Mr. van Wersch was told that they intended to send him to Tongres, but after a deliberation between Captain Spuer and Major Krittel, a very kind man as I have already remarked, he was allowed to stay at Bilsen until the examination should be over. He was allowed to walk through the townlet under military escort at first, but later entirely free, and to sleep at the station under military guard. After another search, he was at last allowed to leave for Maastricht on Monday morning. CHAPTER XIV DURING THE SIEGE OF ANTWERP MANY days before the Germans marched upon Antwerp I announced the siege in my paper. In Louvain I had seen all the preparations and also the arrival of the Austrian 30·5 c.m. which were intended to batter to ruins the bulwark of the national defence. As soon as the siege had begun, I tried to join the Germans, viâ Louvain, and left Maastricht again by motor-car. Only a few miles from the Netherland frontier I met the first soldiers, Belgians. When they saw the Orange flag with the word "Nederland," they let us pass without any trouble. A little farther on the road walked a civilian, who, by putting up his hands, requested or commanded us to stop. We took the most prudent part, and did stop. The man asked in bad Dutch to be allowed to drive on with us to Brussels, but the motor was not going beyond Tirlemont; outside that place motor-traffic was forbidden. The stranger got in all the same, in order to have a convenient journey at least so far. My new companion tried desperately to speak as good Dutch as possible, but failed in the most deplorable manner; every time pure German words came in between. He told a story that he stayed at Maastricht as a refugee, and now wanted to fetch his children from a girls' boarding-school at Brussels. I pretended to believe every word, and after he had forgotten the first story he made up another, saying that he came from Liège, where some officers who were billeted on him were kind enough to give him a chance of going to Brussels, to purchase stock for his business. When we were stopped by German outposts he put out of the window a paper at which they just glanced, stood to attention, and said that all was well. They did not even want to see my papers. In a casual way I asked what a miraculous sort of paper he had, and then he pretended that, by the help of those officers who were quartered on him, he had got a certificate from the Governor of Liège with the order to treat him with great respect and also to allow him to travel by military trains if the opportunity happened to offer itself.