Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1918-02-25
Rum0rs Fly In Paris, But the French
Don't Heed Them, Says Novelist Chester

home, but without our picturesque
a~mpliications by h festive war cor
respondent.
The newly arrived American sees
that paper, and he says: Aha! The
censor! He is keeping back from me
the lurid descriptions with which at
home l sweetened my coffee! What
else is the censor Withholding besides
the gaudy details to which l am &C
, customed, and to which l have an in
alienable right? Aha! rs#
1t is then that he falls a, prey to the
wild rulnor and the hoarse whisper.
These all emanate from one mys-
terious source: and If the police ever
succeed in locating him, they'll swing
Mr.. High Authority from a lamppost,
for he is a German agent, either by
design Or accident.
He must be a wondrous creature.
this High Authority, h no eye
hath seen, but whom every a hath
heard.
He sits in some damp cellar. and
does nothing but read between the
lines until he is full of poison. where
upon he whets his singer and sailies
forth.
Beneath the new arrivals tender
skin he Inserts his subtle virus, and
instantly, violently. that new arrival
/ starts into ever widening circles, pop
eyed and yelping.
When the new arrival becomes a
seasoned dweller in Paris. when he
has been here long enough to discover
to his amazement that the sun still
rises in the east and sets in the west.
and hat night still succeeds day. he
is immune from the virus of High
Authority because he has been stung
before, and is inoculate.
By this time, moreover, he has the
great big idea about this war which
he was. all along trying to get, and
that big idea turns out to be plain, in
, dividual duty! so he tells the hoarsely
whispering confidant of High Author
ity to go to, hell, because he's busy
! hustling potatoes out to the front line
trenches!
AS for the. Frenchman, he only
shrugs his shoulders at the buzzing of
the umo bug.
He has no time for such feverish
fr1volity as the consideration of what
might possibly happen nex Friday. if
something else. which never does,
might possibly happen on Thursday.
three and a half years. and he has
reduced its conduct to three cardinal
principles.
FIRST. it is the duty of the soldier
to go out and stand in the spot as
signed to him, and, with the same
sublime courage Of those who have
died for this cause and the cause of
France, which is the cause of civiliza-
ton. fight until hat sacred cause is
accomplished; SECOND, it is the duty
Of the civilian, besides holding intact
the economic and domestic institu-
tons of the country, to send the sol
der to the front, feed him there, keep
him clothed, put a u in his hand,
and supply that u with endless bull
InfC. TlfPn t. &C. Tho lk. ~ -..-..
purveyor of pessimism, every bearer
Of depressing tales which might weak
en- enthusiasm, every dissemination of
g~rotesquely terrifying maybe-sos or
might-happens. which would tend to
interfere with steadfast purpose, ev-
cry rumor-monger, in fact, to hand
himself over to the military authori-
ties, and be shot for the traitor which
he undoubtedly is!
It's a grand little idea, come to
think it over, for any nation which is
sending its o to the war,