In a little farming village not many miles from Gerbéviller the martyred, stands a battered square belfry, into which the Germans lifted their machine guns, hoping to hold back the pursuit of the French army, thus giving General Clauss time to retreat and "dig in" some miles to the northeast. Tying the ropes to the axle of automobile trucks, the Germans soon lifted their guns into the church tower. They then drove the French women and children into the church and used them as a screen, for no German ever exposes himself to danger if he can possibly find a woman or child behind whom he can hide. One young mother did not immediately obey, because of certain duties in connection with her little child. With two other girls this young wife was stood up against the stone wall of her own little house and shot, for the purpose of teaching French women to obey instantly when German savages command. When all the women and children were packed into the church, a boy was sent back to tell the French that if they fired upon the guns in the church belfry, they would kill their own families. Two nights later when a storm was raging, the women slipped a little boy through the window, and sent word to the officers of the approaching French army that their wives wished them to open fire on the German guns. In blowing these weapons out of the belfry, the French killed twenty of their own wives and children, who preferred to share death with the men they loved, rather than suffer nameless indignities from German brutes. In a hundred years of history where shall you find a record of soldiers, whether red, black or yellow, save Germans, who were such sneaking, snivelling cowards that they do not dare play the game fairly and like men, but in their chattering terror use women and little children as shields against danger? Of a truth, the "Potsdam gang" has added a new word to the literature of cowardice. THE FRENCHMAN'S LOVE OF FRANCE Terrible also the German assassination of the land itself. All men love their native land, but the Frenchman's love has a unique quality. He speaks of La Belle France as Dante spoke of Beatrice, as Petrarch spoke of Laura, and the name of France lingers upon his lips as music trembles in the air after the song is sung.