War Days in Brittany

by Elsie Deming Jarves

"F. F.

"Interne Français.

"Hotel du Chamessaire, Leysin, Suisse."

With this authentic picture before us, shall we not do well, we Americans, to realize what our own boys will have to face, should they fall into German hands?

Dinard has recently been obliged to open her doors to one thousand homeless children from Nancy. That historical and beautiful old town in Lorraine is no longer a safe place for kiddies. Twelve thousand have been sent here to Brittany, escorted by American Red Cross doctors and American nurses, and their school-masters and mistresses. Poor little mites, they look white and frightened and suppressed, but they must be relieved to feel they can run about the beach without the fear of bombs—that terror, night and day, which for so many months has haunted them.

Now the soft lapping of the waves replaces the roar of cannon; the green fields of Brittany, the crumbling buildings of their old home; but their little hearts are heavy, many a baby is crying for "maman" when bed-time comes. Their wan cheeks are growing rosy in the breezes from the Atlantic. Good butter, milk, eggs and peaceful sunny days, freedom from the fear of bombardment, are building up their fragile little bodies, and the strained look is leaving their eyes, and they are becoming normal children again.

We are constantly suffering from the spy fever. Every once in a while it breaks out in a virulent form. Everyone looks askance at his neighbor. The most absurd rumors circulate through the whole community, and the world and his wife are in a feverish state of exasperation, each one offering excellent advice as to the suppression of spies, German agents, pro-boches, etc., etc.

Of course, there is some foundation for their fears. If you take up a map of Brittany, you will see that the coast line is greatly indented. There are high, rocky cliffs and innumerable caves which might easily shelter whole cargoes of enemy supplies. Remote little beaches might serve as landing places, and there are all sorts of rumors about tanks of gasoline, barrels of butter, piles of fresh vegetables and meat being hidden in these natural warehouses, and as to how the submarines come in, signalled from shore by their spies, telling them when and where to land.

Undoubtedly there are bases for supplies along the coast. It is wild and uninhabited for miles, the little fishing villages, sheltering along the shore-line in rocky bays and inlets, are practically denuded of able-bodied men; only women, children and old folk living in these little stone cottages facing the rough Atlantic, and who are they to dare to withstand armed Germans?

All the waters along the coast are infested with the German U-boats. Last week the little English packet, running between Saint-Malo and Southampton, was torpedoed ten miles off the Isle of Wight. Only the captain and four others, who happened to be on deck, were saved by clinging to wreckage. All the crew, the two stewardesses, and the cabin boys were drowned before they could reach the deck. We knew them well, these courageous people who have so often made the journey since the war began, and now they are lying under these green waters, martyrs to their duty.