The lower-class Belgian’s horror of the invaders grew daily, as more and more harrowing tales of their atrocities came to us from regions through which their armies were rushing. “_Schrechlichkeit_” was attaining its object at a bitter price to the poor unreasoning peasants, who saw not only those dear to them slain for no apparent cause, but also their superiors, priests, prominent townsmen, and even women and children. Stories reached us of such unparalleled ugliness that many refused to credit them, and only when like crimes were committed in and about Brussels could we believe modern humanity capable of such deeds. These are now more or less known to the outer world; although doubtless many done in secret will never come to light, save when the victims, at the Last Judgment, add their voice of condemnation to those of innocent men, women, and children sent to sudden and ghastly death on the _Lusitania_. But that revolting crime had not yet happened, to inflame neutral minds in Brussels, which, until convinced of those done in Belgium, were genuinely neutral. So unbiased, indeed, was the feeling among them that even the violation of Belgium was looked on by some as an ugly action, but not wholly damning according to war morals. I heard neutral men, who admired Germany, even seek to excuse it as a daring and possibly necessary “strategic move.” But less than three weeks after the fall of Liège, these very men were among the bitterest and most outspoken haters of the race they had tried to defend. Civilized sentiment was so outraged by the wrongs heaped upon Belgians that several Americans, Dutch, and other neutrals undertook, for their own satisfaction, to investigate certain awful incidents related. When they were convinced that these were not only true, but in some cases too mildly depicted, their neutrality fled in a storm of rage.