Evening star., 1915-11-21
LIFEBOAT~ ON LINER
WHEN SHIP NEARS WAR ZONE
Richard Harding Davis Tells How Pas
sengers Are Assigned to Craft
.4~ by Ticket.

the French captain called down to him.
She is pilot boat No IS. The pilots
name is Jean Baptiste. He has wife
and four children in Bordeaux. and
years old and has a red nose and
wart on his chin. Is there anything
else you would like to know
See German Prisoners.
At daybreak. as the ship swept up
the Gironde to Bordeaux, we had our
first view of the enemy. We had pass
ed the vineyards and those chateaux
the name of which every wine card in
every part of the world helps to keep
! famous and familiar. and had reached
the outskirts Of the city. Here the
banks are close together, so close that
one almost can hail those on shore,
but there was a heavy rain and the
mist played tricks. When on a barge
/ saw a man in black overcoat. with
the brass buttons wider apart across
the chest than at the belt line. r ike
those of our traffic police in summer
time. I thought it was a trick of the
mist. Because at present the uniform
that, by nice adjustment of buttons,
tries to broaden the shoulders and de-
crease the waist. is not being worn
sharpshooter sees it first. But the man
in the overcoat was not carrying
rifle on his shoulder. He was carrying
bag of cement, and from the hull of
the tn barge others appeared. each with
Dag upon his shoulder. There was no
mistaking them, nor their little round
caps. high boots and field uniforms of
gray green. 1t was strange that the
first persons we should see since we
left the wharf at the foot of 18th
street, North river, the first we should
see In France, should not be French
people, but German soldiers.
bordeaux had the good taste to burn
down when the architect who designed
ings facing it was still alive. and.
after his designs or those of his pupils.
Bordeaux was rebuilt. So, wherever
you look you see the best in what is
old and the smartest in what is mod
ern Certainly. when to that city Presi-
cent Poincare and his cabinet moved
the government, they gave it a resting
place that was both dignified and
charming. To walk the streets and
wharVes IS a continual delight. One
IS never bored. 1t is like reading a
nook In which there are no dull pages.
everywhere are the splendid buildings
OF Louis XIV, statues, parks. monu
ments, churches, great arches that
oMGe i were the outer gates. and many
liiies OF quays, redolent, not of the
sea, but of the wine to which the cjtv
gives her name.
*4oAy "OuQQeQ on Streets
But today to walk the streets of
bordeaux saddens as we'll as delights
Ihere ara SO many wounded, there are
SO many women and children. all In
piack. 1t is relief when you learn
tnat the wounded are from different
parts of France, that they have been
sent to Bordeaux to recuperate and are
greatly In excess of the proportion of
wounded you would find in other cities
Sut the women and children in black
are not convalescents. Their wounds
neal slowly. or not at all.
AT the wharves a white shin with pi-
gantic American flags painted on her
sides and with an American flag at the
stern was unloading horses. They were
Tor the French artillery and cavalry.
put they were so glad to be free Of the
ship that their future state did/not dis
tress them Instead. they kicked Joy
ously, scattering the sentries, who were
jet black Turcos. AS one of them
would run from plunging horse, the
others laughed at him with that con-
tagious laugh of the darky that is the
same all the world over, whether he
halls from Mobile or Tangier, and he
would return sheepishly, with eyes
rolling. protesting the horse was
"boche."
Officers, who looked as though in
times of peace they might be gentleman
jockeys, were receiving the remounts
and identifying the brands on the hoofs
and shoulder that had been made by
their agents in America. If the veter-
mary passed the horse. he was again
marked. this time with regimentaI
numbers. on the .hoof with a branding
iron. and on the fanks with white
paint. In ten days he will be given a
set of shoes, and in a month he will be
under fire.
Ringer" Among the Horses.
Col. Rene de Montjou, who has been
year in America buying remounts.
and who returned on the Chicago,
discovered that one of the horses was
a "substitutI; and a very bad "substi-