Idleness and silence
seemed always to have fallen as grim legacies upon the civilian populace
of these captured towns; but the look upon their faces as they listened
to the soldiers' voices was not hard to read. Their town was pierced by
cannonballs where it was not scarified with fire; there was sorrow and
the abundant cause for sorrow in every house; commerce was dead and
credit was killed; and round the next turning their enemy sang his
drinking song. I judge that the thrifty Frenchman who went partner with
the German stranger in the beer traffic lost popularity that day among
his fellow townsmen.
We were bound for the railway station, which the Germans already had
rechristened Bahnhof. Word had been brought to us that trains of
wounded men and prisoners were due in the course of the afternoon from
the front, and more especially from the right wing; and in this prospect
we scented a story to be written. To reach the station we crossed the
river Sambre, over a damaged bridge, and passed beneath the arched
passageway of the citadel which the great Vauban built for the still
greater Louis XIV, thinking, no doubt, when he built it, that it would
always be potent to keep out any foe, however strong.
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