Presently we detected a mutter of resentment rising from the troops; and
seeking the cause of this we discerned that some of them had caught
sight of a big Belgian flag which whipped in the breeze from the top of
the Church of Saint Pierre. However, the flag stayed where it had been
put during the three days we remained in Louvain. Seemingly the German
commander did not greatly care whose flag flew on the church tower
overhead so long as he held dominion of the earth below and the dwellers
thereof.

Well, we watched the gray ear-wig wriggling away to the westward until
we were surfeited, and then we set about finding a place where we might
rest our dizzy heads. We could not get near the principal hotels. These
already were filled with high officers and ringed about with sentries;
but half a mile away, on the plaza fronting the main railroad station,
we finally secured accommodations--such as they were--at a small fourth-
rate hotel.

It called itself by a gorgeous title--it was the House of the Thousand
Columns, which was as true a saying as though it had been named the
House of the One Column; for it had neither one column nor a thousand,
but only a small, dingy beer bar below and some ten dismal living rooms
above. Established here, we set about getting in touch with the German
higher-ups, since we were likely to be mistaken for Englishmen, which
would be embarrassing certainly, and might even be painful. At the
hotel next door--for all the buildings flanking this square were hotels
of a sort--we found a group of officers.

One of them, a tall, handsome, magnetic chap, with a big, deep laugh and
a most beautiful command of our own tongue, turned out to be a captain
on the general staff. It seemed to him the greatest joke in the world