PARIS, May 22, 1927.  France views Captain Lindbergh’s arrival as a modern miracle, from the skies and the press hails it as such.  There is also the feeling that the young Westerns boy is an incarnation of those qualities which in past centuries contributed other prodigious miracles which have come from across the Atlantic.  The Matin remarks with amazement on the warmth with which the population of Paris applauded the American. It says:  “The exploit has been accomplished.  A man, almost a boy, has done the thing which the most experienced experts could not have done.  He had no instruments before him except a compass which technicians said would be useless.  He could not even see the vast horizon about him except by use of
periscope.  He had no companion to replace him or aid him in exhaustion.  Indeed, practically his greatest arm was his courage.  And it conquered.  He crossed the ocean, passing through death which he defeated by daring.

Grief Did Not Cool Reception
    “One might think that after grievous events of the flight of Nungesser and Coli, Paris might have followed Lindbergh’s attempt with coldness and melancholy, but that would be to misunderstand the great spirit of a city.  It was with the most sympathetic anxiety and the most anxious fervor that Paris waited through the long hours until news came that he was sighted.  It was a great ovation, generous and wholehearted, that Paris accorded the announcement of his landing at Le Bourget.  Perhaps it might have been greater still every heart had not been slightly wrung at the thought of the two Frenchmen who never came back.“But it was with tremendous enthusiasm that they demanded with all the strength od thei lungs that American flags should be hung from the balconies of Le Matin, and it was right that the French and American flags should be hung together, celebrating the feat which the son’s of France could not accomplish, but which a son of America has done.  “Frantic enthusiasm greeted this marriage of the tricolor flags, symbolic of the rejoicing of two nations which had been joined by this unbelievable flight.”

Emphasizes His Training
    The journal des Debats, in one of the most striking editorials of today on Captain Lindbergh, said:  “His formidable prowess appeals above everything by its astonishing sporting character, that is, sportsmanship in the significance of its resulting primarily from carefully self-disciplined training to effect a feat which almost surpasses human limits.   “A war pilot yesterday recounted the extreme exhaustion which assailed pilots after six hours at the steering wheel.  Now one thinks of Lindbergh, shut in for thirty-three hours and a half in a cramped cockpit, in dreadful solitude over a merciless sea, aided by wind but by a wind which
could at any moment dangerously shake the plane, one thinks of Lindbergh with his hands occupied with the controls, scarcely able to take up a piece of chocolate or have a drink of water.   “ ‘What is the value of this feat?’ “ may be asked by certain obstinate minds.  “Firstly, noble gestures, even seemingly without utility, must always be honored because they are equivalent to works of high art making for men the finest qualities and aspirations of the race.  Lindbergh’s feat in a certain monument or a great book- it is a masterpiece deserving admiration.  And besides, from the viewpoint of athletics or sport, it is a magnificent record.  “The French view his achievement without envy, but in a brotherly spirit.  His reception by 100,00 Parisians was in a brotherly spirit to acclaim the world’s champion, and it was in a brotherly spirit that Lindbergh, even before snatching an instant of sleep, went to incline a moment before the tomb of France’s Unknown Soldier.”

Flier Fills Paris Front Pages
    Captain Lindbergh and his triumph, his first day in Paris, his impressions and the impressions of others about him, occupy practically the entire page of several scores of newspapers in Paris today, many of which are ordinarily devoted chiefly to political comment. Photographs of the young American flier receiving applause on his visit to Captain Nungesser’s mother or appearing with Ambassador Heddrick upon the Embassy balcony are reproduced in every journal.  They run from close up
views to spreads of from four to six columns. Captain Lindbergh’s own story, published in large type with pictures,
occupies four columns of the front page of the Matin, While other papers less successful in obtaining his personal narrative endeavor by every means to give some fragment which in some way is exclusive.
    In a two-column box on the front page of the journal is published a thirteen-stanza poem dedicated to Captain Lindbergh from the pen of Maurice Rostand, the son of the dramatist.  The poem is an inspirational eulogy of the young American, based upon the words of another American, Alan Seegar, who died for France and America after writing the much quoted verses:  “I have a rendezvous with death.”
    “You danced all that night and then started at dawn like Alan Seegar,” sings M. Rostand, celebrating the flight in heroic trophies.  He includes: “It was not great pride in the exploit; it was not even the wishes of two continents that brought you safely here.  It was that rendezvous you gave to France’s war dead to bow at their tombs.”
    The Petite Parisian, quoting the French long distance flier, M. Arrachart, says: “It is no use for pilots to go in for long distance flying any more for awhile.  Lindbergh has accomplished all that can be done in that line for the present.”
 
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