Behind the Scenes in Warring Germany

four," said Ober-Lieutenant Herrmann, ex

dings, we skirted the edge of that rectangle of stone buildings where Belgian officials used to conduct Belgian affairs. At the corner we turned, passing up the Rue de la Loi, where King Albert's palace frowns down upon two black and white striped Prussian sentry boxes, and then entered the Belgian War Ministry building. A German private ushered us up a flight of marble stairs to an antec

ose from behind a tapestry-topped table, revealing as he did, a slight stoop in his back, and held out a long-fingered hand. As I looked at Governor General von Bissing I saw that he wore the second class of the Iron Cross and no other decorations; at the same time I imagined he had been awarded about ten orders which he could have strung across his narrow chest. His black, glistening, almost artificial-looking hair, was brushed back tight over his head, and when I noticed his eyes, I saw that they were of bluish gr

Governor General what Germany was doing towards the reconstruction of Belgium. I asked Herrmann to explain to him-for I dreaded attempting my ungrammatical German-that America, when I had left it, was u

back and forth across it-German, Belgian, English, and French, but I think you have seen that only in the paths of these armies has the countryside suffered. Where engagements were not fought or shots fired, Belgium is as it was. There has been no systematic devastation for the purpose of intimidating the people. You will learn this if you go all over Belgium. As for the cities, we are doing the best we can to encourage business. Of course, with t

ght that Belgium could ever be Germanized. Suppose after the peace treaty was signed that Germany decided to keep Belgium, would the Empire ever be able to assimilate the new people? Be

Belgium are politically undisciplined children. You may know of the high percentage of criminality in Belgium. You may have heard that the slums of Antwerp are considered the worst in the world. Apparently education was never designed in Belgium for the mass of the people. They knew nothing, they could conjecture nothing, about what was going on between their rulers and the rulers of other countri

try permits the publication of newspaper articles that can have but one effect, and that is to encourage revolt in a captured people. A country likes to call itself humanitarian, and yet it persists in all

to recapture the city. Any day that we can hear the guns faintly, we know that there is an undercurrent of nervous expectancy running through the whole city. It g

t anticipate any uprising among the Belgians, although the thoughtless among them have encouraged it. An uprising is a topic of worry in our councils. It could do us no harm. W

of officials of the Belgian Government, who were

can see their viewpoint. In these days, railway roads and troop trains were inseparable, and if those Belgian railway officials had helped us, they would have committed treason against their country. There was no need, though, for the Post Office officials to hold out, and only lately they have come around. Realizing, however, that withou

ing if there was much need

ost part it is only needle pricks. They are quiet now. They know why," and slowly shaking his h

most important questi

e English would have landed their entire expeditionary army at Antwerp, and cut our line of communication. How do I know that? Simply because England would have been guilty of the grossest blunder if she had not done that, and the man who is in charge of England's army has never been known as a blunderer. It was the only way. Subsequent events, the finding of dip

tively little damaged, roughly, but one-twelfth was destroyed, and I saw the paintings that German officers risked their lives in fire to

excellent work. It is in the highest degree necessary. At first the German army had to use the food they could get by foraging in Belgium, for the country does not begin t

, the number of unemployed there was huge-largest, so Mayor Mitchell had said, in the city's history-and that some Americans were so unsent

llency was indulging in quiet amusement at my expense. He impressed me as being far too clever to make such a statement in entire sincerity. "I welcome the American Relief Committee," he said.

l really ate cakes. I bowed my way out of the rose and French gray room and walked with Ober-Lieutenant Herrmann down the marble stairs. I was thinking of a story that I had heard

you entered the army?"

r," replied

med Von Bissin

outh is so thin and straight, as almost to be cruel, but you feel that he is absolutely fair, and it is hard to think of him as breaking his word. I cannot imagine Governor General von Bissing doing that. I think he is ruthlessly honest, ruthlessly just, hard, a rigid disciplinarian, and scr