City of beauty, built out of the dreams of great artists and great poets,
I have watched you through this time of war, walking through your
silent streets in the ordeal of most dreadful days, mingling with your
crowds when a multitude of cripples dragged their lopped limbs
thiough the sunlight, studying your moods of depression, and
hopefulness, and passionate fervour, wandering in your churches,
your theatres and your hospitals, and lingering on mild nights under
the star-strewn sky which made a vague glamour above your
darkness; and always my heart has paid a homage to the spirit which
after a thousand years of history and a thousand million crimes, still
holds the fresh virtue of ardent youth, the courage of a gallant race,
and a deathless faith in the fine, sweet, gentle things of art and life.
The Germans, however great their army, could never have captured
the soul of Paris.
Chapter IX
The Soldiers Of France
1
When in the first days of the war I saw the soldiers of France on their
way to the front, I had even then a conviction that the fighting qualities
of the nation had not degenerated in forty-four years of peace, after
the downfall in which the courage of the men had been betrayed by
the corruption of a Government.
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