The Glasgow courier. [volume] (Glasgow, Mont.) 1913-current, 1918-11-22


means who insisted on doing it with
his own hands. The sergeant in charge
Of the cemetery, a lawyer in civil life,
was equally insistent that help be pro-
vided, and the Frenchman finally COM
promised on letting two privates help
him in his labor of love. The three of
them, on hands and knees in the soft
reath, set out the rows and clusters
Of shrubs that a~e now one of the
most striking features of the ceme-
tery's beauty.
Caring for Graves.
The same Frenchman, not content
with the round point, also adopted Is
graves, which he is caring for him
self. Most of the graves have been
thus adopted, the rest soon will be.
The majority of the caretakers are
Frenchwomen of high and low degree.
One such Frenchwoman, wanting to
adopt a grave, wrote to her husband
at the front, asking his advice.
"Do just as you choose" he an
swered. "But if you do adopt one
send me less money. It must be cared
for properly"
Triangles in Blossom.
At the end of some of the rows a
small triangle Of earth has been left,
made necessary by the curving paths.
The little triangles are abloom with
a border of red-tinged yellow flow
ers that resemble our own marigolds,
and the space within is richly blue
with a multitude of thistlelike BIOS
SONS. It is a harmony in floral COL
or that one would go far to match.
All of these little triangles are the
care of a single Frenchwoman.
If you visit that cemetery a French
woman, possibly with n or two sober
faced children with her, perhaps in
mourning, will very likely come up to
you and ask how she can get word to
the family of the soldier whose grave
is in her dependable stewardship, and
whose name she will invariably have
carefully copied on a slip of paper.
You have simply to tell her to ad-
dress the Grave Registration service
at Tours, and in a few weeks the
family of a fallen comrade will know
that the resting place of its hero is
trusted to tender, loving hands.
Brooks No Interference.
These Frenchwomen r jealous
guardians, and will not brook the in
reference of an outsider as they go
about their self-appointed task. Re-
Gently a Frenchwoman, attending to
the grave of an American major, left
the mound a moment to throw away
some withered flowers before she laid
fresh ones there.
In the interval another woman, OBJ
viously an American, obviously some
one to whom the dead officer had been
near and dear, kneeled over the grave
to lay upon it her own offering.
The Frenchwoman came back. At
first she did not understand, and the
barrier of language did not east the
tenseness. It was a situation calling
for considerable diplomacy on the part
of any third party who was willing to
risk interfering.
Perhaps that is why they picked for
the sergeant in charge, a mar who US
ed to be a lawyer. He walked owe
to the pair and, in the best French
he could command, explained the sit
uation. Then he turned away. There
are scenes at which I've an ex-lawyer
knows he has no right to be a spec
tator.
Little Groups Look On.
Always, at the gate of the ceme-
terry, you will find a little group of
the reverently curious-French grown
ups, children, soldiers. Little knots
of them gather in the tree-lined high
way which, ever since the first Amer
lean soldier was laid away in Suresnes,
has been called Boulevard Washing
ton.
They bare their heads, make the
sign of the cross or salute every time
a flag-draped coffin is taken through
the gate and laid on the cindered
pathway-cindered because the wife
of a French commandant has been
shipping two truck loads of cinders
to the cemetery every d%ay--hcfore the
chaplain reads the simple ceremony
and the bugler, farther up the hill
sounds the final requiem.
COMBUSTION IN HAY.