THE FRANCO-GERMAN WAR. 8 1 



we received the news of the surrender, and hence we viewed 

 war's hideous desolation in all its recentness. However, 

 they say you cannot be the first Englishman anywhere, and 

 sure enough the "Times'' correspondent was at Longwy 

 before us. 



A German artillery officer took us round the fortifications, 

 and really it was wonderful to see the effect of modern 

 missiles from large mortars. Nothing gave me a better idea 

 of the force with which they came than the mangled trees* 

 on the ramparts. They were most dangerous things to have 

 there. I could quite believe that the Frenchmen dare not 

 show themselves near them for the splinters. A jagged 

 splinter wound is more intractable than a shot wound. 



During the nine days' rain of bombshells, the inhabitants, 

 to the number of 400, took refuge in the casemates. On 

 visiting these, I found them to be low arched passages under 

 the fortifications. Dreadful places, with scarcely any venti- 

 lation. I cannot think how so many people herded into 

 them. Even here they were not safe, for in spite of being 

 warranted bomb-proof, I saw one place where the massive 

 roof had been broken. Hundreds of beds in rows, which 

 the people had slept in, were still there, and some sick and 

 wounded were not yet removed. For nine days they had 

 endured this black hole, amid the noise and din of 30,000 

 bursting bomb shells. Yet such good care did the French 

 soldiers take of themselves, that by all this extraordinary 

 burning of powder, only a very {q\w were killed of the i,Soo 

 who formed the garrison of Longwy. On the German side 

 the destruction of life was equally small ; only nine men 

 killed and twenty wounded. I should think there are very 

 few instances on record of a fortified town being besieged 

 and captured with so little loss. Before they began to 

 bombard, the Germans generously allowed all the women 



** At another place I saw some good-sized timbers cut clean in two. 



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