The Days of a Man 1913 



The Ghent congress over, my family and I pro- 

 ceeded to Rochefort, where I took Eric through the 

 - great cave of Han-sur-Lesse. This was originally 



Ltsse washed out by a considerable stream which first cut 

 its way through the limestone ridge and then, falling 

 to a lower level, left the former channel empty and 

 adorned with stalactites. From Arlon, our next stop, 

 we drove eastward over the Devonian outcrop called 

 " HundsTuckcn" (dog's back), collecting meanwhile a 

 considerable number of fossils. 



Strayed At Arlon I was surprised to see in the markets our 

 Shasta Rainboat trout, a fact which demonstrated its 

 successful acclimation in Europe. A few months 

 later I was more astonished to find in the Rialto 

 market at Venice the brook sunfish,or "pumpkinseed" 

 of New England Eupomotis gibbosus for I had 

 never heard of any attempt to transplant this pretty 

 and gamy fish, too small, however, to have much food 

 value. 



From Arlon I made a trip to the field of Sedan by 

 way of Longwy and Longueuil, towns which now 

 appear in the records of the Great War. From stones 

 quarried nearby at Audin-le-Roman I obtained several 

 fossils with which I hoped to sustain Eric's budding 

 interest. Sedan itself lies in the midst of what novel- 

 ists call a "smiling landscape," enclosed on both 

 sides by low wooded hills from which the Prussians 

 crowded down and overpowered the badly handled 

 French. Most of the fighting took place in the 

 suburban town of Bazeilles, which, with the excep- 

 tion of a single outlying house, "La Derniere Car- 

 touche," was burned in the conflict. "The Last 

 Cartridge" is now a museum containing relics of the 

 battle, the details of which are so graphically if a 



C496 : 



