What, above all,
struck everybody with overwhelming force was the contrast between
Queen Victoria and her uncles. The nasty old men, debauched and
selfish, pigheaded and ridiculous, with their perpetual burden of
debts, confusions, and disreputabilities--they had vanished like the
snows of winter and here at last, crowned and radiant, was the
spring."
M. Jean de Pierrefeu [Footnote: Jean de Pierrefeu, _G. Q. G. Trois
ans au Grand Quartier General_, pp 94-95.] saw hero-worship at
first hand, for he was an officer on Joffre's staff at the moment of
that soldier's greatest fame:
"For two years, the entire world paid an almost divine homage to the
victor of the Maine. The baggage-master literally bent under the
weight of the boxes, of the packages and letters which unknown people
sent him with a frantic testimonial of their admiration. I think that
outside of General Joffre, no commander in the war has been able to
realize a comparable idea of what glory is. They sent him boxes of
candy from all the great confectioners of the world, boxes of
champagne, fine wines of every vintage, fruits, game, ornaments and
utensils, clothes, smoking materials, inkstands, paperweights. Every
territory sent its specialty. The painter sent his picture, the
sculptor his statuette, the dear old lady a comforter or socks, the
shepherd in his hut carved a pipe for his sake. All the manufacturers
of the world who were hostile to Germany shipped their products,
Havana its cigars, Portugal its port wine.
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