"Hang Poullet!"

Hectic Fascismo reared its head last week, even in the phlegmatic Belgian lowlands. For two years M. Pierre Nothomb, lawyer, poet, publicist, has been gathering the extreme Belgian Nationalists about him.

Recently he traveled to Italy, conferred with Mussolini, and returned to Belgium "fired with the ideal of action." Last week he acted up, scandalized most of his steady-going countrymen. His followers staged an anti-cabinet demonstration in Brussels, just as Crown Prince Leopold and Premier Viscount Poullet were about to receive the War standards of several disbanded Belgian regiments at the National Army Museum. Scattered throughout the crowd of 40,000 persons who witnessed this ceremony, the fledgling Fascists created a terrific uproar: "Keep the Army at full strength! Down with Poullet! Hang him! Vive la Belgique immortelle! Hurrah for Prince Leopold! The Army forever!"

Amid pandemonium, the Fascists threw their own hats, and all the hats they could snatch, into the air. Mistaking a streetcar employe with a red "danger" flag for a Communist, they drubbed him soundly. Premier Poullet "turned pale," escaped discreetly through the back door of the Museum, leaving Crown Prince Leopold to receive the Fascists' cheers.

By degrees the excitement gathered. Irrepressibles worked off their surplus patriotism by rushing about the streets of Brussels in bands, waving Fascist flags. They were gawked at by the astonished citizenry.

Two days later, the Chamber showed its contempt for the Fascist movement by according an ovation to Premier Poullet, and then rushing through legislation designed to cut down the period of compulsory military service in the Belgian Army from twelve months to ten.