y distinct, we worked
together, and they had the advantage of a hospital to which
they could always bring their patients, whilst we had the
services of the smartest ambulance corps on the Continent.
The qualities required for the satisfactory working of a hospital
and the successful running of an ambulance are so distinct that
I am sure that the ideal arrangement is to have two entirely
distinct organizations working in harmony.

The position of an ambulance up at the front is always a
delicate one, for as it moves about from place to place its
members have opportunities of picking up information about the
position and movements of the troops of a very confidential
nature. It was therefore a great advantage to Dr. Munro when
his party was joined by M. de Broqueville, the son of the
Minister for War; for it meant that they would have full
information as to where wounded were likely to require their
help, and that they possessed the full confidence of the Belgian
authorities. Their position and our own had been very greatly
affected by the fortunes of the war, for the Belgian Croix Rouge
and Army Medical Services were for the moment in abeyance,
and instead of obtaining from them the help which had hitherto
been so generously given, we had now to undertake their work
and to rely entirely on our own resources. We had not to wait
long for an opportunity to show what we could do. The Belgian
Army, supported by a certain number of French troops, made
its final stand on the line of the Yser, the little river which runs
from Ypres through Dixmude and Nieuport to the sea. From this
position they have never since been shaken, but they have
never had to withstand more desperate attacks than those
which took place in the end of October. The centre of these was
Dixmude, and here the Germans threw against the little remnant
of the Belgian Army forces which might have been expected to
shatter it at a blow. Their efforts culminated in one of the fiercest
and bloodiest engagements of the whole war, and at the height
of the engagement word came that there were wounded in Dixmude,
and that ambulances were urgently required to get them out.
Getting wounded out of a town which is being shelled is not
exactly a joke, and when the town is in rapid process of annihilation
it almost becomes serious. But this was what the Corps had
come out for, and two ambulances and an open car started
off at once. As far as Oudecappelle the road was crowd