There is a map in the German White Book which shows the quarters burnt down. The incendiarism started in the _Station Square_, and spread along the _Boulevard de Tirlemont_ as far as the _Tirlemont Gate_. It was renewed across the railway and devastated the suburbs to the east. Then it was extended up the _Rue de la Station_ into the heart of the town, and here the _Church of St. Pierre_ was destroyed, and the _University Halles_ with the priceless _University Library_--not by mischance, as the German Report alleges, but by the deliberate work of German troops, employing the same incendiary apparatus as had been used already at Visé, Liége and elsewhere.[227] The burning was directed by a German officer from the _Vieux Marché_, a large open space near the centre of the town, and by another group of officers stationed in the _Place du Peuple_.[228] The burning here is described by a German officer[229] (whose evidence on other points has been quoted above). “The Company,” he states, “continued to fire into the houses. The fire of the inhabitants (_sic_) gradually died down. Thereupon the German soldiers broke in the doors of the houses and set the houses on fire, flinging burning petroleum lamps into the houses or striking off the gas-taps, setting light to the gas which rushed out and throwing table-cloths and curtains into the flames. Here and there benzine was also employed as a means of ignition. The order to set fire to the houses was given out by Colonel von Stubenrauch, whose voice I distinguished....” In the _Rue de la Station_ the Germans set the houses on fire with incendiary bombs. This was seen by a Belgian witness,[230] and is confirmed by the German officer just cited, who, in the _Place du Peuple_, “heard repeatedly the detonation of what appeared to be heavy guns” round about him. “I supposed,” he proceeds, “that artillery was firing; but since there was none present, there is only one explanation for this--that the inhabitants (_sic_) also threw hand-grenades.”