There were other pets in Emile’s home, besides the colt; and, first of all, his dog Goldspur, named after the trophies found on the field of Courtrai, when the Flemish weavers, with their pikes, beat the French knights, in 1302. Though he worked hard all day, outdoors on the farm in summer, and tended the cows and horses in winter, he had plenty of time to give to his hares, which were so big and fat, that they took the prize at the local fair. In his loft over the barn, he had a dozen or two carrier pigeons. Some of these had been hatched on his father’s farm, but most of them had been brought from Ghent, a city down on the plain, where the two rivers, the Lys and the Scheldt join. Here, where there were plenty of canals, he had a cousin Rogier, a boy of his own age. The two lads often sent messages to each other by their winged letter carriers.
The Walloon folk pronounced the name of this city of Ghent, or Gand, in the French way, which sounds a good deal like “gong”; while the Flemings, who talk Dutch, say it with a hard g, and as if “gent.” We Americans put an h in the name; for fear, I suppose, lest we should pronounce it like “gent” in gentleman. [[7]]
In fact, when you get into Belgium, you find that even the laws and some of the newspapers, as well as names of places, have two forms, French or Walloon, and Dutch or Flemish. The British soldiers usually take no further trouble to pronounce foreign names, except as they are spelled at home, on their island. That is the reason why, for the name of Ypres, around which the war raged during four years, one may hear the sounds—French, eepe, or epray; Flemish, i-per; and, what the English Tommies say, “wipers.”
Not long after his nineteenth birthday, Emile sent to his cousin Rogier, at Ghent, a message. It was written on a note sheet, as light as tissue paper. Rolled inside a bit of tin foil, in case of rain, and with black sewing silk from his mother’s work basket, it was tied on the pigeon’s right leg, between its pink toes and the first joint of the knee. Safely making the journey, the bird fluttered down on Rogier’s dove cote, which was set on a post in his garden. Untying the missive very gently, and letting the bird into the cote to rest, Rogier read:
Dear Cousin:
“Crops were poor this year, and father had to sell my pet horse, Baldwin. I took it hard, and almost cried, to see a German horse dealer pay [[8]]down the money and lead it off. When out in the road, Baldy actually turned round and looked back at us. The very next day, word came from the army headquarters that I must report to camp at Ypres. From next week, Tuesday, I shall be a soldier under the black, yellow and red flag. Hurrah! Sister Yvette has been singing the ‘Brabançonne,’ when she isn’t crying. I have only one sister, you know. I hope they’ll put me in the cavalry; or, if not, assign me to the machine-gun battalion. Goodbye! We’ll meet, when I get down into Flanders.”
All too soon, the looming shadow, cast from the east, shortened and the war-storm broke. On Sunday night, August 2, 1914, Germany sent an ultimatum, demanding passage of her armies through Belgium to France. To the Kaiser, Belgium was no more than a turnpike road to Paris. The hero, King Albert, knowing he had his people behind him, refused to cringe and become a German slave. It was like the boy David defying the giant Philistine. The national flag—black, yellow and red—the ancient colors of Brabant, the central province in the kingdom of the nine that made Belgium a nation—was unfurled everywhere by “men determined to be free.” That is what our Anthony Wayne said at Stony Point, in 1779. [[9]]
By this time, in 1914, Emile was a seasoned soldier, not in the saddle, as he had hoped at first, but with the dog-drawn mitrailleuse, or machine-gun battalion, No. 40. A happy soldier he was, ready to fight “for King, for Law, for Liberty”—as the chorus in the Brabançonne—the national anthem—declared. Still happier was he to have with him in harness, drawing the revolving, quick-firing cannon, of which he was sergeant pointer, his pet dog, Goldspur. Like man, like dog was the Belgian War Department’s acceptance of both—“in the first class of efficiency.”
This was Belgium at peace, under her beloved King Albert and Queen Margaret. Rich in wonders of art and architecture, in fairy, folk wonder and hero lore, in traditions of valor and industry. When, again and again, the story teller visited the country, he brought back, each time, the seed, for flowers, in the bed-time story-garden. [[10]]