cannot
be carried down the communication trench because it zigzags too much:
he cannot be got round the angles. So he is taken into a dug-out and
gets first aid, and a tablet of morphine perhaps. The M.O. may possibly
come up to see him, but he may be too busy in his own aid-post. There
are stretcher bearers in the trench able to bandage properly. The
average 'S.B.,' by the way, is a man from the battalion, not from the
R.A.M.C. As soon as it is dark the stretcher bearers lift him and carry
him across the open to the aid-post, which is perhaps five hundred or a
thousand yards behind the firing trench, near the battalion
headquarters. It is an eerie journey, with a certain amount of risk. The
brilliant Boche flares rise continually--the enemy is sometimes called
'the Hun,' more often 'the Boche,' in more genial moments 'Fritz,' but
'the Germans' never--and light up the ground vividly. These flares are
very powerful. I have seen my own shadow cast from one when standing at
the time in a camp fully five miles from the trenches, and when you are
close up you feel that every eye in 'Germany' is fixed on you. The best
thing to do is to stand quite still, for artificial light is very
deceptive, and it is hard to make out what an object is. In any case,
the real danger area is 'No-Man's-Land,' for it is on that mighty
graveyard stretching from Switzerland to the sea that the enemy's eyes
are bent. The regiments used to get various kinds of flares to
experiment with. We used to laugh over an incident that occurred when a
new type, a species of parachute, had been served out. The
Second-in-command, who fired it, miscalculated the strength of the wind,
which was blowing from the enemy's trench, and the flare was carried in
a stately curve backwards until it was directly over battalion
headquarters. Here it hung for a long time, showing up all details very
successfully, to the C.O.'s great annoyance. Over this ground, very
slowly and carefully, the stretcher is carried. When the aid-post is
reached the M.O. takes charge, assisted by the sergeant or corporal of
the R.A.M.C., whom he has always with him, and the 'casualty' is laid
alongside others in the dug-out, or cellar beneath some ruined house,
that forms the aid-post and battalion dispensary. The first stage in the
journey is now over. Soon a couple of cars creep quietly up. One by one
the casualties are lifted in or climb in stiffly. The doctor who has
come up with them chats w