Various

“ A woman refugee from Framerie, near Mons, told the following story to the relief committee in Paris:
“My husband is with the Belgian army and I was left with my three babies in our cottage. All was quiet until Monday, when the Germans came. They sacked and destroyed everything in the house. There remains of our poor village nothing but ruins. I saw one of the soldiers strike one of my neighbors in the breast with his sword. Then he flourished the bloody blade as though proud of the feat. Some women who had hidden in their cellars were shot. ”

“ Details of fighting are of course difficult. One can get no soldier who knows what happens outside his own experience. The field guns seem to have done deadly work on the advancing infantry. The policy of shooting at officers was kept up as at Liége.
“As I went to Antwerp early in the morning a great German monoplane with curved wings and fan-shaped tail followed the railway, keeping exact pace with the express train from Brussels till we were halfway to Antwerp. The movement of vast bodies of troops in secret is now impossible with these military eyes everywhere in the skies.” ”

“ The correspondent of the Paris Temps, who had occasion to follow them on the way to the front, is loud in his admiration of the British soldiers’ discipline, equipment and commissariat arrangements. But what he admired most was the summary methods of dealing with spies, every one convicted being shot immediately. A British captain explained his attitude through a French interpreter as follows:
“You French pride yourselves on your humanity in cases where humanity is a mere useless sentimentality. To spare the life of a spy by postponing his trial is a crime against our own troops. ”

“ In this epoch making book in which truth makes the wildest imaginings of the wizards of fiction dull and commonplace, Sophie Lyons, known to the police of two continents as the shrewdest, cleverest, brainiest, and most daring and resourceful criminal of the age, tears aside the veil and reveals the most desperate characters of the underworld, the millionaire aristocrats of crime, as they plot, plan and later execute their dark and incredible deeds. ”

“ Taking advantage of the lull we got out of Namur early this morning, taking crossroads and lanes in front of the Belgian and French lines. The allied forces were pushing the Germans back under great guns placed along the northern line. The fields and low hills were alive with moving troops, columns of cavalry with light guns moving into position and long snakes of infantry.
“An officer warned us in a lane to wait there. He said: ‘We’ve run down some Uhlans in those woods.’ We waited half an hour. No movement in the sunny fields, nothing to be seen. ”

“ It is, for instance, immensely characteristic of the French spirit that an infantry battalion, having put to flight a detachment of German outposts in the forest of Compiègne, calmly sat down to have a picnic in the woods until, as they sat over their hot soup, laughing at their exploit, they were attacked by a new force and cut to pieces. ”

“ Wiring his experiences in Brussels, the correspondent of the London Daily News said:
“I was stopped by an enormous crowd of refugees flocking along the Brussels road, on foot and in vehicles and by Red Cross cars. The sight was pitiful. Of the people leaving their homes by far the greater number were women. Many of them had young children along whose fathers were at the front.
“Fear and ignorance have seized the mob. As I was going out a peasant fired his double-barreled gun at my motor, mistaking my fishing hat for a German helmet. The shot blew the tail lamp to pieces. ”

“ Gradually working near, the shells began to strike the houses in Tirlemont. This was a signal for the populace to flee blindly. The scene was like the rushing of rats from a disturbed nest. The people fled in every direction except one.
“I moved down to Louvain, where everything seemed peaceful. The people sat in the cafés drinking their evening beer and smoking. Meanwhile the Belgian troops were retiring toward Louvain. By midnight the town was in the throes of a panic. Throngs of refugees had begun to arrive, followed later by soldiers. ”

“ The commander of one of the forts, at the moment when the bombardment was heaviest, went mad and began shooting his own men. He was disarmed and bound. The cupola of one of the forts was destroyed by a bomb from a Zeppelin. Fort Chaudfontaine was blown into oblivion by a German shell which dropped into the magazine.
“Finally, Gen. Leman decided to make his last stand in Fort Loncin. When the end became inevitable he destroyed the last gun and burned up the plans, maps, papers and food supplies. He was about to order all the men to the trenches when a shell buried him beneath a pile of débris. ”

“ In the pages of this excruciatingly funny narrative can be found the elixir of youth for all man and womankind. The magic of its pages compel the old to become young, the careworn gay, and carking trouble hides its gloomy head and flies away on the blithesome wings of uncontrollable laughter. ”

“ Pitch darkness reigns in the streets at night and those forced to be out stumble against one another as they grope their way along.
To prevent a prohibitive rise in the cost of food all shopkeepers have been ordered to display a list of prices charged in such a position that all who pass can see it from the outside. ”

“ RODE INTO DEATH’S JAWS
A correspondent describing the fighting before Malines says:
“I could see dark blue masses of Belgian infantry falling back, cool as on a winter’s morning. Through a mistake, two battalions of carbineers did not receive the order to retire and were in imminent danger of destruction. To reach them a messenger would have had to traverse a mile of open road swept by shrieking shrapnel. A Colonel summoned a gendarme and gave him the orders and he set spurs to his horse and tore down the road, an archaic figure in towering bearskin. It was a ride into the jaws of death. ”

“ AUTO ROUGH RIDERS
“Wealthy young Belgians have done great work,” writes a correspondent from Antwerp, “by dashing at the German lines in armored automobiles, each of which carried a single machine gun. In one instance one of these cars stopped for lack of gasolene just as it reached a German patrol. A daring young Belgian jumped out and filled the tank, and although bullets fell about him, he reëntered the car uninjured and the machine started forward again, while the mitrailleuse was working constantly.” ”

“ When fighting was general about Brussels smart women of the Belgian capital motored out to watch battles in the cool of the afternoon as gaily as though going to the races, says an Ostend correspondent. ”

“ The German cavalry losses were appalling. A captured German cavalry officer estimates the wastage of horses, especially in the Belgian campaign, at about two-thirds of the total allotted to the army operating in the direction of Paris.
The army was hampered by a shortage of cavalry scouts, and since it entered France many battery horses have been transferred to the cavalry. As a result guns have been abandoned and have fallen into the hands of the British in large numbers. The horseless cavalrymen are now marching with the infantry. ”

“ This graphic incident of the fall of Liége was told a reporter for a Dutch paper by a German officer:
“When the first dust and fumes passed away we stormed the fort across ground literally strewn with bodies of the defenders. All the men in the forts were wounded. Most were unconscious. A corporal with one arm shattered valiantly tried to drive us back by firing his rifle.
“Buried in débris and pinned beneath a massive beam was Gen. Leman. ‘Le Général il est mort,’ said an aide-de-camp with gentleness. ”

“ A British destroyer, having sunk an enemy, lowered a lifeboat to pick up German survivors. Before the lifeboat returned a German cruiser came out and attacked her, forcing her to abandon the lifeboat.
The British crew was left alone in an open boat without food twenty-five miles from the nearest land, and that land the enemy’s fortress, with nothing but fog and foes surrounding. Suddenly up popped a British submarine close by, opened the conning tower and took the British on board, leaving the German survivors alone in the lifeboat. ”

“ Telegraphing from Rotterdam a correspondent of the New York Sun says:
“An American who arrived here from Berlin said to me:
“ ‘As the Berliners have been treated to a long, unbroken series of bulletins announcing German victories and have an invincible belief in the irresistibility of the German army, I asked why there were so few English prisoners.
“ ‘The reply was: “We are not troubling ourselves to take many. The hatred of our men for the British is uncontrollable.” ”

“ The King’s summer palace, which looks out over the sea, has also been turned into a hospital. Side by side with all these scenes of war it is a striking contrast to watch the crowds of children paddling and playing war games on the sand.
“At 9 o’clock this morning all the men of the Civil Guard were disarmed, and the Burgomaster issued a proclamation to the inhabitants urging them to be calm and offer no resistance to the invading Germans.
“The Maritime Railway station was held by Belgian soldiers this morning, but they will be removed by boat if the Germans enter the town. ”

“ The rescue of the beautiful Lucy Leonard, from the clutches of murderous desperadoes and outlaws, vibrates every nerve in the human body and is one of the most fascinating and stirring incidents ever recorded in criminal history. ”

“ Careless of quick-firers, which experience should have taught them were masked behind the enemy’s advance posts, they charged with the bayonet and suffered needlessly heavy losses during the fighting at Creil and Compiègne. One can only admire the gallantry of men who dare to charge on foot against the enemy’s mounted men and who actually put a squadron of them to flight, but one must say again: ‘C’est magnifique, mais ce n’est pas la guerre.’
“There have been many incidents of heroism in these last days of fighting. ”

“ Fighting was in full swing. The Captain with me already had made some valuable observations when the Germans, noticing my French machine, opened fire on it.
“A number of their bullets pierced the wings of the aeroplane and others struck the stays. We still flew on, however, as it was necessary to obtain the exact position of the enemy. Then the German artillery began. Their shells burst near the aeroplane and each explosion caused it to rock. It was difficult to retain control as pieces of shells had seriously damaged two of the stays. The fantastic dance in the air lasted twenty minutes. ”

“ Here is part of the description of scenes on the battlefields on the banks of the Marne as told to a Paris correspondent by an eyewitness:
“The greatest optimism reigns. I saw the remains of blown-up bridges and hundreds of lifeless horses and mules in the deserted trenches. Dead soldiers had been buried and the wounded cared for, and some priests were throwing burning brushwood on carcasses. ”

“ Two German aeroplanes flying audaciously low swept over the trenches to see how they were held. Then almost immediately afterward the German artillery got the range of the trenches and commenced bursting shrapnel over them. The infantry machine guns were quickly at work, and the little band of defenders settled down to keep the enemy’s masses of troops at bay as long as possible. ”

“ The Prussians are poor shots. They don’t know by a yard where they shoot, and when they see a bayonet they are so scared they just run. I have lost but very few bullets. When I aim for their noses, you can bet that they don’t hear the bullets whiz by their ears. They get it right in the mouth. I never missed a bird on the wing, so how could I miss those square-head Uhlans? ”

“ Stories of the cool nerve of Belgian soldiers under fire are being told everywhere by refugees and correspondents arriving from the battlefield in lower Belgium. The story is told of one volunteer who returned after a skirmish with Uhlans and calmly announced: “Well, I killed two.” Then as he filled his pipe, he added:
“I hit one right there,” putting his finger to his forehead. “His helmet went spinning and I picked it up later and saw the hole my bullet made.”
Clerks, brokers, and business men have been turned into fighting devils. ”

“ A spy may be able by some means to convey a harvest of news to his own side, so as to enable the enemy to surprise us precisely when we hoped to surprise him. In such cases, inopportune indulgence may cost the lives of several hundreds of our own troops. ”

“ The American Embassy in Paris is in daily receipt of letters written by dying German soldiers, forwarded to it by the French Government for transmission to Germany. One is from a German aviator who had fallen into the hands of the French. ”

“ Women are sending up cart loads of fruit and flowers to the camp every day, and trainloads are also arriving, being taken by the Red Cross on trains and stretchers to the hospital camp.
“A detachment of British arrived from the front this morning,” says a despatch. “A major, badly wounded, was exchanging jokes with wounded soldiers and was smiling. He said all he wanted was coffee. Everybody immediately rushed off and returned with coffee and cider.
“Members of the Fusilliers said that on Wednesday the regiment lined up for breakfast, when the German artillery started shelling them. ”