The Washington herald., 1917-08-26
BY MARY LAW

| ny LA"
| While so many of our Sammies are
now on their way to that grim first
| line in France, there is now at Fort
Myer one OF the first OF the Sammies
one who has the Legion of Honor
and the Croix de Guerre to show for
his work. not to mention a couple of
bullet wounds and a pair OF black
trimmed cheaters which he has worn
since he was 'gassed."
He has a fine Connemara name.
| Sweeney II is. And it suits him.
The orderly whom l asked for Maj.
Sweeney expressed an absolute uncer-
| tainty as TO his whereabouts but
kindly offered to help me locate him.
| We wandered hither and yon. mostly
yon. through the maze OF brown tents
and garagelike buildings, pervaded by
pungent and horsy ordors which is the
| o. r. c. training camp. Finally my
| guide and friend spotted a tall, slim,
| deftly uniformed person amusing him
! self with an evidently balky automa-
tic rifle. As we approached 1 noted a
sort of reflex OF velvety French cuss
words in the air. l remarked it.
Can Cuss In Chinese.
The orderly said, Gosh. that's
| in Chinese. He generally gets around
I to that about 2 o'clock"
| 1t sounded interesting.
The object OF our comment turned
toward us with a smile at once whim-
| sical and hard. I understood i'm
mediately the yarns that l had heard
of his cleaning out a German trench
with a bare handful of the Foreign
! Legion.
Maj. Sweeney. while a West Point
| er. resigned from the service OF this
| country some years ago and has been
more or less a soldier of fortune,
| serving in Mexico under Madero and
! in various South American disturb
ances. He happened to be in Paris
when the present conflict broke and
| Immediately enlisted as a private in
the Foreign Legion. that reckless
| corps about the name of which there
| clings the flavor OF unforgettable ad
venture.
ventured some inanity on the sub
| ject and was rewarded with a rem
| iniscent grin.
We'll, in the Legion we did en-
| joy a sort of gamblers happiness.
Every day was lived for itself. Moth
| ing that came before or after mat
| tered.
Had Big Battle Moments,
And then there We're the big mo-
ments of actual attack when We were
all keyed to the nth pitch. I'll al
| ways remember the night fights. They
| made me think of the Fourth OF July
gone mad, what with the flaring star
shells and the savage crackle and
roar of the guns, with perhaps an
| apricot-colo Japanese lantern of a
moon floating serenely overhead.
Some Of those star shells are pc
culiar things. 1 saw one poor chap
who was killed by the shock OF one.
He looked as though he had been
coated with luminous paint"
| 1t is only fair to the reader to
say that possibly 1 may have
missed some interesting points in
the majors talk. He uses French
phrases frequently and 1 made the
fatal mistake of looking intelligent
when he sprung the first one. At
ter that 1 couldn't acknowledge
that French was Greek to me.
Gave Free Paradise Passes.
On the other side. Maj. Sweeney
or Capt. Sweeney, as he was then,
was in command of a bunch of
L
boches cold chills and a number of
free passes to paradise. Since his
return to this country with the
French mission and his subsequent
identification with the army of his
own country. he has been called in
frequent consultation by Oar De-
partment officials engaged in draft
ing plans of these mechanical mon
sters.
mentioned this phase of his
work.
He responded, well, a tank isn't
particularly pretty to look at. When
one of them is crawling over that
cancerous No Mans Land. it seems
a part of the natural fauna. And
inside one of them during an at
tack it's--(vicious Gallo phrase),
with the machine guns and the
cannon in action at the same time
and the ozone machine pumping so
much oxygen in the smoky air that
your heart pounds as though il
tangible results, the tank is one
of the biggest things developed by
the war"
Weren't You wounded in tank
attack" I asked.
'T don't believe I can say that" the
major replied. Wed reached the
trench and all tumbled out of the
machine when a tuzzy-looking little
German boy about IS years old hand |
ed me a few leaden souvenirs at
close range. But outside of this I |
came out unscathed.
Being 'gassed' is a different propo- |
sition, however, had only a light
dose, blt it is still particular wish
Of naiss that might have fivs min