day for 
 that," I said. 
 
 It was five o'clock when we jumped into the 
 cab and begged the driver to " Presto a chez 
 Cook." Neither the ancient nor the modern 
 Romans hurried so it was 5 :30 on the clock in 
 Cook's tourist agency when I burst in and 
 gasped for the motor car and the English speak- 
 ing guide, whom we had ordered that morning. 
 My day in Rome had dwindled to two hours, all 
 there would be left of daylight. 
 
 In a couple of minutes we were seated in a 
 limousine going up the Via Nazionale, or Na- 
 tional street, hill on high, with a very fat and 
 very hot Italian guide holding a white knobbed 
 cane, on the seat in front of us, saying ' ' Yunga 
 leddies, Roma is a city whata is builta on seven 
 hillas." 
 
 First to the Quirinale, the residence of the 
 king and queen, and then to get a view of the 
 Senate house where only the day before, so the 
 
 342 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 papers declared, statesmen had come to blows 
 over the Fiume matter. 
 
 And then to St. Peter's Cathedral. I know 
 a charming woman who boasts she did the 
 Smithsonian Institute in twenty minutes. We 
 could not have had more in St. Peter's. Imag- 
 ine trying to see the art of centuries in twenty 
 minutes ! 
 
 " This is the longest cathedrala in the worlda, 
 younga leddies," began the guide, mopping his 
 perspiring brow. " You see-ah that marble 
 children acrossa there? — you thinka that 
 smaller than this one? No, it justa the same- 
 ah. Now, looka, that dove-ah over there — 
 what you thinka, younga leddies f You thinka I 
 can reacha the dove 's head — come on, I showa 
 you — see, I cannot toucha it." 
 
 " What is this, a measuring game we are 
 playing," I asked Miss Bennett. I had stopped 
 in front of the tomb with the two lions, one 
 sleeping and the other aroused; they almost 
 seemed alive. I tried not to listen to the guide 's 
 description — so I don't know whether there is 
 any difference in the length of those lions' tails. 
 A peasant woman with her shawl over her head 
 
 343 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 walked down the huge, silent, high-pillared 
 cathedral and lifted the little child in her arms 
 to let it kiss the toe of St. Peter. 
 
 The guide, in a slow monotone, was droning 
 off the names of the celebrities who slept in the 
 various tombs. He knew the year each one was 
 born. He might have gotten passports for any 
 one of them. 
 
 Hesitating before a huge marble group I won- 
 dered why it was partly covered with a red 
 cloth. Then I saw the cloth was of marble, so 
 marvelously wrought that you wanted to touch 
 it to be assured it was not a woven fabric. The 
 guide was saying ' ' Younga leddies, there are 
 5,280 pieces of marble-ah in this cloth, all 
 joinded together." And the magnificent altar 
 where the popes of former years were crowned ! 
 And the bas reliefs ! Such treasures of beauty 
 and with only twenty minutes to absorb them 
 — and every little while that droning voice of 
 the guide broke in with " Well, younga leddies, 
 what you thinka of it? " 
 
 But we had to get to the Roman Forum. So 
 reluctantly I came out the wonderful bronze 
 doors to stand impressed to silence on the great 
 
 344 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 porch of the church and view the facade with 
 its magnificent statues and let my eyes sweep 
 across the great Piazza de San Pietro, in the 
 center of which rises the obelisk Caligula 
 brought from Heliopolis. 
 
 Back in the Adams school in Ottumwa I first 
 learned to know the Roman Forum. It was the 
 favorite page in my reader, the one that began 
 "Friends, Romans, Countrymen." "Now 
 where did Mark Antony stand? " I asked the 
 guide, as he stopped the car at a stone wall 
 overlooking a hollow of ruins. He pointed out 
 a group of upright columns on a platform. In 
 the twilight of the Roman day it was not diffi- 
 cult to conjure up the heroic figure, as my imagi- 
 nation had painted him at thirteen, and to hear 
 those ringing words, " I come to bury Caesar, 
 not to praise him." 
 
 Out on the promenade along the Tiber, oppo- 
 site the palatial, modern Palace of Justice I got 
 out of the car to get a better view of the river. 
 What was it one should think of when stand- 
 ing on the historic banks of the Tiber? I was 
 wondering if there was anything else that 
 should be on my passport. But the voice of the 
 
 345 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Man from Cook's broke in at my elbow, 
 ' ' Younga leddy, you see that over there is the 
 Castle St. Angelo and that golden angela on 
 topa — ' ' He was pointing to the building, once 
 a fortress, high on which is poised the statue 
 of the angel, the legendary apparition to 
 Gregory i of the angel who delivered the city 
 from a terrible plague. I was turning a film in 
 my kodak then so I can't recollect now the 
 height of that angel. 
 
 On the top of Janiculan hill, before the high 
 equestrian monument of Garibaldi, and I had 
 a glorious view of the city of Eome. And then 
 down through winding streets and to the Coli- 
 seum. The ruins of the Coliseum are a moving 
 sight. The vast arena around which could be 
 seated 50,000 people saw some of the greatest 
 of tragedies. And with the shadows of night 
 falling over it I did not need the sonorous voice 
 of the guide pointing out where the lions came 
 up and where their victims knelt to get the 
 shivers of reality. 
 
 That night at dinner the plates were inscribed 
 with the words " Tous chemin mene a Rome " 
 (All roads lead to Rome). The old adage says 
 
 346 
 
IN ROME — PASSPORT WORRIES 
 
 nothing about getting out of Rome — perhaps 
 it wasn't always thus. 
 
 We finished off the day by going to the Na- 
 tional theater to see the opening production of 
 11 La Tosca." Now the opera of La Tosca, you 
 will remember, has a one woman and two men 
 plot and the scene is laid in Rome. One of the 
 men is Scarpia, the chief of police of Rome, who 
 is also in love with La Tosca, the singer. The 
 big scene takes place in a room in the Palace 
 Farnese, where we got the French visa, you 
 will recall, and where La Tosca tries to induce 
 Scarpia to give her a passport for herself and 
 her lover so they may leave Rome. And I knew 
 just how she felt when he wouldn't. Puccini is 
 a great realist I am convinced. If you doubt it, 
 go through the passport worries I did and you 
 won't blame him for the vivid tenseness of the 
 music when La Tosca stabs Scarpia with a 'fruit 
 knife, and you won't blame La Tosca. 
 
 In the final scene where the firing squad 
 shoots Mario, the lover of La Tosca, the prop- 
 erty man forgot to load the guns and there was 
 nothing but a faint click or two and the hero 
 was several seconds late in making his fall. The 
 
 347 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 audience broke into laughter and hisses. It is 
 perfectly proper to hiss if you do not like the 
 work of an actor or singer in Italy, I under- 
 stand, which after all is better than clapping 
 and then going home and knocking to the neigh- 
 bors. The audience was thoroughly Italian, 
 though a group of American Red Cross and Y 
 workers was near us. As we were going back 
 to the hotel in the crowded tram car at midnight 
 I murmured, " You don't suppose Puccini knew 
 we were going to have passport troubles in 
 Rome ? " ' ' Why, Puccini wrote that opera 
 twenty years ago," scoffed Miss Bennett. 
 
 It was the next day on the train that she ap- 
 peared in the doorway of the compartment and 
 exclaimed dramatically as we were steaming 
 out of Pisa, * ' Younga leddy, you see-ah that 
 leaning tower of Pisa — how higha you thinka 
 it is? " I turned from the marvel of the lean- 
 ing tower. 
 
 ' ' You remember that morning on the way to 
 Florence when you got out of the train at 
 Bologna and I found you in the station eating 
 Boulogna sausage, because you said it was in- 
 vented there, and drinking tea, and then we 
 
 348 
 
ENROUTE BACK TO PARIS 
 
 couldn't find our train 1 ? Well, we Americans 
 may have to know dimensions to understand, 
 but we wouldn't lose a train to eat Boulogna in 
 Bologna," I said. 
 
 " Oh, I didn't take the risk for the sausage," 
 she returned. " I had to have tea for break- 
 fast." 
 
 Through Civita Vecchia, the port of Rome 
 (and through which La Tosca had planned to 
 flee with her lover) and we came along the 
 Mediterranean, the rain turning the blue of the 
 sea to cloudy greens that darkened into purples 
 against the grey skies on the horizon. It is a 
 beautiful coast line. Once it was a castle far 
 down on the rocks and often just groups of sea- 
 side houses that filled the changing morning 
 panorama. Frequently we passed great mar- 
 ble plants, for this is the famous marble region 
 of Italy. Then we came through a mountainous 
 country with charming little villages perched 
 on distant high mountain tops. Then into the 
 big port of Livourne. 
 
 After leaving Pisa we skirted the shore of the 
 lovely Gulf of Genoa. Here the train goes 
 through countless small tunnels, bursting out 
 
 349 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 into the sunlight to give a marvelous peep over 
 the blue waters only to dash into the darkness 
 of the hills again. These tantalizing glimpses 
 of the Gulf of Genoa continued for hours until 
 we passed the city of Genoa. 
 
 The tunnels finally became nerve racking for 
 there was no light in the train. And though this 
 was the initial trip of the train de luxe, the 
 service of which had been discontinued some 
 time ago, we were made conscious of Italy's 
 coal shortage. There was no light in the car 
 excepting candles and we had a very small one, 
 giving only a gleaming pinpoint of light in the 
 wall bracket. Every rush of air made it blaze 
 close to our coats in the tiny compartment or 
 threatened to extinguish it. There was only gas 
 enough in the carriage for the coming of the 
 duane or customs officials at midnight, we were 
 told, and it must be saved for them. 
 
 A young Italian officer who was with the 
 official train that took Gen. Pershing through 
 Italy told me the American commander-in-chief 
 had expressed surprise that a station at which 
 his train halted in the early morning had been so 
 quiet. " Don't you know why it is so quiet, 
 
 350 
 
ENROUTE BACK TO PARIS 
 
 General? " he had asked. " Because few trains 
 are moving — we are very short of coal." And 
 when Gen. Pershing returned to France he took 
 steps to personally have the coal used by his 
 special train returned to Italy. Italy, however, 
 gallantly refused it, but the thoughtfulness of 
 the American commander-in-chief pleased the 
 Italian government officials. 
 
 On the train were a number of Russians. One 
 man and his wife — she wore the Red Cross in- 
 signia and several war decorations — said they 
 had been on their way four weeks and were 
 enroute to England. Their opinion was the 
 loyal Russians would be in control of their coun- 
 try in a month. 
 
 At the chill hour of two in the morning all 
 passengers were aroused and told they must 
 get out of the train for it was Modane, the 
 frontier town. Here we were obliged to take 
 out our baggage, carry it across tracks and into 
 a depot where it was inspected and passports 
 examined. After the inspection of our suit- 
 cases and my typewriter we stood in line a long 
 time in the dingy station until we were admitted 
 to an inner office where our passports were 
 
 351 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 looked over carefully and files consulted. " Ou 
 allez vous? A Paris? " the big official in the 
 military ulster asked me. 
 
 "A Paris," I answered thankfully. 
 
 "You don't suppose, do you," began Miss 
 Bennett, as we were trying to locate our train 
 from the dark platform, " that we might be 
 going through Switzerland and will need a 
 Swiss visa? " — I leave you to guess my answer. 
 
 Some day I am going back to Rome when 
 the League of Nations makes passports unneces- 
 sary. Then I hope to see more of this city of 
 fountains and churches and to browse over its 
 seven hills. The reason I know I shall return 
 is because if you throw a coin into a certain 
 beautiful fountain in Rome you are destined to 
 come back. So the guide from Cook's solemnly 
 assured me. 
 
 And I tossed in the coin. 
 
 352 
 
T 
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 A NEW CULT AND AN OLD QUAKTER 
 
 Oct. 6. 
 HE other day I delved into Old Paris. 
 
 There are certain things everyone does 
 today who comes to know the colorful modern 
 life of this most metropolitan city on earth. 
 You tea at the Ritz, which is the Waldorf- 
 Blackstone of Paris, and where every day at 
 five fashion and chivalry meet at little tea tables 
 in a long, lofty room and its enclosed garden 
 to " see and be seen." And where during these 
 post-war days the uniforms of every nation 
 add a brilliant dash, and the man who does 
 not wear a Croix de Guerre or the Legion of 
 Honor ribbon looks like a rank outsider. You 
 dine at the Pre-Catelan, out by that wonderful 
 miniature forest, the Bois de Boulogne, and 
 which corresponds to our country club. You go 
 to the Longchamps for the races, the Grand 
 Prix, just as we go to the ball park for a big 
 league game. But to the minds of those who 
 
 353 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 have known Paris only through books you have 
 never really seen Paris until you have dined in 
 the Latin Quarter. 
 
 Now in Paris you speak of your quarter just 
 as we Americans refer to our neighborhood, say 
 Harlem or Brady Hill. And, of course, if you 
 remember your Victor Hugo you long to saun- 
 ter through the quaint byways of the old stu- 
 dent quarter — rich in its memories — little 
 streets made real to us through centuries of 
 famous writers, the scenes of the early struggles 
 of countless artists, where they have worked 
 and striven and starved. Once the dream-goal 
 of every aspiring genius, his first step on the 
 road to fame — there where the art of a world 
 budded and flowered. 
 
 Parisians tell you the picturesque Quartier 
 Latin has long since disappeared. That now 
 its residents eat three square meals a day, like 
 the rest of humanity. And that where you 
 really ought to go is to the Tomb of Napoleon 
 or Fontainbleau. But when the mother of a 
 Paris girl friend, who lived many years in New 
 York, sent mea" petit bleu " saying, "I want 
 to take you to call upon the most interesting 
 
 354 
 
A NEW CULT AND AN OLD QUARTER 
 
 woman in Paris and then you and my daughter 
 and I will dine in a queer little restaurant in 
 the Quartier Latin," I accepted " toot sweet." 
 
 She took me to see Madame Celine Renooz, 
 who calls herself a philosophic scientist, the 
 author of ' ' La Nouvelle Science, ' ' a synthetic 
 series of works on the Laws of Nature. Mme. 
 Renooz is one of the newest of New Women, 
 since she believes that woman will redeem the 
 world. She disputes the Darwinian theory and 
 says she has proved that animal life had its 
 origin in vegetables. As is the lot of all pio- 
 neers in a new science the world has been slow 
 to recognize the truth of her theories. She has 
 expended her fortune in the publication of her 
 works and now lives in a little three-room apart- 
 ment on the top floor of an old building in a 
 narrow street beyond the Trocadero. The 
 Trocadero is the palace museum near the Eiffel 
 Tower. 
 
 The entrance to Mme. Renooz 's home was next 
 to a green-grocer's stall in a street of little 
 shops. We entered a small door, emerging into 
 a dim courtyard and then climbed up and up 
 the darkest of winding steps. Six flights we 
 
 355 
 
WITHIN TPIE YEAR AFTER 
 
 climbed and it gave me a ' ' woozy ' ' feeling, the 
 mysterious silence and the dark. 
 
 The oldest woman I ever saw opened the door. 
 And we were ushered into a shabby room, 
 crowded with quaint, ages-old furniture and pic- 
 tures, and in which the dominating thing was a 
 long table, heaped with neatly piled books and 
 manuscripts. An old-fashioned desk caught the 
 light from one window. 
 
 Then She came in — a little, aristocratic, old 
 woman of probably eighty with keen, starry, 
 eyes and a soft voice. She fitted so well into the 
 picture of that room; you forgot its shabbi- 
 ness and saw only her. She was in some long, 
 flowing, robe of soft black silk, with ruffles that 
 fell over the hands and down the front and a 
 bit of cobwebby white lace at the throat. These 
 Frenchwomen have a trick of seeming part of 
 their clothes. She held my hand and welcomed 
 me with such gentle courtesy that I even forgot 
 the dark stairway and the steep climb. 
 
 Then over the tea table in the narrow adjoin- 
 ing room, where she poured from a silver teapot 
 that would have set any antiquity hunter 's heart 
 pittypattying with envy, she told of her strug- 
 
 356 
 
A NEW CULT AND AN OLD QUARTER 
 
 gles for the recognition of her science. It had 
 been an inspiration, she said. Her first book 
 was published in 1882. Today, she claimed, 
 many of her theories are being advanced by 
 prominent educators who take the credit for her 
 discoveries. Because she is a woman, she in- 
 sists, she is refused recognition. 
 
 I was much interested in her theory that the 
 origin of the species is vegetable and when I 
 murmured to Mrs. G. (who acted as interpreter 
 when I could not understand), did she suppose 
 I might have once been a potato, she threatened 
 to take me away. However, Mine. Renooz be- 
 lieves and claims her science proves that hu- 
 manity sprang from trees, and, after all, that 
 is a happier thought than Darwin's. But it 
 reminds me of all those mutilated young or- 
 chards I saw in the Aisne region, which had 
 been hacked down by the Germans in their 
 retreat. 
 
 Mme. Renooz inquired on what phase of Euro- 
 pean life I was writing and I answered on the 
 reconstruction following the war. Touching her 
 forehead significantly, she said : ' ' The world 
 needs reconstruction here, in thought, since the 
 war — do you not think so? " 
 
 357 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 She believes firmly that ' ' woman will retake 
 her place at the summit of human evolution." 
 Asking about the feminist movement in Amer- 
 ica she wanted to know if Americans were given 
 to taking up new ideas. 
 
 From a translation of her theory on men and 
 women, culled from Frances Swiney's book, 
 " The Ancient Eoad, or The Development of 
 the Soul," which she handed me, I quote : 
 
 " The social convulsions predicted by the 
 Apocalypse are becoming a reality. But it is 
 not a revolution, it is a peaceful evolution which 
 is going to change the world. This will come, 
 not through the policy of old governments, nor 
 by the dynamite of anarchists, nor by the 
 science of the Darwinists, but from a force more 
 powerful than all these, from the word of Truth, 
 which succors and reanimates the souls, from 
 the word of Woman, which will vibrate in the 
 consciences of men. It is from her will come 
 the True Science which will give the world a 
 new faith." 
 
 Mme. Renooz has translated the Bible from 
 the original and does not agree with much of it. 
 Her 's is distinctly a new cult, the cult of woman. 
 
 358 
 
A NEW CULT AND AN OLD QUARTER 
 
 She gave a series of lectures recently in one of 
 the leading Paris hotels and evidently she has 
 many people interested and numerous followers. 
 Her latest recruits, I understand, are a group of 
 working girls. They are raising funds to pub- 
 lish another of her books. Mme. Renooz told 
 me she had lost her husband and four children. 
 Since then her life has been devoted entirely to 
 her science. 
 
 When we arose to go I asked why she did not 
 come to America. She shook her head and, with 
 a wistful smile, answered, "I am too old." 
 Looking back at this charming little gentle- 
 woman standing in the center of that quaint old 
 room, I wondered if it were not the penalty of 
 all modern idealists, to suffer skepticism and 
 neglect until their hour comes. I could not 
 grasp all her complicated science in the short 
 visit of an hour, but I found Mme. Renooz a 
 fascinating, loveable little woman. 
 
 The trip from the new cult to the old Latin 
 Quarter did not take long though they were at 
 opposite ends of the city. The restaurant where 
 the remainder of the party waited was in the 
 Montparnasse, which is on the other side of the 
 
 359 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 Seine, — the Left Bank, it is called. There in 
 the shadow of a vine-latticed retreat, that en- 
 closed the chair-circled tables on the sidewalk, 
 so one missed not a minute of the street life, 
 we had dinner. 
 
 In France when one dines they always dine 
 from hors d'ceuvre and soup to coffee in a 
 course meal, whether in a cheap cafe or in an 
 expensive one. The head waiter in my hotel 
 takes it as a personal slight when I refuse to 
 take soup. Often it is easier to eat soup than 
 to argue about it. The menu at this little Latin 
 Quarter restaurant was surprisingly good for 
 the price, for the cost of living is at high tide in 
 Paris today. There was delicious fish and meat, 
 and a vegetable course, as always in France 
 served extra, and of course always cheese, des- 
 sert and fragrant black coffee. 
 
 The people around us were not rollicking stu- 
 dents, but quiet mannered French couples and 
 one party of Americans. Near the latter the big 
 glass window into the restaurant proper, rather 
 the winter restaurant, since everyone sits out- 
 side in summer, had a strip of what looked like 
 giant courtplaster zigzagging diagonally across 
 
 360 
 
A NEW CULT AND AN OLD QUARTER 
 
 it. ' ' That is from one of the Big Bertha shells 
 that crashed into Paris," they told me. Much 
 damage had been done in this neighborhood. 
 
 A Reel Cross man from Pittsburg, a friend of 
 the hostess, joined us from another table to say 
 he was leaving in a day or two for Budapest. 
 A party of Red Cross men were going there in 
 a box car — it would take them several weeks. 
 The Red Cross has done and is still doing such 
 magnificent work over here and seems to get 
 but little of its well deserved publicity. Sud- 
 denly someone asked why I did not write on the 
 A. W. 0. L. And this is the story I was told. 
 A party of fifteen American doughboys who had 
 gone A. W. 0. L. (absent without leave) had 
 organized themselves into a gang of bandits and 
 for weeks had terrorized villages in the Vosges 
 region. There are two classes of deserters, the 
 narrator explained, the one that goes A. W. 0. 
 L. for a few days, then returns and takes his 
 medicine, and the other, the hardened mis- 
 creant. The draft caught many men who were 
 known crooks and it was said to be a gang of 
 these who leagued themselves together for the 
 depredations in the Vosges mountains. They 
 
 361 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 chose a leader, who called himself Lieut. Smith, 
 and staged a series of daring holdups in villages 
 near Neufchateau. Their leader, in an Amer- 
 ican uniform, said to have been stolen from a Y 
 man, came into town wearing the various official 
 insignia and several wound stripes. He ran up 
 a hotel bill of over seven hundred francs. The 
 whole gang has been captured now. But can 
 you imagine what their Wild West holdups 
 meant to one of those simple little villages in 
 the Vosges mountains? And it is always " those 
 Americans," though it is slowly seeping 
 through the Old World consciousness since the 
 war that all Americans are not alike. 
 
 We discussed Madame Renooz's theory there 
 in the little Montparnasse restaurant. She be- 
 lieves evolution will come peacefully. At my 
 right was the mended glass window. And the 
 Red Cross man expected orders to leave the 
 next day, because they are needed at once in 
 Budapest. 
 
 362 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 Paris, Oct. 20. 
 
 I CAME back last night from Berlin — with 
 a headache. And it was not all due to sit- 
 ting up three successive nights in bitter cold 
 German trains, the only alternative, since one 
 lone ' ' Pullman ' ' is all the daily train to Ber- 
 lin carries and every berth in it had been re- 
 served weeks before — for four days we did not 
 get our clothes off — it had been impossible to 
 get a room in a Berlin hotel even for the day. 
 I came back with such a confusion of impres- 
 sions that I can only write of what I encoun- 
 tered. 
 
 I did not find Berlin gay. Nor did I find 
 Berlin starving. There was apparently plenty 
 of food in the hotels and restaurants we entered 
 and while prices are high, they are not as 
 high as prices in Paris. There is great lack of 
 milk for the children and old people. Butter 
 is 23 marks a pound. Unter den Linden was 
 
 363 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 dreary in the chill October day. Walking its 
 length I saw few happy faces, countless worn, 
 pasty ones, pallor due to lack of fats in food. 
 I listened to many opinions of present con- 
 ditions from the delightful optimism of the 
 cultured German with a long Germanic title, 
 for whom I had been given a card of introduc- 
 tion, to the pessimism of the managing editor of 
 the Berliner Tagesblatt, whom I interrupted at 
 the strenuous hour of going to press. 
 
 In my four days in Germany I talked with 
 business and professional men, to the society 
 woman and the peasant woman, to hotel clerks 
 and porters, the wardrobe girl, elevator men 
 and baggage carriers. Strangely enough, it was 
 the bent old man in overalls who carried our 
 baggage to the train at Wiesbaden and waited 
 twenty minutes to place it in the compartment, 
 who made the situation clearest to me. ' ' Vor 
 den Krieg war alles so schoen " (Before the war 
 everything was so fine). " Now there is nothing. 
 It is worse with us now than during the war," 
 he said. " There is no head. Everyone does as 
 he pleases. Nothing but strikes. People don't 
 want to work any more. Potatoes are so high. 
 There are plenty, but our farmers are holding 
 
 364 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 them for fabulous prices. There is no higher 
 authority to compel them to sell the potatoes to 
 the poor. Money there is plenty but it is worth 
 so little (the mark that day was worth four or 
 five cents, it had been 25 cents). Oh, yes, we 
 have better food since the French occupation. 
 Now we get meat once a week." 
 
 " Only once a week 1 ? " I asked. 
 
 " Oh, yes," he replied, " but every week, on 
 Saturdays. ' ' 
 
 I had been advised not to go to Berlin. I 
 had been told in confidence by an American, 
 just returned from there and who was in a posi- 
 tion to know, that a revolution was expected 
 within a couple of weeks, and if I intended to go 
 I had best go quickly and get away. I had been 
 assured that we would get nothing to eat ; that 
 it cost 300 marks for a meal and not much of a 
 meal at that. So we took along biscuits and 
 chocolate, together with soap, for we had heard 
 that soap bought more than money. These with 
 an out-of-date Baedacker and a handbook of 
 German sentences, belonging to Miss Bennett, 
 the English girl who accompanied me, com- 
 prised the larger part of our baggage. We 
 
 365 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 were agreeably disappointed to find little need 
 of any of them. 
 
 In Frankfort-a-Main we almost turned back. 
 The Frankfort papers blazoned with headlines 
 depicting the acute strike situation in Berlin, 
 saying that all city traffic was suspended and 
 predicting dire consequences. 
 
 "It is foolhardy, two girls going alone to 
 Berlin, under such conditions," announced Miss 
 Bennett, who I forgot to mention is very sen- 
 sible. "I'm going down to the office and ask 
 someone's advice." 
 
 And she did. 
 
 While I snuggled under the fat German 
 featherbed (we were in the Hotel Carlton) and 
 tried to spell out the headlines in the Berliner 
 Anzeiger. The one word I could not translate 
 evidently was the key word. So I gave it up and 
 decided then and there I would go to Berlin, if 
 I went alone. 
 
 To begin at the beginning. We arrived at 
 Mayence, the French bridgehead, Wednesday 
 noon after the all night ride from Paris. I 
 carried a letter from the Ministere des Affaires 
 Etrangere in Paris to the French general com- 
 
 366 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 manding the forces at Mayence asking his aid 
 to get us to the unoccupied region. His head- 
 quarters is the former palace of the Grand Duke 
 of Hesse, a palatial old pile, where we waited 
 in an enormous salon, with a grand piano and 
 many red velvet upholstered chairs, gazing at 
 the large paintings in vivid colors that filled the 
 wall spaces. The commandant general was 
 away and finally a French major saw us and 
 sent us to the passport bureau at the Palace of 
 Justice. He said it would also be necessary for 
 us to obtain a passport visae from the head of 
 the German civil authorities in Frankfort. 
 Things were getting complicated again. At 
 the Mayence passport bureau we were taken 
 past a long waiting line and our passports and 
 identity cards visaed. " You must get author- 
 ity to go farther in Frankfort," we were told. 
 
 We had lunch in a small hotel across from the 
 depot. The meat was good but the bread was 
 dark and soggy. The waiter said they had no 
 milk for the coffee — they had to give their cows 
 to Belgium. 
 
 "We caught the 4 :55 train to Frankfort reach- 
 ing there at 7 o 'clock. There was no gas in the 
 
 367 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 carriage and most of the trip was in total dark- 
 ness. At Goldstein, the limit of the French 
 occupation, the man who came to inspect our 
 passports held up a lantern; then as the train 
 was moving took it for granted they were all 
 right and jumped off. At Goldstein the time 
 changes, for it is French time there and German 
 time in Frankfort, a few miles farther on. There 
 was a ten o'clock train to Berlin that night, 
 which we might easily have taken, had we had 
 the visa of the German civil commissariat. We 
 discussed going without and gave up the idea. 
 Their office would not be open until next morn- 
 ing. So we waited twenty-four hours in Frank- 
 fort to get this permission. And no one asked 
 to see our passports during the remainder of the 
 journey, is the aggravating fact. 
 
 We found the hotels of Frankfort crowded. 
 The Frankforter Hof phoned to another hotel 
 for us but in vain. We drove in a one horse 
 vehicle back through the dark rainy streets to a 
 hotel opposite the depot. There we obtained a 
 room for twenty-four hours. I asked why 
 Frankfort was so crowded and the man at the 
 desk said many Germans of Alsace-Lorraine 
 
 368 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 and the occupied regions had preferred to come 
 back to Frankfort, in order to be outside the 
 French zone of occupation. Then an interna- 
 tional industrial exhibition or messe had just 
 closed. 
 
 Our room was large and comfortable, but 
 instead of sheets on the beds we found table- 
 cloths, of lovely flowered damask, and the pillow 
 cases were made of two large damask napkins. 
 The towel — only one apiece, was a part of a 
 worn tablecloth. The room was warm with 
 steam heat, a surprise since Paris hotels are 
 not yet heated. At dinner in the handsome 
 dining room the tables had paper cloths and 
 paper napkins. It was evidence of the German 
 conservation that we had noticed first in the 
 German trains, where the curtains had all been 
 removed and even the leather straps that low- 
 ered the windows were replaced by straps of 
 a coarse cord. 
 
 The menu required bread and meat cards 
 and we told the waiter we had neither. Evi- 
 dently it did not matter for we were given both. 
 Our waiter spoke English, having been interned 
 in England. He said the people of Frankfort 
 
 369 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 had suffered much during the war. The people 
 still ate a dark bread but the hotels were able 
 to get some white rolls. He said they were only 
 supposed to have meat twice a week, but the 
 hotels had it daily. Once in a while the inspec- 
 tors swooped down on them and took it away. 
 " Oh, then we have to stock up again," he 
 smiled. 
 
 The elevator man told me he had fought in 
 Russia where he had been made a prisoner. He 
 had escaped from the Russian prison and after 
 rejoining his regiment was given leave to come 
 home and later was stationed in Northern 
 France. He had been gassed but never wounded 
 in all that varied experience. 
 
 At the office of the civil commissariat the next 
 morning it looked dubious whether we could go 
 farther. Only 15% of the people asking to 
 travel in Germany now are allowed to go on 
 account of the coal shortage permitting few 
 trains I was told. After showing the cable from 
 The Lee Syndicate authorizing me to go, my let- 
 ter from the French ministry in Paris, my letter 
 from the State Department signed by Hon. 
 Frank L. Polk, my passport, my identity card, 
 
 370 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 a photograph and a calling card, the two latter 
 being pasted on the application for the visa 
 together with the letter from the French min- 
 istry, the visa was, after much conversation, 
 made out. 
 
 " You remember," said Miss Bennett, as we 
 were leaving, " the man in the passport bureau 
 at Frankfort remarked he ought to have made 
 us sign a paper saying they would not be re- 
 sponsible for anything that happened to us." 
 It certainly looked like the " jump off place." 
 
 There was no train for Berlin until 9 :46 that 
 night, so we sauntered down the street, drop- 
 ping into shops. Clothes of all kinds were very 
 high, even with the marks translated into dol- 
 lars. It was a small cafe we entered, and as it 
 was only shortly after eleven the old waiter, 
 who looked like he might have been an aristo- 
 crat of other days, had time to talk to us. 
 ' ' Everything was splendid here before the war, 
 and now everything is gone. And it will be 
 much worse this winter," he said. A German 
 soldier in the faded uniform hobbled in, drag- 
 ging one leg stiffly and with one arm limp. He 
 was selling pencils from a supply dfsplayed in 
 
 371 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 the cuff of his sleeve. On the street we had 
 passed a soldier, shaking from shell shock, 
 begging. 
 
 The tea hour in the hotel was interesting. 
 There were as many men as women in the big 
 lounging room, surrounding all of the small, 
 closely placed tea tables. I marveled at the 
 many young men. But it was a silent throng. 
 The orchestra played exquisitely. Groups at 
 the tables talked in low tones. There was little 
 or no vivacity nor animation. 
 
 On the train from Frankfort to Berlin that 
 night among the passengers in the railway car- 
 riage was a stadtrath of Frankfort, which cor- 
 responds to our city attorney. I tried to draw 
 him out about the future of Germany. The 
 former kaiser, he assured me, could never come 
 back. Nor the crown prince. Time only would 
 tell whether a leader strong enough to guide 
 the New Germany would arise. If not, there 
 was a probability he felt, in say, twenty years, 
 that the people would have such longing, — 
 " Sehnsucht " was the word he used, — for the 
 old days before the war, that they might demand 
 some monarchial form of government. You 
 
 372 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 remember the old aristocratic waiter in the 
 Frankfort cafe and the old baggage man at 
 Wiesbaden had both spoken of the good days 
 in Germany before the war. This German at- 
 torney had been in the German army, had 
 fought at Rheims and Verdun and in Belgium. 
 I spoke of the beauties of Bruges. He re- 
 marked quickly, " We never harmed Bruges." 
 Adding, " Nor Ghent." 
 
 " But Ghent is terribly destroyed," I ven- 
 tured. 
 
 ' ' The English did it, shelling from their men 
 of war," he said. Which is true, but they did 
 it to dislodge the Germans. 
 
 ' ' America should not have been allowed to 
 get into the war, ' ' was his opinion. * ' That was 
 Germany's great mistake." He spoke of the 
 two weeks' messe or industrial exhibition at 
 Frankfort that had closed Oct. 15. 
 
 " What countries were represented with ex- 
 hibits?" I asked. He enumerated Holland and 
 Sweden, but added that buyers had come from 
 all over the world, England, France, etc. And 
 they had offered the Germans much credit, he 
 remarked. " Our manufacturers said they did 
 
 373 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 not know if they could carry out the contracts, 
 but the buyers told them they could have all the 
 credit they needed." He said there was much 
 suffering through the need of milk and fats for 
 the children. 
 
 In Berlin the next day I went to the office 
 of a man who has the distinction of being a 
 business counsel and to whom I had been re- 
 ferred by the Frankfort attorney to get infor- 
 mation on general business conditions. He re- 
 ceived us most cordially — a cultured gentle- 
 man of the old school. ' ' Nothing better could 
 happen to us than that the people of America 
 should want to know our present situation — I 
 am glad to tell you what I can, ' ' he said. ' ' Con- 
 ditions are better generally with us. The Amer- 
 ican Army of Occupation has brought food into 
 Germany and that has helped us very much. 
 We were greatly in need of fats, oils, meats, and 
 chocolate. We did not have sugar and cocoa. 
 Our financial position is the worst. The high 
 price of money makes things hard. We can only 
 buy from foreign countries what is absolutely 
 necessary in raw materials. Wages are three to 
 four times higher than before the war. The cost 
 
 374 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 of living has advanced equally. But with work, 
 strength of will and trust, sooner or later there 
 will be a return of healthy conditions. The 
 German people are sound at heart and in mind. 
 The workmen are anxious that life should re- 
 turn to the normal and the unrest cease. The 
 unrest is caused by a few unscrupulous leaders. 
 I do not believe the Bolshevists have any force 
 in Germany. 
 
 " Our former social life is returning," he 
 continued. " The war intensified a public life 
 that has been at fever heat. The soldier return- 
 ing for a short leave from the fronts, where 
 death had stared him in the face and knowing 
 he was to return to it, brought on this intense 
 life, which was reflected in the movies, in the 
 theaters, dances, in everything. Now there is 
 a tendency to return to the old family life in 
 which lay the solid security of the country." 
 
 This man did not believe there was any imme- 
 diate hunger or distress in Germany. There is 
 work for all the soldiers who will work and 
 when I spoke of soldiers begging in the streets 
 of Frankfort, he claimed it was unnecessary — 
 
 375 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 that there are organizations to care for the 
 maimed, and schools for their re-education. 
 
 The former army officers and their families, 
 lie claimed, were in the most difficult position 
 today, since these officers had learned only the 
 art of war and had no other means of earning a 
 living since the army is cut down. But the state 
 is helping them by creating positions in tax 
 offices for them. The children still suffer from 
 malnutrition because there is little milk and 
 fats. The flour is coarse because all of the 
 grain is milled. 
 
 ' ' What you feed to the stock we must use for 
 bread," he explained. "This will be a hard 
 winter, but I do not believe it will be the worst 
 winter since the war. Heretofore we had to 
 always provide food for our troops — now that 
 the war is over we will have that food for the 
 people. Conditions are not as bad as formerly. 
 Building is beginning, but everything is very 
 high. I have faith in the future of Germany," 
 he emphasized, ' ' the good seed is sprouting and 
 New Germany will right herself. ' ' He refused 
 to say how many soldiers Germany had lost in 
 the war — they do not give the figures — but 
 
 376 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 added " every soldier lost in the war was one 
 too many. ' ' 
 
 This man referred me to Redacteur Paul 
 Bloch of the Berliner Tagesblatt. Mr. Bloch 
 was not in, but I had a few hurried moments' 
 conversation with his managing editor. He said 
 things are in a very bad way in Berlin, that 
 there is great distress. There is much suffering 
 among the children in the small towns of the 
 vicinity. He remarked that America had prom- 
 ised to help Germany but had not done so. When 
 I asked in what way he did not have time to 
 talk further, so I suppose he referred to the 
 fourteen points. 
 
 We had lunch at Kempinski's, which is a 
 large restaurant of the middle class, where 
 the food was very reasonable, especially when 
 counted in French or American money and the 
 menu was long and varied. To quote a few 
 prices, a German beefsteak with vegetables or 
 salad was 4.75 marks ; lamb with beans, 7.25 ; 
 young roast goose with salad, 13.50. There was 
 fish of all kinds, vegetables, an omelette was 
 6.50, scrambled eggs 4.75, coffee with milk 1.25. 
 At the top of the menu card in heavy type are 
 
 377 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 the words, ' ' 50 gramm schwartzbrot 5 pf . " We 
 had an excellent meal for less than an American 
 dollar, including service. Tips are forbidden 
 generally in hotels and restaurants of Germany, 
 as they are in Italy, and one-tenth added for 
 service. 
 
 As we could obtain no room in a hotel, the 
 Adlon and a half dozen others to which we ap- 
 plied being full, we decided to leave on the night 
 train, so took an hour's drive about the city. 
 First to the Reichstag, the German house of 
 congress that has been the scene of so many 
 stormy sessions since the war. Y^e stood before 
 the big iron figure of Hindenburg in which were 
 driven 5,600 golden nails, 75,000 silver and 780,- 
 000 iron nails at the cost of 100 marks, 5 marks 
 and 1 mark, respectively, from Sept. 4, 1915, to 
 the end of August, 1918. The nails evidently 
 were meant as an honor for the old German field 
 marshal and the money used for the war fund. 
 Now the gigantic statue, which has a promi- 
 nent place at the head of the Siegesalle, near the 
 victory column of the war of 1870, is surrounded 
 by scaffolding and is to be shortly removed. 
 
 The Siegesalle is the boulevard down either 
 side of which, at short intervals, is a heroic 
 
 378 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 white marble figure of a former ruler of the 
 House of Hohenzollern. The woodland back- 
 ground is picturesque. We drove through the 
 Potsdamer Platz, one of the principal business 
 squares of Berlin, and then to see the palace of 
 the former kaiser. The cabby pointed with such 
 glee to the bomb marks on the front wall and the 
 demolished side doorway that we wondered if he 
 had been in the mob of Spartacists who had 
 caused the destruction in the attack of the revo- 
 lutionists last January. But he told us he was a 
 Prussian. The great gates were closed. Big 
 placards were pasted on the columns of the en- 
 trance, ending, " Rauber von Frieden " (Rob- 
 bers of Peace). The immense castle was de- 
 serted, the shutters all closed. The palace of the 
 former crown prince, about a block away, had 
 chains across the entrances. 
 
 Dropping into a little cafe for the coffee hour, 
 here is one incident. Two young men, evidently 
 office clerks, sat at a table near us. One took a 
 small round parcel from his pocket and laying 
 it on the table opened it carefully. It was a 
 half pound of butter. They discussed it with 
 much pleasure. From another pocket he drew 
 
 379 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 a parcel with two rolls. Painstakingly he spread 
 a thin layer of butter on the rolls and ate them 
 with relish, first replacing the precious butter 
 parcel carefully back into its wrappings and 
 depositing it in his coat pocket. Butter is more 
 precious than gems in Berlin. 
 
 We walked through the business section and 
 then across the River Spree which winds 
 through the city, and then the length of Unter 
 den Linden. Soap at 7 marks 50 for a large 
 cake and chocolate were sold on the streets. 
 Unter, den Linden is a disappointment ; the few 
 scrawny trees in the center of the wide thor- 
 oughfare might be anything but lindens. Auto- 
 mobile salesrooms give an air of modern dash 
 to blocks of small shops on either side. 
 
 We had dinner in the Bristol hotel. Venison 
 was on the menu. There was extra charge for 
 bread. I even had an omelette. We left Berlin 
 that night for Frankfort. We had seen no evi- 
 dences of the big strike in Berlin ; cars and taxis 
 were running. Little news of the outside world 
 was to be had. 
 
 On the train we met a German who spoke 
 English fluently, having spent some time in 
 America, where his business had been taken 
 
 380 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 over by the alien property custodian. His card 
 showed he was manager of a cotton plant. In a 
 quiet discussion with Miss Bennett and my- 
 self he made many interesting comments. ' ' Ger- 
 many got into the war through the incompetency 
 of her diplomats," he said. " I am confident," 
 he remarked, " that the old kaiser did not want 
 the war. But I am just as confident that he 
 might have prevented it. We got into it through 
 his faults and the incompetency of the men with 
 him. Then, of course, it was the fault of the 
 German people for permitting such a govern- 
 ment. Every German has a vote in the Reichs- 
 tag. The kaiser had the right to appoint his 
 own ministers, but the Reichstag could refuse 
 their budget. Of course they never did. " 
 
 "Why," I asked. 
 
 ' ' You forget the power of tradition, ' ' was 
 his reply. * ' The people believed we were forced 
 into the war. Then they found it could be 
 stopped if we did not want too much." He said 
 Germany had made a hard peace. " The Ger- 
 mans believed in the promises made them," he 
 said. ' 1 1 am sure if we had made such promises 
 America would not have been stupid enough to 
 
 381 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 believe them. We Germans are stupid politi- 
 cally," he repeated. 
 
 "America should never have been drawn 
 into the war," was his statement. Then he 
 said : ' ' Our submarine warfare was a big 
 mistake. It was a failure and worst of all it 
 brought America into the war. But I under- 
 stand America would have gone into the war, 
 anyway. Is that true? " 
 
 He seemed an enlightened man and I asked 
 what about Belgium? He admitted their sol- 
 diers might have taken things that did not be- 
 long to them — armies had done that before. He 
 would not believe there were Belgian atrocities. 
 He had never heard of Dinant. ' ' We have got- 
 ten rid of monarchy," he remarked, " and now 
 you have it." His opinion was that Germany 
 was suffering from the open frontier. Many un- 
 necessary articles, such as perfumes, for in- 
 stance, were coming in through the occupied 
 Rhineland and they are powerless to stop them. 
 These are taking the money that should be used 
 for necessities of life. This and the low value 
 of the mark is what makes conditions so hard 
 at the present. 
 
 382 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 In Frankfort, where we stopped between 
 trains, I went into a tiny grocery in a side street 
 to price potatoes. They asked for my potato 
 card — no potatoes could be sold without. They 
 were 15 pfennigs a pound. They had been as 
 high as 22 pfennigs a pound which evidently is 
 very hard on the poor people. There was plenty 
 of fruit, delicious pears and apples sold on the 
 streets. The wardrobe girl at the hotel told me 
 things had been very bad, but they were better 
 now. The room clerk said it was the money 
 situation that was hardest. "We don't know 
 what will happen next," he said. 
 
 A morning train took us to Mayence. In the 
 compartment was a beautiful woman who told 
 us she was a Hollander, but had married a 
 German so she could not go back to see her 
 people in Holland. Her husband had been 
 wounded in the war and she had come to Berlin 
 from their home in Dusseldorf to nurse him. 
 That was in the winter of 1918. It was terribly 
 cold, she told us, and they had nothing to eat 
 but soup. There was no bread, no butter, no 
 meat. Everyone was undernourished. 
 
 "That was why we lost the war," she said. 
 383 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 " The people could not face such another 
 winter. ' ' She was very pessimistic. ' ' Bolshev- 
 ism will come," she said, " and not to Germany 
 alone, but to the whole world." 
 
 There seems to be much bitterness between 
 the people of Holland and the people of Bel- 
 gium. She said the Belgians did not appreciate 
 that Holland had kept many of them when they 
 had to leave their country. Her views evidently 
 voiced those of a certain class. 
 
 Having -the afternoon in Mayence I decided 
 to take a car and motor out through some of the 
 hamlets to get a closer up vision of how the 
 people take the occupation. At Nieder Olm we 
 found black French colonial troops, from Mar- 
 tinique, swarming the village streets. Farther 
 on, in the fields were numerous corrugated iron 
 huts, which, we learned, were filled with ammu- 
 nition, ready in case of necessity. 
 
 In Worrstadt we had to drink coffee with a 
 little German woman — she had coffee now, 
 she told me, for the French officer and his wife 
 who had been billeted in her home had given 
 her some. She showed me the parched corn 
 they had used before. These French people had 
 
 384 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 also gotten for her a kettle of meat fat which 
 was carefully hoarded. She spoke of them af- 
 fectionately as " Meine Francozen " (My 
 French people). They had left her what pro- 
 visions they could when they had to go, and she 
 was so appreciative. Their photographs had an 
 honored place in the best room. Everything 
 had been better since the French had come. 
 
 Her brother came in. He said the German 
 peace was too hard. The terms would ruin the 
 country. I hazarded that the French believed* 
 they had not received what they should from 
 the war. He asked what about President Wil- 
 son's fourteen points. 
 
 Business in the village was good, but every- 
 thing was very high, he said. And there was no 
 coal. They could only heat one room in each 
 house. I remarked the hotels in Paris had no 
 heat at all. " But the French have our coal, 
 they have the whole Saar region," was his argu- 
 ment. He claimed the war was not entirely the 
 fault of Germany, it was the fault of the diplo- 
 mats of all the countries he wanted me to under- 
 stand. 
 
 " The German people do not know how to 
 hate," he emphasized. 
 
 385 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 ' ' What about the Song of Hate your soldiers 
 sang? " asked Miss Bennett. They asked what 
 it was. " We have never heard it," they said. 
 The man was sure there would never be a mon- 
 archy again — Germany would always be a 
 republic. 
 
 From Mayence that evening we took a tram- 
 car to Wiesbaden, the famous health resort, a 
 few miles distant. It was our one hope of 
 getting a sleeper to Paris but even the offer of 
 100 francs failed to secure berths, so we sat up 
 in the stiff seats through another long night. 
 In Wiesbaden we had dined at the Hotel Rose, 
 where French officers and their families, Eng- 
 lish officers, and an occasional American uni- 
 form, made the dining room very gay. We even 
 found the prices there in a fashionable resort 
 not so high as in Paris. An American Y man 
 from the Army of Occupation at Coblenz spoke 
 to me. 
 
 " It is hard to believe anything against these 
 people. They are so charming. Doesn't seem 
 possible they could have been our enemies," he 
 said. 
 
 The next morning at eight o'clock we had to 
 386 
 
GETTING THROUGH TO BERLIN 
 
 leave the train at Nancy, though we had been 
 told it was a through train to Paris. It was in 
 Nancy that 1,145 bombs fell and all about the 
 depot are signs of the destruction, with some 
 rebuilding started. We went to see the famous 
 public square, Stanislas Place, one of the most 
 beautiful squares in Europe. At the corners 
 are magnificent fountains and a wonderful 18th 
 century forged iron gateway by Jean Lamour 
 tli at fortunately were not harmed. 
 
 On the train to Paris a French general lent 
 me his Saturday Evening Post. He had been 
 reading it with a dictionary. On the margins of 
 the stories he had notatious of the words in 
 French. After ' ' sad ' ' was the word ' ' triste. ' ' 
 He praised the American soldier, telling me he 
 had had many in his division. He was well 
 informed on American politics. There would be 
 no more war, was his opinion. The world has 
 lost twenty million men in dead and disabled 
 through this war, was his comment. But he 
 believed President Wilson stopped hostilities 
 too soon. He should have permitted Marshal 
 Foch to advance, as they had planned, to the 
 Rhine. Saving one man then might sacrifice a 
 
 387 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 million in twenty years, was his military atti- 
 tude. Evidently he was not entirely convinced 
 that there would be no more war. 
 
 But the French soldier loves President Wil- 
 son for having stopped the war. One told me so 
 last night. He had been eleven months in the 
 front line trenches. He also assured me, and he 
 is a business man of wide connections in Paris, 
 that the French do not hate the Germans. They 
 fought out their differences on the battlefields. 
 Now they will resume trade relations. It must 
 come. The common soldier cherishes no bitter- 
 ness. Only those who lost dear ones cannot 
 forget. 
 
 388 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 Paris, Oct. 22. 
 
 IT WAS an imposing white stone mansion we 
 entered, on a wide fashionable street. Two 
 tall, liveried footmen, twin Hercules, bowed us 
 in. Through an anteroom of quiet elegance and 
 noiseless doors opened before a grand staircase. 
 Treacling its gray velvet steps, my feet sank in 
 cleliciously. The landing at the turn gave a 
 sense of space and softly shaded lights. Up the 
 next flight of steps and a gracious woman 
 stepped forth from an informal group. She 
 received us with just the right degree of cor- 
 diality. It is so often overdone. "We were 
 ushered into a salon that even my American 
 stoicism refused to take unblinkingly. The floor 
 was of marble, dark and light, in an artistic 
 conventional design. Over it a few priceless 
 rugs were scattered. I dropped down on a 
 settee, a wonderful old Louis Quinze piece — 
 and my eyes opened wider. The salon was large 
 
 389 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 and all its walls were concealed by magnificent 
 tapestries. The tapestry that covered the entire 
 wall opposite me was a Chinese scene, as ex- 
 quisitely wrought as if it had been done with a 
 brush. In novel cupola arrangements, high in 
 the four ceiling corners of the salon, were fes- 
 toons of Chinese bells. At either end of the 
 salon was a Louis xv commode on which stood 
 a huge blue Chinese vase, with curling dragons. 
 Against the vase, on the commode at the farther 
 end of the room, was an open ostrich fan in 
 colors of flame, that caught and held the eye. 
 The settees and chairs were all in the Louis xv 
 period. I was reminded that there was a craze 
 for things Chinese during the reign of that King- 
 Louis and this salon was in reproduction. I 
 had failed to catch the name of the soft-voiced 
 woman who shook my hand at the head of the 
 stairs when I was introduced. 
 
 Suddenly I remembered. It was all wonder- 
 ful, but I was losing time. " Didn't you say we 
 were going to the dressmaker's this after- 
 noon! " I asked Cousin Berthe, impatiently. 
 ' ' Yes, ' ' she answered, ' ' that is where you are. ' ' 
 We were in the " House of Callot," one of the 
 
 390 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 foremost establishments of fashion creators in 
 Paris. 
 
 This chapter is on Paris fashions, and any 
 mere man who might have begun reading it with 
 the idea that it is on reconstruction had better 
 stop right here. Unless he is interested in how 
 milady goes to buy a Paris gown and hat at the 
 world-famous couturieres and modistes in this 
 autumn of 1919, a year after the armistice. 
 Paris has always been the spotlight for the 
 world of womankind, since it is from here that 
 the final edict goes forth on what she shall wear. 
 And all dress reform to the contrary, with all 
 her unswerving loyalty to American ideas, the 
 American woman preaches ' ' America First ' ' 
 in everything — but styles. Somehow here in 
 this gay city on the Seine there has always 
 gathered a little band of ultra mode creators 
 who have found the secret of the word ' ' chic. ' ' 
 And they know how to express it in women's 
 clothes. 
 
 " What a beautiful fan," I whispered to 
 Cousin Amalie. 
 
 ' ' You can buy it, ' ' was her answer. ' ' You 
 can buy anything you see here." 
 
 391 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 " You don't mean this furniture or these 
 tapestries? " I asked, incredulously. 
 
 " Yes, everything is for sale." 
 
 I subsided into an " Oh ! " 
 
 The first requisite for the American entering 
 these establishments is the proper introduction 
 and that must preferably be through a Pari- 
 sienne who has at some time been a patron. 
 Because Madame, my cousin, was known to 
 them, we were that afternoon taken through the 
 House of Callot which has only recently re- 
 moved to this palatial place. The room beyond 
 the grand salon was equally beautiful though 
 smaller and on a different scale. On its soft 
 toned walls hung a few marvelous paintings and 
 the furniture and hangings were in keeping. 
 Then through a web of corridors and the door 
 opened to a small square room, the four walls 
 of which, from the ceiling to the floor, were solid 
 mirrors. Over the mirrored side walls hung 
 a couple of framed gems of the Louis xvi period. 
 The rug on the floor blended warmly with the 
 upholstery of the Louis Seize furniture. 
 
 ' ' What is this ? ' ' I asked in awe. 
 
 "A fitting room!" Adjoining was another 
 392 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 fitting room, paneled in mirrors that carried 
 out another French period in its rugs and pic- 
 tures, a lovely drawing room in miniature. That 
 is the French of it, to see that the setting for 
 the gown is right, that the background for their 
 creation of art has no jarring note. 
 
 Back in the salon the mannequins or 
 models began to come in, tripping lightly on 
 their high-heeled, wide-toed satin pumps. At 
 first it was bewildering. Soon it was apparent 
 every model was a part of her gown; it had 
 been made for her. They must choose them as 
 types. The girl with the Titian hair piled high 
 sauntered in, robed in a frock of soft green, 
 like the green of the waving Iowa corn at sun- 
 set, and the dusky haired mademoiselle tilted 
 before us in something warm toned and rich and 
 subtle. Sometimes one came swathed to her ear- 
 lobes in a high, fur-collared coat, and as she bal- 
 anced from her toes to her heels before us she 
 would fling back the coat, and slipping from her 
 pretty shoulders, it would reveal a ravishing 
 evening gown made to go under it, because it 
 reflected the coat in rich colorings in satins and 
 georgettes. One of us would murmur " Tres 
 
 393 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 joli." And the pretty mannequin would smile 
 and linger a moment longer before going on to 
 the next group, there to repeat her sway grace- 
 fully from side to side before backing away, 
 until she had circled the salon and made her 
 exit. 
 
 It was in the House of Premet, which you 
 must pronounce " Praymay " if you would be 
 understood, that I fairly reveled in charming 
 creations in my tour of the big establishments. 
 A bright eyed little English girl there explained 
 it all to me. It seems the leadership in styles 
 in Paris fluctuates from season to season. One 
 year one house occupies the pinnacle and the 
 next year another. This year, so she told me, 
 with a touch of personal pride for her connec- 
 tion with the establishment, this year it was 
 Premet. She was called away just then, so I 
 don 't know how they determine the premiership. 
 Anyway, the House of Premet was showing 
 most beautiful models, and their styles had a 
 conservative elegance that the real French- 
 woman loves. Not the loud, bizarre, startling, 
 combinations that we, on this side, are often 
 led to believe are French. In this establish- 
 
 394 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 ment there is no attempt to camouflage the 
 dressmaking end. A figure in the last word in 
 blouses occupies a handsome table in the center 
 of the room; on a side table another exhibits 
 the newest in sweaters. But the salon is rich 
 in old hangings and furniture, and the wall 
 spaces are filled with large, antique, gold-framed 
 mirrors. One near the entrance door had a hole 
 gashed in the glass, and I was wondering who 
 was going to be " out of luck " for seven years, 
 when I was told ' ' that was done when the bomb 
 crashed outside here in the Place Vendome, dur- 
 ing one of the air raids on Paris." It had oc- 
 curred at night, so, fortunately, none of the 
 girls were in the establishment. "Have you 
 many girls employed here T " I asked, seeing 
 not more than a dozen saleswomen on the floor. 
 "About five hundred," was the reply. 
 
 On the Rue de la Paix is the House of Pa- 
 quin, where the liveried doorman ushers you 
 into a salesroom filled with exquisite confec- 
 tions hung on wire figures. You are taken back 
 to a stairway that curls up to a big salon where 
 the mannequins trip out in the latest creations 
 of its designers. And so it goes whether you 
 
 395 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 go to Drecoll, Worth, Ducet, Renee, Jenny, 
 Cheruit, and all the names that every woman 
 learns to know through fashion plates and mag- 
 azines. One house is noted for its evening 
 gowns, another for its street frocks, another for 
 its coats, and which is which every Parisienne 
 can tell you. It is because the American woman 
 does not know that she is often ' ' stung. ' ' An 
 American friend of mine asked me to accompany 
 her to one of the big establishments when she had 
 a gown fitted. I spoke of the famous house later 
 to a Parisienne and she looked surprised. 
 
 " Isn't it a good establishment? " I asked. 
 " Oh, yes," she answered hesitatingly, 
 " only—." 
 
 " Go on, " I begged. 
 
 ' ' Well, the owner was said to be pro-German 
 and we have not gone there since the war be- 
 gan. ' ' 
 
 " If I had only known, ' ' my American friend 
 regretted, adding, " perhaps that is why I met 
 so few Frenchwomen there." 
 
 Apropos of what is sold Americans I was 
 taken to a new house that opened recently. Its 
 big showrooms were crowded with American 
 
 396 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 men buyers, every seat around the salons being 
 occupied when we entered. Beside each im- 
 portant buyer sat a saleswoman with a pad 
 and pencil. If a buyer showed a preference for 
 a gown, the mannequin was signaled to return. 
 Perhaps he buys a model for the sleeves, for a 
 bit of original design in trimmings, for a skirt 
 drapery or a collar, which he has modified or 
 has his American designer use as a motif. It 
 is the idea he is after. An original trimming is 
 known by the house that creates it. Now in 
 this establishment the model gowns were most 
 extreme, like much of the bizarre that we get in 
 our country labeled the ''dernier cri," the last 
 word from Paris. A saleswoman who knew the 
 Parisienne with me, after welcoming her most 
 effusively, remarked, ' ' We have done a million 
 francs worth of business here in three days." 
 
 " All good American money," I hazarded. 
 
 ' ' We have many American customers, ' ' she 
 said. Their opening for their French trade I 
 learned was later. Then, of course, the models 
 would be different. 
 
 The well-dressed Frenchwoman is always 
 chic. She has an innate color sense that makes 
 
 397 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 her a picture in whatever she wears. Even the 
 little shop girl has that knack of wearing a 
 simple black frock with distinction and the good 
 sense never to overdress. 
 
 How does one go about getting a gown in a 
 big establishment! Like this: Suppose a 
 mannequin trips out in a dress that you know 
 instantly is what you want. You communicate 
 this fact to the saleswoman who hovers near 
 you and she calls mademoiselle back as she is 
 leaving the room. You are allowed to examine 
 the fabric carefully. Then you are conducted 
 to a fitting room, the model gown is brought and 
 you are put into it. I say put into it, for that 
 process requires four or five women, one to 
 hook it up and the rest to exclaim in French 
 superlatives about it. " Oh, ravissante! " is a 
 favorite, and from the lips of Mme. Berthe of 
 Premet's, it is convincing. 
 
 You must have a large sense of balance not to 
 let this subtle flattery turn your head, but say 
 you do survive, you may demand to try on an- 
 other and finally select the gown. You may want 
 it in another color and the saleswoman will de- 
 cide whether it would be good in that shade. 
 
 398 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 She will suggest the alterations in the model 
 to suit your style. Her decision " goes," be- 
 cause she would not be a saleswoman in a lead- 
 ing Paris house unless she were a color and 
 style artist. Then they bring you materials 
 and you choose from them. Often it is huge 
 bolts of goods and uncut furs and sometimes 
 only samples. 
 
 Your first fitting will be a great disappoint- 
 ment because they fit nothing but a coarse white 
 cotton lining and they fit it tightly, even to a long, 
 tight, sleeve. Just about the time you get up 
 the courage to ask timidly, ' ' Isn 't it going to 
 have short sleeves'? " you are told smilingly, 
 ' ' that 's all — come back Thursday at eleven. ' ' 
 
 Thursday is when the big show opens. A 
 waist maker and her assistant put the waist 
 on you and then comes a skirt maker and her 
 assistant and these four are supplemented by 
 the saleswoman who took the original order. 
 If you are weak on French they add an Eng- 
 lish interpreter. The six all talk at once and 
 keep up a running comment in French as 
 they stick in a pin here or snip a stitch tliere. 
 Should you have a mild suggestion to 
 
 399 
 
WITHIN THE YEAH AFTER 
 
 offer it is apt to be frowned down and you 
 end by leaving it to them. The result is 
 worth while. As to the price, you must ask 
 that at the beginning and if you are accom- 
 panied by a Frenchwoman who knows values, 
 you will escape paying American prices. The 
 artist saleswoman will even suggest the sort of 
 hat that will harmonize with the gown. 
 
 I don 't suppose the woman has lived since the 
 Lord made Eve who has not at some time or 
 another sighed pensively and wished in her 
 innermost soul to have a Paris hat. Some delv- 
 ing antiquarian is going to prove some day that 
 Eve herself, kneeling before her favorite pool in 
 the Garden of Eden, pushed back her hair and 
 murmured yearningly, ' ' if I could only find a 
 leaf that would follow the lines of my face." 
 That is what the Paris milliner does, follows the 
 lines of your face, for the Paris hat like the 
 Paris gown must express you. But it is not so 
 much the hat after all, as the way the Parisi- 
 enne wears it that gives it its dash. 
 
 A French cousin took me to her modiste. It 
 was up a dark stairway and into a most unat- 
 tractive room. I recalled the big millinery em- 
 
 400 
 
The Statute of Von Hindenburg in the Scaffolding in Berlin in the process of 
 
 being removed. 
 
 At Mayence, the Neighborhood of the Depot. 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 poriums in America and, looking around at a 
 few wire hat stands on which teetered ngly hat 
 frames, I exclaimed, "What a funny place!" 
 " Wait," she said. 
 
 In came Mademoiselle Modiste. There was a 
 long exchange of French courtesies. In a 
 French shop, that is exclusive, you don't just 
 run in and say, "I'd like to see a hat." No, 
 indeed. It isn't done that way. You wind the 
 conversation around to it. After the milliner 
 has inquired sympathetically about your health 
 and that of your family, and the state of the 
 weather has been sufficiently discussed, you 
 touch lightly the paramount question of the hat. 
 She invites you to a seat before a mirror. Then 
 you wait. Waiting is one of the things you 
 learn in Europe, and if you don 't fume and fret 
 about it they doubt whether you are a good 
 American. 
 
 After while back trips the little tight-skirted 
 mademoiselle with a vivacious air of having 
 walked a block, and in her hands she bears a 
 crumpled paper sack, some four feet square, 
 and she drops it on the floor beside you. If you 
 are naturally curious, as I am, you will peep 
 
 401 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 into the paper sack, and your nose will ascend in 
 disgnst. What does she think you want? A 
 sombrero? You wonder if something about you 
 suggests the wild and woolly west. 
 
 There was a running combat of words be- 
 tween her and the French matron. She held 
 up a light blue felt frame. Its crown was a 
 foot high and the brim a foot and a half wide. 
 It was bare of trimming. Poising herself gin- 
 gerly on one foot back of my chair she set 
 the sombrero on my head, and with a pat here 
 and a push there settled it down on my hair, 
 until it lodged coquettishly over one eye. 
 
 ' ' I wouldn 't think of wearing such a fright, ' ' 
 I exclaimed. 
 
 ' ' Look only at the color, ' ' said mademoiselle. 
 4 ' Do you like the color 1 ' ' 
 
 She stood off, and with a bird-like twist of 
 her head critically scanned my reflection in the 
 glass. " I can't see the color for the shape," I 
 laughed. 
 
 1 • Ah, we only get the color now. Later we get 
 the shape." 
 
 A hat for a Frenchwoman isn't a fancy of a 
 moment ; it is a matter of long and earnest re- 
 
 402 
 
WHERE FASHIONS ARE CREATED 
 
 flection. That is why it looks it. And the little 
 delivery girl who brings it to you in a big round 
 box is just as you see her on the French 
 comedy stage. 
 
 I have been in the great establishment of 
 Caroline Reboux, down on the Rue de la Paix. 
 Now any New York or Chicago milliner will 
 get a great respect for you if you show fa- 
 miliarity with the Reboux hat, for it is the lead- 
 ing millinery house of Paris, and its models 
 over here are considered the final word in the 
 world of headgear. Caroline Reboux is a beau- 
 tiful young woman, with white hair and a girlish 
 face. Around the room stood the inevitable 
 high wire floor stands on which hung most un- 
 interesting hats. The newest creations are 
 kept under cover until finally brought out for 
 a try-on, and then carried away again. 
 
 I watched Mme. Caroline sell a hat. A trail- 
 ing assistant brought her a two-inch- wide piece 
 of white crinoline. This she pinned around the 
 customer's head for the size. Then taking a 
 piece of black velvet she held it diagonally 
 across the front of the woman's hair, and said: 
 11 It will be like this. Come in Tuesday at 3." 
 
 403 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 And the hat — I saw it later — was a bit of art, 
 not in the hand, but on the head of the woman 
 for whom it was made. For they believe m fit- 
 ting the hat to the face and simplicity of line 
 is their guiding star. 
 
 Last Sunday I went out to the Longchamps, 
 the great race course just beyond the Bois de 
 Boulogne. Though the newspapers of Paris 
 feature the Sunday races at the Longchamps, 
 the real drawing card is the style show, for all 
 the great dressmaking and millinery houses 
 send their mannequins to the Longchamps races 
 to exhibit their latest creations, and there the 
 first glimpse of every new fad is seen. Fully 
 50,000 people must have been at the track that 
 day. They remain in the grandstand for a race, 
 but as soon as a heat is run the grandstand 
 empties and every one walks about the grounds 
 to view the styles. It was cold and the variety 
 of fur coats shown was a show in itself. People 
 promenaded about watching the passing modes ; 
 many took place in line before the betting- 
 booths, but eventually they would come back to 
 see the style display that is the supreme pur- 
 pose of it all. Men were as interested in the 
 new modes as women. 
 
 404 
 
WHERE FASHIONS A RE CREATED 
 
 Frequently a Frenchman accompanies his 
 wife to buy a hat. At Eeboux's I saw men sit- 
 ting patiently beside the women who were try- 
 ing on hats, giving their opinion critically as 
 they would lean forward on their canes. For 
 the Frenchwoman dresses to please the men, 
 and the modern Frenchman, understanding and 
 admiring beauty first, is a severe critic of 
 woman's dress. 
 
 Thus you see Paris creates styles seriously, 
 throwing heart and soul into the game. Per- 
 haps that is why for so many generations there 
 has emanated from its artistic atmosphere the 
 fashions of a whole world. 
 
 405 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 Nov. 7. 
 
 WASN'T it a "grand and glorious feel- 
 ing ' ' to find yourself actually on the 
 homeward-bound boat after five months through 
 the upheavals of war-torn Europe! 
 
 It was. 
 
 But instead of all my troubles being over then, 
 I found a few new ones had only just begun. 
 Getting back to this country is as difficult as get- 
 ting over had been, only in a different way. 
 My fond hopes that when my heels clicked up 
 the gangplank of the home-going steamer the 
 worst would be over, had been dashed long be- 
 fore I left Paris. Nothing less than the cable 
 message from my office to get to Berlin at all 
 hazards would have persuaded me to change my 
 sailing date, for I had made my reservation 
 back in August for mid-October and steamer 
 reservations at that moment were at a high 
 premium. Taking the next boat looks easy from 
 
 406 
 
BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 this side of the Atlantic, but when the next and 
 the next and all those scheduled to sail are com- 
 pletely filled and your chances hang on the slen- 
 der thread that someone might give up a state- 
 room at the last hour, you begin to feel that 
 home is a million miles away. At last, by mere 
 chance, I was able to obtain a berth in a state- 
 room with two other girls, both " Y ' ' workers, 
 one returning from Czecho-Slovakia, a room so 
 small that only one of us could dress in it at a 
 time. But this was the last steamer to sail 
 from Europe on Oct. 25 at that acute moment 
 of the dock strike in New York. The La France, 
 booked to leave the same day from Havre, had 
 not left America, and 500 boats were known 
 to be tied up in New York harbor. It looked 
 like I was not to miss any of the thrills in getting 
 back. 
 
 The most worrisome development had been 
 the announcement that no traveler might carry 
 more than one thousand francs in paper and ten 
 francs in silver, or its equivalent in any foreign 
 money, out of the country. That is only about 
 $110, and I knew it would not be enough to 
 take me home unless I walked part of the way. 
 
 407 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 The day before, the Paris edition of the New 
 York Herald had featured a story about one of 
 the Vanderbilts who had to give up 40,000 
 francs at the pier, and cited the dire conse- 
 quences to travelers attempting to evade the new 
 law. I went to the American press headquar- 
 ters in the Hotel Crillon and talked to the 
 Herald correspondent who wrote the story. He 
 assured me they were the facts. There was 
 nothing to do but to have my expense money 
 cabled to a New York bank. Even then there 
 was no assurance that the cable would reach 
 there. My cable message from Berlin to Daven- 
 port has not yet arrived ; some censor must have 
 it filed neatly away. I doubt if it ever got to 
 Potsdam, which is the next station to Berlin. 
 
 The passage across was rough — November is 
 always so on the ocean. The overcrowded con- 
 dition of the steamer compelled many cabin 
 passengers to travel steerage. A young Amer- 
 ican business man whom I encountered at Bou- 
 logne sur Mer, when we got out of the steamer 
 train from Paris in the cold, gray, 6 o'clock 
 dawn to carry our hand luggage to the customs 
 officials and have our passports given the final 
 
 408 
 
BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 stamp, told me he had been called home by the 
 death of his mother, and all he could get was 
 steerage passage. He had hoped to find place in 
 the first or second cabin when he got aboard, but 
 later found it impossible even to get his meals 
 there. 
 
 The passport rulings before leaving France 
 are complicated. It was necessary to report to 
 the police headquarters in person three days 
 before leaving Paris, and the procedure in- 
 volved long waits in line and the questions of 
 many officials. Then your passport must be 
 called for at the end of the third day, and there 
 is more red tape. The fact that in one of my 
 official trips the signature and seal of the Paris 
 Prefecture of Police himself had been placed 
 on my passport and the aid of a French clerk 
 from Cousin Arthur's office who " knew the 
 ropes," enabled me to get through in an hour, 
 but this was remarkably unusual. The new 
 three day rule at the passport bureau, I had 
 been told, might keep some people from leaving 
 if they did not know of it, and there was that 
 possibility of getting better accommodations on 
 the steamer. But all such hopes were in vain, 
 
 409 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 About half seas over we sailed into the grip 
 of a violent wind storm, and for three days and 
 nights the big liner tossed about like a toy. To 
 stand on the glass enclosed deck and watch the 
 mountain-high waves dash over the prow of 
 the boat was an exhilarating sight. A little 
 boy voiced the general sentiment one day, after 
 his toys had rolled away from him time and 
 again, when he cried, " Mother, why does the 
 captain have to go over every wave, couldn't 
 he go around some of them? " In the dining 
 salon the first device tried was that of saturat- 
 ing witli water the tablecloths where dishes 
 were placed, to keep them from rolling, but 
 later, when the seas became too high, two inch 
 frames were laid on each table, enclosing the 
 places and even then the soup would persist in 
 spilling over. It was like eating when poised in 
 a high swing, holding on with one hand to the 
 arm of the chair while you ate with the other, 
 getting in the bites after a big dip. 
 
 One evening in the main salon listening to a 
 concert by the ship orchestra, I was on a set- 
 tee with a pretty girl of the Smith college unit 
 who had seen active service abroad during the 
 
 410 
 
BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 war. A big lurch came and she was skidded 
 clear across the room into the arms of a Red 
 Cross officer. A clergyman in a " Y " uniform, 
 interrupted in telling me his experiences during 
 two years overseas, started to the rescue to- 
 gether with several other men. They all landed 
 in a heap in front of the Red Cross officer, only 
 to have him and his friends join them on the 
 return slide when the boat lurched the other 
 way. I was clinging frantically to the back 
 of the settee. It was comical — only the Smith 
 college girl carried a bruised nose for several 
 days. 
 
 Ropes were stretched through the center of 
 the decks and these gave safety holds when try- 
 ing to walk about there, for the frost made deck 
 floors slippery, adding another danger to the 
 pitching of the boat. Three days of this en- 
 forced exercise tired out everyone but the cap- 
 tain. These Dutch captains are wonderful sail- 
 ors and don't seem to mind a storm. I don't 
 know if this was the worst or next to the worst 
 voyage he had had in his eleven years on this 
 liner, because he refused to say. Anyway, he 
 took his ship miles out of the course, almost to 
 
 411 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 St. John's in Newfoundland, to get away from 
 the storm. 
 
 Up there in the fog something else happened. 
 Suddenly someone exclaimed, ' ' Look, we are 
 going backward." The boat was headed in the 
 opposite direction and there was much excite- 
 ment. It developed we had just escaped collid- 
 ing with another steamer. Even the haunting- 
 boom of the fog horn did not give the warning 
 in time to swing around, so that the big liner 
 had to back away. The first lighthouse from the 
 American shore, gleaming across the waters 
 was a welcome sight. It was the first light of 
 home. 
 
 The hour of landing is always a matter of 
 conjecture on an ocean steamer. So much de- 
 pends on winds and tide. If a ship reaches 
 harbor after sundown its passengers cannot go 
 ashore until the following morning. Therefore 
 there was great delight when it was finally 
 known we would dock about two in the after- 
 noon instead of six, and be allowed to disem- 
 bark immediately. A notice posted near the 
 wireless bulletin board requested all passengers 
 to assemble in the dining salon at 10 :30 in the 
 
 412 
 
BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 morning for the inspection of the health officers. 
 Passengers and crew have to undergo medical 
 inspection before the ship has a bill of health 
 permitting them to land. A special press tug 
 brought a trio of New York reporters on board. 
 
 On account of the dock strike there were no 
 dock men to bring the liner into its pier at 
 Hoboken, and a group of sailors were put off in 
 a tug to dock the boat. Coming into New York 
 with hundreds of water craft, scores of huge 
 vessels lying there, is a novel sight. Many- 
 boats, we were told, had started back with their 
 cargoes on board, unable to land them. The 
 stewards were obliged to handle all of the bag- 
 gage, and with twelve hundred passengers that 
 was no small task. One man told me he carried 
 twenty trunks. He was a millinery importer 
 from New York, bringing back Paris models. 
 
 Several days before landing each passenger 
 had been given a long sheet of paper entitled 
 a declaration and they might be seen poring 
 over them at any and all times. You are obliged 
 to declare everything you bring back from Eu- 
 rope and its cost. The fact that you had worn 
 
 413 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 an article did not exempt it from declaration. 
 Even repairs on your baggage must be de- 
 clared. And my suitcase, which had been a vic- 
 tim of Belgian atrocities, having lost its handle 
 in Brussels, was down for eleven francs for a 
 new handle. Evading customs officials is dan- 
 gerous business since they have word of every- 
 thing of value brought over. If a woman pur- 
 chases a gown in Paris she is charged ten per 
 cent extra as a luxury tax. If she is taking the 
 dress out of the country this ten per cent is re- 
 funded to her at the dock. But she pays duty 
 to bring it into this country, whether she has 
 worn it or not. " What I object to," said an 
 American girl on board to me, ' ' is that our gov- 
 ernment makes us swear to what we bring over 
 and then doesn't take our word for it, but 
 searches our baggage besides." 
 
 An inspector comes to you in the dock when 
 all your baggage is assembled and you open 
 your trunks and valises. He may demand to 
 see every article in your declaration. If he 
 finds something of value you have not declared 
 you are subject to fine and imprisonment, so few 
 take a chance. He calls an appraiser and they 
 
 414 
 
BACK TO THE U. S. A. 
 
 figure out what duty you must pay. It takes 
 hours getting your luggage through. 
 
 At 5 o'clock, when my last piece was strapped, 
 a patient old baggage man hoisted them on to a 
 long-handled truck. The next problem was 
 how to get it out of the docks. Brother, stand- 
 ing for hours on the farther side of a picket 
 fence that separated an enormous crowd from 
 the steamer passengers in the big dock shed, 
 had kept a taxi waiting since nine o'clock. 
 
 ' ' Lady, I can 't take this baggage out to a 
 taxi. I'll be shot if I try it — you know there is 
 a dock strike," the old baggage man said. 
 
 We held a consultation over the picket fence. 
 Finally a chap looking more like a Fifth avenue 
 swell than a taxi man stepped up to say he 
 could get my baggage out. So the old baggage 
 man wheeled it to the gate, where the Fifth ave- 
 nue swell took the handles of the truck and 
 pushed it into an elevator. Down on the street 
 landing he pushed it gingerly out to a taxi and 
 though several glowering strikers were watch- 
 ing, he must have had some special permit, for 
 we were not molested. The distance was only a 
 few blocks. It had cost $2.50 going to the 
 
 415 
 
WITHIN THE YEAR AFTER 
 
 dock last Juno, but it cost $10.60 to get us 
 with the baggage to the New York hotel. That 
 is what it is like, landing in America, in the 
 teeth of a dock strike today. 
 
 What impressed me most forcibly when I was 
 on American ground again, was the solid com- 
 fort of the American Pullman service. After 
 the crowded, unsanitary European trains, after 
 traveling over roads lumpy with shell holes, 
 roads Bhrapne] ploughed, reconstructed only 
 recently through No Man's Land, it was good 
 to be in the Broadway Special gliding like velvet 
 across the quiet, unscarred country. 
 
 But what I shall remember longest, aside 
 Prom Big Brother's voice calling "Betty" to 
 me across the landing dock, and the Kid 
 Nephew's bear hug, is the first sight from the 
 train steps of that howling, yelling, Times mob, 
 over a hundred strong, blaring their welcome 
 with whistles and noisemakers, which sounded 
 just then for all the world, like Alma Grluck 
 singing " Home, Sweet Home." 
 
 The End. 
 
 416 
 
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