Evening star., 1914-12-20
COMICALITIES OF A CONSULATE
- BY THORNWELL HAYNES

S
~ of one of the consulates in France 1
was one morning seated at my desk busily
engaged in figuring over my quarterly ac-
counts, when suddenly a woman carrying a
bundle in her arms appeared before me.
had not resided in France sufficiently long
to imbibe the unadulterated French polite
ness; but l had progressed sufficiently 20
ask:
Madam, what can | have the pleasure
of doing for you this morning.
"Monsieur," she exclaimed, walking to-
ward me, holding out the bundle as if to
deposit it on my desk, this is an American
baby. What shall | do with it,"
Abashed at the prospect of SO suddenly
becoming father with the orange blossoms
and rice omitted and knowing that the
American government had established no
precedent of maintaining orphan asylums
either at home or abroad, | hesitated mo-
ment and replied:
will the Madam please be seated over
there by the door, and tell me why, being
a Frenchwoman, she has become possessed
OF an American baby?'
1t never occurred to me to examine the
little bundle of humanity. | had in pre-
vious times rather prided myself on my
ability to distinguish the nationality of peo-
pie, had even boasted l could tell them by
their shoes; but | had never tried my
perceptive powers on infant physiognonl-
les.
"VoHdl7 she said, seating herself.
l shall never forget that word voild.
1t was one of the first French words ever
learned You know it means-oh, so many
things when used exclamatorily, as it gen.
orally is. Usually. however, to the begin
ner in the French language it conveys the
meaning of Here it is" That was about
as far as | had progressed in my French
education at that time in regard to the many
varied meanings of roild, and | determined
that if it meant the baby, then it would
retain its geographical location indefinitely;
that is, in the woman's lap over by the door
or preferably outside. But her poild re-
ferred not so much to the infant as to the
story of how it came to be in her posses
sion.
She talked volubly while l tried to as
sumo the defensive power of silence. But
to a Frenchwoman-well, silence simply
means what the jockey gives the horse in
the last heat encouragement.
From the verbal French cyclone she
hurled at me l gathered few fragments
that enabled me to understand.
For three months she had been employed
as nurse by an American woman who had
paid her good wages. Four weeks pre-
viously, however, the mother had returned
to New York, saying she was going over for
only two or three days on an urgent bust
ness matter and would return at once She
had not seen or heard of her since. Being
woman who had to work for her own living,
the baby was burden on her hands. She
could hardly support herself, much less pro-
vide for the infant, and as the child was of
American parentage she thought the repre-
sentative of the American government
ought to take care of it.
suggested that | would write to the city
authorities in New York asking as to the
genuineness of the address that the woman
said the mother had left with her.
"And what shall do during all the time
you are waiting for an answer,-starve?'
My answer finally was a twenty-franc
gold piece, with which she departed saying
she would try to take care of the baby until
could hear from the New York authorities
Now the reasonable and the unreason-
able part of the story is that since her de-
parture, though the sun has risen hundreds
of times, she has never returned. 1t had
not risen more than seven times, however,
before | learned the reason.
1t was just one week later, at an informal
dinner of the sixteen Cons,1ls who resided
in the city, that in the course of a conversa-
ton with my Italian colleague | told him
+1,4 0f {1n Io1>,