Hardly were they installed, and hardly had the news spread in Paris of their miserable plight, than hundreds of Parisians visited the Cirque de Paris, all bringing gifts of food, drink, or clothing. It was a pathetic and at the same time a cheering sight to watch the refugees hungrily eating the midday meal which their French sympathizers had helped to provide. These refugees, many of whom carry babies in arms, will probably be sent into Normandy and Brittany to be cared for. _Thursday, August 27._ Twenty-fifth day of the war. Rain, severe thunderstorm at noon, northwesterly wind. Temperature at five P.M. 17 degrees centigrade. The huge German army, making its desperate struggle to invade France at many points from Maubeuge to the Vosges, is still held in check. Meanwhile the hand of fate, in the shape of the gigantic "Russian steam-roller," steadily advances in East Prussia. Cossacks have penetrated to within two hundred miles of Berlin. Minister of War Millerand has revived the daily meetings of heads of departments at the War Office. To-day the defensive condition of Paris was discussed. Work already in progress, under the supervision of General Gallieni, is pushed forward rapidly and methodically, and obstructions to artillery fire are being cleared away in the suburbs. I rambled this morning through the so-called German quarter of Paris around the Rue d'Hauteville and between the main boulevards and the Rue Lafayette. All the German and Austrian _teutons_ shops and places of business are closed. The _brasseries_, where the best Munich or Pilsener beer, with _wiener Schnitzel_ or _leber-knoedel suppe_ could be obtained until the end of July, are invisible behind signless iron shutters. The "intelligence section" of the German general staff had for years obtained precious military information through the enterprising, affable German commercial agents, restaurant keepers, commission merchants, waiters, and hotel errand boys (_chasseurs_) who thrived in this thrifty quarter.