When the American officer was tired of buying, I left him and sought
out the _Chicago Tribune_ office, conveniently located above Maxim’s.
The editor was there, but he was also broke, so I went back to the Ritz
and got ready for bed.
The express office will be open to-morrow and I will be a rich man.
_Lundi, 20 Août. Paris._
Went down to the express office and cashed a large part of my order.
Friends were with me, and they immediately relieved me of most of the
burden. I was hungry for lunch, having had no breakfast. Meat was what
I wanted, and meat was what I couldn’t get. Which led me to inquire
into the Rules de la vie of Paris.
1. Monday and Tuesday are meatless days.
2. All except Saturday and Sunday are heatless days. Hot baths are
impossible on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.
3. Strong liquor is procurable between noon and two P. M. and
seven-thirty and nine-thirty at night. At other times ye toper must be
content with light wines.
4. All public places except the theaters must close and douse lights at
nine-thirty in the evening.
5. There is no speed limit for taxis or privately owned cars. A
pedestrian run over and killed is liable to imprisonment. The driver is
not only innocent, but free to hurl as many French curses as he likes
at his victims. If the pedestrian is not killed, he must explain why
not to the judge.
6. It is not only permissible but compulsory to speak to any girl who
speaks to you, and a girl who won’t speak to you should be reported to
the police.
7. No watch or clock is wrong. Whatever time you have is right and you
may act accordingly.
8. Matches never ignite. A smoker must purchase a cigar or cigarette
lighter and keep it filled with essence, the française term for gas.
Sometimes the lighters work.
9. American cigarettes are not procurable. Bum ones may be bought at
any tabac store or café for only five times what they are worth.
10. Water must never be used as a thirst quencher, and seldom for any
other purpose. It’s worse than bourgeois; it’s unheard-of.
The lack of water, hot or cold, drove me to a barber shop this morning.
The barber first made me put on a shroud, and I was afraid he was
either going to cut me to pieces or talk me to death. But his operation
was absolutely painless and his incessant conversation harmless,
because I couldn’t understand a word of it.
From the barber shop I went to the information department of American
Army Headquarters. That’s where you get permits to visit our camps. But
of course, if you’ve run over here from America, you have lots of spare
time on your hands, so they’re doing you a favor if they hold you up a
few days. What is a week or so when a man’s here for a whole month?
They have queer ideas at the Maison de la Presse, which is the French
equivalent for our publicity bureau. They receive you cordially there
and treat you just as if you were not dregs.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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