for the German
machine guns. The other was more suitable for dealing with machine-gun
personnel and riflemen. Some time was taken in training men to use these
tanks, for the crew of a tank must suffer a great deal of hardship on
account of the noise of the engine every command had to be made by
signs, and the motion of the tank being like that of a ship on a heavy
sea, was likely to produce seasickness.

The tanks were painted with weird colors for the purpose of concealment,
and when they first appeared caused a great deal of wonder and
amusement. They were first used in battle on September 15, 1916, in a
continuation of the battle of the Somme, and proved a great surprise to
the Germans. The Germans directed all available rifle and machine-gun
fire upon them without success. A correspondent narrates that: "As the
'Creme de Menthe' moved on its way, the bullets fell from its sides
harmlessly. It advanced upon a broken wall, leaned up against it
heavily, until it fell with a crash of bricks, and then rose on to the
bricks and passed over them and walked straight into the midst of
factory ruins." They were an immense success and had come to stay.

CHAPTER XLIV

BELGIUM'S GALLANT EFFORT

For more than four years Belgium suffered under the iron heel of the
German invaders. One little corner in the far west was occupied by her
gallant army, fighting with the utmost courage and a patriotism which
has won the admiration of the world under its great King Albert, whose
heroic leadership had turned the little commercial nation into a nation
of heroes. Conditions of life in the Belgian cities were almost
intolerable. The great Belgian Relief Commission, under the direction of
Mr. Hoover, had kept the people from starvation, but it could not secure
them their rights. They lived in the midst of brutality and injustice.

On Belgian Independence Day at London, Arthur J. Balfour, the British
Foreign Minister, made an address in which he commented upon the German
treatment of Belgium. In the course of his address he said: "Bitter must
be the thought in every Belgian heart of what Belgians in Belgium are
now suffering. Let them however, take courage. Let their spirits rise in
a mood of profound cheerfulness, for these dark days are not going to
last forever, and when they come to a conclusion, when again peace dawns
upon this much tormented and cruelly tried world, when Belgium is again
free and prosperous, then Belgians, whet