It had been spared, as an open
town, in 1870; and since then, through long, prosperous years of peace a
comfortable conviction had grown that only pleasant things could
happen. Why, it was the place of pleasure, reaping a harvest of fame and
money from its adventurous past! Tourists came from all the world over
to put up at the Hotel du Grand Cerf, once the hunting lodge of kings.
They came to loiter in narrow old streets whose very names were echoes
of history; to study the ruins of the Roman arena and the ancient walls;
to hunt in the forest, as royal men and ladies had hunted when stags and
wild boar had been plentiful as foxes and rabbits; or to motor from one
neighbouring chateau to another. Surely even Germans could not doom such
a town to destruction. To be sure, some people did fly when a rabble of
refugees from Compiegne poured past, hurrying south; and others fled
from the bombardment when big guns, fired from Lucien Bonaparte's old
village of Chamant, struck the cathedral. But many stayed for duty's
sake, or because they believed obstinately that to _their_ bit of the
Ile-de-France no tragedy could come.
They didn't know yet that Von Kluck and his men were drunk with victory,
and that flaming towns were for the German army bonfires of triumph.
They didn't know that the Kaiser's dinner was ordered in Paris for a
certain date, and that at all costs Paris must be cowed to a speedy
peace, lest the dinner be delayed.
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