nder body lived a very gallant soul, and that
gave her spirit to dare and courage to endure. So when we occupied
Morogoro and Lettow fled with his troops to the mountains, this very
splendid sister gave up her chance of leave well-earned to come to nurse
for us in our hospital. The Germans had failed to break the spirits of
these civilian prisoners, and they had full knowledge of the army that
was slowly moving south from Kilimanjaro to redress the balance of
unsuccessful military enterprise in the past. One can imagine the state
of mind of these wretched people when the news of our ill-fated attack
on Tanga in 1914 arrived; when they heard of our Indian troops being
made prisoners at Jassin, and saw from the cock-a-hoop attitude of the
Hun that all was well for German arms in East Africa. Then when Nemesis
was approaching, the German commandant came to their prison to make
amends for past wrongs. "I am desolated to think," he unctuously
explained, "that you ladies have had so little comfort in this camp in
the past, and I have come to make things easier for you now. The English
Government," he continued with an ingratiating smile, "have now begun to
treat our prisoners in England better, and I hasten to return good to
you for the evils that our women have suffered at the hands of your
Government. Is there anything I can do for you? Would you like native
servants? Would you care to go for walks?" But these brave women
answered that they had done without servants and walks for two years
now, and they could endure a little longer. "What do you mean," he
exclaimed in anger, "by a little longer?" But they answered nothing, and
he knew the news of our advance had come to them within their prison
cage. "Would you care to nurse our wounded soldiers?" he said more
softly. Sister Mabel said she would. So now for the first time she is
given a native servant, carried in state down the mountain-side in a
hammock, and installed in the German hospital in Morogoro. There, in
virtue of the excellence of her work and knowledge, she was given charge
of badly wounded German officers, and received with acid smiles of
welcome from the German sisters.

To her, at the evacuation of the town, had Lettow come, and, giving her
a letter to General Smuts, had asked her to put in a good word for the
German woman and children he was leaving behind him to our tender
mercies. "There is no need of letters to ask for protection for German
women," she to