Paris is the lodestar of France for the A. E. F. From every part of the country it draws them like a magnet. When on leave, no matter from what portion of France they may have come or what corner they may be bound for, they always contrive to get there by way of Paris. If the R. T. O. instructs them to change to another line before they reach the city, they arrive there just the same, to explain blandly to the M. P. that they went to sleep on the train: “and when I woke up, why here I was in Paris!” What dodges the doughboys haven’t worked in order to circumvent the M. P.s and get into Paris without official permission, or once in Paris to stay longer than the short time allotted them, would be beyond human imagination. There is one story current, for whose truth though, I cannot vouch, of an American private who passed a week in the forbidden city in the uniform of his cousin, a lieutenant in the French Army. At the time of the signing of the armistice, for several days the M. P.s’ vigilance was relaxed and boys from all over France swarmed to the city to participate in the festivities, but since then the penalties for the unlucky ones who are caught have grown more and more severe. Yesterday by request I took two boys to the Louvre. We wandered through the galleries of Greek and Roman sculptures. One boy, looking at the yellowed and discolored surfaces, declared himself bitterly disappointed. He had heard that the statues were all real marble here, but it was perfectly plain that they were nothing but plaster imitations! The other boy asked naïvely if the mutilated statues were “meant to represent people who had had their heads chopped off.” After about half an hour they consulted their watches, announced that we had just time to get to a movie show, and wouldn’t I go with them? But if the finer points of Greek art are lost on many, there are plenty of other things which they do appreciate. “Can you climb to the top of the Eiffel tower?” “Where is the church that the shell struck on Good Friday?” “What would you advise me to buy to send home to Mother?” “How often does the Ferris Wheel go?” “Is there any place in Paris where one can get ice-cream soda?” These are some of the questions that they ask you. Some go to the Opera, sitting invariably in the best seats to the amazement of the French people. Yesterday I stopped at the box-office to buy some tickets. A boy standing just inside the door spoke to me. “I beg your pardon, were you going to buy a seat for this afternoon?” “No,” I said; “for Saturday.” “I have an extra ticket. I’d be glad to have you use it.” He went on to tell me that he was taking the six o’clock train, that he had bought tickets for himself and a friend for the matinee as a last pleasure, but that his friend had failed him. I hesitated, uncertain. “What’s the opera?” I asked, just because it was something to say. “It’s La Bohème,” he said. I fell.