Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 131, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 June 1917 — HONORED PLACE WAITS BELGIUM [ARTICLE]

HONORED PLACE WAITS BELGIUM

PRESIDENT VOWS RAVAGED NATION shall BE RESTORED WHEN PEACE COMES. .Washington, June 18. —In greeting Belgium’s war mission today here President Wilson expressed America’s “solemn determination that on the inevitable day "of victory, Belgium shall be restored to the place she has so-richly won among .the self-respecting and respected nations of the earth.” The commissioners spent the first day in Washington paying official calls. Secretary Lansing accompanied them to the white house, where Baron Moncheur, head of the mission, handed to President Wilson a personal letter from King Albert ana expressed in a short address _Belgium’s gratitude for America’s aid. “Since the first days of the greatest tragedy which has ever befallen humanity,” said the baron, “Belgium has contracted an immense debt of gratitude to the generous American nation. In a magnificent outburst of sympathy for the little country which had chosen to delay a powerful and pitiless enemy rather than to tarnish its honor or foreswear its plighted word, the initiative of American citizens gave to the unfortunate victims of German cruelty in Belgium the most splendid evidence of ' generosity.. Belgium will again take her place among the nations. The enemy brought us massacre and devastation, but there still remains to the Belgium people their soil, made fertile by the toil of their ancestors, there still remains to Belgium an industrious population of unconquerable energy.’ President Wilson, thanking the baron and through'him King Albert, said in reply: . “Your excellency is good enough to -express the thanks of the Belgian people for. the participation of America in feeding the people of your stricken country. This work, in which so many Americans have been engaged, is one which has brought as much of benefit to them as to the innocent civilized population whom it was intended to aid. The American people have been able to understand and glory in the unflinching heroism of the Belgian people ana their sovereign and there is not among us one who does not today welcome the opportunity of expressing to you our heartfelt sympathy and friendship, and our solemn determination that on the inevitable day of victory Belgium shall be restored to the place she has so richly won among the self-respecting and respected nations of the earth.