" filled vans with rare antiques from the richest mansions;
still, they had no time, or else no inclination, to disfigure the town.
The most sensational souvenir of those days before the Marne battle is a
couple of broken bridges across the Oise and Aisne, blown up by the
French in the hour of their retreat. But that strange sight didn't break
on our eyes as we entered Compiegne. We seemed to have been transported
by white magic from mystic forest depths to be plumped down suddenly in
a city square, in front of a large, classical palace. It's only the
genie of motoring who can arrange these startling contrasts!
If we took Brian's advice, and "played" that our autos were
old-fashioned coaches; if we looked through, instead of at, the dozen
military cars lined up at the palace gates; if we changed a few details
of the soldiers' uniforms, the gray chateau need not have been Army
Headquarters in our fancy. For us, the Germans might cease from
troubling and the war-weary be at rest, while we skipped back to any
century we fancied.
Of course, Louis XV, son-in-law of our old friend Stanislas of Lorraine,
built the chateau; and Napoleon the Great added a wing in honour of his
second bride, Marie Louise. But why be hampered by details like that?
Charles V built a castle at this old Roman Compendium, on the very spot
where all those centuries later Louis XV erected his Grecian facades;
and Henri of Navarre often came there, in his day.
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