Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-07-27
BACKGROUND OF EVENTS
BY PAUL Y. COLLINS,

American tourists are mobbed in the
streets of Paris, and exaggerated
run1ors forecast the need of extra
police protection of the American en-
bassy.
What is it all about? What will
account for the radical reversal of
that mutual cordially between the
French and Americans when Presi-
dent Wilson first arrived in Paris to
aid in the Versailles settlement Of the
World War? The French then lauded
the service of the American Expedi-
tionary Force and American financial
and diplomatic aid in the greatest
crisis that country had ever faced.
An official of the United States
FGovernment, familiar with France,
rates the responsibility, as divided
between French hoodluns and Amer
lean snobs, at about $3.50. That
leaves out Of the calculation prac-
tically all of the average citizens of
both countries, as well as all the Off
cials of any standing; likewise most
of the press.
There is a picture which easily
comes to the mind of any one who
has ever seen fishermen draw a net
at sea, and beheld the catch writhing
and tearing each other in indiscrim-
mating desperation. There is no diff
ferentiation in such a net between
friend and enemy: every touch be-
comes a deadly attack, and one fren-
Zfed fish snaps at the tail nearest, or
another stabs it's friendliest contact.
France is writhing in the net drawn
by her political paTtisans in power,
and as there is no party or bloc strong
enough TO face the opposition of the
combination of all other blocs, the net
wraps around all, and the writhing
passes all degrees of desperation
Can any American fancy seeing
foreigner in a hotel, railway station
or street in Washington openly
sneering at American institutions,
ridiculing American policies and GUS
toms, laughing at our public officials
in toplofty, insulting, supercilious
manner, without resentful indigna-
ton? There are obsequious Ameri-
cans who deprecate the best of Amer
lean institutions and apologize that
we are not equal to dukes and counts
of Europe, but let even such snobs
overhear similar insults from a for
eigner and their faces will flush with
anger. If the odds be not too over
whelming at the moment, there is
likely to be more than verbal protest.
If the insulted Americans chance to
have been fighters in the war; few of
us would be surprised to behold the
policy of treat 'em-rough" put into
action by the would-be patriots"
In Paris there are American tour
lists who seek to display their con-
tempt for the French by plastering the
windows of incoming railway coaches
with deprecated francs. They sneer
at the French statesmen-as if they
themselves were past masters in world
economics. At the park of Versailles
they feed the carp with whole loaves
of bread, forgetting that it was there
that Queen Marie Antoinette lost her
head because she, too, failed in CON-
prehension of the desperation of peo-
pie who lacked bread to feed their
settled and funded for 60 years pay
starving children.
X X X \
There is another picture of France
not too old to retain clear outlines.
Not hoodlum is in this picture, but
| it is more truly typical.
/ Time: January, 1918. Location:
| Somewhere in France" where an
| American soldier boy had been acct
dentally killed while from the top OF
an electric light pole he was watching
an American game of base ball be-
tween doughboys in camp. Being a
/ Protestant, he was buried in uncon-
secrated ground, adjoining a Catholic
| cemetery, the bit of fence being taken
down by the considerate French, that
there might be less mark of shutting
/ out the American from their sympa-
thy. The A. e. F. had not yet begun
| to fall by the thousands.
A week later the FLU took another
Americana Y. M. G.. A. man--and
as the military cortege carried his
body to an open grave alongside the
| first, it was noted that that first
! American grave had been carefully
srnoothed and upon the mound there
| was a little heap of white pebbles, in
the center of which was bunch of
| fresh violets and a card bearing only
these words; "Une Mere Franchise.