One of his few published speeches, made to his old school chums, is on this theme. "To be prepared in our days," he said, "has a meaning which those who prepared for and fought the wars of other days would have great difficulty in understanding. It would be a sad mistake to depend upon a sudden burst of popular enthusiasm, even though it should surpass in intensity that of the volunteers of the Revolution, if we do not fortify it by complete preparation.
"To be prepared we must assemble all the resources of the country, all the intelligence of her children, all their moral energy and direct them toward a single aim—victory. We must have organized everything, foreseen everything. Once hostilities have begun no improvisation will be worth while. Whatever lacks then will be lacking for good and all. And the slightest lack of preparation will spell disaster."
What Joffre said to his chums he had done for the French army, and President Poincare, after the Battle of the Marne, summed up his qualities which made it a French victory in this message to Joffre: "In the conduct of our armies you have shown a spirit of organization, order and of method whose beneficent effects have influenced every phase, from strategy to tactics; a wisdom cold and cautious, which has always prepared for the unexpected, a powerful soul which nothing has shaken, a serenity whose salutary example has everywhere inspired confidence and hope."
These words of the President of the French Republic are an epitome of the character and the military record of Joffre. He is representative of the real France, not the France of Paris and scandals. He is of the peasantry, and he and his kind, men of character, brought about the glorious France of the war.
Among those who accompanied Joffre on his visit to the United States was Rene Viviani, ex-Premier of France and Minister of Justice. He was born in Algeria in 1862, his family being Corsican, and originally of Italian blood.
VIVIANI A SOCIALIST LEADER.
M. Viviani became a lawyer in Paris and built up a large practice. In 1893 he entered the Chamber of Deputies as a Socialist. Together with Briand, Jaures and Millerand he was long a leader of the parliamentary delegation of Socialists. On June 1, 1914, one month before the outbreak of the war, M. Viviani became Prime Minister. He showed himself a brilliant leader and tireless worker. His speeches embodying the spirit of fighting France were read and admired the world over. Many persons consider Rene Viviani France's greatest orator. Volumes of his speeches have had a wide sale.
M. Viviani was succeeded in the Premiership by M. Briand, and recently he became Minister of Justice in the Ribot Cabinet. He is a man of great culture. Though an excellent Latin and Greek scholar, he speaks no English. Rene Viviani has had some experience as a newspaper man, as a special writer and as managing editor of the Petite Republique. His younger son, aged 22, was killed in the war. His older son has been wounded but is back at the front.
Another member of the French mission was M. de Hovelacque, the French Inspector General of Public Instruction. He is well known in the United States because of his marriage to Miss Josephine Higgins, of New York State.
The Right Honorable Arthur Balfour, ex-Premier of England, who came to America to join in the conferences at which the policies for carrying the war were outlined after America became an Ally, is described as one of the most intellectual statesmen in England, and one who, although he won all the honors his country could give him, never realized his own possibilities. At sixty-nine, at the height of his mental development, he occupies a place in the English cabinet, a place which was given him because of his great hold upon the autocracy of England.