Belgium

“ Traveling the roads of Belgium on foot or by steam tram, by slothful barge, or by the very efficient railways of the Belgian Government, we come upon many a picture of odd-fashioned roofs and mirroring water-streets, of city squares and gilded cornices, of farm cots scattered like sheep across the downs, of corpulent windmills busy at their grinding, of canal-boats moving among the flat Flemish fields, of soil-stained men and women tending crops of sugar-beets, flax and grains. ”

“ One test and touchstone for all hearts that feel;
One word that is a stroke of steel on steel,
A stroke whose clangor sets a long note ringing
That falls upon our ears like distant singing.
One word for you who say the strife must cease—
Belgium!
Justice to her must hold the key of peace—
Belgium!
And you who clamor that our cry should be
Not love of country, but Humanity.
Have you not heard it, as you pass unheeding?
Humanity! In her the world lies bleeding! ”

“ You have destroyed Belgium, but Belgium will rise again; and, even if fate should ordain that Belgium is to be for ever wiped away, so long as one Belgian is left alive there will be a heart to execrate you and a voice to denounce your deeds. ”

“ The national culture of Belgium is a synthesis, if I may so call it, where one finds the genius of two races—the Romance and the Germanic—mingled, yet modified by the imprint of the distinctively Belgian. It is in that very receptivity—the fact that it has absorbed and unified the best elements of Latin and Teutonic civilization—that the originality of the Belgian national culture resides. ”

“ The Rise of Belgian Industry
Belgium’s story, as complex in pattern as the tapestry of Flemish looms, is interwoven with the bright threads of genius, and, no less, with the gold of commerce and the crimson threads of war. Proud mistress of the arts as Belgium can claim to be, she has held her own for centuries past as a vigorous industrial nation. Tribes that came across the Rhine after Caesar’s conquest of the Gauls, 57-52 before Christ, were permitted by the Romans to settle upon the lands that extended from the basin of the Meuse River to the sea. ”

“ MAURICE
They—the Prussians. Pierre will go now, and I will go—I will not stay away under any circumstances, understand? What will become of Belgium now?—it is hard to conceive it. They entered Belgium yesterday—do you understand—what scoundrels!
In the distance, along the narrow streets of the town, an uneasy sound of footsteps and wheels is growing rapidly. Distinct voices and outcries blend into a dull, suppressed, ominous noise, full of alarm. The tolling, as though tired, now subsides, now turns almost to a shriek. François tries vainly to hear something. ”

“ Of all the countries of Europe at the present day Belgium is the one which with an equal area supports the most inhabitants; she feeds twice as many as France; the most populous of our departments, that of the North, is a portion which Louis XIV detached from her. Towards Lille and Douai you already see spread out in an indefinable circle, extending up to the horizon, this great kitchen garden, a deep and fertile soil diapered with pale grain sheaves, poppy-fields, and the large-leaved beet, and richly stimulated by a low, warm sky swimming with vapor. ”

“ On Sunday night, August 2, 1914, Germany sent an ultimatum, demanding passage of her armies through Belgium to France. To the Kaiser, Belgium was no more than a turnpike road to Paris. The hero, King Albert, knowing he had his people behind him, refused to cringe and become a German slave. It was like the boy David defying the giant Philistine. The national flag—black, yellow and red—the ancient colors of Brabant, the central province in the kingdom of the nine that made Belgium a nation—was unfurled everywhere by “men determined to be free.” ”

“ THE RELICS OF GENERAL CHASSÉ
A TALE OF ANTWERP.
That Belgium is now one of the European kingdoms, living by its own laws, resting on its own bottom, with a king and court, palaces and parliament of its own, is known to all the world. And a very nice little kingdom it is; full of old towns, fine Flemish pictures, and interesting Gothic churches. But in the memory of very many of us who do not think ourselves old men, Belgium, as it is now called—in those days it used to be Flanders and Brabant—was a part of Holland; and it obtained its own independence by a revolution. ”

“ Belgium, after centuries of intermittent misery and recuperation as the cockpit of Europe, had with a hundred years of the peaceful fruition of the intelligence, courage, thrift, and industry of its people, emerged as the beehive of the Continent. ”

“ THE PART PLAYED BY BELGIUM
One of the earliest, and perhaps one of the most inspiring, of the flashes as of lightning whereby we saw the drama of the war was that which revealed the part played by Belgium. Has history any record of greater heroism and greater suffering? Such courage for the right! Such strength of soul against overwhelming odds and the criminal suddenness of surprise! ”

“ I shall never think of Belgium without seeing endless processions of silent men and black-shawled women, pitchers in hand, waiting, waiting for the day’s pint of soup. One and one-quarter million make a long procession. ”

“ The Queen was overjoyed at the thought that I was to make my home in Austria and Hungary, whence she had herself come, and where I should remember her, and at the same time further my country's glory and the King's ambitions.
I have been sacrificed for the good of Belgium, and Belgium now includes Belgians who reproach me for the gift of my youth and happiness essentially destined for their benefit! Belgians to-day regard me as a German, a Hungarian—a foreigner—and worse even than that! Alas for human gratitude! ”

“ The country of the Meuse and the Sambre is by far the loveliest part of Belgium. It abounds in myths and legends suited to the wild, romantic scenery of its hills and valleys. It abounds also in the villas and châteaux of the Belgian noblesse and haute bourgeoisie. The wealthy people of the cities delighted in their summers among the mountains of the Ardennes, while many families of ancient lineage but lesser fortunes lived the year round in their old-world houses. ”

“ Personally I find them a trifle disappointing; they come, no doubt, as a welcome relief after the rest of Belgian landscape, which I have heard described, not altogether unjustly, as the ugliest in the world; but the true glory and value of Belgium will always be discovered in its marvellously picturesque old towns, and in its unrivalled wealth of painting, brass-work, and wood-carving. Compared with these last splendours the low, wooded wolds of the Ardennes, with their narrow limestone valleys, seem a little thing indeed. ”

“ On one side the sea; on the other the dunes, with little shade and no beauty—such is the location of the new capital of Belgium. And here, in one of the six small villas that house the court, the King and Queen of Belgium, with the Crown Prince, are living. They live very quietly, walking together along the sands at those times when King Albert is not with his troops, faring simply, waiting always—as all Belgium is waiting to-day. ”

“ Belgium is a little country and the sound of the guns along a hundred miles of front strikes the senses hourly, and the hopes of the people rise and fall with the rise and fall in tones which follow the atmospheric changes and the daily rise and fall of battle. ”

“ It was out of the wedding of the fairies of the sand and clay, that beautiful Belgium was born—the country which the men and women living in it love so dearly, that they gladly die for it. In time of war, before the battle began, the knights and foot soldiers used to kneel down on the ground and kiss it. Then they prayed to be strong and brave, and vowed to defend their soil, from all enemies. ”

“ Belgium has its tradition of deathless glory, its imperishable memories of gallant bravery which lighten its darkness and make it shine like noonday. The one unlightened tragedy of the world to-day is Germany.
I thought of these things that night when I was being entertained at the Southern woman's hospitable home. ”

“ The Belgian people, left to themselves, would have known better how to act, and how to honour the memory of Leopold II, but this duty was delegated to those who, to this day, have wilfully and lamentably failed.
Let us consider Belgium as a human being, endowed with honour and reason, and jealous of the judgment of history and the esteem of the world; mistress of millions of Congolese and of other millions of colonial treasure. As a reasoning being, would she have considered herself free from all obligations towards the unfortunate children of the giver of these gifts? ”

“ Of these profoundly tried minds, of these wonderful energies now employed for the first time, of these atrocious sufferings which have brought all hearts into closer contact, a new Belgium is born, a greater, more generous, more ideal Belgium. ”

“ Belgian commerce embraces the whole circle of the earth, and it is in the peaceful work of culture that Germans and Belgians everywhere meet. Their cultivation of the more spiritual arts fills us with similar wonder when we behold to what a conspicuous place the poets and artists of Belgium have attained. May the trustful and friendly feelings, to which in recent times the relations of our governments bore such pleasing evidence, be ever more closely preserved! From your Majesty’s reign may happiness and blessing stream forth upon your house and upon your people! ”

“ The Belgians have paid a high price for freedom. Ever since commerce and the arts found there their first foothold in Northern Europe, the flourishing cities and fertile fields of Belgium have been the lodestar of political adventurers and needy despoilers. They have been the sport of intrigues and royal marriages. They have been fought for by Burgundian, Spaniard, Austrian, Frenchman, Dutchman, and German. ”

“ In my thoughts the future of Belgium has always been blended with my own, and I have always regarded it with the confidence inspired by the right of a free, honest, and brave nation, which wills its independence, which has won it, proved itself worthy of it, and will know how to preserve it. ”

“ BELGIUM
Town Life FIVE
It is befitting that a city more than fourteen hundred years of age should present many dignified aspects—that its buildings should be wreathed in the mists of antiquity, and that its traditions should be hallowed. Brussels—“a manor near the marsh”—is shrined in a niche of the ages, its pre-medieval garments clothe it richly. Yet the manners of the Belgian capital are modern, and the life there, while based on Flemish custom, is compared, with reservations, to the life of Paris. ”

“ You present yourself to the country supported by your two sons and the remembrance of the Queen beloved and regretted as a mother, you are surrounded by the Royal family, by illustrious alliances, by confidence and sympathy, you are supported by foreign Governments, your fame has grown greater, and you possess the love of Belgium which has grown still greater than any fame. ”

“ To the good citizen, as well as to the statesman, the story of Belgium presents innumerable problems, and teaches the sternest of lessons. Many of the difficulties remain to be solved. Centuries will not exhaust the retribution which must be exacted for the martyrdom of this heroic kingdom. A country may be devastated, but its history cannot be wiped from the chronicles. ”

“ Standing here, in this rich and picturesque interior, you realize strongly the gulf in this direction between Belgium and France, in which latter country, in these days of ecclesiastical poverty, loving restoration of the kind here seen is rare, and whose often neglected village churches seldom, or never, exhibit that wealth of marble rood-screen and sculptured woodwork—of beaten brass and hammered iron—that distinguishes Belgian church interiors from perhaps all others on earth. ”

“ Through centuries, in one way or another, she has continued to hold the world’s admiration. In olden times, when the clever weavers wrought historic scenes in their Flemish tapestries, they surely wove into the hearts of our forefathers the Spell of Belgium. In Belgium, the home of the violin, we have listened to the magic strains of the great masters and been charmed by the musical verses of Maeterlinck. ”

“ Conscious of the part that Belgium has played for more than eighty years in the world’s civilisation, it refuses to believe that the independence of Belgium can be preserved only at the price of violation of her neutrality. ”

“ The history of Belgium and the Belgian people does not begin to date merely from 1830, not even from the fifteenth century. It dates in fact from the time when, during the fifth century, Gallo-Romans and Germanic invaders intermingled and laid the basis of that ethnical and linguistic duality that has been for many centuries the characteristic of the Belgian populace and has impressed its mark on the whole course of Belgian history. ”

“ When we think or speak of Belgium our faces glow, and we are all resolved, should the need arise, to do as Belgium has done, and to do it in the same resolute and unconquerable spirit. In the meantime we rush for the newspapers with a constantly increasing eagerness. At about 11 A.M. the whole of Totland Bay is filled with people reading their papers in the open air. Everybody bumps into everybody else, but nobody minds. ”

“ Most important, perhaps, labour was abundant, low of cost, and highly skilled. In her people really lay Belgium’s greatest strength, for they are hardy and thrifty, and peculiarly skilled as mechanicians.
They used to say that while France furnished mankind with their luxuries, Belgium supplied them with their necessities. But this is not [139] wholly true, for the smaller country is celebrated for its exquisite lace and superb tapestries, while the gardens of Ghent raised orchids, azaleas and camellias for the flower-markets of France, Germany, England and even America. ”