HOSPITAL
 HEROES
K;.,»ir
ELIZABETH WALKER. BLACK 
WZ 100 B6272h 1919
55230490R
NLN DSETElDb  1


    NATIONAL LIBRARY OF MEDICINE
SURGEON  GENERAL'S OFFICE


    LIBRARY.
  Section-------------------



   .no. 113,   No. .3L&.Z.C&Jr
 W. D.S. G.O.
I'                  _________.
NLM052921061 
        RETURN TO
NATIONAL LIBRARY OF MEDICINE
   BEFORE LAST DATE SHOWN
 
 
HOSPITAL HEROES 
 
 
Elizabeth Walker Black. 
HOSPITAL  HEROES
ELIZABETH WALKER  BLACK
" We've seen too much to remember. We're
too little to hold it. Men are things that
think a little but chiefly forget. If one did
remember there wouldn't be any more war."
           —" Under Fire."
        NEW YORK

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
           1919
 
COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS


        PUBLISHED JANUARY, 1919
U>2-
\oo
 
                   TO
     MY  MOTHER  AND FATHER
WHO HAVE FOUR STARS IN THEIR SERVICE FLAQ 
 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  I wish to thank Laurette Taylor for giv-
ing me the inspiration to go "Out There,'*
untrained, but willing to work, the Amer-
ican Girls' Aid for my passport, and Mrs.
Noe-Daly for taking me to the front.
  For helping me to "stick it," my thanks
are due to the letters written by my mother
and my Civil War uncle, who believe that
girls, as well as boys, should leave home to
stand by the colors, and serve with every
bit of themselves the country which is the
mother of us all.
              Elizabeth Walker Black. 
 
             CONTENTS
CHAPTEB                                   PAQI
   I.  The Letter-Box......    3
  II.  American Crusaders.....19
  III.  With  the Third French Army    .   36
  IV.  The Blesses.......54
   V.  Life at the Front.....75
  VI.  An Attack........96
 VII.  Under Fire........115
VIII.  Fetes..........  128
  IX.  Evacuation of Auto Chir No. 7  .  148
   X.  Arrival of the  British Fifth Army  167
  XL  En Repos........182
 XII.  During the German Advance .   .199 
 
             ILLUSTRATIONS



Elizabeth Walker Black..........Frontispiece

                                            FACING PAGE
Cugny....................    42


"Monsieur le Valet" and other patients of Ward V  .    70

The hospital in winter.............    76

Dressings in the "saUe de pansements"......104

Ward V....................130

The evacuation train..............158


The arrwal of the British Fifth Army.......168 
 
HOSPITAL HEROES 
i 
CHAPTER I
         THE LETTER-BOX
^ I^HE  office of  "Gestionnaire"  was a
 A  mass  of floating  veils and  soiled
aprons as every one  looked eagerly  for
letters on their way to luncheon.
  "No American mail, yet!" "There hasn't
been any for  weeks." "Nothing much for
you," tossing  some dingy envelopes in  my
direction with my  name  spelled  in every
conceivable manner: Le Blat, Blac, Blague.
  I took them away to a quiet corner to
enjoy them by myself  as a  dog  with  his
bone. They were very precious, these letters,
written for  the most part in pencil; and
very hard to read,  not  because the hand-
writing was poor, but  because it was  too
good — so fine and small. They  came  as
thank-you  letters  from the trenches  or
from beds in  base hospitals whenever a
                   3 
4          HOSPITAL  HEROES
train of evacuation took my wounded out
of the danger zone. I call them mine be-
cause I had the ward for "Petits Blesses,"
and, being the less serious cases, they were
sent off  as quickly as possible to make
room  for the new ones who were brought
in every day from the trenches where they
received their first dressing. I liked to re-
ceive these letters, for they showed that in
spite of the rush of work I had made friends.
  I opened a large yellow envelope, and read:

Mademoiselle:
  I dare not think you will remember me,
but receive  anyway the thanks of a little
poilu  who  had the  honor  of being taken
care of by a little miss. A thousand times
thanks! How have I had such happiness,  I
who never had  luck in my life. I have been
in two hospitals since leaving the Auto
Chir No. 7,* but I missed the soft hand that
used to do my  dressing.  Often I see in
thought Ward V, always joyous that ward.
Do you sing still in the evening? How can
  * Automobile Chirurgical, a surgical hospital ready to move at
any time, attached to an evacuation or field hospital near the
front. 
THE LETTER-BOX
5
I forget the good care you gave? One does
not forget so soon  good people. I dare not
ask, though I would like the pleasure of re-
ceiving  a letter from you now and then
telling me what is happening in that Ward.
I would like  to sharpen your pencil again
or roll the cotton for the dressing cart.
  Do you remember the day you trimmed
all  our  moustaches? How proud we  had
been all the younger ones to have acquired
these sweeping graces of manhood, and how
"Monsieur le Tigre" roared when his dis-
appeared under your relentless shears! You
had the courage, Mademoiselle.  It was just
after the "soupe,"  and you said you could
stand it no longer, that  we must  all be
trimmed like the Americans. Since revisit-
ing my  home in Bordeaux which is  full of
Americans, I appreciate your point of view.
  Now completely healed, I have rejoined
my regiment. It is five o'clock in the morn-
ing and I am in a hole with water  to my
ankles. We have reached the second  line of
the Boches. I worked with confidence be-
cause I thought I was fighting as much for
you as for myself,  and see, because  of this
thought, I am  safe and sound. When will
this abominable war be ended ? You too are
near the Front, like the soldiers doing your
duty. It must  be  very tiring to  be with 
6
HOSPITAL HEROES
your wounded so long without a rest. I give
you all my compliments on your beautiful
act of devotion. Permit  me  to  offer you
these little flowers received in a letter from
my parents for good luck.
  I close  my letter in wishing you good
health. Will you wish the doctor, D----,
good  morning for  me?  Also the orderly,
Leclerq. I pray you to excuse my writing
in pencil on such modest paper, but it is a
poor httle poilu who writes. Receive the
expression  of my  highest  consideration.
[Followed  by a complicated signature and
army address.]

  The next letter was written in lavender
ink on pale-blue paper with a deeper-blue
border.

My Dear Little Nurse:
  Our journey  in  the hospital  train was
good, and  I am growing accustomed to hav-
ing only one leg and a half. I am in the
mountains to get the good air. This hospital
is good but how I  regret  the Auto Chir
No. 7 where you were so kind. I am bored
here. I think often  of the troubles I made
you  endure. I was a restive patient, never
satisfied, always scolding. How I shouted 
           THE LETTER-BOX          7

"Enough! Enough! Gently!" every  time
you gave the Carrel treatment.  Today  I
ask forgiveness for  all that.  Will you be
indulgent enough to pardon me? I cannot
make grand phrases. I can only say a big
thank  you very  simple and  sincere. My
parents write that they wish  me to thank
you for the good care I received during my
stay in your ward. I am homesick for that
ward. I hope to see you in the United States
after the war. I have found your fete day
in my Httle calendar of the saints. It is my
prayer that the war will end  on that day,
November nineteenth.
  I have been decorated with the "medaille
militaire" and the "croix de  guerre" and
am very happy. But I wish you were here.
No one  comes through the ward  at two
o'clock  saying "Milk  or chocolate?" and
counting the number of orders for each on
her fingers. I remember your difficulty in
pronouncing  French words   and  phrases
which made us laugh. A lot of little cares
and attentions have  been discounted which
I never lacked with you.
  Will you give my address please to the
"Vaguemestre" so he can send my letters
here? I will never forget you  for you took
good care of me when I suffered most. I am
always afraid you may be wounded, too, by 
8          HOSPITAL HEROES
a bomb from the aeroplanes. You are  so
near the lines. And the cold weather? You
must be frozen. You  were always so cold
and  could hardly hold the thermometer  to
shake it down.
  With all the best wishes of a  grateful
little soldier who admires your devotion.
  There were several picture  post-cards.
One  from a  farmer's  unit in  the interior
where the crippled soldiers were taught  to
serve their country even if they had lost
a hand or a leg. Another was a picture of a
casino  on  the Riviera transformed into a
convalescent  home. Another  sent "poor
little cards of my own country" having re-
turned on leave before going back to the
trenches, and beginning the weary game all
over again. They were all marked "Souvenir
of a blesse  who will never forget," and
were sent with the usual polite expressions
of "homages and sentiments the most re-
spectful and devoted." One very elaborate
card had  flowers  embroidered  in colored
silk and opened like an envelope enclosing 
THE LETTER-BOX
9
a little card printed in English for my special
benefit:  "Greetings  from France. To my
dear Brother."
  One letter was in English from a French
boy born in San Francisco. He was not one
of my blesses, but visited my ward often
and helped me with my French, being a
better interpreter than letter-writer.  Here
it is as I received it:

Dear Miss:
  Don't  take care if i speak not very well.
i write like the french speak. You have one
of my chaps in your room in Bed No. 41.
tell him if  you please that the boys of the
3 piece give him a good day and hope him
much better. Tell me how is he please.
  I am at home since yesterday for twenty
days, i hope you always in good health.
Your's sincerely, the American boy who
was in your hospital. Great hope to  you!

  An artillery  sergeant "permitted"  him-
self to send me his  photograph, standing
proudly beside his cannon. He also sent his
cordial salutation and profuse apologies for 
10         HOSPITAL HEROES
the grimace he had made on account of the
sun.
  Several of the blesses called me "made-
moiselle marraine"  instead of "mademoi-
selle"  or  "infirmiere"  (nurse).  The  next
letter was from one  of these godsons  of
war, enclosing a post-card.

My Dear and Good Little Marraine:
  I permit myself to send you this picture
of the chateau where we are being cared for.
I hurry to write you these few words. For
several days blesses have arrived from Auto
Chir No. 7 who speak often of Mademoiselle
Marraine. You  were a model  "Infirmiere"
and all the patients loved you. Here I begin
to make friends who ask me for a song, but
I think often of the evenings  in Ward V. I
enjoyed singing to  you in my  little bed
No. 6. I was better off there  than here  in
a chateau. I have lost Riviere. My foot is
better but I still use crutches.  I am 18 kilo-
meters from Frangois and when I am better
I shall walk over to say hello.
  With greatest respect and thanks for good
care received,
  A little lame "filleul" who thinks of you.
I permit myself to  give you  my address, 
THE LETTER-BOX
11
and I hope you will write me news of you,
if only two lines. I cannot help thinking of
you because you were so kind.

  Another  "filleul" thanked me most  ap-
preciatively for some cigarettes and choco-
late I sent to him when the time came for
him to return to the front lines:

Good Morning,  Dear Marraine:
  What a good surprise  today!  I see you
are going to spoil your "filleul."  I received
the wonderful package in  good  condition
and divided it with some of my  comrades.
How grateful we all are! But I cannot ex-
press myself well enough to tell you.
  After 24 hours on the railroad and  110
kilometers  on  foot, we have arrived at a
little village not far from you. I tried to
see you but met  the  gendarme and  not
having a permission was forced  to return.
Enfin,  one  must submit  without murmur.
Since it must be thus, one must resign one-
self to disappointment. I wanted to give
you a little present, a shell of our glorious
seventy-five which I have decorated. I  am
sending it hoping you will be pleased.
  We will be in the trenches eight days and
then released for eight  days or for three or 
12         HOSPITAL HEROES
four months. How long the hours will seem!
Do you know what gives me courage? My
httle Marraine. I went  to the  war in the
first days of 1914 when there were no good
marraines to console  and amuse us with
their kind  letters  of  encouragement  and
hope. No  one  dreamed then  that  they
would come to  lighten the dreary solitude
of the trenches. And now who of us is not
happy in corresponding  with one of  you?
You help the task of the soldier more than
you realize. But there are few who when
wounded have  a marraine for  a  nurse. I
wish all the blesses could be  cared for by
a little  mademoiselle  marraine, but  alas!
what a futile wish! To most nurses we are
but broken bodies. They do not  trouble
themselves  about that terrible malady, the
cafard. I think  you made it your duty to
look happy even if you were not. I hope my
letter will  find you in  good health.  My
health is perfect. "Messieurs les Boches"
must look out for themselves!

  I opened  a little black-bordered note with
a sinking heart.  It was from the young wife
of an artist who used to draw clever carica-
tures for me, and had since returned to the
firing-line. She wrote to tell me of his death, 
THE LETTER-BOX          13
"killed in action," such a brave little note
filled  more with pride of being the widow
of a hero than of sorrow or bitterness at
having the dearest thing in her life snatched
away so  ruthlessly.  "One  must  pay for
the privilege of being the wife of a hero of
France. I will  pay with my widowhood."
  A dear old man with four children whom
he has not seen for fourteen months  wrote
in a hand that tottered and spread all over
the page. He  was at the  hospital when I
first came and keeps on writing every now
and then from another hospital to thank
me all over again. I wish these poilus would
not be so grateful. Their appreciation makes
me feel guilty. There are so many  things I
wanted  to do  for them, and there was so
little time.
Dear Little Infirmiere of Other Times:
  It is  going  better  with me although I
have a little feebleness in  my left  leg, and
no more of your frictions "in the direction
of the heart."  The beds are not as good as
those  in Auto  Chir  No. 7. I am in a little 
14         HOSPITAL HEROES
draught from the window and no one thinks
of putting a bed sock on my head. I have
received some more pictures from my wife
of the children but no one cares to see them.
You would be pleased to see that  the boy
has grown taller than his older sisters now.
I am well taken care of but you  see this
does not prevent me from thinking often
of your hospital.
  I hear with pleasure that you have  a
ward  of your own now. How  happy you
must be, alone and independent, no one to
scold you any more.
  I begin to get up but must not leave the
ward. My back is not all well yet. When I
look at the end of the arm that is cut off,
I wonder what my children will say. Then
I remember what you told me about crippled
bodies not being  half so bad as crippled
brains or hearts. I may go home soon, but
will not forget you. I pray  you to accept
some cards of my native country and sur-
roundings.
  Permit me, Mademoiselle, to thank you
for the courage and goodness and tender-
ness you have shown towards me and  my
wounded friends. I thank you with all my
heart for coming such a long way to take
care of us. I shake your hand cordially and
cry loudly: "Vive l'Amerique!" 
            THE  LETTER-BOX         15
   That night when the rumble of artillery
 seemed louder and the scratching of mice
 in the paper ceiling over my  bed alarmed
 me even more than the guns, and the mat-
 tress felt harder than  usual,  I could not
 sleep for a long time, and so  I thought
 about the letters. You can find rose-colored
 spectacles anywhere, they say, if you try
 hard enough. The blesses have found mine
 for me.
   A  few months  ago  I was  comfortably
 enjoying the cynical excitements and futile
 pleasures of what I considered  life. Since
 then I have lived and worked  and suffered
 among people who had been  at the front
 so long that it was as commonplace to them
 as if they were only in a little town in peace-
 time, instead of in a very busy  field-hos-
pital seven miles from the firing-line.
  These  letters make me realize that the
work  I am doing, however small it may be
in comparison to the wholesale surrender
of fives once belonging  to individual minds 
16         HOSPITAL HEROES
and hearts, is yet big enough to make me
forget my endless discomforts. War is less
exalting than the civilian realizes who takes
his three square meals a day, comfortable
house, and bombless nights of undisturbed
sleep for granted. Death is unimportant and
hard work makes one forget fear, but it is
harder to endure the little discomforts be-
cause they are always there to annoy when
one is tired — the perpetual mud and damp-
ness, the wind blowing down the pipes of
the inadequate stoves and putting out the
fire, the snow sifting in through cracks in
the paper windows, the unvarying supply
of potatoes, war-bread, and tinned food,
and,  worst of all, no real baths.
  The blesses make it all worth while and
chase away the "cafard,"  that slough of
despond when you feel you don't like to be
out there at all and yet would hate not to
be there. Luxuries seem contemptible when
men  are dying.  One  cannot be homesick
when looking back is like seeing a view 
           THE LETTER-BOX          17
through the wrong end of opera-glasses, so
small  and insignificant.  It seems  unreal
back there with  all the hating and pen-
and-ink fighting. Here, there is a wonderful
"camaraderie," a fine feeling that joins all
in a common cause, and makes up for the
many things that are taken away. There is
regeneration in knowing you can meet the
worst and survive. I am happier here than
I have ever been before because I am doing
something  where history is being made
among people who  have a contempt for
anything not the bravest. We  are doing a
work into which no  selfishness enters, and
in which  there  is  no restless wondering
what to do next.
  Among the waste of bones and flesh  that
once were the physically fit of  France,  the
things which each individual gives up count
for  httle.  Instead, there  is a  grim  deter-
mination not to waste any more  time with
death so near.  I cannot understand how
this work would ever harden one. Pity and 
18         HOSPITAL HEROES
sacrifice must purify the whole  nature. A
courage comes out of the crucible, more of
the soul than of the nerves, which lifts one
above  the  terror, doubt, and pain. After-
ward, when the great elation is over, one
must have developed and the future will
be better on account of it. 
            CHAPTER  II
     AMERICAN  CRUSADERS
  AS soon  as  I  realized that life in war-
   *-  time must  be either danger and ad-
venture  and active service, or safety and
tedium and a passive helping to  "win the
war" at home, I  made my choice and took
my  opportunity  when it came. If  some
were  giving their lives for the happiness
and safety of the others, I could not stay
behind  and comfortably  accept such  a
sacrifice.  When  so many  are doing big
things, I could not  do little ones. I had to
go out with them and risk everything for
real service. If happiness and safety are
worth such a price of blood  and self-ab-
negation, I must  not  shirk, but pay it too,
instead of leaving the hard work  to others
while I hide under some excuse and  wait
for them to "come marching home."
                   19 
20         HOSPITAL HEROES
  The crossing was uneventful as far as
submarine activity was concerned, but very
interesting  as to  passengers. The  steamer
was crowded with people, many in uniform,
every one  with a  mission. Here  was no
sluggish blood nor eyes blind to duty. There
was an exhilaration in being one of such  a
company of brave  people, some on diplo-
matic errands,  three hundred  ambulance
drivers for the Norton Harjes and American
Field Service, aviators for the Lafayette Es-
cadrille, canteen and Y. M.  C. A. workers,
and our  hospital unit of doctors,  nurses,
and aides.
  Dreading a domestic brass-band farewell,
I started off alone,  having seen my family
on  the train for  their summer instead.  I
was afraid  that the good-by  side  of  the
boat might make me weaken and lose heart,
so I left the waving crowd and found  a
corner on the upper deck, facing the ocean
and unknown future that lay  beyond it.
Here in the rain, I made a circle of dead 
        AMERICAN CRUSADERS      21
matches in a pathetic attempt  to  smoke
and be a man, until the ship had left the
harbor,  and  I had regained my courage
enough  to join my friends. There were
other moments of self-doubt and  depres-
sion, but they were easily  overcome after
this first victory. There is  a romantic ex-
citement and personal courage in being de-
tached from the every-day life of home and
habit. The thrill of being  a part  of this
great war made me forget  to be lonely or
afraid as we sped nearer and nearer the
danger zone.
  "I didn't know they were taking chil-
dren over there." Looking around, I found
my corner had been discovered by  one of
the ambulance boys. He was looking dis-
dainfully at  the dead matches. Having
learned to smoke only a few months before,
he was feeling very superior and grown-up,
and it evidently hurt his pride to have me
starting off on his big adventure,  too. I did
not reply to his taunt, so he went on: 
22         HOSPITAL HEROES
  "What are you doing here?"
  "Trying  not to cry," I answered truth-
fully.
  "You were silly to come," was his cold
comfort.  "What good can  you  do? You
should have stayed at home and married."
  "I didn't want to. I couldn't have been
happy enjoying  a selfish safety  I hadn't
earned. It was more a feeling than a reason
that made me come."
  "You don't look very happy now,"  he
remarked, as he lit a cigarette, preparing
to stay and probe the matter further.
  "That's  because  I feel  so useless and
stupid among  all  these capable-looking
people. But when we get over, I  am sure
I can help. I am to begin in a supply-room."
  "What is that?"
  "I'm not sure, but I hope to work out of
it to a ward so I can wear a uniform."
  "Ever been in  a hospital?"
  "Not very often."
  "You didn't train in one?" 
        AMERICAN CRUSADERS       23
  "I helped in a baby clinic when  they
were short-handed, and I  learned to  take
histories, temperatures. . . ."
  "But what do you know about wounded
men?"
  "I commenced the Red Cross home-nurs-
ing course, but it didn't have any wounded
in it, so I thought the best way to learn
would be in the midst of them."
  "Come and  watch the steerage. That'll
train you some for the men who come in
from the trenches."
  There was  another inexperienced  but
enthusiastic  girl, who like  myself was to
start work in a supply-room. I will tell our
story so that others, who  feel useless but
are anxious  to do  something that  takes
more  of themselves than the little  war-
work  games  at home,  may be  inspired
and  encouraged  by our experience.  Inci-
dentally, the demand for nurses was so great
that neither of us were put  in a supply-
room. The other girl went to La Panne, I 
24         HOSPITAL HEROES
might  add,  and had a ward of her own
parallel to one managed by a trained nurse,
doing  the same work and  gaining  much
praise  from  Doctor  Depage  and the ma-
tron. Our school motto  proved truer than
we  realized: "Not for our school but for
our lives we learn." The things we had to
learn this time were harder,  but we were
older and more eager.
  There  was gun practice and boat drill,
but except for much staying up at  night
looking for submarines and  the fact  that
life-preservers  were much  in evidence,  the
life  of the ship was as care-free as in peace-
times.  The decks were  dark, but always
gay with singing and the tinkling of uku-
leles and mandolins. One  former glee-club
star even played a tiny piano, undaunted
by  the darkness.  These  concerts  stopped
when the procession of blankets and pillows
warned us that those who fled from a sleep-
less night in stuffy staterooms, with all the
port-holes closed by  order, were about to 
        AMERICAN CRUSADERS       25
try their luck under the stars. Staggering
under  their burden,  they stumble  along
from one  person to another, until finally,
after groping  in every direction, putting
their hands in various eyes and mouths,
they succeed in finding a httle place for
themselves, often remaining till six in the
morning, when they are ruthlessly aroused
by a torrent of water warning them too late
that the decks were  being  cleaned.  Then
every one adjourns to the lounge or stairs,
"shooting crap" until breakfast is served.
   We made a big adventure of it, and yet
underneath  our frivolous holiday exterior
was the earnest hope that  the adventure
would  ripen  into a bigger  service. If we
laughed and danced  and sang too much,
it  was to hide a little nervousness as to the
immediate future, and an embarrassed self-
consciousness that we were doing something
hard and  real  in leaving our comfortable
homes and going into a foreign, war-wrecked
country. We were most of us quite young. 
26         HOSPITAL HEROES
Those  who are young enough and  free
enough  to  go are  the  lucky  ones and, in
spite of danger  and discomfort, they are
happier than those who must stay behind
with the rumors and "Extras!" changes,
regrets,  and good-bys.  We were to  forget
our troubles in the immensity of universal
suffering and find out the  real facts. They
would  have  to  believe what  they  were
told, and wonder and worry.
  In the danger zone I slept  on deck in a
heavy coat thrust  upon me by an ambu-
lance boy, "so as not to die of exposure in
a life-boat." I filled the large  pockets with
crackers, fruit, hairpins, and pictures of
my family. Ever since that time, when I
have been  sent out alone  to  do anything
hard, I  have carried the feeling of taking
somebody  else with me. K---- even had
a book  so  she would not  be bored if we
had to wait many days before being picked
up by another steamer.
  I liked to lie  where  I could  watch the 
        AMERICAN CRUSADERS       27
water, so peaceful and  harmless-looking.
The phosphorus was  well worth  the trip,
for with the  fights out,  it sparkled and
danced along beside the boat in intensified
splendor. The fresh air revived  me after
the month of June which I had spent in
New York trying to be useful selling bonds,
taking the census, rolling bandages, and
knitting. The stars were reassuring, for they
went  on holding the world in place undis-
turbed. It gave me a feeling of security and
endurance to look up at  them and know
that they would go  on and  on through
wars  and men's lives without  change.  It
makes one believe  that some power guides
the ship that speeds through the fogs with-
out a sound of warning and crashes through
the blackest  nights without a  light.  No
matter what  wars and men may destroy,
the world goes on held in place by a stronger
force than they.
  I have often since  longed for my little
stateroom with  trunks and bags piled  in 
28         HOSPITAL HEROES
front of bed and closets, making it difficult
to move or dress, the carpet, seldom swept,
covered with crumbs and orange-peel, and
the baskets of fruit outside  the  door at-
tracting flies and making  people  cross.  It
belonged to the first part of my  real life,
and I try to keep the sense of humor that
made it  seem so amusing  instead  of un-
comfortably messy.
  "Come and  have a  look  at  France!"
called one of  the aviators, as he hurried
from the dining-salon.
  We watched the waves our steamer made
as they overflowed the banks of the river
that took  us  to  Bordeaux.  Large swells
swept up into  fields of grain or  pastures
where cows were startled 'in  their grazing
and had to run away. Little boats at  anchor
were so disturbed that they capsized. The
green banks and little farmhouses made it
sad to realize that war had devastated just
such peaceful  scenes. Such a country was
too beautiful to be ruthlessly destroyed. 
         AMERICAN CRUSADERS       29
  Next day we took a ride in a seagoing
hack driven by a fat old man who fell asleep
persistently whenever we  stopped to look
at anything, and had to  be waked up  in
French. What I remembered of the language
from  my governess  and  school-days  was
just enough  to make  me misunderstood.
My first luncheon was not a success, as I
forgot what httle I knew in the excitement,
and asked for preserved apple-trees instead
of plums, and was given ice-cream when I
asked for a glass of water.  When the waiter
explained that he  was not  French  but
Spanish, I understood spinach and  said:
"Non, je voudrais petits pois."
  The ride through the city was depressing.
So  many closed houses,  crape veils,  and
crippled soldiers! Women were  running the
tram-cars,  and a  few children  in black
roamed through the quiet  streets. Two art
museums were open and  contained many
fine works brought from  the  Louvre for
safety. On the whole, the art was rather 
30         HOSPITAL HEROES
morbid and unhealthy.  I liked the "pay-
sages" best. They seemed to tell those who
doubted that the faith  that brooded  over
the farm-lands  and countryside would not
be destroyed by the apathy  of the  city.
The  cathedral was a religion in itself. The
spirit of France is kept  alive by the quiet,
humble people  who burn candles  at the
altars of the big cathedrals and cover the
shrines in the little country churches  with
photographs and prayers of "Protect my
son.
  On the way to Paris we passed through
soft, peaceful country with long, graceful
lines of  Lombardy poplars and chateaux
high on wooded hills with wreaths  of red-
roofed cottages  around them, like Edmund
DuLac's fairy-tale  illustrations.  Women
were working in the fields. Sometimes we
passed gangs of German prisoners at work,
the only discordant note in the landscape.
  Late in the evening we arrived in Paris.
The head of our unit went to the seashore, 
         AMERICAN CRUSADERS       31
evidently no longer responsible  for us, in
spite  of  having assured  our families  that
we would be chaperoned most carefully in
Paris.  The  understanding  had  been  that
we would remain there only three or four
days while the head doctor inspected sev-
eral  French hospitals  which were at  our
disposal in order to make the best choice.
K----'s  brother met her and took us to
his  hotel, where we stayed three months
waiting for  further orders, unable to sign
up  with any  other hospital, as we were
enrolled with this unit for  six months. On
our way over, the American Red Cross had
taken  charge  of all American units, and
the French  Service de Sante had nothing
to offer  us  as near the front as we had
hoped.
  In the meantime, we found work, some
of us at surgical dressings, others at  the
Y. M. C. A., and the rest  in a canteen at
the Gare de l'Est,  where we supplied  the
crowds of soldiers coming  and going with 
32         HOSPITAL HEROES
large, full-coursed meals. It was a turmoil
of constant demands, everything  to  be
done at once amid much shouting in French
for more soup, bread, or plates, much burn-
ing  of fingers when the  soup was  ladled
out into cups, and a weary arm that went
on and on cutting large chunks of heavy
war-bread. I was in charge of the first sec-
tion  and  had to supply all the  soup, hors
d'ceuvres, bread and butter, as well as mak-
ing  change in "sous."  It was like  a Billy
Sunday cafeteria, only not  so orderly and
clean.
  I was  glad to have some work  which
kept me  too busy to think and made me
feel  useful,  and  preferred  it to  surgical
dressings, where each one  had to sign her
name at the end of the day with the number
of compresses or bandages she had done.
The  strain of sitting still so long and the
hurried feeling  were too much  for  me to
stand day after day. The canteen was better,
though it was a disappointment to be so 
         AMERICAN CRUSADERS       33
far from the front where the only signs of
war were high prices, poor bread,  and the
hum  of aeroplanes overhead  like  great
bumblebees.
  In the summer of 1917  the  Paris  air-
raids were  of little importance. We talked
or slept through several without realizing.
Seemingly  cheerful people strolled uncon-
cernedly up and  down the  boulevards, or
sat at the  httle tables along the sidewalk.
Shops were open, even those selling expen-
sive gowns  and jewelry. Many of them were
closed at the beginning of the war, but re-
opened when the proprietor returned with
his wounded stripe. Some of the  fashion-
able hotels  on the Champs-Elysees had been
turned into hospitals, but others were doing
business, the work  being carried on by
old men, women,  httle  boys, or wounded
soldiers  who were  no longer able to  go to
the front. These "reformes" were usually
covered  with medals as a compensation for
the loss of  a  leg  or  arm. Vaudevilles, 
34         HOSPITAL; HEROES
theatres, and  operas were patronized by
men on leave. It was not unusual to see the
performers wearing the red ribbon of the
Legion  of Honor.  The elevator-man  at
Morgan Harjes' had so many medals I hated
to trouble him. Outside of Carrier's stood
another war hero with a new face.
  A civilian was a rare sight. The few one
did see were old men or foreign  represen-
tatives  from Spain, South America,  and
Switzerland. Everywhere one saw  the quiet
efficiency  and fitness of the English  and
American  khaki, the elaborate glamour of
the French and Italian uniforms, with here
and there  a Russian, Serbian, Belgian,  Jap-
anese, or Indian with his voluminous head-
dress piled high above his dark  face and
flashing eyes.
  The Frenchwomen were usually in mourn-
ing and went out rarely, but now  and  then
one noticed one of the better class, sensi-
tive and piquant, daintily  dressed in  wel-
come contrast  to the sober uniformity or 
        AMERICAN CRUSADERS      35
mistaken elaborateness of the Englishwom-
en, with their pale-colored tulle scarfs and
dark' woolly suits. The Englishwomen  are
at their best in khaki. I have seen them
repairing their own machines, undisturbed
by snow, cold, or mud, quick and cheerful
like boys.
  There were  no cabarets, no music in  the
hotels or dancing, except  in  places which
were frequently raided. One could have  hot
water only at week-ends. Monday and Tues-
day were meatless, Tuesday and Wednesday
were without pastry and candy. Restaurants
closed at half past nine. The whole city was
dark at that hour, and there was nothing to
be had, not even a taxi. One was expected
to economize light and go to bed early. 
CHAPTER  III
   WITH  THE  THIRD  FRENCH
                ARMY
 FUST as  I was resigning  myself  to  the
*^ railroad canteen for the duration of the
war, one of my former school friends ar-
rived in Paris on her way home for a rest
after a year of nursing.  She thrilled  me
with tales  of her work in a French field-
hospital  seven miles  from  the German
fines. I was reassured to find she still had
her hair, teeth, and health in spite of the
terrible stories that had been told at home
to discourage me from  coming. D----was
just the same after her hard work; if any-
thing,  more  enthusiastic  and  alive. She
arranged a meeting for me  with the head
of her  Equipe, who by some lucky chance
was in Paris that day.  Arrangements were
made for me to go to this  hospital, as help
                   36 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH  ARMY  37
was needed for the hard winter ahead, and
even an untrained person could be of ser-
vice.
  It was  not difficult to leave the other
unit which had brought me over.  In fact,
I was released with pleasure. I think  the
head doctor would have liked to have been
released from his own  unit  after  such  a
long period of waiting, tangled up in  red
tape. Then began the task of collecting all
the papers required for  admission to  the
war  zone, and several shopping tours for
uniforms and heavy winter clothes.
  At last, armed  with every sort of paper,
I set off from  the Gare  du Nord  wearing
the military "tricolore" and an  identity
bracelet. While in Paris, I had been obliged
to have two papers, one which permitted
me to  stay in France provided I  did  not
change my residence, called a "permis de
sejour," and the other my "immatricula-
tion," a leaf from  the register  of all for-
eigners. To these I had now added an Amer- 
38         HOSPITAL HEROES
ican Red Cross  card, a  military  nurse's
"livret" (a -sort  of diploma to be signed
at each place where service was done), a
"carte d'identite,"  a "carnet d'etranger"
which allowed a foreigner  to enter the war
zone, and a "bon de transport" so I and
my baggage could travel free, like the sol-
diers. Besides these,  I had to have my
American passport ever ready to show. To
four of these were attached my photograph.
I could not forget myself  very easily, and
would  have been in great difficulties if I
forgot  any of my literature. Later, when
on leave, I had another paper to show the
railway authorities  and the "mairie,"  an
officially signed  and sealed "permission."
I have  heard American aviators boast  of
leaving their  French camp  without  per-
mission,  and "getting away with  it"  by
waving chewing-gum coupons as they passed
the guards. Of course, if caught, they always
said  they "did not understand," but I un-
derstood so well that I was quite intimidated 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH  ARMY  39
and trembled  every time, worrying about
my papers being "en regie."
  Two other "infirmieres" went with me.
We left the  train at Compiegne, where we
were met by  our "directrice" and one of
the doctors, who had come by  "camion"
for supplies, and would take us and our
baggage the rest of the way. We had lunch
in the  Palace  Hotel, opposite the chateau
which was then used as Etat-Major for the
French General Staff. I httle expected that
I would come here  to  five in  February,
while  taking a course  at the Carrel and
Ambrine Hospitals,  and have  what the
Tommy calls a "near squeak," my room
losing its wall  during an air-raid the night
after I left for Paris. Nor did I dream that
in April I would be sleeping in the deep
caves  under  that  chateau  for  protection
during the bombing of the  first  German
drive.
  The  "camion,"  a large, uncomfortable
motor supply-truck, rumbled over the road 
40         HOSPITAL HEROES
carrying us ever nearer the front. The Aisne
is a flat country of plains and river valleys.
In pre-war days there had been many beau-
tiful forests,  but  most of these had been
destroyed. The Germans were  driven out
in March, 1917, and in their retreat made
the land even flatter by shelling and burn-
ing towns and systematically cutting down
whole  orchards.  Farm  implements were
broken, cattle and horses killed.  So com-
plete  was  the  work  of  destruction that
nothing remained but a levelled landscape
of roofless and  windowless houses that
looked like empty boxes, to some  of which
the poor peasants had returned and were
living in the ruins. At one place there had
been a large factory, but only a few pieces
of broken machinery remained, and near
by were a few graves,  with crosses of wood
which  gave the name, date, and rank  of
some  dead soldiers. These graves seemed
such peaceful spaces in  the battle-scarred
land and  death such  a  grateful  sleep  for 
   WITH THE THIRD  FRENCH  ARMY  41
tired men that I did not feel as  much pity
for them  as  I do for  those safe at home
who shirked  their duty  and were deaf to
the call. They are left so far behind with
their flabby souls and  sluggish blood living
selfish  lives,  while they  let others die for
their safety.
   There had been little attempt  at rebuild-
ing, except rude huts of wood or tile. The
chimney-stacks and kitchen ranges alone
seem to have resisted  the fire, as if, in de-
fiance  of war, they wish to show that the
French home and  "cuisine" will endure
forever.  We  passed through a  part that
once had been No Man's Land. It looked
as dreary as  it sounds, a desert of  tumbled
stone,  barbed wire, trenches, and dugouts,
with here and there a sign  to show where
once had been a  village. Some sullen Ger-
man prisoners were working on the road
as we went through this vast land of mud,
treeless, houseless, pitted with shell-holes.
   I was glad to leave  this ruined country- 
42         HOSPITAL HEROES
side and arrive at the small village in which
our hospital  was located. This place  had
not suffered so badly, although its church,
of the twelfth century, was only a pile of
stones.  Cugny had three little stores  and
several houses in which troops were billeted
as they passed to and from the firing-line.
The streets were always lined with rows of
"camions."  There  were hedgerows  along
the roadside  and quaint little  farmhouses
in the surrounding country. I was surprised
to see children playing about the roads as
unconsciously as if they had not been with-
in sound of the guns. The French peasants
continue to live in their homes at any risk.
If they are shelled one day, they hide in
cellars or run away to a safer place,  but
always  return. It  is strange that there  is
no word for home in the French language
when they are so home-loving, while the
Germans  who talk  incessantly  of their
Vaterland are apparently quite as  happy
in any other  country. 
                                             Cugny.

The small village in which our hospital was located. .  . .  Cugny had three little stores and several houses
                                   in which troops were billeted. 
 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH ARMY  43
  The inhabitants always saluted our "tri-
colore." Some of them had remained through
the German occupation of the village. They
told dreadful stories, and  assured us that
most of the devastation was done on pur-
pose  so that nothing  of  value would  be
left for the Allies. Many of them were crazed
with shock and sorrow, and begged us piti-
fully to find their daughters for them. The
place was noticeably empty of young men
and women.
  When the refugees came pouring into the
"Gare du Nord" during the first German
drive, months later, I  recognized some of
the people from Cugny. There were can-
teens and even cots ready for  them, and
they sank down wearily with a dazed look
in their sad faces. Train after train came
in with the same huddled forms, each with
a bundle of household  goods, or treasures
done  up in a towel or pillow-slip.  When
they recognized me  they nodded sadly:
  "Yes, we had  to leave. We  dared not 
44         HOSPITAL HEROES
stay a second time. We knew too well what
would happen."
  Our hospital was  situated between  the
main road to the front lines and a railroad
with an ammunition centre on either side,
which means we were often under bombard-
ment, especially when the Taube observers
caught sight of  troops  marching to  the
front.  From a little  hill near us we  could
see, far away over the plains, the spire of
the cathedral of St. Quentin, then in Ger-
man hands, but spared, at least until they
were forced to retreat. It seemed miraculous
that it should be  left while the rest of  the
country looked  as  if  a giant  mowing-
machine had run across it.
  Some English  canteen women, also  at-
tached to  the  Third  French  Army and
stationed near us, gave  concerts and  va-
riety  shows. They gathered  the talented
ones from the passing  troops, and it was
wonderful to see so many able-bodied men
after the dreary rows of hospital beds con- 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH ARMY 45
taining shreds of what were once the best
men of  France.  After my first few weeks
in the ward, I  began to fear that  there
would be no more men left to fight. But
here,  crowded together in  the "Theatre
du Front" were  so many it made me want
to look at them  all the time, although the
performance was excellent.  The first few
rows were reserved for officers and doctors,
but the rest of the seats were full of poilus;
they stood even  in the aisles and doorway.
The talent was of the best. There were re-
citers, humorists, a tenor, and a violinist
who had left the Gymnase, Porte St. Mar-
tin, and Cigale to fight for their country.
  A few nights after my arrival we enter-
tained  some of  these canteen women at
dinner.  Afterward  we  went on a  tour of
the hospital, which was my first chance to
see it. I had been too busy to find time for
sightseeing.
  There  are several different equipes, but
the politics are so involved that I am satis- 
46         HOSPITAL HEROES
fied with  the knowledge that  the hospital
is divided into  two main parts: one for
the wounded and one for the sick. "Blesses"
and "Malades" they are marked at the en-
trance. There are many doctors to do the
dressings  and  a few surgeons to operate,
each with a staff of orderlies  and French
"ministerielles," women taken from  other
employments, like the mobilized men, and
paid by the government. The  French had
few trained nurses at the beginning of the
war, their hospitals having been managed
by nuns.
  Our  equipe,  forty women of all  ages,
characters, and nationalities,  was organized
and is  managed by an  American woman.
Fortunately, we are never all together in our
barracks at one time, some being away on
leave or recuperating. Half of us are Amer-
ican, ranging from nineteen  to fifty  years
of age, some unmarried, some married to
Americans, some to  French titles, and one
deaconess. The other half are English mili- 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH ARMY  47
tary  nurses  and  V.  A.  D.'s, a  French
countess,  and a French-Russian girl with
strong  revolutionary  ideas.  Our  work is
in the wards, receiving-room, assisting the
doctors in the X-ray and laboratory de-
partments, and at the dressings and opera-
tions, and superintending the work of the
orderlies in the sterilizing-room.
  To the large staff of doctors are added a
group  of  medical  students, who are sent
here to complete their training, which was
interrupted by the war, and an "Equipe
de  Renfort" sent to help during  attacks
when the work is heavy. I have sometimes
felt that I had more "majors" than blesses,
as these new doctors are constantly visiting
the wards in search of "the arm that came
in this morning,"  or "the  head  of last
night." As there are so many heads and
arms and every  kind of wound  coming in
all the time, it is difficult to find each doc-
tor's special case for him. I soon acquired
a habit of greeting any casual visitor with 
48         HOSPITAL HEROES
pad and pencil ready for orders, never sure
who might be a new doctor. The medical
students were another trial, as they would
crowd around a bed while the surgeon lec-
tured to them, keeping the blesse exposed
in the coldest weather, and worrying him
by discussing his case freely.
  The hospital is a town of its own, with
a railroad-station from which the blesses
are sent to the interior as soon as they can
travel  to  make room for others who are
constantly arriving from the trenches. Rows
and  rows  of  sheds  stretch  away  on every
side, connected by  plank  walks.  The cor-
ridors  have floors  of  earth,  and suggest
subterranean caves or catacombs, as they
are dark at night. There are twelve wards,
wooden huts, connecting  the corridor  on
each side. Each  has room  for forty-six or
fifty beds. The officers have a ward of their
own, and  the Arabs and German prisoners
are isolated.
  The installation is quite remarkable con- 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH  ARMY  49
sidering the inaccessibility of our position,
and the chance of the hospital being moved
at any  time to follow the army. There is
a large  receiving-room or "triage," heated
by steam-pipes and stoves,  an X-ray or
"radio" with motor-cars attached carrying
the dynamo for this apparatus and supply-
ing electricity for  the whole  hospital,  also
a  sterilizing and operating room, and  two
"salles  de pansements" for  the dressings
not done in the wards. Supplies sent by the
"Service  de Sante" and  American  Red
Cross are kept in  another  wooden  hut.
There are offices for the two medecin-chefs,
a  pharmacy, laboratory,  and  "gestion,"
where  the administrative work is  carried
on by militarized priests and  their assis-
tants.
   At the end of each ward  are two little
rooms, one used as kitchen by the orderlies,
where  the head, a corporal, has his desk
and attends to the charts, special diets, and
keeps the other little room, used  by the 
50         HOSPITAL HEROES
"infirmiere," supplied  with material for
the  dressings,  medicines,  blankets,  and
linen. He sits at his desk (usually writing
letters!)  and superintends the work  of the
two  orderlies who  are  supposed to keep
the ward clean, sweeping and washing the
floor twice a day, wait on the blesses, and
serve the meals.
  Most of the wounds are of such a nature
that the blesses are put on "petit regime,"
which means only liquid food, usually "po-
tions" from the pharmacy—"calmante,"
"todd," or "vin de quinquina," to be taken
every two hours or a bottle finished in a day.
The two  meals  from the hospital-kitchen
and the breakfast coffee and chunk of bread
are not enough for those who need nourish-
ment, so I  turned  part of my little room
into  a  kitchen  where  I made chocolate
every day at two o'clock, which I gave with
a bit of bread to dip into it.
  The orderlies bring cold tea, coffee, and
various mixtures called "tisane," "tilleul," 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH  ARMY  51
and "limonade," which I supplement with
egg-nogs and milk from a near-by farm.
I even squeeze the juice from jam-jars into
water to make a variety of cool drinks for
the feverish. The little alcohol-lamp is con-
stantly burning  either for cooking,  boil-
ing  syringes  and needles, or just heating
water  for hot-water bags, as it takes too
much time to wait for the orderlies to get
it. No one is  supposed to enter this  little
room without my permission,  and yet  I
noticed the 95 per cent alcohol disappear-
ing rapidly and an empty bottle was found
under one of the beds.
  I came willing to do anything, but was
relieved to find  orderlies and even a few
maids to help with the washing and  bed-
making. My training began under an ener-
getic American woman who had  a ward
of forty-eight beds,  and  was  temporarily
in charge of  the  emergency ward as well
until that "infirmiere" returned from "per-
mission."  Fortunately,   there were  only 
52         HOSPITAL HEROES
twelve cases in the emergency ward, and the
wards  were  opposite  each other.  There
were three orderlies and a maid in each,
but we were hurriedly busy every minute.
I started the first day with temperatures
and pulses,  and was grateful to the baby
clinic  for the  only training I  had  ever
had.
  It was the first time I had even  seen a
hospital ward,  except once when  I had
gone to visit a friend who was recovering
from an operation for appendicitis, and I
got into the  accident ward by mistake. The
sight had frightened  me so much  that I
fairly  ran through.  This  time, however, I
could  not run. There was so much work to
be done and so  many things  for  me to
learn that I had no time to be upset. When
I saw how cheerful they  all were, reading
or writing, talking,  or playing games  with
each other, they reminded me of the little
crippled children I used to teach on a boat
in the East River in the winter or take for 
   WITH THE THIRD FRENCH ARMY  53
rides to the seashore in the summer,  all
hurt and disabled together. Even those
with their faces  bandaged smiled "Bon
jour" with their eyes. 
           CHAPTER  IV
           THE  BLESSES
"^pHERMOMETERS! Always a ther-
   ■*■  mometer!" the blesses groaned as
I started my afternoon round. In the morn-
ing, before they  were thoroughly awake,
it did not bore them so much. But by after-
noon,  when those who could get up were
strolhng about or  trying  out  their  new
crutches, and  the rest were playing cards
or the "jeu des dames," a game something
like our checkers, all of them were feeling
too well to see the necessity of  a  ther-
mometer. However, it was a mihtary rule
that the charts for temperatures and pulses
should be complete, with the dressing or
operation marked as well.
  It is quite a difficult task to  bring each
one back to his bed at four o'clock in the
afternoon, connecting each  man  with his
                   54 
             THE BLESSES            55
chart,  and not  skipping  any one. There
are usually guests and much talking and
confusion. The "phono" is going like mad,
playing march  after  march, the  favorite
music of the poilu. None of the pulses beat
in time with the music, so I have to count
out loud. But if they see I am rushed with
new arrivals,  operated cases demanding
much attention,  and various interruptions,
they hurry back to their places so I will not
be late. They like to tease, but never hurt
or exasperate, and realize I  must finish
before  the doctors' visits and the "soupe,"
the universal word for anything to eat, just
as "pinard" means wine to them.
  Some of the names were so hard for me
to pronounce, and there were several with
the same one, that to simplify matters  we
made up nicknames. It was always a relief
to reach the  bed of  "Le Boxeur," for a
wound in his left leg  kept him from wan-
dering away. He also had both hands band-
aged; one was so  mangled we were in doubt 
56         HOSPITAL HEROES
about saving it. I have to take his pulse in
his forehead, and he likes to delay me by
chewing to confuse the count.  He has to
be fed and is quite helpless, and yet can
always  joke  about  something.  I hardly
know whether to laugh or cry when he pre-
tends to box with his big bandaged hands.
  "Camouflage"  was  next  to  him, with
white bandages across his face, making him
look a part of the sheet. He was a tall "mi-
trailleur," and showed me a  photograph of
his pretty fiancee in her Alsatian costume.
  "Tell me,  Mademoiselle  Marraine," he
would always say anxiously, "do you think
she will care for  me when I return, a poor
mutile  with a changed face? She always
told me how handsome I was, so much more
so than all the other men. Maybe she will
marry Jean after all, when she sees what
they have done to my face, those 'sales
Boches' and  these doctors. O la, la, what
a terrible war!"
  Before I had learned  all their names and 
             THE BLESSES           57
wounds, I always had to admire their photo-
graphs. As soon as a man is brought into
the ward,  and has recovered sufficiently
from his operation,  he begins fumbling in
his "musette," or if it has not been brought
in yet, begs the orderly to  hurry and find
his bag of treasures, so he can "show Made-
moiselle" his wife or fiancee or children. I
always worry as to how these wasted bodies
and amputated men will be received when  \
they go home.
   "I do  not need a marraine, for I have a
fiancee," said Davesne, limping along on
crutches. "See how fast I can go now. Will
you speak to me if you see me selling news-
papers in the streets in New York?" He is
six feet tall and  very  clever, and I hope
for a better future for him, and yet I cannot
help wondering what he will do, as I watch
the empty pajama  leg swinging from his
stump. They all want to come to America
after the war. I do hope some one will find
work for them. 
 58         HOSPITAL HEROES
   "Mademoiselle,  you are a thief," called
 "Rigolo" when I had  progressed several
 beds beyond him. "I accuse you of stealing
 four sous!"
   This was a never-failing source of merri-
 ment. When I  am not noticing, some one
 will put a joke in  my pocket. As the doc-
 tors' visits come right afterward, there is
 much stifled  amusement when I put my
 hand in  my pocket  to  find  my pad  and
 pencil to take orders, and pull out a cham-
 pagne cork or  a pipe. Every  one claims it
 as his own, and I am called a thief by many
 ferocious men  with mustaches bristling  in
 feigned wrath.
  "Where is 'Le Moqueur' ?" I asked, look-
 ing about for a handsome boy of nineteen,
 who had come  in  with a  shoulder wound
 which did not depress him in  the least. He
 was almost too gay, teasing everybody all
 the time, and usually getting into trouble.
  "There he is! See,  beside the stove! He
is trying to make the thermometer go up." 
             THE BLESSES           59
  I rescued it just in time, threatening to
give him one for a whole hour as punish-
ment. They were so expensive and easily
broken. I was  often the guilty one when
I started off on a cold morning with hands
so  numb  the  thermometer  would  slip
through  as I was shaking  it down.  But
"Monsieur le Thermometre" had the worst
score of all. Every time I gave him one, I
said a mental  good-by, for he invariably
found a new  way of  breaking  them. How-
ever, he was  so eager to help me with my
work that I could not be angry. He never
tired of rolling  cotton for the dressing-car-
riage, or sharpening pencils, though his leg
was shot in several  places.  Each time he
went to the "radio," a new piece of  shell
was discovered, necessitating another opera-
tion.
  "Too much stomach," said "Soixante,"
who was trying to learn English from a
book I had given him. He  had been run
over by a  motor-truck, and worried more 
60         HOSPITAL HEROES
about himself than any of those wounded
in battle. His temperature  was a matter
of grave importance to him. He had a pulse
of sixty for several days, and when I found
it upset  him for the whole day to have
more or less than "soixante," I would mark
it to please him whether it was fifty-eight
or sixty-two,  as he was not serious enough
to matter,  and yet it influenced his whole
attitude toward life if he could see a straight
line  running  across  his chart.  He  had a
violent relapse when, in my  absence, some
one  marked  sixty-four,  and almost cried
with joy when I returned and somewhat
guiltily wrote: "Soixante."
  Many of them guess and bet  what their
temperatures  will be. If they have a fever
and go up  very high, I try  to finesse and
put their chart where they  cannot  see it,
but the doctor usually spoils my plan by
waving his arms excitedly, saying: "Oh, it
goes up!"
  The  unhappy mend  slowly,  and so I 
             THE BLESSES           61
try to find out the special worries. They
are more than mangled bodies to be shud-
dered at, quickly cared for, and passed hur-
riedly by. Each day  men are brought in
who have kept the enemy back and saved
those behind the lines. After such an effort,
what does it matter how dirty or querulous
they may be ? I cannot do enough for them,
and I try to make a little time as I work
in order to know each one separately with-
out being partial, and find out their special
worries and sorrows. I like to take care of
them as individuals,  not as cases to be
tended  professionally  and  then  left to
brood.
  "What is  the  great  'Samson'  crying
about?" I whispered  as I approached the
largest man in the room, who had been
there a long time with an abdominal wound
which mended slowly. He was often hys-
terical and I had caught him several times
tearing open his dressings, to scratch the
wound. 
62         HOSPITAL HEROES
  "He  has received  no  word from his
parents for over a month," the man in the
next bed explained.
  I told him neither had  I and I was so
much farther away from my home, but one
must be brave. He paid no attention until,
remembering he had eaten no lunch,  I
made him some hot chocolate, his favorite
delicacy. Even this he refused until I calmly
fed him with a spoon. This  made the others
laugh,  and soon he  rallied and took the
cup himself.
  We see the morale of the army at a time
when it is  unfair to  judge. Men come in
delirious or hysterical,  and  they do not
know what they are  saying.  Pain makes
them say things they would not even think
of before they were brought to us down and
out. I have heard them swear at the doctors
during  dressings, call  the orderlies and
ambulance-drivers "embusques," and say
it is only a "fad" for Americans to come to
France, that they will not really fight. But 
              THE  BLESSES            63
the fact remains that whether these men
wanted to or not,  they have been heroes
in the midst of all the horror and danger
for four years,  fighting for the safety of
those behind the lines, and I cannot help
feeling grateful  to  them,  so  grateful that
it obliterates every  other  feeling.  They
have  been superior to the rest of us, no
matter how low they may sink afterward
from  the pain of  their wounds or home-
sickness. In a few  weeks  these same men
will be mending a  hole in my sweater or
working  away at a silk table-cover  which
they weave on a little frame to give to me
or sell when they return to the city. I took
some  cases of lost  families to a special de-
partment of the Red Cross, and was glad
to hear from the men  later that their lost
had been found.
  "Monsieur le Crocodile" is always cry-
ing about imaginary hurts. One day, it is
because they  have hurt  him so much at
his dressing, that he must cry, "O,  la, la, 
64         HOSPITAL HEROES
how my leg hurts!" for hours afterward
until one hopes they will not dress his leg
again for some time. Again, he will be in
tears because, "Look, Mademoiselle, there
are two whole days since my dressing has
been changed. O, la, la, what a miserable
life! I  am not being well cared for. They
forget me."
  However,  he is easily pacified  with a
pair of brand-new bed-socks "sent all the
way from America for 'M. le Crocodile,'
because his  crying was heard far  away."
But, poor man, his  home is in  German
hands.
  "You have been smoking too much," I
announce as I come to "le Bebe."
  "Please do not scold, 'Petite Maman,'"
the youngest begs, "but bring me a  hot-
water bag, for I  am so cold." Hot-water
bags were very scarce. I had only five  rub-
ber ones for my forty-eight beds, and a
few  stone ones  which the  blesses called
"soixante-quinze" because they were shaped 
              THE BLESSES           65
like the shells  for  their famous cannon.
The others seemed to understand that "le
Bebe"  was a  spoiled child  and therefore
privileged to receive more attention. I tried
not to be partial, but he was so young and
was suffering so much from  two' shattered
legs which the doctor was trying to save
by various experiments  of  Carrel  treat-
ments and  plaster  casts and  steel  plates
screwed  to the remaining  bone. Finally,
fearing sepsis, he had returned to the Carrel
system of  irrigating the wound, but "le
Bebe" was so sensitive that  the  injections
every  two  hours made him  cry  out with
pain.
   "Toto" pretended to be  asleep, hoping
I would pass by and not disturb him. He
got his name  the  first  day  when I  asked
him for "the pulse," and evidently  used
the French slang for "cootey." After search-
ing for several minutes while I waited,
much mystified, he had said: "I cannot find
the 'toto,'  Mademoiselle." The others in- 
66         HOSPITAL HEROES
sisted he had one, so the name clung to him.
Fearing to make another mistake, I asked
for "the hand"  next time.  Whereupon he
shook my hand  solemnly, saying:  "Com-
rades, in spite of everything."
  "Mademoiselle, will you  be so good as
to ask 'Monsieur le Major'  when he comes
if I  may  have  a cachet of aspirin?  My
head aches." This formal request came from
"l'Amoureux," so  called because he  had
wakened from his operation ardently mak-
ing love. It was so unusual for ether to affect
any one in so amusing a manner, that he
entertained the  whole ward, to his great
embarrassment  later, for he was a most
formal,  retiring  young man  who  spent
most of his time quietly puzzling over an
old edition of the New York Times, Every
one begged for the laughing ether, but no
one else had such a humorous after-effect.
Too often they came back from an  opera-
tion in tears.
  "Don't  forget the 'ventouses' this  eve- 
              THE BLESSES            67
ning, please," said "Grandpere." He always
wants  cupping,  whether the  doctor  has
ordered the treatment or not.  He is such
an old man,  I  humor him when I have
time, but he is  so thin that not many of
the little glasses  will stay. We  make quite
a game of it, even the orderlies clump around
the bed with their heavy sabots which they
always forget to  "leave at the door on en-
tering  the  ward." Just as I think I have
put on a good one that will stay, and the
blesses cry, " £a y est!" off it rolls, clattering
along the wooden floor under the next bed.
Nothing daunted,  "Grandpere"  shouts:
"Encore!"  He is never satisfied to have
a  few  good ones but must  always have
"Just  one  more!"  even if  they  clatter
around him like hail-stones. I am so excited
when one does take, that the blesses cheer
and the orderlies  clank back to  their work,
muttering:  "That helps, that does good."
We call  the purple marks  that are left
medals for valor in the hospital. Once I 
68         HOSPITAL HEROES
forgot to take them off when the ten min-
utes were up, in  the confusion of having
several things happen at one  time,  and
poor " Grandpere " remained bent forward
uncomfortably for nearly an hour without
a word of  complaint. I thought he would
be  cured after this  experience, but next
day he began asking for them as usual.
  The "Artiste" was copying one of Otho
Cushing's drawings  of  a Red Cross angel
from an old Life. When I stopped to admire
it as I interrupted his work prosaically with
a thermometer, he said:
  "I am glad it pleases you, I have made
it for you, Mademoiselle Marraine, for you
are our angel." He went on elaborating this
theme while I took his pulse.
  I was glad the  "Sergent," who ruled as
king in the ward of poilus, called me at
that embarrassing moment to show me
some flowers some one had given  him. He
was so pleased with these few flowers  that
he called it a "f&te." The ward was so bare 
             THE BLESSES            69
and drab, they liked to see me wearing a
few flowers, or decorating the walls with
holly or mistletoe.
  "Gamin  le  Gaspillage,  stop  walking
around  with your thermometer, and look
at this  great chunk of bread I found  on
your httle table."
  The orderlies were supposed to keep  the
bedside tables  clean,  washing the  cups,
bringing fresh towels and  napkins, and re-
moving crumbs of food and cigarette ashes.
I had found so many  pieces of bread  left
after each meal that I made a point of look-
ing over these tables. They teased me about
not wanting any bread to be wasted, asking
me if I  had been raised in Germany.
  "We  always take a  big piece, hoping it
may taste better than last time. What
matter if it goes to waste ?  The government
pays."
  They evidently thought after a lifetime
of thrift, the government  owed them this
privilege. "Gamin le Gaspillage" was  the 
70         HOSPITAL HEROES
worst offender, as he left bits of cheese and
butter as well as untouched pieces of bread.
He always  gave them to me laughingly
when he saw me  making a  round in the
cause of tidiness, saying:
  "Look, here comes the poor Mademoi-
selle gathering  up her dinner. Here, my
poor child, is a crust for you."
  "Here is  a nice  book for  you to  read,
Mademoiselle," said "Monsieur le Valet."
He spent most of  his time reading Balzac,
which he called "delicious," and looked like
an artist with his  pointed beard. His cul-
tured voice and literary taste  seemed above
his profession. I was  surprised when he
asked me to  take  him  back to  America
with me, offering as a special inducement to
work three  months gratis because I  had
dressed his foot so well. When a wound was
not very serious, the doctors  left it for me
to dress. Although the "Valet"  had lost
his big toe, it was considered "peu de grave "
and turned over to my care.  He is usually 
              "Monsieur  le Valet" (left) and other patients  of  Ward V.
He spent most of his time reading Balzac . .  . and looked like an artist, with his pointed beard. 
 
             THE  BLESSES            71
in a heated  argument with  his neighbor,
"Monsieur le Sculpture," who has the foot
of his bed raised on bricks like a pedestal,
and the whole of one leg in a plaster cast.
  All the blesses insist on keeping the rough
bits of shell that have caused  them so much
trouble. After every operation, I must wash
the blood-stained "eclat," tie it up in a
compress, and hang it where they can always
see their precious souvenir. The "bavards"
like  to talk  about  their wounds,  though
they  never mention the battle-field,  and
show me a  pocketbook with  a shell-hole
in it which saved their life.
  I never discovered the origin of the "Be-
gonias." They are the ones who walk about
and  help with  the  work, making the beds
and  feeding  their helpless comrades. Their
leader was the cause of my first attempt at
dentistry. I was used to putting drops in
eyes and ears that hurt, but was  puzzled
when  the  chief of the "Begonias"   ap-
proached me, turning his mouth inside out 
72         HOSPITAL HEROES
to show me a large cavity in his back tooth
that was giving him great pain. I took him
into my office at the back of the ward, and
with all the others  craning their necks to
watch  the performance through the little
window, pushed a tiny bit of cotton soaked
in iodine into the hole. Iodine is my stand-
by remedy for all ills, but it was so hard to
use it this time, that  his chin was stained
with trickles of  brown and had  to be
scrubbed hard with  Dakin, the best bleach
I  knew,  to the  amusement of the ward.
Ever after, the chief of the "Begonias" had
only to approach me with his mouth wide
open, pointing inward and upward,  to get
a burst of laughter.
  The  "comedians" keep their end of the
room cheerful with an unending supply of
funny stories, told in  a "patois"  which I
do not understand.  From what I know of
French wit and humor, it is probably  just
as well I  do not understand their "badi-
nage,"  which is a bit "rosse," and yet I hke 
THE BLESSES           73
to see them amused, no matter what they
laugh at. "We must be gay," said one who
had  looked  upon horrors  untellable. This
spirit is the  hope of the future.
  "Robespierre," a perfect likeness, opened
the  door  for me when the thermometer
session was over.
  "Meyran  wanted me to tell you, Made-
moiselle, that there  is a beautiful sunset,
when you have a httle moment to come
and  look at it."
  Meyran,  my  favorite  orderly, always
cleaned the  basins on the door-step where
he could watch the sky, and tell me when
an aeroplane from the camp not far from
us was performing feats  worth watching
or a Boche observer flew so low one could
see the black cross  on the wings. He  also
knew how much I hked to see  the sunset,
after the dreary sameness of the wards, and
the  flatness  of  the surrounding country,
which made everything seem so small and
insignificant. There is something about flat 
74         HOSPITAL HEROES
country  which  enhances the  beauty  of
sunsets. I suppose the total lack  of  any-
thing beautiful in this place  allows the sun
to set with no detracting competition.  It
always rested me to gaze  into that en-
chanted space, radiating joy unspoiled by
"the thunder and moaning of war." Some-
times, the whole sky was misty with pastel
colors, and sometimes the heart of the west
burned like a  great open fireplace. How I
would have appreciated a  blazing wood-
fire in the drafty ward instead of the  little
round stoves that made so much dirt and
so little heat! 
CHAPTER  V
      LIFE  AT THE  FRONT
|"ET no  one trained in a big New York
■"—' hospital suppose we had a furnace to
heat the wards or our own rooms, or run-
ning water and bathrooms. We had barely
the necessities for a hospital. Our buildings,
being temporarily constructed, were little
protection  against the  snowy weather of
December.
  The cold was penetrating and more pain-
ful than sunny, dry zero  weather in New
York. The wind blew down the stovepipes,
putting  out the fires,  and almost tearing
the roof off.  Snow  sifted into  the ward
through cracks in the ceiling and around
the windows. I had  to rearrange the beds
every day,  pulling them  into the centre
at all angles to avoid drips, giving the room
a demoralized aspect. Every blesse had a
                   75 
76         HOSPITAL HEROES
cold.  The  "caporal" whittled a stick for
me to use when I painted chest after chest
with  iodine each night. They did not like
to see my fingers  stained, as they always
were when I took the cotton or a compress
in my hands. So I flourished the stick like
an  artist's brush, and amused  them by
starting off with initials or a picture. Those
unavoidably  in drafts  had  bed-socks of
various  colors  on their heads.  I  envied
them  in their beds like hibernating animals,
snuggled under nine heavy blankets.
  My hands would become quite lifeless as
I made the tour of temperatures the first
thing  on a cold morning, or held icy bot-
tles for  the doctors as they did the dress-
ings.  When I  tried  to  warm my numb
fingers by literally placing them upon the
stove, the blesses would cry out in protest
and rub them warm for me so I would not
have "engelures."
  I dreaded each trip to my little room, for
the back door was opened  so often by the 
                            The  hospital  in  winter.

Our buildings, being temporarily constructed, were little protection against the snowy
                               weather of December. 
 
          LIFE AT THE FRONT        77
orderlies on their various errands that the
floor was a sheet of ice, and yet I had to
stay there a great part of the time to prepare
the dressing-carriage, sterilize needles and
syringes, clean instruments,  make drinks,
and  enter the  doctors' orders for treat-
ments,  dressings,  and operations, the  ar-
rivals  and departures of the blesses  and
to which equipe each belonged, neatly in
French in  a note-book kept open for the
night nurse  to  add her  remarks.  How I
would have  appreciated  hoofs!  My  un-
gloved hands were a pathetic purple,  and
in spite of the blesses' care, often cracked
and bleeding, and my nose was a most un-
becoming red. I wore two pairs of  heavy
stockings and  stuffed  cotton inside  my
tennis-shoes,  which  kept popping out at
the sides like a  fringe or the pads  horses
are given  when  they interfere. And yet
through  everything I had to  keep up the
morale of my ward. I had read somewhere
about "hospital  wards,  cheerful and pleas- 
78         HOSPITAL HEROES
ant, with trim, nice-looking girls as nurses,
whose air of coquetry was deemed helpful
to the patient."  This was more difficult
than one  would suppose, but  the blesses
helped a lot. In  fact, I was  never  quite
sure  whether I was taking care of  them
or they of me.
  The first time I helped at a dressing, a
little boy of seventeen, known as "le Petit
Parisien," because  he  was  typical  of his
birthplace, saved me from uttering a cry
of horror  and running away. He was one
of the happiest in  the ward,  and seemed
to be quite free from suffering or worry.
Therefore the  shock came unexpectedly
when I  first took off his bandage and re-
vealed a  right hand frightfully mangled
from which the fingers hung down fastened
by a  mere thread.  He held it  up without
a quiver for the doctor to dress, and when
he saw  my expression, though there  were
tears in his eyes,  he smiled at me reassur-
ingly. 
         LIFE AT THE FRONT       79
  "Monsieur le Coiffeur"  could not forget
his original profession, though he had served
three years as "marechal des logis," he
always informed  me in a distressed  tone
when my veil had slipped to one side or
had  some of the black from the stovepipe
on it. They made so much fun of my com-
fortable,  rubber-soled shoes, that  I  only
dared wear them on the coldest days when
they were more lenient in their discipline.
I considered  myself  responsible for the
morale of my ward and took it as a per-
sonal affront when any one had the  "ca-
fard." During the harrowing moments when
the doctors were doing most painful dress-
ings, I tried to wear a mask of cheerfulness
as I gave the doctor  compress after com-
press to cover a large expanse of mangled
flesh, or poured ether or "menciere" on the
wound. I did not want them to see in my
face how serious and horrible it was.
  Perhaps my  great  sympathy  for  them
and  longing to keep them from suffering 
80         HOSPITAL HEROES
atoned  for  my  inexperience.  I  was not
treated  as  a novice and was grateful for
the impression given to the blesses that I
had  done it  all  many times. It  gave me
confidence. When in doubt about anything,
I would admit "I must ask the doctor,"
using the feeble excuse that "things are so
different in America."
'■■ In England or America, I would not have
been up to the standard, but in  France I
was better equipped after my two months'
apprenticeship than most  of the French
"infirmieres" and  "ministerielles," for it
seems  only English-speaking  races have
professionally trained nurses. The work in
French  hospitals has been done chiefly by
the English, and the  Frenchwomen  who
have given up other occupation to answer
the needs of the country, but who are as
new  to the work as voluntary workers like
those in our unit. There is so much to be
done, and so few really strong enough to
do it or able to support themselves. Trained 
LIFE AT THE FRONT       81
nurses are rather scornful and sceptical in
their remarks about untrained aides being
sent to the front, but  if they are unable
to give their services without pay the work
must be done  by those who  can and are
willing to  learn, and do as they are told.
Otherwise  some of  the blesses would be
left to the  orderlies, who are not very clean
or conscientious. Trained nurses are only
going  on with their  usual  work  with an
added zest and excitement given by  for-
eign service and war, but no one should
criticise those who give their services,  and
sometimes  their lives, for a work to which
they  are  not accustomed.^ Many  women
are slaving night and day who never knew
what it was to suffer a  discomfort. French
countesses  who were helpless without a per-
sonal maid have turned up their sleeves
and  dressed wounds reeking with the  un-
bearable odor of gangrene poisoning. Doc-
tor Carrel, the famous surgeon of the Rocke-
feller Institute,  who  has been promoted 
 82         HOSPITAL HEROES
 by the French Government to the  rank
 of Commander of the Legion of Honor for
 his discoveries of methods of blood trans-
 fusion, conservation of living tissue, graft-
 ing bones, and treating wounds, which have
 been of  such  universal  benefit  to  the
 wounded, has praised  the work of volun-
 tary  nurses  highly. His own  nurses are
 Swiss "benevoles."
 J When the  American Red Cross did send
 some  professional  army  nurses  to  help
 during an attack, the "medecin-chef" sent
 them away, saying they were only  "lemon-
 trees standing in the wards." They could
 not speak French and refused to take tem-
 peratures as  we had  been  doing all the
 time. Triumph for  the  untrained nurses,
; even if I do say so when I should be modest!
| However, it is  something to be proud of
 to be able  to aid  a doctor  willingly and
I unquestioningly wherever one  is needed
 and to  care  for wounded with tact and
 sympathy that comes from  culture if not 
         LIFE AT THE FRONT       83
with trained professional  skill. The need
in our hospital was so great that I had to
give hypodermic injections  and do  some
of the  dressings,  which  American  aides
and English V. A. D.'s are not allowed to
do even after  months of hospital experi-
ence. During my apprenticeship I was some-
times left alone in the ward, so it was not
very hard a little  later to have charge of
one of my own.
  For a while I had a maid to help me as
well as the caporal and two orderlies, but I
preferred to give the baths  and make the
beds myself. Though they  were her own
countrymen, she was rough and careless
and refused to do anything but sit around
on the beds on Sunday and gossip. When
I reminded her that if men could be wounded
on Sunday they could be taken care of as
well, she flounced  out of the room  saying
I was "too young  to give  orders." I  never
let her come back  again. The blesses com-
plained  that she had only bothered,  walk- 
84         HOSPITAL HEROES
ing so heavily  it hurt their  wounds, and
talking so much.
  I never had a regular "day off," nor did
any one in our unit. We went on duty at
eight o'clock each morning, with two hours
off  in the  middle  of  the day for a walk
and lunch, but if  there  was  a great deal
of work to be  done,  we would only take
a half-hour. The English always made time
for tea, but  that  was my hour  for  tem-
peratures and doctors' visits. We left the
wards at  seven o'clock,  when night duty
began.
  One of us did  night duty for a week alone,
being replaced in her ward or daytime work
so she could rest. In busy times two of us
would take the same night, one until mid-
night, the  other after midnight.  If there
are many new arrivals and much operating,
the night  nurse calls  for assistance,  and
whoever is in charge of the operating-room
hurries over to  help the surgeon on guard.
Usually night duty consists in making a tour 
          LIFE AT THE FRONT        85
of the wards every two hours to give the
Carrel injections or other  treatments  and
hypodermics ordered,  recording what she
has done in the book  kept  by the nurse
in charge of each ward. It takes courage
to go on duty all alone at night in the dark
with only a flash-fight or lantern. Bombard-
ments often occur, and  there  are more
deaths than in the daytime.
  The shed in which our unit is billeted is
near the road, where we can see the troops
passing by hke a  river of gray steel  hel-
mets.  The French troops  march  silently,
except for their heavy boots clumping along
the hard road, but I often longed for the
sound of a military band to drown out the
continuous noise of the traffic. Armed  mo-
tors and the big guns rattled by, mingling
their din with the heavily lumbering motor-
lorries, the clattering hoofs of the packed
horses, and tooting horns of staff cars that
shot past at top speed. They would billet
in our little village, so one day the streets 
86         HOSPITAL HEROES
would  be  filled  with  picturesque  "Blue
Devils," and the next with a swarthy Al-
gerian  regiment. Sometimes  young  boys
would be  brought in to the hospital  from
the trenches, and other times the wards
would fill  up with gray-haired men.
  When we did have time for a short walk,
it was  like stepping into an illustrated
Sunday paper or into a Pathe Weekly of
"Somewhere in France." Behind us on the
road and  ahead  of us were millions of men
in blue, almost the same height. It seemed
unreal, hke a stage-setting with  ruins on
every side, and yet we were actually in it,
marching  along with men who would  soon
be in the first-line trenches. From a distance
the long,  monotonous roll of artillery, like
surf beating on the  seashore, made it all
too real.
  It always seems to rain at the  front, as
if the desolate plains and dreary  boom of
the cannon and continual sight of suffering
are not enough  to make one realize there 
         LIFE AT THE  FRONT        87
is  war  close  by.  In cross-country walks
one  sometimes  stumbles against piles  of
shells, evidently forgotten, concealed in the
most unexpected places. I found a croix
de guerre in the ruins of a town. The ribbon
was  faded, and the dates were 1914-1916
with a  star. Having no way  to identify
the man who had earned it,  I could not
return it to his family.
  One day, when the French were preparing
to attack, we heard  that there were some
tanks in a field not far from us. Every one
stole a few minutes from  work to see them.
I was fortunate enough to go with a nurse
who had  been  decorated by  the general
of the blesses in her ward with a "croix  de
guerre fourragere." Through  her  influence
we  were admitted to  the meadow where
about fifty tanks were stationed. The officer
on guard let us climb into one of the middle-
sized ones, which looked hke  a big green
frog  with  its camouflage of mottled green,
and guns peering out at each side like eyes. 
88         HOSPITAL HEROES
In it we went down-hill into the mud and
climbed up again.
  That evening  the captain of the tanks
had dinner with  us, being a cousin of Ma-
dame G----. Our one recreation consisted
in staying up late and entertaining officers
on their way through  Cugny after  our
day's work was  done. The splendid gold
braid of their uniforms  contrasted oddly
with our poor dining-room.
  Lunch and dinner (or dinner and supper
— I never was sure which was which) were
served in a wooden hut similar to those
used as wards, except that it was divided
into three parts:  one-third for the "femmes
de menage" (maids who did our housework
and  helped  in the  wards),  one part for
kitchen, presided over for a time by a real
chef  from the Ritz, who had  come to us
wounded and was  kept as  cook during
his prolonged convalescence until the gen-
darmes arrested  him for bigamy. We did
not care how many wives he had, if he 
          LIFE AT THE FRONT        89
could only have stayed with us, cleverly
disguising the poor quality of the food with
his delicious sauces.
  The last and largest part was our dining-
room. A  long  wooden  table with a long
wooden bench  on each side, and  an arm-
chair for the "directrice" at the  end, give
the impression  of a refectory, until we are
all there. Then  it becomes the wildest scene
of confusion. We  have no table  manners,
and  startle our guests by repeatedly rising
from the table. In one corner is a stove on
which we make toast as  we eat, climbing
over the back rail of the  bench frequently
to see how it is coming along. We heat over
what has chilled if we are late, or run out
to the kitchen to see whether the maids
are having better food than we are, which
is often  the  case. Whereupon we bring it
back with us and put it  down proudly in
front of the officer of highest rank. All
around the walls are large crates and pack-
ing-cases of food in tins, and hospital-sup- 
90         HOSPITAL HEROES
plies, beyond which and overhanging them,
out of reach, are shelves of books and maga-
zines. The windows look almost too civilized
and  pathetically  dainty  with their chintz
curtains.
  Work and the open air that penetrates
our  walls  as  if we were  living  outdoors
make us hungry even for the monotonous
diet  of  a military  hospital.  Tinned food,
horse-meat, red wine that tastes like vine-
gar,  mouse-trap cheese — we are so hungry
we eat it all. If the soup is even more taste-
less  than usual, we grate cheese into it or
make it snappy with a touch  of Worcester-
shire sauce. If the pudding is the same we
have been eating  for  two meals a  day,
week after  week,  month after  month,
we dress it up with a cover of jam. What
would  we  ever do without   jam? Three
times a day  we spread  it over uneatable
bread and forget that it  is gray instead of
white, and that we noticed sawdust in the
crust. 
          LIFE AT THE FRONT        91
  When there are guests a  special effort
is made. Some one goes to the nearest town
and brings back cakes, pate  de foies gras,
and champagne.  But the table is  always
set in the same manner: two white  enamel
plates,  one  on top of the other; a knife,
fork, and spoon. This and nothing more for
the whole meal. It takes skilful management
to put the right things together. You must
finish every bit of your soup, for the meat
and potatoes will taste better on that plate
than the pudding will on the  same plate
with the vegetables.  Each one keeps  her
napkin  in a  little linen bag hanging  behind
her part of the bench, and usually keeps it
indefinitely,  forgetting to send  it with  the
rest of the laundry.
  We are billeted  in a hut like the ward,
with paper  ceilings (full of mice)  instead
of wood, and windows of yellow paper in-
stead of glass. No one opened these windows
at night. There was no need with the wind
blowing up through the cracks in the floor. 
92         HOSPITAL HEROES
Instead, we shut them tighter with cotton
stuffed along the cracks.  Each one  has a
little space of her own with sheets for walls,
so that the general impression on  opening
the door is of a  Pullman done in white.
Our rooms were quite cheerful with bright-
colored chintz  concealing trunks,  shelves,
and rows of hooks, and a blanket on the
floor for a rug. After the war I shall never
want  to see a  trunk, after  living  without
unpacking ever since I got on the steamer.
  For furniture we  have  wooden tables,
camp-stools,  an electric light, and a gas-
mask. Some of us had had experience camp-
ing out, but we had  never roughed  it in
snowy weather. We stood it very well, not
even getting tonsillitis, bronchitis, or grippe,
as one does in steam-heated houses. I sup-
pose we were all in good condition  when
we  came, after living in comfortable homes,
well nourished.
  I don't believe in the strict army system
of giving the men so many hardships be- 
          LIFE AT THE FRONT        93
fore they are sent to the front.  It  may
harden some of them, but it weakens others
who might otherwise escape illness if  they
had arrived in perfect condition in the war
zone, instead of being  worn out needlessly
with poor food and discomfort. Every one
who has to go under fire should have  all
the care and comfort he can get before  he
comes way  out here. He needs all his re-
serve strength  and  nerves intact for the
strain. However, my business is to take care
of the soldiers afterward and not before.
  Sometimes, though tired, I have gone to
a party, spurred on by the prospect of dif-
ferent food (I must admit) more than enter-
tainment.  One  night  the  French   com-
mandant of an ambulance section stationed
in our vicinity sent his car for those of  us
who had  been invited for dinner at his
poste. Even the cold ride was a treat  after
being housed for a long time. We dined in
the cellar of a ruined chateau and could
hear the guns plainly. The walls were crum- 
94         HOSPITAL  HEROES
bling. One of them had fallen only the day
before and killed a man.
  The  dining-room was decorated  with
pictures from illustrated papers. Bathing-
suits were the last things I  had expected
to see out there. I sat between a prince
chauffeur and an American "Loot" (giving
him his own rendering of his rank). Neither
of them having  a thing in  common, not
even language, only their work, which one
does not discuss at parties, I was glad when
we began to sing. Such strange connections
and acquaintances are formed at the front.
All sorts of people you would never  meet
at home are so friendly and sympathetic.
There is a mutual interest and respect that
I have found nowhere else.
  On All Souls' Day, "le jour des morts,"
we  placed fresh  flowers  upon  the  little
graves in the  cemetery near our hospital.
They were surrounded  by  a railing  of
painted wood.  Over each grave was a cross,
hung  with a  fancifully decorated wreath 
          LIFE AT  THE  FRONT        95
and an identity disc and  "tricolore" in the
centre, and sometimes the kepi, coat, and
boots. It did not seem pathetic or sad, but
a fine thing that they should be lying there
at rest in their native soil which they had
tried to defend with their lives.
  From  there  we went  by  camion to a
lonely  hilltop near Flavy-le-Martel. Here
the  American  aviator  McConnell,  who
wrote  "Flying  for France," was  buried
where he fell  when shot by the enemy. A
monument with parts of his aeroplane and
gun commemorated the spot, in the midst
of what  had  once been  a large  apple-
orchard. Every tree had been systematically
cut down by the Germans in their retreat,
the branches pointing in the same direction,
like rows of graves. 
           CHAPTER  VI
            AN ATTACK
'T^HERE is  a maid who brings us hot
  ■*■  water and breakfast. Not the polite
third-person kind that says  deferentially
"Madame est servie," but a  comedian of
the May Vokes variety — only  more so.
She starts off  noisily  in all directions at
once,  arriving  nowhere  in time,  singing
loudly or  telling herself what  chore she
is going to do next, though in spite of her
own constant reminder she invariably for-
gets to do it. "O quelle horreur!" she cries,
when  she does  anything awkward, which
is most of the time.
  Nevertheless, I like Germaine, the much-
abused, for she has a big heart.  In  this
atmosphere of  efficiency in  which I am
living there is httle time for feelings,  and
I was  drawn to Germaine when  I found
                   96 
              AN ATTACK            97
her huddled up on the floor by the stove
crying over a dead cat. In return for a few
kind  words I am one of the favored few
who breakfast in bed, and how I appreciate
a  hot drink before I  have to get up and
dress in a place colder than outdoors be-
cause there is no sun. I burned my face
and froze my back trying to get less cold,
my one consolation being  the fact that I
could not get any colder.  I would never get
warm  enough to catch a  chill.  However,
the thought of  the men in the trenches
pulled me through the coldest weather and
made my hardships unimportant.
   I acquired strange habits of stowing my
clothes  under the covers every night, and
postponing a bath  for the middle of the
day when one could thaw out a little and
begin to feel one's feet again after hobbling
painfully about on them all morning. Even
then it was hardly a bath, for the rubber tub
was too small. It tipped over so easily that
it was safer to take it to an empty room near 
98         HOSPITAL HEROES
the big stove that kept the water heated for
all of us. It was warmer here,  but one had
to hurry, for Louis was always coming in
to keep the fire going, and you could only
lock the door by pinning the sheets together
and  shouting "Don't come in!" whenever
you  heard his manly tread.
  Germaine was supposed to waken me at
seven o'clock, but usually  arrived at half
past  or  later,  calling  cheerily:  "Seven
o'clock." The French always lie  if they
think it  will give more  happiness than
telling the truth. When she is  too busy  to
toast the impossible  war-bread, she does
one side  anyway. The coffee is boiled and
quite tasteless,  with a lump of condensed
milk at the bottom of the cup. I never get
that far, and am  consequently very hun-
gry when lunch-time comes. This coffee and
the bath will keep me modest when after
the war I may think myself extraordinary.
The  memory of these humble details will
save me from becoming insufferable. 
              AN ATTACK            99
  One morning Germaine burst  into  my
room, pulling the sheet wall apart in a place
that was not the doorway and upsetting
my wash-stand. She seemed more flurried
than  usual, if such a  thing were  possi-
ble.
  "Good morning, Mademoiselle," she be-
gan hastily, tripping over the blanket  rug
and putting my breakfast-tray under  my
chin with a plunge. "Listen ! Do you hear?
It is the  French who attack to-day. Poor
boys! You can hear the glorious seventy-
fives ! Quelle  horreur! Will  this  frightful
war never end! Now I must get  the  hot
water for Madame de B----."
  When  wide  awake, I could plainly hear
the peculiar bark of the "glorious seventy-
fives," and could distinguish the "arrives"
from  the  "departs."  During  my  hasty
dressing,   a  strong  cannonade  shook  the
barracks,  and  made the  stovepipes creak.
Many new faces, or what remained of faces,
greeted me when I entered the ward. 
100         HOSPITAL HEROES
  "Beaucoup d'entrants!" said the caporal,
looking sadly at the new arrivals.
  "We need more aluminum for our rings
and 'briquets,'" said Jean  Biscay, as he
worked away at his  handicraft of making
little  cigarette  lighters and  rings out of
pieces of  old shell.  "'Messieurs les Boches'
are filling our order now."
  The ward was very quiet  all day out of
respect to  the "entrants"  who  were in
great pain and needed rest and sleep. Sev-
eral hemorrhages  had to be  stopped, and
many  poor souls  crying  from shock and
exhaustion had to be comforted. The work
was heavy and I had to be  several places
at once, and do many things at the same
time.  The orderlies and "Begonias" were
a valuable assistance and, thanks to them,
no one was neglected.
  All  day the roar of artillery shook the
wooden building.   All  day  the  stretcher-
bearers shuffled in and out of  the  ward
carrying  men to and from the operating- 
              AN ATTACK           101
room. Some of my walking delegates were
sent into another ward, where there was
no nurse, only orderlies, to make  room for
those who needed  more attention. Some-
times the brancardiers left their burdens on
the floor, and hurried back to the operating-
room, or triage, where ambulance  after am-
bulance  arrived  leaving more and more
wounded. There  they would lie  until  the
orderlies had time to lift them into a bed,
which I was making while its former  oc-
cupant  collected  his things to move out.
At last the ward was full, and still  the bran-
cardiers appeared with their stretchers and
the caporal  or I  had to turn  them away:
"Pas de place."
  There seemed to be every kind of wound
except an aseptic one.  Most of the dress-
ings were done in the ward, several doctors
of different  equipes often arriving  at  the
same time and adding greatly to  the gen-
eral  confusion. There  were many hypo-
dermics to be given to stimulate those who 
102        HOSPITAL HEROES
had lost a great deal of blood or needed to
be braced  up  after their  operation.  The
gassed cases had an oxygen inhalation every
five minutes  from a Zeppelin-shaped  bag.
The most serious gassed cases were sent to
the " malades," where fourteen died in one
day. Cradles had to be placed over mangled
limbs to keep the blankets from pressing
too heavily. Swollen faces full of bits  of
shrapnel had to be washed gently. Some of
the mouths were full of blood, and the eyes
of one man had to be pushed in again now
and then. There were men whose hair was
gray at thirty-five, and boys younger than
I with faces of old men. The German shells
must  have  been poisoned, as the men had
all received prompt attention at the "poste
de secours" in the front lines before coming
to us, where  they were immediately oper-
ated,  and  yet  several amputations were
necessary on account of gangrene.
  I am always afraid to tell them, but wait
for the doctor to break the sad news when 
              AN ATTACK           103
they have sufficiently recovered. Some of
the men tell sad stories. One "fusilier" said
he did not mind losing his leg.
  "There is no one to care, Mademoiselle,"
he  explained  with a quiet desperateness.
"One time I had a wife so devoted that the
first year of this miserable war she dressed
in man's  clothes and  came to see me at
the  camp,  just  before  I went  into  the
trenches.  But that is  over. The war was
too long.  She grew  tired of being  always
alone.  The waiting bored her.  She  is now
with a Spaniard who makes munitions and
money, while  I  fight and lose my leg and
get little pay.  It is the war, Mademoiselle,
and one must not expect justice. There is
nothing but death to look forward to."
  He  was  only thirty-two, and though
wasted, his hands were well shaped, and
his face was still good-looking, with sensitive
mouth and refined features. He was very
talkative and  feverish after his operation.
It seems he enlisted as a private for socialis- 
104        HOSPITAL  HEROES
tic reasons. How abruptly war cut him off
from  a career and happy home  life! And
how many others like him! So many had
wives; even  the boys of seventeen  wore
wedding-rings proudly, and all waited anx-
iously for the daily visit of  the  " vague-
mestre" with his letters and parcels.
  For a field-hospital, the  installation  is
quite complete,  though rudimentary. The
compound fractures with open wounds are
suspended  in Doctor  Blake's apparatus.
Most of the doctors use Doctor Carrel's
system of irrigating the wounds.  The ap-
paratus consists  of a glass flask of one litre,
filled with a solution of Dakin,  and fastened
to a  post attached to a  part of  the  bed
nearest the wound. A long rubber tube at-
tached to the lower opening  of  the  flask
is joined to the ends of the drains by little
glass  tubes. The drains are perforated dif-
ferent lengths (5, 10, or 15 cm.) and from
one to four are  used according to the size
of the wound. One end is tied with a string 
            Dressings  in the  "salle de pansements."
Most of the doctors use Doctor Carrel's svstem of irrigating the wounds 
 
              AN ATTACK            105
so the solution may distribute itself instead
of going right through. There  is a metal
clasp on the long tube to keep the liquid
from flowing except when necessary, every
two  hours, when  it is opened for as many
seconds as there are drains. The idea is to
keep the wound  disinfected by keeping it
moist.
   If a man has several wounds to be treated
in this  way  at the same time, the same
flask may be used with several connecting
tubes joined to the main one, or his bed
can  be  surrounded by posts in convenient
places,  making it look very festive with
two  or three pink balloons around.
   Assisting at the dressings is the most in-
teresting part of my work. It is like a game
of jackstraws, picking up each instrument
and handing it to  the doctor without touch-
ing anything. At first the sight of the wound
and  the suffering  of my own blesses, a mo-
ment before so cheerful,  and now in such
agony, was hard for me to watch, but soon 
106         HOSPITAL HEROES
I became so absorbed in the dressing, and
in giving the doctors the various things they
asked for in French, things I had  never
seen or heard of before, that it  took  my
mind off the pain of the blesse and the horror
of the open wound. I was too busy to think.
No anaesthetic is given, although some of the
dressings are almost operations. Pieces of
tissue or ligaments are sometimes cut  away,
sending a man out  of his head  with  the
pain. When several dressings are going  on
at the same time, the ward is almost  un-
bearable with  the cries  and moans and
the abominable odor of gangrene. The doc-
tors are usually  very gentle, even  when
rushed during a day of attack, and talk to
the blesse as they work,  calling him  "mdn
pauvre  vieux."  Bits  of clothing,  mud, and
even flowers are taken out of some of the
wounds as well as shrapnel and jagged bits
of shell.
  The  carriage must  be  furnished with
sterilized instruments and supplies enough 
              AN ATTACK           107
for several doctors and dressings at a time.
Afterward there are blood-stained instru-
ments to wash,  maybe one with a piece of
skull fastened tightly to a jagged edge of
the instrument,  a piece of some trepanned
head that will ever after be half-witted be-
cause of  the loss of that little scrap of bone.
  However, I would not care to be in the
"salle de pansements," where  dressings are
done all  day in  rapid succession. It would
be  worse than  an  operating-room, where,
no matter how terrible the work may look,
the  man is  not suffering, but under an
anaesthetic. In the ward there are so many
different  things to keep me busy and occupy
my mind. There are moments when every-
thing happens at once, as on the day of an
attack, extra work  as  well  as the daily
routine.
  When  the  Carrel treatment is used,  the
wound is washed with a solution of Dakin,
or a liquid soap  containing zinc, lime, and
glycerine. Sometimes chloramine paste is 
108         HOSPITAL HEROES
used at the dressing for a day or two, elim-
inating the necessity for the  two-hourly
injections.  The  wound  is  then  covered
with vaseline compresses,  which  can  be
removed without tearing, and large pads
of both  kinds of  cotton,  the  absorbent
next the wound and the non-absorbent  on
the outside.  These are held in place  by
moist bandages or a wide bandage pinned
around the body if the wound is in the back
or abdomen.
  The  solution of Dakin is  a powerful dis-
infectant, as it succeeds in cleaning wounds
even when the dressing is not done in proper
Carrel  style.  I  have sometimes  noticed
drains  put in with the perforations on the
outside, so that although some of the solu-
tion soaks  through  to the wound,  most of
it stays in a puddle in the bed. Often the
two kinds of cotton are not arranged cor-
rectly.  When done in the right way, it takes
only four days to disinfect a fresh wound
and fifteen for an old one. 
               AN ATTACK           109
   On  the  day of an  attack  the  poverty
and shortcomings of our hospital become
more apparent. When my blesses write me
from other hospitals that they are not as
well taken care of as at Cugny, that the beds
and food are not as good, I am surprised
and anxious about  them.  Sometimes  our
poverty  is appalling. I  have seen horses
that  had better  blankets  than those on
the beds in our wards. When the laundry-
machine, which is in Compiegne, quite far
away, breaks, we go weeks without clean
linen for the men. Sheets are only changed
when there is a great emergency, not when
they are gray with cigarette ashes or dirt
from  those who insist upon walking bare-
footed about the ward.  There is a  small
reserve supply in the emergency ward when
this shortage of laundry occurs, kept espe-
cially for the  "grands  blesses" who have
hemorrhages, or wounds  of such a nature
that their beds must be changed  several
times a day. 
110        HOSPITAL  HEROES
  The highest proof of the French civiliza-
tion is found in the  characters of  these
blesses, farmers,  taxi-drivers, plain work-
ing men, simple country boys, who  are
never  too  hurt or  too  faint to  murmur
their  thanks for every small attention. If
they thought I was tired they  would  say
they were perfectly comfortable instead of
having their beds made over, or an alcohol
rub, or any httle comfort. In the midst of
torture and  death  they are still  cheerful
and unselfishly try  to help  their "cama-
rades." Hot-water bags,  httle  pillows  for
filling up uncomfortable places in the bed,
and special luxuries, of which there is but
a scant supply, are  quickly offered to  the
latest  "entrant" or "opere"  when  they
are carried  in  delirious  or  moaning  with
ether  or pain. Even those who would rather
read quietly or sleep, would let the "phono"
play noisily by their bedside for the pleasure
of the others, if I did not take it away.  In-
stead  of making men brutal, war seems to 
AN ATTACK
111
have made them very gentle and kind to
one another.
  I was hurrying back to supper after the
busy day of the attack when the nurse in
the emergency ward  stopped  me  on the
way past her door.
  "Oh, please stay in my ward a few min-
utes," she begged in a distracted way. "The
orderlies  have not come back from  their
supper, and I have to tell the doctor about
one poor man who is dying. I can't leave
the ward alone.  Do  watch them  until I
get back. It won't be  long,  and you'll help
a lot."
  The "salle d'urgence" was even a more
depressing  sight than my ward had been.
In the faint fight, the men  looked ghostly.
There  was  no sound but  an occasional
moan or  cry. Now and then a delirious
blesse would lean forward  in his bed  and
shout imaginary orders, or some  one  else
would  begin  whispering softly, supposing
his  wife was there. Except for these  mo- 
112        HOSPITAL HEROES
ments, the suffering goes on silently with
lips set tightly together and  sad, patient
eyes alone showing what pain there  is be-
hind the stoicism. Most of them had several
wounds,  abdominal, pierced skulls,  lungs
shot through, and compound  fractures of
the legs.  When one man  had several of
these,  there  hardly  seemed enough  flesh
left to keep  him together. They were kept
alive  with numerous injections of  saline
solutions,  camphorated  oil,  ether,  and
strychnia. Often it was hard to find a place
to insert the tiny needle, so covered was
the body with bandages, iodine stains, and
holes  where  former injections had been
given. Many of the wounds necessitated a
change of dressing, and the whole bed re-
made every few hours. Another man had a
chest  wound, the  dressings  of which had
to be undone and ether injected every four
hours. Though the nurse of this ward was
assisted by a maid and three orderlies, she
had more to do with twenty beds than I 
              AN ATTACK           113
had  without a maid and  forty-six. Each
of these men could have kept a nurse busy
by himself if only to supply his constant
requests for a drink.
   There was nothing special for me to do
but watch that no one fell  out of bed, so
I  sat by  the stove  and read about each
case.  Some of the  wounds  were so inde-
scribably  horrible and numerous that  for
the poor blesse's sake, I almost hoped that
he would not survive. Now and then I got
a  drink for some feverish one or held the
hand of a delirious poilu who thought he
was a general. The warmth  of mine or the
electricity  that  goes from  one being to
another seemed to calm him, and he would
drift off to sleep.
  The man who  was dying was the most
pathetic case of all. His body was perfect,
and he of all the mangled ones should have
been allowed the precious gift of life. Six
feet, of strong build, he lay  tied in bed
with an ice-bag  over his head  which he 
114        HOSPITAL HEROES
was trying to push away. His hands and
arms became so purple and marked where
they were  tied, I  had to unfasten them,
preferring to stand over and watch that
no harm come. An " abri" had fallen on his
head and he was  evidently trying  to re-
move it. It was dreadful to stand there
and watch him dying, powerless to help
him. Whoever discovers a cure for shock
will give something marvellous to the world.
This man died a few hours after I left. 
CHAPTER  VII
            UNDER  FIRE
fT^HE  electric  switch  that lights  our
 ■*-  sleeping-barracks  is  turned  off  at
ten o'clock, so that silence is enforced as
rigorously at that hour as at a boarding-
school  or in Berlin.  Not  a whisper  was
heard,  only  the occasional  turning  of a
page or  crackle of a paper  showing that
some sleepless one was trying to read by.
candle-light.  In  the bitter winter weather,
when the cold hurt so one could not sleep
right away no matter how exhausted, B----
and I pulled the dividing sheet away from
between  our  beds  and  made  chocolate,
pantomime  fashion, in  the middle of the
night.  Our  "directrice"  teased us after-
ward in Paris by telling every one that she
was kept awake every night at the front,
not by bombs but by the continual  stirring
                   115 
116        HOSPITAL HEROES
of chocolate. However, she took pity on us
now and then, when December was at its
coldest and the four little stoves were mak-
ing much soot but no heat, and sent us to
bed with something more potent to make
us sleep. I have skated  at  home in zero
weather against a biting wind, but I never
felt as cold as I did that winter in the Aisne.
We were always  pushing our beds to a dry
part of the room, away from the snow that
sifted in. I wore more clothes at night than
in the daytime, when, unfortunately, I had
to look civilized.
  It is hard to say which was more uncom-
fortable,  the cold  which  was always with
us or the bombardments which  happened
now and then. When  troops  were passing
through on their way to the firing-line, a
Taube observer would report their position
to the air-raid  authorities;  or when the
moonlight enabled them  to  see the posi-
tion of the ammunition centres  on either
side  of our hospital, or just  without any 
             UNDER FIRE          117
special reason, the enemy planes would fly
over our heads and drop bombs.
  The first time they came since my arrival
in the war zone I was glad to stay under
the covers and my bed seemed a safe, pleas-
ant island in a wild, storm-swept sea. The
noise was most alarming,  like a thousand
thunderstorms, and the clamor of the maids
in the next barracks added to the terrifying
sensation of being under fire. Our windows
were covered with heavy black curtains so
the room  was absolutely dark. I  tried to
pretend I was at a play. There was some-
thing sheltering about the darkness, like a
heavy curtain wrapped around to hide and
protect one.
  The bombs seemed to be right overhead,
and the sky full of screeching, swishing
whiz-booms   and  whangs. Between  the
crash of a bomb, one could hear the pop-
pop of  the  "mitrailleuses" on the  aero-
planes, showing that the French were there
to protect us, and more distant the loud 
118         HOSPITAL HEROES
boom of the- antiaircraft guns with their
questioning   "Warum?"  The  aeroplanes
were so low over our heads that we could
hear, in rare pauses, the hum of their en-
gines, even distinguishing the French from
the German. The patter of shrapnel on our
roof like rain made it seem all too  realistic
for a play.
  The next night my curiosity made me
get up and  watch from underneath a bit
of overhanging roof. It is really the noise
that terrifies.  It  was a wonderful though
dreadful sight.  The sky was full of signal-
rockets  and star-shells. Three big search-
lights pointed right over our heads, groping
now and then like arms, but returning ever
to the same place above us. The bombs
came with a loud crash and the "eclairants"
shells burst with a blaze of light.
  On  a moonlight night when the ground
is covered with snow, a bombardment  has
a terrible beauty like giant  fireworks. The
stars  mingle with  the rockets and star- 
              UNDER FIRE           119
shells and signal-lights. The noise of the
unseen  antiaircraft cannon and  machine-
guns on the planes are like thunder in the
mountains. It seems as if all the sky were
alive  and fighting a war too big for man
to finish.
  There is an exaltation about being under
fire. The realization that any minute may
be  the  last,  that each crash  may  mean
the end of life, makes one full of a  desire
to work hard with a  final  burst of energy
to make up for past years of idleness and
the things one might have done, making
the last part  of life at least worth while.
There is even a  gladness  and pride that
one's own courage and skill are being used
at such a time of danger and  need.
  One can grow so accustomed to the dis-
tant cannonading and roll of artillery that
they seem to  go on like corks popping at a
cafe, or thunder  rumbling far  away. The
uncanny shrieks  and deafening bangs  of
a bombardment are another matter, but 
120        HOSPITAL HEROES
even these noises seem less terrible if one
gets up and watches them.
  An air battle in daytime is very interest-
ing and so high above and far away that
it  is not alarming.  There  may be some
danger from falling shrapnel, but  never-
theless we go  to the door and look up  at
them. The planes are so  high  we can only
see the puffs of smoke from the "mitrail-
leuses," the French puffs being white and
the German black.  These puffs of explod-
ing shell look like  soft,  fluffy clouds, and
when  occasionally  one does see the aero-
plane, it looks like a dragon-fly. The blesses
watch  these battles with  great excitement,
calling out advice  and instructions  to the
aviators.
  "There,  he goes! He   escapes!  Stupid,
follow  him! Look, they  leave  one French
aviator alone  with  three Boches! What is
the matter with them? There, good, they
got that Taube! See, he falls!  Bravo!"
  There are three large observation-balloons 
UNDER FIRE
121
near us, one German and two French. One
day  one of these French "saucisses" was
surrounded by four black puffs of smoke.
No French aeroplane came to the rescue
and  the great balloon  began to descend
slowly, a  mass of flames, with a  trail of
smoke. The man escaped from his burning
elevator in a parachute.
  I went to the front lines the night before
Christmas in  an ambulance. Having heard
there would be no attack, we took a road
forbidden in daytime, right to the trenches.
We  went first through the small ruined
town Flavy-le-Martel,  with its  roofless,
windowless houses looking like ghosts in
the snow. Here and there chimneys  rose
against the dark, moonless sky, like arms
reaching  for help. The next little ruined
village was Jussy, chiefly remarkable for
its camouflage hanging over the river and
along its banks like banners of "Welcome
to Our City" or "Vote for Wilson."
  Something of that first strange thrill that 
122        HOSPITAL HEROES
had been with me when I began  nursing
at the front, but which had slowly vanished
through  the blessing of getting used to
things and being constantly among people
who took it all as a matter of course, began
to return and seize me with renewed  vigor
as we sped nearer and nearer to the Ger-
man hnes. Something stronger than my will
had adapted me to my new life, and I could
not feel  above  a certain level. I had  come
to the  conclusion  that seeing so much
that was hideous and horrible and feeling
sorry to  the utmost extent of my capacity
had made  me immune  to any future ex-
citement or enthusiasm.  But  out  here
something stirred and quickened my heart
again, and I was glad  to feel  a thrill of
excitement.  I forgot that I was tired and
that the  ambulance bumped along  uncom-
fortably, that  the cold wind  was piercing
through all covering.
  After  passing the village of Montescourt
we entered a  strange, unnatural country, 
              UNDER FIRE           123
quite empty. There  was no  stir, because
there was nothing to stir. It reminded me
of the poem of "The Walrus and the  Car-
penter":
      "You could not see a cloud, because
        No cloud was  in the sky;
       No birds were flying overhead—
        There were no birds to fly."
  The snow stretched away into the dis-
tance  on  every  side hke the Great  Salt
Lake,  melting into the horizon  in an in-
distinguishable mist  of land  and sky.  It
was such an endless expanse of blank white-
ness that it made  one feel at the end  of
life or the beginning of eternity. One seemed
about  to fall over  the edge of the world
into nothing but space.
  It was a  land cut off  from the rest  of
the world.  Somewhere people were  still
dressing up and going to parties and worry-
ing about the stocks. But here there  was
no past or future, nothing  but space  and
shell-holes. 
124        HOSPITAL HEROES
  We did not go into the trenches, as it
was  forbidden for nurses to  ride to  the
front lines in ambulances, and  we were not
disguised except for the fur caps we wore
instead  of veils. But  we did get out and
look at the shell-holes, and  learned  the
difference between a hole twenty feet wide
made by what the Tommies  call a Jane
(12-inch) and a "Jack Johnson," and one
known as a  "Woolly,"  deep  enough to
drown a man.
  On the  way  back  we  passed dreary
columns  of troops  returning from   the
trenches. I felt  so  sorry  for  those other
lines of  men trudging out  to relieve them.
Stiff with cold, even in the car, tired and
aching from a big day's work and the  jolt-
ing ride, I wondered if anything was worth
all this. It seemed so futile, all this struggling
and misery in order that one army of frozen
men could take some snowy, uncomfortable
holes in the ground  away  from another
army, equally wretched, fighting for acres 
              UNDER FIRE           125
of snow!  It was, as Barbusse says,  "one
great army committing suicide."
  I  could understand why  Joffre's men
stayed by their fires in spite of the advance
of the Germans.  Our barracks were such
a cold prospect to return to, that I believe if
I had seen a big roaring fire on the German
side of that cold, white plane, I would have
walked right up to it and refused to  leave
until I had thawed out thoroughly for the
first  time  since winter came.
  I wondered if the war was trying to turn
the world into a dead, burnt-up place like
the moon. And yet overhead were the same
stars that I had watched with such  faith
on the steamer  only a few  months ago.
Only  a few months,  and yet how long it
seemed and how little I had then known of
war! The  very thought of my blind enthu-
siasm and innocent eagerness made me feel
old and very tired.
  I had discovered that life so  near the
roar of the guns and groans of the wounded 
126        HOSPITAL HEROES
was a blind existence. The fatalism of the
front is what makes the ghastliness bear-
able. The past is so very far away and the
future so uncertain that there is only the
present to  cling to and make the most
of. It is hard, but you somehow stumble
along, "fed up" but "sticking it." Living
on the edge of eternity this way raises one's
working  efficiency to a  higher rate.  Life
increases in value as its moments decrease.
When strong men  cry and hold your hand
like children lost in the dark,  you cannot
leave them. You must stay  and work and
comfort and cheer and help  all you can
until the light comes. It may be your last
chance.
   Homes and lives may be lost, but while
one can serve there is something left to  go
on living for. Service brings its own peace
even in the midst of war. It is  the only
religion that remains in the suffering. There
is  no hardening in hospital work if one
can only put enough of one's self into the 
              UNDER  FIRE           127
service. While I work I am as happy as I
can be in a world full of fighting and hatred
and pain. And yet I couldn't help thinking
bitterly as I slipped between  icy blankets
(sheets  had been discarded since the cold
weather): "What a Christmas Eve!" 
         CHAPTER  VIII
               FETES
  IT  is  the  telling about war work that
   makes it interesting. At the time it  is
as tiresome and monotonous as any phys-
ical labor carried on day after day. The
danger and  dreary sameness in which we
live force us to  seek  distraction. We are
always looking for entertainment, not so
much as a rest and change from the physical
strain,  but from the nervous tension. As
an English officer said:
  "War  is  damn dull, damn dirty, and
damn dangerous."
  We could  not  endure our existence  if
we did not  have  the precious  gift of for-
getting ourselves in laughter. It was almost
as hard to be cheerful on days when nothing
happened as it was during a bombardment.
                  128 
FETES
129
It takes  so much courage and faith to re-
sist boredom and weariness.
  During the coldest weather there was
little fighting, most of the new cases being
accidents. My "entrants"  walked in  with
blankets over  their  shoulders and  their
long bare legs hanging down forlornly  from
the inadequate  shirt  given  them  in the
triage  when  their own clothes  had  been
taken  away  until necessary. Between ar-
rivals  and  departures  I had  more doctors
than patients and felt as if my ward  were
a railroad-station.
  There  was  a  rumor that we were  to
evacuate and that the English would take
our part of the front. Our one-sheeted news-
paper did not give us the information the
people in America were getting  each  day.
And yet we  could watch  the spirit of the
fighting men  and hear rumors  of action
ahead  of time and have  a wonderful op-
portunity of watching the greatest spectac-
ular performance in the world from a front 
130        HOSPITAL HEROES
seat, as it were. We were too close for news,
so we kept on sending men to the interior,
gradually emptying the hospital. The work
dragged on.
  We had  only our work and quarrels to
talk about. I suppose wherever a few people
are gathered together there will be friction.
However, when our barracks showed signs
of falling apart, and much whispering went
on on both sides of the  dividing sheet like
conspiring criminals, Madame G----saved
the situation by pinning on the door a copy
of the sign  seen in all railroad trains:
  "Taisez-vous! Mefiez-vous!
  "Les oreilles ennemies vous  ecoutent."
  Our  directrice summed up  our feelings
and situation at this  time of coldness and
inactivity by saying:
  "After the  war Joffre and  Petain will
be sitting at a little table in  a cafe along
the boulevard,  telling  each other stories
of the  great war. Suddenly Joffre will stop
in the  midst of some reminiscence to ask: 
                                     Ward V.

We are always looking for entertainment, not so much as a rest and change from  the
                    physical strain, but from the nervous tension. 
1 
                 FETES              131
     By  the  way, whatever became  of
those hospital  units you sent  up to the
Aisne in  1917 with the Third Army?'
  "Whereupon Petain will clasp his fore-
head and exclaim:
    'Mon Dieu, I forgot all about them!
Do you suppose they are still there?' "
  Though I  could have  taken time off, I
^referred to stay in the ward, doing extra
work, however unnecessary. I was happier
with the blesses than  anywhere else. They
had undertaken  to  perfect my  French,
teaching  me  in various accents.  One time
a delirious entrant had  given  an angry
cry:
  "Oh, there are Boches here!" hitting the
air  wildly,  when I tried to persuade  him
that he would be more comfortable in bed
than on the floor.
  Escaping from the  danger zone, I  told
Meyran  to watch him,  while a  "filleul"
in the next bed explained to him that I
was not German, and that in a short time 
132         HOSPITAL HEROES
he would grow accustomed to my American
accent. When he recovered he began giving
me French lessons, as an apology, I suppose.
He  did  not allow me to  "sing" or drawl,
but made me hurry along staccato, in one
tone deep in the throat.  The whole ward
helped with the matter of gender. I tried
to compromise by having one day all mascu-
line and the next feminine, but this did not
suit my instructors.  Protests  of "/a tete"
or "le lit" would come  from every side,
punctuating  my attempts  at  conversa-
tion.
  Most of the blesses have been decorated
with the "croix de  guerre" for valor, or
the "medaille militaire"  (and  a pension)
for  the mutilated ones. This is  an impres-
sive ceremony, though it  happens so often.
Sometimes one man will receive both decora-
tions. The citation is read by the "medecin-
chef,"  followed by a kiss on each cheek.
The whole  ward compliment the hero, and
the walking  delegates shake hands with 
                 FETES              133
him. It always makes me rather sad. The
two  httle medals pinned on  the patched
shirt of some "ampute" do not seem a fair
exchange for a leg or an arm. They look sort
of cheap.  It is the reading  of the citation
that thrills  me. There is a colored man at
the Equitable Trust in Paris who told me
his son had been missing almost a year.
He recited  a long  citation his son had
received for several remarkable deeds, hav-
ing learned it completely by heart.
  The blesses could tell many stories if they
wanted to, but they don't.  They are past
that. Most of them must have had splen-
did deeds of heroism behind their wounds.
Even if there had been time for  conversa-
tion they were too weak and feverish to
have  their  strength  taxed this way for
curiosity.  Later, when the  worst is over,
they do not refer to the past.  I thought
it kinder to help them forget. Others who
care less,  and were not  so  busy, can tell
the stories. I only want to show the blesses 
134        HOSPITAL HEROES
as I knew them, telling only what I saw
and dwelling on the horrible side as little
as possible.
  Sometimes  there  is  a  moving-picture
show, and all who can  limp or stand  the
strain of  being carried  on a  stretcher  to
another part of the hospital are allowed to
go. There is much excitement when this
happens.  The lucky ones  go off with  so
much joy, I felt sorry for those who were
left. This is how our concerts started. Of
course we had always had "phono fetes"
for a while each afternoon when there were
no "entrants" or "operes." But this went
on while I was working, and though I was
amused at the absurdity of washing feet
to the tune of "Tipperary" or "Old Black
Joe,"  it was not much  of  "f^te" for me.
They liked to resurrect old American dance-
music for my benefit, and burst out laugh-
ing at  the nasal  twang of our popular
vaudeville voices. Little  did I realize a few
years  before,  while  dancing at a  college 
                 FETES              135
prom or Sherry's, that I would be cutting
nails (and using both hands, for they were
tough) to those same merry dance-tunes.
  When  the  others  had  gone  to   the
"cinema" there was little for me to  do,
so I decided to amuse the unfortunate ones
who were left behind. I sang to them in
Italian, a few Neapolitan street-songs;  in
English,  especially  ragtime for the drag
and rag pleases them; and in French, their
own popular songs and marches, and some
American ragtime  I heard translated  in
Parisian  vaudevilles.  "They  Didn't  Be-
lieve Me" and "Hello, My Dearie," sound
almost sensible in a foreign language.
  After that, in the evening when no one
was in great pain, in the interim  between
"soupe" and sleep, while I gave the rubs
and tucked them in for the  night, there
would be  a concert. It was really a most
serious and formal event. Mayou was master
of ceremonies, walking up and  down  the
ward commanding order, with  a little cane 
136        HOSPITAL HEROES
hooked over the end of his left arm where
his hand used to be.
  Some of them have  very good voices.
I like to hear "Monsieur le Cultivateur"
sing  my favorite selections  from Puccini,
Massenet,  and  Saint-Saens. In  spite  of
my great  love of  music, these  peasants
often shame me by their superior knowledge
of grand opera.
  The  "adjudant"  sings most  dramatic
pieces,  and almost  flings himself out  of
bed  in  the  excitement of  "Le Dernier
Tango."  Frangois's  eyes twinkle  wickedly
as he sings "Nous avons tous fait ga, Plus
ou moin, n'est-ce pas?" or some improper
ballad  that the French  appreciate.  I do
not understand  the most  improper,  and
airs are always pretty, so I do not mind.
  Some of the  performers have not good
voices  and yet  insist  upon taking  part.
This is often  quite trying, especially when
it is a "sergent" who wishes to honor us.
Their songs  are  even  longer than those 
                 FETES               137
sung by the good voices as if, in defiance
of criticism, they would show their superior-
ity  in  memory if not in musical  ability.
Nothing will stop them  until every verse
is done, and some of the popular songs have
so many, many  verses. If they get hoarse
or choke,  and are unable to go on, I  am
summoned and  must  administer  a cure.
So  in the midst of our soiree the sound of
gargling  is  often  heard  as an interlude.
But no one laughs if "Mon cceur s'ouvre
a ta voix"  has  strange  variations,  for,
though extempore, this concert is a serious
affair. Even I  am reprimanded  severely by
Mayou when I speak, if only to ask if some
one is comfortable or am I hurting him by
rubbing too vigorously.
  I like the marching songs in which  the
whole ward joins for the chorus:  "Quand
Madelon  vient  nous   servir  a  boire,"
"Marche Lorraine," and  "Paname" (a  sort
of  Paris  "Tipperary").  I  taught  them  a
French version of "Over There."  Some of 
138        HOSPITAL HEROES
them are  eager to learn English and like
songs that have a few words like "Tout le
long de la Tamise." They know a  little of
"Smile, Smile, Smile," and all of them come
in with a "smile"  whenever  there  is a
chance. We are rather proud of our chorus,
but some  one coming in to borrow aspirin,
remarked  crushingly that she "never heard
such a noise, every one in a different key."
Tant pis!
  They are afraid I will be lonely or bored
and  treat me  with  a  fatherly solicitude
mingled with a kind of awed respect, because
I have come such a  long way from home
across a dangerous ocean, and have settled
down so near  the front lines. Not  being a
travelling race like ours, this impresses them
a great deal. I am quite a curiosity and
source of unfailing interest from my Ameri-
can accent to my American shoes.  When I
have letters, they are most interested.
  "Look,  Mademoiselle has a long letter
from her fiance." 
                 FETES              139
  "No, no, Pierre, that is the writing of
her brother.  She gives  me the envelopes,
for I like to have American stamps."
  "Mademoiselle,  you have many  broth-
ers," said one sceptically.
  They wanted to hear about my brothers
and the various camps they were in. They
were also most anxious about my future,
and asked me repeatedly if I had a  fiance,
and if I would marry a Frenchman or an
American.
  When an American ambulance boy was
brought into  my  ward, their excitement
was intense.  With their  love of romance,
they looked  forward  with much interest
to what to them was my opportunity.
  I tried not to be partial, though  it was
a relief to speak  English again. He  had
broken his arm cranking a Ford at an am-
bulance section near  us. Bored  to  death,
he roamed around with his right arm in a
plaster cast.  He was  always hungry,  and
I have to admit that  the French food for 
140        HOSPITAL HEROES
wounded  is  not very  substantial for a
healthy American appetite, so I smuggled
some of my pudding from lunch, and gave
him a party hidden away in my little room
at the  back of the ward, where the blesses
could not see that he was  being treated
better than they were.
  He was very popular and made me quite
jealous. One blesse claimed him as a friend
because he had brought him to the hospital
in his ambulance, so they had their meals
together at a httle table by the stove. C----
could not appreciate his  table manners as
much as  his  devotion,  and often begged
me to  sing, especially while  the soup was
being consumed. He cheered them up and
gave them a perpetual  "fete," having a
generous supply  of cigarettes and crackers.
"Monsieur le Valet"  gave  him  French
lessons. His favorite amusement was stroll-
ing out of the ward and getting  the "bran-
cardiers" to carry him in on a stretcher. At
the cry of "Un  entrant!" I  would hurry 
                 FETES              141
up  with the orderlies, and  C---- would
roll off  on an empty bed to the huge ap-
preciation of  the whole  ward. Coquelle
was so  fond of his  cough-drops that  he
munched them continually, even after his
operation before he was  allowed a drink,
and said he didn't care if they made him
ill,  he liked them.
  Sometimes C----  would  have visitors
from his ambulance  section.  They would
take the place by storm.  The "phono"
would play and attract some of the younger
"aides-majors." One of them had a kind of
flute that he whistled through. They asked
me  to sing  "the song that was  sung when
the Lusitania  went down," so  I got part
way through  "Nearer, My God, to Thee,"
until the Americans told me not to be such
a gloom. Then we tried the "Star-Spangled
Banner" by request, starting three times
before we got  the pitch that was not  a
growl at the start, and  yet would not take
us beyond our  powers  at the end. It was 
142        HOSPITAL HEROES
not a  success,  but I redeemed  myself  by
singing all three verses of the "Marseil-
laise." To be  truly patriotic, the  Ameri-
cans present rendered "Dixie" and "Over
There." By order of the "major" (I insisted
that it be a  military command) I  danced
with several of the guests, to the immense
satisfaction and flattering  approval of the
blesses, and the horror of the caporal, who
was a priest.
  When  any of the visitors came to take
pictures, there was a  wild  scramble for
any sort of clothing available. Men that I
had thought  were beyond  caring for any-
thing  but  sleep  and peace  would stand
around in the snow with long lavender
bed-socks pulled up  to their knees  over
faded and patched  pajama trousers and a
sweater or blanket around them. If  they
had  their kepi they could pose happily
and with dignity for hours. There were so
many demands for pictures that we some-
times had to pretend to  take them in order 
                 FETES              143
to get them back to bed. Then some time
exposures had  to be attempted for those
who could not get  up,  or there would be
tears.  Such  babies, these great  bearded
godsons of mine!
  Sometimes in the evening I wrote letters
for those who cannot use their hands. They
liked to  hear C---- dictating  his with  a
few French expressions. However, it was
a little embarrassing having him there, and
I was rather relieved when the  medecin-
chef allowed him to be sent  to Doctor
Blake's in Paris. He had never been in  a
hospital  before, and seemed more human
than  the  French  whom  I  treated like
children  and thought of as a  neuter class
of simply blesses.
  One day, soon after  his arrival, C----
had asked me where he could take a bath.
When  I  told him to wait before getting
dressed until I came—I would give him the
only kind available—he did not look very
enthusiastic over the idea, and  was not in 
144        HOSPITAL HEROES
the ward when I arrived next day.  His
doctor was annoyed and muttered some-
thing disparaging to  the caporal about
Americans who never understood military
discipline. I was  rather worried about his
A. W. O. L. Seeing my anxiety, the blesses
teased:
  "Ah,  Mademoiselle,  he no  longer loves
you. You have been too cold and cruel.
He has gone away forever."
  At last he appeared in the doorway in
his sheepskin  coat  covered with snow.  I
hurried up with a scolding.
  "Well,  you  see,  Inferior  Major," he
began, calling  me his interpretation of my
explication that I was infirmiere-major of
that ward, "I just had to get a bath. Yours
would have been all right, but I wanted
the kind I was used to taking for six sous.
Please don't be cross.  I  promise never to
take another if it's going to bother you so
much."
  The time for the second injection of anti- 
FETES
145
tetanus was a trying one, and much dreaded
by the victim and me. They  all felt that
the  first  "piqure"  received  upon  their
entrance in the  triage was  enough, and
this  second one an insult  to their present
state of recovery and well-being. Camphor-
ated oil or morphia, when ordered by the
doctor, were  accepted  without a murmur,
but this antitetanus in  the stomach seemed
to hurt more. I did not hke to give it, and
they made matters worse. The walking
delegates would run to  the other end of the
long, narrow ward or hide under the beds.
The "Begonias"  would help me trace an
escaping one, entering the game with great
zest, crying, "Here he  is! See! Under this
bed," as he rolled from one end of the ward
to the other,  while I pursued him, holding
the  tray  with  syringe,   compresses, and
iodine  aloft out of a contact that would
unsterilize my work.
  Whatever the trials of the day, we would
always part friends, and I would leave the 
 146        HOSPITAL HEROES
 ward at night amid a  chorus of "Bonne
 nuit, Mademoiselle Marraine," and an oc-
 casional "Good-by" or "Sleep well." They
 often say these English words if  I leave
 the  ward in the  daytime on an  errand.
 They tell me how much my smiles  help
 them,  and do  not understand that  it is
 they who keep me "toujours gaie, toujours
 souriante." They are so  brave, but one can
 be wretchedly unhappy while being brave
 and  really would not be brave unless one
 suffered.
'"^ It is in the hospital that the true courage
 is shown in this war. The old-time  tactics
 and  strategy  and romance  of the sword
 have been revolutionized by modern in-
 ventions. War of movement has practically
 been replaced by war of position. There is
\ httle opportunity for individual heroism and
 achievement  when war is run on  such a
I business basis, with the men  fighting like
 members of a firm trying to put a big deal
/ across.  Machinery  and  poison-gas  and 
                 FETES              147
T. N. T. are winning the war.  In such  a
contest,  victory will  come in the  end to
the side  with  the biggest numbers,  the
largest purse, and the most enduring nerves.
But in  the hospital the old-time Spartan
fortitude and heroic endurance go on every
day as each individual fights his own battle
against pain. 
CHAPTER  IX
 EVACUATION  OF  AUTO CHIR
                 NO. 7
 AS an interruption of the daily routine,
-^ *■ we sometimes have an inspection by
a general or several generals at once. The
caporal warns me when this is to take place
and  there is a great house-cleaning. The
whole ward must be scrubbed and smoothed
out,  cobwebs swept from the ceiling, every
little table overhauled and books, papers,
and  games put away, all as quickly as pos-
sible. The men must stay either in bed or
near it, keeping as clean as they can. This
is a great strain, as no one knows at what
moment the generals will  appear.  After
waiting indefinitely in a painfully immacu-
late  condition, they are apt  to arrive in-
considerately at  the inauspicious moment
                   148 
 EVACUATION OF AUTO CHIR NO. 7  149
of "soupe," when every one is clamoring
for more potatoes, eating noisily,  or  using
a towel or a sleeve instead of the napkin
hung beside their bed.
  The  generals  walk slowly  through the
ward,  accompanied  by the  medecin-chef
and  other privileged officers. Sometimes
they stop to inquire about a wound. One of
them stopped in front of Riviere's huddled
form. With Carrel tubes reaching up  his
back, he looked  like a monkey on a chain.
However, this wound did not  matter to
him. He accepted it philosophically as part
of the war. When the general asked kindly:
  "And where  were  you wounded, mon
petit?"
  "In  the operating-room,  my  general,"
Riviere replied, saluting solemnly.
  One  of the "ministerielles," in her zeal
to help, had burned him with a hot-water
bag during his operation. I cannot imagine
why the doctor did not notice. Poor Riviere
suffered more from this unnecessary wound 
150        HOSPITAL HEROES
than from the original one, which was bad
enough, causing him  to remain ever in a
sitting posture, except at night, when  the
Carrel tubes were disconnected. I was so
upset about this accident that Madame
G---- offered to treat him with the new
method of  ambrine.  She dressed his burn
during the lunch-hour so I could help her.
I was so interested that I went to the "Mis-
sion de l'Ambrine"  when we  went  "en
repos," and  took the course.
  The process of healing burns in this way
is very simple and easily learned. The treat-
ment is without pain, which seems unbe-
lievable when one sees huge raw wounds.
We took Riviere to  the "salle de  panse-
ments" instead of doing his dressing in  the
ward, partly because the apparatus  was
easier to manage there, and also because
of the frightful odor  of the old dressings
when they  were removed.
  Little by little, the new skin gains over
the raw space. Wounds that  have been 
 EVACUATION OF AUTO CHIR NO. 7  151
treated with ambrine heal without a scar.
Even faces that have  been badly burned
are left clear and unmarred. It can only
be  used,  however,  on thoroughly clean,
disinfected wounds, as  it has no antiseptic
properties. But a burn is never very septic,
so that the wound is usually clean if it is
not too deep. When not perfectly clean,  the
wound may be treated  with  "serum phy-
siologique"  or  "huile  gomenolee"  or a
"pansement humide" for two days instead
of ambrine.
  Ambrine gets  its name from  being  the
color of amber. It was first used for rheuma-
tism. The idea  is so simple that it seems
strange no one thought of using it for burns
before. Paraffin is taken at fifty-two degrees,
a hundred parts  for five  or ten parts of
gutta-percha, which makes  the paraffin
supple.  This mixture,  which  looks  like
cakes of maple-sugar, is placed in an auto-
clave or popinal at one hundred and thirty
degrees under pressure  of one and one-half 
152        HOSPITAL  HEROES
kilograms for four hours.  It is then left in
water at eighty degrees until used.
  The solution must never be boiled, as the
petrol gases will be liberated, and this vapor
is  inflammable. Ambrine cools much more
slowly than  water. When  applied  on a
wound at fifty degrees, it will only have
lost five or six degrees by  the next day.
It does  not burn and can even be used at
sixty degrees on  an open wound. Applied
hot, it is liquid, but hardens when cooler,
forming a supple  shell, covering the wound,
but  separate  from  it  and non-adhesive.
Under the influence of the heat, the tissue
dilates and mends itself.
  The chief advantages of this treatment
are its entire absence of pain, the quickness
of the healing on account of  so little loss
of substance  (the  dermis not  being  de-
stroyed), and the good quality of the cica-
trice. Instead of putting the blesse to sleep
during  his operation,   his wound  is put
to sleep  for twenty-four hours, which  en- 
 EVACUATION OF AUTO  CHIR NO. 7  153
courages the  epidermis to  grow and  the
new skin to form and gain over the burned
part.  Unlike other dressings, it  does  not
stick  to the wound, so there is no pulling
or tearing of  the tissue  in taking  it  off.
After three days, white begins to appear
around the edges and white spots form in
the middle of the wound. These are new
living cells. If this treatment does not suc-
ceed,  the wound cannot be clean. It is the
first dressing that aids nature, and is also
used for eczema and frozen feet.
  The method of applying  ambrine is  an
important  factor. I will tell you how Ma-
dame  G----  treated Riviere. First,  she
removed the dressing and dead skin, pulling
gently with forceps or cutting with scissors,
but never  touching with  her hands or  an
unsterilized instrument or tearing any but
loose  pieces. She washed  the  wound with
a solution of salt water, "eau oxygenee," or
Dakin, using a glass tube so that only the
solution touched the wound. The  edges 
154        HOSPITAL HEROES
were then  cleaned  with alcohol  or  ether,
and afterward zinc oxide or sterilized vase-
line  was apphed. She  dried the surface
thoroughly with  warm  air.  If  not dried
well, the ambrine will heat the water and
burn. The ambrine is squirted on the wound
with an atomizer or painted on with  a
brush sterilized  for each dressing.  When
the surface is white, a thin layer of  steril-
ized  absorbent cotton is quickly  put on to
keep the heat and another coat of ambrine
which clings to the cotton, forming a cover
more supple than compresses. Both kinds
of cotton are then wrapped around  the
dressing, held  in place  by  moist  band-
ages.
  Every wound that  came to us was in-
fected and  it was remarkable the way the
men recovered. When every opening was
filled with earth, bits of clothing, mud, and
even flowers, there must be immense sepsis.
Perhaps the microbes in the  fields are not
as deadly as those  in crowded cities. The 
 EVACUATION OF AUTO CHIR NO. 7  155
men who had led healthy, moderate lives,
especially  peasants  who had lived out-of-
doors,  of course,  had the advantage. The
men in the wards made better progress than
the officers who were isolated. The officers'
ward was usually empty except for a few
beds clustered forlornly at one end.
  Although the military disciphne of our
hospital was as rigid as that in the army,
the  "medecin-chef"  being  generalissimo,
there was the same off-duty "camaraderie"
among "majors" and poilus  that I had
noticed in Paris  when  officers  and their
men chatted together at the same table in
a cafe. It seems,  when off duty, the poilu
can say what he hkes with the freedom of
a Roman  soldier  to the  centurions.  How-
ever, the  collapse  of  the Russian  army
shows that only highly intelligent and pa-
triotic soldiers can be allowed such license.
The tie of service brings all  dreams  of
brotherhood true, whether the French gen-
eral  calls his men "mes petits soldats"  or 
156        HOSPITAL HEROES
the British officer loves his men at a dis-
tance, as Robert Nichols expresses it:
"Was there love once? I have forgotten her.
   Was there grief once? Grief still is mine.
 Other loves I have; men rough, but men who stir
   More joy, more grief, than love of thee and
       thine."
  There  is  great confusion  in the  ward
when a train  of evacuation goes. The eve-
ning  before,  those who can walk gather
around the stove, and  we  sing and drink
"To the end of the war." Each "evacue"
gets a farewell friction and my initials in
iodine on his chest besides a clean bandage
for the journey.
  Next day the caporal brings in a  mass
of uniforms and the personal effects taken
from the men on their arrival. These have
to be sorted out and each returned to the
proper owner, even to the special "bidon"
for wine.  Socks, shirts,  and  anything de-
stroyed or lost are replaced from the hos-
pital supply.  Each  blesse  has his papers 
 EVACUATION OF AUTO  CHIR  NO. 7  157
in a large envelope tied to a button of his
coat, making him look like a helpless little
child  travelhng alone for the  first time.
They are quite pathetic in their  misfit uni-
forms,  many of them bearing decorations
pinned  proudly on the shabby  coat that
has seen rough service, others wearing their
glory and reward  inside their  chests  or
shining in their eyes.
   It is hard to see them go, all  these men
whose  sufferings I have shared, and with
whom  I have experienced the joys  as well
as the  horrors of war. They come to  us
with tears of pain and leave us in tears of
regret, some to their homes as "reformes,"
some to base-hospitals, others back to the
front after a furlough.
   Before the train  leaves, I make a tour
of inspection and am glad when I  see the
name of Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt on the side
of a car as well as  the usual red  crosses,
for then I know there is a clean little "salle
de pansements " and a neat blue-and-white 
158        HOSPITAL HEROES
kitchen.  The officers have  a special car,
but the  poilus  are herded into box-stalls
hastily arranged with swinging stretchers,
two rows deep. I try to make them com-
fortable  with little pillows  under their
heads and backs.
  My  blesses get so shuffled up  in the
process of  embarkation that I  run dis-
tractedly with flying cape and veil to find
them and give them cigarettes and choco-
late. However, if any one thinks he is being
overlooked  he caUs me, so no one is left
out. We wave as the train pulls out, calling
"Aurevoir!" and "Bonne chance!" until
they are gone.
  "I shall give myself the pleasure of seeing
you in America  soon" is a universal am-
bition. I suppose they have grown curious
about us, or  does the almighty dollar lure
them  from an impoverished  country? By
their  letters  of  appreciation  I  still have
news of them and can follow each one from
hospital to hospital, at his home, or in the 
                              The  evacuation train.

They come to us with tears of pain and leave us in tears of regret, some to their homes as
     "reformes," some to base-hospitals, others back to the front after a furlough. 
 
 EVACUATION  OF AUTO CHIR NO. 7  159
trenches, from a quiet rest "cantonnement"
to the second hne of the Boches, through
all their danger and hardships, work and
pleasures.
  They make me feel as if I had two coun-
tries, my own and France. Work with her
men in her hour of need has bound me more
closely than months of travel and pleasure
could have done. I have made friends that
will  last beyond the  war.  What  matter
where they  come from or what they did
before? They are worth remembering now
and I am deeply touched when any of them
greet me later, meeting by chance in Paris.
  The poilu is unaware of his fineness, and
yet there is some unconscious solace in his
heart, the only thing man-made or  God-
made that war cannot take from him. He
is brave as a matter of course because it is
the better way. He rather regrets  that it
is necessary to be a soldier, and lets poets
talk  about it instead of doing so  himself.
The doctors are the ones who glory in being 
160        HOSPITAL HEROES
mihtary. But, though war has no glamour
for him and  life is dear, it  is not so dear
as France and honor.
  When his wounds hurt or a long-expected
letter fails to arrive, he grumbles, cursing
the government and calling all those behind
the fines  slackers,  but,  except for  these
moments  of depression and the agony of
dressings  or  operations,  he is  contented
enough. He does not worry about his future,
but takes what comes as stoically  as  he
can. These newsboys, apothecaries' clerks,
carters, scene-shifters,  blacksmiths,  and
porters  are not the ones to philosophize
about fife. They are not morbid or  senti-
mental and do not talk religion. They hate
war and long  for peace; but even more they
hate those who do not take  an active part
in it, and  feel a contempt for any one who
tries to get peace without fighting for it.
There seems  to be an unexpressed convic-
tion among them  that this war must  be
fought to  a finish, not only to the annihila- 
 EVACUATION  OF AUTO CHIR NO. 7  161
tion of the Hun, but the end of all wars.
Lifted out of their pre-war selves, they do
their duty with the tenacity of the common,
necessary man in the hne.
  English and American wounded are rest-
less and  their spirits require activity, but
the Frenchman can he in bed month after
month discussing politics, reading, and writ-
ing letters. His stoicism  under great pain
is incredible, and though he  comes from
the humblest of homes, his education gives
him some interest to fall back on. He is
childishly unselfconscious,  and his  imag-
ination  and never-faihng sense  of  humor
make a  game  or joke of misfortune.  He
is always appreciative, refined, and  gentle,
sharing  any  present that may come  for
him with his comrades and never forgetting
to offer some to me.
  When in uniform, Tommy is undoubtedly
more "chic." I have never seen a poilu in
a uniform that fitted him. The long, bulky
overcoat with its long-waisted belt makes 
162        HOSPITAL HEROES
him look like a tramp. "Sac au dos," and
laden with all their impedimenta, they look
like an army  of White Knights walking
out of Alice's "Looking Glass"  world. Their
humor shows in their eyes and  their mental
attitude  about  things, giving expression
and mobility to their faces, which are usu-
ally well modelled and sensitive and almost
never fat. Though my  heart aches when I
see them, they  soon make me forget their
pain in their glory. The French may not
be sports  in our  American  and English
athletic sense  of the  word, but for stoic
endurance, self-sacrifice, and heroism they
are the best of sports. They keep alive the
spirit  of France, though its  morale may
weaken in the rear.
  When  my ward was empty, I went  to
the emergency ward to help with the serious
cases  that could not be moved till the last
minute. The ward is full of feverish men
constantly asking for drinks.  There is one
with a chest wound who, forbidden to speak, 
 EVACUATION OF  AUTO CHIR No. 7  163
calls "Sist!" more loudly than the rest and
more often.  He is from the "midi," and for
some reason, which I have never been able
to  discover, these  "midi"  men are not
popular.* They are usually  the  ones who
swear hysterically and their bodies are tat-
tooed.  "Sist" is  covered  with beautiful
women. I try to rub them out when I give
him a friction, and it always amuses him
to have me say, "Disparu," when I cover
them with  powder so he can blow  it off
again and reveal his fair escort  as before.
"They"  are his wife, so he considers  it
quite all right to have them.
  There  are some who worry about their
temperatures  and  almost turn their faces
inside  out  trying  to see  their  eyes and
tongues at  the same time  in tiny cracked
mirrors. Three "amputes" owe their lives
to orderlies  who gave some  of their blood
for  a transfusion.  "They are going to do

 *The troops who retreated when the Germans took Alsace-
Lorraine were from the midi. Hence their reputation as cowards. 
164        HOSPITAL HEROES
a confusion," one of the English told me,
and  it was a good description.  The blood
is carried by instalments in a syringe from
one end  of the room to the other, as the
orderly is put in  the first unoccupied bed,
and  the  one to  be  saved is usually  far
up in  the ward, near the stove. There is
a large audience of doctors,  medical  stu-
dents, infirmieres, ministerielles,  and order-
lies.
  Smoking is forbidden  in  this  ward  of
"grands  blesses," but one day  I found a
package half-full on Erard the "artilleur's"
table. He has a  Carrel  tube in his  head
which he calls a telephone and reprimands
me for using it so often. When  I took his
cigarettes, he said:
  "They are good to eat, my friends. Didn't
I tell  you?  See, the little  Mademoiselle
wants to try  the rest."
  The  wounds were of all kinds, one man
often having  several. Sometimes they have
lain  neglected for  days  before  being  dis- 
EVACUATION  OF AUTO CHIR No. 7  165
covered.  One of them who had a frightful
back  told me he had received additional
wounds while waiting to be picked up. The
Germans had a habit of slashing and shoot-
ing the wounded as they passed over them.
As  I  looked  at the inevitable  "eclats"
treasured by  the  men,  I learned about
shells and bullets.
  Shell wounds were frequent, an "eclat
d'obus"  often tearing a whole limb away,
for these shells are intended  to  destroy
fortified  towns. Shrapnel is for people.  It
is  a metal case holding dozens of bullets,
perhaps  a half-inch in diameter,  packed
by  hand, carrying  a  charge  of explosives
timed to  burst when it reaches its destina-
tion. Being smooth and round,  the bullets
go  through  soft tissue without much in-
jury,  but when they strike  a  bone  they
flatten and cause frightful pain. There is a
barbaric  German bullet, short and pointed,
which  when it strikes  turns  a  somersault
and goes in  backward. The base having 
166        HOSPITAL HEROES
been thus protected spreads, and the result
is ghastly.
  Sheets are hung around the beds of the
dying, and the priest comes quietly through
the back door, but every one knows what
has happened. It is  hard to be  cheerful
in this ward of strain and silence, and yet
I feel more one of them, as if I had earned
the right to  be "Sister," as the English call
their mihtary nurses.
  There were a few British wounded before
we left. They were hurt by bombardments
or accidents on their way to the front. In
the evening they would  gather in groups
for close harmony,  singing  hymns  and
other melancholy selections.  They asked
me to join  them, but I hated to  spoil it,
and, besides, did not care for their pathetic
strains.  Perhaps they were  chosen out of
respect to the more serious cases or maybe
every Tommy is sentimental under a gruff
and hearty exterior. 
CHAPTER   X
  ARRIVAL  OF  THE  BRITISH
           FIFTH  ARMY
^T^HE long-rumored arrival of the British
 -*-  became an actual fact. Khaki-clad
troops  passed our hospital, swinging along
to various gay tunes played by the first
band I had heard outside of a  vaudeville
since I came to France. They  were quite
a contrast to the silent marching of the
French as they returned,  gray  and tired,
from their hard winter in the  trenches.
The smart-looking officers might have been
riding  in Hyde Park, so httle did they sug-
gest the  ghastliness of the war  they were
going  into.  With every button  on  every
Tommy's uniform  shining and  even the
harness  on the work-horses gleaming in
the  sun, they  all  looked as if  they were
                   167 
168        HOSPITAL HEROES
off on a lark. And yet their English voices
singing  songs  I  had often sung at home
made war seem nearer.
  The road was a whirl of action. Army
scouts hurried noisily by on motorcycles.
Military motor-cars and  ambulances sped
by.  An  occasional   London  motor-bus
crowded with  more singing boys rumbled
past, followed by heavy lorries, groaning and
creaking, cannon, kitchen and ammunition
wagons moving slowly, with a cloud of dust
behind.
  The men  seemed very young, even the
officers. It was good to hear English  and
we talked if they halted near us.  There
was no presentiment of tragedy.  Perhaps
they did not realize, but  I think they did,
and it was  just their courageous way  of
doing their  bit.  I shall  never  forget the
heroic and inspiring impression  they made
with their shining buttons as they marched
singing  into one  of  the  worst slaughters
of the  war.  How terribly  few of these 
              The arrival  of  the British Fifth Army.
Khaki-clad troops passed our hospital, swinging along to various gay tunes. 
• 
       THE BRITISH FIFTH ARMY    169
  cheereo" young  men ever returned from
this march. The song they sang most often
I shall always remember:

"There's a long, long trail a-winding into the land
     of my dreams
  Where the nightingales are singing and the white
     moon beams.
  There's a long, long night of waiting until my
     dreams all come true
  Till the day when I'll be going down that long,
     long trail with  you."

And  we  never thought  so many  would
pass into the land of  dreams without any
more waiting.
  Having nothing to do  for a week, owing
to the necessity of  waiting for "permission"
to move to another part of the war zone,
we  walked through the  country.  Except
for  the  exercise and being outdoors,  I did
not enjoy  this much.  The front seems so
far  away from everything one has  grown
to expect in life. The perpetual mud gives
the landscape a lugubrious expression. It 
170        HOSPITAL  HEROES
seems a place set apart  by a curtain of
rain.  One walks  on  and on  through  a
monotonous flat land of vast mistiness and
black crows,  while  the guns stir up the
quiet atmosphere  with their pounding like
a melancholy storm.
  One day Madame G---- and I set out
for Ham, a town  of about three thousand
inhabitants before the war, situated on the
River Somme, in a marshy country. We
started in an ambulance, but as it was for-
bidden to  carry passengers, we were shut
out of sight with the back flap down. This
was  not interesting, so we soon got out
and  tried  our luck again. This time,  I
stopped an English officer in a Rolls-Royce.
In my embarrassment, I said:
  "Oh, I am so sorry! I would never have
stopped you if I  had  known. I never ex-
pected there  would be a  staff-officer so
near the front."
  "We leave  Paris  now and then if it is
quite worth while,  but  what a  shocking 
      THE  BRITISH  FIFTH ARMY    171
bad opinion you have of us. What, what ?"
He laughed  and took  us in.
  The streets of Ham were like a pageant.
French poilus rubbed elbows with British
officers,  American Red Cross men strolled
along with Scotchmen in  kilts. There was
even a troop of  Chinese  coolies. The few
shops exhibited  large supplies  of  wrist-
watches and wedding-rings with every-day
necessities of life. Tobacco was scarce. A
long hne extended into the street from the
one shop that had any for sale.
  The only  ruin was  the chateau,  founded
in the tenth century,  with a great tower as
its distinguishing feature. It had been used
as a state prison, having had among other
inmates Jeanne d'Arc and Louis  Napoleon.
Later, it was used as barracks until  the
Boches destroyed most of  it, leaving a vast
mass of stone partly blocking the canal.
  We returned on top  of a high-seated farm-
wagon. There was a springlike mist in  the
air, though it was only February,  and  the 
172        HOSPITAL HEROES
distance  seemed to fade  into soft pastel
colors like a sunset. I never saw so many
magpies. They gave contrast to the  pale
shades of the country as if on purpose.
  Another day I had  luncheon  in  Noyon,
a town twice the size of Ham, situated on
the slopes of a hill in Oise. This had been
the German headquarters at the beginning
of the war, so the buildings were almost
all spared,  and clustered around an open
square with a fine old hotel de ville and
a  twelfth-century  cathedral.  There  are
many shops and the streets were crowded.
We had  to have tea in a kitchen, as the
tea-rooms were full of officers and canteen
women.
  We followed the  remains  of  an  old
Roman wall to some cemeteries. The Ger-
man graves were forlorn and neglected, with
rough wooden  crosses and numbers  in con-
trast  to  the  festive wreaths and  flowers
of the French. A  German inscription on
a large tomb in which many had been buried 
       THE BRITISH  FIFTH ARMY    173
showed that they were not all ignored and
forgotten. These German graves depressed
me. It seemed so sad to be left in the land
of their enemy far from their homes with
no one to care. After all, they were victims
of the same militarism that was hurting us
all, only  more unfortunate because they
were on the wrong side, pledged to follow
false leaders.
  On the way back we were picked up by
two Tommies in a motor-lorry. They were
so glad to  speak  English  again  that  we
were entertained all the way. Among other
topics, the  name of Lafayette was men-
tioned.
  "I say, Sister," one of them began, "who
is this Lafayette chap you  Americans and
French talk so much about?"
  As I hesitated to resurrect the old enmity,
the other quickly spared me:
  "Why, don't  you know? Thought every-
body  had heard of  him.  He's  the famous
English conjurer and lion-tamer that made 
174        HOSPITAL HEROES
such a hit on the stage eight or ten years
ago. Haven't  you  heard of him?  He  was
burned to death in a fire. Famous, that's
what he was, the greatest conjurer Eng-
land ever had."
  An English  colonel and staff entertained
us in a half-ruined cottage near the avia-
tor's  grave. Although we  went  in three
divisions,  we  were  rather overpowering.
Just before our arrival, the  colonel told
us a general had appeared and had been
almost shoved from the door so he would
not see the table spread with the best  tea-
party I had seen since my arrival. It was far
more complete and delicious than  any  one
could find in pastryless Paris.  There were
white bread  (a most unheard-of  luxury),
pastry,  confitures,  toast,  and plenty of
butter and sugar.  I could  hardly  wait for
the party to begin, and felt the way I did
at my very first party when the hostess had
discovered me sitting on the floor  in front
of the dining-room door instead of playing 
       THE BRITISH FIFTH ARMY    175
games with the other children because I was
"waiting for the party."
  When our order to depart finally arrived,
the colonel gave  a farewell party to six of
us, a dinner as complete and unexpected as
the tea had been, with  everything marvel-
lous even  to  a savory. The  menus  were
printed on crested paper under the  title:
" 42d  Field Ambulance B.  E. F.  Diner  a
l'Equipe Americaine, Auto Chir No. 7."
  We  gathered around an  open fire  (an-
other  treat)  afterward and  listened  to
a  Victor  while the orderlies  cleared the
kitchen for dancing.  We had to  use the
few good dance records over and over again.
I will never hear the "Blue Danube" and
the "Broken  Doll"  without thinking of
that evening spent so gayly five miles  from
the German lines in a country soon to be
taken by Von Hutier's first  offensive.  I do
hope my friends came through.
  To  punish  us  for staying  out  so  late,
the sheet  partitions  were  packed  while 
176        HOSPITAL HEROES
we dressed next morning.  The interior of
our barracks looked like a series of stage-
settings for  moving  pictures,  the  incon-
gruous sights one  sees  at the Universal
City in Cahfornia being the only approach
to the impression we gave, each one busily
occupied with something that had no con-
nection with  what  went  on beside her.
The beds and wash-stands stood awkwardly
with no wall to lean against and  account
for their miscellaneous positions. Everything
happened   at random,   while  along  the
centre aisle  the  sheets  were  folded and
laid in piles  by those who were  through
packing. The directrice, being tired, stayed
in bed and gave orders as unconcernedly as
if she were on a throne.
  Before leaving Cugny,  where I had lived
so long and  constantly  without interrup-
tion, I went to a little hill to  say  good-by
to some carrier-pigeons  and the two men
in charge.  Here every one  talks to every
one. All barriers are broken down by the 
       THE BRITISH  FIFTH ARMY    177
great common interest. An American doc-
tor went with me, and we arrived just as
the wagon was moving away. A horse had
been  hitched to it  and it was going "en
repos" hke the  rest  of the Third  Army,
which had done  its duty all  winter, and
I do  not  know  how  long it had been in
active service before I joined it.
  The English loft was ready to take its
place, an  old motor-bus  fixed over  inge-
niously into a little house. Two men could
live in the lower part with bunks on one
side and kitchen on the other, instead of
camping  outside in a tent, as the French
had  done.  On top were the pigeons  in a
loft similar to the French, with the same
little  bell  arrangement to  announce  the
return of  each  messenger. It  seemed like
a boat drifting along independent  of the
massed formation of the rest of the army.
These birds had helped in several important
battles in  Belgium. I wished they  could
have talked, for the men were so thoroughly 
178        HOSPITAL HEROES
Scotch  it  was impossible to  understand
them. One must know many languages in
this  war,  and one of the most  difficult is
English with  all its  accents. There is  a
store on the Rue de Rivoli in Paris with a
sign  "English  Spoken. American Under-
stood."
  Carrier-pigeons have played a great part
in this war. The French appreciated their
value in the last war, when, during the siege
of Paris, they  were the  only communica-
tion  possible  with  the outside world. And
yet, with the coming of wireless telegraphy,
the use  of these little messengers was sup-
posed to have passed, and if it had  not
been for  the  interest in  racing  pigeons
maintained by fanciers in France, Belgium,
and  England, there would have been no
trained birds for this war.
  Among  the  many  new inventions we
still  need  old-fashined methods, and keep
the  old-time  bayonets,  hand-grenades,
and pigeons. These birds did not look  like 
       THE BRITISH  FIFTH  ARMY    179
the ones  we  call  carrier,  with  scrawny
build,  ragged feathers, and  homely  beak
and eyes. They were  cultivated as racing
homers,  and  are  small,  well  built,  with
beautiful feathers. They did  not look like
soldiers as they cooed and murmured  com-
fortably in  their clean loft.  They seemed
too frail and beautiful to be sent  into the
thick  of battles, and  yet  even they had
their part  to  play in  the  big  war drama
that called all to serve and spared no one.
  Our   equipe  separated,  some going to
Paris or the Riviera for a vacation, others
to Ressons-sur-Matz with  the  supplies, it
being our official place of "repos." Not far
from Compiegne, it was considered out of
danger, and yet it soon became the front,
and some of our supplies were lost.
  It was a great privilege to  take a course
at Doctor  Carrel's hospital installed  in  a
hotel on the edge  of  the  forest of Com-
piegne.  It was so clean and well equipped
after our Auto Chir that it was worth see- 
180        HOSPITAL HEROES
ing, though the wounds were not as interest-
ing as ours had been. The course consisted
in lectures, some of which were illustrated
with  colored plates  and practical demon-
strations as we watched the surgeon on his
round of dressings, all of which were done
in bed. He was assisted by two infirmieres,
the matron, the doctor from the laboratory
to take a blood-test  each  time, and  two
orderlies. With all of  us and several other
"stagiaires" there was quite a crowd, but
blesses love an  audience.
  The laboratory  work, examining  the
germs through a powerful magnifying-glass,
and making the Dakin solution, completed
the "stage," after which we went to the
"Mission de 1'Ambrine" which  Madame la
Baronne de Rothschild had installed in an
old convent. While taking the courses we
lived at a hotel opposite the  chateau where
the Etat-Major was located. We used to
sit at the window and watch the staff-cars
and gold-striped uniforms of all the  Allied 
      THE  BRITISH FIFTH ARMY    181
forces. They brought the glamour of war
to remind us that armies were not entirely
composed of muddy tramps in misfit uni-
forms. The  officers added to the "once-
upon-a-time"  impression of the  historic
chateau and park. Built during the  times
of Louis XV and  Louis XVI on the site
of an old hunting-lodge of the Frankish
kings, it is very soothing and peaceful with
its vine-covered arbors after the mud and
shattered fragments of the front.
  The cathedrals  have  many beautiful
stained-glass windows   illustrating  scenes
from the fife of Jeanne d'Arc, who was cap-
tured here  by  the Burgundians  and de-
livered to the English. 
           CHAPTER  XI
              EN REPOS
    THE night before we left for Paris, the
     French  "avions"  made a  raid  on
the German headquarters.  Therefore the
following night the enemy retaliated, and,
although they did not succeed in hitting
the chateau, our  hotel was struck and my
room lost its wall.
  Paris was not a  comfortable place at
this time.   Food  restrictions  were  more
severe. Pastry, candy, and sugar had dis-
appeared.  Bread cards  were  a  necessity
even in hotels. There was no cream or milk
after nine o'clock a. m., not even for cooking.
One could  eat nothing between the hours
of two and six in the  afternoon, which re-
duced  tea-parties to a lonely cup of  tea
or  chocolate made with water and served
                    182 
               EN REPOS            183
without cream or sugar. A few places started
to serve figs and  dates in place of  sand-
wiches, but this was stopped immediately.
Every one carried  his own sugar-box, even
to private houses. In  the hotels a waiter
made the rounds with a bottle of saccharine,
giving a  spoonful to  those who  had no
sugar. One day when I had forgotten  my
little box, which was supplied indirectly by
the American Commissary Department, a
French aviator with a "croix de  guerre"
and long  ribbon of palms offered  me  his.
The "bonne camaraderie" of the front had
come  to Paris.
  Paris was in fact in the war zone. The
German offensive had begun on March 21,
under  Von Hutier, striking the British on
the southern flank, not unexpectedly, but
with invincible violence and superior num-
bers. Where the Fifth Army had been there
opened up a thinly defended area which
almost allowed the  Germans to realize their
dream of reaching Amiens and Paris. 
184         HOSPITAL HEROES
  A French officer reported that our little
village of  Cugny had been bombarded
heavily  shortly after our departure,  and
that forty people  were killed. As I did not
imagine there were that many inhabitants,
it must have been wiped out of existence.
Later, a British officer who had been sent
to our  former hospital, wounded in the
arm, told  how the British had set fire  to
it as the enemy approached so they would
not profit by our supplies. Evidently the
Germans had  been counting on using  it
themselves, having spared it in all the raids
while we were there. When they saw it  in
flames, they were  so enraged that they shot
the doctors and  bayoneted  the wounded
before they could be hurried off in a train
that was waiting.
  I like to hear the English  tell their ex-
periences.  They are  so  frank and uncon-
scious of heroism. The  war  is  hunting  or
cricket to them,  and, though they rather
wish it was being played in England, they 
               EN REPOS            185
do not complain as long as they can run
back to Paris now and then for a bath and
good  dinner. This officer told me calmly
that he had been sent to Ham with a few
men to load some barbed wire on a lorry.
As they drew near the  town, a shot was
fired at them from behind a house. He left
his  ten men in shelter  while he went on
"to have a look in, as it  seemed a bit odd."
The  town was full of Boches, who fired at
them with machine guns as they crawled
all the way back to Cugny in the ditches
of the unprotecting road.
  A  world of cosmopolitan uniforms has
almost obliterated the  old Paris  of the
Louis and Napoleons. Their beautiful city
of harmonious buildings, row after row of
graystone carved into  fragile designs or
columns,  with wide avenues and parks full
of statues, has been turned into a city of
khaki and sand-bags. The  great doors of
Notre Dame, the Arc de Triomphe, Napo-
leon's column in the Place  Vendome, and 
186        HOSPITAL HEROES
the statues in  the Place de la Concorde,
around the Opera and in the Tuileries are
all disguised by a defense of sand-bags. And
yet the wine-like atmosphere is ever there,
making it still a city of romance.
  Sometimes torches were set in the ground
filling the air with a heavy black fog in an
attempt  to cover Paris with a protecting
cloud. In the Bois de Boulogne and Luxem-
bourg  Gardens  were a few balloons  like
those used for observation, but lacking the
basket for  the  observer. When floating
high at night,  many wires were dropped
and a fence formed, circling the  city with
a barrage of wire less dangerous  to  its in-
habitants than  the shrapnel of  the anti-
aircraft guns.
  The  cafes in the Bois and along  the
Champs-Elysees  had not opened  as  yet
after the winter. The theatres would often
have to stop performances scarcely  begun
because of an air-raid. It would  not have
paid the  managers to issue rain checks, as 
               EN REPOS            187
it rained bombs so often. With nothing to
do, the first charm of my vacation  wore
off when the luxuries of civilization ceased
to be a novelty. I joined an "ouvroir" at
the Porte Dauphine, where artificial limbs
were made by hand  out of papier-mache.
It made me happy to feel that I was still
working for them "jusqu'au bout."
   The city at night was even darker than
last summer. Very few of the street-lamps
were lighted, and  these,  under  dark-blue
shades, did not shine far. A lighted car or
even a flash-light  carried by a pedestrian
aroused  a  protesting  cry  of  "Pas  de
lumiere!" One had to  feel one's way in
utter gloom under the archways  that line
the streets. Among so many fears, no single
one predominates  enough  to  make  one
afraid.  People  are cautioned to  go into
places  of safety during air-raids to escape
the falling shrapnel from  the antiaircraft
guns as well as bombs dropped from the
aeroplanes. Hotels and other  large build- 
188        HOSPITAL HEROES
ings open  their  corridors  and  cellars  to
the public,  marking on the outside wall
how many can be accommodated in each
"abri." Every entrance to the underground
railroads has  "refuge"  over  it in large
letters of the usual blue. Trains stop, and
the civilians crowd  into the  Metro and
Nord-Sud stations  to  wait for the  "All
clear" to be sounded by the firemen.
  Air-raids  occurred  almost every  night
and  sometimes twice in the same night.
The damage done  was  greater than  the
one-sheet  newspapers  admitted, but re-
pairs  were  quickly  made, so  there was
scarcely a  trace  of  the nightly tragedy.
The "alerte" is given as  soon as an enemy
plane is reported  to have crossed the front
lines.  At the warning shriek of  the  sirens
and horns blown by firemen as their red
cars speed through  the city, the  people
disappear from the streets and upper stories
of houses like ants into ant-hills. They say
it is easy for the German aviators to find 
               EN REPOS            189
Paris by following the  black  spot  of  the
Forest of Compiegne and the river.
  The "gothas" are so  high that one can
scarcely hear the  machine guns  on  the
planes or  the hum of the motors,  as one
can  when  they fly low overhead  at  the
front. Signal-lights like white and red stars
move about, and the rumbling of the anti-
aircraft cannon goes  on  in the distance.
When a bomb falls there is a flash of light
and  a great  crash and  crunching  sound.
Except when these deafening bangs occur
near by, it all seems far away  and unreal.
Night after night of interrupted sleep wore
on the people so that there was an exodus
of families with children  and wounded from
the hospitals. Except for a few people who
drew their money from  the banks, there
was  no sign of panic, though the Germans
were advancing every day.
  After one night of a few hours' sleep owing
to raids, I was awakened at half past  six
by a crash. Wondering how the "gothas" 
190         HOSPITAL HEROES
dared appear in daylight, I strolled out into
the street, where groups of sleepy, surprised
people were gathered together scanning the
sky, which was perfectly clear. Not quite
daring to return  to  my room on the  top
floor, I breakfasted at Rumplemeyers, where
I discussed the situation with a Salvation
Army woman, a Russian officer in civilian
clothes  (they  all went  into disguise after
their revolution),  and  the  madame  who
was vainly  trying to  lure her  waitresses
back from the street.
  "Come back here,  all of you," she called
hke a distracted hen. "Why do  you insist
upon standing out there listening  to all the
horrible  stories  those  people tell? They
will make you believe that the Kaiser him-
self is coming here for breakfast.  Voyons!"
  By noon we learned that Paris was being
bombarded by a long-range gun, carrying
seventy-five miles from Laon, the  nearest
point of the German army. After another
advance the cannon  was moved nearer and 
               EN REPOS            191
fired from the Forest of St. Gobain. The
shell was not as large as one would expect,
and the sound scarcely more than that of
a cork popping unless  it fell near by. For
several  days  a shot came  every  fifteen
minutes, and the people grew so accustomed
to it that strangers  in cafes  would bet or
have heated arguments as  to how  many
seconds over or under  fifteen minutes Big
Bertha was  coming.
  The damage done  by the long-range gun
was not as  great as that  done during  the
air-raids, and  yet it  added considerably to
the nervous strain and depression of spend-
ing part of  every night in cellars, reading
news of the German advance through all
the "France reconquise"  of the year  be-
fore, and being in  danger  every  fifteen
minutes or half-hour of the  day. It was a
difficult test for even the strongest to stand.
When the church of St. Gervais was struck,
on  Good Friday, and some  of my friends
had to search  every  hospital  and even the 
192        HOSPITAL HEROES
morgue for missing members of their fami-
lies, I did not blame any one  who left for
the sunny  south. I longed to be safe  at
the front again. There, at least, one could
feel that the  "gothas" might not  hit a
hospital,  but in  Paris one could  not help
realizing  that each bomb was  intended  to
kill as many people as possible. It makes
one a fatalist, this feeling that only Provi-
dence or luck saves each moment from being
the last. How could one tell which way  to
go when any direction might prove fatal ?
  And yet,  in spite of the unconquerable
confidence in the future and the calm poise
of the people, the shadow of war has fallen
on the city. Both times I was in Paris when
the morale was depressed, and  I am glad I
stayed long enough to adjust  my impres-
sions and separate the real from the false,
the brave native soul  of the city  from the
war-corrupted forms that covered it, washed
back from the battles of many nations  at
war in one country. 
               EN REPOS            193
  Paris is so far removed from the action
and  courage of the  front that the  unfit
and  afraid, the despair  of  the refugees,
the poverty and worry and sorrow of the
women, the careless attitude of the wounded
and soldiers on leave, all help  to give the
impression of a great city dying. Seen from
the streets,  the life of Paris is abnormal
and very  tired, full of unrestrained loving
and cadaverous faces with haunted  eyes.
People  almost  fall asleep  as they trudge
along in dowdy clothes, and cabs run riot-
ously, with no traffic regulations. There is
no conscience in  these  people  who  have
been through unspeakable sorrow and  pain,
and no consequences to be feared. A frantic
effort is made by exiles and all the home-
sick  soldiers who expect to die  soon to
crowd  as  much pleasure of any kind into
what time remains. They have been through
the worst  and nothing matters.
  Everywhere  houses are  closed  or for
rent; even some of the large buildings that 
194        HOSPITAL HEROES
had been used as hospitals are now vacant.
The  shop-windows  hide  their  increasing
emptiness behind fantastic designs made of
pieces of paper pasted in long strips across
the glass  to prevent breakage by concus-
sion during air-raids. In  the homes of titled
people one finds them fiving in large houses
half closed,  the walls dismantled  and the
treasured heirlooms, tapestries, and pictures
sent  away to the south for safe-keeping.
One or two servants are all that remain of
the once luxurious establishments, but there
is no entertaining, so the work is hght. The
French are taking the war as seriously as
they formerly took  life frivolously;  many
of the women who were accustomed  to
ease and luxury are now  hard at  work in
hospitals. I know one white-haired countess
who was an invalid before the war, and is
now head of a hospital of six hundred beds.
  The French gayety and  enthusiasm seem
to have  burnt  out,  but  underneath  the
dreary exterior a keen patriotism still fives, 
                EN REPOS            195
 unhurt by war and its evil effects, strength-
 ened by the nobility of its past, and looking
 forward to new beauty in the future. This
 unconquerable  spirit  is  so  great  that it
 dwarfs the things that cannot spoil it, and
 scatters abnormality and unhealthiness be-
 fore it hke a fresh breeze. The true soul of
 France tries to  show all who are depressed
 that war  cannot  eat  up the  world.  Man
 may try to  destroy himself and  use his
 knowledge to  ruin all, but there are bigger
 things that have a life  he  cannot crush,
 and that will  wait patiently for the storms
 to pass and the real work of the world to
 go on, the broken threads of life to be picked
 up and continued.
  It is easy to love the Paris of peace-time
 with its shaded avenues, built  by  kings
 who had no  scruples about  pushing the
 poor out  of the way. With a genius for
making scenery and architecture harmonize,
they edge their avenues  with long  lines
of  symmetrical  houses   and  colonnades. 
196         HOSPITAL HEROES
But in war-time you must use your imag-
ination and let it carry you  back to the
Paris  that made history.  Let your eyes
follow the domes  and spires up to the sky,
where rainbows and unusual cloud effects
are  ever  changing,  due  to  intermittent
showers. You have only to watch  the sky
to realize where the French artists find in-
spiration.
  There are not enough artists in life. Any
one taking a picture of Paris  at this time
would show a city paralyzed by four years
of war and suffering, the weary heart of
a country that has  given  up caring about
life  and clean things,  a people who just
want to he down and die, resentful of the
American  energy  that is coming in so late
to stir it up again. But an artist is not satis-
fied with plain facts as they appear on the
surface. He penetrates to the  innermost
depths and  finds  the true meaning. Then
he paints a picture with a soul.
  The wide culture and psychological genius 
               EN REPOS            197
of Paris is not dead, only smothered tem-
porarily by a  cloud of nervous pleasure-
seekers who overrun  the city  while  its
heroes are dying at the front. These para-
sites prey upon Paris when it has no vitality
to shake  them off. However, their voices
are not so loud as the real voice that speaks
from the spires of Notre Dame and the
height of the Arc de Triomphe.
  The "repos" of  the Third French Army
was  rudely interrupted, and General Hum-
bert's  reserves  were sent  out to stop the
German advance.  When my orders came
to report for  duty at Compiegne, then
evacuated and  almost in the  hands of the
enemy, every one  said good-by as if they
never expected to see me again. But really
I was  glad to  leave Paris. The  perpetual
bombing  was  horribly  on my  nerves.  I
wanted to go where I could be busy enough
to forget.  I had even envied the concierge
when he stopped cleaning windows, pulled
down  his sleeves,  and apologetically ex- 
198         HOSPITAL HEROES
plained as he ran the elevator that he had
to be "all things" now. One can only en-
dure war when one is not thinking. At the
front there is no time to worry and wonder
where the  shells are falling,  no time  to
think, just a lot of work that must be done
quickly.
  A great many hospitals,  field and base,
had evacuated and were pushing south, so
we  were unable to install  our Auto Chir
until the  offensive was broken  and  the
counter-attacks began. Our supplies,  sup-
posedly left in a safe place, were inaccessible.
In the meantime, we were to help the Amer-
ican Red Cross to care for the refugees, and
to- work in a canteen kitchen at the station.
On  our way out, the roads  were full of the
British  going back,  some  of them being
the sole survivors  of their  companies, and
the French coming up with flowers in their
bayonets and victory in their eyes. 
CHAPTER  XII
     DURING THE  GERMAN
              ADVANCE
^ I^HE houses  along the  railroad near
 *■-  Compiegne were only shells of what
they had been the  last time we made this
trip. There were large  shell-holes  in the
street leading to the hotel,  now occupied
by  the American  Red  Cross.  The hotel
had lost its inside walls and had no running
water,  electric light, or servants. Only sol-
diers and  war workers  were to be seen.
With no mail service, not  even  a news-
paper,  and the civilians gone, the town was
in a pathetic  state of dilapidation.  But it
was not quite empty of its civilian popula-
tion. Here and there would be a dog,  guard-
ing faithfully the door of a crumbling, roof-
less house,  or some  starving cats would cry
in the abandoned streets like lost children.
                   199 
200        HOSPITAL HEROES
  We were appointed various tasks as wait-
resses  and housemaids  in the hotel, and
chauffeurs to collect refugees, wounded, and
supplies. A few of us were sent to care for
the wounded at the station and in an aban-
doned  hospital.  I went  to  the  canteen
kitchen near  the station and crossroads
to  give  coffee,  crackers, chocolate, and
cigarettes to the troops passing through on
foot or driving the big guns  and supply-
wagons. Sometimes we would gather up  a
handful of chocolate and cigarettes and run
into the road among the confusion of guns,
heavy  wheels,  and  horses' hoofs to throw
something to the drivers who were unable
to rejoin the  line around the kitchen on
wheels and its surrounding baskets.
  Usually I would stand all day, giving
cigarettes with  one hand and  chocolate
with the other to fill the endless line  of
outstretched hands. I had to stop sometimes
to remind some  one that  he had  returned
too many times,  and was cheating others 
   DURING THE GERMAN  ADVANCE  201
of their share. They liked to see how often
they could come back without being recog-
nized,  these  poilus ever ready  to  tease.
Sometimes, a former blesse of mine would
greet me  and cheer me on with a work
that was  rather  fatiguing  and  not  very
interesting. One of them  brought  me  a
httle girl "who had fallen from the nest,"
and  could not find her parents. She  had
golden curls and such an appealing manner
that I wanted to adopt her,  but had to give
her up  to the Red Cross when  I was re-
minded that my work was with the blesses.
  As the laundry had been destroyed, we
conserved the few uniforms we had brought
with us in answer to the  order: "Bring only
what you can carry." We wore our dark-
blue travelling uniforms with aprons that
once had  been clean, and  tied our dark-
blue veils back as if we were about to sweep
a room. This  was not the  time to worry
about  looking  "reglementaire."  One  did
what one could. 
202        HOSPITAL HEROES
  We  even wore  our uniforms at  night
when we slept in the damp "caves" deep
down  under the  chateau. At first  we
stretched  out on  blankets  on  the moist
stone floor, but later we had canvas beds
like large camp-stools, not comfortable, but
good enough when one was tired standing
up all day. I even kept my boots on because
the dampness made them too wet if I took
them off and left them under the bed. Here
we slept night after night during the  bom-
bardments, English and American canteen
workers, Red Cross men, poilus, all of us
in a long row in the narrow corridor of the
cave.
  At six o'clock we would scramble up the
slippery stairway  several  flights  to the
ground floor, leaving  our  blankets in a dry
place, and hurry to the hotel to wash. This
was  a hope rarely realized, for usually a
shell  would  whistle   menacingly  by the
window, and we would be  ordered to the
wine-cellar under the hotel "toute de suite." 
   DURING THE GERMAN  ADVANCE 203
Here we opened boxes of supplies  for the
canteen workers, and broke chocolate into
pieces until the danger was over. We had
to carry our  gas-masks strapped over our
shoulders wherever we went, as the rumor
was that gas-bombs were being dropped.
  The day nurse at the abandoned hospital
asked for assistance, and I was sent to help
her, though what she really needed was an
orderly. There were gangrene  cases and a
"trepane," and the work was the  hardest
and  most disagreeable I had ever  done.
But  it was so necessary I  liked it better
than the canteen, where I felt like a moving-
picture actress as I ran wildly about among
the heavy  wagons with  my  veil  floating
in the  wind and cigarettes dropping from
my overflowing hands. One English-speak-
ing boy had scribbled:  "Darling, I love
you. Love you myself?" In the hospital I
was treated with respect.  Some ambulance-
drivers  told me afterward that when they
picked up men from these troops later they 
204         HOSPITAL HEROES
invariably  asked  to  be taken  where the
"petites infirmieres" were, so in spite of
their jokes we were evidently appreciated.
  There was one doctor who had remained
at Royallieu  when the hospital had been
evacuated, and one French nurse who had
returned from "permission" after the others
had left. She was shocked at the way things
had been managed.
  "No, mesdames, this was not an evacua-
tion. This hospital was abandoned in great
haste. It is shameful."
  The doctor had no orderhes. There were
a few roaming around quite  intoxicated,
but when  asked to carry water or find food
for  their  own countrymen,  they  always
replied negatively  that they were "of an-
other service." We often gave  the blesses
our lunch. Work with  men dying of gan-
grene-poisoning does not make one hungry,
and most  of them were too hurt or feverish
to eat much. But even water was hard to
get.  WTe  wasted time and energy  looking 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE 205
for the simple necessities that are usually
taken for granted in a hospital. So many
dressings and  operations had  to  be done
with the same meagre supply of instruments
that I was always cleaning and sterilizing
them. But that was  better than  helping
the doctor, for the odor of gangrene is be-
yond human endurance in a ward  with the
windows  closed.  Even matches were hard
to get and we  needed our lamp every min-
ute for sterilizing and hot drinks. We could
only do as the doctor ordered to  the  best
of our ability with what material we could
find or invent, tumbling into  our cots in
the dark each night after  the  others had
fallen asleep.
   We were relieved at eight o'clock by the
night nurse and  drove  back by  "camio-
nette" to the caves. The sky was red where
the roar of artillery showed the fighting was
going on. It seemed very near. We knew
the bridge was mined and that we might
have to  leave at a moment's  notice.  Day 
206        HOSPITAL  HEROES
after day this life went on with no change,
not  even of  clothing.  I was  too  tired to
worry about  the poor  dying blesses or the
danger. The feeling of it all being a dreadful
nightmare  from  which  we  must  waken
acted as a narcotic. It seemed too unreal
and  too unnatural to last.
  Early in April, the French reserves began
their counter-attacks to break the German
offensive. These battles were so costly that
we had to work night  and day, sometimes
thirty-six hours without  a rest and  only
a little food  snatched quickly  before  an
orderly appeared announcing:  "Encore des
entrants!"
  Our Auto Chir was installed in barracks
near the one  in which I had been working.
As soon as the first ward was ready we
moved our blesses into it, those that still
lived. The task of reinstalling an evacuated
hospital at  a  moment's notice  with  blesses
arriving all the time was gigantic. Madame
Carrel  gave  us some  supplies  from  her 
   DURING  THE  GERMAN ADVANCE  207
hospital, which had been bombed. We spent
many days carrying mattresses and making
bed after  bed, in one ward after another,
in the confusion  of conflicting  and  con-
tradictory orders.
  "These mattresses must not  be  used
here. The whole ward will have to be done
over with the mattresses in the  next pa-
vilion." Or  the  medecin-chef  would say,
"There are  too many beds in this  room"
or "Those beds must all be taken  out of
here. They belong to the officers' ward at
the end of the pavilion."
  When there was time, we slept and ate
in a barrack of brick and cement like the
wards at the end of the row of "pavilions."
The place suggested  a  prison  more than
anything else. At  first there were no sheets
for our beds, eight in a room with no parti-
tions, but as we were  always chilly and
damp living in such a  cellar,  we did  not
mind  sleeping in  our clothes. Behind each
bed was a shelf running around the room 
208         HOSPITAL HEROES
on which to unpack  whatever we might
need in  a  hurry.  These shelves  were an
untidy smattering of soap, condensed milk,
cigarettes, powder, malted-milk tablets, a
tooth-brush, a candle, and almost anything.
Our possessions were reduced to the lowest
common denominator, the rest being stowed
under the bed.
  Our only needs were sleep and food. Even
these  were  not always obtainable.  It  is
hard for eight people to be quiet, or should
I say, eight women ? Some one writes letters
by a  flickering candle,  some  one snores,
some one makes a hot  drink, and others
gossip about people at home. As for food,
mouse-trap cheese and rancid butter seemed
to be ever with us. Potatoes were the vege-
table, and  eggs or tinned food the meat.
Confiture was available but there was only
enough for  one turn. Being so poor in qual-
ity, the food did not give us an appetite;
quite  the contrary. After  each meal  we
would make coffee or chocolate and smoke 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE  209
to fill up the gaps. I shall never scorn" Fati-
mas" or "Lucky Strikes," for they helped
to "keep  the  home-fires burning" at this
critical time.
  Pinning  two strips of red flannel on  a
towel, we put up  a flag by the first "pa-
vilion" so that the ambulance-drivers would
know where to  leave  the wounded. Ours
must have been the only field-hospital for
miles around,  for they kept arriving, from
various services,  French  and  American,
leaving broken bodies with bandages half
fallen off the  hastily dressed wounds, re-
turning again and again with  more.  We
had  only room for the worst cases, mostly
hemorrhages, so the less serious were sent
farther south to a base-hospital.
  I went  on twenty-four-hour duty in the
triage, or receiving-room. Every other night
is enough for sleep, and I used the rest of
my off-duty time to help unpack boxes of
supplies or do odd jobs in the "salle de
pansements," where dressings were done so 
210        HOSPITAL HEROES
continually that things could not be  pre-
pared fast enough. It would have been im-
possible to sleep in the daytime with every
one coming into the room.
  The triage is kept warm  with a stove
that  heats  water for  the  washing  and
hot-water bags. There  are rests  for  five
stretchers, and beside each  a httle table
with basin,  soap, brushes, and towels. A
meagre  supply  of hot-water bags hang on
nails along the  wall.  Towels and shirts are
kept on shelves at one end  of the room. At
the other, near  the window, is a long table
with benches where  the sergeant and his
orderlies, all of  them priests,  write the his-
tories of the men who are brought in. They
also print beautifully lettered signs to be put
on doors of offices and wards. Opposite their
table is my dressing-cart with a large supply
of bottles, compresses, bandages, and cotton,
with an alcohol-lamp on a shelf continually
burning to sterilize syringes and needles.
  Only  five  men  can be attended to at a 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE 211
time, so some have to wait in the next room,
where the stretchers and blankets are kept.
There  they  lie, moaning and  begging for
water,  until the "brancardiers" carry them
into the  triage, where they are undressed
and washed  by the two  "laveurs" and me
as quickly as  possible, given an injection
of  antitetanus and  any  other  "piqure"
needed to stimulate them. Sometimes  a
500-grammes saline injection is necessary.
The great need and hope that  an injection
may give them less pain or even save their
fives made this task less difficult,  though
I had  dreaded it so much a  few months
before  in  the  ward when  it was time for
the  second   antitetanus  "piqure."  The
desire to help overcame my former reluc-
tance and I was very generous with strych-
nia, morphia,  and  camphorated oil. How-
ever,  after  twenty-four  hours of this  I
would  sometimes come to  the  dining-room
pinching  my arms, automatically looking
for a place to insert a needle. 
212        HOSPITAL HEROES
  Reinforcing  the dressings  was another
hard part of my work. Most of the blesses
had  received first-aid treatment, but the
ride  in a jolting  ambulance had loosened
their dressings, so that  some of them fell
off, and all were soaked through with blood.
Many hemorrhages had  to be stopped.
  One time I had to put several compresses
in a large hole in a man's back while he
leaned  forward on  the  stretcher. Fearing
that the strain might be too great, I stopped
in the midst of my extempore dressing to
look around at  him. What was my  sur-
prise to see him white and hollow-eyed but
smoking a cigarette!
  An officer, not to be outdone, fumbled
among his "effets" for  an old newspaper,
which he held upside down waiting for an
operation from which he did not recover.
  There  were  so many being brought in
all the time that the operating-room  was
always full. Some of the blesses had to
wait, lying on stretchers many hours until 
   DURING THE GERMAN  ADVANCE 213
there was a  vacancy.  There were plenty
of "aides-majors"  to do the dressings but
few surgeons to operate.
  Some of the men were sent to the X-ray
first to have the position of pieces of shell
marked on their bodies and data recorded.
There were more of these  "radioscopies"
done in a rush than plates photographed.
I would sometimes have to stand by the
table to hold a dehrious  blesse who threw
himself about, as the "radiographe" had his
hands full with his complicated apparatus.
  I would make a hst of the most urgent.
Sometimes I  would take a  serious case to
the operating-room myself right away, hold-
ing one end of the stretcher and kneeling
on the floor by the door regardless of mud
to keep frantic hands  from scratching an
open wound.
  Sometimes   German  prisoners   were
brought in. One would expect  them to be
coolly received in  the  midst of so many
suffering Frenchmen, and I marvelled at 
214        HOSPITAL HEROES
the great humanity that made the doctors
and orderlies care for their enemies as well
as their own  countrymen. In spite of the
many atrocities one hears, these prisoners
always said, "Thank you very much," in
French, when  I gave them hypodermics,
which according to their Kultur might have
been poison. With their hats off they are
not a bit impressive or fierce. Their heads
are flat in the back, as if things had been
left out. When  one of them was  dying, I
did not put him on the urgent list, think-
ing the French more important. But a doc-
tor came in and hurried him off right away.
  Returning from the "radio" or operating-
room after accompanying the stretchers to
open doors, keeping some one from falhng
off, or reminding the "brancardiers" with a
"Doucement!" that they were not jogging
along swinging bags, I would make a hasty
survey of the two waiting-rooms to see if
there  were  any hemorrhages or if a "pi-
qure" was needed. 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE  215
  In the triage there would always be new
arrivals waiting, and  each  must  have a
nasal injection and gargle preparatory to
his operation, a clean shirt,  and hot-water
bag if there was one left. I had to collect
and redistribute them  among  the most
urgent. To shuffle five among fifty-five men
or  more arriving in a  night took  careful
management.'
  There was enough work for several "in-
firmieres," but I never called for assistance,
because every one else  was  working over-
time in her department. The arduous task
of doing so many things at once over and
over again,  and being in several rooms at
the same time, acted as a panacea at this
time of danger and anxiety. It was stiff,
dirty work, not  sympathetic, as the ward
had been. There were no smiles here, only
moaning  and  writhing  and  an occasional
stoic "It is going better now. Thank you,"
that was almost harder  to bear than com-
plaining or delirious crying. 
216        HOSPITAL HEROES
  The conscious were the hardest to watch,
for they were so brave in their agony. The
shell-shocked and delirious  are  mercifully
dulled to pain. The sight of so many mangled
bodies is appalling, some carried face down-
ward, and all suffering excruciating  torture
from more than one wound. There is little
complaining or  swearing, only a low moan-
ing sound of a  hurt  animal,  broken by
sharp cries of "O, la, la, how I suffer!" or
some feverish one talking about his  wife or
mother.
  "Mademoiselle, I am the last my parents
have.  Don't let me  leave them. The others
are killed. I must go back to them." I had
scarcely time to  reassure  him when from
the next stretcher would come frightened
cries of "The Boches! the  Boches! they
will get to Paris, my beautiful Paris! They
will assassinate the world, the whole world!"
  Then all would be quiet except for  the
sound of washing as the "laveurs" worked
on and on, and  the  twisting, writhing, and 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE 217
turning of aching bodies in search of the
least painful position. Sometimes a pool of
blood under the stretcher would show that
some  urgent case must be hurried to the
operating-room. Sometimes a pale greenish-
gray color would spread over a white face,
and a gurgling noise would tell me that it
was too late to hurry this  one. The "bran-
cardiers" did not like  to  see me cry, and
I have  seen them hurrying off with  some
blesse, whispering: "Quick! He must not
die here!"
  It was harder to see  the men brought in
wearing their uniforms than it had  been
in the ward when they appeared washed
and  operated, with  clean bandages, the
worst over as a rule and a hopeful con-
valescence  ahead. In my off-duty time I
would  sometimes look  through  the wards
to see how they came through, but I gave
up this idea, as it was too sad to find how
few survived.
  No wonder our newspaper reporters  write 
218        HOSPITAL HEROES
encouraging accounts of the dilapidation of
the German prisoners,  in  spite  of  which
fact war goes on. All men look like tramps
after weeks  and months of  exposure  in the
trenches, with  their faces  gray and tired
and  almost as stiff and muddy  as their
uniforms. They are a pathetic sight in their
uniforms, once  so new and proud, now all
torn, blood-stained, and caked with clayey
yellow mud. The mud clings to their clothes
and hair and wounds. One could knock it
off in lumps. They look  so forlorn lying on
the  straw-covered  stretchers  with   their
hobnailed boots sticking out beyond the
blanket, on  which are sometimes scattered
cigarettes  from  the  precious  supply of  a
kind-hearted ambulance-driver (American,
of course!),  but lying unnoticed before the
staring, unseeing eyes  that  look beyond
with an expression that pleads for  some-
thing we cannot give.
  To realize the poverty of France after
four years of war, one should see the  order- 
   DURING THE  GERMAN ADVANCE  219
lies pulling an exhausted, panting man out
of his clothes instead of ripping them quickly
and letting him save what strength remains
for his  operation. When I hurry to  the
rescue with my scissors, they mutter dis-
approvingly:
  "Mademoiselle is American and does not
know what poverty is. France is too  poor
to give  new uniforms to all these men."
  I would stagger back at the end of my
twenty-four hours to report, with an apron
and often a face  spattered with  blood and
mud, and yet a spirit radiant and unweary
with the thrill  of service. A feeble whisper
of thanks from the lips of a man suffering
untellable agony or the unspoken gratitude
in dying eyes made me realize that the girl
who had started humbly  and  ignorantly
to be in a supply-room  was making good
in a real work.
  The operating goes  on night and  day,
the old cases when there is time and the
new cases always. Our life seemed unreal, 
220        HOSPITAL HEROES
like a series of moving pictures turned very
fast over and over again. All day and all
night the ambulances would rumble in and
out, and more piles of dirty, blood-soaked
clothes would be taken away to be washed
or burned. These little  heaps were  very
sad.  Here  would be a sweater, torn and
stained, made by some loving hands, and
there  a precious band  that  every poilu
wraps around his waist cut ruthlessly and
thrown away.
  As  soon  as blesses could be evacuated,
they were  sent off  in "peniches," the old
boats that used to go  up and down the
Seine  being used instead of trains. Skirting
the banks,  green with budding trees, they
were  safe from Taubes. How restful this
ride must have been!
  The work was  not  an  uninterrupted
series  of horrors.  Even  the  triage had its
diversions.  When  not  busy, the  priests
would make sketches and caricatures. There
was a staff of Annamites in  saffron-colored 
   DURING THE GERMAN ADVANCE  221
uniforms and  red turbans,  who  cleaned
and  swept and  carried stretchers.  They
were  absolutely  ahke  and  seemed little
boys more than grown men. The sergeant
and I had to manage them by pantomime
orders, which was  quite amusing, as they
spoke and understood only a guttural lan-
guage  of  monosyllables.  Generals would
make tours of inspection, and  for a while
some American doctors followed me about
asking me  to  explain  what I was doing.
I had had all  my  training in French and
knew only the French terms for every-
thing. They added  greatly to the confusion
and  made me rather nervous, but  habit
had made me sure  of my work. No matter
what happened I could not lose my sense
of humor, and found it hard not to laugh
when one blesse took out some false teeth
and  solemnly washed them  in the water
I had prepared for  him to gargle.
  For a long while no  mail penetrated to
our new post. Among the first letters that 
 222        HOSPITAL HEROES
 came was one from  a "filleul"  enclosing
 some flowers which he had found on the
 edge of his trench a few kilometres  from
 the German lines.  Imagine a man shooting
 other men, stopping to notice or even being
 able to see flowers, and then send  them to
 a  foreigner who spoke his  language  with
 difficulty  and just happened to take care
 of him for a while when he was hurt!
   My life had been going on indoors  as if
 I were in a tunnel, and it was hard to  real-
 ize that spring had come outside  in  spite
 of war. It seemed ironical and almost cruel
 that flowers could  have the heart to bloom
 and  that  birds could sing  as  merrily as
 they did before these  four years of sadness
 and suffering. Perhaps the earth, neglected
 and unable to produce grain to nourish her
poilus, was doing  her best to  compensate
with flowers for the delight of their souls.
And the poilus, even on the edge of battle-
fields, appreciate her efforts with souls not
weakened  but exalted by war. They  still 
   DURING THE  GERMAN ADVANCE  223
have  eyes  to  see violets  growing on  the
sides  of their  trenches. It will take more
than militarism to conquer these poilus of
France.
  And in the triage, day after day, and
night  after   night,  the   "brancardiers"
shuffled back and forth carrying shattered
pieces of these same poilus to be patched
up and sent back to the trenches. No won-
der Lord Kitchener said:
  "The best soldier is the healed wounded
man who returns to the fire." 
 
 
 
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