This morning was spent in finishing packing, which usually is the biggest part of it, I find.

There appears to be violent fighting at Malines, Louvain and Tirlemont. Nevertheless we are setting out from the chÂteau, at two o'clock, bag and baggage. Everybody felt sorry to leave the servants (LiÉgeois) who have been staunch and comforting friends through all the misery of these terrifying times. Will an eager Fate close them in? Let us hope they will absorb the effervescent optimism of the fat old cook who continually reiterates in her awful French, "They cannot hurt me. I am a Hollander."

2 P. M.—Well, off we started. It was a moment I shall never forget, for it was as if we had taken up something solid and heavy (an experience, for example) in our two hands and put it behind us. There were in the party our two autos and Monsieur H. with Signor K., an Italian consul, in his. Monsieur H. has a passport from the military Governor, Field Marshal von der Golz, to go anywhere in Belgium, so we felt very safe to be with him. No ancient stage-coach with a dozen passengers on the top could have made as precarious a flight as our machines, packed and jammed full inside and crowned on the roof with an overhanging cornice of every sort of bundle. You can imagine that there was an idea at the back of our minds of never returning, perhaps, or of keeping what we could in immediate possession.

It was interesting in leaving the city to see the disposition of troops; we passed through Seraing, where are those tremendous Cockerill factories, and soon arrived opposite the famous Fort Hollogne which did such wonderful work in the defense of LiÉge, August 5th. At present it flies the German flag and but for one or two sentinels pacing near, one would never dream that a tremendous fort was there. Like the others, it is built three stories underground, with just a slight rising of earth defining the cupolas. Along the road on both sides, for miles and miles, lay splendid trees which were cut down for cannon range. Just before arriving at Jauche we met three automobiles with Prussian officers, who shouted "Nicht weiter" and made violent signs which we did not understand. But why "nicht weiter" with the Herr Feld Marschall's permission in our pocket? We soon learned at the railroad crossing. An hour before there had been an alarm and the station had received orders to allow no one to pass, as there was fighting not far beyond in the direction of Tirlemont. Then and there arose a mighty discussion and the esprits of many nations (Belgian, Italian, Russian, French and German) entered into the argument while one meek American looked on at the sparring. Even the little slip of paper ladened with the name of von der Golz in much ink, had no weight. Then we tried another route, that lay right through the heart of a dirty, squalid, little village to Ramillies, the same Ramillies of Louis XIV.'s time, famous in the "Batailles des Flandres." We arrived there by a sudden turn of the road which brought us up standing, onto a bridge spanning the railroad. Below, perhaps two hundred feet distant, was the station, out of which, upon our sudden apparition, swarmed a hundred soldiers in alarm, quite as if the surprising toe of a boot had inadvertently kicked over an ant hill. At Ramillies we were not more successful than at Jauche, for as the officials explained, if we passed the railroad station we were in danger of being caught between two battlelines. So, sadly indeed, we retraced our way and returned in the dark and the pouring rain to a dismantled house and forlorn hopes.