September 15th was our day with Henry Verhagen, the tall gray
alderman of the town that was once Termonde.

During all the time I was with him Verhagen did not speak a bitter
word. On the contrary, he was calm--particularly calm as he stood
beside the mound where the Belgian soldiers were buried in the
center of the ruined town, pointed to the pile of bricks where he had
lived, and told us how in two nights he had lost 340,000 francs, his
son, his factory, and his home. It was from him, from the
burgomaster's wife, and from a priest that we learned the story of the
city that had ceased to be.

It was the night before that I had wandered into Ghent alone, without
even the excitement of getting arrested. Luther, who became restive
early the next morning while I was jotting notes in the log-book, went
off in search of adventure. Because of the influence exerted by Vice-
Consul Van Hee an arrangement was very soon made whereby a Belgian
Government car and chauffeur were placed at our disposal. We had no
laissez-passer for the firing line; but we were accompanied by the
United States Consul and not governed by any stipulation as to our
destination. In our Belgian car, decorated with all the American flags
we could find, and "American Consular Service" pasted in huge letters on
the windshield and side flaps, we raced along the Boulevard de
l'lndustrie, swung into the southern suburbs, and, once outside the city
limits, we opened up the exhaust and threw down the throttle as Van Hee
shouted out the order:--"To Termonde!"

Termonde was at that time the scene of determined fighting between
units of the ninth German Corps and the Belgian defenders. Situated