“In honour of our arms I have surrendered neither the fortress nor the forts. “Deign pardon, Sire. In Germany, where I am proceeding, my thoughts will be, as they always have been, of Belgium and the King. I would willingly have given my life the better to serve them, but death was not granted to me. “Lieutenant-General LEMAN.” It was a happy and a graceful act on the part of the French Government to bestow the Legion of Honour on the town of Liège, which, as was well said in the decree setting forth the honour, “was called upon to bear the first brunt of the German troops, and kept the invading army in check in a struggle which was as unequal as it was heroic.” Every soldier worthy of the name not only respects, but heartily admires, a gallant, magnanimous foe. Had there been even a few German commanders like General von Emmich, there would not now rest, as there will do till the Day of Judgment, an indelible stain on Germany’s name. It is awful to have to put on record that after the fall of Liège the enemy, maddened by the unexpected resistance, took a fearful vengeance on poor little Belgium. As they marched through the lovely, peaceful villages, and charming, storied towns, which all other invaders had spared even in the so-called dark ages, the Germans burnt, blew up, and destroyed far and wide, killing even women and children in their ruthlessness. Yet even so, these unarmed Belgians performed wonderful deeds of valour. When the enemy approached Heristal, the Belgian Woolwich, where is the National Arms Factory, the town was defended against the German attack by the women, for all the men were already away fighting. These wives and mothers swore that the enemy should never take the factory. They armed themselves with revolvers and other weapons, and actually repulsed several charges of the Uhlans. When their ammunition was exhausted, they barricaded themselves in various houses and poured boiling water on the Germans. Children and old men shared in the defence, and for two days the Belgian colours still floated over the factory buildings. There is scarcely a village, and there is no town, in Belgium which has not some glorious page of history to its credit, and some precious survival of the Middle Ages in the shape of a noble old church or town hall. Only the glorious pages of history now remain. But these have been added to, for as a brave Frenchwoman once finely phrased it, “Le plomb ne tue pas l’idée,” which may be freely translated, “Bullets can only kill the body.” The storied monuments alas! which belonged not only to generous little Belgium, but to the whole world, are gone. Battered, shattered, in many cases razed to the ground, by German lead, which, though powerless to kill the mind, has been able to destroy the sanctified beauty which the genius of artists and of saints had created with such happy labour and prayers.