August 6th, Thursday.
Rain came with the light. That gentle pattering on the sod, after the tumult of the night, was the sweetest sound I ever heard. It was just as if Nature had put out Her mother's hand over the earth to soothe its troubled breast. Was she pleading for that mercy which drops as Her own gentle tears from Heaven?
During the morning the road in front of the château was filled with Belgian troops, bedraggled with mud, trying to regain order. And there they halted for hours and hours in the rain—an absolute picture of dejection. Even the horses imbibed the general despair as they stood there, heads drooping, their manes stirring in the wind. That must be the hard part of it—waiting for orders; but they did it well, no impatience nor fretting, just obeying the command, their very immobility carving them a niche in the landscape. These men had been fighting for several days and, bowed down as they were with the wet and misery of it all, made a shocking contrast to fresh troops of cavalry which passed at the same time, brandishing long, dramatic looking lances. And Felix, the second gardener, who is one of these "lanciers," came to say good-bye in the elegant uniform of his regiment and looking very smart in white trousers and short blue jacket—in fact, a man transformed.
I had always seen him in wooden sabots and blue apron coaxing this flower and that into bloom, but he had never been a great success at it. When his elder brother died, he had wished, so much, to replace him as head-gardener, so his master let him try for a little and he had failed, indifferently. But here was a soldier-man, stout heart and valiant sword, eager to serve his King. This time he will not fail but will meet his opportunity more than half way.[1] All day Red Cross ambulances and every kind of vehicle were hurrying by, bringing the wounded from the battlefield. Madame X.'s family physician stopped in on one of his trips for a moment's respite from the awfulness up there—his description of those scenes is too terrible to write about. The carnage was awful—pieces of bodies scattered about everywhere, the wounded writhing in their death agony and the dead standing up straight against masses of dead.
In the evening, indistinct sounds of a far off battle could be heard as the struggle moved on to another quarter. Nearer, we heard the trailing of heavy artillery down the mountain and against our will the thought formulated itself, "Will that wave of terror roll back to us?" Our ears have developed an abnormal acuteness, so that almost a pin falling will make taut nerves scream, though in reality nobody moves—a glance is enough to both ask and answer a question. A marvelous new self-possession seems to have come to everybody which bridges over a natural despair and forms, at least, a skeleton framework by which we keep each other up.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Not heard of again.
August 7th, Friday.
More or less booming from the forts all day. As communications of every kind have been cut off, we cannot know what is happening. But where is the assistance so direfully needed, promised by both France and England to poor little Belgium with the great German army moving on Liége? Everybody has faith, however, in the Allies, and in the streets it is pathetic to hear people assuring each other, "O, oui, les Français viennent ce soir" (Oh, yes, the French are coming to-night). There are many German troops in town already, who somehow have pushed their way in between the firing, but the city will not cede the forts, so the bombardment may begin at any moment. I cannot define my impressions—some day I may be able to, but just now I do not know what they are. Happily the château is on the edge of the city and there is a certain quiet at present, but in town pandemonium reigns. Men, women and children are fleeing in all directions with their few most precious possessions tied up in a bundle. And where are they going to, the poor things, with all roads in the country choked up, soldiers and trenches everywhere?
August 8th, Saturday.
This morning we walked through the garden to service in the little village church. For a short moment a welcome calm stole over us in the quiet of those walls, but how sinister to hear the eternal boom of cannon between the words of the Mass. All the bridges of the city are mined and guarded. The five days given Liége by the Prussians to surrender are up tonight. What will tomorrow bring forth? The Belgians have blown up the tunnel at Trois Ponts, near the German frontier, as well as the railroad in many places, which will impede the enemy's advance considerably, and great trees have been cut down across the roads in all the country roundabout.
Mère Gavin came hobbling down the path from the top of the hill this evening to tell us of the astonishing experience she had this afternoon when a peasant came to her old hut and offered to buy her cow. Now as her cow is her most precious possession and her sole support she refused at once, tho' frightened at her own boldness. The stranger, however, was rather insistent and asked if she would rent the cow, then, for fifty francs an hour? Was there ever a queerer offer? Of course fifty francs was a gold-mine to Mère Gavin, so she accepted, and was fairly overcome when the man laid down three hundred francs on the table and told her to keep them for him. Then he drove the cow away over the hills while Mère G. sat staring stupidly at her gold. After a time he came back (with the cow) and said, "Old One, three hours after I have gone, you can tell your people that the red pantalons (French soldiers) will be here in forty-eight hours." Was that not a clever way for a French Scout to find out the lie of the land?
August 9th, Sunday.
Some of the Prussians have succeeded in penetrating into the city, tho' the forts have not surrendered, and are already establishing martial rule. Aeroplanes, with the wings turned back, Taubes, have been flying about all the morning. In the afternoon we went up over the hill to the plain of Sartilmont, the battlefield of Wednesday night. All along the road were heaps of uniforms, some quite new, probably taken from the dead. Those horrid limp things made me shiver with their lifelessness, and the spirit of death, everywhere, seemed to close us in. Countless numbers of haversacks were strewn about, doubtless cast away by the soldiers to disencumber themselves in falling quickly back from one position to another. In them, generally, was a change of underwear, light boots, hard biscuit, canned meats and confiture. Already a flock of human ravens was collected about the piles of débris, sorting out what was good to take and collecting fragments of bread for a happy repast. It was sickening to see, when possibly some of those brave, dead soldiers were lying, yet unburied, in the nearby hedges and ravines. Arrived at the little village we saw destruction a plenty. The inhabitants all had terror-stricken countenances and yet in their desire to please, literally fell over each other in haste to tell and show. Some of the buildings were entirely demolished, others with doors hacked up and windows broken, while everywhere houses and trees were riddled with bullets. One old peasant woman told me that she and fifty others were imprisoned for twenty-four hours by the Germans in a tiny stable, without food or drink, and for no apparent reason.
The battlefield on the top of a ridge of hills between the Ourthe and the Meuse is a large plain, around the edges of which lay scores of magnificent trees cut down in haste to give unobstructed range. Their branches had been previously soaked in pétrole and set on fire. The effect of those prostrate, charred monsters added to the desolation all around. Across the end of the plain were those famous open trenches of "two stories," that is, with about a two-foot elevation of earth in the bottom against the front wall of the ditch, forming a kind of platform for the soldiers when taking aim.
These were dug by the soldiers and men from the factories of Liége. In front of the trenches were constructed those marvellous, barbed wire fences, about one and one half metres apart and perhaps five rows deep, with the wire twisted and wound in every conceivable fashion. Thirty feet in front of this barrier was buried a string of mines, connected with the trenches by an electric wire, to be exploded at a given moment. Dark as the night was, the enemy found and severed some of these communications so that most of the mines were rendered ineffective. We saw the cut wire in several places. What hope can those poor soldiers have, enemy or no, the advance guard of the besiegers, who are pushed forward often at the point of the bayonet, armed only with huge scissors to cut through such an almost impenetrable defense?
A most touching sight was the graves of thirty Belgians in one end of these trenches. Does that not seem a terrible irony to be buried in one's own trenches? A few common, wayside flowers were strewn on the graves, in front of which was an old prayer-stool and a wooden cross surmounted with a Belgian képi (military cap). This cap seemed a living thing almost and reminded me of the red fez so often seen on the Moslem tombs in the cemeteries of Constantinople, which seemingly strives to evoke a vital spirit from the frigid marble. Nailed to the cross was a fragment of those well-known lines of the Immortal Cæsar, "Of all the peoples of Gaul, the Belgians are the bravest." You see, the old warrior knew that long ago.
Near by was a small, shrapnel gun carriage, by which stood a toothless, old man who told, in that excruciating Wallon tongue, a pathetic story of one of the dogs which had probably drawn it. His mate doubtless was killed in battle, but he returned three days later, lay down beside the broken wheels and defied anyone to approach.
Monday, August 10th.
Monsieur S. came home to-day laden down with bags of gold like Ali Baba. How he is going to do away with it so that the ferret eyes of the enemy will not spy it out, is a problem to me. And I do not want it explained for I am sure I should look right into the forbidden corner at the wrong moment and give the secret away.
Although there are thousands of German soldiers who have come into the city and who control it, they are like rats in a trap. On account of the twelve surrounding forts they cannot leave it and for the same reason no one can come to their aid. So they have mounted machine guns in corner houses of many streets and it is horrible to see those deadly mouths gaping out of the windows. In case of an uprising among the civilians the soldiers' revenge will be to kill the women and children. But no! that is not possible in these days, from men who are neither savages nor Turks.
A heavy cannonading began at 4.30 A. M.—it literally tore us from sleep, for it seemed as if the very house were tumbling down about our ears and the singing and whizzing of those big shells was bizarre, to put it mildly. One did not know whether to get up or efface one's self in the blankets. I remember having the utmost confidence in the headboard of my bed, which was toward the window. But that did not obliterate the siren whistle of those big shells and the moment of suspense between the lightning and the thunder. After each deafening burst I kept reiterating to myself, "Saved again," as one would repeat a chronological table of something important. About 8.00 A. M. we straggled into the breakfast room—all of us rather lifeless and with very white faces and little appetite for either eating or talking. There seemed to be only one thing to say, which was, "Did you hear that?" It was the same sensation again of the thread between heaven and earth. I wonder if it will break!
This afternoon we took a little walk into the city along the river, Madame X., her two sons—Monsieur S. and Monsieur J., her daughter, Baronne de H., and myself. We passed several Prussian guards on the bridges and Monsieur S. talked with one of them. It appears that the men are very disheartened. This man said he had started with a company of seven hundred soldiers and entered Liége with sixty four. That's what it means to "take cities without difficulty"—and nobody remembers the seven hundred mothers, or wives, or children that are left. The burgomaster has received some most sensational news from Brussels, but it is too ridiculous to be believed.
Tonight is still and Nature is beautiful in the moonlight. Is it the calm before the storm? Here in the château we are comfortable with plenty to eat and faithful servants. In town one is not so lucky as a cousin of Madame X. is quartering forty soldiers and ten officers at table who are not—or rather, who are a little argumentative, and we have heard of some instances where the "host" and "hostess" have had to sleep in the garret or the cellar or wherever they could, while the best rooms are appropriated by the militaires. Blankets, etc., are also being requisitioned from many houses.
It is reported that Général Léman narrowly escaped being captured recently when he was lunching in the court of the Café —— in town. His companions-in-arms suddenly became aware of four men in strange uniform who were approaching, and gave the alarm. Général Léman succeeded in getting over the wall of the garden while the others engaged the spies in a hand-to-hand fight and overcame them.
August 11th, Tuesday.
Invincible Liége! People are still firm in their faith, encouraged by the peace of the morning. The day was quiet until 6.00 P. M., when furious shooting into the valley began. We saw the great shells bursting in the air and between the clouds of smoke we could distinguish an old monastery on the other side of the valley which was being shot to pieces by the enemy's field-cannon. The structure changed shape half a dozen times before our eyes and the setting sun concentrated, as if purposely, all its rays on the windows which made them blaze forth through all that fury like the veritable Hand of God, writing in fire. It seemed almost like a premonition.
Pressure from those tremendous guns could remodel mountains, and Nature herself, sometimes, cannot hold out against the fiendish ingenuity of man. And the city, itself! Can it hold out?
In the garden, very near the foot of the mountain, is the old farmhouse, in one corner of which is a little chapel whose door stands open the year round. It is of particular interest to the peasants, being the last relic of a certain superstitious legend of the countryside. The people come from miles around, crossing the fields by a little path which they themselves have beaten down, to kneel before this tiny altar; and on the last Sunday in May, the annual fête, the priests, leading a religious procession which starts from the church, say Mass there. This year, May 31st, 1914, the head gardener, who is the indisputable authority on floral subjects in the village, borrowed everything from the conservatory and gardens that he could lay his hands on in the way of decoration. He arranged the semi-circle in front of the little chapel very artistically with branches of leaves, palms and hundreds of pansies which the day before had been uprooted from the terraces of the château to make room for the red, summer geraniums.
At ten o'clock this Sunday morning the usual fusillade and tolling of bells announced the departure of the procession from the church. It passed slowly along by the highroad and presently we heard a chorus of young voices singing hymns—the girls and boys of the village: the music was soft and illusive in the distance, developing a sweet crescendo as they turned into the pasture, fairly plowing their way through a sea of daisies. Behind them came two little acolytes, fair as angels, swinging their golden incense lamps; then followed six choir boys, chanting the Mass, like veritable della Robbias, in their red soutanes and exquisite, white, lace surplices. Next were the clergy, in robes of cloth of gold and rare Flemish lace, carrying the Host under a purple velvet canopy. The village people followed on in quiet devoutness and, arrived at the chapel, placed lighted candles in the sconces at each side of the grille door. When the Mass was said and the last plaintive notes had died away, little children came forward and heaped their thousand-colored bouquets before the altar. It was an impressive ceremony and must, by its charming simplicity, leave a mark on many a worldly heart.
Today, August 11th, 1914, at dusk, as the cannon had ceased firing, we took a little recreation, following the paths on the mountainside; looking down from a height of perhaps one hundred feet through the trees, we saw the little chapel gleaming like a beacon in the dark, dozens of blinking candles pinioned against the black walls. The grille door was woven with nosegays, making a curtain of flowers which partially concealed the altar beyond.
Before it, stretching up supplicating hands, many women knelt, bowed down with grief and despair, and children, awed by recent memories, stood immovable in their places. Poor, poor people! Some of them in spite of their unwavering faith must drink the bitter cup so near at hand.
August 13th, Thursday.
It is true that one gets inured to danger (particularly if one has not so far been hit) and after a week of the bombardment, we have a distinct feeling of annoyance at being disturbed at an unearthly hour every morning by the screeching and bursting of shells.
About four A. M. we were awakened by another terrifying whizzing and exploding of bombs as if we were in the very midst of a battlefield. This lasted about three hours and all we could do was wait. I often wonder if it's as hard for the men to go off to war as it is for the women to stay. The battle was inconceivably furious this morning. If you could imagine five hundred of the worst thunderstorms, shaken up together, that you ever experienced, you would arrive at a mild notion of the tumult, not counting the apprehension, the danger and that terrifying voice in the whistling trail of every shell which sings, "This time I'll get you." At four this afternoon the Fort of Chaudefontaine fell, blown up by the Prussians. Between four and six o'clock the firing ceased.
It was an evening of ineffable beauty and the garden looked so lovely in its mantle of roses, the little lake at the foot with its white swans and the wooded mountain rising up almost from its waters—a picture of calm and contentment. We were there taking a long breath after the nightmare of the day, when the young gardener rushed in from the village with the news that thirty of the soldiers in the fort, wounded and burned beyond recognition, were being brought into the Sisters' Convent, which had been turned into a Red Cross Ambulance hospital.
The shells from the great field pieces of the enemy falling upon the forts had shattered the cupolas and had caused them to fall in upon the Belgians who were thus imprisoned and barely escaped suffocation from the poisonous gases of the exploding shells. The electric wires were cut immediately so that the poor things who were entrapped three stories underground groped about in the dark some time before they at last found the stairs which led them up through shot and flame and gas to the air.
Gathering some old linen together we fairly flew across the field to the convent and stopped short, staggered by what we saw. Never on this earth could one imagine so horrible a sight as those thirty charred bodies with no suggestion of faces—just a flat, swollen, black surface, with no eyes, nose nor mouth. Some of the wounded lay on beds, others in the middle of the floor or wherever there was space, and each was holding up hands burned to the bone. The room was dimly lighted, a hushed quiet reigned except for an occasional stifled groan of pain or a sigh of concern from the villagers or the swish of the black garments of those ministering angels, the nuns, as they fluttered about among the suffering; their white coifs, like a halo, contrasting them with that other Angel, whose black wings, indeed visible, already shadowed his chosen.
August 14th, Friday.
One has hoped against hope, but the worst has happened and the people are despondent. Liége is certainly in the hands of the Prussians. They have been pouring into the city all day and most of the forts have either been destroyed by the German field artillery or been blown up by their defenders rather than surrender. We nursed the soldiers all day—if last night was horrible I could not find the words to describe what the daylight revealed, or the awful odor of burned flesh when the wounds were redressed. It was pitiful to see the courage of the poor men—the Belgians are brave not only on the battle field. With lips too seared to articulate, they would try to speak and one could occasionally catch an indistinct "de l'eau," or a half-formed "Merci, chère Soeur," but never a moan or a groan.
At night, as we were wearily returning home, the young footman, with ashen face, met us half-way down the steps and announced that there would be Prussian officers at dinner who were already quartered in the château. We were nearly too tired to be impressed at this as one naturally would, at least, be moved in one sense or another, but we did inwardly wonder what the keynote might be at table.
At eight o'clock dinner was served. Madame X.'s daughter and I, after such a scrubbing and disinfecting, came down the last ones and stepped into a veritable playworld of the Middle Ages with the most beautiful setting—a large salon, opening out onto the terrace, with old, Flemish-wood fire-place and raftered ceiling, Japanese bronzes, rugs from the Orient, soft lamps and portraits of dear grandmothers, in the beauty of their youth, smiling out from their golden frames on the walls. As we came into the room from the brightly lighted hall, a semi-circle of gray-green coats rose right up out of the dimness and we were blinded by a vision of shining buttons, polished boots, gleaming swords and a military salute accompanied by clinking spurs. At the end of the room stood Madame X. and her sons waiting for us. Naturally there were no presentations and the moment was unique in the extreme—nobody moved for a second which seemed like a decade and nobody spoke, so all there remained to do was to acknowledge the salute with a semi-circular bow.
Dinner was an odd affair tho' it went off not so badly. Madame X., in her proud Russian beauty and her admirable control of the conditions, was superb. I never admired anybody so much, for it is not easy to entertain at one's board an enemy who has just usurped home and country, but her extraordinary charm and dignity gave the situation its note and the "guests" were everything that was agreeable. We talked of generalities, as well as "War," in four languages (Russian, French, English and German) with much the same sang-froid as the juggler who tosses knives and, when the meal was done, thanked Heaven that nobody had launched a tactless bomb which might have plunged us into a boiling sea. There was nothing particularly boastful in their conversation, though at times a certain assured reference to "Paris in a fortnight" crept in, which we found difficult to digest—in fact I was furious. Paris, indeed! Beautiful Paris! My neighbor at table on the right was a man of perhaps fifty-eight years, rather gray and grandfatherly, with such nice, blue eyes. Prefacing all his remarks with a nervous little cough to fix my attention, he would launch with difficulty one or two phrases in restricted French followed by a few straggling words in English and finally finished up with a burst of voluble German. It was a work of art to understand him, but I arrived panting—at least I had that sensation, and it is not the first time I have given thanks for a woman's natural intuition. Then I decided to lead out next—anyway I wanted to get him started on "War" without precipitating an international difficulty and I asked him as stupidly as possible (perhaps I did not need to simulate that) if he liked "War." He hesitated just a second and I was prepared for the usual self-respecting denial when he horrified me by answering a simple "Yes." Voilà, le sentiment prusse!
Afterward when we went into the salon all the officers, commencing with the superior, came up to Madame X. and kicking their spurs together with the habitual "Danke, Frau," kissed our hands all around. The youngest soldier among them was a handsome boy of about twenty-two years, who interested me rather, because he was different—even his boots were different and he truly had a striking manner, though very gracious. I am convinced that he was a prince of a reigning house. The atmosphere had a way of parting in rapid waves when he came in and dropping behind him like an impervious shield when he went out. Fair, young Achilles! Will a fatal arrow attain his charméd person?
August 15th, Saturday.
We took care of the wounded all day: it is the most heartrending spectacle to see those poor, black heads lying there on their pillows. They were so shapeless and immovable, I had almost begun to look upon them as without life like charred logs, when, after finishing a dressing this morning, I was startled by a hearty, "Merci, chère Soeur." Oh, the joy of it! That brightened the whole scene and flooded me with hope. Then they have not lost their intelligences, they aren't mere pieces of wood and one day when their poor flesh has rejuvenated itself, they will be given back to real life—and their country, again.
The village people and the Sisters were so ardent in their desire to help that dressings well covered with ointment sometimes fell from their eager fingers onto grimy blankets or flopped, butter side down, so to speak, upon the floor; which did not disconcert anyone but me, whose modern prophylactic soul rattled and shook with horror as the recalcitrant bandage was gaily redeemed from its dusty resting-place and applied as originally intended.
It seemed as if I must remonstrate, but the dear whole-hearted helper was so sure that her dressing would cure and the patient was so overwhelmingly grateful for the trouble she took to pick it up for him, that I was dumb before their exquisite faith.
Here was something too big for my stilted aseptic advice and it occurred to me, suddenly, that perhaps there are many things yet undreamed of in our philosophy.
All day long the troops in an endless chain have been passing on the highroad before the château. The air was full of mingled sounds, as, for example, the singing of the soldiers in the distance, which sounds like the droning of bees far away and always heralds an advance of troops; the rhythmic shuffling of feet, the thud of horses' hoofs, the chugging of autos which carry the superior officers, and the heavy wheels of the gun carriages with their clanking chains. Their order, equipment and discipline are admirable to see.
All their apparel is new, as one of the officers told Monsieur D. at Spa. Uniforms, boots, belts, saddles, bridles and even buttons—all new and spic and span for a triumphal entry into Paris. Each man carries two sets of buttons, one for field service (negligible) and the other, shining brass ones, for the review down the Champs Elysées.
All the officers wear a tiny card-board map of Belgium about (3" x 4"), hung on their coat buttons and every soldier has embossed on his belt plate "Gott mit Uns." At dinner the officers were very entertaining; the ice was somewhat broken, at least, we knew better what piece was safe clinging to and we managed to exchange some ideas. It is rather odd how few of these educated men speak French. In fact, it is so odd that it makes us suspicious and cautious. Monsieur J. attacked the captain with this question, as a leader, "when he thought the war would be over?" (This being the second week of it.) His answer was net and forbade argument—"We shall be 'home' by Christmas, or Easter at the latest." But he did have the grace to congratulate the Belgian army on its stout defense of Liége, for instead of the two days given the Germans by their Emperor to capture it, they had been constrained to take nearly two weeks at it.
August 16th, Sunday.
A warm, beautiful morning. As Madame de H. and I walked through the garden and the wood to the little convent ambulance, it was difficult not to contrast smiling Nature with the frightful scenes of which, in a few minutes, we would be a part. The awful stench of burned flesh met us half a block away and congealed my courage as I walked, for it permeates everything. We can even taste it, it clings in our hair when we go home and we are obliged to hang our nursing clothes out of the window all night. I felt as if I must run away from it and those terrible dressings, reeking with purulence, where ears and eyelids and lips come off and fingers and hands peel like a glove.
Then I thought of the patience of those brave fellows and the pain and awfulness of living it. The fortitude and devotion of the village men and women are beyond praise—they come day after day to help in the nursing, some spending the night, turn and turn about. Especially the tenderness of the men for their "camarades" is one of the sweetest things I ever saw, for they are as gentle and capable in their care as any woman could possibly be.
Prussian troops continue to pass and it is a wonderfully impressive sight; infantry in gray-green khaki, singing, always singing their famous "Wacht am Rhein" and other folk songs: the Uhlans, on beautiful prancing horses, with their long lances and gray-blue capes fluttering in the wind; chasseurs in light green; "Hussars de la Mort" with the death's head emblem in the front of their high fur hats and endless companies of artillery with their huge field cannon, each drawn by six magnificent horses. On the gun carriages sit four gunners back to back, still as statues, with arms folded as if on parade. It was for all the world like a circus when the procession goes twice around the ring before commencing the serious business of the entertainment.
Dinner was gay tonight (one is obliged to make the best of a bad affair) and the officers as men of the world were interesting and in unusually good spirits.
The Captain, a little facetiously, took up the menu and, drawing a tiny note-book and pencil from his pocket, proceeded to copy it in French, soliciting Madame X.'s aid en passant.
A curious fact occurred to me as I sat there looking down both sides of the table, how much alike they were—it seems as if they must even think the same thoughts to resemble each other so much. As their heads were closely cropped, outlines were baldly apparent, low forehead sloping back to a narrow crown and all set upon a bulwark of neck. They must surely have been struck in the same mould. Though forceful, none of them were good-looking except the young one, of whom I have spoken, and his face in repose was shockingly cruel. They are expecting marching orders in the morning and are probably eager to ride on to victory (?). They bade us good night and good-bye by kissing our hands as usual, a click of spurs, a military bow and very gracious thanks to Madame X. for her hospitality.
August 17th, Monday.
About half-past three in the morning I was wakened from a sound sleep by a commotion in the court under my window. Impatient horses were pawing the ground and a voice exactly like a snarling dog was hurling out orders—I peeped out cautiously and saw that the snarling dog was the amiable captain who copied the menu last night.
The officers left at four A. M. Fort Lançin fell today and Général Léman, commander-in-chief of the army here, was taken prisoner. Thousands of soldiers have passed as usual. In the afternoon a company of Prussians arrived, whose captain had mistaken the route, which put him in an abominable humor, having made his men march fifty miles out of their way and also risking a court-martial on his own account. He ordered Monsieur S. to open the garage door, in the hope of lodging his men there for the night. Unluckily the chauffeur, being absent, had the key, which plunged his Military Highness into a towering rage and he placed Monsieur S. at once under arrest between two soldiers, baionnette-au-canon, while the others battered in the door with the butt of their guns. Not finding sufficient quarters for two hundred men, he marched Monsieur S. away, as guide, half a mile down the road to a neighbor's.
That excitement had hardly quieted down when another batch of officers arrived at dusk, demanding lodgings for the night. These men were a rough type, altogether different from the preceding ones. About eight o'clock as we, the women, were waiting in the library for dinner to be announced, we heard a tremendous stamping of heavy boots and spurs and a snarl of angry voices just over our heads. Baronne de H., brave little woman as she always proved herself to be, flew up the stairs in a flash and found her brothers at the end of the hall between two orderlies with fixed bayonets, trying to pacify seven officers who were disputing angrily and were just about to enter one of the private apartments—in fact their father's room. She addressed them in a few vehement words—"I forbid you to enter the room of my father, who has been dead only a week." Then she added that the other soldiers who had been here were gentlemen and that she expected them to be. They were cowed at once and all humility, begging pardon properly. They pleaded fatigue for their rudeness and said "certainly they expected to be gentlemen, too." Wasn't that comical? They were ill at ease and rather sullen at dinner: and such a dinner as we had!—glacial does not express it. The captain of the band spoke English, French, Russian and German, but he could not coax anybody into conversation, for we clung to "Oui," or "Non," and stopped there. More than that, a kind of rigid fascination fixed our attention on one of their number—the tallest and lankiest, who sat down at least two feet from the table and endeavored to serve himself like that. Every mouthful was fraught with tense anxiety (for us). Happily they went to bed early, the captain kissing our hands and asking Madame X. if she were used to that, it being the custom in Germany.
Hardly had they got under cover and we were alone again, when a hoarse cry arose in the court—it was blood-curdling to us, as every sound these days is full of terror and possibilities. But it turned out to be only the cry of the sentry. There had been promiscuous shooting along the railroad in the village and all our brave soldiers tumbled out of bed, fell down the stair-case one after the other, buckling on swords as they went. It is the greatest wonder to me that we were not all shot on the spot when we stood there staring up, as one very young lieutenant descended three steps at a time with a revolver in one wobbly hand which was shaking like an aspen leaf, and a pair of field glasses in the other. I think the sudden excitement may have unnerved him and there is no doubt, this time, that the gods favored the innocent. That was the last we saw of our guests.
August 18th, Tuesday.
This morning one of them came back for some personal things, principally his watch, which, in the true, novel style, could not be found anywhere. So the Herr leutnant ordered a thorough search and said, with a grand air, to the housekeeper that if it could not be found he would be obliged to take one of the servant's as a forfeit. Fancy!
I can see the butler's poor, old, bowed legs, now, flying up the stair-case, with a bayonet stuck in his back to expedite matters. I do not know if this threat lent an added zest to the search, but fortunately someone had the happy thought to look under the mattress (where the officer had put it himself) and there was the ill-fated timepiece calmly ticking off German minutes. I think I forgot to tell you that since the invasion we retire at ten instead of eleven o'clock, having been advised to adopt Celtic time.
Prussian troops in khaki continue to pass; will they never cease? One's spine shivers at the sight of the endless, green snake which crawls along, insinuating its greedy length into the gardens of plenty. This morning four new officers came to the château; three of them were nondescript, but the fourth, to all appearances, was an Englishman, pure blood. He spoke English absolutely without accent and had a perfect English drawing-room air. It was as funny as an impersonation and as he had appeared on the scene alone, I believe his brothers-in-arms were almost suspicious of him. After a little the story came out. He is really a German, but has lived fifteen years in London. At the début of the war he had been obliged to take up arms against a sea of troubles, or relinquish forever his right to go back to Baden, where his parents live. Naturally he chose the former (also probably thinking that "War" was a word only) and allowed himself to be bored by circumstances. He told us some amusing tales of his having been already arrested three times for an English spy. Everybody here likes him very much and I welcomed him personally as the nearest approach to an Anglo-Saxon that I have seen in many months.
Monsieur J. and several of the representative men of the village, including Monsieur le Curé (a little, fat, rosy-cheeked man, adored by his flock), were taken as hostages for twenty-four hours and had to sleep in the railroad station. It was nervously comical to see Monsieur J. starting off, his valet following with a mattress on his back and a box of sandwiches in his hand against the misery of the night. But it is not so amusing to be the victim of even a threat which at any moment may take the form of a sudden reality for no reason except to terrorize honest people who are defending their homes. The enemy's way of punishing and evading future insurrection among the civilians is to take people as hostages and shoot them if necessary, or burn the houses. This they have already done in several quarters in Liége. A few nights ago several students fired on some German officers in a café and the latters' revenge was instantaneous and terrible; they just stood eighteen men up in front of the University and shot them like dogs—then burned that section for blocks around.
Austrian artillery was passing today with their great cannon drawn by automobiles. The wheels of the gun carriages are enormous and the cannon are the biggest things we have yet seen.