e and wounds ached and burned. Sleep was almost out of the
question, and in the darkened ward I soon noticed the red glow of
cigarette after cigarette from bed to bed as the men sought to woo
relief with tobacco smoke.

We began to discuss a subject very near and very dear to all wounded
men. That is, what they are going to do as soon as they get out of the
hospital. It is known, of course, that the first consideration usually
is, to return to the front, but in many instances in our ward, this was
entirely out of the question.

So it was with Dan Bailey who occupied a bed two beds on my right. His
left leg was off above the knee. He lost it going over the top at
Cantigny.

"I know what I'm going to do when I get home," he said, "I am going to
get a job as an instructor in a roller skating rink."

In a bed on the other side of the ward was a young man with his right
arm off. His name was Johnson and he had been a musician. In time of
battle, musicians lay aside their trombones and cornets and go over the
top with the men, only they carry stretchers instead of rifles. Johnson
had done this. Something had exploded quite close to him and his entire
recollection of the battle was that he had awakened being carried back
on his own stretcher.

"I know where I can sure get work," he said, glancing down at the stump
of his lost arm. "I am going to sign up as a pitcher with the St. Louis
Nationals."

Days later when I looked on Johnson for the first time, I asked him if
he wasn't Irish, and he said no. Then I asked him where he lost his arm
and he replied, "At the yoint." And then I knew where he came from.

But concerning after-the-war occupations, I endeavoured that night to
contribute something in a similar vein to the general discussion, and I
suggested the possibility that I might return to give lessons on the
monocle.

The prize prospect, however, was submitted by a man who occupied a bed
far over in one corner of the room. He was the possessor of a
polysyllabic name--a name sprinkled with k's, s's and z's, with a
scarcity of vowels--a name that we could not pronounce, much less
remember. On account of his size we called him "Big Boy." His was a
peculiar story.

He had been captured by three Germans who were marching him back to
their line. In telling me the story Big Boy said, "Mr. Gibbons, I made
up my mind as I walked back with them that I might just as well be dead
as to spend the rest of the war studying Ge