Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1916-04-07
BORDEAUX SAD, BUT SURE OF VICTORY.
BY HERBERT COREY.

ORDEAUX.-N is in Bordeaux that the newcomer
x to France first comprehends what it means to
- a country to be at war. Here is city of 900
people in which there is laughter no love MAX
ing and no happy, idle noises A city in which the
men who stroll past for the part wear bandages
hobble crutches themselves jaunty under
the new shrapnel hemlet, which sign that
wearer has been ordered front city in which
women the motormen sweep the streets andyin
which the men are old or unfit It is a busy city
busy with the business of war-but it Is an uncan-
nily quiet city. OF Sunday afternoon Bordelais
marcn past the chairs of the in tragic
silence They almost unreal. 1t is as though
they were the ghosts happiness
What is about Bordeaux that is so depressinx?"
the members of our party of four each other.
1t not the wounded The streets crawl
with wounded But of other cities
of this stricken land. 1t not alone the silence
That is to be expected of Sunday afternoon. when
the trucks have ceased from gathering cobbes
1t not altogether sadness France greves but
France grieves in privacy Her and women are
dignifed and reticent in moments great emotion.
At last we puzzled it out
There is no love making"
n happier times Sunday streets would have
been filled with laughing chattaing, flirting utterly
happy and absorbed young and women A French
crowd is usually cheerful, loquacous, lively,
noisy gathering. The and frankly
terested in each other In Bordeaux today the young
girls seem not to go the Streets in which there
young The go about their business
quietly. OF fourteen who passed the Cafe de
Bordeaux 1 watching eleven wore mourning At
my side sat elderly couple-a father mother,
perhaps-gazng straight before them, with never
word to each other. Their silence was eloquent of
despair.
"In Bordeaux" a Frencnman told me, 1.-THE
Bordelais begin a conversation about politics,
five minutes they are talking food"
1t is one of the strongholds-some hold almost
one surviving stronghod-of old epcurean tradi-
ton who would replenish his cellar
sips at wines by the hour from shallow silver
and in each wine qualities that grosser
western paates unable to find when the road
has signboarded. There at least
which dinner is rite preceded by long
conversations with the maitre d'hotel followed
efforts have proved worthy Today good part of
patronage of those high affairs of ST. Boniface
nished by casual Americans newly landed from the
ship, who merely seek to end an animal hunger They
served by young women VINO do pretend a
knowledge of the servtors They only carry
to and the tables.
These statements are not at all exaggerated. Bor-
deaux before the the third port of France.
Today-f imports of war material be excepted-it
i the first port of France been
diverted to the shipping point of of the
worlds greatest wine districts. may
handling greater tonnage than before his
tory One of fortunes being made here
business just likewise hears the complaints of
merchants order this and that for theri customers
only to their goods Communicated for the govern
ment they reach the pier. 1t is futher from the
line of any other considerable city in France.
If happiness is be found in France it should be here
One finds silence instead.
An utterly wrong impression will be received by the
reader if he that Bordeaux is hearted
discouraged Bordeaux is sad of course. Their is not
town or hamlet dozen nations involved in this
struggle that sick to its heart of But
bordeaux seems be resigned to struggle that may
last for years. France will be victorious
In the end. In Paris hears talk of the being
ended by midsummer. Here they contemplate calmly
the possibility that it may last for two more.
Some are talking of five years more The one thing
that one never suggested is that be
defeated
Perhaps it consequence of this conviction that
victory is certain that the people of Bordeaux to
have somewhat mder attitude toward the enemy than
one finds elsewhere. There is strong admixture Of