Louvain was burnt on the 19th of August. The Germans entered Brussels on the 20th. Longres, though farther east than Louvain, was not occupied till two or three days later--for the town lay off the direct route to Brussels and the interior. One of the first acts of the German commandant was to put my Uncle Spencer and M. Alphonse under arrest. It was not that they had done anything; it was merely to their existence that he objected. The fact that they were British subjects was in itself extremely incriminating. “Aber wir sind,” my Uncle Spencer protested in his rather rudimentary German, “im zwanzigsten jahrhunderd. Und der--or is it das?--krieg wird nicht lang....” he stammered, searched hopelessly for the word, “well, in any case,” he concluded, relapsing into his own language and happy to be able to express his astonished protest with fluency, “it won’t last a week.” “So we hope,” the commandant replied in excellent English, smiling. “But meanwhile I regret....” My Uncle Spencer and his fellow-Briton were locked up for the time being in the lunatic asylum. A few days later they were sent under escort to Brussels. Alphonse, my Uncle Spencer told me afterwards, bore his misfortune with exemplary and oriental patience. Mute, uncomplaining, obedient, he stayed where his captors put him, like a large brown bundle left by the traveller on the platform, while he goes to the buffet for a drink and a sandwich. And more docile than a mere bundle, mutely, obediently, he followed wherever he was led. “I wish I could have imitated him,” said my Uncle Spencer. “But I couldn’t. My blood fairly boiled.” And from what I remembered of him in the sugar-making season I could imagine the depth, the fury of my Uncle Spencer’s impatience and irritation. “But this is the twentieth century,” he kept repeating to the guards. “And I have nothing to do with your beastly war. And where the devil are you taking us? And how much longer are we to wait in this damned station without our lunch?” He spoke as a rich man, accustomed to being able to buy every convenience and consideration. The soldiers, who had the patience of poor men and were well used to being ordered hither and thither, to waiting indefinitely in the place where they were told to wait, could not understand this wild irritation against what they regarded as the natural order of things. My Uncle Spencer first amused them; then, as his impatience grew greater instead of less, he began to annoy them. In the end, one of his guards lost patience too, and gave him a great kick in the breech to make him hold his tongue. My Uncle Spencer turned round and rushed at the man; but another soldier tripped him up with his rifle, and he tumbled heavily to the ground. Slowly he picked himself up; the soldiers were roaring with laughter. Alphonse, like a brown package, stood where they had put him, motionless, expressionless, his eyes shut.