bled stones and mortar.
In the market-place now roam bands of half-starved dogs in search of
food; not a roof remains intact. A couple of sentries pace before the
hospital at the end of the Grand' Place. A recent photograph in the
_Illustrated London News_ taken from an aeroplane shows the ruined town
like a vast honeycomb uncovered, the streets and squares filled with
debris, the fragments of upstanding walls showing where a few months ago
dwelt in peace and prosperity an innocent, happy people, now scattered
to the four winds--paupers, subsisting upon charity. Their valiant and
noble king and queen are living with the remnant of the Belgian army in
the small fishing village of La Panne on the sand dunes of the North
Sea.

The unique character of the half-forgotten town was exemplified by the
number of ancient, wooden-faced houses to be found in the side streets.
The most curious of these, perhaps, was that situated near the Porte de
Lille, which I have mentioned in another page, and which noted
architects of Brussels and Antwerp vainly petitioned the State to
protect, or to remove bodily the facade and erect it in one of the vast
"Salles" of the Cloth Hall. Both MM. Pauwels and Delbeke, the mural
painters, then engaged in the decorations of the Cloth Hall, joined in
protests to the authorities against their neglect of this remarkable
example of medieval construction, but all these petitions were
pigeonholed, and nothing resulted but vain empty promises, so the matter
rested, and now this beautiful house has vanished forever.

The great mural decorations of the "Halles" were nearly completed by MM.
Delbeke and Pauwels, when they both died within a few months of each
other, in 1891. In these decorations the artists traced the history of
Ypres from 1187 to 1383, the date of the great siege, showing taste and
elegance in the compositions, notably in that called the "Wedding feast
of Mahaut, daughter of Robert of Bethune, with Mathias of Lorraine
(1314)."

One of the panels by M. Pauwels showed most vividly the progress of the
"Pest," under the title of the "Mort d'Ypres" (_de Dood van Yperen_,
Flemish). It represented the "Fossoyeur" calling upon the citizens upon
the tolling of the great bell of St. Martin's, to bring out their dead
for burial.

M. Delbeke's talent was engaged upon scenes illustrating the civil life
of the town, the gatherings in celebration of the philanthropic and
intellectual events in its remark