Part 17 (1/2)
These letters roused the enthusias resolution was passed by acclaovernment shall have an inscription placed in the Pantheon to perpetuate the hest aspirations
On Nove letters were solemnly read aloud in every school, and Guynemer was presented as an example to all French schoolboys
The army then prepared to celebrate Guynemer as a leader, and in default of any place suitable for such a ceremony they selected the camp of Saint-Pol-sur-Mer, whence Guyneht On Nove the First Ar the Flemish British sector where he had so brilliantly assisted in the success, decided to associate his lorification of Guyne A raw breeze was blowing off the sea, whose violence the daround, was not sufficient to break In front of the battalion which had been sent to render the is bearing the s To the left, in front of the airures were visible, one in black, one in horizon blue: Captain Heurtaux still on his crutches, the other _sous-lieutenant_ Fonck The former was to be ion of Honor Heurtaux, a fair-haired, delicate, al er, had been, as we have said, our Roland's Oliver, his companion of old days, his rival and his confidant Fonck, whom I called Aymerillot because of his s, the hope of the ed Guyne to the _Kolnische Zeitung_, had boasted in a letter to his people of having brought down the most famous French aviator ”Don't be afraid on erous eneain” Now, on Septeh the head as the latter was piloting a Rumpler machine above the French lines
While the band was playing the _Marseillaise_, accoale and of the sea, as well as of the airplanes circling above, General Anthoine stepped out in front of the row of flags His powerful frahts of old, as, silhouetted against the cloudy sky, he towered above the two di The band stopped playing, and the general spoke, his voice rising and falling in the wind, and swelling to a higher pitch when the ele almost on the spot where Guynemer had departed froht
”I have not sue he has a right to frorave No trace could be found in Poelcapelle of his mortal remains, as if the heavens, jealous of their hero, had not consented to return to earth what seeht, and as if Guyneh a miraculous assumption Therefore we shall omit, on this spot froenerally concluding the lives of ht of the Air, without fear or reproach
”Men coo, but France relory, and her splendor is made up of their worth Happy is he who enriches the coift of himself
Happy then the child of France whose superhu! Glory be to hilory be to his, sacred embles of the second aeronautical unit and of the First Army, you keep in the mystery of your folds the memory of virtue, devotion, and sacrifice of every kind, to hand down to future generations the treasures of our national traditions!
”Flags, the souls of our heroes live in you, and when your fluttering silk is heard, it is indeed their voice bidding us go fros, keep the soul of Guynemer forever Let it raise up and multiply heroes in his likeness! Let it exalt to resolution the hearts of neophytes eager to avenge the ive theendary hero!
”For the only hoe he expects from his companions is the continuation of his work
”In the briefmen see, as in a vision, the whole past and the whole future, if Guynemer knew a comfort it was the certainty that his coun
”You, his friends and rivals, I knoell; I know that, like Guynemer, you can be trusted, that you meet bravely the formidable task he has bequeathed to you, and that you will fulfil the hopes which France had reposed in him
”It is to confirht to witness it, that I alad to confer on two of his cohters, distinctions which are at the salory”
Then the general gave the accolade and embraced Heurtaux, now less dependent on his crutches, and Fonck, suddenly grown taller, children of glory, both of them, and still pale frolory He pinned the badges on their coats
After this he added, in a lull of the conflicting elerateful adet, of whom it was so proud, and whose h he be, a uides us, if we kno to follow hi the triumphal hich, over ruins, to”
Of itself, thanks to this religious conclusion of the general's ode, the ceremony had assumed a sort of sacred character, and the hich concludes prayers, the A priest, naturally caeneral saluted with his sword the invisible spirit of the hero, and the blasts of the bugles rose above the gale and the sea
VI IN THE PANTHeON
In the Pantheon crypt, destined, as the inscription says, for the burial of great raven on a marble slab cemented in the wall The proper inscription for this slab will be the young soldier's last citation:
FALLEN ON THE FIELD OF HONOR ON SEPTEMBER 11, 1917 A LEGENDARY HERO, FALLEN FROM THE VERY ZENITH OF VICTORY AFTER THREE YEARS'
HARD AND CONTINUOUS FIGHTING HE WILL BE CONSIDERED THE MOST PERFECT EMBODIMENT OF THE NATIONAL QUALITIES FOR HIS INDOMITABLE ENERGY AND PERSEVERANCE AND HIS EXALTED GALLANTRY FULL OF INVINCIBLE BELIEF IN VICTORY, HE HAS BEQUEATHED TO THE FRENCH SOLDIER AN IMPERISHABLE MEMORY WHICH MUST ADD TO HIS SELF-SACRIFICING SPIRIT AND WILL SURELY GIVE RISE TO THE nobLEST EMULATION
”To deserve such a citation and die!” exclai it
In his poem, _Le Vol de la Marseillaise_, Rostand shows us the twelve Victories seated at the Invalides around the to to welcome their sister, the Victory of the Marne At the Pantheon, in the crypt where they rest, Marshal Lannes and General Marceau, Lazare Carnot, the organizer of victory, and Captain La Tour d'Auvergne will rise in their turn on this young nize at once one of the knights in his _Legende des Siecles_, and Berthelot will look upon his co as an evidence of the fervor of youth for France as well as for science But of them all, Marceau, his elder brother, killed at twenty-seven, will be thein the Rhine Valley soe to Marceau's tomb, outside Coblenz, just above the Moselle
In a little wood stands a black ilt letters:
Here lieth Marceau, a soldier at sixteen, a general at twenty-tho died fighting for his country the last day of the year IV of the Republic Whoever you may be, friend or foe, respect the ashes of this hero