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MY FOUR WEEKS IN FRANCE

A password was what he wanted, and Mr. Poincaré had forgotten to give me the correct one

MY FOUR WEEKS
IN FRANCE

By
RING W. LARDNER
AUTHOR OF
Gullible’s Travels, Etc.

ILLUSTRATED BY
WALLACE MORGAN

INDIANAPOLIS
THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY
PUBLISHERS

Copyright 1918
The Bobbs-Merrill Company

PRESS OF
BRAUNWORTH & CO.
BOOK MANUFACTURERS
BROOKLYN, N. Y.

CONTENTS

MY FOUR WEEKS IN FRANCE

I
DODGING SUBMARINES TO COVER THE BIGGEST GAME OF ALL

Wednesday, July 18. A Lake Michigan Port.

I kept an appointment to-day with a gentleman from Somewhere in Connecticut.

“How,” said he, “would you like to go to France?”

I told him I’d like it very much, but that I was thirty-two years old, with a dependable wife and three unreliable children.

“Those small details,” he said, “exempt you from military duty. But we want you as a war correspondent.”

I told him I knew nothing about war. He said it had frequently been proved that that had nothing to do with it. So we hemmed and we hawed, pro and con, till my conscientious objections were all overruled.

“In conclusion,” said he, “we’d prefer to have you go on a troopship. That can be arranged through the War Department. There’ll be no trouble about it.”

Monday, July 30. A Potomac Port.

To-day I took the matter up with the War Department, through Mr. Creel.

“Mr. Creel,” I said, “can I go on a troopship?”

“No,” said Mr. Creel.

There was no trouble about it.

Wednesday, August 1. An Atlantic Port.

The young man in the French Consulate has taken a great fancy to me. He will not visé my passport till I bring him two more autographed pictures of myself.

George W. Gloom of the steamship company said there would be a ship sailing Saturday.

“Are we convoyed through the danger zone?” I inquired.

“We don’t guarantee it,” said he. “There has never been an accident on this line,” he added.

“What I was thinking about,” said I, “wouldn’t be classed as an accident.” Further questioning developed the comforting fact that the ship I am taking has never been sunk.

I told him I wanted a cabin to myself, as I expected to work.

“You will be in with two others,” he said.

“I would pay a little more to be alone,” said I.

This evidently was not worth answering, so I asked him how long the trip would take.

“I know nothing about it,” said he.

“I believe that,” said I when I was well out of his ear-shot.

Wednesday, August 8. At Sea.

We left port at ten last night, a mere three and a half days behind schedule. The ship and I should be very congenial, as we are about the same age.

My roommates are a young man from Harvard and a young man from Yale, but so far I have managed to keep the conversation neutral. We suspect that they made ours a first-class cabin by substituting the word 1ère for 2ème on the sign, and I am very certain that my berth was designed for Rabbit Maranville.

Our passenger list includes a general, a congressman, a lady novelist and her artist husband, French; a songbird, also French; two or three majors, a Thaw, and numerous gentlemen of the consular service. The large majority on board are young men going into American Ambulance and Y. M. C. A. work.

After breakfast this morning there was life-boat drill, directed by our purser, who is permanently made up as Svengali. He sent us down to our cabins to get our life-belts and then assigned us to our boats. Mine, No. 12, is as far from my cabin as they could put it without cutting it loose from the ship, and if I happen to be on deck when that old torpedo strikes, believe me, I’m not going to do a Marathon for a life-belt. Shoes off, and a running hop, step and jump looks like the best system. Moreover, I’m going to disobey another of the rules, which is that each passenger must remain calm.

Next we had to fill out a form for the enlightenment of Svengali as to our destination, business, home address, foreign address, literary tastes, etc. One item was “the names of relatives or friends you lofh.” This was unanswered, as nobody aboard seemed to know the meaning of the verb.

In the fumoir this afternoon a young American wanted a match. He consulted his dictionary and dug out “allumette.” But he thought the t’s were silent and asked Auguste for “allumay.” Auguste disappeared and returned in five minutes with a large glass of lemonade. The cost of that little French lesson was two francs.

I am elected to eat at the “second table.” Our bunch has luncheon at twelve-thirty and dinner at seven. The first table crowd’s hours are eleven and five-thirty. Breakfast is a free-for-all and we sit where we choose. My trough mates at the meals are two Americans, a Brazilian, and four Frenchmen. Ours is a stag table, which unfortunate circumstance is due to the paucity of women, or, as they are sometimes called, members of the fair sex. The Brazilian speaks nine or ten languages, but seems to prefer French. The two Americans are always engaged in sotto voce dialogue, and the four Frenchmen race with the Brazilian for the conversational speed championship of the high seas. This leaves me free to devote all my time to the proper mastication of food.

Thursday, August 9. Completely at Sea.

A gentleman on board is supplied with one of these newfangled one hundred dollar safety suits. The wearer is supposed to be able to float indefinitely. It is also a sort of thermos bottle, keeping one warm in cold water and cool in hot. I do not envy the gent. I have no ambition to float indefinitely. And if I didn’t happen to have it on when the crash came, I doubt whether I could spare the time to change. And besides, if I ever do feel that I can afford one hundred dollars for a suit, I won’t want to wear it for the edification of mere fish.

When Svengali isn’t busy pursing, he is usually engaged in chess matches with another of the officers. The rest of the idle portion of the crew stand round the table and look on. Sometimes they look on for an hour without seeing a move made, but they never seem to lose interest. Every little movement brings forth a veritable torrent of français from the spectators. I can understand the fascination of chess from the player’s end, but could get few thrills from watching, especially when there was standing room only.

Far more fascinating to look at is the game two of my French trough mates play at breakfast. The rules are simple. You take a muffin about the size of a golf ball. You drop it into your cup of chocolate. Then you fish for it, sometimes with a spoon, but more often with your fingers. The object is to convey it to your mouth without discoloring your necktie. Success comes three times in five.

The players are about evenly matched. One of them I suspect, is not in the game for sport’s sake, but has a worthier object. Nature supplied him with a light gray mustache, and a chocolate brown would blend better with his complexion. If the muffins hold out, his color scheme will be perfect before we reach port.

The discovery has been made that there’s a man on board who plays the cornet, so if we are subbed it will not be an unmitigated evil.

Friday, August 10.

Every morning one sees on the deck people one never saw before, and as we have not stopped at any stations since we started, the inference is that certain parties have not found the trip a continuous joy ride.

A news bulletin, published every morning, sometimes in English and sometimes in French, keeps us right up to date on thrilling events, thrillingly spelled. I have copied a sample:

It is now the tim for the final invaseon of the west by the eastren american league teams and before this clash is over it will be definitively known wether the two sox teams are to fight it out in a nip and tuk finish or wether the Chicago sox will have a comfortable margen to insure a world series betwean the two largest American citys Chicago and New York.

The French news deals exclusively with the developments in the world series Over There, which is, perhaps, almost as important.

A new acquaintance made to-day was that of the Gentleman from Louisiana. He introduced himself to scold me and another guy for not taking sufficient exercise. We told him we found little pleasure in promenading the deck.

“That’s unnecessary,” he said. “Get yourselves a pair of three-pound dumb-bells and use them a certain length of time every day.”

So we are constantly on the lookout for a dumb-bell shop, but there seems to be a regrettable lack of such establishments in mid-ocean.

The Gentleman from Louisiana says he is going to join the Foreign Legion if they’ll take him. He is only seventy years old.

“But age makes no difference to a man like I,” says he. “I exercise and keep hard. All my friends are hard and tough. Why, one of my friends, an undertaker, always carries a razor in his boot.”

Presumably this bird never allows psychological depression in his business.

The Gentleman from Louisiana continues:

“I’ve got a reputation for hardness, but I’m only hard when I know I’m right. I used such hard language once that they injected me from a committee. I was state senator then. But in all the time I held office I never talked more than two minutes.”

We expressed polite regret that he was not a state senator still. And we asked him to have a lemonade.

“No, thank you. Even the softest drinks have a peculiar effect on me. They make my toes stick together.”

We guaranteed to pry those members apart again after he had quenched his thirst, but he would not take a chance.

On the way cabinward from this fascinating presence, I was invited into a crap game on the salle à manger floor. The gentleman with the dice tossed a hundred-franc note into the ring and said: “Shoot it all.” And the amount was promptly oversubscribed. So I kept on going cabinward.

Samedi, 11 Août.

The man back there in the steamship office can no more truthfully say: “There has never been an accident on this line.”

I awoke at three-thirty this morning to find the cabin insufferably hot and opened the port-hole which is directly above my berth. The majority of the ocean immediately left its usual haunts and came indoors. Yale and Harvard were given a shower bath and I had a choice of putting on the driest things I could find and going on deck or drowning where I lay. The former seemed the preferable course.

Out there I found several fellow voyagers asleep in their chairs and a watchman in a red-and-white tam-o’-shanter scanning the bounding main for old Hans W. Periscope.

I wanted sympathy, but the watchman informed me that he ne comprended pas anglais, monsieur. So we stood there together and scanned, each in his own language.

My garçon de cabine promises he will have me thoroughly bailed out by bedtime to-night.

I sat at a different breakfast table, but there was no want of entertainment. At my side was a master of both anglais and français, and opposite him an American young lady who thinks French is simply just impossible to learn.

“Mademoiselle,” says he, “must find it difficult to get what she likes to eat.”

“I certainly do,” says she. “I don’t understand a word of what’s on the menu card.”

“Perhaps I can help mademoiselle,” says he. “Would she like perhaps a grapefruit?”

She would and she’d also like oatmeal and eggs and coffee. So he steered her straight through the meal with almost painful politeness, but in the intervals when he wasn’t using his hands as an aid to gallant discourse, he was manicuring himself with a fork.

The majority of the ocean immediately left its usual haunts and came indoors

This afternoon they drug me into a bridge game. My partner was our congressman’s secretary. Our opponents were a Standard Oil official and a vice-consul bound for Italy. My partner’s middle name was Bid and Mr. Oil’s was Double. And I was too shy to object when they said we’d play for a cent a point.

At the hour of going to press, Standard Oil had practically all the money in the world. And my partner has learned that a holding of five clubs doesn’t demand a bid of the same amount.

Sunday, August 12.

The boat seems to be well supplied with the necessities of life, such as cocktails and cards and chips, but it is next to impossible to obtain luxuries like matches, ice-water and soap.

Yale and Harvard both knew enough to bring their own soap, but my previous ocean experiences were mostly with the Old Fall River Line, on which there wasn’t time to wash. Neither Yale nor Harvard ever takes a hint. And “Apportez-moi du savon, s’il vous plaît,” to the cabin steward is just as ineffectual.

All good people attended service this morning, and some bad ones played poker this afternoon.

In a burst of generosity I invited a second-class French young lady of five summers to have some candy. She accepted, and her acceptance led to the discovery that the ship’s barber is also its candy salesman.

This barber understands not a syllable of English, which fact has added much to young America’s enjoyment. The boys, in the midst of a hair cut, say to him politely: “You realize that you’re a damn rotten barber?” And he answers smilingly: “Oui, oui, monsieur.” Yesterday, I am told, a young shavee remarked: “You make me sick.” The barber replied as usual, and the customer was sick all last night.

To-morrow afternoon there is to be a “concert” and I’m to speak a piece, O Diary!

Monday, August 13.

The concert was “au profit du Secours National de France. Œuvre fondée pour répartir les Secours aux Victimes de la Guerre.”

Ten minutes before starting time they informed me that I was to talk on “The American National Game,” and I don’t even know how the White Sox came out a week ago to-morrow.

The afternoon’s entertainment opened with a few well-chosen remarks by our congressman. The general, designated on the program as “chairman,” though his real job was toastmaster, talked a while about this, that and the other thing, and then introduced the cornet player, using his real name. This gentleman and I blew at the same time, so I have no idea what he played. I got back in time for some pretty good harmonizing by three young Americans and a boy from Cincinnati. Then there was a Humorous Recitation (the program said so) by a gent with a funny name, and some really delightful French folk songs by the lady novelist. After which came a Humorous Speech (the program forgot to say so) by myself, necessarily brief, as I gave it in French. The French songbird followed with one of those things that jump back and forth between Pike’s Peak and the Grand Cañon, and a brave boy played a ukelele, and the quartette repeated. In conclusion, we all rose and attempted La Marseillaise.

Some of the programs had been illustrated by the lady novelist’s artist husband, and these were auctioned off after the show. I made my financial contribution indirectly, through better card players than myself. My bridge partner, I noticed, had recovered from his attack of the Bids.

Tuesday, August 14.

The concert, by the way, was given in the salon de conversation, which, I think, should be reserved for the Gentleman from Louisiana. He has now told me two hundred times that he won his election to the State Senate by giving one dollar and a half to “a nigger.”

One of our young field-service men spoiled the forenoon poker game with a lecture on how to catch sharks. His remarkable idea is to put beefsteak on a stout copper wire and troll with it. He has evidently been very intimate with this family of fish, and he says they are simply crazy about beefsteak. Personally, I have no desire to catch sharks. There are plenty aboard. But I do wish he had not got to the most interesting part of his theory at the moment the dealer slipped me four sixes before the draw. Everybody was too busy listening to stay.

We have discovered that the man behind the gun in the fumoir bears a striking resemblance to Von Hindenburg, but no one has been found who will tell him so.

There was a track meet this afternoon, and the author of this diary was appointed referee. But the first event, a wheelbarrow race, was so exciting that he feared for his weak heart and resigned in favor of our general. There didn’t seem to be much else to the meet but ju-jutsu, the sport in which skill is supposed to triumph over brawn. I noticed that a two-hundred-and-thirty-pound man was the winner.

We are in that old zone, and the second table’s dinner hour has been advanced to half past six so that there need be no lights in the dining-room. Also, we are ordered not to smoke, not even to light a match, on deck after dark. The fumoir will be running for the last time, but the port-holes in it will all be sealed, meaning that after thirty-five smokers have done their best for a few hours the atmosphere will be intolerable. We can stay on deck smokeless, or we can try to exist in the airless fumoir, or we can go to bed in the dark and wish we were sleepy. And the worst is yet to come.

Wednesday, August 15.

The rules for to-night and to-morrow night provide for the closing of our old friend, the fumoir, at seven o’clock, and that witching hour is on you long before you expect it, for they jump the clock fifteen minutes ahead every time it’s noon or midnight. The ship will not be lit up. The passengers may, if they do their shopping early.

There was another life-boat “drill” this afternoon. Every one was required to stand in front of his canoe and await the arrival of Svengali. When that gent appeared, he called the roll. As soon as you said “Here” or “Present,” your part of the “drill” was over. When the time comes I must do my drifting under an alias, as Svengali insists on designating me as Monsieur Gardnierre. But No. 12 is at least honored with two second-class ladies. Many a poor devil on the ship is assigned to a life-boat that is strictly stag.

The Gentleman from Louisiana to-day sprang this one:

“You know when I part my hair in the middle I look just like a girl. Well, sir, during the Mardi Gras, two years ago, I put on a page’s costume and parted my hair in the middle. And you know girls under a certain age must go home at nine o’clock in the evening. Well, sir, a policeman accosted me and told me I had to go home. I gave him the bawling out of his life. And maybe you think he wasn’t surprised!”

Maybe I do think so.

The Gentleman strayed to the subject of Patti and wound up with a vocal imitation of that lady. He stopped suddenly when his voice parted in the middle.

We have seen no periscopes, but when I opened my suit-case this morning I met face to face one of those birds that are house pets with inmates of seven-room flats at twenty-five dollars per month. I missed fire with a clothes brush, and before I could aim again he had submerged under a vest. Looks as if the little fellow were destined to go with me to Paris, but when I get him there I’ll get him good.

Thursday, August 16.

Great excitement last night when a small unlighted boat was sighted half a mile or so off our port. Our gunners, who are said to receive a bonus for every effective shot, had the range all figured out when the pesky thing gave us a signal of friendship. It may have been part of the entertainment.

To-day we persuaded the Gentleman from Louisiana to part his hair in the middle. The New Orleans policeman is not guilty.

It develops that while first- and second-class passengers were unable to read or smoke after dark, the third-class fumoir is running wide open and the Greeks have their cigarettes, libations and card games, while the idle rich bore one another to death with conversation.

Un Américain aboard is now boasting of the world’s championship as a load carrier. It was too much trouble for him to pay Auguste for each beverage as it was served, so he ran a two days’ charge account. His bill was one hundred and seventy-eight francs, or thirty-five dollars and sixty cents.

“Who got all the drinks?” he asked Auguste.

“You, monsieur,” that gent replied.

“And what do you charge for a highball?”

“One franc, monsieur,” said Auguste.

Which means, if Auguste is to be believed, that one hundred and seventy-eight highballs went down one throat in two days. And the owner of the throat is still alive and well. Also, he says he will hereafter pay as you enter.

As an appetizer for dinner to-night the captain told everybody to remain on deck, fully dressed and armed with a life-belt, this evening, until he gave permission to retire.

We’re all on deck, and in another minute it will be too dark to write.

To-morrow night, Boche willing, we will be out of the jurisdiction of this Imp of Darkness.

II
I GET TO PARIS AND ENCOUNTER SOME STRANGE SIGHTS

Friday, August 17. A French Port.

In obedience to the captain’s orders we remained on deck last night, fully dressed, till our ship was past the danger zone and in harbor. There was a rule against smoking or lighting matches, but none against conversation.

The Gentleman from Louisiana and a young American Field Service candidate had the floor. The former’s best was a report of what he saw once while riding along beside the Columbia River. An enormous salmon jumped out of the water and raced six miles with the train before being worn out. Whether the piscatorial athlete flew or rode a motorcycle, we were unable to learn.

The Gentleman from Louisiana yielded to his younger and stronger countryman. Some one had spoken of the lack of convoy. “Don’t you think we haven’t a convoy,” the kid remarked.

I scanned the sea in all directions and saw nothing but the dark waters. “Where is it?” I inquired.

“There’s one on each side of us,” said Young America. “They’re about twenty miles from the ship.”

“I should think,” said somebody, “that a very slender submarine might slip in between our side kicks and us and do its regular job.”

“No chance,” the youth replied. “The convoy boats are used as decoys. The sub would see them first and spend all its ammunition.”

A little later he confided in me that the new American war-ships were two hundred and forty-five thousand horsepower. I had no idea there were that many horses left to measure by.

We spotted a shooting star. “That was a big one,” I said.

“Big! Do you know the actual size of those things? I got it straight from a professor of astronomy. Listen. They’re as small as a grain of sand.”

“Why do they look so big?”

“Because they’re so far away and they travel so fast.”

Round ten o’clock, beckoning lights ashore told us we were close to safety. But the French gunners remained at their posts two hours longer. The captain’s shouted order, relieving them from duty, was music to our ears.

After midnight, however, we turned a complete circle, and at once the deck was alive with rumors. We had been hit, we were going to be hit, we were afraid we would be hit, and so on. The fact was that our pilot from ashore was behind time and we circled round rather than stand still and be an easy target while awaiting him. We were in harbor and anchored at three. Many of us stayed up to see the sun rise over France. It was worth the sleep it cost.

They told us we would not dock until six to-night. Before retiring to my cabin for a nap, I heard we had run over a submarine and also that we had not. The latter story lacked heart interest, but had the merit, probably, of truth. Submarines have little regard for traffic laws, but are careful not to stall their engines in the middle of a boulevard.

I was peacefully asleep when the French officers came aboard to give us and our passports the Double O. They had to send to my cabin for me. I was ordered to appear at once in the salon de conversation. A barber hater addressed me through his beard and his interpreter: “What is Monsieur Laudanum’s business in France?”

I told him I was a correspondent.

“For who?”

“Mark Sullivan.”

“Have you credentials from him?”

“No, sir.”

“Your passport says you are going to Belgium. Do you know there are no trains to Belgium?”

“I know nothing about it.”

“Well, there are no trains. How will you go there?”

“I’ll try to get a taxi,” I said.

“Are you going from here to Paris?”

“Yes.”

“And where are you going from Paris?”

“I don’t know.”

“Please explain that answer.”

“I will go wherever the authorities permit me to go.”

“That is not a satisfactory answer.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What is your real business in France?”

“To write.”

“I’m afraid we’ll have to keep your passport. You will appear to-morrow morning at nine o’clock at this address.”

And they handed me a scary-looking card.

On the deck I met our congressman and told him my troubles.

“I know these fellows very well,” he said. “If you like, I can fix it for you.”

“No,” I replied proudly. “I’d rather do my own fixing.”

At the dock I got into a taxi and asked to be taken to the —— Hotel. Not to my dying day will I forget that first ride in a French taxi. Part of the time we were on the right side of the street, part of the time on the left, and never once were we traveling under a hundred and fifty miles an hour. We turned twenty corners and always on one ear. We grazed dozens of frightened pedestrians, many of them men crippled in the war, or by taxis, and women too old to dodge quickly. We aimed at a score of rickety horse-drawn vehicles, but our control was bad and we bumped only one. In front of the hostelry we stopped with a jerk.

“Comme beaucoup?” I asked the assassin.

“Un franc cinquante,” he said.

Only thirty cents, and I thought I knew why. When they get through a trip without killing any one, they feel they have not done themselves justice nor given you a square deal.

I found myself a seat at a sidewalk table and ordered sustenance. The vial they brought it in was labeled “Bière Ritten,” but I suspect the adjective was misspelled.

Till darkness fell I watched the passing show—street-cars with lady motormen and conductors; hundreds of old carts driven by old women, each cart acting as a traveling roof for an old dog; wounded soldiers walking or hobbling along, some of them accompanied by sad-faced girls; an appalling number of women in black; a lesser number of gayly garbed and extremely cordial ones, and whole flocks of mad taxis, seeking whom they might devour.

By using great caution at the street crossings, I succeeded in reaching the telegraph office where I wrote a message informing Paris friends of my arrival. I presented it to the lady in the cage, who handed it back with the advice that it must be rewritten in French. I turned away discouraged and was starting out again into the gloom when I beheld at a desk the songbird of the ship. Would she be kind enough to do my translating? She would.

The clerk approved the new document, and asked for my passport. I told her it had been taken away. She was deeply grieved, then, but without it monsieur could send no message. Bonne nuit!

Back at the hotel I encountered the Yankee vice-consul, a gentleman from Bedford, Indiana. I told him my sad plight, and he said if matters got too serious his office would undertake to help.

With his assurances to comfort me, I have retired to my room to write, to my room as big as Texas and furnished with all the modern inconveniences.

Saturday, August 18. Paris.

It is Saturday night and they have hot water, but before I take advantage of it I must recount the thrilling experiences of the day.

After a sidewalk breakfast of “oofs” and so-called café in Bordeaux, I went to keep my engagement at court. It was apparent that I was not the only suspect. The walk outside and the room within were crowded with shipmates, most of them from the second cabin, all looking scared to death.

I stood in line till I realized that I must make it snappy if I wanted to catch the eleven-five for Paris; then I butted my way into the august presence of Him of the Beard.

He recognized me at once and told me with his hands to go up-stairs. In a room above I found the English-speaking cross-examiner, with the accent on the cross.

He waved me to a chair and began his offensive.

“Monsieur Laudanum,” he said, “when I asked you yesterday how you expected to get to Belgium, you said something about a taxi. That answer was not satisfactory. You have not explained anything to us. I do not believe we can allow you to leave Bordeaux.”

“All right, sir.” I arose.

“Sit down!” he barked. “Now tell me if you have any explanations to make.”

“Nothing beyond what I said yesterday. I have come here to write. I want to go to Paris, and when I arrive there I will find out where else I will be permitted to go.”

“It seems very strange to me that you have no papers.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Have you any?”

I searched my pockets and produced a used-up check book on a Chicago bank. The ogre read every little stub and I felt flattered by his absorbed interest. When he had spent some five minutes on the last one, which recorded a certain painful transaction between me and a man-eating garage, he returned my book and said: “You don’t satisfy me at all. You will have to stay here.”

“Suppose,” said I, “that the American consul vouches for me.”

“That will make no difference. You do not seem to realize that we are at war.”

“Not with America.”

“I don’t know your nationality.”

“I thought,” said I, “that my passport hinted at it.”

“You will have to stay in Bordeaux,” was his pertinent reply.

“Thank you, sir,” I said, and arose again.

“Sit down,” said he, “and wait a minute.”

He was out of the room five years.

“If he ever does come back,” I thought, “it will be in the company of five or six large gendarmes.”

But when he came back he came alone.

“Here,” he said abruptly, “is your passport. You will be permitted to go to Paris. We will keep track of you there.” And he bowed me out of the joint.

The crowd down-stairs seemed as great as ever, and as scared. I picked my way through it with my head held high, a free man.

I decided on a fiacre for my trip from hotel to station. It would be safer, I thought. But I learned, on our interminable way, that defensive fighting in the streets of Bordeaux is far more terrifying, far more dangerous than the aggressive taxi kind. We were run into twice and just missed more times than I could count, and besides my conveyance was always on the verge of a nervous breakdown. ’Spite all the talk of periscopes and subs, the journey across the ocean was parlor croquet compared to my fiacre ride in Bordeaux.

While awaiting my turn at the ticket window I observed at the gate a French soldier wearing a large businesslike bayonet. “Probably to punch tickets with,” I thought, but was mistaken. Another gentleman attended to that duty, and the soldier did not give me so much as the honor of a glance.

Outside on the platform were a few of the Red Cross and Y. M. C. A. men of our ship, and I learned from them that one of their number had suffered a sadder fate than I. He had tried to get by on a Holland passport, viséed at the French consulate in New York, and been quietly but firmly persuaded to take the next boat back home.

I shared a compartment on the train with a native of the Bronx, and a French lady who just couldn’t make her eyes behave, and two bored-looking French gentlemen of past middle age, not to mention in detail much more baggage than there was room for. The lady and the two gentlemen wore gloves, which made the Bronxite and me feel very bourgeois.

Our train crew, with the possible exception of the engineer and fireman whom I didn’t see, was female, and, thinking I might some time require the services of the porter, I looked in my dictionary for the feminine of George.

To try my knowledge of française, I had purchased at the station a copy of Le Cri de Paris. I found that I could read it very easily by consulting the dictionary every time I came to a word.

But the scenery and the people were more interesting than Le Cri, the former especially. Perfect automobile roads, lined with trees; fields, and truck gardens in which aged men and women, young girls and little boys were at work; green hills and valleys; winding rivers and brooks, and an occasional château or a town of fascinating architecture—these helped to make us forget the heat and dust of the trip and the ear-splitting shrieks of our engines. No wonder the boche coveted his neighbor’s house.

We stopped for some time at one particularly beautiful town and went out for air. I wondered audibly concerning the name of the place. An American companion looked at the signs round the station.

“It’s Sortie,” he said.

But it wasn’t. It was Angoulême, and I wouldn’t mind moving thither. My American friend was probably from Exit, Michigan.

The discovery was made and reported that one might go into the dining-car and smoke as much as one liked without asking permission from the maiden with the dreamy eyes. This car was filled with French soldiers and officers going back to the front after their holiday. There seemed to be as many different uniforms as there were men, and the scenery indoors was almost as brilliant as that outside.

It was about eight-thirty in the evening when we reached Paris. The sophisticated soldiers engaged their “redcaps” before they left the train, calling to them through the open windows. The demand was much greater than the supply, and I was among the unfortunates who had to carry their own baggage. I staggered to a street where a whole flotilla of taxis was anchored, but when I asked for one the person in charge said “No, no, no, no, no,” meaning “No,” and pointed around the corner. I followed his directions and landed on a boulevard along which there was a steady procession of machines, but it was fully twenty minutes before one came that was going slow enough to stop.

Our city is not all lit up like a church these nights, and it was impossible to see much of what we passed on the way to the hotel.

At the desk an English clerk, dressed for a noon wedding, gave me a blank to fill out. All the blank wanted to know was my past family history. It is to be sent, said the clerk, to the prefect of police. I had no idea he was interested in me.

Sunday, August 19. Paris.

When I get back to Chicago I shall insist that my favorite restaurant place tables out on the walk. It is more hygienic and much more interesting.

But Chicago, I’m afraid, can’t provide half as much sidewalk entertainment as Paris. As I remember the metropolis of Illinois, there is a sad lack there of demonstrative affection on the streets. In fact, I fear that a lady and gentleman who kissed each other repeatedly at the corner of Madison and Dearborn would be given a free ride to Central Station and a few days in which to cool off. Such an osculatory duel on Paris’s Grand Boulevard—also known by a dozen other names—goes practically unnoticed except by us Illinois hicks.

Only a few were thoughtless enough not to stop and kiss a few times in full view of our table

An American officer and I—at the former’s expense—lunched sur curb to-day. The food was nothing to boast about, but we got an eyeful of scenery. Soldiers—French, British and American—strolled by constantly, accompanied by more or less beautiful brunettes, and only a few were thoughtless enough not to stop and kiss a few times in full view of our table. We also observed the inmates of passing taxis. No matter how wide the back seat, the lady occupant invariably sat on her escort’s lap. A five-passenger car in America is a ten-passenger car in Paris, provided the chauffeur has a girl of his own.

When the American officer was tired of buying, I left him and sought out the Chicago Tribune office, conveniently located above Maxim’s. The editor was there, but he was also broke, so I went back to the Ritz and got ready for bed.

The express office will be open to-morrow and I will be a rich man.

Lundi, 20 Août. Paris.

Went down to the express office and cashed a large part of my order. Friends were with me, and they immediately relieved me of most of the burden. I was hungry for lunch, having had no breakfast. Meat was what I wanted, and meat was what I couldn’t get. Which led me to inquire into the Rules de la vie of Paris.

1. Monday and Tuesday are meatless days.

2. All except Saturday and Sunday are heatless days. Hot baths are impossible on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.

3. Strong liquor is procurable between noon and two P. M. and seven-thirty and nine-thirty at night. At other times ye toper must be content with light wines.

4. All public places except the theaters must close and douse lights at nine-thirty in the evening.

5. There is no speed limit for taxis or privately owned cars. A pedestrian run over and killed is liable to imprisonment. The driver is not only innocent, but free to hurl as many French curses as he likes at his victims. If the pedestrian is not killed, he must explain why not to the judge.

6. It is not only permissible but compulsory to speak to any girl who speaks to you, and a girl who won’t speak to you should be reported to the police.

7. No watch or clock is wrong. Whatever time you have is right and you may act accordingly.

8. Matches never ignite. A smoker must purchase a cigar or cigarette lighter and keep it filled with essence, the française term for gas. Sometimes the lighters work.

9. American cigarettes are not procurable. Bum ones may be bought at any tabac store or café for only five times what they are worth.

10. Water must never be used as a thirst quencher, and seldom for any other purpose. It’s worse than bourgeois; it’s unheard-of.

The lack of water, hot or cold, drove me to a barber shop this morning. The barber first made me put on a shroud, and I was afraid he was either going to cut me to pieces or talk me to death. But his operation was absolutely painless and his incessant conversation harmless, because I couldn’t understand a word of it.

From the barber shop I went to the information department of American Army Headquarters. That’s where you get permits to visit our camps. But of course, if you’ve run over here from America, you have lots of spare time on your hands, so they’re doing you a favor if they hold you up a few days. What is a week or so when a man’s here for a whole month?

They have queer ideas at the Maison de la Presse, which is the French equivalent for our publicity bureau. They receive you cordially there and treat you just as if you were not dregs.

I jumped thither after a futile visit to our own headquarters. I said I would like to go to the French front.

“Certainly,” replied the man in charge. “Whenever is convenient for you, we’ll see that you get a trip.”

So I told him when it would be convenient and he’s going to see me through. I hear that the British are similarly peculiar. They are polite even to newspaper men and magazine writers. They might even speak to a cartoonist.

Returning to our side of the Seine, I bumped into some Australians, here on leave. One had been in Germany before the war and could speak and understand the “schoenste language.”

“They use me as an interpreter,” he said. “When they bring in a bloody boche prisoner, I talk to him. First we give him a real meal, maybe bacon and eggs and coffee, something he hasn’t seen for months. Then I ask him where he came from and how he got here. Most of them are glad to tell me the truth. Those that do, I mark them down as ‘Very intelligent.’ Those that volunteer information I record as ‘Extremely intelligent.’ Those that say ‘Nicht verstehe’ go down in the record as ‘Not intelligent.’ But the majority are so bloody well glad to be out of the war that they talk freely.

“I asked one Heinie if he was going to try to escape. ‘Not me,’ he said, ‘I’m tickled to be here.’ They’re all fed up on the war. You’d be too with three years of it.”

This young man admitted that he was one of the best football players in Australia. “Maybe I’ve forgotten how now,” he said. “I’ve been over here three years. Just think of it—I traveled twelve thousand miles, or maybe it’s kilos, to mix up in this.”

Baseball, he told me, had taken a strong hold on Australia.

“I don’t hit well,” he said, “but I can catch what you call flies! I can catch the widest flies that are knocked.”

Which gift would probably be useless in America, where most of the flies knocked are bloody narrow.

Before I left him I learned also that Les Darcy was all right at heart, but that the professional “sports” spoiled him, and that he could have “knocked Jack Johnson, Stanley Ketchel, Billy Papke or Jess Willard clean out of the ring.”

He is going back to the trenches to-night, and I hope there are plenty of extremely intelligent Heinies there to keep him busy interpreting till his next leave. Interpreting, I should think, would be much pleasanter than going over the top.

Tuesday, August 21.

This time it was an American of the French Ambulance Service.

“Say, listen,” he said. “I can give you some mighty good stories. Real stuff, do you get me? Listen: One night there was a boche wounded out there and I brought him in. He had one leg all shot to pieces and we had to operate. I was going to give him the ether when he turned over and looked me in the face. ‘Why, Dan,’ he said, ‘aren’t you going to speak to me?’ It was a chap I’d gone to school with in America. I could give you lots of stuff like that; do you get me? I used to be in New York, and Rube Goldberg used to call me up out of bed at six in the morning. ‘Dan,’ he’d say to me, ‘I’m up against it for an idea. Will you give me an idea?’ Do you get me? And there’s a dramatic critic in New York—I won’t tell you his name—but he used to tag around me after a first night and ask me what I thought of the show. Do you get me? I can give you a lot of good stuff.”

I told him I was afraid that if he gave it to me all at once I wouldn’t remember any of it. So he is coming to my hotel every day during his leave, to give me a little at a time—if he can find me.

Last night a good-hearted American officer took me to dinner at La Tour d’Argent, which is said to be the oldest restaurant in Paris and which, they say, is the place the Kaiser was going to have his banquet on a certain night three years ago if Gott hadn’t gone back on him at the last moment.

We ordered duck, the restaurant’s specialty. They cook it in your presence, slice off whatever is sliceable, and then put the bird in a press and give you the result as gravy. After the meal they hand you a post card on which is inscribed le numéro de votre canard. I looked up “canard” in my dictionary and found that it meant a drake, or false news, or a worthless newspaper. I have heard lots of false news, but I know no one took the trouble to count the items. Also I know that my newspaper is neither worthless nor numbered. So canard in this case must mean drake. The number of mine was 41654. If he had happened to disagree with me, I could have taken his number and traced him to the source. It’s a very good idea and might be used in America on eggs or drinks.

I made another trip to the office which is supposed to be in charge of American correspondents and accommodations for them. I will go there again to-morrow and again the next day. I will bother them to death. Meantime I have applied to a person in London for permission to go to the British front, and have been assured a visit to the French lines late next week. I have wonderful vision and can see things twelve miles away.

P. S. It was revealed to me to-night that my detention and trial in Bordeaux was a frame-up conceived by loving friends aboard ship and carried out by that English-speaking cross-examiner, who, believe me, is a convincing actor.

Thanks, gents. It was good for about two thousand words.

III
I TRY TO GET TO THE AMERICAN CAMP—BUT MEET DISASTER

Wednesday, August 22. Paris.

The gentlemen authorized to issue visitors’ passes to the American camp and the various fronts don’t seem to realize that a person may be in a hurry. They fail to appreciate the facts that hanging round Paris is financial ruin and that the world series, which one positively must attend, is drawing nearer every hour.

Permission to go to the British front was requested over a week ago. No reply. Daily calls at our own press bureau produce nothing but promises of a trip somewhere, some time. Monsieur Boss of the French Maison de la Presse says I may be taken through the devastated territory—in a week or so.

Meanwhile the Battle of Paris goes on, with Death always staring one in the face—Death from taxis, from starvation, from water thirst, from hand-to-hand encounters with the language.

Death from a taxi is the most likely form and the most distressing, for under the Parisian law the person run down and killed is the one at fault and the corpus delicti is liable to life imprisonment or worse. A pedestrian has no more rights here than the Kaiser, and it’s almost impossible to cross the street unless you’ve gone through a course of intensive training in Detroit.

There would be little danger if all the crossings were on the upgrade, for the French cars—those which aren’t in the military service—have a desperate time climbing. They have to shift speeds even to run up on the sidewalk, which is one of their favorite sports. But the Loop District of Paris is topographically on the level, and taxis can tear along like an eastbound Russian.

On occasions when you are run into and knocked down a gendarme appears on the scene with pencil and note-book. He takes the name and address of the driver and escorts you to jail. If you die there, the driver is sent a medal for marksmanship.

Taxi fares are cheaper, probably, than anywhere else in the world. They amount to practically nothing if you have an accident—that is, a trip without a collision with something or somebody. But even if you enjoy an average tour and hit a building or another vehicle or a dog or a person, they soak you only about half as much as they would in New York or Chicago, where there are far fewer thrills per drive.

The tariff from the hotel where I put up (I haven’t found out how much) to American General Headquarters, where I go every morning to be refused a pass to the camps, is one franc cinquante if you miss all targets. This forenoon it was two francs cinquante because we knocked the rear wheel off a young boy’s bicycle.

The boy, after a hearty bawling out by the driver and two gendarmes, was carted to a police station. They’ll hardly keep him in jail, though. Matteawan is the proper place for a boy who attempts bicycling on the streets of Paris.

A pedestrian has no more rights here than the Kaiser, and it’s almost impossible to cross the street unless you’ve gone through a course of intensive training in Detroit

Thursday, August 23. Paris.

One of several differences between an American and a Frenchman is that an American tries to understand a Frenchman’s English and a Frenchman tries not to understand an American’s French.

To-day I wanted to go from somewhere to the Hotel Continental.

“Hotel Con-tin-ent-al,” I said to the driver.

He shook his head. I repeated. He shook his head again. This went on till I had pronounced the name five times and he had shaken his head that often. I said it the sixth time just as I had said it the other five.

“Oh-h-h!” shouted the driver, his face lighting up. “Hotel Con-tin-ent-al!”

And there wasn’t a particle of difference between his version and mine.

There was excitement in our village last night. At twenty-three-thirty o’clock, as we Parisians say, began a chorus of screaming sirens, the warning signal of an air raid. Those of us living in up-stairs rooms experienced a sudden craving for a home Somewhere in the Basement, and in gratifying it didn’t stop to use the elevator. The majority taking part in the Great Descent wore pajamas or their female relatives, sometimes called chemises de nuit. A few, of which I was one, were still attired for the day, and we went outdoors and looked up.

A regular flock of planes was, you might say, planely visible, but there was no fight in the air and no dropping of bombs on our fair city. The birdmen soared round a while in a perfectly friendly manner and then retired to their nests. The sirens were stilled and we all went up-stairs, the majority, mentioned above, grateful for the war-time lack of lights.

It seems that a Frenchman, returning from his day’s toil, forgot to flash his password, which is a red tail-light, or something. And the patrol took him for a boche and gave chase. Fortunately for himself, he glimpsed his pursuers in time and turned on the required signal.

To-day there has been a big demand for first-floor rooms.

Friday, August 24. Paris.

An American major—it is interdict by the censor to mention the names of any officers save General Sibert and General Pershing—asked a friend in London to buy him an automobile and ship it here for his use. The Londoner was able, after much difficulty, to purchase one of those things that grow so rapidly in Detroit. He packed it up and mailed it to Le Havre. From there it had to be driven to Paris.

The major had never learned to drive this particular brand. In fact, his proportions are such that not even a shoehorn could coax him into the helmsman’s seat. He asked me to go up and get it for him. I declined on grounds of neutrality. That was a week ago.

Well, yesterday one Mr. Kiley, who has been over here some time in the ambulance service, came back to town with the car and four flat tires, which, evidently, were far past the draft age when the sale was made in London. Mr. Kiley helped himself to a stimulant and then told me about his trip.

He reached Le Havre last Saturday afternoon. He had in his pockets no papers except an order for the car. He had been in Le Havre about two minutes when a gentleman attacked him from behind with a tap on the shoulder. The gentleman pulled back his coat lapel and flashed a star bearing the insignia of the British Intelligence Department. He was curious as to Mr. Kiley’s name and business. Mr. Kiley told him. Then he wanted to see Mr. Kiley’s papers. Mr. Kiley showed him the order for the car.

“I’m afraid that won’t do,” said the officer. “I’d advise you to leave town.”

“Give me just an hour,” pleaded Mr. Kiley, “just time enough to get the car and get out.”

“All right,” said the officer, “and be sure it’s only an hour.”

Mr. Kiley hastened to where the car was reposing, displayed the order, and started joyously to wind her up. He cranked and he cranked and he cranked. Nothing doing. He gave her a push downhill and tried to throw her into speed. Nothing doing. It occurred to him that something must be the matter. A thorough examination resulted in a correct diagnosis. There was no gas.

Next to getting a drink of ice-water in Paris, the hardest job for a stranger is buying gasoline in any French town. Mr. Kiley was turned down five times before eighteen o’clock, when all the garages closed for the day.

He registered at a hotel and went into the café for dinner. He was just picking up the carte du jour when his friend, the officer, horned in.

“Mr. Kiley,” says this guy, “you have been in town more than an hour.”

“Yes, sir,” said Mr. Kiley. “But I’ve had trouble. I found my car, but I can’t run it because there’s no essence.”

“I think you’d better leave town,” said the officer.