counts a sufferer, "in Station Street, Louvain, and the German
soldiers fired on us. I saw the corpses of some women in the street. I
fell down, and a woman who had been shot fell on top of me." Women and
children suddenly turned out into the streets, and, compelled to witness
the destruction by fire of their homes, provided a sad spectacle to such
as were sober enough to see. A humane German officer, witnessing the
ruin of Aerschot, exclaims in disgust: "I am a father myself, and I
cannot bear this. It is not war, but butchery." Officers as well as men
succumbed to the temptation of drink, with results which may be
illustrated by an incident which occurred at Campenhout. In this village
there was a certain well-to-do merchant (name given) who had a good
cellar of champagne. On the afternoon of the 14th or 15th of August
three German cavalry officers entered the house and demanded champagne.
Having drunk ten bottles and invited five or six officers and three or
four private soldiers to join them, they continued their carouse, and
then called for the master and mistress of the house.

"Immediately my mistress came in," says the valet de chambre,
"one of the officers who was sitting on the floor got up, and,
putting a revolver to my mistress temple, shot her dead. The
officer was obviously drunk. The other officers continued to
drink and sing, and they did not pay great attention to the
killing of my mistress. The officer who shot my mistress then
told my master to dig a grave and bury my mistress. My master
and the officer went into the garden, the officer threatening
my master with a pistol. My master was then forced to dig the
grave and to bury the body of my mistress in it. I cannot say
for what reason they killed my mistress. The officer who did
it was singing all the time."

In the evidence before us there are cases tending to show that
aggravated crimes against women were sometimes severely punished. One
witness reports that a young girl who was being pursued by a drunken
soldier at Louvain appealed to a German officer, and that the offender
was then and there shot. Another describes how an officer of the
Thirty-second Regiment of the Line was led out to execution for the
violation of two young girls, but reprieved at the request or with the
consent of the girls' mother. These instances are sufficient to show
that the maltreatment of women was no part of