War Cripples are Working in Paris

Sun (Christchurch), Volume IV, Issue 1164, 3 November 1917, Page 4 (Supplement)

War Cripples are Working in Paris

VEX as late in the war as last year it OU-))5)& was impossible for me to repress a KyMgeSL shudder when some of the dear shattered wounded went by. It seemed to me that the time would never come when these harvests of the almost death could appear normalnatural, observes a special correspondent in Paris. I resented their armless sleeve, their turned up bit of red trouser leg; I loathed all it represented of human suffering; I raged at the invisible enemy it suggested. The swing-swing of their crutches as they moved slowly forward was much worse lome than the patient little tap of a wooden leg. But now, some way, that has gone. Busy, energetic men stump vigorously over the pavement on the way to work. Under that powerless arm with its carefully gloved wooden hand is a huge package of papers—a chief of a bureau hurrying back after lunch. So common has it become, and yet so thoroughly are the men equipped with the latest devices in artificial limbs, that there is only a warm glow now at the unquenchable optimism and courage of the man who has set himself out to learn a new trade; a new life against such odds. No more of that horror, of that sickness at the sight of poor, mangled beings. To-day Paris Is refilling her civilian positions with men of this sort. There isn't a restaurant where at least one of the waiters or one of the chasseurs hasn't a wooden leg. There isn't a shop or a bank or an otlice in town where there aren't clerks whose arms or hands are gone. The little grey glove usually tells the tale. But ribbons are measured; books wrapped up; drugs poured carefully out drop by drop, by this same clerk. The chauffeur of a well-known Chicagoan who is here has only half of his right hand, and yet he is as steel-quick in the melee of this Paris traffic as any two-handed man could be. Get Systematic Training. A large part of this is due to special training in convalescence hospitals, and another share to the improved apparatus which are manufactured nowadays. , I was interested a few days ago in seeing the work that is done at the "White House"—an institution for preparing the amputated men for a new profession. This institution is just a year old. That was what the party was for, in celebration. It is the gift of Mr Stotesbury, of Philadelphia, and was secured to France by Mrs Baylies, who

has had charge of the work in New York. She wired Mr Stotesburv, "I need SBO,OOO. Can I have it?" The school was built, and the running expenses, amounting to SSOOO a month, are all met by the hanker. There have been 1000 men received there who have had either arms or legs off. They have been fitted with perfect artificial limbs and have received a training for some useful, well-paying position. Among other things, accounting, stenography, commercial drawing, as well as applied design and decoration, mechanics, auto driving, carpentering, sculpture and wood carving, saddlery, tanning, horticulture. I can't begin to enumerate to you the different occupations to which the various men are apprenticed according to their tastes. And in addition to this there are night classes organised for the less educated. It is surprising to see, after working all day, how many of the men want to study English or Spanish at night. A Twelve-year-old Victim. Among those coming forward the other day for his diploma was a little boy oLI2. He had great dark eyes under smiling brows, a sweet, fresh face —but you wanted to take him home to one of our big, breezy western farms and feed him milk and eggs and butter all day while he chased bumblebees and grew fat. He hopped quickly along over the big paved court to get his diploma for his year's schooling, and it wasn't until he got out from behind the row of chairs that I saw that both his legs had been cut off, and that the funny old-fashioned long trousers, that had made me smile at first on such a wee kiddie, were only there to cover up the ugly joints of wood and leather, and to let peep out at the bottom the little wooden feet on which he balanced himself so agilely without a stick or a canar His mother was a widow living at Amiens, and in one of the aerial bombardments one of her legs was taken off; and both of the little boy's. But they say that in the year that he has been at "La Maison Blanche" no one has ever heard him complain when all the tedious and painful fitting of the apparatus was going on. That, on the contrary, he used to run after the men who, driven almost to frenzy by the irritating pain of the new, unaccustomed legs, would try to throw them away, and coax the men to resume them.

The Russian Socialists are not so millennial after all. They have liberated Mr Stuenner owing to his feeble health, but they have exacted bail of 100,000 roubles. As he is bound to rate his life beyond this, the Treasury will benefit by £IO,OOO.