croute-au-pot with the simple appetite of a French poilu--who would
have been a splendid mark for anyone careless of his own life and
upholding the law of frightfulness as a divine sanction for
assassination. It was "Soixante-dix Pau," and I was glad to see that
brave old man who had fought through the terrible year of 1870, and
had been en retraite in Paris when, after forty-four years, France was
again menaced by German armies. Left "on the shelf" for a little while,
and eating his heart out in this inactivity while his country was
bleeding from the first wounds of war, he had been called back to
repair the fatal blunders in Alsace. He had shown a cool judgment
and a masterly touch. From Alsace, after a reorganization of the
French plan of attack, he came to the left centre and took part in the
councils of war, where General Joffre was glad of this shrewd old
comrade and gallant heart. He was given an advisory position, un-
hampered by the details of a divisional command, and now it seemed
to me that his presence in Dunkirk hinted at grave possibilities in this
fortified town. He had not come merely to enjoy a good luncheon at
the Hotel des Arcades.

The civilian inhabitants of Dunkirk were beginning to feel alarmed.
They knew that only the last remnant of the active Belgian army stood
between their great port and the enemy's lines. Now that Antwerp had
fallen they were beginning to lose faith in their girdle of forts and in
their garrison artillery. The German guns had assumed a mythical
and monstrous significance in the popular imagination. It seemed that
they could smash the strongest defences with their far-reaching
thunderbolts. There was no outward panic in the town and the
citizens hid their fears under a mask of contempt for the "sacres
Boches." But on some faces--of people who had no fear of death
except for those they loved--it was a thin mask, which crumbled and
let through terroi when across the dykes and ramparts the rumours
came that the German army was smashing forward, and closer.

The old landlady of the small hotel in which I stayed had laughed very
heartily with her hands upon her bulging stays when a young Belgian
officer flirted in a comical way with her two pretty daughters--a blonde
and a brunette, whose real beauty and freshness and simplicity
redeemed the squalor of their kitchen.

But presently she grabbed me by the arm, closing the door with the
other hand.

"Monsieur, I am an old fool