thusiasm the soldiers and sailors of the
United States have given the best that was in them to this war of
redemption. They have expressed the true spirit of America. They
believe their ideals to be acceptable to free peoples everywhere, and
are rejoiced to have played the part they have played in giving reality
to those ideals in cooeperation with the armies of the Allies. We are
proud of the part they have played, and we are happy that they should
have been associated with such comrades in a common cause.

It is with peculiar feeling, Mr. President, that I find myself in
France joining with you in rejoicing over the victory that has been
won. The ties that bind France and the United States are peculiarly
close. I do not know in what other comradeship we could have fought
with more zest or enthusiasm. It will daily be a matter of pleasure
with me to be brought into consultation with the statesmen of France
and her Allies in concerting the measures by which we may secure
permanence for these happy relations of friendship and cooeperation, and
secure for the world at large such safety and freedom in its life as
can be secured only by the constant association and cooeperation of
friends.

I greet you not only with deep personal respect, but as the
representative of the great people of France, and beg to bring you the
greetings of another great people to whom the fortunes of France are of
profound and lasting interest.

This meeting of the American and the French presidents at a banquet in
the French capital is a remarkable incident in the history of the
world. The statement of the likelihood of such a meeting would have
been ridiculed before the war.

[Illustration: President Wilson driving from the railroad station in
Paris with President Poincare of France to the home of Prince Murat, a
descendant of Marshal Murat, Napoleon's great cavalry leader.]

As we read the speeches, however, and grasp their full meaning, we
understand that the most remarkable fact about the historic meeting is
that the leaders of two great republics met with minds and hearts set
upon justice. They were determined that the weak who had suffered
unimaginable wrong should not fail to secure justice because they were
weak and they were equally of a mind that the high and mighty who were
responsible for these wrongs should not escape justice because they
were high and mighty.

Many times in the history of the world, meetings of the g