e path
that leads from the road to the Forest is piled with bodies and is a
stream of blood. Some of the dead are lying very quietly in the ditch,
their heads pillowed on their arms--every now and then something that
you had thought dead stirs.... And the screaming from the Forest is
incessant so that you simply don't hear the shell (now very close
indeed)....

There _is_, you know, that world somewhere with the Rev. Someone
lecturing on Fools and "the class 'Ruysdael' costing in the
neighbourhood of $100." At least, it's very important if I'm to
continue to keep my head steady that I should _know_ that it is there!

It seemed that we were the first Red Cross people to arrive. Oh! what
rewards would I have offered for another ten wagons! How lamentably
insufficient our three carts appeared standing there in the road with
this screaming Forest on every side of one! As I waited there,
overwhelmed by the blind indifference of the place, listening still to
the incredible birds, seeing in the businesslike attentions of my
sanitars only a further incredible indifference, a great stream of
soldiers came up the road, passing into the first line of trenches,
only a little deeper in the Forest. They were very hot, the
perspiration dripping down their faces, but they went through to the
position without a glance at the dead and wounded. No concern of
_theirs_--that. Life had changed; they had changed with it....
Meanwhile they did as they were told....

We worked there, filling our wagons. The selection was a horrible
difficulty. All the wounded were Austrians and how they begged not to
be left! It would be many hours, perhaps, before the next Red Cross
Division would appear. An awful business! One man dying in the wood
tore at his stomach with an unceasing gesture and the air came through
his mouth like gas screaming through an "escape" hole. One Austrian,
quite an old man, died in my arms in the middle of the road. He was
not conscious, but he fumbled for his prayer-book, which he gave me,
muttering something. His name "Schneidher Gyorgy Pelmonoster" was
written on the first page.

We started for home at length. Our drive back was terrible. I find
that I cannot linger any longer over this affair. Our carts drove over
rough stones and ruts and we were four hours on the journey. Our
wounded screamed all the way--one man died.... My candle is nearly
out. I must find another. In one of its frantic leaps just now I
fancied that