here
their horses trod.

Civilization had been justified. The "scrap of paper" had come to life.
It was a great day, an hour of right and might, a soul-stirring climax
to a most stupendous drama. The hero rode in triumph; and the villain,
after ignominious flight, was hiding behind the skirts of a Dutchwoman,
over the border.

No finer troops marched through Brussels on this gala day than the
Yanks, who were given a conspicuous place in the celebration. A
battalion of infantry from the Ninety-First American Division and a
battery from the Fifty-Third Brigade, fresh from the beating they had
given the Huns at Oudenark a few days before, were prominent in the
lines, and shared in the plaudits a liberated people showered upon their
own heroic troops. Troops that had held the last strip of Belgian soil
through all those bitter years with a tenacity the Huns could never
shake. These Belgian soldiers, had, of course, the place of honor.
French and British troops, with bands playing and colors flying, shared
in the glorious triumph.

The King and the royal family rode at the head of two Belgian
divisions--a column of veterans stretching out fifteen miles. The day
was like midsummer--bright and fair. All the roads leading to the Rue
Royale and the Boulevard Anspach were packed hours before the King's
arrival. At the Port de Flandre the throngs were so dense they were
impassable. The whole city was gorgeously decorated. Aircraft were
overhead, dropping confetti. The balconies all along the route were
draped with flags and colored banners, and filled with people who, when
the King and his family rode by, showered them with flowers and little
flags. At one place a company of five hundred young women sang the
Brabanconne, the Belgian national song, and the American, French and
British national anthems.

The royal progress ended at the Palais de la Nation, where the King
dismounted and entered, to address the parliament in its first assembly
after the war--an historic session. Then he reviewed the troops in the
great square, and thence went to the Hotel de Ville to receive the
address of the Burgomaster Max, that sturdy figure, which the Germans at
the height of their tyranny had not been able to budge.

AMERICA'S TREMENDOUS ACHIEVEMENT BEHIND THE LINES

When the armistice was signed on November 11, 1918, the United States
land forces in Europe numbered some 2,200,000 fighting men. Of these
about 750,000 were in the Argonne