The Cordova daily times., 1918-02-27
(By Barton Blake)

come in comfortable motor car, and
ne smoked big pipe.
1t is at Grecourt that group of near
~ twenty graduates of Smith College
have camped in portable houses round
the ruins of the Chateau de RObecourt.
This ruined castle, that was for thirty
months a Bayarian field hospital (the
Germans blew it up when they re-
treated), is center now for social and
medical repair work in the neighbor-
ing villages. The American Red Cross,
no less than the aIumnae of the college
at Northampton, has gladly taken a
hand in financing the colOny-the
nurses, the social workers" and Chill
dren's workers." the motor cars which,
with a stock of necessaries, tours the
neighborhood and sells at two-thirds
OF cost price; the farm department,
with it's cows supplying milk for a
nearly milkless neighborhood, and all
the rest of the activities of these
strenuous young women.
One of the Smith Collegians, who
is classed on the roster of the Gre
court conoly as Social Worker, head
of Children's department and Carpen-
ter told the New York journalist
that one of the sad facts about the chill
1ren of the neighbOrhOod-whom she
had come to know very we'll when
they came to listen to story telling,
and to classes, was that during the
period of nearly three years of Ger
man occupation they had very nearly
forgotten how to play.
"Our doctors say that they are UNI
dersized" she said, "and you can see
that for yourself, when you ask them
their ages, and the boy you had taken
Tor twelve proves to be fourteen, and
the girl who seems only ten says she is
twelve. That is one of the results of
bndernourishment, suppose. But that
isn't ali They have forgotten-or
have never learned-how to play!
I'VE are changing that. They are
learning to play. French games and
American games, too. We are restor-
ing childhood to these children of
France!
: >,, = it is pity that they haven't
:. anv noks to read during the last
l 1@D o gaaFs The intellectual life OF
the region was arrested during the
time the Gertilahs were mere, This
was more serious for the children
than for the grown-upS.
unfortunately, we have very fe"
hooks to give them, or to lend them.
What we have, they devour! They
are so grateful, these children that
YOU want to do more for them thah
YOU can afford to dol"
So spoke the social worker" who IS
uroud. also of being Grecourt's car
penter.
The newspaper man said nothing
but took notes.
Twenty-four hours later he was back
in Paris. He took a morning off, and
let his typewriter have rest while he
sauntered along the Seine. No one
who loves Paris has forgotten the
hook boxes which line the river banks
France may be an empire, Kingdom
or republic. France may have peace,
or may be fighting off the invader OF
1888, of 1870, of 1914-remain always
the fellows who fish In the Seine
Though no one ever saw them eaten
anything!) and the old men in cordu-
rows who sell old books and old prints
and wretched copies of paintings in
the Louvre, from their zinc boxes built
onto the parapets of the riverside
So this New York newspaper man
FASTENED to the Quai Voltaire, and
worked his way gradually up to the
DUAL de la Tournelle, where stands the
restaurant of la Tour dArgent-the
wonderful old restaurant where VIII
helm II counted on having his Christ
mas dinner in December, 1914.
~ And bought books-not many, blu
fhe few that he deemed suitable fol
the children of Grecourt, and not too
dirty either.
That newspaper man has had let
yer from "the carpenter who is als'
head of the Children's department
He is rather proud of the letter. III
knows that it is not easy for tire
carpenter to write letters by candle
light, in a portable house, after mar
DAYS work with hammer and nails
and children!
you didn't forget those books!" hi
letter begins. 81 thought you wer
only a journalist'-after copy;
never occurred to me that I was bet
ging for my kiddies when told 20