red yards. I was then again arrested and taken
before another group of officers. This time they searched my
knapsack and wanted to requisition my maps, but one of them
pointed out they were only automobile maps and, as compared to
their own, of no value. They permitted me to proceed to Enghien. I
went to Enghien, intending to spend the night and on the morning
continue. I could not see why I might not be able to go on indefinitely.

As yet no one who had held me up had suggested I should turn back,
and as long as I was willing to be arrested it seemed as though I
might accompany the German army even to the gates of Paris. But
my reception in Enghien should have warned me to get back to
Brussels. The Germans, thinking I was an English spy, scowled at
me; and the Belgians, thinking the same thing, winked at me; and the
landlord of the only hotel said I was "suspect" and would not give me
a bed. But I sought out the burgomaster, a most charming man
named Delano, and he wrote out a pass permitting me to sleep one
night in Enghien.

"You really do not need this," he said; "as an American you are free
to stay here as long as you wish." Then he, too, winked.

"But I am an American," I protested.

"But certainly," he said gravely, and again he winked. It was then I
should have started back to Brussels. Instead, I sat on a moss-
covered, arched stone bridge that binds the town together, and until
night fell watched the gray tidal waves rush up and across it,
stamping, tripping, stumbling, beating the broad, clean stones with
thousands of iron heels, steel hoofs, steel chains, and steel-rimmed
wheels. You hated it, and yet could not keep away. The Belgians of
Enghien hated it, and they could not keep away. Like a great river in
flood, bearing with it destruction and death, you feared and loathed it,
and yet it fascinated you and pulled you to the brink. All through the
night, as already for three nights and three days at Brussels, I had
heard it; it rumbled and growled, rushing forward without pause or
breath, with inhuman, pitiless persistence. At daybreak I sat on the
edge of the bed and wondered whether to go on or turn back. I still
wanted some one in authority, higher than myself, to order me back.
So, at six, riding for a fall, to find that one, I went, as I thought,
along the road to Soignes. The gray tidal wave was still roaring past.
It was pressing forward with greater speed, but in nothing else did
it differ from