For a mile or so outside the enceinte which has been thrown up around the town the roads are heavily mined and small red flags planted between the cobbles to warn passers-by to tread gently and gingerly. We did not require the urging of the sentries to make us proceed with caution over these places, which were so delicately mined that heavy carts were not allowed to pass. I breathed more easily when we were once out of this.

We found the military hospital and handed over our wounded soldier to the attendants, who bundled him inside and then rushed back to hear what we could tell them. They had not heard a word from the outside world-or rather from our part of the outside worldsince the withdrawal of the Belgian army to Antwerp, and they greeted us as they would greet fellow-beings returning from a journey to Mars. They had a few newspapers which were being published in Antwerp and handed them over to us, we being as anxious as they for the news that we had not been able to get.

The pro

From the hospital we drove to the Hôtel St. Antoine and asked for rooms. prietor was very suspicious of us, and we had a tremendous time convincing him that there was nothing the matter with us. He knew that we could not have come from Brussels, as nobody had been able to make the trip. Our papers were en règle but that made no differGerman spies and other suspicious characters had managed to get forged papers before that.

Fortunately for us, all the other diplomats were living in the hotel, and I asked that he hunt up some of them and verify what we had to say for ourselves. Webber of the British Legation was brought out and acted as though he had seen a ghost. He calmed down enough to assure the proprietor that we were respectable citizens and that he could safely give us

rooms.

All the other people were away from the hotel for the moment, so we deposited our things in our room and made for the Consulate General. It was then half past six and the Consul General had gone for the day. A well trained porter refused to tell where either he or the V. C. G. lived, but we managed to find out and got to the V. C. G.'s house after a hunt with a chasseur of the hotel on the box. He was not at home, but his wife was there and came down. We talked with her for a few minutes and then went back to the hotel to

await Sherman's (V. C. G.) coming. He called in the course of a few minutes and we made arrangements to go to the Consulate after dinner and get off our telegrams.

By the time we could get ourselves ready for dinner the crowd had come back, and when we set foot on the stairway we were literally overwhelmed by our loving friends. First

I met Sir Francis Villiers and accepted his invitation to dine. He and Prince Koudacheff, the Russian Minister, a lot of other colleagues, and goodness only knows who else fell upon us with demands for news. I took refuge in Sir Francis's office and saw as many people as I could until dinner time. Baron van der Elst, the Secretary-General of the Foreign Office, and M. Carton de Wiart, the Minister of Justice, forgetting all about the requirements of the protocol that I should make the first call upon them, came tearing around to see if I had any news of their families. Luckily I had and was able to tell them that all was well. I did not know that I had so much first-hand knowledge of the people in Brussels, but was able to give good news to any number of people. It became a regular joyfest and was more fun for me than for anybody else.

By eight o'clock we got out to dinner, but I was still besieged for more information and hardly got two consecutive bites without interruptions. In the midst of soup, General Yungbluth, Chief of Staff to the King, came around in full regimentals and wanted to get all sorts of news for the Queen. Before we got much farther others began to arrive and drew up chairs to the table, filling up all that part of the room. As we were finishing dinner several Ministers of State came in to say that the Prime Minister wanted me to come to meet him and the Cabinet Council which was being held-just to assure them that all was well with their families and to tell them, in the bargain, anything that I felt I properly could. However, I had my real work ahead of megetting off my telegrams to Washington. tore myself away from the crowd and, joining Sherman, who was waiting for me in the hall, I made for the Consulate General. The C. G. was already there anxious to hear the news. had to get before the Department all the news I could and as comprehensive a statement as possible of all that had happened since communications had been cut. I pounded away until after eleven and got off a fat bundle of cables, which Sherman took to the office for me. I

I

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then made tracks for the General Staff, where the Cabinet Council was waiting for me.

I have never been through a more moving time than the hour and a half I spent with them. It was hard to keep from bursting out and telling them everything that I knew would interest them. I had bound myself with no promises before I left about telling of the situation, but none the less I felt bound not to do it. I was able to tell them a great deal that was of comfort to them and that could give no ground for objection if the Germans were to know of it -and on these subjects I gave them all they wanted. After telling them all I could about their families and friends, I let them ask questions and did my best to answer those that I could. The first thing they wanted to know was how the Germans had behaved in the town. The answer I gave them was satisfactory. Then they wanted to know whether the Royal Palace had been respected or whether the German flag was flying over it; also whether the Belgian flag still flew on the Hôtel de Ville. Their pride in their old town was touching, and when they heard that no harm had as yet been done it you would have thought that they were hearing good news of friends they had lost. Then they started in and told me all the news they had from outside sources-bits of information which had reached them indirectly via Holland and the reports of their military authorities.

We stayed on and talked until nearly half past twelve, when I got up and insisted on leaving.

Perhaps it is just as well. They did not want to break up the party, but when I insisted they also made up their minds to call it a day's work and quit.

We brought van der Elst back to the hotel, and with his influence ran our car into the Gendarmerie next door. Then to bed.

A CALL FROM A ZEPPELIN

Blount and I had a huge room on the third floor front. We had just got into bed and were settling down to a good night's rest when there was an explosion the like of which I have never heard before, and we were rocked as though in cradles. We were greatly interested but took it calmly, knowing that the forts were nearly four miles out of town and that they could bang away as long as they liked without doing more than spoil our night's sleep. There were eight of these explosions at short intervals, and then as they stopped there was a sharp purr, like

the distant rattle of a machine-gun. As that died down the chimes of the Cathedral-the sweetest carillon I have ever heard—sounded one o'clock. We thought that the Germans must have tried an advance under cover of a bombardment and retired as soon as they saw that the forts were vigilant and not to be taken by surprise. We did not even get out of bed. About five minutes later we heard footsteps on the roof and the voice of a woman in a window across the street asking some one on the sidewalk below whether it was safe to go back to bed. I got out and took a look into the street. There were a lot of people there talking and gesticulating, but nothing of enough interest to keep two tired men from their night's sleep, so we climbed back into bed and stayed until morning.

Blount called me at what seemed an unreasonably early hour and said we should be up and about our day's work. When we were both dressed we found that he had made a bad guess when he looked at his watch and discovered that it was only a quarter to seven. Being up, however, we decided to go get breakfast.

When we got down we found everybody else stirring, and it took us several minutes to get it through our heads that we had been through more excitement than we wotted of. Those distant explosions that we had taken so calmly were bombs dropped from a Zeppelin which had sailed over the city and dropped death and destruction in its path. The first bomb fell less than two hundred yards from where we slept-no wonder that we were rocked in our beds! After a little breakfast we sallied forth.

The first bomb had been in a street around the corner from the hotel and had fallen into a narrow four-story house which had been blown to bits. When the bomb burst it not only tore a fine hole in the immediate vicinity, but hurled its pieces several hundred yards. All the windows for at least two hundred or three hundred feet were smashed into little bits. The fronts of all the surrounding houses were pierced with hundreds of holes, large and small. The street itself was filled with débris and was impassable. From this place we went to the other points where bombs had fallen. As we afterward learned, ten people were killed outright; a number have since died. of their injuries and a lot more are injured and some of these may die. A number of houses were completely wrecked and a great many will

have to be torn down. Army officers were amazed at the terrific force of the explosions. The last bomb dropped as the Zeppelin passed over our heads fell in the centre of a large square-la Place du Poids Publique. It tore a hole in the cobble-stone pavement some twenty feet square and four or five feet deep. Every window in the square was smashed to bits. The fronts of the houses were riddled with holes and everybody had been obliged to move out, as many of the houses were expected to fall at any time. The Dutch Minister's house was near one of the smaller bombs and was damaged slightly. Every window was smashed. All the crockery and china is gone; mirrors in tiny fragments; and the Minister somewhat startled. Not far away was Faura, the First Secretary of the Spanish Legation. His wife had been worried sick for fear of bombardment, and he had succeeded only the day before in prevailing upon her to go to England with their large family of children. Another bomb fell not far from the houses of the C. G. and the V. C. G., and they were not at all pleased. The windows on one side of our hotel were also smashed.

THE TRAIL OF THE AIRSHIP

We learned that the Zeppelin had sailed over the town not more than 500 feet above us; the motor was stopped some little distance away and she slid along in perfect silence and with her lights out. It would be a comfort to say just what one thinks about the whole business. The purr of machine-guns that we heard after the explosion of the last bomb was the starting of the motor which carried our visitor out of range of the guns that were trundled out to attack her. Preparations were being made to receive such a visit, but they had not been completed; had she come a day or two later she would have met a warm reception. The line of march was straight across the town on a line from the General Staff, the Palace where the Queen was staying with the royal children, the military hospital of the Elisabeth filled with wounded, the Bourse, and some other buildings. It looks very much as though the idea had been to drop one of the bombs on the Palace. The Palace itself was missed by a narrow margin, but large pieces of the bomb were picked up on the roof and shown me later in the day by Inglebleek, the King's Secretary. The room at the General Staff where I had been until

half an hour before the explosion was a pretty ruin, and it was just as well for us that we left when we did. It was a fine big room with a glass dome skylight over the big round table where we were sitting. This had come in with a crash and was in powder all over the place. Next time I sit under a glass skylight in Antwerp I shall have a guard outside with an eye out for Zeppelins.

If the idea of this charming performance was to inspire terror, it was a complete failure. The people of the town, far from yielding to fear, are devoting all their energies to anger. They are furious at the idea of killing their King and Queen. There is no telling when the performance will be repeated, but there is a chance that next time the balloon man will get a warmer reception.

In the morning I went around and called at the Foreign Office, which is established in a handsome building that belonged to one of the municipal administrations. The Minister for Foreign Affairs took me into his office and summoned all hands to hear any news I could give them of their families and friends. I also took notes of names and addresses of people in Brussels who were to be told that their own people in Antwerp were safe and well. I had been doing that steadily from the minute we set foot in the hotel the night before, and when I got back here I had my pockets bulging with innocent messages. Now comes the merry task of getting them around.

The Minister showed me a lot of things that he wanted reported to Washington, so I went back to the Consulate-General and got off some more telegrams. The trip was worth while.

Blount and I were for lunching alone but would not hear of it and insisted that we should sit at their table as long as we stayed on in Antwerp and whenever we came back. They were not only glad to see somebody from the outside world but could not get over the sporting side of our trip, and patted us on the back until they made us uncomfortable. Everybody in Antwerp looked upon the trip as a great exploit and exuded admiration. I fully expected to get a Carnegie medal before I got away. And it sounded so funny, coming from a lot of Belgian officers who had for the last few weeks been going through the most harrowing experiences, with their lives in danger every minute and even now with a perfectly good chance of being killed before the war is over. They seem to take that as a

matter of course, but look upon our performance as in some way different and superior. People are funny things.

I stopped at the Palace to sign the King's book and ran into General Yungbluth, who was just starting off with the Queen. She came down the stairs and stopped just long enough to greet me and then went her way; she is a brave little woman and deserves a better fate than she has had. Inglebleek, the King's Secretary, heard I was there signing the book and came out to see me. He said the Queen was anxious I should see what had been done by the bombs of the night before. He wanted me to go right into the houses and see the horrid details. I did not want to do this, but there was no getting out of it under the cir

cumstances.

We drove first to the Place du Poids Publique and went into one of the houses which had been partially wrecked by one of the smaller bombs. Everything in the place had been left as it was until the police magistrate could make his examination and report. We climbed to the first floor and I shall never forget the horrible sight that awaited us. A poor policeman and his wife had been blown to fragments, and the pieces were all over the walls and ceiling. Blood was everywhere. Other details are too terrible even to think of. I could not stand any more than this one room. There were others which Inglebleek wanted to show me, but I could not think of it. And this was only one of a number of houses where peaceful men and women had been so brutally killed while they slept.

And where is the military advantage? If the bombs were dropped near the fortifications it would be easy to understand, but in this instance it is hard to explain upon any ground except the hope of terrifying the population to the point where they will demand that the Government surrender the town and the fortifications. Judging from the temper they were in yesterday at Antwerp they are more likely to demand that the place be held at all costs rather than risk falling under the rule of a conqueror brutal enough to murder innocent people in their beds.

The Prime Minister told me that he had four sons in the army-all the children he has -and that he was prepared to give every one of them and his own life and fortune into the bargain, but that he was not preparedand here he banged his fist down on the table

and his eyes flashed-to admit for a minute the possibility of yielding to Germany. Everybody else is in the same state of mind. It is not hysterical. The war has been going on long enough and they have had so many hard blows that the glamor and fictitious attractiveness of the thing has gone and they have settled down in deadly earnest to fight to the bitter end. There may not be one stone left upon another in Belgium when the Germans get through, but if these people keep up to their present level they will come through—what there is left of them-free.

Later in the afternoon I went to the Foreign Office and let them read me the records of the commission that is investigating the alleged German atrocities. They are working in a calm and sane way and seem to be making the most earnest attempt to get at the true facts, no matter whether they prove or disprove the charges that have been made. It is wonderful to see the judicial way they can sit down in the midst of war and carnage and try to make a fair inquiry on a matter of this sort. If one one thousandth part of the charges are proven to be true

The rest of the afternoon was spent seeing people who came in for news of Brussels and who had messages to send home. I had had to tell the hotel people that I would be there from four to seven to see people and that the rest of the time I must have free for my own work. work. They came in swarms, all the diplomats, the Cabinet Ministers, and the Ministers of State, army officers, and other officials-a perfect mob. I had a package of cards on which I noted names and addresses and the messages which were to be delivered. These messages have been sent out to-day after being submitted to the military authorities, some of them in writing and some by word of mouth, and if they have afforded one tenth the comfort that I hope, the sum total of misery in this town has been reduced a good deal this day.

Colonel Fairholme left for the front with the King early in the morning and was with him. during the battle at Malines. He thought we were going back during the day, as I had told him the evening before. About noon he called up from the telephone and told Sir Francis that under no circumstances was I to be allowed to start, as the town was being bombarded with heavy siege pieces and all traffic was absolutely stopped; that we could not only not get by but that any part of the trip

by the regular road was extremely dangerous. I was just as glad that we had decided to stay over. The Colonel stayed out all that night and had not returned to Antwerp when we left yesterday. During the morning he called up again and asked about us, again advising against our starting. Pretty decent of a man who had as much to think of as he had to be worrying about us enough to telephone us as to the dangers of the road.

To make sure of offering no unnecessary chances for Mr. Zeppelin, the authorities had ordered all the lights on the streets put out at eight o'clock. It was dark as midnight and there was no use in thinking of venturing out into the town. The Cathedral clock was stopped and the carillon turned off for the first time in Heaven only knows how many years. It was a city of the dead. Guns were posted in the streets ready for instant use in case the airship should put in another appear

As a result of this and the searchlights that played upon the sky all night, our friend the enemy did not appear. Some people know when they have had enough.

Yesterday morning I looked out of my window at the Cathedral clock and saw that it was twenty-five minutes to ten. I tumbled through my tub and rushed downstairs to get through my morning's work, only to find that it was half past six. I had forgotten that the Cathedral clock had been stopped.

It was just as well that I was up early, however, for there was plenty to be done. I found a lot of telegrams waiting for me at the Consulate and had to get off another string of them. Then an orderly held me up on the street to tell me that the King's Secretary was hunting for me all over the place and that I was wanted at the Palace. When I got there he had started off on another hunt for me. He finally got me at the hotel and kept me for half an hour.

By the time that I got through with him there was word that the Minister for Foreign Affairs wanted to see me, so I made a bee-line over there; then there was another call to the Consulate to answer some more telegrams. After attending to various matters at the Palace, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Consulate-General, and seeing a few more people at the hotel, the morning was gone and it was time for lunch and a quick get-away.

All hands came out and bade us farewell. You would have thought we were on our way

to Heaven except for the fact that they urged us to come back.

As we could hear the cannonading we deIcided that we would avoid the Malines road and would try to skirt round the zone of trouble and work our way into Brussels from the west. We got ferried across the Scheldt on a terrible tub of a steamer that looked as though she would go down under the weight of the military automobiles that she had to get across so that they could get ammunition to the front. We all got away in a bunch from the other side, but we drew ahead of them, as we had not such a heavy load, and within three quarters of an hour we were outside the Belgian lines. Van der Elst had secured for us a most imposing laisser-passer, which took us through with practically no trouble except that it was so imposing that we were held at each barricade while all the men on duty took turns reading it. The only ticklish part of the trip to the Belgian outposts was working our way through the villages which had been mined in anticipation of a German invasion. It is bad enough working one's way through them in a motor with everybody helping you to keep out of harm's way, but it must be a trifle worse to do it in a mass with a man on a hill a little way off waiting for you to come up to the signal post so that he can touch a button and send you in small pieces into the next world.

We struck out through St. Nicholas, Hamme, Termonde, and Assche, and got into Brussels from the west without mishap. We have got quite used to having people poke bayonets in our faces and brandish revolvers at us, so the latter part of the trip with only that to contend with seemed quiet and almost boring.

On the road in from Assche, we passed near Eppeghem and Vilvorde, where the fighting had been going on for a couple of days. After news had been received in Antwerp of the defeat of the French and English at Mons and Charleroi, the Belgians had been ordered to fall back on Antwerp and had left these little villages to be occupied by the Germans. As they occupied them they had set them afire and the flames were raging as we came by. They were quaint little towns and had excited our admiration two days before when we had gone through-despite the fact that we had other things on our minds besides admiring the beauties of architecture. Now they are gone.

The Germans gave us no trouble, and we got back to the Legation by a little before five.