Peeps At Many Lands: Belgium Part 4

There are cakes, called _gauffres_, which are often eaten on St.

Martin's Day, and are therefore sometimes called St. Martin's cakes.

That favourite saint is so much spoken of in connection with eating good things that in the Valley of the Meuse they call him _le bon vivant_, which means the person who lives well.

Just as in England bonfires are lighted on Guy Fawkes' Day, November 5, so in Belgium they light them on the evening of St. Martin's Day.

Indeed, they are known as St. Martin's fires, and the children call lighting a bonfire "warming the good St. Martin."

About a month after St. Martin's comes the Day of St.

Nicholas--December 6. During the night before this saint is supposed to ride through the sky, over the fields and above the housetops, mounted on a donkey or a white horse, with a great basket stuffed full of toys, fruit, sweetmeats, and other nice things. Down the chimney of every house where there are children sleeping he drops some of these things, if the children have been good, or a whip if they have been naughty.

So on the Eve of St. Nicholas Belgian children, before they go to bed, fill their shoes, or sometimes a basket, with hay or carrots, and place them near the chimney of their sleeping-room, so that when St.

Nicholas comes to the house he may find something for his donkey or horse to eat, and in return leave presents for them.

Having made these preparations, the children ought to sing or repeat verses addressed to the saint. Here is one of them--the one they sing at Lierre:

"Sinte Niklaes, n.o.bele Sinte Niklaes!

Werpiet in myn Schoentjen Een Appeltjen of een limoentjen!"

This means in English: "n.o.ble Saint Nicholas, please throw into my little shoe just a small apple or lemon."

There is another of these rhymes which is not so polite, in which the saint is told that if he gives something, the child will serve him for life, but if he doesn't, the child will not serve him at all!

[Ill.u.s.tration: A FARMSTEADING.]

Next morning the children wake early, and jump out of bed to see what has happened during the night. They expect to find, if St. Nicholas is pleased with them, that the hay and carrots have disappeared, and that their shoes are full of presents; but that if they have not been good enough, the shoes will just be as they were the night before, and a birch-rod stuck into the hay. But, as you may suppose, it always turns out that St. Nicholas is pleased. The presents are there, and amongst them there is sure to be a gingerbread figure of the saint, which they may eat or not, as they please; so they are happy for the rest of the day.

St. Nicholas, you see, is much the same as Santa Claus, for whom stockings are hung up in England.

About a fortnight after this comes December 21, dedicated to St.

Thomas, when Belgian children can play tricks on their parents in a curious way. The game is to get your father or mother to leave the house, and then lock the door and refuse to let them in till they have promised to give you something. A child will say: "Mother, somebody wants to speak to you in the garden." The mother goes out. Of course there is n.o.body there; and when she comes back the child calls out: "St. Thomas's Day! What will you give me to let you in?" So the mother promises something, which is usually chocolate, with a piece of _cramique_--a kind of bread with currants in it--and not till then is the door opened. This, of course, is great fun for the children, who always hope that their parents have forgotten what day it is, and so will be easily tricked.

A week later is the Festival of SS. Innocents, or _Allerkinderendag_ (the day of all the children), as it is called in Flemish, which is observed in memory of the slaughter of the children by Herod. On this day Belgian children are supposed to change places with their parents, wear their best clothes, and rule the household.

They can put on their parents' clothes, and go about the house making as much noise as they like, teasing the servants and giving them orders. The youngest girl has the privilege of telling the cook what she is to prepare for dinner; and all the children may go out and walk about dressed up as old people. This is not often seen now, though poor children sometimes put on their parents' things, and beg from door to door, calling themselves "the little fathers and mothers."

These winter festivals, when the children have so much liberty and get so many presents, take the place in Belgium of the Christmas-trees and parties you have in England.

CHAPTER XII

THE ARCHERS: GAMES PLAYED IN BELGIUM

Let us imagine we are taking a walk along some country road in Flanders on a summer afternoon. There is a cinder-track for cyclists on one side, and the lines of a district railway on the other. The road between them is causeway, very hard, dusty, and hot to walk on.

But we can step on to the railway, and walk between the rails, or take to the cycle-track. If a train comes up behind, the engine-driver will whistle to give us warning, but we must keep a sharp lookout for cyclists, who seldom ring their bells, but rush swiftly and silently past, and perhaps shout something rude to us for being on their track.

There are no fences or hedges, but a straggling row of tall poplar-trees on each side of the road, and beyond them square fields of rye or pasturage divided by ditches of stagnant water.

It will not be long before we come to a village, a row of white cottages with roofs of red tiles, and outside window-shutters painted green. In front of each cottage there is a pathway of rough stones, and a gutter full of dirty water. There are about fifty of these cottages, of which half a dozen or so have signboards with _Herberg_, which means public-house, over their doors. The railway pa.s.ses close in front of them. A little way back from the road there is a church, with a clock-tower, and a snug-looking house, standing in a garden, where the parish priest lives.

Just outside the village we notice a meadow, in which there is a wooden shed open at one side, with benches in it, and reminding us of the little pavilions we often see on village cricket-grounds in England. The part of the meadow just in front of this shed is covered with cinders or gravel, in the middle of which rises a very high pole, tapering towards the top, and looking like a gigantic fishing-rod stuck in the ground. It is crossed, a long way up, by slender spars, like the yards of a ship, only they are no thicker than a walking-stick. On these spars, and along the pole itself near the top, a number of little wooden pegs, with tufts of yellow worsted attached to them, are fixed. One bigger than the rest is perched on the very summit of the pole, which bends over slightly to one side. They look like toy canaries, but are called "pigeons," and they are put there as marks to be shot at with bows and arrows.

Presently a number of men come from the village, each with a long-bow and some arrows. It is a holiday, and the local Society of Archers is going to spend the afternoon shooting for prizes. One of them takes his stand close to the foot of the pole, fits an arrow on his bowstring, aims steadily, and shoots straight up. It needs a good deal of strength, as the bow is stiff to bend. The arrow flies whistling among the "birds," touches one or two without bringing them down, rises high above the top of the pole, turns in the air, and comes down again to the ground with a thud. It is the duty of two or three boys to pick up the arrows, and bring them back to the shooters. The arrows are blunt, but to protect their heads these boys wear hats with thick flat crowns and very broad brims, which make them look like big mushrooms with legs as they run about to fetch the arrows.

When a bird is. .h.i.t fair and square it comes down, and the shot is cheered. Sometimes shot after shot is fired, and nothing falls, especially if there is a wind. But the interest never flags, and the shooting goes on for hours. There is a great deal of talking and laughing, much beer is drunk in the pavilion, and the fun only ends when the light fails.

This is the great national sport of Belgium. There is scarcely a town or village which has not a Society of Archers, called generally after St. Sebastian, the patron saint of archers. Many of them were founded 600 years ago, at the time when the famous archers of England were showing how well they could hold their own with the bow against knights clad in heavy armour. In 1303 a society called the Confraternity of the Archers of St. Sebastian was founded at Ypres, a town in Flanders, to celebrate a great battle, the Battle of the Golden Spurs, in which the Flemings had been victorious over the French the year before, and this society still exists. The chief Society of Archers in Brabant in the old days was at Louvain, and it was founded just three years before that Battle of Cressy of which you have so often heard, when, as the old chronicler Froissart says, the English arrows flew so thick that it seemed to snow.

Thus the history of this national sport goes back to the time when arrows were used in battle, and men had to practise constantly with their bows in order to be able to defend their country or attack their enemies. But when the use of firearms became universal, and archers were no longer employed in warfare, the societies still continued to exist, and their meetings gradually became what they now are--social gatherings for the practice of archery as a form of sport.

At Bruges there is a company of archers called the Society of St.

Sebastian, whose club-house was built with money given by Charles II.

of England, who lived in that town for some time when he was an exile; and it may interest you to know that Queen Victoria, when on a visit to Bruges, became a member of this society, and afterwards sent two silver cups as prizes to be shot for.

Another form of this sport is shooting with crossbows at a target. St.

George is the patron generally of those who use the crossbow. The Society of St. George at Bruges has a curious festival, which is observed in February. It is called the _Hammekensfeest_, or festival of the ham. The shooting takes place in a hall, where a supper-table is laid with various dishes of ham, salads, fish, and other eatables.

The target is divided into s.p.a.ces marked with the names of the dishes.

If anyone hits a s.p.a.ce marked, for example, ham, he may go and help himself to ham; but if someone else, shooting after him, hits the same place, he must then give up his seat. In the bull's-eye of the target there is the figure of an ape, and if anyone hits that he can eat of any dish he pleases. You may suppose what an amusing supper-party this is, when all the guests are shooting and eating by turns, and no one knows whether he may not have to rise suddenly and give up his place to somebody else.

There are many other customs and festivals connected with the archer societies, which are very flourishing in Belgium, chiefly among the _pet.i.te bourgeoisie_.

There are athletic clubs in Belgium, and rowing is a favourite sport, especially at Ghent. Two years on end the Ghent Rowing Club won the Grand Challenge Shield at Henley, beating all the English crews which rowed against them.

As in all countries, the children have many games. One, which they call _balle dans la maison_ (ball in the house), is much the same as rounders, and there is another game called _camp ruine_, which girls play at school. There are two sides. A ball is thrown up, and each side tries to prevent the other catching it. Each player who is prevented has to join the opposite side or camp, and so on till one camp is "ruined" by losing all its occupants.

There is a very popular game among Belgian working-men called the _jeu de balle_. There are five players on each side, who stand on two large courts marked on the ground. The ball is served by hitting it with the hand (as at fives) by a player on one side over the line which divides the courts, and is returned in the same way by a player on the other side. The ball must not touch the ground, and is taken full pitch. A point is lost by the side which sends a ball outside the lines of the court into which it ought to have been served or returned. The points count fifteen, thirty, forty, and five for the last, which wins the game.

This is the chief game played by working-men in Belgium. In some places it seems to be quite unknown, but in others it is very popular.

But there are so many rules that it is impossible fully to understand it without seeing it played, or to explain it without a diagram showing the positions of the players, who have all different names, like men fielding at cricket. The _jeu de boule_, which you may hear mentioned in Belgium, is quite different from the _jeu de balle_, and is much the same as skittles.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLAYING "JEU DE BOULE," AT A FLEMISH INN.]

Of the more important games football is the most popular in Belgium.

Great crowds a.s.semble to watch the matches, which are always played under "a.s.sociation" rules. Rugby football would be impossible for Belgians, because they would never keep their tempers when caught and thrown down. There would be constant rows, and no match would ever be finished. As it is, there is a great deal of quarrelling, and when one town plays another the visitors, if they win, are hooted, and sometimes attacked, when they are leaving the ground. Lately, after a football match in Flanders, knives were drawn, and some of the players had to escape in a motor-car.

Cricket has lately been tried, but it has not as yet spread much, and is not likely to become very popular, as it requires too much patience and steadiness for Belgian young men and boys. Lawn-tennis and hockey, however, are quite the fashion, especially lawn-tennis, which many Belgians, ladies as well as men, play extremely well. Important tennis tournaments are held every summer at Ostend and other places on the coast.

In recent years several golf-courses have been made in Belgium. There is one at a place called Le Coq, near Ostend, where Leopold II., the present King of the Belgians, founded a club. It is very pretty, and there is a fine club-house; but good English players do not like it, because the course is too artificial, with flower-beds and ornamental shrubs, whereas a golf-course ought to be as natural as possible. Golf is played also at Brussels, Antwerp, Nieuport, and Ghent.

Another place for golf is Knocke, a seaside village near Bruges, where the game was introduced by a few Englishmen some years ago. The golf-course at this place is laid out among the dunes, and is entirely natural, with "bunkers" of fine sand. A great many players go there from England and Scotland, as well as from various parts of Belgium, and the Flemish "caddies," who cheerfully carry the clubs for 5d. a round, speak English quite well, and know all about the "Royal and Ancient Game."

CHAPTER XIII

WHAT THE BELGIANS SPEAK