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Naturally the bus was pretty well full and the conductor was surly. You will find the
cause of these things in the 8-hour day and the nationalisation schemes. And then the
French lack organisation and a sense of their civic duties otherwise it wouldn't be
necessary to distribute numbered tickets to keep some semblance of order among the people waiting to get on the bus--order is the word all right! That day there were at
least ten of us waiting in the blazing sun, and when the bus did arrive there was only
room for two, and I was the sixth. Luckily I said "On Government business" and
showed a card with my photo and a tricolour band across it--that always impresses
conductors--and I got on. Naturally I have nothing to do with the unspeakable
republican government but all the same I wasn't going to miss an important business
luncheon for a vulgar question of numbers. On the platform we were packed together
like sardines. Such disgusting promiscuity always causes me acute suffering. The
only possible compensation is the occasional charming contact with the quivering
hindquarters of a dainty little midinette. Ah youth, youth! But one shouldn't let
oneself get excited. That time I was surrounded entirely by men, one of whom was a
sort of teddy boy whose neck was of inordinate length and who was wearing a felt hat
with a kind of plait round it instead of a ribbon. They to send all creatures of that sort
off to labour camps. To repair the war damage. That caused by the anglo-saxons,
especially. In my day we were young Royalists, not Rock 'n Rollers. At any rate this
young object suddenly makes so bold as to start abusing an ex-service man, a real
one, from the 1914 war. And he doesn't even answer back! When you see such things
you realize that the Treaty of Versailles was madness. As for the lout, he threw
himself on to a vacant seat instead of leaving it to the mother of a family. What times
we live in!Anyway, I saw the pretentious young puppy again, two hours later, in front of the Cour de Rome. He was in the company of another jackanapes of the same kidney,
who was giving him some advice about his get-up. The two of them were wandering
aimlessly up and down, instead of going off to break the windows at the communist
headquarters and burn a few books. Poor France!