d quietly
that she was going to bring them out. The only way to reach the fort
was by a straight and narrow road, a mile long, on which German shells
were bursting with great accuracy and frequency. To me and to the
Belgian officers who were with me, it looked like a short-cut to the
cemetery. But that didn't deter Mrs. Winterbottom. She climbed into
her car and threw in the clutch and jammed her foot down on the
accelerator, and went tearing down that shell-spattered highway at top
speed. She filled her car with wounded men and brought them safely
back, and then returned and gathered up the others who were still
alive. I have seen few braver deeds.

Mrs. Winterbottom remained with the Belgian army throughout the great
retreat into Flanders, and when it settled down into the trench life
on the Yser, she was officially attached to a division, with which she
has remained ever since, moving when her division moves. She lives in
a one-room shack which the soldiers have built her immediately in the
rear of the trenches and within range of the enemy's guns. Her only
companion is a dog, yet she is as safe as though she were on Beacon
Hill, for she is the idol of the soldiers. She has a large recreation
tent, like the side-show tent of a circus, but painted green to escape
the attention of the German airmen, and in this tent she entertains
the men during their brief periods of leave from the trenches. She
gives them coffee, cocoa, milk, and biscuits; she provides them with
writing materials--I forget how many thousand sheets of paper and
envelopes she told me that they used each week; and she keeps them
supplied with reading matter. Three times a week she gives "her boys"
a phonograph concert in the first-line trenches. You must have
experienced the misery and monotony of existence in the trenches to
understand what these "concerts" mean to the tired and homesick men. I
asked her if there was anything that the people at home could send
her, and she replied rather hesitantly (for she is personally bearing
the entire expense of this work) that she understood that some small
metal phonographs were procurable which could easily be carried about
and would not warp from dampness, for the trenches on the Yser are
very wet. She also said that she would welcome phonograph records of
any description and French books. The last I saw of her she was wading
through a sea of mud, in rubber boots and a rubber coat and a
sou'wester, to carry h