g to control them, gazed in fright from side
to side. Down to the door he padded, rocked, swayed, turned and almost
fell. Then back again he flapped.

Dense stillness in the ward, broken only by the hard, unsteady thumping
of the bare feet. The feet masterless, as the spirit had been
masterless, years ago. The three judges in white blouses stood with arms
folded, motionless. The patients in the beds sat up and tittered. The
man who had been kicked by a horse raised himself and smiled. He who had
been knocked down by a despatch rider sat up, as did those with
bronchitis, and those with ptomaine poisoning. They sat up, looked, and
sniggered. They knew. So did Andre. So did the Paris surgeon, and the
little staff doctor, and the swarthy orderly and the priest-orderly.
They all knew. The patient knew too. The laughter of his comrades told
him.

So he was to be released from the army, physically unfit. He could no
longer serve his country. For many months he had faced death under the
guns, a glorious death. Now he was to face death in another form. Not
glorious, shameful. Only he didn't know much about it, and couldn't
visualize it--after all, he might possibly escape. He who had so loved
life. So he was rather pleased to be released from service.

The patients in the surrounding beds ceased laughing. They had other
things to think about. As soon as they were cured of the dysentery and
of the itch, they were going back again to the trenches, under the guns.
So they pitied themselves, and they rather envied him, being released
from the army. They didn't know much about it, either. They couldn't
visualize an imbecile, degrading, lingering death. They could only
comprehend escape from sudden death, under the guns.

One way or another, it is about the same. Tragedy either way, and death
either way. But the tragedies of peace equal the tragedies of war. The
sum total of suffering is the same. They balance up pretty well.

PARIS,
18 June, 1916.

A SURGICAL TRIUMPH

In the Latin Quarter, somewhere about the intersection of the Boulevard
Montparnasse with the rue de Rennes--it might have been even a little
way back of the Gare Montparnasse, or perhaps in the other direction
where the rue Vabin cuts into the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs--any one who
knows the Quarter will know about it at once--there lived a little
hairdresser by the name of Antoine. Some ten years ago Antoine had moved
over from Montmartre, for he