BY GASTON V. DRAKE.
XVI.—FROM BOB TO JACK.
Paris.
DEAR JACK,—Had a fine time yesterday. We hired a great big open wagon that used to belong to Napoleon the Third and drove out to Versailles. If it wasn't wrong to bet I'd bet you a quarter you can't pronounce that word. Two to one you'd call it Ver-sales, which it isn't at all, but Vare-sigh. That's a queer thing about French. It isn't spelt the way it's pronounced, which I can't see the good of, and people who don't know it get lost. Take the word Luxemburg for instance. We'd pronounce it Luks-um-berg, but these people here wouldn't recognize it if we did it in their hearing, but if we said Loo-ksaun-boor they'd understand right away. And all the streets are Roos or Boolyvars. Boolyvars is French for Boulevards, and it's all right to call them that if they want to because that's what they are, but what's the sense of changing an easy word like streets into a silly little word like roos I can't even guess, and I'm generally a good guesser.
I sat next to the driver going out and it was very interesting. He couldn't speak English and I couldn't speak French, so we spent most of our time laughing. He'd say something to me and laugh and then I'd get one of my jokes at him and laugh, and I must say it was just about as good as if we understood what we were saying to each other—anyhow, it was more successful than Pop's attempts to talk to him. Pop said something to him in his patent French, as Aunt Sarah calls it; he asked him what a certain building was and as far as we could make out his answer, he replied that he thought it might before night, though it was clear enough when we started.
Speaking of Pop's patent French, it sounds quite as good to me as real French. He just takes an English word and Frenchifies it. For instance if you don't know French for building, you say bildang. Kesserkersay cet bildang la, in Pop's patent French means what building is that there. In some cases it works without your knowing it, like Pudding. If you take pudding and Frenchify it into Pooh-dang it's near enough for a Frenchman to understand, and if there is any, and there generally is, he'll bring you some.
It's a beautiful drive from Paris out to Versailles and you see lots all the way. The first thing we passed was the obelisk. It's kept cleaner than the one in Central Park and I don't like it as well. It doesn't seem so old, because it is so clean. Ours always looks as if it was on its last legs as it has a right to be, while this Paris one is as spick and span as it would be if it had been polished up with tooth-powder that very morning. The next thing to be seen on the drive was the Arc de Triomphe. That means Arch of Triumph and was put up when the French people used to triumph. It's got a fence around it now so that nobody can wear it out by walking under it. That's sarcasm as Aunt Sarah calls it, which is saying what you don't think with your nose turned up. The real reason why it's fenced in I guess is that the French people aren't triumphing as much as they were when they had a man like Napoleon at the hellum. France isn't any Yale College nowadays and hasn't won anything for a long time, and I don't see how she can expect to with the funny looking soldiers she has. Pop says they're all fuss and red pants, but Aunt Sarah thinks they're fine because there isn't any pomp about them, they're content to be plain soldiers of the Republic and wear what the government thinks is good for 'em. Pop says they make up in vanity what they lack in pomp, and when it comes to a question between Pop and Aunt Sarah I always side with Pop because he's a man and knows more. Anyhow I don't think much of the French soldiers. They haven't got great big chests like the English soldiers have and somehow their uniforms make me think of hand-organs. I wish we had a few arches like that Arc de Triomphe about New York or even America.
You can see this particular one from all over the city and there's no use of talking about it it makes you think more of the people and you learn more of their history looking at arches than when you don't see anything but elevated railroads and big sky-scraping office buildings. That's one thing Paris hasn't got and I guess it's one reason she's such a bright sunshiny looking city. All your light and air and sunbeams aren't shut out by life-insurance companies and newspapers. Elevated railroads, and life-insurance companies and newspapers don't teach you much but arches of Triumph do and I sort of think if we Americans would put up a few arches like that even if they cost a lot of money and took ten years to build there'd be more patriotism around about. I know this: I've learned more history over here in a week from what I've seen, than I could learn home in forty years from books, which is all we Americans can learn from except the newspapers which don't even agree and leave us worse off after we've read 'em than we were before.
Then we went through the Bois de Bologne which as I told you before is French for Central Park and it was great. They have woods and lakes and avenues all through it and best of all you don't have to keep off the grass either. What good grass is if you can't enjoy it is a thing I never understood. Pop says he can't understand it either except that people who can't make anything else like to make rules which accounts for all the signs in Central Park forbidding you to do everything you want to do, like "Don't tease the monkies," and "keep off the grass" and so on. In our American parks all you can do is walk where you're let, but here you can do anything you please in the parks and no one's any the worse off. What's more the folks that enjoy parks go to 'em and get all the fun out of 'em there is to be had, here. You see Frenchmen pushing two baby-carriages at once and smiling all over even if it isn't easy work, and you can't ride a mile without seeing a half a dozen picnics going on right square on the grass, any day of the week; only a French picnic isn't a bit like an American one. It lacks lots of things that makes an American picnic pleasant, particularly lemon pie. It's queer these people over here don't seem to know how good real pie is—but anyhow they all come out and sit on the grass and sing together and have a good time. That's what I like. Pop says I like it because it's something I never saw before, but he's only half right. I like it because I like to see people having a good time and that's what they have in the Bois de Bologne. Then there are caffys where you can get ice-cream and cake all through it with bands and fountains playing all day.