FUNERAL OF M. BRIAND

Wairarapa Daily Times, 14 March 1932, Page 5

FUNERAL OF M. BRIAND

IMPRESSIVE CEREMONY. PARIS, Saturday. Hundreds of thousands assembled in the bleak March sunshine to watch M. Aristide Briand laid to rest. The Cardinal Archbishop Yerdier, in the presence of the Papal Nuncio and clergy of Notre Dame, gave absolution to the statesman who had been excommunicated for separating Church and State. The scene was the black-draped court room at the Quai D Orsay, the on'v witnesses being the President, M. Paul Doumer, relatives and closest friends of the deceased, and members of Cabinet.

Occupants of the stands outside gazed silently while the coffin was placed on a catafalque draped in the tri-colour, after which the Premier, M. Tardieu, delivered a funeral oration. He saluted the dead in the name of France, saying that M. Briand’s last words were “Marne,” “Salonica” and “Verdun,” names inseparable from his own. M. Tardieu’s final tribute was tu M. Briand as guide and philosopher of the League of Nations, in which he 1 interpreted the most powerful aspirations of the age. Hence, said che Premier, most people would mourn him as an apostle. The coffin was transferred to a hearse, which was escorted by detachments of the Republican Guard and 800 Poilus. It was followed by carriages piled with wreaths, and others conveying Cabinet members and Ambassadors, including Lord Tyrrell, representing the King of England. The procession crossed the spacious Place de la Concorde, whose thousands of lamps were veiled with crepe. Between the flanking guards and the silent populace the hearse and its attendants passed slowly up the Champs Elvsee to the Arc de Trimplie, where glows for ever the light M. Briand did so much to kindle. The official section of the procession halted at the Trocadero, only intimate friends of the dead statesman accompanying the coffin to the quiet little cemetery at. Passy, where it will rest until it is removed to Cocharil for permanent interment.