If I forget all about the war there will always remain a few vivid pictures. The other night I saw two or three. One was my first view of Notre Dame de Paris. It was about sunset, during a very heavy shower. In a framework of leaves, there stood the old black building with its flying buttresses and two square towers, seen through a curtain of rain and silhouetted against a bright sky. A picture not soon to be forgotten.
Another was the Trocadero, a huge gray affair with tall twin towers, seen just at dusk against a gray sky. Then there was the Arc de Triomphe and the Avenue des Champs Elysées in a flaming sunset. No other city can have so much potential beauty. Also, when one has seen the huge and gorgeous palaces alongside wretched alleys and hovels, it is not much of a strain to understand the French Revolution. I was with Ernie Schoedsack, who has a quick sense of such things, and we appreciated the spell that this city can work on a person. The chief trouble with Ernie is that he realizes as much as I do the incongruity of his 6 ft. 5 walking along next to my 5 ft. 6. But we have a good time together.
Next post July 30
Letters from Sidney Friend During The Great War 