Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1918-10-15

"a 10 Lhe arch across the street a few feet away,
through which they would soon pass with the
american and French flags intertwined and the
'oto IN Dig scrawly letters, SOyes les Bienvenus."
me explained that | was an American They
seemed 70 understand and their faces lighted up,
Tor THIS was in early June and even These pitiful
ones VINO had been where little news had reached
''leih Tor nearly four years knew that the Ameri-
cans were in France in good numbers now, and
we're their allies
80 the group ceased to shrink from my camera.
y woman even thrust her child forward and
hoothed its hair so that it would look well in the
picture But just as l was about to snap the
%llutter another woman in the group. standing a
title back looked at me with an expression that
'as full of condemnation, full of appeal as she
said; Yes, my friends, let us stand up straight
20 that he can get good photograph of miseryw
Then she laughed bitterly, and well, did not
AXE the picture.
AT this moment the rest of the convoy began to
tomc out of the station led by the Chasseurs' lit
lie band With them came Red Cross men and
nurses, carrying or helping those who could not
walk into the waiting camions and ambuances
! put up my camera and hurried ahead to reach
the casino, whittier the procession bound, be-
lore their arrival there Someone struck up La
AIarseillase" woman with a high shrH
voice. AS l climbed upon the front seat of an
ambulance and started to pass the crowd 1
L
zee, going TO hear, what had come up from Paris
fOr-the glad burst Of enthusiasm, of happiness
from these people now that they fully realized
hat they were in France, among their own, free
from the German yoke, which had lain on their
aeCls since 1914 But as our ambulance went by
lhe procession there were no other voices raised
20 join that of the singing woman and after few
bars she, too, stopped singing and the procession
vent on, silent, shutting, except for some small
bows town bows who trud~pd ahead of tha C,baS-
saurS, still playing their tune on drum and bugle
I reached the casino ahead of the procession
md waited at the door for them to come down the
Rue du Casino. The narrow, steep street was
crowded along its sidewalks with townspeope
and from windows flung the trcolOr, while the
American flag waved here and there, too. As the
procession came around the head of the street the
people hailed ii with cheers and the waving of
flags. The Chasseurs played more loudly-now
il was "Vive rArmee" they were footing. A few
of the children raised their heads and looked with
glad eyes on the enthusiastic natives who were
trying so hard to cheer them home An old man
in the procession Strengthened up and shouted
"Vive lie General Joffre." But otherwise there
we're no cheers, no thrills of happiness nor any
thing but Just that down-bent attitude that shut
fling walk, that dazed, whipped, cowed express
sion 1t was. the woman at the station had
said misery. For Evian is the clearing house of
misery these days,
II was not so Mt first, the American Red Cross
doctor told me, and so the subprefect of the de-
partment of the Haute-Savoie also assured me-
(Which is why we make such a great effort TO
cheer them as they come in nowadays" he said
They are crushed, these people; they are like
dead men and women and the children even the
little ones, are scarcely alive to the situation
Free from Germany once more? They cannot be-
lleve it-there is scarcely enough strength left in
their poor minds and bodies for them to be able
to understand"
YES" added the Red Cross doctor, pointing out
a girl of eighteen or nineteen who passed Took
at the expression on the face Of that girl" 1
looked, / caught here eye she turned In my d.