Going up a steep street to where at the top stood
a stone church, with an image of the Christ almost covered by that
virgin vine which we call Virginia creeper, I opened the
leather-covered door and went quietly in.
There was no service. The building was quite empty. And the Commander
of the Armies of the North, probably the greatest general the French
have in the field to-day, was kneeling there alone.
He never knew I had seen him. I left before he did. Now, as I look
back, it seems to me that that great general on his knees alone in
that little church is typical of the attitude of France to-day toward
the war.
It is a totally different attitude from the English--not more heroic,
not braver, not more resolute to an end. But it is peculiarly
reverential. The enemy is on the soil of France. The French are
fighting for their homes, for their children, for their country. And
in this great struggle France daily, hourly, on its knees asks for
help.
I went to the hotel--an ancient place, very small, very clean, very
cold and shabby. The entrance was through an archway into a
cobble-paved courtyard, where on the left, under the roof of a shed,
the saddles of cavalry horses and gendarmes were waiting on saddle
trestles. Beyond, through a glazed door, was a long dining room, with
a bare, white-scrubbed floor and whitewashed walls.
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