n under the
impression that the R.A.M.C. was a sort of small tail to a very large
Red Cross kite, owing to our little army and general unpreparedness
when the war broke out. I could see that to my surprised hosts I
appeared to be mentally deficient, but I was able to assure them that
there were tens of thousands who knew even less than that, and thought
that the chances still were that if their loved ones were hurt, they
might be left to die because some one had not given their annual
contribution to a society. It seemed a very serious omission that the
public had not the information that would carry so much consolation
with it. The British Red Cross has every one's love and support, but
its function in war, as one officer said, must increasingly become, in
relation to the R.A.M.C., that of a Sunday-school treat to the staff
of the school.

The officialdom of Germany and even of France had always contrasted
very unfavourably in my mind with our English methods. I was surprised
in America that so many hospitals were Government institutions, and
yet worked so well.

At Melville we turned aside to inspect what was apparently a second
Valley of Hinnom. It was a series of furnaces, built out of clay and
old cans, efficiently disposing of the garbage of a town and a large
section of the line. At West Outre an officer found time to show us
his ingenious improvised laundry. His share was to fight the enemy by
keeping our boys decently clean; and for this purpose he collected
their dirty linen into huge piles. He had diverted the only available
brook so as to put a portable building over it. His battalion
consisted of the whole female strength of the country-side, and had
to be prepared to advance or retire _pari passu_ with the other
fighters. The chattering, shouting crowd, almost invisible in the fog
of steam as we walked through, made me realize how difficult a command
this regiment of washerwomen constituted. The triumph was that they
all appeared to be contented and fraternal.

As every one knows one of the worst problems of the trenches was
vermin. We entered a huge building used in peace-time for the purposes
of dyeing. A Jack Johnson had only just exploded in the moat that
brought the water to the tanks, but provision was made for trifles of
this kind. When we peered over the edge of a steaming vat, it was to
discover a platoon of Tommies enjoying the "time of their lives,"
before they joined the line of naked being