Page 5 Advertisements Column 3

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 106, 7 January 1915, Page 5

The orioin cf the name of General Joffre has° been exercising the minds and imaginations of the French. The Paris correspondent of the Tjondon Truth writes: Gascons are known to be imaginative. The alleged origin of General Joffre’s name (a supposed ancestors who hawked about wares with the cry of “J’offre”) arose, it appears, out of the imagination of a Gascon, \vho attended the autumn manoeuvres, and entertained a party of reservists with the story of a Catalan “Dutch auctioneer,” who ’’smarjced ‘'J’offre” (“I offer”) as r.e held up a pen knife, scissors, or sp utacles. The name Joffre was really the Catalan form of Geoffrey, Jauffret, Jauffre —all akin to the English Jeffries. The writer proceeds to remark that General Joffre is not of aristocratic birth, and therein he resembles Gambetta, the son cf a gipsy: Ney, a cooper’s son; Murar, the son of an ostler; and I.efsbvre, the son of, a laundress.