We road through a gently undulating farming and grazing country to the Alle River, where we boarded a little Government tug which threaded its way through dead cows, horses, pigs, dogs, and now and then a man floating down the stream.  Battered trenches, ruined farmhouses, splintered woods, the hoof marks of Russian horses that had forded the stream under German fire, showed that the struggle had been intense along the river.  The plan of battle formed in my mind.  It was clear that the Germans had made the western bank a main line of defence, which, however, had been broken through.

“Just wait until we reach Allenburg,” said the man in brown, “and you will see what beasts the murdering Russians are.  Wait until you see how they have destroyed that innocent town!”

According to the course of the battle and the story of the Russian destruction of Allenburg, I expected to find it on the western bank, but to my great surprise it is on the eastern, with a considerable stretch of road, separating it from the river.  We left the boat and walked along this road, on each side of which lay willows in perfect rows where they had been skilfully felled by the Russians.  This sight evoked new assaults from my guides upon “the beasts” whom they accused of wanton and wilful violation of the arboreal beauty which the Allenburgers had loved.

I put myself in the place of the citizens of Allenburg, returning to their little town devastated by war; I understood their feelings and I sympathised with them.  I was seeing the other side of Germany’s page of conquest.  The war map of Europe shows that she has done most of the invading, and during all the days I spent in the Fatherland I never heard a single word of pity for the people of the regions overrun by her armies—­except, of course, the Pecksniffian variety used by her diplomats.  It was now any rare privilege to return with German refugees to their ruined country, and they vied with one another when they talked to me in the presence of my guides in accusing the Russians of every crime under the sun.  The war had been brought home to them, but in the meantime other Germans had brought the war home even more forcibly to the citizens of Belgium and northern France, but the thing could not balance in the minds of those affected.

I was conducted to a combination home and chemist’s shop, the upper part of which had been wrecked by a shell.  The Russians had looted the place of chemicals and had searched through all the letters in the owner’s desk.  These they had thrown upon the floor instead of putting them back neatly in the drawers.

My guides laid great stress on such crimes, but I took mental note of certain other things which were not pointed out to me.  The beasts—­as they always called them—­had been quartered here for three weeks, but not a mirror had been cracked, not a scratch marred the highly polished black piano, and the well-stocked, exquisitely carved bookcase was precisely as it had been before the first Cossack patrol entered the city.