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Show DUNKIRK CHILDREN GOING TO SCHOOLS, DESPITE BOMBING Youngsters, Sometimes Timid When Shells Are Flying, Are Reminded of Brave Records of Their Ancestors. "THE FIGHTING FLEETS." By RALPH D. PAINE. (Copyright, 1918, by Ralph D. Paine.) (3y special arrangement with Houghton Mifflin Co.) INSTALMENT 24. The French Trawlers. THIS Monsieur Terquem, a soldier sol-dier of France, had taught his people to conquer fear, to believe be-lieve in their souls that death was a little matter so long as their city lived and moved and had its being. It was all true what the merchant and the naval lieutenant had said in the cellar of the cafe, what this heroic mayor affirmed without with-out the slightest thought of boasting. The evidence was there to behold with one's eyes and daylight revealed it at every turn. No longer veiled by darkness, Dunkirk displayed her ruins, almost every house scarred with fragments of bombs and shell, every pane of glass broken, desolated desolat-ed buildings in all the streets. Yes, there were the children flocking flock-ing to school, those somewhat older taking the courses in bookkeeping, sewing, nursing, stenography, which were offered by the Ecole Pratique de Commerce et d'Industrie. They were building for the future of France. Children Behave During Bombing. It was this spirit which had organized organ-ized an exposition of the industries of Dunkirk which was successfully conducted in 1D15 during the ordeal of frequent bombardments. A schoolteacher school-teacher was asked how she was able to compel the attention cf the children chil-dren who lived in peril of their lives. "Ah. there are some whose minds wander," was the reply, "who axe not diligent. To these I have only to say, 'Sons and daughters of Jean Bart, are you worthy of the past history his-tory of your city, worthy of serving the country in the tremendous drama which is now unfolding?' Will you believe it? These urchins weep, moved by the accents of reproach." It was' these children who, when gas was first used by the Germans, and before the masks were obtainable, obtain-able, made forty thousand gags or pads of cloth which the French troops plastered with mud and tied to their faces. Care is taken to nourish the little ones, to see to it that the babies grow lustily. Citizens Supplied With Pure Milk. The public nurseries and clinics have saved the lives of hundreds, and pure milk has been supplied by the city. The poor pay a small amount for such benefactions in order to preserve pre-serve what Monsieur Terquem calls the "dignity of those of humble means, that dignity which must bo ihe little blue flower of a well-organized society." Dunkirk had its municipal store of coal when the rest of France was suffering suf-fering with the intense cold of winter. win-ter. It was sold at a fixed price and no family had to go without it. During Dur-ing the early months of the war, thousands thou-sands of refugees streamed into the city from Belgium and tho north of France. Not one of them lacked food or shelter. Municipal markets have distributed great stores of potatoes, beans, butter, eggs, meat, with exact justice in the matter of price. There are no profiteers in Dunkirk, nor is there in the whole United Slates one city so efficiently and unselfishly organized or-ganized for the common weal in time of war. And this amid conditions which might well seem to have made 1)10 place uninhabitable. Naval Traditions Always Fostered. So. richly endowed with French naval na-val tra (lit ions of the past, Dunkirk is the fitting headquarters of a naval officer who has made his name illustrious illus-trious In tho present conflict, Vice Admiral Ronamh. It was he who commanded com-manded the 6000 French sailors and marines at Antwerp, at Dixmude, on ' other fields of i-ielgium during those early weeks of 19M when the German Ger-man tide of Invasion was but barely stemmed, France honors them greatly, great-ly, these officers and men who left their ships to fight and die as a forlorn for-lorn hopfc Six thousand of them went In and 2000 of them came back, but they had said, "They shall not pass!'' and the pledffe WHS l(fpt. DIxmUde, nowja heap of ruins mi-titlerably mi-titlerably gad, vis then like a peasant peas-ant in holiday V"'h nr nri, green With the livers vV-r and Handzaeme tied Lo her sirdlV .She gfla JJic V younger sister of her neighbor Bruges, offering to tired eyes a like prospect of green and leafy surprises along her ancient quays. It was the historic line of the Tser which marked the defense after the fall of Antwerp, when Dixmude was chosen as the objective of the German Ger-man onslaught and King Albert's Belgian Bel-gian army was to be brushed aside in the headlong rush to the channel ports. The Hun did not break through, and no sol di ers did m ore to t h wa r t him than Vice Admiral Monarch's fusiliers marins, these sailors used to bare feet on rolling decks who tramped the highways in forced marches of thirty kilometers a day. When the Legion of Honor was bestowed upon the vice admiral, the citation read, "For the bravery, tenacity ten-acity and indomitable energy with which lie was able to resist the attacks at-tacks of- an enemy far superior in numbers, upon whom he inflicted serious losses and victoriously maintained main-tained his own position. Directs Action of French Destroyers. Having done his duty by land, Ad-m Ad-m i ral Ronarch re tu rn ed to the sea, from his base at Dunkirk, directing the operations of the French destroyers, destroy-ers, trawlers, mine sweepers and other craft which helped to guard the channel and the strait of Dover. When I called to pay my respects he was living and working in his sandbagged sand-bagged and timbered redoubt of a dugout which had been bombed in vain. The rooms were, of course, very small a.nd gloomy, the partitions parti-tions of rough boards. The officers of the staff were tucked away, in these cubby-holes which contained a desk and a chair. In the poor light of the entrance hall I stood waiting to be escorted into the presence of a personage conspicuous for gold stripes and buttons. There presently stepped out of the nearest box stall, as you might call it, a short, muscular man in a plain blue coat whose rank was indistinguishable. indis-tinguishable. Gray hair, a gray tuft on the chin, the face of a Breton sailor, seamed and stubborn and brown; a man of the utmost simplicity simplic-ity of habit and manner, he seemed ingenuously pleased that a visitor from America should have cared to seek his acquaintance. Admiral Praises French Trawlers. The sea sets its own stamp upon those who follow it. Vice Admiral Ronarch could not have been mistaken mis-taken for a general, even at Dixmude. Dix-mude. Not to apologize, but to explain, ex-plain, he said of tho French navy: "Our trawlers, now you have seen them for yourself. They have done their share, like the Knglish fishermen fisher-men of the North sea. We had many more of the smaller torpedo boats than destroyers, and for this reason the patrol of the French coast in stormy weather has been assisted by the splendid co-opera Lion of the United States. Here in the channel we do all we can to aid the work of the British navy. There is no discord always a mutual respect and sympathy. sym-pathy. "It is realized by these allies of ours that France has found it advisable advis-able to save her strength wherever possible. The war has been long and severe. France is still virile and un-conquered, un-conquered, but she has sulfered. The navy has gladly stent its men to the trenches whenever they were needed there, as was true in the first part of the war. "Tho naval arsenals have made munitions mu-nitions for tho army. These things are not signs of weakness or exhaustion. exhaus-tion. It is that England and America Amer-ica have the greater naval resources. They aro not fighting the enemy upon their own soil. As the sailors say, "France has had to claw her way off a lee shore.' " The vice admiral was a trlflo sensitive, sen-sitive, you would have perceived mindful of certain criticisms that Franco had not done her full share afloat. He smiled with a shade of wnstfulness as he went on to say: "Our battle fleet in the Mediterranean Mediterra-nean has not been given an opportunity opportu-nity to engage the squiulrons of the enemy. There were heavy losses in the affair of the Dardanelles, but those tig ships of ours were sunk by mines and submarines. It Is an unsatisfactory un-satisfactory war for the fighting vessels. ves-sels. Otherwise, wo have done wli.it we could. You-- Admiral Wilson has been kind enough to speak highly of his relations with l he French navy on the coast of Britany." (To Be Continued.) |