If
they could have packed up the chateau and carted it across the frontier
they would--if it had taken three years. As they couldn't do that, they
did what Cardinal Mazarin wasn't able to do with his picked engineers;
they blew it up with high explosives. But all they could steal they
stole: carvings and historic furniture. You know there was a room the
guardian used to show before the war--the room where Cesar de Bourbon
was born, the son of Henri Quatre of Navarre and Gabrielle d'Estrees?
That room the Boches emptied when they first came in August, 1914. Not a
piece of rich tapestry, not a suit of armour, not even a chair, or a
table, or lamp did they leave. Everything was sent to Germany. But we
believe we shall get it all again some day. And now we must go, for the
Boches shell this road whenever they think of it, or have nothing better
to do!"
The signal was given. We turned and tore along the road by which we'd
come, our backs feeling rather sensitive and exposed to chance German
bombs, until we'd got round the corner to a "safe section." Our way led
through a pitiful country of crippled trees to a curious round hill. A
little castle or miniature fortress must have crowned it once, for the
height was entirely circled by an ancient moat. On top of this green
mound Prince Eitel Fritz built for himself the imitation shooting-lodge
which was our goal and viewpoint. And, Padre, there can't be another
such German-looking spot in martyred France as he has made of the
insulted hillock!
I don't know how many fair young birch trees he sacrificed to build a
summer-house for himself and his staff to drink beer in, and gaze over
the country, at St.
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