of this vast army was by degrees distributed in the surrounding territory where tent accommodations had been completed.  The good Hollanders provided for the children with especial care and sympathy.  They supplied milk for the babies and children generally.  Devoted priests comforted many; but military organization prevailed over all.  Among the thousands of these poor refugees that crossed the frontier at Maastricht and besieged the doors of the Belgian consul there was no railing or declaiming against the horror of their situation.  The pathos of lonely, staring, apathetic endurance was tragic beyond expression.

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXVII

YSER BATTLES—­ATTACK ON YPRES

A large part of the Belgian forces with some of the English marines were forced across the Dutch border, where they were promptly disarmed and interned, while the remnants of these forces retreated toward the west by way of St. Nicolas and reached Ostend on October 11 and 12, 1914, with greatly reduced numbers.  Many were cut off and captured by the German forces, which entered Ghent on October 12, and pressed on to Ypres in one direction and to Lille in another.  Next day, the thirteenth, they approached Ostend, forcing these Belgians who had managed to get through, to evacuate.

Bruges was occupied by the German forces on October 14, 1914, and other detachments appeared in Thielt, Daume, and Esschen on the same day, thus getting under their control the entire Kingdom of Belgium, with the exception of the northwestern corner, north of Ypres, to the coast of the channel.  For Ostend, too, had fallen into their hands by October 15, after the English and Belgian troops had been taken away by an English fleet; the Belgians were transported to France where they were re-formed while the English marines were sent back to England.

In the meantime the Germans were drawing on reenforcements from the Vosges and the Champagne districts and every day their numbers increased.  West Flanders was swarming with German cavalry, and about this time they were as far west as Hazebrouck and Cassel, and only twenty-five miles distant from Dunkirk.

By October 20, 1914, the allied line was in position from Albert to the sea, a little short of 100 miles, eighty as the crow flies.  From south to north the allied front was commanded by General Maud’huy from Albert to Vermelles; General Smith-Dorrien from Vermelles to Laventie, opposite Lille; General Poultney, from Laventie to Messines; General Haig from Messines to Bixschoote; General de Mitry had French and Belgian mixed troops defending the line from Bixschoote to Nieuport and the sea, supported by an English and French fleet.

For days this fleet under the British Admiral Hood had shelled the coast defenses under General von Beseler’s command.  As the naval guns had a far better range than General von Beseler’s artillery, it was an easy matter to hold the coast at Nieuport Bains, and even six miles inland without subjecting any of the ships to the fire of the German guns.