Red Bank High School - Log Yearbook (Red Bank, NJ)

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tives of the noblest families of Belgium. Women beautifully gowned and gracious of manner; men elegantly groomed and distinguished for their gallantry—old and young—all made a galaxy of splendor and refinement. In the banquet hall the guests sat at tables bedecked with gorgeous flowers and the finest linen and at which were served the choicest viands and wines. After the feast dancing commenced for the younger people in the ballroom, and the elder people either sat along the sides to watch the gay Terpsichoreans or repaired to an adjoining salon to gamble at cards. Standing apart, near an open window, were engaged in earnest conversation General Leman and the Scion of the Chateau in Charles. The youth, full of venture- some spirit, was attracted by the gold braid and stirred by the renown of the old soldier. After discussing the Servian agitation and its possible reaction upon all of Europe, the conversation drifted to the boar hunt of the next day. The General, a past master in the art of war and an enthusiastic hunter, was deeply impressed by the responsive chord awakened in the young Vicompte by their mutual interest in Mars and Diana. The youthful noble was boyishly grateful, there- fore, when General Leman promised that if he distinguished himself at the hunt the next day, he would make him his aide. As the Vicompte was an officer in the Garde Civique, he was qualified for the proffered post. The General was at that time sta- tioned at the Citadel of Liege, the first defense against an invading force. The two proceeded to the salon where the Comtesse, the Chatelaine of the Chateau, was occu- pied with some of the older guests, and acquainted her with the General’s promise. The mother’s deep love for her son made the thought of his departure repugnant to her, but she realized that the Vicompte would he in excellent hands and that if there should be an outbreak of war, it would be the part of loyalty and duty to make this sacrifice, and she thereupon gave her consent. The following morning presented a bustling scene at the old Chateau. All of the guests, full of excitement and expectation over the coming hunt, were eager to be on the ground. The hunt of that day was to be “en battu.” Scores of peasants were sent into the forest equipped with heavy staffs to beat off the bushes and to drive the wild boar before them into an open space where the animals would have to run the gauntlet between two parallel rows of hunters stationed in boxes which stretched along a distance of an eighth of a mile. The boxes on a side were sixty feet apart, and the boxes on one side were diagonal to those on the other. The width of the alley was a hundred and seventy-five feet. There were very strict rules to be observed by the sportsmen in order to prevent accident and to give the animal every chance. A gunner could fire only when the animal was directly in front of his box and could not make a quartering shot. He could shoot but once. If he missed, it was then the turn of the gunner in the next box on the opposite side. A wild boar is as ferocious as a tiger and more dangerous than a mad bull. It was such an animal that the General and the Vicompte were stationed in their boxes to shoot. The first boar came rushing madly through the alley-way almost unex- pectedly and passed the last box without being hit and disappeared into the forest. This was due not to lack of expert marksmanship but to the fact that the nimrods had not as yet steadied themselves. Several boar were finally killed, but the climax of the day’s sport was reached when a boar, wounded by the General, in its rage charged at its assailant. There was a foreboding lull on the part of the hunters and spectators. The Vicompte, who was in the next box, perceiving the imminent danger to the Gen- eral, rushed out, hunting knife in hand, to encounter the boar; this knife-to-tusk com- bat being a part of the sport requiring great nerve and courage. The boar then turned upon the challenger, and, as it made a vicious charge at the young man, the agile youth quickly sidestepped, at the same time deftly plunging his weapon into the heart of the beast. Needless to say, this act sealed the General’s promise to make the hero of the day his aide. Mars superseded Diana. The conflagration of war burst forth in middle Europe and its consuming flames sought to burn a path through Belgium into France. Liege, after its world-famed resistance and stubborn defense, was the first rampart to fall. 7

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There is plenty of work as well as pleasure. For each hour’s class work we are sup- posed to spend two hours in preparation, so that one is kept busy all the time. I would like to give you Red Bank people some advice, although you wont take it (as I know I never would have believed it last year), that is, study and work hard when you are in high school and you will find work much easier when you are in college. Last year I used to think that if 1 could bluff through my work without putting much time on it, I was that much better off. Now 1 regret that 1 had the wrong idea about school work. Every so often, flunk or warning slips are put in our postoffice boxes to let us know our standings. This is very helpful as it keeps us working and warns us when our grade is below standard. It is terribly nerve-racking to go to our boxes the days the slips are due. If we dont get one we can hardly believe it’s true, and we ask all our friends if they are sure the slips came out that day. Above the pleasure, above the work, above all, I admire the true Wilson spirit, that spirit which causes a girl to have high ideals, high aims in life; that which moulds the college girl into the college woman, thoughtful and considerate of others; and finally, that which makes a girl forget herself in the interest of others; all for one end—service, the true aim of every one’s life. The feeling of every Wilson girl toward her college can best be expressed by a stanza from one of our college songs: “For there is no place like Wilson, Though we search o’er land and sea, She is small but she is mighty And she’s wonderful to me. For her name is Alma Mater And we’ll ever stand as one, Firmly pledged to love and honor Till the sands of life are run.” —L. C. S» lOttcrarg. Where the Torrent First Broke Through. Our hero isn’t any greater than any other hero who has sacrificed his life that another might live, but we distinguish him from the others because official news comes over the water to us that he was the first to fall in the bloody cataclysm which swept Europe in 1914. In the Belgian Ardennes, not remote from Liege, there stands an ancient feudal castle, the Chateau de Modave, built in the early fifteenth century by Baron Guillaume de la Marck, the “Wild Boar of the Ardennes,” and the last of the Barons to oppose the French king. Later, in the sixteenth century, it fell into the possession of the Due de Montmerency (afterward Henry Second), and since then has returned to the hands of Guillaume’s descendants. It is a stately pile built on a rock which rises sheer from the valley below to a height of two hundred feet. Its original purpose was to serve as a stronghold; and probably as a fortress. It is one of the strongest, strategetically, in Europe. Its walls are seven feet thick, three sides being guarded by perpendicular rock and the fourth side, the entrance, by a fossee. A further obstacle to siege is a stream, the Oerth, which flows at the base of the rock. In regard to its towers, embattlements, bastions and dungeons, it is similar to other medieval castles. The Oerth, alive with trout, meanders through the forest land which stretches for miles around. These preserves abound with wild boar, deer, fox, quail and many other species of game, the hunting of which affords unlimited sport fo the occupants of the Chateau and their guests. Oh the evening in 1914, before the opening of the hunt for the wild boar, there were assembled at the Chateau de Modave five score guests, among them representa- 6

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Then, in turn, succumbed Namur, Charleroi, Verviers, Bruxelles and Anvers, leaving the Chateau country in the hands of the German enemy, the Chateau de Modave be- ing' engulfed in the maelstrom. Belgium, the martyr-nation of the war, was lighting not only her own battle, but the battle of France, the battle of Great Britain, and the Battle of Freedom. German officers took possession of Modave and German troops were quartered in the surrounding forest. The marauders ransacked and despoiled the old Castle, removing priceless works of art, destroying furniture and emptying its celebrated wine cellars. The Comtesse, prisoner in her own Chateau, could only witness the desecration with speechless indignation, almost oblivious to this vandalism in her great agony for the safety of her son about whom she had heard nothing. While affairs were at this pass, two German officers of high rank arrived to station themselves at Modave. The Comtesse knew that these two would countenance further spoliation and determined that the world should some day know who it was who sanctioned it. She naively asked the officers if they would not comply with an old custom of the Chateau and register their names and the date in the visitors’ book. Flattered, they did so. They were assigned to rooms still untouched by the hands of the wreckers. During a short stay there, they slashed into ribbons with their swords all the curtains, sheets and tapestries in their rooms; smashed to atoms all the bric-a-brac and costly furniture and costly vases. Moreover, they consumed vast quantities of wine, wantonly wasting it. After their departure, the Comtesse gave strict orders to her servants to leave their suites exactly as they then were. In order to save the wine that remained, she charged the servants secretly to conceal the bottles in the Oerth, in the hope that at the dawn of peace, this wine might be used to celebrate victory. We now leave Modave and digress to an incident which occurred before the storming of Liege. Upon learning that the German troops had crossed the border, in violation of a treaty in which England guaranteed her protection to Belgium in case of invasio'n, the populace of Liege, in particular, were hopeful that Great Britain would immediately dispatch troops to aid in the defense of the city. Because several English officers had been seen in Liege, the people were deluded into the belief that their ally had arrived, being too frenzied to realize its impossibility. The people shouted: “Les Anglais Arrivent!” This cry reached the ears of General Leman at his headquarters in the Rue Lourex, where Charles was assisting him in some official work. The office was on the ground floor and the General was seated by an open window facing the street. Charles was seated at a desk between the commandant and the door. The door opened and in walked several British officers. The officers had come, to all appearances, to discuss the defense of Liege, and were very cordial in their demeanor and speech. The first surprise of their unexpected arrival being over, Charles, rapidly recovering his equanimity, came to the decision that it was an impossibility for the English to have arrived already on the scene, and as rapidly came to the conclusion that these men must be imposters—that they were Germans attired as British officers. Evidently the equally quick witted strangers read what was passing in Charles’s mind, and one of the strangers put his hand to his hip. This convinced Charles that he had guessed correctly, and he divined their purpose. Without a moment’s loss of time he jumped toward General Leman, gathered him up bodily and threw him out the window, shouting to him to flee—that these were enemies. Scarcely had he performed this act and uttered his warning than the reports of several shots rang throughout the building, and Charles, the first martyr of the war, lay dead at the feet of his murderers, having consummated in one brief act two of the noblest deeds possible for a man to perform—to die for one’s country and to sacrifice one’s life to save that of another. And from his mortal wounds gushed the first drops of blood stained torrent shed in vindication of the world’s ideals of liberty, justice and chivalry, and in expiation of the abominations of a race who by its hate slew its own soul. General Leman was saved from the cunning and illicit trick of the Germans. It was their intention to capture or kill him, which was frustrated by Charles’s nobility and heroism. Had they succeeded, it is possible that the brave defenders of Liege, deprived of the brilliant leadership of Leman, would not have been able to offer the 8