THE FRENCH AT BAY

Greymouth Evening Star, 25 September 1917, Page 6

THE FRENCH AT BAY

CUAii'WIE iSAijUAxVIi Li-rOiiT. THE WAR-HARDENED BOILIS. (special Representative Sydney Sun.) i'leneli JtiudUquai'leiS. June 1. To rca-use wlia-t wax' means to aiu outraged nation you mu&t come heiu 'xno rrencU iiavu been Uuough -at- i gum Limes that they throb m uin.v.',t lo events at Hie fronts, lliey ieei tlij war as- a very intimate thing. It i* in then- house, it is among their children, it is something sacred and awful, close to their skins. You hear the guns even in their cities, and sea tlie war passion on their faces everywhere. They feel it too strongly to talk much about it.

Paris has become dull. Hotels are war offices, and the color ill tlio streets is that of soldiers on leave. Some theatres struggle to keep open, but the men playing high jinks there are British, Australian, and Belgian —always very many Belgian—from the front. The newspapers are single sheets giving war news and political notes.. Food, gas, paper, aliid fuel arescarce and dear. To ride in a taxi you must first scour Hie streets to find one, and then submit to highway robbery. The output of war work is enormous.

Some cities nearer the front are deserted. Others bear marks of bombardments, and every second shop is closed. Naval guns have long range, and German aeroplanes travel far. Throughout Northern France the British seem to control railways, road::, and towns. Every station is thronged with good, sound, British soldiery, and in every trait) khaki fills the corridors and compartments. The civilian will not move outside any city he may innocently lodge in, until he has been bounced betweeto military and police offices! for hours and" been duly stamped. The spy hunt is rigorous and efficient. The notice on walls, trams, and railways becomes burnt on the brain. TAISEZ YOUS!!! MEFIEZ VOUSm LES OMELLES ENNEMIES VOUS ECOUTENT! Outside the cities, the fields are still tilled to their utmost yard, with the wonderful economy of French peasant agriculture, and throughout the industrial provinces you see the munition factories absorbing swarms of blue-coated French artisans and blue-frocked French munitioners. STRIKES AND POLITICIANS. Thi s is a nation making its utmost effort. Nearly one-sixth of the population has 1 been mobilised for the firing line?! and for male work immediately behind them. Boys of 18 have been put into rich field-blue, and fill the garrison towns, the last hope of a nation. These French children must be the best thing that even old France has turned out, so lively in intelligence, chivalrous in spirit, and grace-

ful in form they seem. But do not ivaste sympathy upon them. They would scorn the hope of a foreigner that the war should end now, and they be spared their fate. A shrewd and experienced observer of the French said to me that their only trouble was their politicians. But a nation gets the politicians it deserves, and it is truer to say that France's trouble is that before the war changed her fibre she elected "i Parliament that ban failed to be steadfast. It is admitted that another election now would change this body. Its hundreds "of - members flounder obstinately in the intricacies! of war government, and move from Ministry to Ministry, never satisfied to see a strong man rule. Intrigues already shake the veteran Ribot.

The* peace party in the Chamber of Deputies is negligible, though the minority Socialists have become the majority in that section and threaten trouble! But the parties led by ambitious men are many, and every Government must balance between them, taking this man and that into office, doing this and that with the army to please this or that group, telling every secret to the Chamber in ''secret session," and bowing constantly to the "sovereignty of the people's representatives." Jt is good democracy, but it is not war.

The result is weak Government, expressed in food profiteering, shortage of necessities fumbling with financial problems;, and interference with the army commands. But much of this is truly French. The French people are essentially spiritual, paying much attention to the aesthetic things of life, and they cannot be worshippers of soul and beauty and at the same time ruthless and efficient organisers. Moreover, their burdens to-day in the field are such that they hesitate to take drastic political measures which might disunite the nation. They have queer contrasts'. They are intensely patriotic, yet they do not bring out their hoarded gold for the war loans. They are starving for men, their new generation is small in numbers and they cling to the ideal of small families; yet Think of what they did at Verdun.

My strong impression ia that France will go through with this war to the bitter end, without strife at home or any serious grumbling. They

have paid the price of liberty without murmur, though most families are in mourning. 'their sufferings during -winter, even in their cities', are great. In Pan's coal is almost unobtainable. All city dweller.-; during the coming winter will be painfully cold. They .have to stand in queues to get their food, and they work long hour;-. But there is no bitterness in it. Indeed, there is: general exultation. The war possesses, them, for it is their final chance a.sj a nation. WHAT FRANCE MUST HAVE. Every Frenchman knows that if Prussia beats the Allies, France at once will become a second-rate nation, and in time will sink in culture, riches l and power. She has allowed \iuv crop of men to get far too short to hope to stand up again in another war. She hu s failed to breed in Uie past, not through sterility, but through the tenacious ideal of French parents to lavish attention upon a perfect upbringing for a few. J find a pessimism even amongst her best friends in Paris, concerning her families of the future. They doubt whe-. ther French parents will accept the burdens, of large families. Put at least 'France would get, its chance again, if she had Alsace-Lorraine back in the fold and inherited from her young armies new vigor and new views l .

These armies promise great things. They are war-beaten and long for home. Put they do not contemplate a return without victory. Their offensives to-day are asi vigorous as at the beginning, though they do not yield encouraging results. Their tenacity is beyond praise. No generals in Kurope are better supported by their troops than the French. Nothing discourages them, and they have inherited martial spirit that makes! all the mechanism of an army seem natural. A French sentry stands to attention, however young he may be, as though he had stood beside the same box in Napoleon's day. A French Rifleman .marches in the natural rolling way of Napoleon'smen, a born soldier from his toes to his brain. A French general inherits his men'si strong respect for army leadership, bred through generations) of hard wars.