A sale of small Belgian flags in Paris and throughout France brought about $40,000 for the benefit of the Belgian refugees. The sale was prolonged in the outlying provinces. There was every manifestation of enthusiasm.
Once gay Ostend is desolated. The city lives in an atmosphere of fear. The spectre of famine is continually before the inhabitants, who subsist on wounded, emaciated horses purchased at $4 a head from the Germans. They are the only meat the people can buy. There are no vegetables, and scarcely any coffee and no tea. Many convicts from prisons in Germany, distinguished by their shorn heads, are employed in grave digging work about the city.
The hygiene committee of the French Chamber of Deputies has won over the veto of General Joffre that a number of committeemen be allowed to inspect the hospitals at the front with a view to certain reforms. General Joffre opposed the proposal. The Minister of War, however, agreed that twelve of the committee should go on the inspection trip.
That the battle of Crouy was one of the bloodiest engagements of the war is demonstrated by the stories told by wounded soldiers reaching Paris to-day. An officer gives this thrilling account of the affray:
"After our successful advantage the Germans counter attacked with fearful violence. How strongly they were reinforced is shown by the fact that they were 40,000 against less than 10,000 French. They first drove us from Vregny to Crouy, then, because further reinforcements were still reaching them, we were compelled to quit Crouy, Bucy, Moncel, Sainte Marguerite and Missy.
"These attacks certainly hit us hard, but our losses are not comparable with those of the Germans, for we killed an inconceivable number of them. A battery covering our retreat alone annihilated two battalions of Germans who advanced, as usual, in a mass. We could not resist, so we left a small rearguard force with the mission to hold on to the last man so that the bulk of our 10,000 men could recross the Aisne.