we simply could not give them all clean shirts and
drawers as we longed to do. The trousers were our worst problem, hardly
any of them were fit to put on. We had a few pairs of grey and black
striped trousers, the kind a superior shopman might wear, but we were
afraid to give those to the men as we thought the Germans would think
they were going to try to escape if they appeared in civil trousers, and
might punish them severely. So we mended up these remnants of French red
pantaloons as best we could. One man we _had_ to give civil trousers as
he had only a few shreds of pantaloon left, and these he promised to
carry in his hand to show that he really could not put them on.

The men were laughing and joking and teasing one another about their
garments, but my heart was as heavy as lead. I simply could not _bear_
to let the worst cases go. One or two of the Committee came up and we
begged them to try what they could do with the commandant, but they said
it was not the least use, and from what I had seen myself, I had to
confess that I did not think it would be. The patient I was most unhappy
about was a certain French count we had in the hospital. He had been
shot through the back at the battle of Nalinnes, and was three days on
the battlefield before he was picked up. Now he lay dying in a little
side room off the ward. The least movement caused him acute agony, even
the pillow had to be moved an inch at a time before it could be turned,
and it took half an hour to change his shirt. The doctor had said in the
morning he could not last another forty-eight hours. But if he was alive
the next morning he would be put in those horrible springless carts, and
jolted, jolted down to the station, taken out and transferred to a
shaky, vibrating train, carrying him far away into Germany.

Mercifully he died very peacefully in his sleep that evening, and we
were all very thankful that the end should have come a little earlier
than was expected.

Late that night came a message that the men were not to start till
midday, so we got them all dressed somehow by eleven. All had had bad
nights, nearly all had temperatures, and they looked very poor things
when they were dressed; even fat, jolly Adolphe looked pale and subdued.
We had not attempted to do anything with the bad bed cases; if they
_must_ go they must just go wrapped up in their blankets. But we
unexpectedly got a reprieve. A great German chief came round that
morning, accom