They had a right to be proud. They had been making history. In order
to give them time to mobilize, the Allies had asked them for two days
to delay the German invader. They had held him back for fifteen. As
David went against Goliath, they had repulsed the German. And as
yet there had been no reprisals, no destruction of cities, no murdering
of non-combatants; war still was something glad and glorious.

The signs of it were the Boy Scouts, everywhere helping every one,
carrying messages, guiding strangers, directing traffic; and Red
Cross nurses and aviators from England, smart Belgian officers
exclaiming bitterly over the delay in sending them forward, and
private automobiles upon the enamelled sides of which the transport
officer with a piece of chalk had scratched, "For His Majesty," and
piled the silk cushions high with ammunition. From table to table
young girls passed jangling tiny tin milk-cans. They were supplicants,
begging money for the wounded. There were so many of them and
so often they made their rounds that, to protect you from themselves,
if you subscribed a lump sum, you were exempt and were given a
badge to prove you were immune.

Except for these signs of the times you would not have known
Belgium was at war. The spirit of the people was undaunted. Into their
daily lives the conflict had penetrated only like a burst of martial
music. Rather than depressing, it inspired them. Wherever you
ventured, you found them undismayed. And in those weeks during
which events moved so swiftly that now they seem months in the
past, we were as free as in our own "home town" to go where we
chose.

For the war correspondent those were the happy days! Like every