The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1918-08-16
LETTERS FROM THE
BOYS. IN THE CAMP.
From Saturdays Daily.

From Saturdays Daily.
Lucien Ventre OF this city is in
receipt of the following letter from
France
Headquarters, Company "F''
Twenty fifth Engineers, Somewhere
in France. July 18th 1918.-My Dear
Ventre: No doubt you have long
since placed me in the list of un-,
grateful people but l assure you if
what little spare time i have was not
spent in admiring your wonderful
country you would have received
word from me long ago.
| Many, many times my thoughts
have been brought back to my lessons
with you and your very interesting
chats and l would then and there
VOW to write you Immediately but if
you have not received any written
concentrations you have never the
i less been the subject of many vocular
appropriations.
| To tell you what 1 think of France
would require my retiring from the
army and devoting my entire time
to the study of expression but I
have faint idea that there are
numerous people wishing to do the
same thing as myself. However l did
not have to wait until visiting here
to appreciate this beautiful spot as
for a great many years next to my
own country France has always held
a very prominent place in my
thoughts.
My attempts at French speaking
are almost tragic but as always these
people make it very easy for you for
their minds seem to divine your diff
fculties and they grasp your meaning
instantly. l have spent great many
hours, especially on the voyage over,
trying to get the grammar of the
language planted in my memory but
it is very difficult and if this war
does not last sufficiently long enough
for me to get correct knowledge
of the language l shall do my utmost
to prolong it, as horrible as it may
seem to you.
For the past five months l have
been located near one of the very
large cities and Sunday usually finds
me there either admiring the city or
else erucifying it's inhabitants with
my efforts at speaking it's language.
| The strangest and certainly the
grandest, is the speechless but per-
feet brotherhood of understanding of
the French and the Americans. All
conversations seem to follow the
same route and it usually ends up
| that they are happy to see us and we
are equally joyed to be with them.
| If we get lonesome and wish to feel
ourselves at our homes all that is
necessary is to step across the
threshold of some French home, you
do not understand their words neither
do they comprehend the Americans
quick actions but there is that bond
of friendship that vanishes all these
difficulties into mist.
| Speaking for myself, the greatest
lesson Z have learned over here is
tpatience, sympathy and knowledge
that in the long list of things that
make life a decent journey is the fact
+ hat hurry up dollars" comes very
| far down the list. After learning
these things know now why every
| Frenchman was fortunate enough
to know was gentleman. 1t takes
an acrobatic mind to draw picture
of what we could call in America,
French "roughneck." the word and
Che country they come from are at
the utmost extreme.
| When l first came here, and
speak for the entire army now, saw
the little locomotives, and what ap-
Ipeared 10 me as funny ways of doing
| things, right away l thought France
and Europe in general far behind the
time but the longer stay here the
| further north does France get and
America seems to be edging towards
1.-THE south. There is something gently
Iworming its way out of every soldier
here and that is the bombastic, the
grandiose and in its place we find
that friendship cemented by touch
of sentiment makes the day just a lit
tile brighter and your fellow man a lit
tie more interesting. We have at last
confessed that because Americas
trains run on the right hand side of
the track is no reason that Frances
left handed trains are wrong.
In my own country if man in
business thinks success can only be
reached with the aid of cold steel
and chisels he is looked upon as a
good business man but let him con-
fess that the other fellow is not such
La "red devil as he is supposed to be
land you are "fini." Now when the
American soldier with his long tute-
lage in cold bloodness meets up with
ia real Frenchman who is schooled in
the very opposite there is some awk-
Irxr,y I'd fe I>,,f
stays and lives here he begins to
think as the Frenchman has always
thought. Then comes to the surface
90 =