Magazine 'The Bystander' of the 12th of June 1918, pages 11 until 15., item 2

• November 5, 2017 14:24:34 Thomas A. Lingner

  The Bystander, June 12, 1918
  

  
  

  The Bystander in Paris
  

  The Simpler Life
  

  Illustrated by Marcel Poncin
  

   Illustration of a woman and a man with tennis rackets. The man holds the woman's hand. She is turned from him at 90 degrees, looking not directly at him. 

   Caption 

  "To make the flirtations at the tennis"
  

  
  

  Mes Amis -
  

  It was a very clever man - a professor at Oxford - who said to me once: "England has principles, but France has her philosophy and faith." And it is now I think how often it is we have need to be philosophers - the very wise philosophers, who make their way of living to the way they must.
  

  
  

  Before the war it was our philosophy to make the money, to save a little, and to enjoy very much what of it we could spend. It was also our philosophy that the youth and the love were to be enjoyed and that life was not a misery.

  
  

  When the war arrived we made such a little change in our philosophy. The war was a Vendredi maigre - a carême. One must not so much amuse oneself, but the life was just the same, and there would be the fête of a so great Mardi gras when the victory was to us and our Allies.
  

  
  

  And we went on to have as much as was our possible of the amusements of before. But now it is changed. All the world has a new philosophy - to lead, what you say, the simple life. One cannot any more spend a grasse matinée to lie in bed, because the fat Bertha wakens us so early, but, all the same, one makes a virtue of to get up.
  

  
  

  It is sometimes I think how if there had not been the war of those imbecile Boche, there would this year have been so extravagant fêtes. For so many weeks there has been the beautiful weather and how it would have been magnificent, the Bois at the hour of the return from the races. But instead it is of such a simplicity the life of the Bois as the life partout.
  

  
  

  There are only the motor cars of the military which are allowed to circulate, and it is for us hard to see the so important young lieutenants of twenty years who can pass the gendarme when we must all go à pied or in a voiture, of which the cocher is a great profiteer. In the Avenue des Acacias there are not any more the magnificent toilettes, but only so simple tailleurs; and it is, as Lucile says, the mode of the hats is so modest that one can say it does not any more exist.
  

  
  

  It is the life of the family of which everyone makes practice. To sit in a party in the Avenue des Bois in the evening altogether, to go to the cinema, or to make a little picnic to the woods of Meudon where the Bertha does not disturb - these are our amusements. It is the life of the open air we lead and the so domestic virtue. There are only the jeunes gens of the class of next year to make the
  

  
  

   Drawing of a man and a woman having a picnic under a tree. She lies on her stomach looking at the man, he sits against the treetrunk cross-legged with a bottle of wine. 

   Caption: 

  "To the woods of Meudon"
  

• November 5, 2017 13:37:52 Thomas A. Lingner

  The Bystander, June 12, 1918
  

  
  

  The Bystander in Paris
  

  The Simpler Life
  

  Illustrated by Marcel Poncin
  

   Illustration of a woman and a man with tennis rackets. The man holds the woman's hand. She is turned from him at 90 degrees, looking not directly at him. 

   Caption 

  "To make the flirtations at the tennis"
  

  
  

  Mes Amis -
  

  It was a very clever man - a professor at Oxford - who said to me once: "England has principles, but France has her philosophy and faith." And it is now I think how often it is we have need to be philosophers - the very wise philosophers, who make their way of living to the way they must.
  

  
  

  
  

  
  

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