The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1921-02-17
HOW IT LOOKS .
NOW IN FRANCE.
There Is Not Much Change ex-
cept in the Spaces Between
-, the Villages.
SHOWS HAVOC uNMsTuRBED

The Soldier Who Goes Back 70 HE
Duoout In The Woods 10 Likely to
Find That Only the Rains .-
Have Rsshaped It
New York.-To any American COM
ing back from France these days, the
first greeting from quondam mem
Der of the A. e. r. 10 always this:
swell, how's it look ever thereH
Changed muchT'
To which, after some futile short
lived notion Of describing the great
muulated stretch Of France, with its
million discouragements and its thou
sand and one evidences Of renewing
life, the returning wanderer must
needs answer:
mo, not much"
For the impression that the old bat
tleflelds make is of havoc undisturbed,
paralysis uncured, Alexander Wooll-
colt writes in the North American
Review. The soldier who goes back
to his old dugout in the woods near
Grand Pre- is likely to find that only
the steady rains have reshaped it, that
the old helmet the shell-hit blew from
his head still lies where it fell two
years ago and more. The villages Of
the Meuse, the Ourcq, the Vesle and
the Aisne look much as they did when
the American troops trudged out OF
them for the last time. 1t is true that
the rubble Is gone from the streets,
and the litter of stone has been re-
duced to neat piles Of assorted pieces.
Here and there rough new cottage
has been fashioned from the materials
Of its demolished predecessor. At in
tervals there are unfamiliar shacks
and barracks. But on the whole Mont
faucon and Fere- en-TardenOis and Ju-
vigny-they all look much as they did
when the Yanks started home. Vaux
that little Marine village which the ar
tillery behind the ninth infantry blew
to bits in the excitement Of June, 1918
-Vaux has only one new building. 1t
Is not much Of a building at that-just
a shack Of wood and taxpayer. And
it is not a dwelling at all. 1t is q
buvette.
Where improvements Are Seen.
It is in the spaces between the vii
lagos that the change is so remark
able. You see it even in the rolling
land Of the Argonne and the blasted
countryside Of the Chemin- des-D Danes.
For almost everywhere some tilling
has been done.
Visitors to the American graves near
Juvigny in the spring of 1919 marveled
to find that the old quarries along
the ravine on the side Of the town,
which had once served as divisional
headquarters, message centers and
dugouts in time of battle, were then
serving as homes for the first six OF
the returning families, so that children
were playing with the useless gas
masks out in front while Spartan
percentages bloomed at cave en-
frances and the weeks wash tapped
in the wind.
Now another winter and another
summer have gone by. The fields near
by have been largely cleared of their
wire and shells and have yielded some
food and a little income to Juvigny. |
Perhaps 200 people are back in the
town.
1t is because Of this scantiness of |
reconstruction as far as home build
ing goes that, as you walk along a
ruined street, Juvigny seems de-
serted city. But it is hardly that and
you realize as much with something |
of a thrill when in clearing amid
the rubble, you come upon barrack
and catch through the windows the
unmistakable drone of childish voices. |
1t is a school and glance through |
the window shows row on row of pig
tailed girls and blacksmocked boys |
declaiming the fact that the Amazon
is river in fAmerique du Sud or that |
Ceylon is an island where the tea |
comes from.
School In a Barracks.
Laboring with them patiently, his
brow furrowed by his sense of the
time that has been lost, you see
young Frenchman. Perhaps
he was corporal at Verdun when the
armistice was signed.
AS the American in France sees all
the preposterous havoc and blight still
in force, he finds himself thinking of
pleasant suburbs back in America,
comfortable, well fed America, of tidy
lawns and children romping off to
school, of country clubs and poker
games and silk stockings and squan-
dered wealth. And Of people who say:
"Oh, forget about the war;" And he
begins to feel a certain tingling re-
sentiment at America.
But then the train wheezes into
Paris and his taxi whirls him away to
boulevards all gay with bustling peo-
ole and restaurants with groaning ia
bles and such food and drink as only
the Old World knows. He sees luxury
and ease and extravaganza on every
side and he realizes then that all the
selfishness and forgetfulness in the