LAST HONOURS.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 8 January 1931, Page 5

LAST HONOURS.

JFRANCE MOURNS HER HERO. JEtXFB DE RIVOLI PACKED BY SILENT, STILL CROWD. JOFFRE IS HOME TO BE LEFT AS MUSEUM TO THE, NATION. /By Telegraph—Press Assn.-Copyright.) (Received This Day, 9.30 a.m.) PARIS, Jan. 7. Before daylight mourners commenced to line the route of Marshal Joffre s .funeral, between Notre Dame and Les Invalides. The Marshal’s flag was •dropped on the coffin, w-hieh lay on a. high black pedestal in the centre of the magnificent nave, decorated with black and silver and the French and Allied flags. ' Cardinal Verdiee read the absolu--tion, aud the coffin was lowered from the pedestal to an accompaniment of bugles'and carried to the gun-carriage, to which 1 sis black horses were harnessed. Brilliantly uniformed French .■and Allied soldiers and ex-soldiers formed the advance guard of the procession. Then came red-robed cardinals, Jthe 3>urple-clad bishop, Joffre’s bay charter, and the gun-carriage, escorted by .a company of infantry on either side. It was an impressive spectacle as the long cortege traversed the Rue de IPivoli, ordinarily noisy and hustling, ibut now packed with a silent, motionThe coffin was placed in the chapel •of the Hotel des Invalides until the time for its .burial in the Garden at Louvecinnes, .overlooking the capital -which Joffre saved from capture in .1914. , Madame Joffre said that the 'sole -object df her life now would be to •collect 411 of her husband’s military belongings and souvenirs and assemble them in her Louvescinnes home, which will be converted into a Joffre annseum and be left to the nation.