One
Eyed Dah-veed (as it was pronounced of course) had been in prison at
Noyon during the German occupation, which he described fully and without
hyperbole--stating that no one could have been more considerate or just
than the commander of the invading troops. Dah-veed had seen with his own
eyes a French girl extend an apple to one of the common soldiers as the
German army entered the outskirts of the city: "'Take it,' she said, 'you
are tired.'--'Madame,' answered the German soldier in French, 'thank
you'--and he looked in his pocket and found ten cents. 'No, no,' the
young girl said. 'I don't want any money. I give it to you with good
will.'--'Pardon, madame,' said the soldier, 'you must know that a German
soldier is forbidden to take anything without paying for it.'"--And
before that, One Eyed Dah-veed had talked at Noyon with a barber whose
brother was an aviator with the French Army: "'My brother,' the barber
said to me, 'told me a beautiful story the other day. He was flying over
the lines, and he was amazed, one day, to see that the French guns were
not firing on the boches but on the French themselves. He landed
precipitously, sprang from his machine and ran to the office of the
general. He saluted, and cried in great excitement: "General, you are
firing on the French!" The general regarded him without interest, without
budging; then, he said, very simply: "They have begun, they must
finish.
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