workmen were employed each day in workshops at
considerable distances from their own homes. In times of peace the
morning and evening trains were always crowded with laborers going to
and returning from their daily toil. One of the first things seized upon
by the German officials was the railroads, and it was with great
difficulty that anyone, not belonging to the German army, could obtain
an opportunity to travel at all, and it was with still greater
difficulty that supplies of food of any kind could be transported from
place to place. Every village was cut off from its neighbor, every town
from the next town. People were unable even to obtain news of the great
political events which were occurring from day to day, and the food
supply was automatically cut off.

But this was not the worst. One of the first moves of the German
occupation was to quarter hundreds of thousands of troops upon their
Belgian victims, and these troops must be fed even though the Belgian
and his family were near starvation. Then followed the German seizure of
what they called materials for war. General von Beseler in a despatch to
the Kaiser, after the fall of Antwerp, speaks very plainly:

The war booty taken at Antwerp is enormous--at least five hundred cannon
and huge quantities of ammunition, sanitation materials, high-power
motor cars, locomotives, wagons, four million kilograms of wheat, large
quantities of flour, coal and flax wool, the value of which is estimated
at ten million marks, copper, silver, one armored train, several
hospital trains, and quantities of fish.

The Germans proceeded to commandeer foodstuffs and raw materials of
industry. Linseed oil, oil cakes, nitrates, animal and vegetable oils,
petroleum and mineral oils, wool, copper, rubber, ivory, cocoa, rice,
wine, beer, all were seized and sent home to the Fatherland. Moreover,
cities and provinces were burdened with formidable war contributions.
Brussels was obliged to pay ten million dollars, Antwerp ten million
dollars, the province of Brabant, ninety millions of dollars, Namur and
seventeen surrounding communes six million four hundred thousand
dollars. Finally Governor von Bissing, on the 10th of December, 1914,
issued the following decree:

A war contribution of the amount of eight million dollars to be paid
monthly for one year is imposed upon the population of Belgium. The
payment of these amounts is imposed upon the nine provinces which are
regarded as