More pitiable, because when they
reached such ports as Calais or Boulogne or Havre, the hotels and
lodging-houses were overcrowded from attic to cellars, the buffets
had been swept clear of food, and committees of relief were already
distracted with the overwhelming needs of a Belgian invasion.
25
I remember a day and night in Boulogne. The narrow streets--evil with
odours brought forth by a hot sun, were filled with surging crowds
which became denser as new trains arrived from Calais and Dunkirk
and junctions on northern lines. The people carried with them the
salvage of their homes, wrapped up in blankets, sheets, towels and
bits of ragged paper. Parcels of grotesque shapes, containing
copper pots, frying pans, clocks, crockery and all kinds of
domestic utensils or treasured ornaments, bulged on the pavements
and quaysides, where whole families sat encamped. Stalwart
mothers of Normandy and Picardy trudged through the streets with
children clinging to their skirts, with babies in their arms and with big
French loaves--the commissariat of these journeys of despair--
cuddled to their bosoms with the babes. Old grandfathers and
grandmothers, who looked as though they had never left their native
villages before, came hand in hand, with shaking heads and watery
eyes, bewildered by all this turmoil of humanity which had been thrust
out, like themselves, from its familiar ways of life.
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