To witness to our great soldiers and to their incomparable chiefs our infinite gratitude, let us display from all our houses the French colors and those of our Allies.
Our dead can sleep in peace. The sublime sacrifice which they have made of their life for the future of the race and for the safety of France will not be sterile.
For them as for us "the day of glory has arrived."
Vive la République!
Vive la France Immortelle!
THE MUNICIPAL COUNCIL.
Paris had anticipated the advice of the City Fathers. Printers and bill posters were not quick enough. But the proclamation was read with enthusiasm. "Ça y est cette fois-ci!" cried a girl who had just come out of Maxim's.
The cry was taken up immediately by all who were gathered around the poster, and we heard it passing from mouth to mouth as we worked our way toward the Madeleine. Nothing could express more appropriately and concisely the feeling of the Parisians than this short sentence. Cette fois-ci! This time! There had been other times when rejoicing was not in order. There had been false hopes, just as there had been false fears. The certitude of victory cette fois-ci—a certitude coming so miraculously a few months after incertitude and doubt—was the explanation of the fierce mad joy expressed in the pandemonium around us.
After a mile on the Grand Boulevards, a mile that reminded us of football days, the Artist said, "This is great stuff now, and will be greater stuff tonight. I wonder if we had not better try to get around to other places before dark just to see, you know." Beyond the Matin office, in a side street near Marguéry's, we saw a taxi. The chauffeur was shaking a five franc note, and heaping curses on a man who lost himself in the boulevard crowd. We ran to the chauffeur and told him we would make it up to him for the cochon who had not been good to him.
"Double fare, and a good pourboire beside," Herbert insisted. The Artist opened the door and started to help me in.