It Was A Dreary Drive Beside The Wood Of
Soignes And Through A Part Of It, - That Melancholy-Looking Forest
Of
tall-stemmed beeches - beech, beech, nothing but beech - and through the
Walloon villages - Waterloo is one of them - and
Through fields where wet
women were at work, and over roads where dirty children by dozens were
dabbling like ducks in the puddles. At last we stopped at the village of
Mont St. Jean, whence we walked through the slippery mud to the mound
erected in the midst of the battle-field, and climbed to its top,
overlooking a country of gentle declivities and hollows. Here the various
positions of the French and allied armies during the battle which decided
the fate of an empire, were pointed out to us by a young Walloon who sold
wine and drams in a shed beside the monument. The two races which make up
the population of Belgium are still remarkably distinct, notwithstanding
the centuries which have elapsed since they occupied the same country
together. The Flemings of Teutonic origin, keep their blue eyes and fair
hair, and their ancient language - the same nearly as the Dutch of the
sixteenth century. The Walloons, a Celtic race, or Celtic mixed with
Roman, are still known by their dark hair and black eyes, and speak a
dialect derived from the Latin, resembling that of some of the French
provinces. Both languages are uncultivated, and the French has been
adopted as the language of commerce and literature in Belgium.
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