CEREMONIES IN PARIS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16283, 17 July 1916, Page 6

CEREMONIES IN PARIS.

HONOURS FOR THE FALLEN.

PRESIDENT AND TROOPS.

VERDUN'S EPIC GRANDEUR.

BRITISH ARMY'S TRIBUTE.

Aust. and N.Z. Cable.

PARIS, July 14.

The boulevards were thronged with people celebrating the National Fete to-day. The public monuments were decorated with flowers. French, English, Canadian, Indian, and Australian troops paraded at the Invalides, where there was a strange medley of martial music when the Belgian trumpets were sounded together with the bagpipes and the melodious music of Russian military bands.

President Poincarc reviewed a large body of troops before the Petit Palais. Soul-stirring scenes were witnessed when the President handed certificates showing the nation's appreciation to the relatives of 500 of the fallen. As each name was called out there was a momentary silence, and then an officer solemnly announced, " He has died for his country." A procession marched through the Champs Elysees, the Rue Royale, and the Grand Boulevard, and dispersed at the Place de la Republique. British troops taking part were warmly cheered, and women threw flowers to the Anzacs. Enemy's Illusions Fading. President Poincare stirringly addressed the troops. "You know," he said, " how during interminable weeks, under concentrated artillery fire, and heedless of rain, our battalions have defended Verdun. Their endurance and stoicism has facilitated elsewhere the combined operations of the allies. It is a spectacle whose epic grandeur surpasses anything yet known to humanity. Verdun is now little more than a heap of ruins, but over the blackened stones of your houses the German army sees from afar France's victory. "Our enemies will not long retain their illusions regarding the possibility of placing the allies at their mercy, and of drawing from their weariness a peace that may enable militarism to mask the preparations for a fresh aggressive. We should not weaken if we were fighting for honour alone, but we are also fighting for life and conscience. The nations of Europe are face to face with a poignant problem, but a free democracy will not submit to an existence which means simply vegetating in the stifling and unhealthy shadow of a German Empire strong enough to spread over the whole of Europe a heavy hegemony." Cordiality Between Allies. Sir Douglas Haig sent tfce following message to the President:"We are participating with the valiant French in a struggle which has now become desperate. The British Army expresses its admiration of the results which the French have obtained, and its unfaltering confidence in the prompt realisation of our common aims."

President Poincare replied : 'Please convey to the gallant British my keen admiration of tho splendid successes they have so brilliantly developed. They have echoed a reply from all French hearts. Your troops in Paris to-day received a thrilling evidence of the public feeling."