A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium Part 16

Our Senator was very much down in the mouth about the situation in general and wanted to talk about it. The Colonel told him of the bulletins that had been published in Antwerp as to the progress of the campaign, and as this went on he cheered up visibly minute by minute--whether as a result of the good news or the champagne, I don't know.

The Colonel was called away after a time to talk to Lord Kitchener over the telephone. Kitchener keeps himself informed directly as to the progress of operations and the knowledge that he may drop in over the telephone at any minute gives his officers a very comforting feeling that they are not forgotten.

Finally, after dark, Colonel DuCane and Captain Ferguson came in, and we got under way. It was too late to go forward with hopes of seeing anything, but it was evident that things would be as hot as ever the next day and that I could not hope to get my charges back to Brussels.

Accordingly the Colonel's invitation was extended and accepted, and we turned back toward Antwerp considerably disappointed.

While we were waiting around trying to make up our minds--if any--I ran into young Strauss, the half-American, who was in the armoured car behind young de Ligne. He was really the princ.i.p.al hero of the occasion, having stood bolt upright in his car and riddled the German forces with his mitrailleuse until the few survivors turned and fled. He had with him two of the other survivors of his party. All of them had been decorated with the Order of Leopold for their behaviour. An order like that looks pretty well on a private's uniform, particularly when given with such good reason.

We had retreated inside the Hotel de Ville during a particularly heavy downpour of rain, when in came the King, who had spent the whole day in the field with the troops. He was drenched to the skin, but came briskly up the steps, talking seriously with his aide-de-camp. He stopped and spoke with us all and took Colonel DuCane into his study and had a few minutes talk with him by way of farewell. The King shows up finely in the present situation and all the foreign military attaches are enthusiastic about his ability. He is in supreme command of the army and no detail is too insignificant for his attention.

[Ill.u.s.tration: At Malines--a good background for a photograph to send home to Germany]

[Ill.u.s.tration: His Eminence, Cardinal Mercier, Archbishop of Malines]

We got the pa.s.sword and made back for Antwerp in the dark, leaving Colonel DuCane and Captain Ferguson to spend the night at Lierre. We were in bad luck and got stopped at every railroad crossing along the way. Troop and supply trains were pouring down toward the front and Red Cross trains were bringing back the wounded in large numbers. Both sides must have suffered heavily during the day, and there may be several days more of this sort of fighting before there is a lull.

When we got back to the hotel we found Sir Francis waiting for us with a glowing telegram and an equally glowing face. It was the most enthusiastic message yet received from the British War Office, which has been very restrained in its daily bulletins. For the first time that day it spoke with a little punch, speaking of the "routed enemy" and their being "vigorously pressed." We tumbled through a hasty bath and got down to dinner in short order.

After dinner it was the same old performance of going over to the Grand Hotel and labouring with Monsieur de Woeste, who was still bent on getting home to his clean linen without further delay. It took the united arguments of the Cabinet, which was in session, to convince him that it would be useless and foolish to try to get away. Finally he yielded, with a worse grace than on the previous evening. I had a comfortable visit with several of the Ministers, who were glad to hear news of their families in Brussels, and asked me to remember all sorts of messages to be given on my return. I only hope that I shall not get the messages mixed and get too affectionate with the wrong people. The Cabinet was going through the latest telegrams from the various fields of action. They even had some from Servia and were decidedly cheered up, a big change from the dogged determination with which they were facing bad news the last time I was in Antwerp.

Sat.u.r.day morning the Colonel and I were called at six, and at seven we got away in a pouring rain over the same road to Lierre that we had travelled the day before. There was a big force of workmen hard at it in the vicinity of the outer forts, burning houses and chopping down trees and building barbed-wire entanglements. It is a scene of desolation, but it is necessary in a fight like this.

We found things moving rapidly at headquarters in Lierre. Messengers were pouring in and orders going out with twice the activity of the day before. The movement had been under way for two hours when we got there and the guns were booming all around. After learning as much as we could of the disposition of the troops we went out and stocked up with bread, cheese, and mineral water, and started forth to see what we could of the operations. We took along a young officer from headquarters to show us the road. We soon saw that he did not know the roads and could not even read a map, and had to take over that work ourselves. Colonel Fairholme and I went in my motor with the headquarters pa.s.senger and Colonel DuCane and Ferguson followed in their own car with an orderly. We got to Malines without difficulty and got out for a look at the Cathedral. It is a dreadful sight, all the wonderful old fifteenth century gla.s.s in powder on the floor. Part of the roof is caved in and there are great gaping holes in the lawn, showing where the sh.e.l.ls struck that fell short of their mark. A few of the surrounding houses, belonging to entirely peaceful citizens, were completely wiped out while they were getting the range. It is hard to see what useful military purpose is served by smashing churches and peaceful habitations, when there are no troops about the place. Malines was bombarded when the troops had withdrawn. It is hard to reconcile with _Gott mit uns_.

Before we left Lierre, nine troopers of the Landsturm were marched into the hallway of the Hotel de Ville, to be examined by the officer who is there for that purpose. They were a depressed lot who had run away and given themselves up, so as to be spared the hardships and dangers of the rest of the war. They answered questions freely, telling all they knew as to the disposition of troops and making their get-away toward the local lockup with great alacrity as soon as the word was given to move.

Most of them were Bavarians. Colonel Fairholme speaks German like a native. He talked with these chaps, and there was some interesting conversation. They were all without enthusiasm for the war, and all expressed indignation at having been brought out of the country, maintaining that the Landsturm cannot be used for anything except the maintenance of order in the Empire. I think they are wrong about that, but this was no joint debate on German law, and no attempt was made to sooth their injured feelings. A lot of men were brought in while we were there, some of them prisoners taken during the fighting, but a great many of them fugitives who were sick of the war, and only asked to get off with a whole skin.

As they marched out of the hall, the King came in from the field for a look at the morning's telegrams. He had been out since long before daybreak, and was covered with rain and mud. He shook himself vigorously, spraying everybody with raindrops, and then stopped to speak to us before going in for a cup of coffee and a look at the news.

From Malines we made back along the northern side of the ca.n.a.l, in an endeavour to find the headquarters of the ----th Division. We went through a little village where all the inhabitants were standing in the road, listening to the cannonading, and spun out upon an empty and suspiciously silent country road. A little way out we found a couple of dead horses which the thrifty peasants had already got out and skinned.

I didn't like the looks of it, and in a minute the Colonel agreed that he thought it did not look like a road behind the lines, but our little staff officer was c.o.c.k-sure that he knew just what he was talking about, and ordered the chauffeur to go ahead. Then we heard three sharp toots on the horn of the car behind--the signal to stop and wait. And it came pulling up alongside with an inquiry as to what we meant by "barging"

along this sort of a road which likely as not would land us straight inside the enemy's lines. There was a spirited discussion as to whether we should go ahead or go back and strike over through Rymenam, when we heard a sh.e.l.l burst over the road about half a mile ahead, and then saw a motor filled with Belgian soldiers coming back toward us full tilt.

The Colonel stopped them and learned that they had been out on a reconnaissance with a motor-cyclist to locate the German lines, which were found to be just beyond where the sh.e.l.l had burst, killing the motor-cyclist. It would have been a little too ignominious for us to have gone bowling straight into the lines and get taken prisoners. We turned around and left that road to return no more that way. We got about half-way up to Rymenam when we met some Belgian officers in a motor, who told us that a battery of the big French howitzers, which had just gone into action for the first time, were in a wood near H----. We turned around once more, and made for H---- by way of Malines. We found the headquarters of the ----th Division, and went in and watched the news come in over the field telephone and telegraph, and by messengers on motor-cycles, bicycles and horses straight from the field. The headquarters was established in a little roadside inn about half a mile outside the town, and was as orderly as a bank. Officers sat at the various instruments and took notes of the different reports as they came in. Reports were discussed quickly but quietly, and orders sent out promptly but without confusion. The maps were kept up to the minute by changing the little flags to show the positions of the different troops right at the minute. There was telephone communication with the forts, and several times they were ordered to pour fire into a certain spot to cover an advance or a retreat of parts of the Belgian forces, and, at other times, to cease firing, so as to let Belgian troops cross or occupy the exact spot they had been bombarding. It was a wonderful sight to watch, and it was hard to realise that this was merely a highly scientific business of killing human beings on a large scale. It was so business-like and without animus, that to anyone not knowing the language or conditions, it might have pa.s.sed as a busy day in a war office commissary when ordering supplies and giving orders for shipment.

Just outside the headquarters was one of the fine German kitchen wagons with two fine Norman horses which had pulled it all the way from Germany. It had been stationed in the grounds of a chateau not far away, and three men of its crew were hard at work getting a meal when a little Belgian soldier with two weeks' growth of beard waltzed into the garden, shot one of the men dead and captured the other two. He disarmed them, put ropes around their necks and drove the kitchen to headquarters in triumph. He was proud as punch of his exploit, and, for that matter, so was everybody else around the place.

In a field of turnips a couple of hundred yards away from the headquarters were the howitzers. There were three of them in a row with three ammunition wagons. They had been sent here only a few days ago, and they were promptly put into action. They were planted here, slightly inside the range of the guns from the outer forts, and were able to drop sh.e.l.ls six miles from where we stood, or about five miles outside the range of the fort guns. They toss a sh.e.l.l about two feet long, filled with deadly white powder, six miles in ten seconds, and when the sh.e.l.l strikes anything, "it thoes rocks at yeh!" as the darkey said about our navy guns. The battery was planted down behind a little clump of pines, and was dropping sh.e.l.ls into a little village where there was a considerable force of Germans about to be attacked. The Germans must have been puzzled by this development, for they had counted on being able to advance safely up to the range of the forts, feeling sure that the Belgians had no powerful field guns of this sort.

We were introduced to the officers commanding the battery, and watched their work for nearly two hours. One of the officers was Count Guy d'Oultremont, adjutant of the Court, whom I had known in Brussels. He was brown as a berry, had lost a lot of superfluous flesh, and was really a fine-looking man. He had been in Namur, and had got away with the Belgian troops who went out the back door into France and came home by ship.

After we had been watching a little while, an aeroplane came circling around, evidently to spot the place where these deadly cannon were. It cruised around for some time in vain, but finally crossed straight overhead. As soon as we were located, the machine darted away to spread the news, so that the big German guns could be trained on us and silence the battery; but the Belgians were Johnny-at-the-rat-hole again, and he was winged by rifle fire from a crowd of soldiers who were resting near the headquarters. They killed the observer and wounded the pilot himself, to say nothing of poking a hole in the oil tank. The machine volplaned to earth a few hundred yards from where we were, and the pilot was made prisoner. The machine was hauled back to the village and shipped on the first outgoing train to Antwerp as a trophy.

We were leaving the battery and were slipping and sliding through the cabbages on our way back to the road, when we met the King on foot, accompanied only by an aide-de-camp, coming in for a look at the big guns. He stopped and spoke to us and finally settled down for a real talk, evidently thinking that this was as good a time as any other he was likely to find in the immediate future.

After talking shop with the two colonels, he turned to me for the latest gossip. He asked me about the story that the German officers had drunk his wine at the Palace in Laeken. I told him that it was generally accepted in Brussels, and gave him my authority for the yarn. He chuckled a little and then said, in his quiet way, with a merry twinkle: "You know I never drink anything but water." He cogitated a minute and then, with an increased twinkle, he added: "And it was not very good wine!" He seemed to think that he had quite a joke on the Germans.

As we talked, the sound of firing came from the German lines not far away, and shrapnel began falling in a field on the other side of the road. The Germans were evidently trying to locate the battery in that way. Most of the shrapnel burst in the air and did no damage, but some of it fell to the ground before bursting and sent up great fountains of the soft black earth with a cloud of gray smoke with murky yellow splotches in it. It was not a rea.s.suring sight, and I was perfectly willing to go away from there, but being a true diplomat, I remembered that the King ranked me by several degrees in the hierarchy, and that he must give the sign of departure. Kings seem powerless to move at such times, however, so we stayed and talked while the nasty things popped.

His Majesty and I climbed to a dignified position on a pile of rubbish, whence we could get a good view up and down the road, and see the French guns which were in action again.

A little later Ferguson, who was standing not far away, got hit with a little sliver and had a hole punched in the shoulder of his overcoat. It stopped there, however, and did not hurt him in the least. He looked rather astonished, pulled the little stranger from the hole it had made, looked at it quizzically, and then put it in his pocket and went on watching the French guns. I think he would have been quite justified in stopping the battle and showing his trophy to everybody on both sides.

The King was much interested in all the news from Brussels, how the people were behaving, what the Germans were doing, whether there were crowds on the streets, and how the town felt about the performances of the army.

He realised what has happened to his little country, and made me realise it for the first time. He said that France was having a hard time, but added that perhaps a sixth of her territory was invaded and occupied, but that every bit of his country had been ravaged and devastated with the exception of the little bit by the sea coast and Antwerp itself, which was getting pretty rough treatment, in order to put it in shape to defend itself. He spoke with a great deal of feeling. And no wonder!

Then to change the tone of the conversation, he looked down at my pretty patent leather shoes, and asked in a bantering way whether those were a part of my fighting kit, and where I had got them. I answered: "I got them several months ago to make my first bow to Your Majesty, at Laeken!" He looked around for a bit at the soggy fields, the marching troops, and then down at the steaming manure heap, and remarked with a little quirk to his lips: "We did not think then that we should hold our first good conversation in a place like this, did we?" He smiled in a sad way, but there was a lot more sadness than mirth in what he said.

Guy d'Oultremont came up and said something that I did not understand, and we started back toward the headquarters. We stopped opposite the inn, and the two colonels were called up for a little more talk.

Just then a crowd of priests, with Red Cross bra.s.sards on their arms, came down the road on their way to the battlefield to gather up the wounded. With his usual shyness the King withdrew a few steps to seek shelter behind a motor that was standing near by. As we talked, we edged back a little, forcing him to come forward, so that he was in plain sight of the priests, who promptly broke out in a hearty "_Vive le roi!_" He blushed and waved his hand at them, and, after they had pa.s.sed by, shook hands with us and followed them on foot out onto the field. In modern warfare a King's place is supposed to be in a perfectly safe spot, well back of the firing line, but he does not play the game that way. Every day since the war began, he has gone straight out into the thick of it, with the sh.e.l.ls bursting all around and even within range of hostile rifle fire. It is a dangerous thing for him to do, but it does the troops good, and puts heart into them for the desperate fighting they are called upon to do. They are all splendidly devoted to him.

The rain stopped as we got into the motors and started back toward Malines, with the idea of locating the other battery of _obusiers_.

There was a sharp volley of three toots on Colonel DuCane's horn, and we came to a sudden stop, with the emergency brakes on, to receive the information that it was two o'clock and time for lunch. None of us had kept any track of time, and all were ready to go sailing along indefinitely without food. As soon as we had noticed the time, however, we all became instantly hungry, and moved along, looking for a good place for lunch. I had the happy idea of suggesting the convent where we had taken refuge on Thursday, and thither we repaired to be most warmly greeted by all the nuns, and most particularly by the little Irish sister who was overjoyed to see British uniforms and hear some war news that she could believe. She hailed me with, "Oh! and it's the riprisint.i.tive of the Prisidint!" The nuns gave us a table in the park and two big benches, and we got out our bread and cheese and chocolate and a few other things that Colonel DuCane had found somewhere, and had a most comfortable meal with a towering pitcher of beer brought out from the convent, to give us valour for the afternoon's work.

After lunch we went back through Malines again, through the railroad yards, b.u.mping over the tracks, and away toward Muysen and Rymenam to see the other batteries. I was struck in going through the railway yards, which I had always seen teeming with activity and movement, to see that all the rails are covered deep with rust--probably for the first time. Think of it!

After leaving Muysen, our road lay for a mile or so along a ca.n.a.l with open fields on either side. Uhlan patrols had been reported in this part of the country, which was in a weak spot in the Belgian lines, and the Colonel told the staff officer to keep a sharp lookout and be ready with his revolver and prepared for a burst of speed. That military genius replied with an air of a.s.surance: "Oh, that's all right. They cannot cross the ca.n.a.l." The Colonel confined himself to saying mildly: "No, but bullets can!" Little Napoleon said nothing more, but I noticed that he unstrapped his revolver without loss of time.

We were bowling along the road, looking for the battery, when there was the most enormous noise which tore the earth asunder and the universe trembled. I looked around to the left, and there not more than a hundred feet away were those three husky French guns which had just gone off right over our heads! We had found them all right, but I should prefer to find them in some other way next time.

We spent a little time looking at them, and Ferguson had them get out some of the explosive and show it to me. It comes in long strips that look for all the world like chewing gum--the strips about the same proportions, only longer. I fail to see, however, how they can be made to blow up.

After a bit we got back into the cars, and started out to cruise around to the Belgian left wing and watch, a little of the infantry fighting at close quarters. We very soon began running into stragglers who informed us that the ----th Division was being driven back, and that a retreat was in progress. Soon we came upon supply trains and ammunition wagons making for the rear, to be out of the way of the troops when they began to move. We were not anxious to be tangled up in the midst of a retreat, and obliged to spend the night trying to work our way out of it, so we forged ahead and got back to Lierre as fast as we could. It was raining hard as we came in, and we took refuge in the Hotel de Ville, where the colonels read their telegrams and got off a report to London. One of their telegrams brought the unwelcome news that Ferguson was also recalled to England. They are evidently hard put to it to find enough officers to handle the volunteer forces. He will have to stay on for a few days, but Colonel DuCane came back with us and left the next morning for England by way of Ostend.

When we got back to the hotel after a fast run, I found that Inglebleek, the King's Secretary, had been around twice for me, and wanted me to go at once to the Palace. I jumped into the car and ran over there, to learn that the Queen wanted to see me. She was then at dinner, and he thought it would do the next time I came up--she seems to have wanted more news of Brussels--nothing pressing. She had told Inglebleek to give me a set of the pictures she had had taken of the damage done to the Cathedral at Malines. They are interesting as a matter of record.

Sir Francis had another good bulletin from the War Office, and was beaming. The colleagues came and gathered round the table, and chortled with satisfaction.

Heavy cannonading continued well into the night, to cover the advance of the ----th Division, which had been reinforced and was moving back into the dark and rain to take up its old position and be ready for the Germans in the morning.

I was up and about early on Sunday morning. Had breakfast with Count Goblet d'Alviella, one of the Ministers of State. Gathered up Monsieur de Woeste and Faura, and made for the Scheldt and Brussels. Instead of going across on the boat as we had to do the last time, we found a broad and comfortable pontoon bridge placed on ca.n.a.l boats and schooners lashed together and moored from one side of the river to the other. Any time they like, the Belgians can cut the string, and there is no way of getting into the city from that side. There was a tremendous wind blowing and the rain fell in torrents--short showers--from the time we left Antwerp until we came sailing into town here.

The bridge at Termonde had been blown up by the Germans on evacuating the place after having destroyed the entire town, so there was no thought of returning that way. I knew there could be nothing doing the direct way through Malines, so decided on a long swing around the circle by way of Ghent as the only practicable way. We found Belgian troops all the way to Ghent, and had no trouble beyond giving the pa.s.sword which I had. We drew up at a restaurant in a downpour and had a hasty lunch, getting under way again immediately afterward.

About ten kilometers this side of Ghent we came to Melle, a village which had been destroyed, and another where a number of houses had been burned. A nice-looking young chap told us that there had been a fight there the day before and that the Germans had set fire to the place as they retreated--just from cussedness, so far as he could see. There, and at another place along the road, peasants told us that they had been made to march in front of the German troops when they marched against the Belgians. I don't like to believe that there is any truth in that story but it comes from every direction and the people tell it in a most convincing way.

We found no Germans until we were this side of a.s.sche and then our adventures were evidently at an end. As we came in we could hear heavy cannonading from the direction of Vilvorde and Hofstade and knew that the fight was still going on. They had been hearing it in town for a couple of days.

The family at the Legation had been somewhat anxious, but had learned through the Germans that we were all right--evidently from somebody who got through the lines. I had to sit right down and tell the story of my life from one end to the other.

I never got over the idea in Antwerp of the incongruity of going out onto the field all day and fighting a big battle, or rather, watching it fought, and then sailing comfortably home to a big modern hotel in a motor and dressing for dinner. I don't think there has ever been a war quite like this before.

Herwarth has gone to the front for some active service. I am sorry to miss him. He went up to Hofstade the day I was to have returned, and waited for me about an hour, but the fire got too thick for him and he came back and reported that I would not be able to get through.

Monsieur de Woeste called this afternoon and paid his respects. He gave the Minister an account of the attempts we made to get through that made his hair stand on end for an hour afterward.