waiting,
packed up.

Went with one of the regulars to-day to see the big hospital ship
_Asturias_ with 3000 beds, and also to see Sister ---- at the
No.-- Maritime Hospital. They've been very busy there dressing the
wounded for the ship. Colonel ---- brought us back in his motor, and met
the Consul-General on the way, who told us K. came through to-day off a
cruiser, and was taken on to Paris in a motor. Smiles of relief from
every one. One of the Sisters had heard from her mother in Scotland that
she had five Russian officers billeted! They are said to be on their way
through from Archangel.

Troopships full of French and English troops are leaving Havre every
day, for Belgium.

Wouldn't you like to be under the table when K. and J. and F. are poring
over their maps to-night?

_Wednesday, September 2nd._--We are leaving to-morrow, on a hospital
ship, possibly for Nantes K. has given orders for every one to be
cleared out of Havre by to-morrow.

We found some men invalided from the Front lying outside the station
last night waiting for an ambulance, mostly reservists called up; they'd
had a hot time, but were full of grit.

The men from Mons told us "it wasn't fighting--it was murder." They said
the burning hot sun was one of the worst parts. They said "the officers
was grand"; many regiments seem to have hardly any officers left. They
all say that the S.A. War was a picnic compared to this German artillery
onslaught and their packed masses continually filling up.

There is a darling little chapel on this floor, beautifully kept, just
as the nuns left it, where one can say one's prayers. And there is also
a lovely church, where they have Mass at 8 every morning.

You can imagine how hard it has been to keep off grumbling at not
getting any work all this time; it is one of the worst of fortunes of
war. It seems as if most of the "dangerously" and many of the
"seriously" wounded must have died pretty soon, or have not been picked
up. The cases that do come down are most of them slight. Some of the
worst must be in hospital at Rouen.

_Friday, September 4th. R.M.S.P._ Asturias, _Havre._--At last we are
uprooted from that convent up the hot hill and are on an enormous
hospital ship, who in times of peace goes to New York and Brazil and the
Argentine. There are 240 Sisters on her, one or two M.O.'s, and all the
No.-- equipment. She is like a great white town; you can walk for miles
on her decks; she is the bi