Hippolyte, therefore, at a very early age indeed, went to live at Terbeeke. Terbeeke, I understand--for I was never there--lies just at the southward edge of the Flemish flats. Northwards the country is as flat as a drawing-board, criss-crossed with dykes and little canals; to the east is a wide State forest, and to the south a range of low hills. Between the little town and the hills lies what in pre-war days was Terbeeke's one claim to fame--the Terbeeke mere or marsh, forming a crescent to the south and west. I do not know how broad or wide it is, but it has been famous for centuries as bottomless, and a whole cycle of legend has grown up round it, dealing with the notabilities of one kind or another who have been drowned in its brown, oozy depths. Perhaps because of this evil fame it has never been drained, and is to-day as darkly ominous as in the times of fairies and lubber-fiends. The mother of Hippolyte lived in a small and lonely house at the other side of the marsh from the town of Terbeeke. She must have possessed some private means, for she seems to have carried on no business of any kind, but to have devoted most of her time to religion, crossing the marsh-arm several times daily to the parish church, which stood in the centre of the town. Otherwise her days were passed in solitude, for she lived quite alone with the child, their only companion being a large dog. She passed the time not taken up by religion in wandering about the marsh, for she had few friends, and the people of Terbeeke often saw the three moving about the surface of the quagmire in places where there was no known track. II--IN PATH OF PRUSSIAN INVADERS Time passed, and the war broke out. Terbeeke was not in the direct path of the invaders, and, sheltered behind the forest, it almost seemed to the townspeople as though they might escape the fate of the rest of Belgium. But the respite was not for long. The low muttering of distant guns grew every day louder; the stream of fugitives hurrying through the forest and past the town towards the French frontier grew always denser; at last the climax came. A British officer dashed into the town at three o'clock in the morning and hurried into the Mairie. The civilian population, it was announced, must evacuate their houses instantly. There followed the usual scenes of frantic terror and chaotic haste that happened so often during the opening chapters of the Great War. The one road out of the town was blocked with every kind of conveyance, from bicycle to dog-carts; there were blocks at every corner; precious minutes were wasted in useless recriminations; and long before the last civilian had left, the turmoil of desperate fighting was heard coming always nearer through the dim mystery of the forest.