HONOUR FROM FRANCE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18454, 16 January 1922, Page 6

HONOUR FROM FRANCE

MR RUDYARD KIPLING AT THE SORBONNE. TWIN FORTRESSES OF EUROPEAN CIVILISATION, (From Ova Own Coebespomdeht.) LONDON,- November 30. Intellectual France accorded a wonderful reception to Mr Rudyard Kipling and Sir Jamea Frazer at the Sorbonne when the 'University of Paris conferred upon them the degrees of Doctor. The French President was in the chair, accompanied by the Minister of public Instruction, Mons. Leon Berard, Grand Master of the University of Paris. The rector, Mons. Paul Appell, was on the platform. The l 'band of the Garde Republicaine played the “Marseillaise,” followed by “ God Save, the King ” as the President of the Republic and the other distinguished guests arrived Presenting. Sir J. Frazer, Professor Delacroix (Faculty of Letters) announced that ho had covered the whole field of classical ethnolbgy, folklore, mythology, arch ecology, and philosophy, and he went on to speak of “ the illustrious work, the immense knowledge, and the extraordinary erudition ” of the author of the “ Golden Bough,” in which ho hod “ gathered and grouped an astounding variety of facts, -sketched, origins of the human mind and social institutions, and awakened’ the murmur of the great mythic forest.” _' In reply, Sir James, who spoke in French, expressed, his thanks for the honour conferred on him Mons. Lcgouis, Professor of the English Language in the Faculty of Letters, then presented Mr Kipling’s* title as a man of letters and a scholar. In the course of an cnthusiostio panegyric, he spoke of Mr Kipling as “having at £5 become celebrated throughout the Anglo-Saxon half of the world and at 35 having conquered the rest of the planet.” Mr Kipling had expressed “the very essence of English genius." During the war his pen became a veritable sword, and he gave to his country his, only son, who fell on the battlefield. _ On'* rising to receive the diploma Mr Kipling had a tremendous ovation that lasted nearly two minutes, the whole audience rising to acclaim him.- He began hisbrief expression of thanks in excellent French, but only to ask the indulgence of the audience] as he did not feel equal to' expressing himself adequately unless He used his mother tongue. He spoke of his debt to French literature 'and then of the catastrophe of thus: “When that catastrophe occurred mankind saw.with what passionate virtue and faith in her men and women France put herself in movement la meet it, with what endurance she supported it, with what hardihood she overcame her 1 triple burdev of butchery, torture, and devastation what inherent reasoni she undertook the ronaration of her inconceivable losses at the* cost of almost {inconceivable 'abour.—(Cheers.) .Those qualities are not born full grown in any nation,, and cannot be produced by sudden pressure of necessity, tumble as it _ may be. They are born ; from a national past, tficy are tempered in the fires of war, but also in the daily fire of a million modest homes. And they are reflected above all, step by step, through generation after generation-, in the literature of the country whose instincts have ’developed them, of the country of which they are the sure defence. It is for this reason that I thank you very humbly but very probably for having even for a moment associated my name with the august succession of frank, joyous, and wise writers who, ever since the Sorbonne introduced the art of printing to France, have upheld, revealed, and glorified the indomitable spirit of your race.” . ,Thero was another outburst. of sustained applause as Mr Kipling sat down] and the ceremony was brought to an end by a few words from Mons. Millerarid, who emphasised the fact that the French Government desired to associate itself with the day’s • manifestation. FOLK TALES AND THEIR VALUE. In the evening there was a banquet given at thei Sorbonne by the OounciJ of the University of Paris and the Association France-Grande Bretagne. The gathering included some two hundred of the bestknown personalities in the world of art, letters, politics, diplomacy, and ' science. Lady Frazer and Mrs Kipling were present. Responding to the toast of a FrancoBritish Alliance and to its Eternal Continuance (proposed bv Mons. Jounart, the French Minister at the Vatican), Mr Kipling submitted the view that the nations of the world betray the essential characteristics and ideals more intimately and more precisely - in the folk tales that they tell to their children than, through any other medium. In public assemblies a man might make use of the lie proper to the occasion, but beside his own hearth, among his own family, he reveals unconsciously the absolute truth concerning all that he desires or fears. Folk tales pi a race never lie. . . Our national fairy tales, reflect the inmost desires of the Briton and the Gaul. In Franco and in England, which together compose the twin fortresses of European civilisation of to-day, our folk tales prefigure our racial temperaments. Every, race betrays itself thus in the tales, it tells its own children. THE WEHRWOLF. “From the earliest ages comes down to us from out of the north, inhabited by tribes of Teuton and Tartar, a mass of legend and story almost literature in itself, which deals with the wehrwolf, a beast that can : t pleasure or for profit change itself into the likeness of man and for {Measure or profit become again a wolf. I confess that when I first read them I was fascinated by the cold tenacy and ruthlessness of wehrwolves as much as I despised the stupidity of their victims. For in those days 1 believed with the rest of the world that such tales came out of the twilight of ; primitive savagery. I did not know then as you and 1 know now that they were the dawn and forecast of modem philosophy, -an absolute evil which has since been made plain in the face, of all mankind. I did not think then as I think now that if our loaders had accepted the folk tales in their children’s story books for guide our world, desolated to-day, would have prepared itself against the wolves before they came down from the North, and would have made sure also that the cycle of suspense, treachery, and torrbr would never repeat itself. “To-day we have not that security; You in France are exposed still to direct ravages of wolves who are men; we in England to the indirect but therefore more dangerous attacks of men who are wolves. Both our nations know this in its heart, because both have suffered, but this knowledge is not yet the basis of our common actions. *’ Why ? I am by your grade Doctor of Letters, but were i Doctor of Medicine I would venture a theory that the very Continuance and pressure of the agony through which mankind is passing have driven many minds to create and invent as a relief for their nerves grandiose, meticulously regulated, but none the lees nebulous (organisations and ceremonials of Utopian administrations in the sincere belief that by virtue of the intensity of thought bestowed upon them these fantasies would achieve the ppace which the world still seeks. RE-ESTABLISHING THE 'FOUNDATIONS OF PEACE, “It is a state of mind which in my calling produces what is known as literature ol escape—that is to say when an artist recoiling from the harsh face of life as it is, takes refuge in depicting life that never was. But I hold that precisely aa this mood passes from the so also will it pass away from the- nations] In

England at the present moment situations and opinions are controlled by those who not having foreseen the war are perhaps less capable of complete peaces But behind them are men who stand upon the threshold of the councils of the nation whose education to that end was commenced seven years ago by the side of your own sons. These men desire for the future above all that elementary ' justice and reasoned safety against the wolves from the north for which they gave themselves in the past on the held of battle. Remember the association of France ' and England. There was no easy and unbroken progress, towards overwhelming triumph. Suoh. dreams exist only in (ho minds of races who have always exploited but never begotten civilisation. With us it was otherwise. There waa no anxiety, no humiliation no compromise, no defeat, no catastrophe, and no splendour of recovery_ which, the sons of France and England did not experience together from the first to the last days of the Gehenna, through which they came. “ For 30 generations France and England in secular, but fruitful, conflict have engendered and sustained civilisation which has been attacked by an immense and highly organised barbarism. It is threatened now not only by a recrudescence of that barbarism, impenitent and energetic as oyer, but by. a world-weakening reaction that has overtaken us after our prodigious battle. For that w© who know each other must make allowance. On© cannot resume a broken world as easily as one can resume a broken sentence. But before long our sons who have spent themselves in suffering and toiling td abolish the menace of barbarism will recover also froml the menace of moral lassitude, and will re-establish the foundations of the peace of the- world' not on pious dreams or amiable hopes,, but on those ancient virtues of logic, sanity, and laboriousness with which her history and her own indomitable genius have dowered France” ■ ' A POLITICIAN AND NOT A MAN OF THE PEOPLE. Before Mr Kipling left Paris for Strasbourg ho gave an interview to Monsieur Leou Blooq, of I’Eclair, in which he stated: "The evil from which we are suffering respite from the .elections following the war,- which did not reflect the general sentiment of the' country. I know the, agricultural classes, and even the working classes, pretty well, and they do not see what is going on to-day with an approving eye, Mr Lloyd George directs English politics as a politician, and not as a man of thq people. .The next elections, let us hope; will; put right the evil that is now being done. The men who negotiated, the armistice and' -were the. authors of die Peace Treaty failed to ensure either justice or security. We are very, anxious in England "that the men. who were responsible for the war and the war criminals should receive exemplary punishment, but there has been only' a parody of justice in regard to them. Even those who have been tried end sentenced are at liberty, which amounts' to nothing less than a joke. Then we are anxious that it should not be possible for whr to begin again. To, ensure this we must keep a > watch on the ■' bodies, prevent them from being able to work harm henceforward, take away their arms and munitions, and even allow you French to take definite possession of the left bank of the Rhine. It is very evident that the Peace Treaty in no way ■ corresponds to what your hopes were during the war. The English. people are suffering from the same fact, and for that they will call upon their governors for an account.” MERE WORDS. Asked, ‘‘Do you think the Washington Conference will have any results?” l Mr Kipling replied: , ‘‘Words! Words I Words I We have had' enough of phrases, of talking, pf speeches, ond-eloquenco. What is wanted are acts. Security above, everything. Suppose the war began again to-morrow. . . . My own son was killed on the field near Villers-Gotterets. .What our politicians do not sufficiently understand is that there are scattered throughput the whole of Europe, possibly throughout the whole world, fathers of families like myself who have lost sons in this war and whose one common’ cry is ‘Security.’ ”. Mr Kipling, the interviewer remarks, was moved to deep emotion when -he referred to his'som ’ He added that he is engaged in writing the history of the Guards’ Regiment, to which his son belonged. , “To prevent Germany from beginning another war,” ho said, “must be Pur programme and our one duty.”