dle of forts. Upon examination it was found that the
actual damage done to the city by the bombardment was comparatively
slight.

During the last days of Antwerp's reign of terror fully 300,000
fugitives sought shelter in Bergan-op-Zoom about twenty-five miles
northward across the Dutch frontier. Most of these were in a condition
almost indescribable, ragged, travel-worn, shoeless, and bespattered
and hungry. Few had money; valuables or other resources. All they
owned they carried on their backs or in bundles. The little Dutch
town of Bergen-op-Zoom with but 15,000 inhabitants was swamped; but
the Hollanders did their best to meet this terrible pressure and
its citizens went without bread themselves to feed the refugees.
Slowly some sort of order was organized out of the chaos and when
the Dutch Government was able to establish refugee camps under
military supervision the worst was over. A majority of this vast
army was by degrees distributed in the surrounding territory where
tent accommodations had been completed. The good Hollanders provided
for the children with especial care and sympathy. They supplied milk
for the babies and children generally. Devoted priests comforted many;
but military organization prevailed over all. Among the thousands
of these poor refugees that crossed the frontier at Maastricht and
besieged the doors of the Belgian consul there was no railing or
declaiming against the horror of their situation. The pathos of
lonely, staring, apathetic endurance was tragic beyond expression.

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXVII

YSER BATTLES--ATTACK ON YPRES

A large part of the Belgian forces with some of the English marines
were forced across the Dutch border, where they were promptly disarmed
and interned, while the remnants of these forces retreated toward
the west by way of St. Nicolas and reached Ostend on October 11
and 12, 1914, with greatly reduced numbers. Many were cut off and
captured by the German forces, which entered Ghent on October 12,
and pressed on to Ypres in one direction and to Lille in another.
Next day, the thirteenth, they approached Ostend, forcing these
Belgians who had managed to get through, to evacuate.

Bruges was occupied by the German forces on October 14, 1914, and
other detachments appeared in Thielt, Daume, and Esschen on the
same day, thus getting under their control the entire Kingdom of
Belgium, with the exception of the northwestern corne