TRAGIC ECHO OF WAR.

Patea Mail, Volume XLIV, 24 November 1920, Page 3

TRAGIC ECHO OF WAR.

LONDON ST KELT SALUTE TO A BLIND FRENCHMAN. The scene was Piccadilly Circus (writes a Lonron correspondent.) The hour was that congested one of thronged hustling around all the theatres which immediately precedes the rising of the curtain within. The chattering crowds poured out of the restaurants and cafes, making for the playhouses, and the stream of traffic in the Circus was at its height. Suddenly there fell a strange silence which momentarily infected the whole mis-en-scene. H was a silent and tragic echo of the past And it even drew from the West End crowds of conscientious merrymakers its tribute of profound silence. An old gentleman and a young lady appeared leading each by one arm a blind French officer. They came right across the Circus, making from South Uegent Street towards Shaftesbury Avenue, and literally the animated and noisy panorama stood still and held its breath while they passed. The elderly man and the young lady walked unconsciously yet proudly through the silent homage of the gazing multitudes. The blind soldier of France, an erect and manly figure of a young man in the very prime of life, faultlessly attired in the scarlet and blue of a French cavalry regiment, with a. face of sun-burnt pallor and eyes hermetically closed like a statue's, surrendered himself to their guidance like a novice in the terrors of eternal darkness. And Piccadilly—cynical, flippant, dissipated riotous, sinister Piccadilly—raised its hat to the scarlet fouragerie of France on the tunic breast of the blind man.