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[Page 111]
Steen-Je
5/7/16
Up at 7 for early morning parade in the trim little green meadow. After breakfast marched to battalion parade ground and then returned and carried on with platoon work & rifle exercises. All very rusty after being off drill so long. After lunch did battalion drill and then the same as the morning.
At 4 pm met Bert Curnow and we found our way to Bailleul proceeding by winding pretty lanes. These twisting ways are very disconcerting for the place you are steering for is now in front, not on your right and then a few minutes after on your left. The town (13500) is chiefly noted in these days for the rapes & atrocities committed there by the enemy. It is a Flemish style of town noted for its hand made lace of which we saw quantities in shop windows and many women had the little lace machines.
The town is built on a hill and clusters thickly round its big church & town hall just as if it had been walled and made compact for defensive purposes. There is a fair sized square in front of the town hall where no doubt market is held – today there was fishmonger's booth there. The Hotel de Ville is a fine old place dated 1536 and has a square tower with peculiar globed top. Its many bells give it a novel look.
Behind it is the Church of St Vaast which is dated 1609 and has a square old tower. The door is finely carved. Inside the place smells very stuffy owing to lack of ventilation. It is a big church with the usual praying chairs and an elaborate carved wooden pulpit. The oak panelling carved into medallions. Windows recent. Plenty of side altars. The confessionals are wood hand carved to resemble curtains and quite deceive one at first being so cleverly done. There are no mural tablets to indicate antiquity but the altars are wooden carved & have Latin inscriptions.
An old priest with flowing white locks delivered a great haranguer from the pulpit to the congregation and a girl sang a solo from the organ loft. The old priest was wearing a white surplice and the remark "that the chap evidently belonged to the Druids" was a trite one.
Behind this church is another (1639) smaller. It was awfully stuffy and musty inside. There were some fine [indecipherable] and an altar to Jean d' Arc as Notre Dame de Low[indecipherable].