This Saxon officer had, nevertheless, already witnessed like “atrocities.”  The preceding day, Aug. 25, at Villers-en-Fagne, (Belgian Ardennes,) “where we found grenadiers of the guard, killed and wounded,” he had seen “the cure and other inhabitants shot”; and three days previous, Aug. 23, at the village of Bouvignes, north of Dinant, he had witnessed what he thus describes: 

Through a breach made in the rear we get access into the residence of a well-to-do inhabitant and occupy the house.  Passing through a number of apartments, we reach a door where we find the corpse of the owner.  Further on in the interior our men have wrecked everything like vandals.  Everything has been searched.  Outside, throughout the country, the spectacle of the inhabitants who have been shot defies any description.  They have been shot at such short range that they are almost decapitated.  Every house has been ransacked to the furthest corners, and the inhabitants dragged from their hiding places.  The men shot; the women and children locked into a convent, from which shots were fired.  And, for this reason, the convent is about to be set fire to; it may, however be ransomed if it surrenders the guilty ones and pays a ransom of 15,000 francs.

We shall see as we proceed how these notebooks complement one another.

(d) Notebook of the Private Philipp, (from Kamenz, Saxony, First Company, First Battalion, 178th Regiment.) On the day indicated above—­Aug. 23—­a private of the same regiment was the witness of a scene similar to that just described; perhaps, the same scene, but the point of view is different.—­At 10 o’clock in the evening the First Battalion of the 178th came down into the burning village to the north of Dinant—­a saddening spectacle—­to make one shiver.  At the entrance to the village lay the bodies of some fifty citizens, shot for having fired upon our troops from ambush.  In the course of the night many others were shot down in like manner, so that we counted more than two hundred.  Women and children, holding their lamps, were compelled to assist at this horrible spectacle.  We then sat down midst the corpses to eat our rice, as we had eaten nothing since morning. (Fig. 4.)

[Illustration:  Figure 4.]

Here is a military picture fully outlined, and worthy to compete in the Academy of Fine Arts of Dresden.  But one passage of the text is somewhat obscure and might embarrass the artist—­“Women and children, holding their lamps, were compelled to assist at this horrible spectacle.”  What spectacle?—­the shooting, or the counting of the corpses?  To get some certainty on this historic point, the artist should question that noble soldier—­the Colonel of the 178th.

His work of that night, however, was in accord with the spirit of his companions in arms, and of his chiefs.  We may assure ourselves of this by consulting the Sixth Report of the Belgian Commission of Inquiry upon, the violation of the rules of the law of nations (Havre, Nov. 10, 1914) and the ignoble proclamations placarded by the Germans throughout Belgium.  I will content myself with three short extracts.