ith whom I attempted to hold converse
became coldly aloof. Holding the best of intents, I was treated like
a pariah. The only one whom I could get a raise from was a
bookseller who spoke English. His wrath against the spoilers
overcame his discretion, and he launched out into a bitter tirade
against them. I reminded him that, as civilians, his fellow-
countrymen had undoubtedly been sniping on the German troops.
That was too much.

"What would you do if a thief or a murderer entered your house?"
he exploded. "No matter if he had announced his coming, you
would shoot him, wouldn't you?"

Realizing that he had confided altogether too much to a casual
passerby, he suddenly subsided. The only other comment I could
drag out of him was that of a German officer who had told him that
"one Belgian could fight as good as four Germans." My request for
a lodging-place met with the same evasion from him as from the
others.

Chapter VIII

Thirty-Seven Miles In A Day

"Death if you try to cross the line after nightfall." Thus my soldier
friends picketing the Holland-Belgium frontier had warned me in
the morning. That rendezvous with death was not a roseate
prospect; but there was something just as omnious about the
situation in Liege. To cover the sixteen miles back to the Dutch
border before dark was a big task to tackle with blistered feet. I
knew the sentries along the way returning, but I knew not the
pitfalls for me if I remained in Liege. This drove me to a prompt
decision and straightway I made for the bridge.

It was no prophetically favorable sight that greeted me at the
outset. A Belgian, a mere stripling of twenty or thereabouts, had
just been shot, and the soldiers, rolling him on a stretcher, were
carrying him off. I made so bold as to approach a sentry and ask:
"What has he been doing?" For an answer the sentry pointed to a
nearby notice. In four languages it announced that any one caught
near a telegraph pole or wire in any manner that looked suspicious
to the authorities would be summarily dealt with. They were
carrying him away, poor lad, and the crowd passed on in heedless
fashion, as though already grown accustomed to death.

When the troops at the front are taking lives by the thousands,
those guarding the lines at the rear catch the contagion of killing.
Knowing that this was the temper of some of the sentries, I
speeded along at a rapid rate, daring to make one cut across a
field, and so cam