LAND & WATER 
August 10, 1 91 6 
Chateau dcs Comtes, Ghent, a stronghold founded in 
the 9th Century 
{Continued from pa^e 5j) 
picture, the roof of which, appropriaielv enough, is a re- 
production of the stern of an ancient galleon), standing on 
the N.VV. side of the Place. They were carefully restored 
and where necessary rebuilt in strict accordance with the 
original plans during the last decade of the last and first 
year or so of the present century. 
Brussels is by no means the only city or town where 
the ravages and destruction of wars of the past have been 
so far as skill, sympathy, and public spiritedness could 
accomplish it, made good. But it well illustrates the 
spirit which in the past has existed and has been the 
means of preserving much that is of inestimable interest 
and value for the present generation. 
It is believed that little remains of the charming late 
Gothic Hotel de Ville at Mons. It was in the early daye 
of the war successively occupied by the English ana 
German General Staffs. Mons is now for every one of 
us a name, associated with the British Army and our 
national history, of undying glory. This Hotel de Ville 
may well be re-erected after the war according to the 
original plan, not only as an example of late Gotliic 
architecture, but as a memorial to the gallant dead of 
our island race. 
In a scheme such as that we indicate it will be, of course, 
necessary to select. To rebuild Belgium as it was would 
in many respects be undesirable if possible ; but following 
on the lines of what Belgians have done in the past some- 
thing substantial can doubtless be easily saved from the 
wreck to retain the beauty and interest of its cities, 
towns, and villages. 
Much of the plunder, one may hope, may be recovered 
from the Huns. They should be made to disgorge 
what they have stolen, and not merely that, but also to 
replace from the national collections of their own land 
objects of art, pictures, and other things that have been 
destroyed. It might well be that the wings of the wonderful 
altar piece of Ghent Cathedral the work of Jan and 
Hubert Van Eyck — for many vears past in the Berlin 
^luseum, shall be asked for. although it is only fair to s<?y 
they were come by more honestly than the booty carried 
across the Rhine during the present war. 
Those who knew quaint and beautiful Ypres in pre- 
war days will doubtless remember the famous and to the 
art lover, student and archteologist absorbingly interest- 
ing Hotel de Mcrghelynk which stood at the corner of the 
i^ue de Lille and the Marche aux Vieux Habits. Built 
duiing the last quarter of the eighteenth century it was 
in i8()2 and onwards fitted up and devoted to the pur- 
poses of an eighteenth century museum, which was 
wonderfully interesting and instructive. Each room was 
completely furnished in the style of the period, and con- 
tained nothing which did not date from it. So com- 
pletely, indeed, was the idea carried out that in the dining 
room, for example, the table w'as laid as for a meal, with 
the plate, china, cutlery and napery of. the same date, 
and even old iiagons of wine were on the sideboard. 
In the bedrooms one found not merely eighteenth 
centurj' furniture, but in the " presses " and cup- 
boards garments of the period ; and the toilet table 
fittings corresponded even to a block for the wig ! 
Not only did the Hotel ISIerghelynk provide an excellent 
object-lesson, existing chiefly through the munificence of 
a Ypres citizen who had made a careful study of a most 
interesting period, but it showed what can be done to 
form local museums of a high educational value. 
There will, we fear, be only too much " flotsam and 
jetsam " of beautiful and historic things left by the tides 
of war. It is not too .soon to begin thinking "how these 
can best be preserved, and used, and so far as possible 
amid the environment of which they formerly constituted 
a part. It would be a thousand pities if any scheme 
for the rebuilding of Belgium, which may be advocated 
and finally adopted, paid no heed to the claims of the past 
as well as the needs of the present and the future To 
those who knew and loved Belgium and its gallant people 
in the past her material, as well as spiritual and political 
rebuilding and reconstruction cannot fail to be a matter of 
anxious concern. Clive Holland 
The Grande Place, Dixmude, with battered Church of St. Nicholas and ruined Hotel de Ville 
