nd formally installed as Matron of the hospital with full authority to
make any improvements I thought necessary, and with the stipulation that
I might have two or three days' leave every few weeks, to go and visit
my scattered flock in Brussels. The appointment had to be made subject
to the approval of the German commandant, but apparently he made no
objection--at any rate I never heard of any.

And then began a very happy time for me, in spite of many difficulties
and disappointments. I can never tell the goodness of the Committee and
the Belgian doctor to me, and their kindness in letting me introduce all
our pernickety English ways to which they were not accustomed, won my
gratitude for ever. Never were Sisters so loyal and unselfish as mine.
The first part of the time they were overworked and underfed, and no
word of grumbling or complaint was ever heard from them. They worked
from morning till night and got the hospital into splendid order. The
Committee were good enough to allow me to keep the best of the Red Cross
workers as probationers and to forbid entrance to the others. We had
suffered so much at their hands before this took place, that I was truly
grateful for this permission as no discipline or order was possible with
a large number of young girls constantly rushing in and out, sitting on
patients' beds, meddling with dressings, and doing all kinds of things
they shouldn't.

I am sure that no hospital ever had nicer patients than ours were. The
French patients, though all severely wounded and prisoners in the hands
of the Germans, bore their troubles cheerfully, even gaily. We had a
great variety of regiments represented in the hospital: Tirailleurs,
Zouaves, one Turco from Algeria--our big good-natured Adolphe--soldiers
from Paris, from Brittany and from Normandy, especially from Calvados.
The German soldiers, too, behaved quite well, and were very grateful for
everything done for them--mercifully we had no officers. We had not
separate rooms for them--French and German soldiers lay side by side in
the public wards.

One of the most harrowing things during that time was the way all the
Belgians were watching for the English troops to deliver them from the
yoke of their oppressor. Every day, many times a day, when German rules
got more and more stringent and autocratic, and fresh tales of
unnecessary harshness and cruelty were circulated, they would say over
and over again, "Where are the English? If on