Life, 1918-10-17 · page 15 of 38
Life — October 17, 1918 — page 15: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains an article praising American soldiers in France during WWI, contrasting their behavior favorably with other Allied forces. The main illustration depicts a domestic scene: a woman seated indoors with a man standing nearby, a child, and a dog—suggesting American soldiers are genteel and respectful. The caption below the illustration poses a flirtatious riddle about a girl's waist measurement versus a man's arm length, implying American soldiers maintain proper decorum with European women despite wartime proximity. The smaller inset cartoon labeled "Advance Fashion Note" appears to satirize European military fashion, showing an exaggerated soldier figure. The text criticizes German and Italian soldiers while praising British cooperation, ultimately celebrating American soldiers as civilized and well-mannered representatives abroad.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Our Soldier Men UR sons in France are introducing us to Europe. They make a great cal of talk; reflection and exposition following observation. Their co-work- crs on the Big Job seem very much The French, by all ccounts, love them not only for their lor, but for their friendliness, The Germans have not reported their feel- gs at much length or in much variety, sed with them, y have become ctty generally aware that our gentle- nen are in France, and when they expect to meet them they make formal The Italians have only about our fight- ut it is believed that th reparations. ne complaint to mal ng men, which is, that there are not enough of them in Italy. As for the strangers to them than to the others rey think about us habitually. Some f them are very near in fecling and opinion to some of us. British, we are less They read our and papers and we read theirs, und we are not “foreigners” to them, nor they to us. Neverthele: iculars our soldier-men are intro- ng us to England too, Britain wel- comed us into the war with nothing less than an exultant hug—most un- English—and watched with anxious satisfaction the great spectacle of the United States gathering headway, and bet on us hi , in many her than we bet on our- selves, and reassured us when we were ADVANCE FASHION NOTE STYLE FOR EUROPEAN SCARECROWS FOR THE NEXT TWENTY YEARS Shes VN'T AT STRANGE THAT THE CIRCUMFERENCE OF A GIRL’S WAIST IS THE LENGTH OF A MAN'S ARM? He: 18 11? Let's GET A STRING AND SEE. worried. She has yielded to our opin- ion—as in making Foch top general: when she needed to, and preparations had gone far and the need of men was urgent, it was in her ships, for the most part, that our first million of peace delegates Sritish manners have been admirable, and British co-operation smooth and effective. actual fight- ing men in the flesh, in British training camps and at the French front, are closely watched, from England, with the result, chiefly, that appreciative critics when our crossed the seas. And now our rise up to tell us how curiously good they are. Chesterton remarks on the dismay of British pacifists at the American ardor for the war. They had counted on the pacific Americans to soothe the fierce French and make them accept a fair article of peace when offered, and now they are driven to the hope that the French will mollify the fierce Ame! s and make them reasonable. Whereat the fat prophet laughs, re- joicing at the Yankee thoroughness, amd says that the European mind is comicbooks.com