A battery of artillery cleared the barricades and the slaughter began. After four hours of butchery in the streets, the commander discovered that the old Tenth Regiment Armory was crowded. More than a thousand women and children accustomed to attend Vassar’s school of patriotism had sought refuge there. The children had found the flags and their mothers in foolish superstition had pinned them on their breasts for protection--the flag they had been taught to love! The Imperial Guard turned their artillery on the armory and tore the flimsy front wall into fragments. When the screaming children and frantic women rushed through the breach, a withering fire from the pompoms piled their writhing bodies on the blood-soaked pavements. Benda had been killed in the second intrenchments on Long Island. Angela faced the storm of lead at the door, holding her boy behind her back to shield him from the bullets. A shell exploded inside and a fragment buried itself in the child’s breast. The mother felt the stinging shock and heard the thud of the iron crash into the soft flesh. The boy made no cry. The iron had torn through his heart. The little hand was lifted feebly and clutched the tiny flag that covered his breast. With a cry of anguish she clasped the bleeding bundle of flesh in her arms, ran through the building and found her way into the darkened basement. When the building was cleared the commander entered with a squad of soldiers, lighted a cigarette and inspected the ruins. On the blackboards still were standing in clear white chalk the sentences and mottoes Vassar had written: ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL. The Commander laughed and wrote beneath it: BUT YOU COULDN’T STOP A SIXTEEN-INCH SHELL WITH HOT AIR! The men cheered. On the next blackboard stood the words: LIBERTY--EQUALITY--FRATERNITY. The officer struck a line through each word and wrote beneath: AUTHORITY--OBEDIENCE--EFFICIENCY. [Illustration: “A battery of artillery cleared the barricades and the slaughter began”] Again the soldiers cheered. Within three months the fallen nation had been completely disarmed and rendered helpless. The penalty of death was enforced against everyone who dared to conceal a pistol, rifle, shotgun or piece of explosive. The manufacturing plants making arms and ammunition were under the control of the invaders. They not only controlled these gun and shell factories, they took possession of every chemical laboratory and every piece of machinery that could be used to make explosives. It was no more possible to buy a piece of dynamite for any purpose than to buy a forty-two centimeter siege gun. All blasting for building and commercial purposes was done by an officer, who charged well for his services. Every street railway and trunk line was manned by the army. The ammunition factories were all working with double shifts of American laborers, compelled by their conquerors to turn out shells for future use against their fellow-countrymen.