erman is a critic of war. But so is every Frenchman a critic of
war. The criticism I now hear is the best spoken criticism, utterly
impartial, that I have heard.

"In sum," says the grey-headed stockbroker, "there disengages
itself from the totality of the facts an impression, tolerably clear, that
all goes very well on the West front."

Which is reassuring. But the old lady, invincible after seven-and-a-
half decades spent in the hard acquirement of wisdom, will not be
reassured. She is not alarmed, but she will not be reassured. She
treats the two men with affectionate malice as children. She knows
that "those birds"--that is to say, the Germans--will never be beaten,
because they are for ever capable of inventing some new trick.

She will not sit still. A bit of talk, and she runs off with the agility
of a girl to survey her household; then returns and cuts into the
discussion.

"If you are coming to lunch, Bennett," she says, "come before
Monday, because on Monday my cook takes herself away, and as
for the new one, I should dare to say nothing. . . . You don't know,
Bennett, you don't know, that at a given moment it was impossible
to buy salt. I mean, they sold it to you unwillingly, in little screws of
paper. It was impossible to get enough. Figure that to yourself, you
from London! As for chicory for the morning cafe-au-lait, it existed
not. Gold could not buy it."

And again she said, speaking of the fearful days in September
1914:

"What would you? We waited. My little coco is nailed there. He
cannot move without a furniture-van filled with things essential to his
existence. I did not wish to move. We waited, quite simply. We
waited for them to come. They did not come. So much the better
That is all."

I have never encountered anything more radically French than the
temperament of this aged woman.

Next: the luxury quarter--the establishment of one of those
fashionable dressmakers whom you patronise, and whose bills
startle all save the most hardened. She is a very handsome woman.
She has a husband and two little boys. They are all there. The
husband is a retired professional soldier. He has a small and easy
post in a civil administration, but his real work is to keep his wife's
books. In August he was re-engaged, and ready to lead soldiers
under fire in the fortified camp which Gallieni has evolved out of the
environs of Paris; but the need passed, and the uniform was laid
aside. The two little boys