“To safeguard the national safety the public authorities are obliged to leave for the moment the city of Paris.  Under the command of its eminent chief, the French army, full of courage and spirit, will defend the capital and its patriotic population against the invader.  But the war must be pursued at the same time in the rest of the French territory.

“The sacred struggle for the honor of the nation and the reparation of violated rights will continue without peace or truce and without a stop or a failure.  None of our armies has been broken.

“If some of them have suffered only too evident losses, the gaps in the ranks have been filled up from the waiting reserve forces, while the calling out of a new class of reserves brings us tomorrow new resources in men and energy.

“Endure and fight!  Such should be the motto of the allied army, British, Russians, Belgians and French.

“Endure and fight!  While on the sea our allies aid us to cut the enemy’s communications with the world.

“Endure and fight!  While the Russians continue to carry a decisive blow to the heart of the German empire.

“It is for the government of this republic to direct this resistance to the very end and to give to this formidable struggle all its vigor and efficiency.  It is indispensable that the government retain the mastery of its own actions.  On the demand of the military authorities the government therefore transfers its seat momentarily to a point of the territory whence it may remain in constant relations with the rest of the country.  It invites the members of parliament not to remain distant from the government, in order to form, in the face of the enemy, with the government and their colleagues, a group of national unity.

“The government does not leave Paris without having assured a defense of the city and its entrenched camp by all means in its power.  It knows it has not the need to recommend to the admirable Parisian population a calm resolution and sangfroid, for it shows every day it is equal to its greatest duties.

“Frenchmen, let us all be worthy of these tragic circumstances.  We shall gain a final victory and we shall gain it by untiring will, endurance and tenacity.  A nation that will not perish, and which, to live, retreats before neither suffering nor sacrifice, is sure to vanquish.”

The removal of the French government departments to Bordeaux was accomplished within twenty-four hours and the southern city became at once a center of remarkable activity.  Ambassador Herrick, representing the United States, remained in Paris to render aid to his fellow-countrymen who were seeking means of returning to America and were more than ever anxious to get away when a state of siege became imminent.  A radical change in the French military operations was put in effect after the Germans had swept in from Belgium, and had taken the cities of Lille, Roubaix, and Longwy.  The French army had attempted to strike and shatter the Germans at their weakest point, and failed.