THE CHINA MAIL, AUGUST 13, 1940
Page: 7
CHINA MAI An Englishwoman's
WHY WE FIGHT
M. Duhamel has ob
more
Dear A
who had
a whole
.
Letter
the
✡
•
Of course, as yet no one knows
.
itical creed of world domination, Here in England no one has
can only be met by a mightier Itime to be tired, and men I know
force. Yet we know, too, that retired into a life of
(even a mightier force would not simple,' gentle, comfort in the
bring the victory and the libera- served in a little book, country, but who have taken up
tion for all that we crave if we some form of work, several out\
had not undivided unity, bind- "Why France Fights," with the mine-sweepere, knowing
ing all political parties into one determined... and harmonious that, whereas in Britain little rest day or night, say they
have never felt better in their Out of it all, too, will come the horror and anguish we know must whole. In that is our strength, and France attention had lives. The whole country seems greatest good for individuals that be dispelled, and that the world
caught up into a great unity of we have yet known,, for it has will dispel. "All is well" mthat and the spirit behind been drawn
[whole nation, which would have magnificent, spite of all the dark nightmare to be seen and felt to be under- and selflessness. Of course, there are revealed something
exceptions-the usual grumblers, not only in a few, but in all: awe have been forced to face and
(stood. more to the problem of opposers and pacifists (I have a kind of new ardour in every face, look squarely at..
great reverence for the truly spir-young and old, and a great quiet, Outwardly life goes on much the machine and its dan-itual ones), and there are tremen-a gentle and considerate serenity. the same as it did two months ger to moral civilisation, dous difficulties to be overcome it is greater than all the reports, ago, yet we are living in a com-
in mobilising
the essays, the books, the country
ex-pletely changed England, in a ra- in the totalitarian States materially, physically and spirit-planations, the talks, the rumours, pidly changing world. Incredible what will happen; one lives each
the divisions,
hour under a certain suspense, the partisanships; things happen each day and we which is purely physical, for there ually, to gather itself together for
for it bears the look of complete are all accustomed then had given all their a great final effort.
to the new
is great calm and quiet in every- One feels here that we are liv-and assured certitude, which is work for every hand; to the coun- energy to the task of de-
the thing that gives fing and sharing in the most stu-
one. But we do know that num- fearless try places filled with the evacuat-bers are not the final word in war veloping the machine as pendous revolution in all of his-sirength to every conscience. ed children and those demanding
That which is evil in men's One feels the instrument of arbi-, evil for the world, enslav-hearts in flight, and all that poc-raid warnings, shelters and sand-
the unity of high attention; to gas masks and air-any more than in any other pro- cess. One great artist is worth more than Atty supers, and I trary and unscrupulousing in every way, has come burn- tic splendour which has produced bags, anti-aircraft-guns, the sound have heard a chorus of twenty
surface like an in poetry itself the unbroken tra-down here of far-off gun fire! power. It is strange that ingly up to the
sing more gloriously and erupting volcano, and that is dtion of a people, whose natural and cannonading and explosions; than a poor one of ifty. Quality, the Governments of the well, for it must not only be speech almost is poetry and whose to the complete black-out that not quantity-the free spirit in
stenimed or stayed but vanquish-thinking and actions are so full hides this little island as if democratic peoples
face of how many robots-is the ed for good and all, for the good of the quality of great laughter were almost an uninhabited so slow to see this new of all.
answer. Of course, if Hitler and It is like some great civil and happiness.
We may
have world, so dense, so dark and So his Government decide to loose danger.
war for the liberation of mankind fogs and mists and all kinds of silent are the nights except for their enormous forces in the air, from the quagmire into which it disturbances and criticisms and he great searchlights that sweep under the sea, and on the land, The historian has re-is sinking-a kind of materialis-arguments, but at heart it still is the sky in magnificent arching we are all fully awake to what marked that the triumph tense ambitions, and little vain- because I have been so "interna- here, as we are right on the coast,
tie lethargy, full of fears and in-Merry England," and somehow, splendour at certain times. Down will happen..
Not a day passes that we do not of ideals in the world has glorious narrow nationalisms. tional" all my life, I see this little they are especially watchful and realise more and more what it is
Behind the voices of our wis-Island with a Jong depended largely on the est and greatest men we hear the tive. No country
perspec-powerful,
that we are combatting. And that can be truly
is why all over this country, so weapons of war, that it music of a great determination, merry unless its heart is at peace,
mobilised and yet so unmilitary, to resolve it all into some ma-its purpose sure, and its spiritual was the Macedonian spear jestic harmony, some great con-convictions above
atmosphere of good any creed England has made a mighty ef-we find an that brought Greek cul-cord of nations, whose ideal will ritual or restricted form. fort and as always, when there is will, of something both cheerful do not not be trade or martial suprem- I feel these gifts pouring out on gars description.
the need and call, one that beg-and gentle. You, who
know England, and have never ture to Asia and the Span-jacy or petty safety, or economic me every day, and that is why I sure and without tyranny, it has seen the tender, brooding loveli- ish sword that enabled ascendancy and the controlling must sing for you this paean of all taken place.
were
dream of ceaseless
Rome to give her tradi-ling.. tion to the modern world. This is a half-truth, a| half-truth of capital im- portance at this moment.
PUBLIC OPINION
or
✡
it
Without pres-
little country country, within હૈ few short enveloped
army men,
fully
autunn un-
an
money-mak-gratitude to this
A mobilised ness of this small island, either
in her soft where I found birth, and from months an army, and an
mists or the bloom of her where I set sail over forty-three of helpers here at home
paralleled spring, can hardly im- years ago, to your country, which women and
agine what I mean. When it steals young people, ini
the
of consciousness also is so bathed in the splendour every branch of helpful, protec- into of human ideals, love of liberty, tive work. I have friends who, American or a foreigner it leaves and spiritual convictions, and a few
Jan indelible impression, such as short weeks ago, were horror of hate and bitterness and pianoplaying
do the poems of Keats or Shelley, or acting, writing]
or that long unbroken line of poets or typing, or just being of happy who carry the torch of the parti leisure, now either in the A.R.cular genius of this country. When doing telephone work, car driv
one roads of the great wrongs ing, land work, cooking, nursing, still to be righted-of poverty, and Nazi tyranny had been the press to a stricter cen- The days speed by, and we are for any of a thousand and one innumerable distresses of unem-
If the Great War were There are still to-day, inferuelly. to end to-day we should this day and age, persons have to conclude that the who would like to subject|
*
:
* - *
able to establish itself by sorship, and would apply busy, doing the things that
of necessity ever more and more things to keep a country going ployment and bad housing, either
who
are with two millions overseas, Au
here or in America-the heart the discovery of the new this not only to news but most helpful
in the way
of increased navy, coast and sea and sinks. But these things Ere uses to which iron and also to the expression of the men on
making and sending comforts for land patrols, and all the supplies acknowledged and faced and dis- unceasing vigil on and help needed for what may cussed by a free people, in free steel could be put for the views.
boh sea and land, and taking be a long, long war! destruction of life.
care of those needing help
speech, I am grateful to say. The Such an extension of
Never in our history, have we But behind und above and are with us...
been led by so many good, hu-around all these stil! machine
existing has overrun the censorship could not I can look back and look for-mane, and peace-loving men. evils lies an Indomitable attitude France. But to conclude be justified on the ground ward, for it is as if I were on a They all abhor war but that does that is by far the most important that it must enslave the of anything that has hap at so much beauty and heroism, quite aware that force of such a crisis that confronts us.
very quick journey, looking out not mean that they are not now quality of British thinking in the world is to forget that pened under the present far surmounting any pain and ruthless kind, with such a fana-l
and
Yours, E
Petit Paris de l'Amerique,
pennants There is still a Paris of gaiety the city like a silver eel, and the bright
miles across
across- the
men can meet its threat system. Nor could it be by what Bacon called justified by consideration| "the sinews and steel of of the public interest, to men's minds, wit, cour-which, indeed, it might be age, audacity, resolution, disastrous. Many of those temper, and industry." ¡who were observers in
To the British peoples France think that the and charm, daughter of that other business of the Port of New Or-day, and women leaning out the there falls the heroic duty collapse was in part due Paris, more than three thousand leans goes on oblivious of that shuttered windows gossiping with the sea, where wit other world also within the loose-leach other. Or there will be si- of organising and collect- to the gagging of the and art still Bourish and liber-ly spread-out confines of La Nou-lence, the sun, and a cat or a dog. ing these natural forces press, So that public ality and hospitality are no stran-velle-Orleans-a little world six-This would be at noon, when all gers. A Paris that Americans ty-six city blocks in area, as ty-sensible people take their siesta. matching them opinion was not well in-happily can visit to-day, and pically French as the Paris we Like as not the music of this
a hot
summer's Petit Paris will be expressing it- against the Nazi levia-formed, was not prepared which has already over the years all loved. Of
endeared itself to thousands, day you may see the less enter-self in tretful scales laboriously than. It would be strange for what happened,
and down a tiny and hides away deep in the heart of prising shopkeepers tilting back pounded up if the people whose gen-was in no position to in-old New Orleans. French Town, in their shirt-sleeves against their piano, or an off-key popular piece it is familiarly called, better buildings, feet hooked around the in alternately jerky-fast and in-" ius gave the world the am-spire and uphold the GOV-known to the world as the French rungs of their straight chairs, quiring-slow measures on the ju biguous blessings of the ernment. In the British Quarter, or Quartier francais, ly- Women call each other, "Cherie," venile saxophone. The afternoons the ing on "the other side" of Canal shoo their children. away with are hot and quiet between Industrial Revolu-Isles; it. was public opin-Street. To-day a new city ordin-some fondly scolding French busy morning and the awakening
from phrase.
Jevening, but any time before the tion were unable to armion acting through a freelance protects the Quarter
undesired modernisation.
midday dinner, from early morn- freedom as powerfully as press and through Parlia- She is bold, this other Paris,
ing on, you can hear the phono- the Nazis have armed ment which, late and only This Petit Paris of every Mississip- There is another French Quar-graph singing away in its bright The advent of farm boy's ter, branching off from Royal canned. fashion. tyranny.
just in time, gave us the dreams. At night bright music tin- Street and the antique shops. This the radio: doubtless is inevitable, We have lived as a present war Government.kles from her open-doored cafes, part of our Petit Paris is shy and but thus far the phonograph seems
Again, she brings you back to must be wooed. You
queen of Orst to still be the people during the last ten It is not Government or yesterday in the old Caruso re- glimpse her through some fi-people's heart. years at half-power in Parliament or press that cords they will play for you if greed iron gateway, in the play they know you at Joe's, while of a fountain in a courtyard,| Europe. To-day a sum-can by itself save the you wind your spaghetti medita where the palms and banana trees Little Paris, other Paris, you mons has come such as country and bring vic-lively, leaning on the red-check-catch any small breeze that may are the repository of the Gaelic ed cloth. She can be sentimen- be attracted there. For blocks warmth and repartee, the grace- no man living can remem-tory. That will be done tal, too this Paris of the New and blocks there are courtyards ful adaptation of circumstances ber to our spirit, our cour-by the people, which, World, If you stroll to her across catering to tourists who want "at-to your way of living the sane- the moonlight of Jackson Square mosphere" with their food--and tuary of the hard-pressed and the age, our tenacity, our self-apart from its daily task, and watch the cloud shapes over get it.
quick-paced, the slow student and discipline and self-sacri-will assert its will the Cabildo; or fancy some figure But the patient searcher is the dilettante, who make up the
of the past sedately regarding you rewarded. There are yet court-kmeidoscope world we call fice. The French collapse through all three chan-over her black lace fan on the yards neither commercialised nor It is yours to interpret to us may be a help to us, if it nels. Among these it uses balcony of the building. across, exclusively locked against in-what that other, that buried, Paris makes us
where once the Baroness Pontal-Įtruders, and here the curious, not is trying to say to us. to-day. realise that a free press as a means of ba held court.
the curiosity seeker, will be led "Conquered, I will rise again." nothing less than our full informing itself and of Above the banana trees and the and may enter.
How long? high leveo loom the hulks and Cobblestoned, the old court- Meantime, the wisdom and the strength can save us, and watching, criticising with masts of ships. Now and then a yards, and the grass between the suavity, the carefree irresponsi- that if we can find that discretion, and promoting her answers; or the one goes paradox of geraniums in a rusted Gallic temperament are precious- river boat tries out its voice and stones. Here you will see the bility and the shrewdness, of the full strength and exert it by all possible means the monning mournfully down the tin while oleanders or poinsettias ly preserved in New Orleans. May freedom will survive here most resolute conduct of night, finding no echo as it ex-(depending on the scason) its French Quarter always be pre-
bloom and in Europe.
plores the crescent.
beneath. Here you served; By day the river curves about will see washing strung like
the war.
Louisiana pi., and
I
.1
this
art.
R.J.S.