y sincerely,
"JOHN J. PERSHING."

In Paris also the celebration was an evidence of the same or even
greater enthusiasm. Flags, bands, cheers, songs, public meetings and
addresses--these all were like a repetition of the scenes that had
greeted the arrival of the American commander on the soil of France.
Once more General Pershing was the idol of the day, because in this way
the French people best believed they could express their deep
appreciation of the part America was promptly taking in the fight for
freedom.

The response of America was equally strong when ten days later the great
country, more than 3,000 miles away, joined in a hearty celebration of
the French national holiday--Bastile Day. As Lafayette had brought to
and presented to the United States the key to the famous old prison so
it seemed almost as if the key had unlocked the doors of every American
heart. The French flag was flying from thousands of buildings. The
French national air was heard on every side.

In America, too, just as there had been a brief time before in France,
there were great assemblies quickly aroused to the highest pitch of
enthusiasm by the words of orators describing the marvelous heroism and
devotion of France in the present world war. As one famous, speaker
said, "France had not only found her soul and surprised the world by her
devotion; she had even surprised herself."

Perhaps the celebration in America reached its highest point in a vast
meeting in the Madison Square Garden in New York City on the evening of
July 14th. One newspaper glowingly described the vast concourse that
filled the Garden: "It isn't too much to say that perhaps the air
quivered no more violently around the Bastile on that great day in Paris
129 years ago, than it did in Madison Square Garden last night when at
the apex of a day of glorious tribute to France a tall young man wearing
the horizon blue of the French army and noted throughout the world for
his singing, sang with splendid fervor France's--and now in a way our
own--'La Marseillaise.'"

The Garden fairly rocked with the applause, as banners and flags were
waved in the hands of the excited, shouting throng. French soldiers with
the little marks upon their sleeves that showed the bravery on the
battlefield of the men privileged to wear them, soldiers and sailors of
many lands, war-nurses in their cool white costumes, men who had fought
in France, Belgi