Belgium Part 18

[_THE FLEMISH MOVEMENT_]

It is significant that the movement started in Flanders before influencing the French-speaking part of the country. The Flemish novelist, Henri Conscience (1812-83) had devoted a series of books to the history of his country long before De Coster wrote his _Ulenspiegel_. The Flemish language was, at the time, struggling against great difficulties. It had been entirely neglected, from the literary point of view, during the eighteenth century, and suffered now from the natural reaction which followed the 1830 Revolution. It had reaped little benefit from the fifteen years of union with Holland, and there was a general belief, among the Flemings themselves, that it would never recover its ancient position. The Flemish literary Renaissance was initiated by a small group of intellectuals, headed by Jan Frans Willems (1793-1846), who exerted all their energy to revive Flemish customs, collect folk songs and traditions, and obtain a liberal interpretation of the Const.i.tution which proclaimed liberty of language. The Flemish Movement received a new impulse when the young poet Albrecht Rodenbach (1856-80) spread its influence to all Flemish intellectual circles. The Flemings began to realize that they possessed in Guido Gezelle (1813-99) a religious poet whose work could bear comparison with the best French writings in the country. They saw, growing up around them, a new school of writers of great promise, and they insisted on their language being recognized, not only in principle, but in fact, as the second official language of the country.

In 1898 a law was pa.s.sed removing some of the causes of grievances, such as the inability of judges and officials to understand the language of the people with whom they dealt. Progressively the Flemish language came into its own in matters of education and administration, and, before the war, the only large question still under discussion was the creation of a Flemish University. The principle of such an inst.i.tution had been admitted, but the relations.h.i.+p between this new University and the old French University of Ghent had not yet been established.

[_COMMON TEMPERAMENT_]

It must be understood that the language question remained throughout a local quarrel between two sets of Flemish intellectuals. It was not a quarrel between Walloons and Flemings, and administrative separation was scarcely ever mentioned. It was not even, before the war, a quarrel between the Flemish people, who knew only Flemish, and the Flemish bourgeoisie, who preferred to talk French. It was a dispute between a few intellectual Flemings, who wished to restore the language to the position it occupied before the Spanish and Austrian regimes silenced it, and the Flemings who wanted to restrict it to the common people and treat it as a patois. It was, to put it bluntly, a discussion between those who ignored history and those who realized that the independence of the Belgian provinces was bound to bring about a revival of Flemish Letters, as it was causing a revival of French Letters. For two centuries the country had remained silent; she was now able to speak again and to use all the riches and the resources of her two languages.

Instead of threatening national unity, bilingualism was its necessary condition. For real differences do not lie in modes of expression, but in the feeling and the soul of the people, and it matters little if an image or a thought is expressed in one language or another, as long as they reflect a common temperament and common aspirations.

CHAPTER XXIX

CONCLUSION

The part played by Belgium during the war is well known. Those who knew the country and its history were not astonished at the att.i.tude observed by King Albert and his people on August 3, 1914. Quite apart from any foreign sympathies, no other answer could be given to an ultimatum which directly challenged Belgium's rights. A modern nation might have been intimidated, but an old nation like Belgium, which had struggled towards independence through long and weary periods of warfare and foreign domination, was bound to resist. In challenging King Albert and his ministers, the German Government challenged at the same time all the leaders of the Belgian people, from De Coninck to Vonck and De Merode, and the reply of the Belgian Government was stiffened by an age-long tradition of stubborn resistance and by the ingrained instinct of the people that this had to be done because there was nothing else to do.

[_GERMAN INVASION_]

History also accounts for the desperate fight waged by the small and ill-equipped army against the first military Power in Europe. Liege, Haelen, the three sorties from Antwerp, the ten terrible days on the Yser, are not due merely to the personal valour of the leaders and of their troops, but to the fact that they were Belgian leaders and Belgian troops, that they belonged to a nation conscious of her destiny and who had never despaired in the past, in spite of the ordeals to which she was subjected and of the scorn of those who questioned her very existence. The same thing might be said of all Allied nations. Even so fought the British, even so fought the French; the only difference lies in the fact that their heroism was expected as a matter of course, while that of the Belgians came to many as a surprise. For British traditions and French traditions were well known, while the past of Belgium was blurred amidst the confusion of Feudalism and foreign rule.

On the Yser, in October 1914, the Belgian forces had been reduced from 95,000 to 38,000 bayonets. These last defences, preserving about twenty square miles of independent territory, were maintained during four years while the army was refilling its ranks and reorganizing its supplies. It took its share in all the concerted actions of the Allies in Flanders, and when, at last, the final offensive was launched, on September 28, 1918, King Albert was placed at the head of the Anglo-Franco-Belgian forces.

Meanwhile the civil population, under German occupation, was undergoing one of the severest trials that the nation had ever experienced, not excepting revolutionary oppression and the Spanish Fury. The Germans used every means in their power to disintegrate the people's unity, break its resistance and enlist its services. Terrorism was used, from the first, at Aerschot, Louvain, Tamines, Andenne and Dinant, whilst the invasion progressed towards the heart of the country. Then, under the governors.h.i.+p of Von Bissing, the method was altered, and attempts were made to induce the chiefs of industry and their workmen to resume work for the greater benefit of the enemy. This policy culminated in the sinister deportations, pursued during the winter of 1916-17, which enslaved about 150,000 men and compelled them to work either behind the German front or in German kommandos. Enormous fines and contributions were levied on towns and provinces, the country was emptied of all raw material, private property and the produce of the soil were systematically requisitioned, and the population would have been decimated by famine but for the help of the Commission for Relief in Belgium. When it became evident, in 1917, that the pa.s.sive resistance of the workers could not be broken, all the industries which had not been commandeered were entirely or partially destroyed and the machinery transported to Germany.

[_VON BISSING'S INTRIGUES_]

The most insidious attack of Governor von Bissing's policy on the Belgian nation was his attempt to use the Flemish Movement as a means to divide the Belgians against themselves. The governor, who explained his intentions in a remarkable doc.u.ment known as his "Political Testament," undertook this campaign under the a.s.sumption that Belgium was an artificial creation of the Vienna Congress and that such a thing as Belgian nationality did not really exist. German university professors had been at great pains to explain to the German and neutral public that nationality could only be created by unity of race or language, and that Belgium, possessing neither of these attributes, could consequently claim no right to independence. Following this trend of thought, the governor and his advisers considered the Flemish Movement as the outcome of internal dissensions between Walloons and Flemings, and hoped that, by encouraging the Flemings, they would succeed in dividing the country and in securing the protectorate of Flanders.

First the creation of a Flemish University in Ghent, replacing the French University, absorbed the attention of the German administration.

Having secured the support of a few extreme "flamingants" known as "activists" and completed the professorial board with foreigners, they hastily inaugurated the new inst.i.tution (1916). To their great surprise, all Flemish organizations protested indignantly against this action, contending that the occupying Power had no right to interfere in internal policy. The next step was a series of decrees establis.h.i.+ng Administrative Separation, with two capitals at Namur and Brussels and a complete division of Government offices between the Flemish and Walloon districts of the country. This measure failed like the first, owing to the patriotic resistance of the Belgian officials and the inability of the Germans to replace them, and long before they were obliged to evacuate the country the Germans had given up the hope of mastering the absurd and unscientific decision of Walloons and Flemings alike to remain one people, as history had made them.

Professor Van der Linden has given to his valuable work on Belgian history the sub-t.i.tle of _The Making of a Nation_, and shown conclusively how the present inst.i.tutions of Belgium are the result of various contributions from the Middle Ages to the present time. But a book on Belgian history might just as aptly be called _The Resistance of a Nation_, since history tells us not only how the monument was built, but also how it was not destroyed in spite of the most adverse circ.u.mstances. From that point of view, Belgium may indeed be considered as the embodiment of steadfastness, rather than that of sheer heroism. She has succeeded in preserving, far more than in acquiring. From her fifteenth century frontiers she has been reduced to her present limited boundaries, which, nevertheless, contain all the elements of her past and present genius. She sacrificed territory, centuries of independence, long periods of prosperity, but she remained essentially one people and one land, a small people on a small land, combining the genius of two races and two languages and acting as a natural intermediary between the great nations of Europe. Her history, up to her last fight, is nothing but the struggle of a nation to a.s.sert her right to live, in spite of her weakness, in the midst of great military Powers. Unity, first const.i.tuted in the fifteenth century, is at once endangered by the rule of a foreign dynasty. During the first part of the sixteenth century the two influences, national and foreign, contend in the counsels of the nation. The latter tendency prevails, and, though remaining nominally independent in regional matters, the country pa.s.ses under foreign rule. When, in the beginning of the nineteenth century, after the failure of several insurrections under the Austrian and French regimes, independence is finally granted, and when a new dynasty is at last inaugurated as a symbol of national unity, Belgium remains nevertheless under foreign tutelage. Her independence is bought at the price of neutrality; and it is only after the violation of this guaranteed neutrality by two of the foremost Powers which established it that the cycle of Belgium's trials comes to an end and that she is allowed to exert her sovereign rights in external as well as internal affairs.

[_TREATY OF VERSAILLES_]

Some may consider that Belgium has not reaped important advantages from the treaty of Versailles, and may be inclined to compare the small territories of the Walloon districts of Eupen and Malmedy with the efforts made during the last few years. But, quite apart from economic indemnities, which may prove a great a.s.set if they materialize, Belgium has conquered a far more valuable possession than any territory could give. For the first time in modern history she has received full recognition. She is at last allowed to make friends with her friends and to beware of her enemies, if she has any reason to fear them.

Through the bitter struggle of the last few years Belgium has conquered what other nations might consider as their birthright--the right to be herself, the master of her fate, the captain of her soul.

It becomes more and more apparent to foreign consciousness that her future is bound up with that of Europe. Her welfare will be Europe's welfare, her ruin, the ruin of Western civilization and Christianity.

Unless through the League of Nations, or through any other means, justice prevails in international relations, the history of her tribulations is not yet closed, for only under a regime of justice may the weak hope to live in freedom and in peace.

Among the pantheon of monuments erected by modern Belgium to the heroes of her past history, the stranger will find, with some surprise, in the midst of the Place Royale in Brussels, an equestrian statue of G.o.dfrey of Bouillon, who, nine centuries ago, sold his land to join the first crusade, and who refused to wear a crown of gold where his Saviour had worn a crown of thorns. Quite close stands the Palace where another Belgian prince returned lately, after four years' incessant labour at the side of his soldiers amid the sodden fields of Flanders. There is a great contrast between the civilization of the eleventh and that of the twentieth century, between the Great Adventure sought by the old crusaders and the Great War forced on Western Europe, between the mystic idealism of the Middle Ages and the practical idealism of modern times. On both occasions, however, Belgium was placed in the van, and found in G.o.dfrey IV and Albert I two leaders whose courage and dignity will stand as the purest symbol of chivalry and national honour.

THE STORY OF THE NATIONS

1. =Rome.= By ARTHUR GILMAN, M.A.

2. =The Jews.= By Prof. J.K. HOSMER.

3. =Germany.= By Rev. S. BARING-GOULD, M.A.

4. =Carthage.= By Prof. ALFRED J. CHURCH.

5. =Alexander's Empire.= By Prof. J.P. MAHAFFY.

6. =The Moors in Spain.= By STANLEY LANE-POOLE.

7. =Ancient Egypt.= By Prof. GEORGE RAWLINSON.

8. =Hungary.= By Prof. ARMINIUS VAMBERY 9. =The Saracens.= By ARTHUR GILMAN, M.A.

10. =Ireland.= By the Hon. EMILY LAWLESS.

11. =Chaldea.= By ZeNADE A. RAGOZIN.

12. =The Goths.= By HENRY BRADLEY.

13. =a.s.syria.= By ZeNADE A. RAGOZIN.

14. =Turkey.= By STANLEY LANE-POOLE.

15. =Holland.= By Prof. J.E. THOROLD ROGERS.

16. =Mediaeval France.= By GUSTAVE Ma.s.sON.

17. =Persia.= By S.G.W. BENJAMIN.

18. =Phoenicia.= By Prof. G. RAWLINSON.

19. =Media.= By ZeNADE A. RAGOZIN.

20. =The Hansa Towns.= By HELEN ZIMMERN.

21. =Early Britain.= By Prof. ALFRED J. CHURCH.

22. =The Barbary Corsairs.= By STANLEY LANE-POOLE.

23. =Russia.= By W.R. MORFILL, M.A.

24. =The Jews under the Romans.= By W.D. MORRISON.

25. =Scotland.= By JOHN MACKINTOSH, LL.D.

26. =Switzerland.= By Mrs. LINA HUG and R. STEAD.

27. =Mexico.= By SUSAN HALE.

28. =Portugal.= By H. MORSE STEPHENS.

29. =The Normans.= By SARAH ORME JEWETT.

30. =The Byzantine Empire.= By C.W.C. OMAN.

31. =Sicily: Phoenician, Greek and Roman.= By the Prof. E.A. FREEMAN.

32. =The Tuscan Republics.= By BELLA DUFFY.

33. =Poland.= By W.R. MORFILL, M.A.

34. =Parthia.= By Prof. GEORGE RAWLINSON.

35. =The Australian Commonwealth.= By GREVILLE TREGARTHEN.

36. =Spain.= By H.E. WATTS.

37. =j.a.pan.= By DAVID MURRAY, Ph.D.

38. =South Africa.= By GEORGE M. THEAL.

39. =Venice.= By ALETHEA WIEL.

40. =The Crusades.= By T.A. ARCHER and C.L. KINGSFORD.

41. =Vedic India.= By Z.A. RAGOZIN.

42. =The West Indies and the Spanish Main.= By JAMES RODWAY.

43. =Bohemia.= By C. EDMUND MAURICE.

44. =The Balkans.= By W. MILLER, M.A.

45. =Canada.= By Sir J.G. BOURINOT, LL.D.

46. =British India.= By R.W. FRAZER, LL.B.

47. =Modern France.= By ANDRe LE BON.