it. Thousands of these exemplary women of the
bourgeoisie--hundreds of thousands--care little or nothing for
"society." They call at stated intervals, upon which ceremonious
occasion they drink coffee and eat pastry; give their young people
dances when the exact conventional moment has arrived for putting them
on the market, and turn out in force at the great periodicities of
life, but otherwise to live and die in the bosom of The Family is the
measure of their ambition.

I shall have a good deal to say later of the possible results of the
vast upheaval of home life caused by this war; but of these women
sitting for hours on end in a back room of Mlle. Javal's central
establishment in Paris it is only necessary to state that they looked
as intent upon making cigarettes in a professional manner, beyond
cavil by the canny poilu, as if they were counting the family linen or
superintending one of the stupendous facts of existence, a daughter's
trousseau. Only the one to whom I was introduced raised her eyes, and
I should not have been expected to distract her attention for a moment
had not she told Mlle. Javal that she had read my books (in the
Tauchnitz edition) and would like to meet me when I called.

It seemed to me that everything conceivable was in those large
storerooms. I had grown used to seeing piles of sleeping-suits,
sleeping-bags, trench slippers, warm underclothes, sabots, all that is
comprised in the word _vetement_; but here were also immense boxes of
books and magazines, donated by different firms and editors, about to
be shipped to the depots; games of every sort; charming photogravures,
sketches, prints, pictures, that would make the baraques gay and
beloved--all to be interspersed, however, with mottoes from famous
writers calculated to elevate not only the morale but the morals of
the idle.

Then there were cases of handkerchiefs, of pens and paper, pencils,
songs with and without music, knives, pipes, post-cards, razors,
parasiticides, chocolate, vaseline, perfumes (many of these articles
are donations from manufacturers), soap in vast quantities; books
serious and diverting; pamphlets purposed to keep patriotism at fever
pitch, or to give the often ignorant peasant soldier a clear idea of
the designs of the enemy.

In small compartments at one end of the largest of the rooms were
exhibited the complete installations of the baraques, the portable
beds, kitchen and dining-room utensils and dishes,