The 42nd Parallel

The Camera Eye (27)

there were priests and nuns on the Espagne the Atlantic was glassgreen and stormy covers were clamped on the portholes and all the decklights were screened and you couldn’t light a match on deck

but the stewards were very brave and said the Boche wouldn’t sink a boat of the Compagnie Generale anyway, because of the priests and nuns and the Jesuits and the Comité des Forges promising not to bombard the Bassin de la Brieye where the big smelters were and stock in the company being owned by the Prince de Bourbon and the Jesuits and the priests and nuns

anyhow everybody was very brave except for Colonel and Mrs. Knowlton of the American Red Cross who had waterproof coldproof submarineproof suits like eskimosuits and they wore them and they sat up on deck with the suits all blown up and only their faces showing and there were firstaid kits in the pockets and in the belt there was a waterproof container with milkchocolate and crackers and maltedmilk tablets

and in the morning you’d walk round the deck and there would be Mr. Knowlton blowing up Mrs. Knowlton

or Mrs. Knowlton blowing up Mr. Knowlton

the Roosevelt boys were very brave in stiff visored new American army caps and sharpshooter medals on the khaki whipcord and they talked all day about We must come in We must come in

as if the war were a swimming pool

and the barman was brave and the stewards were brave they’d all been wounded and they were very glad that they were stewards and not in the trenches

and the pastry was magnificent

at last it was the zone and a zigzag course we sat quiet in the bar and then it was the mouth of the Gironde and a French torpedoboat circling round the ship in the early pearl soft morning and the steamers following the little patrolboat on account of the minefields the sun was rising red over the ruddy winegrowing land and the Gironde was full of freighters and airplanes in the sun and battleships

the Garonne was red it was autumn there were barrels of new wine and shellcases along the quays in front of the grayfaced houses and the masts of stocky sailboats packed in against the great red iron bridge

at the Hotel of the Seven Sisters everybody was in mourning but business was brisk on account of the war and every minute they expected the government to come down from Paris

up north they were dying in the mud and the trenches but business was good in Bordeaux and the winegrowers and the shipping agents and the munitionsmakers crowded into the Chapon Fin and ate ortolans and mushrooms and truffles and there was a big sign

MEFIEZ-VOUS

les oreilles enemies vous écoutent

red wine twilight and yellowgravelled squares edged with wine-barrels and a smell of chocolate in the park gray statues and the names of streets

Street of Lost Hopes, Street of the Spirit of the Laws, Street of Forgotten Footsteps

and the smell of burning leaves and the grayfaced Bourbon houses crumbling into red wine twilight

at the Hotel of the Seven Sisters after you were in bed late at night you suddenly woke up and there was a secretserviceagent going through your bag

and he frowned over your passport and peeped in your books and said Monsieur c’est la petite visite