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THE BABIES OF Bi:L(iH M <? ? . v By W/II Inv n. $ *t> m <? <?> < <*x $ <e- <?> <i> 4N -?> 3> <j> <;> <$> ^ <?> $ Two or tr.ree little pictures be-fore 1 'begin: j It was the Pas do Calais at tL:e end j of October?an October blessed, in j this year o:' dread with clear, cool, j "bracing weather, much like our own j In-dian Summer. Around a turn in , the road came a strange, shuffling j multitude, doiVbly strange in that well - j ordered landscape. I At the <i:e^id marched an old wo- j ^ manfj ' stalwart, straight-backed | irjrTp-pni<;'h woman, vigorous in spite of j her 60 years. Besides her walked ! - a boy of not more toan 12, his tigure ^ already settling into a peasant solidity. He, like the old woman, carried on his back a bundle wrapped in a sheet. And between them they dragged by the hand a little girl, not more than six years old?calf carried her, since now and then she raised her feet from the ground and let them support &er. It was plain to see why she lifted K her feet. Her poor little shoes, heavy * though they had been in the beginning, were worn clear through. Her clothes and hair were matted with dirt, and <ber face was gray with it, save for the streaks made by her tears. She had stopped crying now; s^e was past that. There comes the "time with all these refugees, young and old, when they get beyond tears. Behind followed the rest of tfce refugee caravan, like these leaders ex\ cept for minor details. Of course, there was not among them u man of ^ vigorous years?-only a ? ew grand . * **! fathers, trudging along beside their women folks. Mainly it was a collec- j lion of young children?all. like the t little girl in t. e leading party, be-j yond tears witn misery. A dozen of the women, at least, car- ! ried babes in arms who had somehow j survived the miseries of days an j days j of walking. These were the last cf < the Belgian refugees to pour into France. They came, mainly, from that thickly settled, fertile, once prosperous southwestern strip, along w:icn Germans and allies were now .iglningj lor tv.e bridge-head of the Yser. i But not all. Some o< them?as I j learned from The few who had the en- j ergy to talk?lived further North. A month Defore, the/ ad f'.ed from in? German advance after the capture o' Antwerp; ana tnev naa oeen r:ee:n- ; 'A e.er since?Sleeping 1:1 t' e i";e.cla I through rain and shine, eating what \ bread of charily Heaven only knows. The .tail o the procession. 1 found., had halted at a crossroads beside which someone hrd erected a tent [frcm blankets str:ng on sticks. As I approached, wondering what t- is might be, an automobile came whiz- ! ?ing dcwn the road at 70 miles an j k hour?there are no speed laws for mil itary automobiles in time of war. It: stopped beside ti:e tent; t-:ere was1 I a parley; and a man in Belgium uni-1 Ik form wearing a Red Cross brassard on lis arm alighted. "What is it?what is happening?" I asked the first of tiie refugees beside j the tent?an old man who crouched i ! in the gutter. k "Un enfant?a baby is being born." A he said briefly. The man in uniform "was a Belgian surgeon taking tinv* from his work of repairing death to ' assist in giving life. Again; it was the next day in Calais - -Calais, once so busy and so vener- ; ehlp. and in snots so Drettv. but no-tt faded^ and dirty wit'.i the passage of j armies. Ten thousand of these rein- j i gees came into Calais that day. That L day, also the Red Cross was bringing j A in Belgian wounded by the thousand? 1 SL there had been serious fighting along , K the Yser. T'.:e refugees, herded or escorted by L fhe police, streamed down the streets to the concentration yards prepared for them on the docks by the French j government, which was going to trans- j port them to the Midi as soon as it could get the steamers. You would hear now and tnen the toot of an j automobile >>.orn, and the refugees j would make way for the passage of j L a motor-car loaded to capacity with j ^ the white-faced wounded. The car J ^ would go on, and the refugees would close their gaps and resume their j weary, nerveless pace. At the concentration yard they sat ! in family srouns. tee children huddled about tfreir mothers and grandmothers i like chickens around hens. No child , among them laughed or played; tuey j were too weary for that: but no child ^ cried. I was trying to have speech "with ihe^e refugees, and finding 'Vm Hr too nerveless to give any account <>:' t'.eir adventures when an ambulantarrived. A nurse and a phys:cian descended. A woman rose from a distant group. and joined them. She carried 111 her j arms a bundle wrapped in rags. The ( slant o: her back showed that the j bundle contained a child?there is an i attitude of motnerhood wuich none! can mistake. i 1 v\.K.ivii it uro.:,: followed the pantomime with ihe:r tearless, hopeless eyes. "Waat is it?"' I asked. |7or'a time none of the women an-j swered. Then one spoke in a dead j tone. "Wor Kohv i? Head, she said. "Sne | had no milk in her." j All that -happened on the fringe of j Belgium, to the refugee? who had mad-? Cheir way out and were nearing safety, and enough comfort to keep soul and body together I could multiply instances from the observation of others. There was, for example, tJhe group of two hundred rft'ueees who arrived in Holland early in November. Tta-ey carried with there j .our dead, newborn babies. It was the same story which one { hears everywhere. The mothers were I so reduced by privation that they had i no milk of their own. As for cows' milk, it was not to be had for any money. Add another picture, brougnt out by an Amei'.can from Belgium. He stood one morning by the back door of a German cook camp, watching a group of Belgian women grubbing through the trash-heap piled up behind the camp. All these women carried babie?. "What are they doing?'' ihe asked ^ German sergeant with whom he had cj ?n anniiaintanf'P "Scraping our condensed milk J cans," said the sergeant. "It's the only way to get milk for fceir babies, j I've seen them run their fingers round ! a can which looked as bright as a { new coin, and hold them into the ba- | bies' mouths to suck. My company," he added, "has been getting along without milk in its coffee and giving j it to these women. We've received no j orders to t.v e contrary?and we're : mostly family men. But we're an ex-1 c-cpticn; ^nd it doesn't go very far." Here is another recent picture from i . stricken Brussels, that gay, dainty., lively city in old times?t>:e city whose j smiling people called it petit Paris, i The scene is the once busy, pleasant boulevard Bischofsneim. A woman collapses on a bench set along the I side walk alter the ashion of the ! Greater Paris. In i. er arms is a ! laby. A child staggers along, cling- j ing to her apron. The woman's face ! is blue and yellow; sr.e is on the verge j of collapse. The baby, surely not over { five months old. has a pale, lead- j colored skin. Its mouth is open as j though set that way. Its eyes are! closed. : Two women of Brussels pass this | unhappy group. They hurriedly ex- S change some words, turn back to the J woman on ti e bench. Then one stands rii a I'd wni:e me oiaer nasiexis iu? seme mi:k and bread?such as is to be, found in the Brussels of today. They fcice a little milk between the teetn of the mother. They let the baby drir.k. it drinks as trough it had never drunk otherwise. To th? face of ti^ .mother comes a few patches o color. 9:e slowly recovers until siie is a:ble to eat a bit o' bread. The baby opens its mouth, drinks more greedily. "It has not fed since two days," the mother whispers. ITI"e mother tries to rise from the bench but she cannot. TT.^e elder child drinks the milk that is left. It looks curiously at the piece of bread as if it did not know what it was. The mother forces it to eat. A crowd has gathered, murmuring. This sigrt is not new, yet each time it draws a little crowd. Every one would like to give?but no one can. Who is not : ! poor at this moment? Many of them i have children at home who today J weigh less than the day tuey were 1 V? tt M UVJI II. France and England and Germany and Austria are issuing their lists 01* the dead, whici.i are mounting up day by day to a ghastly million. But these ! take account only of the strong young j men who have_ died in the fighting. They do not take account of mere noncombatants. They do not list the wo-1 men, who :oolisUly or ignorantly stick- j ing to their homes, have died under the shell-fire of enemies or friends. Tliey do not list the weak and helpless ! who have dropped out from the pa- j thetic carvans of refugees to perisa j along the edges of the roads. They do | not list those who are beginning to j die by hunger in stricken Belgium. And finally, tiiey do not list these babes of Belgium, dropping off before their lives have fairly faegun, because ; there is no milk. Let us view the situation in cold ! blood. Belgium is slhut off from tv?p i . . i woid?ringed with steel. Her own food supply was used up long ago. j either by the people or by their concjuerors. The cattle were first o:~ all to go: even in August I saw the Germans killing milch cows for rations. A or.r.'l is: lo T JlPre *-"U W UI cl OJHUI uw.i ^ ... . _ ? or v eve: but they arc the exceptions. The supply ci' condensed milk ran short long ago. Now milk is a necessity to most civilized children between the ages of one and two years. Seme children, it is t^ae. pull through under exceptional circumstances of pr.'vation, without it; but these are the 'rem ilit rule. .The average young (i ilcl mils: have milk or 'l:e will die. And th^r? is no milk. I A'.ain. tlic ?ik- <lin r babv must have mother'.- milk or a substitute. There is, of cc.'rse, no substitute to be had I irt Beigiuni and equally there is lit-1 tie mother's milk. . . . ' Every woman knows mat a civilized j nursing mother must "keep up her ! strength." She must cave nourish-! ing food?an many cases special food. J Every .voman knows that a certain | proportion of ci'.ilized mothers cannot feed their own babies even at that. ! Nourishing ood?special fool! The | news which fi.'ters out o:' that locked, stricken country to The Commission j for Relief in Belgium makes a sar- j casm and a mockery of those phrases. ' ? i In many, if in not most .Belgian j i cities, the populace is down to one ! large biker's bun a c\\ issued by j foe municipal authorities. In scmc-[ places, the authorities have been able* to supplement that ration by ony bowl of cabbage soup a day. One bun and one bowl of cabbage soup a day ?for a nursing mother! Yet that is all they rave and a'I t':ey will have this winter at the best j America can do. T.^e commission ' hoDes at most to transmit ten ounces of food a day to each inhabitant of Belgium?and to do that the people o.'} the United States must strain every' resource o: charity. How little that is for a civilized human being, and especially for a nursing mother, becomes plain when one learns that the average inhabitant of Greater New . York consumes 42 ounces of food i : dav. Tho mothers of Belgium can i . . i 'ope only for a quarter ration tl:is 1 winter! Even allowing for the reduction of j thp birth rate due to the war, there \ must have been 40 thousand births ! in Belgium since the Germans came. | There will be 40 thousand more in this winter of hardship and privation, j How many of the newly arrived 40 J thousand 'haue already died unnecessary?undecorated, unsung victimc OPERA t i _ __ r\ i uesaay, ut George Klei "THE LION i in Six A Beautiful, Hist< tional f DON'T MATIMFF A a jla 1uu a j Prices: - - 1 ^iiiiiiiiiiiii[iiiiiiiiiiiiiIIIIIIII!IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHiIIIIiIiI!IiIIiIIIIII I Rayo Maki I A Pie ' I ^HE full mellow glov g A your eyes and makes absence of glare and harshi Hj to you. It is this quality II recommend the soft light i fk^/o lamp , fection in oil lamps. No light always Rayo Lamps are easy to 1 pensive?yet the- best light Your dealer will he glad tc i 1 STANDARD 0 | ; Washington, D. C. (NEW J JSorfolk, V o a * rp* Richmond, V&, t>ALl I i,. u i 1 will -v Know. Hiv.v many o the coming 40 thousand will die this winter depends up- j 011 us in America?upon how much ' :ood we send to the nursing mothers, i how much milk ro the babies. j "Gets-t" 2 Drops,j -?- * * * i * Corn Vanishes!| The Only Sure Ender of all Corn. Desperate, are you, over trying to get rid of cours? Quit using old formulas under new nannes, bandages, binding tapes and cotton rings that make a fat little package out of your This Is the Grip of the Happy, Cornleu Footerrv*- r "OFTS-IT." toe. Quit punishing your feet -by using toe-eating salves and ointments. To use knives, files, scissors and razors, slicing and haciking at a corn only makes it grow fas+er and bigger. It also brings danger of bleeding and blood poison. The new way, the cornhistory, is "GETS-IT." It's a liquid? 2 drops on a corn does the work. Pain goes, t'he corn begins to shrivel and out it comes! You apply it in tow seconds. Nothing to stick, nothing to hurt, and it never fails. Try "GETS-IT" tonight on corns, caluses, warts or bunions. "GETS-IT" is soia "by druggists everywhere, 25c a bottle, or sent direct by E .Lawrence & Co., Chicago. "GETS-IT" is sold in Newberry by W. G. Mayes, P. E. Way, and Gilder i & Weeks. i " I 1 HOUSE jcember 29 i1 i ne presents OF VENICE" Parts. >ricai and Educai Mcture. i miss it lND night | 10 and 20 Cents I jj es Reading 1 asure | / of the Rayo Lamp rests pi reading a pleasure. The ly less will be a distinct relief r cridnhefp +r\ 5-1 uiai oLiv.ii.iou iv ? : of the oil lamp. The | s the highest point of perglare, no flicker, correct ight and care for. Inexat any price. H j ) show you the Rayo. * ?IL COMPANY I | ERSEY) Charlotte. N. C. - - ? ? rimrl -atnn W V?. f :1 MORE Charleston, S. C. | I IIIIHlillii|!llll|l!ll|iti|lll!>MllMllliti!l!ilillll?liilii!llilll'llllllll'ir3l _____ < IT PAYS [ TO ADVERTISE 15 V I II THE HEKALD ANU 3i,ns III BEST ADVERTISING j MEDIUM JJ * ) I