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just hated their fellow citizens, including their superior officers. I had been disturbed, as one always is in France, by the arrogance and overbearing quality of those who are in high places toward the others. That's French military style. The person who had taken me through this French camp had said, “That's French military style. That's the way it's done. The officers dust off their hands as though these dirty peasants will contaminate them. They don't take care of them the way the Americans take care of their troops, like they were babies.”

However, this man at luncheon was very reassuring. I didn't like to tell him that I thought the army looked very poor, that the recruits looked very badly equipped, that they didn't look as though they had been trained at all. I'm no judge of military effectiveness. I was just going on looks. At any rate he tried to lay it on thick where the strength was and so forth, which was largely lost on me because I'm so ignorant in the military field. Of course, the Maginot Line was held up to me again.

At any rate, my impression from that luncheon and from my conversation with Marshal Petain was that Petain was slightly overage, to be sure, but strong, vigorous and in good health. He appeared to be in excellent health. He made a charming toast as he lifted his glass