The French are fond of almost nobody, but they have been fond of Joseph Jacues Césaire Joffre ever since Paris was saved at the Battle of the Marne.
Who won the battle is not the piont. That will all be threshed out again for the hundredth time when Marshal Joffre's memoirs are published posthumously.
The point is that last week all France learned with an emotion hardly to be conveyed in words that on Dec. 19 the Marshal had sustained an amputation of his right foot, had been suffering the most terrible pain, yet had commanded:
"Do not let people know until Christmas has passed." ' Such a man the French called "Papa" Joffre, and he responded with a fatherly love. The announcement, by his doctors, that in their opinion the death of Marshal Joffre was imminent cast a shadow deeper and more appalling than any since the War.
Clemenceau was the "Tiger," the atheist, the master. Foch was the strategist, the Catholic, the messiah of battle whose military vision seemed to come at times from a Supernatural Power. Also a Catholic,* also at times a masterful man, Joffre could fail of the highest achievements and yet be loved, as a father who has not wholly succeeded is loved by his children. On Jan. 12, 1852, to a mother who bore eleven children, the future Marshal Joffre was born at Rivesaltes in the eastern Pyrenees. In 1870 Joffre took a student's furlough from the École Polytechnique to fight in the defense of Paris, unsuccessfully. With soldiering in his blood, he went to the Far East, assisted at the French occupation of Formosa in 1885. Eight years later he performed the feat described in his book My March on Timbuktu. Starting down the left bank of the River Niger on Dec. 27. 1893, he marched and skirmished 813 kilometres (504 mi.) in 48 days, entered on Feb. 12, 1894 "The Town of Timbuktu, the Meeting Place of Camel and Canoe,"† Steady promotion carried Joseph Joffre by 1911 to the post of Chief of the French General Staff "at only 59." What he called "Plan 17" was soon ready. He merely pulled out and unfolded it when Germany declared war. As the German armies advanced, Joffre tried to outflank their right (seaward) wing, they tried to outflank his left (seaward) wing and the two flanking operations (both perfectly sound) became "the race to the sea." Nobody won the race. It merely strung out the fighting lines. Terrible pounding began. The armies of France were forced back and back.
Better than anyone else the Commander-in-Chief knew how near he and his country were to defeat and ruin every day, every hour. . Enemies of "Papa" Joffre say with cutting sarcasm that, "his greatest attribute as a commander was calm." Calmly he flung this division to certain death, calmly he learned that another had broken through, calmly he received the best news and the worst. Whenever the panicky politicians in Paris telephoned him, the sound of his voice and what he said was always reassuring. It is for that that "the people" are still grateful. They feel that without Joffre in 1914 they might have gone mad. Of the victory at the Marne, Marshal Joffre said a few months ago putting volumes into the words: "If I had lost, how many people do you think would have claimed that they lost?"