The _Rotterdamsche Courant_ in a leading article said that Holland had read with satisfaction Sir Edward Grey's statement that it was obligatory on the Great Powers to maintain the neutrality of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark. Holland also observed with satisfaction that Germany was avoiding the Dutch frontier. The engagement referred to above was generally known as the first battle of Liège. Subsequent particulars of it showed that the Belgian forces captured seven guns, and that 8,000 of the invaders were killed and wounded. On Wednesday, August 5th, in an encounter between the Vesdre and the Meuse Rivers a single Belgian squadron annihilated six German squadrons. The Seventh German Corps suffered enormous loss, 800 prisoners being brought into Brussels. The encounter began in the early morning, and lasted till five in the afternoon. Germans, with the Seventh Army Corps supported by a large mass of cavalry, began a violent attack against the south-eastern section of the Liège stronghold, not engaging the forts with their artillery, but trying to reach the interior of the stronghold through the intervals. The ground was mined in several places, and all the battalions were destroyed. The German loss was enormous. That of the Belgians was very much less. Early on Wednesday morning, by force of numbers, the German advance guard succeeded in entering Liège. Fighting went on in the street for a time. In view of the strength of the fortifications at Liège, the strategic position of the town, and the fact that the main body of the Belgian army was concentrated there, it became evident that the invaders could not advance without either "containing" Liège--_i.e._, surrounding the place with a large body of troops, and, as it were, imprisoning the garrison without making any attempt at capture--or reducing the fortresses to such an extent as to drive the main body of the Belgian army before it. The latter plan was adopted and was eventually successful; but not before the heroic garrison, though greatly outnumbered, had succeeded in delaying the German advance for nine or ten days. As time was an essential factor in the German programme, it is difficult for us to over-estimate the advantage which thus accrued to the defenders of Western Europe.