Yet in spite of spy-mania and a hundred methods of spy-
catching, we who were classed with spies--passed all barriers and
saw all the secrets of the town's defence. If instead of being a mild
and inoffensive Englishman I had been a fierce and patriotic German,
I might have brought away a mass of military information of the
utmost value to General von Kluck; or, if out for blood, I might have
killed some very distinguished officers before dying as a faithful son
of the Fatherland. No sentries at the door of the Hotel des Arcades, in
the Place Jean-Bart, challenged three strangers of shabby and
hungry look when they passed through in search of food. Waiters
scurrying about with dishes and plates did not look askance at them
when they strolled into a dining-room crowded with French and British
staff officers. At the far end of the room was a great general--drinking
croute-au-pot with the simple appetite of a French poilu--who would
have been a splendid mark for anyone careless of his own life and
upholding the law of frightfulness as a divine sanction for
assassination. It was "Soixante-dix Pau," and I was glad to see that
brave old man who had fought through the terrible year of 1870, and
had been en retraite in Paris when, after forty-four years, France was
again menaced by German armies.
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