It is a quiet stream that a child could ford without danger. It flows slowly and sweetly from the mother hills to the embracing sea. A few arched bridges leap from one low bank to another. It has not cut deep into the land of 15 France but it has cut deep into the heart of France. It is one of the ribbons of victory and glory that France will always wear across her breast. And it is a ribbon made red by the blood of the men of France who have died for France.
And yet we of America would call it a little stream, and 20 old men would fish all day in it from a shaded velvet point, and boys swimming would hunt some favorite Devil's Hole where they might dive.
For four years now it has flowed peacefully on while 25 men have fought to scar its banks with trenches--burrowing themselves into the earth as only the muskrat had done in the forgotten days of peace. Strong, unafraid men came from the ends of the world to die by its side. And it would have gladly sung them a sweet, low lullaby, crooning a song 30 with which mothers on the shores of all the seven seas had once rocked them to sleep--only now the sound of heavy firing, dull booms of the cannon, and the spit and nervous drum of the machine gun, made its song as futile and indistinguishable as the whisper of a child in the roar of a mob. 5
What a story its sweet waters had to tell to all the rivers of the world when they met in the broad sea: a tale of strange men who fought and died that it might still be a part of France; a tale of deeds of glory and of valor and of sacrifice. And some of these men had come from faraway 10 America to this little river, this stream so tiny and so modest that it might have forever remained unknown and unsung.
After all, what does size matter--except the size of the 15 heart and of the soul?
The great Mississippi, the mystic Amazon, the majestic Hudson, the wide Danube--all mighty in power and commerce!
The Yser, the Aisne, the Oise, the Somme, the Marne--little 20 streams of France; old brooks as precious as Thermopylæ or Bunker Hill!
1. What three rivers are discussed? For what does each stand?
2. Explain the French schoolgirl's letter. Which party, to her, represented justice?
3. What great general is called the "Hero of the Marne"? Why?