UNIVERSAL SACRIFICE.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 801, 4 September 1916, Page 6

UNIVERSAL SACRIFICE.

SPIRIT OF FRANCE.

POILU AND HIS BRITISH COMRADE.

A GENEROUS APPRECIATION

(The following Iribnte to the patriot ism and self-sacrifice of the French, published in "The Time*," is from an English officer who has serred in •France.]

You ask what we think of the French Army and its methods, and how wc gel on with the French soldiers and the people of the villages behind the firing line. It is quite unnecessary for me to pay any sort of tribute to what you might call the business management of Hie French Army, or to the extraordinary efficiency and valour of the French troops. I imagine the whole world has been recognising the one and paying real homage to the other for some time past. I am not sure whether the world at large is equally aware of the true greatness, the grandeur of the sacrifices France has made. I never want to hear the word "frivolous" used again in connection with our French friends; or, if I do, it will always have a meaning for me such as was never before associated with if. Do you remember a poem of Browning's—l forget (he title? It describes how a young officer, a mere boy, brings to Napoleon news of the capture of Ralisbon. He was wounded, you know:— You looked twice "ere vou saw his breast Was all litit shot in two.

Well, Napoleon was mighty pleased, you must know. The news was a big relief to him. His face showed his pride and gladness. And then he looked down at his messenger, and the flash went out of his eye. I hope I have the words right:— "You're wounded? - ' "Nay," his soldier's pride Touched to the quick, he said: "I'm killed. Sire!" And his Chief beside Smiling the boy fell dead.

That was the way of it, as I remember; and the frivolity of thai boy's answer and smile is the only kind of frivolity I shall associate with the name of France after this war. I give you my word there is nobody French in all this countryside who is not consciously, gladly, steadily, and all the time making his or her sacrifice for France to-day—-the sacrifice of themselves. They cannot offer more. "It Is For France."

"Madame, Monsieur, my child—lt is for France." With these words, upon my honour, you might take not only all that belongs to them, all they have not been asked to give, but you could take life itself from these people, and it would be "Smiling the boy fell dead," over again. The thought of question or discussion of sacrifice, the avoidance of this or that deprivation, it simply docs not occur to \ .these French people. "It is the war." "It is for France." "France has need of this." "It will help France." That is all. Further discussion is not only unnecessary, it would be looked on as indecent.

I have in my mind at this moment a dear old man and his wife, refugees from . They had been what you call warm people, retired farmers. They saw the home of their old age and carefully built-up independence—all they possessed—utterly destroyed by German shells. Their relatives were all killed or in the fighting line. On a broken wheelbarrow they carried away a survivor in the shape of an old, blind, and lame sheep-dog, a book or two, and one or two small oddments. In the village of 13 miles behind the line, the Mayor gave them shelter of a certain small house which stood empty; its owner away in the fighting line. There the white haired dame contrived to make a home of some sort for her fragile old husband and the veteran sheepdog: God knows what they lived on, with their kindly, deep-lined parchment-coloured faces. In that village, it seemed, no place could be found to serve as a mess for my friend, Captain , and his company officers, when they arrived. The Mayor was, of course, appealed to. He always is. He thought a minute. He has so many problems to solve in these war days. Ah, yes; he thought he could manage. An hour later, Captain and his brother officers were comfortably established in a convenient tiny house. They found a white-haired old lady sweeping out the already perfectly clean, paved main room in which they were to eat. All unasked, the same gently smiling old lady helped their batmen to prepare a meal. Outside, a tottering old man with almost transparent skin was busily raking together odd bits of

wood to serve them for fuel. Late that night, Captain paus» i cd in passing to flash his torch into ■ an open-sided shed without a doo#. j There he saw the kindly old lady ; lying asleep. Some: rough sweepJings served her for a pillow; hef ! husband's coat was about her shoulders, and across that was his thin 'right arm; for the parchment-faced j old man lay beside her. There was no straw for him, and he was awake I still.

Hardly bears talking about, does jit? Well, thank goodness, Captain i is the true sort of Englishman. i He soon had the old couple in the little house, and his batmen out of its warm kitchen into the shed, and j a comfortable bed, of which his own j Wolscley valise formed the founda- , tion, made up for the old couple 'on the kitchen floor. But, mark you, they never said a word about having ever occupied the house, let alone suggested that our officers had turned | them out of it. Captain only ! learned that next day from the . mayor, who said in effect:—"But that ;is nothing; nothing at all. Madame | and Monsieur are French, you underi stand. It is for France, n'est-ce pas? j What would you. No apology is ! needed."

I He was right, too. The thing was nothing—as things go in France to- ; day. It was routine of French life !in the war. But is it not fine? I j rrave no time, even if I were able, to attempt to do justice to the almost reI ligious fervour of the patriotic devo- ! tion which is being shown, not by i this man or the other, but by every \ single man, woman, and child in the \ country. Poilu and Tommy. j Some one asked young the : same question you asked me, but hN ! reply was concerned only with the j French solider, the inimitable poilu, ; who, with the "famous M 7s's" of the ; French artillery, has won such ; glory. And do you know what he ' saitl was the most wonderful of all : the achievements of the poilu? You ! would never guess. He said it was | their achievement of really underj standing appreciation of, and friendj ship with, our Tommy. And, mind you, it is wondeffaJ* : You know what we are. Who was !it said we were incomprehensible jbut indispensable? Whoever t wis | understood us more than most. I j won't attempt to explain our fellowl : to you, but to anyone not possessed of the key—and who has it, outside England? not every one, by any manner of means, even in England—they are assuredly apt to prove very ! incomprehensible. To the Frenchman their rough-cast cynicism; I their generally sardonic humour, j which so effectually disguises from ; foreign eyes the fact that they have lany humour at all; their reticence; i the void in them which occupies the place of a dramatic sense; their atj titude of good-humoured scorn and J contempt for any and every thing I they do not wholly understand —a fairly wide field, you know—their i incorrigible apparent harshness, ! and their consistent abstinence from \ all the minor graces and politenesses, ! which is more than mere abstinence, | because based on real hatred and ! fear of everything of the kind: conceive what an impervious shell these \ things would represent to the aver- \ age Frenchman.

But the poilu has pierced that shell ! by the sheer adroitness and artistry of his inimitable tact; and, having ' pierced it, he has analysed and ap- < praised by the light of his fine, frank French humour the sterling stuff it ! hides, taken that to his big heart, re- ! jected the shell, and become the true ' and loyal comrade of Tommy Atkins. Sounds simple; but believe me, the | difficulties in the way were prodigijous. Only real genius couM have I overcome them. The poilu provided ! the genius; and Britain can be trusted to go on providing the sterling I stuff. What do I think of the French? I salute them, as I salute the memory of Nelson and Wellington; of Boberts and Kitchener; as I salute our own beloved England, with its waitin, watching, working women of to-dav—from my heart.