ough. The guns
are nearer to-day or more distant, the battle sways backwards and
forwards, and there is no such thing as a real "base" for a hospital.
We must just stay as long as we can and fly when we must.

About 10 a.m. the ambulances that have been out all night begin to come
in, the wounded on their pitiful shelves.

"Take care. There are two awful cases. Step this way. The man on the top
shelf is dead. Lift them down. Steady. Lift the others out first. Now
carry them across the yard to the overcrowded ward, and lay them on the
floor if there are no beds, but lay them down and go for others. Take
the worst to the theatre: get the shattered limbs amputated and then
bring them back, for there is a man just dead whose place can be filled;
and these two must be shipped off to Calais; and this one can sit up."

[Page Heading: A WOUNDED GERMAN]

I found one young German with both hands smashed. He was not ill enough
to have a bed, of course, but sat with his head fallen forward trying to
sleep on a chair. I fed him with porridge and milk out of a little bowl,
and when he had finished half of it he said, "I won't have any more. I
am afraid there will be none for the others." I got a few cushions for
him and laid him in a corner of the room. Nothing disturbs the deep
sleep of these men. They seem not so much exhausted as dead with
fatigue.

A French boy of sixteen is a favourite of mine. He is such a beautiful
child, and there is no hope for him; shot through the abdomen; he can
retain nothing, and is sick all day, and every day he is weaker.

I do not find that the men want to send letters or write messages.
Their pain is too awful even for that, and I believe they can think of
nothing else.

All day the stretchers are brought in and the work goes on. It is about
5 o'clock that the weird tired hour begins when the dim lamps are
lighted, and people fall over things, and nearly everything is mislaid,
and the wounded cry out, and one steps over forms on the floor. From
then till one goes to bed it is difficult to be just what one ought to
be, the tragedy of it is too pitiful. There is a boy with his eyes shot
out, and there is a row of men all with head wounds from the cruel
shrapnel overhead. Blood-stained mattresses and pillows are carried out
into the courtyard. Two ladies help to move the corpses. There is always
a pile of bandages and rags being burnt, and a youth stirs the horrible
pile with a stick. A queer s