"Conscious of the rôle which Belgium has played for more than eighty years in the civilised world, it refuses to believe that its independence can only be preserved at the price of a violation of its neutrality.
"If the Belgian Government be disappointed in its expectations, it is resolved to repulse by every means in its power any attack upon its rights."
Of these documents we in Brussels were at the time, of course, wholly ignorant. But on Tuesday, August 4th, we became aware that some terrible darkness had come upon the sun. There was galloping and the glitter of swords and lances in the streets; the King was on his way to take counsel with a specially summoned session of his Parliament. In a little while the newsboys were crying the papers madly through the streets; we tore them from their hands, and the smudged print blazed into our souls that speech with which Albert rose to take his place among the heroes of European freedom. I make no apology for printing here every word of it. It is the case of Belgium, the case of the Allies, and the case of civilisation.
"Never, since 1830, has a more serious hour struck for Belgium: the integrity of our territory is threatened!
"The very strength of our right, the sympathy which Belgium, proud of her free institutions and of her moral conquests, has uninterruptedly en-
