"CHILDREN IN THE RUINS"

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 248, 8 July 1918, Page 3

"CHILDREN IN THE RUINS"

A GREAT WAR PLAY. Poulbol. is portrait-painler in ordinary to tlio street urchins of Paris, writes the Paris correspondent of tlio "Daily Mail." Everyuno knows "los gooses de Poul.bot," thoso quaint drawings of the children of Alontmartre, ;vlios? faccs aro a little paler and tlioir eyes a littlo brighter and ilieir clothos a littlo funnior than thoso of the gutter-sparrows of any other great city. Their ivils aro a little sharper, too, and «t hat is why there is something 'so droll and appealing about the preroeious solemnity of their games and sayings, Poulbol's "Rosses" arc real. Ho did not invent them, he discovered them. And now he and his friend Paul Gsell have put them on the stage at the Theatre des Arts in a little play, of which everyone is talking, called "Les Gosses dons les Buines," or "Ragamuffins Among the Ruins," though "ragamuffin" does not quite convey the tenderness of the word "gosec"; "kiddy" is perhaps

Poulbot's "gosses" are there, on the stage in flesh and blood, the very children whom he uses as models, and thoy strut and talk and play exactly as they do outside in the street. But it is not merely a stage play. It is , a slice right out of the war.

The scene is a ruined village of the Sonimo at the. moment of its liberation by French and British troops in 1917. Almost foo realistic gunfire aende a shiver round the house as the curtain rises. The Germans .ire retiring after having set firo to the houses, ent down the fruit trees, and mined and blown up the cross-roads. The children arc seon peeping out from their hiding-places among the ruins, watching the last disappearing invader.

As the noise oi the firing dies away they emerge, pale and emaciated, from cellars, with «• look of fear on their faces. Then, seeing that the Germans have really gone, the old people- and cripples creep out into the- sunlight. Someone brings out the French flag that has been hidden during the German occupation, and an urchin hoists it on top of a lialfdomolished house. A veteran of the war of 1870 unpacks his red trousers and puts them on to celebrate the deliverance.

Suddenly there ie a moment of panic. Soldiers are seen approaching, "but not ours."

"Who are these men in brown ana blue-grey uniforms?" The ragamuffins back into the cellars and the aged and the- maimed hobblo after them.

When the soldiers arrive it is explained that they are the I'reuch in the nonuniform, and the British in khaki, and fear turns to delirous joy.

One oi the soldiers recognises the charred walls of his house and the ruined trees of his orchard. His "gosses," grown out of all knowledge, are there among tho pale ragamuffins, but his wife is missing, carried off by the Bodies. Ho wants to go in pursuit, but is stopped by iiis officer. Soon Hie poor woman returns, the clothes torn on" her back, dis•trought and hinting at horrors.

In the meantime, the children, tired of hearing their elders' tales of atrocities, have gone back to their games. They play nt "Being the Kaiser." Olio boy is bribed to taku the unpopular role of the tyrant, and ho and his guard wear spiked helmets constructed by 1 thrusting a carrot through tho crown of an old bowler hut. They march about imitating the goose-slop with comic solemnity, and the Kaiser begins his acts of cruelty, ordering the children to be shot and tortured..

But lie is powerless against the immortal fairy song—played by a little lame girl, who is given the part because n, German soldier crippled her for singing the "Marseillaise." Fairy "La Chaneuii" triumphs over the. Kaiser, and commands that the ruined village shall arise from its ashes.

Much is the bare outline of the story, which ie poignant in its pathos aiid realism. Most of the dialogue is a faithful account of what the l'icardy peasants aciudliy said while village urchins played at being Kaiser around thorn. The children do hot act; they simply—play.

Poullotn war idyll, as he calls it, was accepted J>y the "Cmnedie i'rancaise" last year, and was to have to been pUiytd on the anniversary of the Marne, but the production was forbidden by the Censor, perhaps as being too poig'muiv 'for Hie moment. M. Clemencoiiii's Government-, however, authorised it without modification.

Poorly staged as it is in Paris, and, apart tram the wonderful children, poorly Wist, it is the first tiin? the sufferings mid heroism of the people during this war have been put on the stage, and it ought to be used to bring home to the people in England and America what wur really insiins to those who «ire ils heipless, unarmed victims.