I had just got inside when the
door opened and the King came in. He had heard I was coming to see the
Queen and had motored down from Furnes. I was able to satisfy him in a
few minutes on the points he had wanted to see me about and then he
questioned me about friends in Brussels. I suggested to him that it
would probably help our committee in raising funds if he would write an
appeal for help from America. He fell in with the idea at once, and
together we got out an appeal that is to be sent across the water. Where
we sat we could see the British ships shelling the Germans, and the
windows of the dining-room were rattling steadily. The King stood beside
the table with his finger tips resting on the cloth, watching the stuff
ground out word by word. I looked up at him once, but could not bear to
do it again--it was the saddest face one can imagine, but not a word of
complaint was breathed.

Just as we were finishing, the Queen came and bade us in to tea. She was
supposed to wait for her Lady-in-Waiting to bring me, but didn't. The
King stayed only a minute or two and then said he must be getting back
to Headquarters, where he would see me later.

I suggested to the Queen that she, too, make an appeal to the women of
America, to which she agreed. Another appeal was prepared for her, and
it, too, will be sent to America by the first post.

The Queen had wanted to see me about the subject of surgeons for the
Belgian army. The Belgian surgeons in the Brussels hospitals have been
replaced by Germans, and have nothing to do, although they are
desperately needed here. The Queen was terribly depressed about the
condition of the wounded. There are so few surgeons, and such tremendous
numbers of wounded, that they cannot by any possibility be properly
cared for. Legs and arms are being ruthlessly amputated in hundreds of
cases where they could be saved by a careful operation. Careful
operations are, of course, out of the question, with the wounded being
dumped in every minute by the score. In these little frontier towns
there are no hospital facilities to speak of, and the poor devils are
lucky if they get a bed of straw under any sort of roof, and medical
attendance, within twenty-four hours. We went to see one hospital in a
near-by Villa, and I hope I shall never again have to go through such an
ordeal. Such suffering and such lack of comforts I have never seen, but
I take off my hat to the nerve of the wounded, and the nurse