A policeman challenged me and I replied--I hadn't much
German--"Deutsch." All, I think, would have gone well had he not
glanced at my feet. Then he promptly switched on an electric lamp, worn
at his breast, and covered me with a revolver. The game was up; my
race was run! I had to admit that I was an "Engländer." To add to my
mortification, I learned from the officer that I was only five or six
kilometres from the Dutch frontier.
Well, to give the German his due, that policeman played the good
Samaritan. He knocked up a cottager and got me some coffee and
bread--and never did anything taste so sweet. I was utterly reckless as
to my fate, for I had developed a devil-may-care frame of mind. I was
disappointed--that was inevitable. Who wouldn't have been disappointed
at seeing a scheme that had arrived so near fruition come toppling down
like a house of cards? Punishment I knew I should get, and punishment
I certainly received.
I was sentenced to ten days' solitary confinement in a cell, at first
totally dark, to which the light was gradually admitted. Next I was
paraded round the camp as a standing example of Germany's might, and a
hideous warning to "evil-doers." A red and white band sewn to my sleeve
gave notice to all and sundry that this was the ill-mannered churl who
spurned _Kultur_ and wanted to get back to that despicable England
about which the Germans sang.
I should here explain that, in the intervals of contriving splenetic
irritants for their prisoners, my captors often sang the notorious
"Song of Hate." I have seen them march in all solemnity around the camp
singing the "Vaterland" and "Gott Strafe England"--and the spectacle
was too much even for my limited sense of humor.
Their brutalities were beyond the belief of any commonplace civilized
beings. At the Sennelager camp, for instance, there were many civilian
prisoners, and they were treated far worse than we soldiers were--and
that's saying something. One especial form of amusement (for the Huns)
was the shaving of civilians. Whether it was as punishment or as sheer
deviltry I don't know, but I have seen many civilians shaved on one
side of the head and face, with half their hair, half their whiskers,
and half their moustaches gone. Fit game for a Nero, wasn't it?
Neither that ten days' confinement, nor yet the beautiful red and white
band, and my exhibition before my compatriots, broke my spirit, and I
was still determined to see England or die. The Germans talked of their
glorious deeds. Goodness knows how many times they sent our navy to the
bottom of the sea, and I have forgotten how often they told me their
Zepps were "sending England to H----." They were very full of their
Zepps, by the way, but we didn't swallow all their stories either of
their ships in the air, their ships on the sea, or their victorious
armies on land.
Now and again, you see, authentic news reached us, and an occasional
smuggled newspaper told us that the tide had turned and gave us heart
of grace to bear our burdens, if not with patience, yet with some
degree of fortitude.