The armistice changed all about. Our military ports in France had to become ports for the embarkation of troops with an equipment vastly expanded. America had sent to France an Army perfectly clothed and accoutered. For the sake of uniformity the home ports of embarkation had prepared the 2,000,000 troops for the voyage, and this meant issuing smaller or larger quantities of clothing and other personal articles to practically every man who sailed. The A. E. F. proposed to return its men to their homes well dressed, clean, and self-respecting, and it was logical, too, to accomplish this purpose in France in the process of embarking the troops. To carry out the plan, however, required an extensive plant, something not to be materialized by a wave of the hand. France after the armistice was to witness an extensive military construction carried on by the Americans at their ports. Brest, Bordeaux, and St. Nazaire had been the three principal landing places for our troops sent to France directly from the United States. Brest, near the northeasternmost extremity of France, possessed a harbor with water that could accommodate the largest ships afloat, but the water near shore was too shallow for docks at which large ships could berth. Consequently the troops rode in lighters between ships and shore. This was Brest’s chief disadvantage as a military port, but it was not a serious disadvantage. Next southward came St. Nazaire, on the Loire River a few miles inland. The first of the expeditionary troops landed at St. Nazaire, in July, 1917. The port boasted of docks with berths for troopships, but the waters of the river were too shallow for the largest transports. Still farther south was Bordeaux, fifty-two miles from the ocean on the Gironde River. What few troops landed at Bordeaux were incidental, for the port construction at Bordeaux and other great developments at Bassens and Pauillac nearer the mouth of the river were conducted by the A. E. F. with the view of making the Gironde the chief ocean terminal for the reception of army supplies shipped from the United States. Troopships could tie up to the docks at Bordeaux, but the Gironde was so narrow and its tidal currents were so swift that the military administration of the port had to manage the stream on a schedule as it might operate a single-track railroad. There were several places in the river where vessels could not pass each other.