The whole proceeding was irregular and unauthorized, of course, but for that matter so was the German invasion of Belgium.  In any event, it seemed the thing to do and I did it, and, under the same circumstances I should do precisely the same thing over again.

Though a very large force of German troops passed through Antwerp during the whole of Friday night in pursuit of the retreating Belgians, the triumphal entry of the victors did not begin until Saturday afternoon, when sixty thousand men passed in review before the military governor, Admiral von Schroeder, and General von Beseler, who, surrounded by a glittering staff, sat their horses in front of the royal palace.  So far as onlookers were concerned, the Germans might as well have marched through the streets of ruined Babylon.  Thompson and I, standing in the windows of the American Consulate, were the only spectators in the entire length of the mile-long Place de Meir—­which is the Piccadilly of Antwerp—­of the great military pageant.  The streets were absolutely deserted; every building was dark, every window shuttered; in a thoroughfare which had blossomed with bunting a few days before, not a flag was to be seen.  I think that even the Germans were a little awed by the deathly silence that greeted them.  As Thompson drily remarked, “It reminds me of a circus that’s come to town the day before it’s expected.”

For five hours that mighty host poured through the canons of brick and stone: 

Above the bugle’s din,
Sweating beneath their haversacks,
With rifles bristling on their backs,
The dusty men trooped in.

Company after company, regiment after regiment, brigade after brigade swept by until our eyes grew weary with watching the ranks of grey under the slanting lines of steel.  As they marched they sang, the high buildings along the Place de Meir and the Avenue de Keyser echoing to their voices thundering out “Die Wacht Am Rhein,” “Deutschland, Deutschland Uber Alles” and “Ein Feste Burg ist Unser Gott.”  Though the singing was mechanical, like the faces of the men who sang, the mighty volume of sound, punctuated at regular intervals by the shrill music of the fifes and the rattle of the drums, and accompanied always by the tramp, tramp, tramp of iron-shod boots, was one of the most impressive things that I have ever heard.  Each regiment was headed by its field music and colours, and when darkness fell and the street lights were turned on, the shriek of the fifes and the clamour of the drums and the rhythmic tramp of marching feet reminded me of a torchlight political parade at home.