How true lovers could resist a long separation and the most wicked calumnies without losing faith in one another has been the theme of many a story.  From the story-writer’s point of view, the true narrative of the German occupation of Belgium is much more romantic than any romance, much more wonderful than any poem.  The mass is not supposed to show the same constancy as the individual, and one does not expect from a whole people the ideal loyalty of Desdemona and Imogen.  Besides, we do not want the reader to imagine that, before the war, the Belgians were ideally in love with one another.  Like the English, the Americans and the French, we had our differences.  It is one of the unavoidable drawbacks of Democracy that politics should exaggerate the importance of dissensions.  Therefore it is all the more remarkable that the sudden friendship which sprang up between classes, parties and races in Belgium, on the eve of August 4th, should so long have defied the untiring efforts of the enemy and should remain as unshakeable to-day as it was at the beginning.

We do not wonder that the German intellectuals who have undertaken to break down Belgian unity are at a loss to explain their failure.  Scientifically it defies every explanation.  Here was a people apparently deeply divided against itself, Socialists opposed Liberals, Liberals opposed Catholics, Flemings opposed Walloons; theoretical differences degenerated frequently into personal quarrels; political antagonism was embittered by questions of religion and language.  Surely this was ideal ground in which to sow the seed of discord, when the Government had been obliged to seek refuge in a foreign country and a great number of prominent citizens had emigrated abroad.  The German propagandist, who had been able to work wonders in some neutral countries, must have thought the task almost unworthy of his efforts.  Every one of his theoretical calculations was correct.  He only forgot one small detail which a closer study of history might have taught him.  He forgot that, in face of the common danger, all these differences would lose their hold on the people’s soul, that the former bitterness of their quarrels was nothing compared with the sacred love of their country which they shared.

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The first action of the German administration after the triumphal entry into Brussels was to try to isolate the occupied part of the country, in order to monopolize the news.  Rather than submit to a German censor, all the Belgian papers—­with the exception of two small provincial journals—­had ceased to appear.  During a fortnight, Brussels remained without authorized news.  From that time, the authorities allowed the sale of some German and Dutch dailies and of a few newspapers published in Belgium under German control.  The Government itself issued the Deutsche Soldatenpost and Le Reveil (in French) and a great number of posters, “Communications officielles du Commandant de l’Armee allemande,” which were supposed to contain the latest war-news.