War Days in Brittany

HAIL TO THE DEAD! HAIL TO THE DEAD! ( Salut Aux Morts! ) How many sad hearts are in France this night of the Jour des Morts (All Soul's Day), in this third dolorous year of the Great War? All over the country, from earliest hours, thousands upon thousands of black-clad mourners have placed their homage of respect and love on the tombs of those who have died in the past twelve months. Churches held constant services, chants and prayers rose in unbroken succession; bells tolled, people flocked to the cemeteries; everywhere the "soul of the French" has been in communion with its dead and this great national and religious festival has been observed as never before. In Paris and its suburbs nearly a million accomplished this sacred duty. Every town and village was filled with sorrowing throngs. Seeing all this desolation and sadness, one wonders how they can so steadfastly look forward to another year of war. When one remembers how many beautiful lives have been sacrificed in the last twelve months, how much of talent, art, intellect and science has been ruthlessly destroyed when these promising men died, does it seem strange that the whole nation has gone forth to honor their dead? How many young fellows, just leaving the Lycée thoroughly prepared by years of hard study to accomplish great things in their chosen profession, have been wounded, or killed, or maimed? What humanity has lost will never be known, but that the loss is stupendous is acknowledged by everyone. Each man and woman has someone to grieve for tonight. Countless young widows are facing the future, deprived forever of the companionship of their helpmates, some so young as to have had only a few months happiness. To how many childish eyes is shown (in tears and sorrow) the photograph of le pere mort pour la patrie (the father who died for his country). Poor little ones, they will never know his loving care, his solicitude for their welfare, his devoted protection. To them he will always be a wonderful heroic being, remote and impersonal, who cannot share their little pleasures and troubles, can never play with them or be their friend! The poor old fathers and mothers, how bent and tragic they are! All they cherished on earth has gone! Slowly and painfully they move amongst the be-flowered graves, and life holds no further happiness for them. Let me describe the procession as it passed on the way to the burying ground. First came the school children in two long files on either side of the boulevard, leaving the center free, the little boys walking two by two, clutching their sprays of chrysanthemums, gay and laughing as if on a frolic, but sobering suddenly when the teacher's eye veered in their direction; following them a hundred little girls, much more demure, stepping daintily, well clad, even the poorest putting on their best for this great national fete. The Mayor is escorted on either side by the French and Belgian "Commandants de Place," one in Belgian khaki and the other in horizon-blue, (the latter limping badly, a hero from Verdun where he won the Croix de Guerre and the Medalle Militaire ), the doctors in uniform and the Red Cross nurses whose white dresses, blue caps and veils add a note of color, and present a cheering appearance in contrast to the convalescing Belgians who follow, very sombre, in their black uniforms and black caps. Original Two hundred-odd Frenchmen, striding after them, are very different in appearance and behavior. The Belgians are gloomy and taciturn, moving along in silent ranks; the Frenchmen, on the contrary, are full of life and nerve (their wounds notwithstanding), attired in delicious shades of blues and reds and creamy-white—the light blue of the Hussars, the darker shades of the Chasseurs Alpins, the brilliant Zouaves, the red trousers of the Fantassians; even the black-faced scarlet-clad Senegalais give a lively note, for these men are convalescing, and old clothes are good enough, their new horizon-blue uniforms being kept for their return to the front. A very pleasant crowd they form, with an eye towards the pretty Bretonne in her peasant coiffe and costume, with a laugh for a comrade, and a merry word for the bystander. Behind these plucky fellows (perhaps on the battlefield tomorrow) come the townspeople and peasants from the neighboring country. The procession moves on to the cemetery, where prayers and speeches, patriotic and religious, are made, wreaths placed on the little wooden crosses. White-coiffed heads are bowed in silent communion, and over all tolls the solemn notes of the church bell. All over France today there has been a great coming and going. Flowers are placed lovingly and regretfully on the mounds. But to how many, even this last service is denied, for the northern battlefields hide many unknown graves. Only in spirit can these afflicted ones visit the last resting-place of father, husband, son, or fiancé. But who shall say that the great army of heroic souls, so lately passed over, are not present, consoling and comforting by their spiritual presence, their grieving people? The French have often been considered a frivolous race, but no one who has seen the solemn way in which they fulfil this pious duty can ever believe it again. "One could kneel before our soldiers," said one of our great chiefs in one of the most tragic moments in the long agonizing siege before Verdun. In face of the most violent attacks, under the infernal bombardment, such acts of heroism and self-sacrifice and devotion took place, that one realized how deep is their sense of duty, and how great their determination, expressed in their own battle-cry, "They shall not get through." ( Ils ne passerons pas! ) This same martial spirit is found all along the line. What can be more novel and inspiring than the aviators who fight their fantastic duels 3000 metres above the earth? Again, the sangfroid, the supreme devotion of the artillery, who amidst apalling losses and the heaviest bombardment, stick to their posts, regulating their fire and working their guns, taking every risk without a moment's hesitation. The infantry, that backbone of the army with their "élan" carry forward the banner of France or die heroically in no-man's land. In every attack, glorious acts are done, often by the humblest of soldiers, whose abnegation and modesty is only equalled by their scorn of death! One is amazed at this wonderful state of mind. Men of all ages and all conditions excel in these heroic qualities. Fathers of families, who know how anxiously they are awaited in the home; young men, with the call of life ringing in their ears, go gaily into the combat—they have counted the cost—and lay down their lives with simplicity and dignity; with no other thought than their duty to their country; with no other ambition than "to be there when we get them ( d'etre la quand on les aura )." Pessimists and pacifists will say, "Oh, yes, that is very noble, very sublime; but when the heat of the battle is past, when excitement and furor has disappeared, what is left to the poor fellows, suffering from wounds, fever and pain? They must be greatly disillusioned then, these gay soldiers." Yet he who speaks thus, let him go to any ward in any of the great hospitals in Paris or elsewhere and there receive his answer. Here is a soldier of the class of 1914. When he left for the war, his family was in easy circumstances. His father a well-to-do merchant, his mother and sisters lived comfortably and happily in their charming home. Since then the father has died, poverty came, his sisters now are working for their living, supporting the mother, and he, young, vigorous, intelligent, and well-educated, who in ordinary times would have replaced the father, has received a terrific wound in the head, and is blind for life. Does he whimper or complain? Hear his answer: "I ought to have been killed" he said pleasantly, "when they drew the bullet from my head. I might have remained an idiot or an epileptic, but, thank God, I am getting better and better, and I shall learn a trade. I am told there are good ones for the blind and I shall help support my dear ones." Here again is a lad, a young soldier of the last class of 1916 sent to the front. He is almost a child, but he has the patience and courage of a man. A terrible wound in the spine, cutting it open to the marrow, did not cause him to despair. To his weeping parents he said: "Don't weep, dearest mother, I shall recover, I shall get well, I shall go home with you, to be your little boy again," and in panting voice he went on to praise the skill of the doctors, the tenderness of the infirmière, saying, "Yes, she hurts me terribly at times, so I must cry out, but she is so good, so kind, I forgive her when the dressing is over." Further on, a man with a shattered shoulder suffers atrociously, but tells me with a cheerful grin that he is glad to have seen it, to have found himself surrounded by Germans with raised arms shouting "Kamerad!" One of the lady visitors offering to be his amanuensis (as he cannot write), he accepted with joy, and then, blushing, said: "But you see, Madame, it is a bit difficult, I am accustomed to calling my wife by a pet name; if I began my letter otherwise she would not believe it was from me." "Yes, and how do you wish it to begin?" asked the lady. "Well, Madame, I always called her 'my little Rat'." "All right, here goes for 'my little Rat'." One more instance: A pale, emaciated man of middle age, with both hands amputated, suffering a martyrdom without a murmur, without a reference to what happened to him on the battlefield, accepts with gentle politeness the cakes and chocolates offered to him. Seeing a large letter on his bed, I asked if he had news from home. "No, madame, it is from the government announcing that I am decorated with the Médaillé Militaire and the Croix de Guerre . Please read it to me." "N———, cannon-servant, was admirable for devotion and sang froid; when a shell wrecked his cannon and killed all his companions, severely wounded himself in both hands, he remained at his post alone, notwithstanding his atrocious pain, to guard the remains of his companions and his cannon." To people upheld by such ideals, inspired with such patriotism, to whom France means all that is sacred and beautiful, "defeat cannot come." Until the detested enemy has been thrown across the Rhine, no suggestion of peace would be welcome; they will even call on the dead to defend their beloved land, as witnessed in the following story, vouched for by General Zurlinden, from whom I have also obtained some of the above facts: It would interest all men to know how the now famous cry, "Stand Up, You Dead!" was first shouted forth. On April 8th, 1915, Adjutant Pericard, acting lieutenant of the 95th Regiment of Infantry, found himself in a perilous position. A trench having been taken the day before by the 1st and 3rd Batallions was the object of a violent counter-attack, the occupants were withdrawing, and the trench on the point of being taken by the enemy. Lieutenant Pericard was in reserve, but seeing how badly things were going called for volunteers, and with his little band rushed to arrest the enemy. He succeeded in retaking the trench, but feeling himself abandoned, he looked back and saw only dead and wounded, not another man on his feet. It was then he shouted his famous war-cry: "Stand Up, You Dead!" Dinard, November 1st, 1916. A RED CROSS HOSPITAL IN BRITTANY I Within the walls of this cool, tranquil place Lie wounded men from Northern battlefields; With shattered limb, with wan and pain-streaked faces. Safely they rest; they whom the Red Cross shields, The roar of gun, the shriek of bomb and shell, The shrapnel hissing through the awful din, Are silenced here. A nearby chapel bell Strikes the calm hours. Quietly within The restful rooms the men lift up their eyes, To that small crimson cross afloat in peaceful skies. II From rain-filled trench, from bare and blood-soaked ground, Where in low piles the dead and dying lie— (The mitrailleuse has swept each ridge and mound Where Frenchmen rushed to conquer or to die) They bring them to us—broken, crippled boys, White as the linen bands around the head. And some may live. To some life's hopes and joys Are growing dim—unto the glorious dead Their souls depart. Ah! God will speed them well. These gallant men who for their country fell. III From the White Alps up to the gray North Sea, Along the Somme and Meuse the Army holds; Calm in the certitude of Victory— They see her shining on their banner's folds. These injured boys have helped to do this deed. Their strength and youth were gladly offered here, That their dear land might once again be freed From the black curse of war, and grief, and fear. When Peace returns, let their great sacrifice Remain forever holy in our eyes. August, 1916. THE CASTLE OF COMBOURG Original T he September morning was crystal-clear. The old fortifications at St. Malo, violet in shadow, lay wrapped in sunlight as from the crest of the hill we turned for a farewell glimpse of Dinard and the sea, before turning eastward on our long proposed trip to some Brittany hospitals. Our motor was packed in every corner with hospital supplies—tins of ether, rolls of absorbent cotton, hundreds of compresses and bandages, surgical supplies and instruments, cigars, cigarettes, chocolate, hospital-shirts and slippers, sponges, socks—all we could think of, capable of mending the broken bodies or healing the spirits of those brave poilus we were to visit in various hospitals during the next few days. The motor looked top-heavy, with great hampers strapped on its roof, as we (my husband, the singer and I) squeezed ourselves in between the bulky supplies, but in these days of almost priceless tires and rare gasoline one must manage with little personal pretentions to comfort. The first place of call was the Chateau of Combourg. As we bowled along roads now much in need of repair after three years of forced neglect, we recalled something of its history. The vast pile, buried in its own forests, was built, before the Norman Conquest, of immense blocks of granite hewn from nearby quarries; its five great towers, with deep slate roofs, ornamented with forged iron "grilles" and weathervanes, its massive keep, its crenelated walls and outlying bastions, have apparently withstood the vicissitudes of centuries. Wars, revolution, fire, siege, storms, have left it unharmed. As we approached, the castle loomed up above the surrounding groves, looking much as it must have appeared to the Crusaders as they left its doors for the Holy Land. We rolled through a sordid village lying at its base, and soon stopped before an iron gate in a high stone wall for the concierge to open, and then a lovely scene met our eyes. Great avenues of oaks and chestnuts stretched in all directions, interspersed with long stretches of greensward and clumps of bushes. It required slight imagination to see Robin Hood and his men, or catch a glimpse of them fleeting through the sun-wrapped distance—or hear their horns sounding in the forest. The young chatelaine was awaiting us at the head of a great flight of stone steps, "Tescalier d'honneur," large and broad enough for a regiment to ascend. The drawbridge and moat, formerly occupying this side, were removed by order of Cardinal Richelieu, who, fearing the belligerent spirit of the Brittany nobles, and determined to destroy their feudal privileges for all time, conceived the idea of turning their castle-fortresses into harmless country-houses, and they, themselves, into extravagant courtiers. For two and one-half years these walls have sheltered wounded from the battlefields of Picardie and Lorraine, nursed back to health by the Comtesse who, as "infirmière Majeure," does all the dressing of wounds herself— 50 beds in all . She has three assistant nurses and a doctor, but all the expense of this private hospital is borne by the Comte and Comtesse de Durfort. No small item, when everything has doubled in price, and hospital supplies, as well as food, are necessarily difficult to obtain. The question of lighting and heating alone is a hard one. No coal to be found anywhere, so trees are sacrificed in the Park. Candles and kerosene lamps being the only way of lighting, these immense halls must be gloomy and depressing enough in the long dark afternoons of winter, with the wind howling around the towers and the rain lashing the casements. Original The great dining-room and salons (in feudal times the "Salle des Gardes") have been turned into dormitories, white cots stand in rows beneath the painted beams of the ceilings; frescoed knights, bishops and ladies gaze down from the lofty walls on the broken soldiers of today; hooded chimneys of stone, heavily carved with armorial bearings, still burn, in their black depths, logs from the neighboring forest. Through cross-barred windows, cut in eighteen feet of masonry, one catches glimpses of white and blue skies, of seas of verdant leaves, of sunlight glinting on yellow lichen roofs far below. A pale blue smoke drifts upward, the voices of children, the clang of forge, the lowing of cattle in the market place, sound faintly through the autumn air, and gazing downwards from this elevation, one realizes vaguely how great was the distance, socially and morally, separating in the middle ages the serf from his overlord! After a most excellent luncheon of chicken "en casserole," venison, fresh vegetables and salads, a pastry and some fine Burgundy (all furnished by the estate, except the wine), the host and hostess, the singer, my husband and I, climbed around the upper turrets, gazed down through the "Machiacoli" whence boiling oil was hurled on the besieger in the Dark Ages, scrambled through low stone arches, up corkscrew-stairs to the bedroom of the famous Comte de Chateaubriand, great-uncle of the present owner, and from whom she inherited the property. Here he spent his lonely childhood, full of dreams and fears; in one of his books, complaining of the bats circling and flapping outside his window, in the moonlight, around this white-washed room high up in this silent tower! What a dreary abode for an imaginative boy! Down the turning staircase, where an ancestral ghost with a wooden leg and accompanied by a spectral cat "walks" before any disaster comes to the family, we came to the Poet's Library, a circular room, lined from floor to ceiling with books, as well as many unbound manuscripts. A ladder on runners can be pushed around to reach the higher rows. Here are many family relics; a comfortable oak armchair and table before the open fireplace, where Chateaubriand wrote many of his world-renowned books. On returning to one of the salons, we found some thirty-five wounded awaiting the little concert we had arranged for them. Some village notables, the mayor, the cure, the postmaster and a few elderly neighbors, were amongst them. The singer, Miss Marion Gregory, of New York, confided to me afterwards that she was so overcome, facing those poor wounded fellows, especially the blind with their sightless eyes turned towards her, that her voice seemed to die in her throat; but the singer was new to all the pain and sorrow, having only just come from "'God's Country." She said she had faced many large audiences in America, but never with so many qualms. The soldiers, however, ignoring this, sat in blissful attention, enjoying every note of her lovely voice, and heartily applauding. The postmaster then recited some stirring French poetry, then, rising, we all sang the "Marseillaise." One poor blind boy, with tears streaming down, said to me: "Oh, Madame, I am so sad, I have no longer eyes to see to fight to avenge the wrongs of my beloved France." A "gouter" served in the dining-hall made us all very cheerful. Speeches were made, hands shaken, toasts drunk, in that excellent wine of Champagne to "la Victoire," and to the intimacy of France and the United States. The Comte and his beautiful wife, surrounded by their "blessés," bade us farewell at the foot of the "escalier d'honneur;" the castle behind them looming gray and forbidding against the evening sky. The sun, gilding the crests of the chestnuts and oaks and glinting on the tricolor, the Red Cross flag and the family banner hanging limply in the lambent air, sent its flood of red over the little group. As we waved goodbye, we felt how intimately the past and present are related. How great traditions never die, but repeat themselves in national life from generation to generation. The high caring for the humble, the rich for the poor. How love of country wipes out all distinctions of caste, making France what she is today, the world's example of sacrifice, devotion and patriotism. September, 1916. A BELGIAN ROMANCE Original S he was a slender, graceful creature; tall, blond, highbred; so young and so good-looking, one wondered how she was able to escape from Belgium without unheard-of difficulties from those brutes of Germans; but here she was, that cold February night, coming to Val Fleuri with a pitiful handful of luggage, a great courage, and soul-racking remembrances. A mutual friend had months ago told me of her tragic experiences and her keen desire to escape from the German tyranny in Belgium, so we originated a scheme (through a Belgian consul in Switzerland) by which she was to travel via Germany to Switzerland, thence to France where she would sign on as a regular Red Cross nurse. Poor girl! Her life in Namur had been so tragic, it was extraordinary she had the courage to undertake alone a long journey, in the depth of winter, through enemy country, going voluntarily into exile for an indefinite period, with no one to turn to in case of trouble or sickness, entirely dependent on her meager Red Cross pay, frcs 2.50 (50 cents) a day—board and lodging alone being provided by the hospital. She remained a number of months in Val Fleuri as our guest, and little by little, as her reserve wore off, the tale of the actual horror of her life under the German yoke came out, and I was able to understand the motive which drove her, a beautiful girl of twenty-seven, into France, facing an unknown future and a hard present, rather than remain a day longer than was necessary under German rule. The only daughter of a rich and indulgent widow, until the fatal summer of 1914, she had lived a luxurious idle life; petted by society in Belgium for her charm and her beauty; welcomed at house parties and balls; sought for cotillions, dinners, race-meetings; with all that wealth and rank in the old nobility could offer to a girl of her position, the sudden transition to the horrors of German invasion and occupation was terrific. When the war broke out in 1914, her mother and she were entertaining a large house-party of fashionable young people in their chateau, some miles out from Namur. The sudden crashing of guns broke in upon their country pleasures, their guests fled, the shells boomed over the park and buildings, old friends advised them, two defenseless women, to abandon the chateau and take refuge in their large town house at Namur. Their hearts were heavy with grief and foreboding, that August morning, when they looked their last on their ancestral home; its huge towers and wide terraces framed in great oaks and chestnuts, sleeping tranquilly beneath a radiant blue sky. Ten days later their home had been gutted from tower to basement, flames had destroyed their furniture, pictures, family heirlooms, household treasures—all scattered, burnt or carried off by the Huns—and, crowning insult, German dead buried in the rose-gardens beneath the marble terrace. * *Note. She seemed to feel this more bitterly than anything else. Original None of us in America have had our homes pillaged or destroyed, so it is hard to realize the heart-anguish of looking on, helpless, while the destruction of all one holds sacred is consummated; so these two lonely women passed many gloomy hours in the town house at Namur where they immediately installed a Red Cross hospital. The shells boomed night and day over the town; every hour my young friend passed through the whole building, with her servants, carrying water, wet blankets and sticks to beat out any possible fire; six or seven poor families from the neighbors had taken refuge in their great house, and one could not turn them away to face the fire and bullets in the streets, so they camped out in the kitchen and offices, hall-ways and cellars. The Louis XVI ballroom, with its magnificent frescoes and paneled walls, was turned into a temporary hospital, my young friend in charge. Fortunately, before the war, she had, like many women of rank in Belgium, taken a course in surgical nursing, and, having passed her examination, was fully qualified to take charge of the hospital. The wounded during the siege were brought in from the streets, their blood staining the marble steps of the grand escalier, and lying in pools on the inlaid floors of the ball room. A ghastly reminder for all time of that August, 1914! For four months they fed, sheltered and protected 36 people, not counting the wounded. The Red Cross flag over the great portes-cocheres did not prevent the German soldiers from firing at any imprudent person who might show themselves at the windows after dark. The health of the widow, never robust, gave away under these misfortunes, and early in December, 1914, the poor girl was left alone to face her difficulties. Her country destroyed, her mother dead, the town house a hospital, and German officers quartered in the two wings looking on the court. Not a safe or pleasant home for a defenseless girl. Friends of her parents advised her leaving for France, but still she hesitated to leave what little remained of her previous happiness to seek an unknown future in a strange land, and only a dangerous and unpleasant incident finally decided her to take this hazardous step. In December, curious to see the damage done by the Huns, she went with a girl friend to visit the town of Dinant , that spot of infamous memory, where the boches shot down civilians—men, women and children—like dogs, and dragged their families out to see their execution. On the tram, the girls fell into conversation with a man who, a native of Dinant, had nearly been massacred on that fearful day in August. He said he had been lined up with the other victims and the order given. Shots were poured into the helpless crowd. He owed his escape to the fact that he was in the second line and was short, the man in front being a tall noble, who turned out to be a cousin of my Yolande. He showed the girls a sharp, white line along the top of his head, where the bullet had passed. He fell beneath the cousin of my friend, who, being a large, heavy man, completely covered him. During the night the boches came back often and fired into the dark mass, did they see the slightest movement. All during the night the man talked in undertones to the wounded noble, who told him to be still until dawn, when they might hope to escape in the morning mists by swimming the Meuse. About 3:30 a. m., the traveler spoke to the noble, and, getting no reply, very slowly and carefully moved his hand up to where he thought the head was. The body had been growing heavier and heavier and he had been saturated with a wet substance. What was his horror to find the head had been shot away in the last volley! He waited, silent as the dead about him, until the morning mists crept up from the river, then wriggled out from the mass of dead, and effected his escape by creeping down the bank and swimming the Meuse in the early dawn before the sun rose. My poor Yolande was deeply affected by this recital. She had known of the murder of her relative, but none of the details. On reaching Dinant, she visited the devastated part of the town, where some poor wretched women sought shelter under their broken roofs, having lost everything, and not knowing where their families were scattered, having nowhere else to go, they came back like homeless cats, nothing but broken walls, shattered roofs and piles of plaster, bricks, charred wood, and perhaps a chimney to show what had once been their homes; but they came back and poked among the rubbish with sticks, hoping to find a spoon or cooking utensil; many holding monkey-like babies to their starved breasts, all that remained to them of their previous families. Sitting thus, holding their starving children to their bosoms, their vacant faces and shrivelled forms outlined under the roofless doorways; staring at space, they presented a truly desolate picture. My friend spoke to them and tried to awaken and cheer them, but it was useless, they were too far gone in misery to even understand. This horrible spectacle of misery, combined with the story of her relative's death, raised such hatred in her heart that, as she said, she must have shown too plainly what she felt, for, while passing in front of a cafe where some German officers were singing and feasting, she suddenly felt a hand on her shoulder and she and her friend were arrested and taken to the guardhouse. When she demanded why they had been arrested the sergeant said: "because she had cast such a look of hatred at the officers in the cafe!" ("Un regard de hain.") For five hours they were left sitting in the guard-room, while soldiers came in and tried to laugh and talk to them. Finally the officer who had them arrested came in and tried to "jolly" them. When all his efforts were met with a frigid silence, he went to the phone. Fortunately for Yolande, as she understood his German orders, she immediately claimed her release as a Red Cross nurse. He would not listen at first, but an insistent appeal to the Military Governor on her part secured their freedom, and the two girls were turned out at two o'clock in the morning in the soldier-infested streets of Dinant; and, remember, this was at the height of the German invasion of Belgium, when the whole country lay at their mercy. Had she not understood German, it is doubtful if the girls would ever have been seen again! How she ever got back to Namur she never quite remembered, but this experience determined her to leave. After much wire-pulling and family influence, she obtained her passports, and, in company of a young wife and three small children, they made their way across Germany to Switzerland. Her perfect German accent and blond appearance helped them along, but when at last they crossed the frontier their hearts were too heavy for talk. They were safe, but at what a sacrifice. Safely arrived in Dinard, she immediately signed on "for the war," and became one of the most valuable and beloved nurses. She was so gentle and gracious, but still so firm and competent, she soon was given charge of a whole floor (65 men of all kinds and descriptions). I looked at her often in amazement. How that slender young woman could make those rough men obey her! She never raised her voice or lost her temper in all the eighteen months she was in Dinard. I never saw her peeved, or snappy, or cross. At that time I used to go every morning, from 9 to 12, to make a little "extra food" or canteen for the more dangerously wounded, I had invited a friend, the Marquise de T——— (also a Belgian), to help me. We had a little rolling table piled high with jam, bread and butter, soup, and a rum punch I made from Mellin's food, milk and eggs and rum, which we took to the different wounded. The men were very fond of this punch, but only those who were "bed cases" could have it, and then only a glass apiece. Amongst others, there was a huge Senegalais, an interne for some months, who had had a number of small operations and who, just as he was getting better, would always go out and get drunk and then was laid up again, a perpetual blesse. One day, apparently, the Marquise and I were innocently distributing our little dejeuner, when this huge creature hobbled up, demanding some "Ponche." We told him it was strictly forbidden that day. He gave a wild bellow and rushed at us. I shall never forget that great animal, his face as black as ink, with flashing, angry eyes, his great red mouth open and yelling incomprehensible gibberish at us, flinging himself along on crutches, with terrific speed, he seemed the personification of Darkest Africa. We fled down the corridor pursued by the negro, our little table rattling along, cups, saucers and tartines bounding out as we ran, the precious rum punch slopping over at every step, and that great bellowing Senegalais pounding along behind, flinging everything that came to hand at us, even to his slippers, which he finally whipped off as he saw us dash around the corner. Suddenly a door opened and Yolande appeared. What she said to the monster or how she appeased him I don't know, but after a while he went grumbling and growling back to his room. The other soldiers said, " Vous l'avez échappé belle c'est un mauvais caractère ." (You got off easily, he has a nasty character.) For over two years, Yolande staid on, reaping golden opinions on all sides; her constant devotion to the wounded all day and many nights, easing their suffering, comforting, cheering, even in the last sad hours staying with them through the Valley of the Shadow, and going to the funeral and the grave! I often wondered how she stood the strain, the long tedious hours, the poor food, the cold and discomfort, the anxiety of the operations, and then, added to all these, the uncertainty of the future, the loneliness of exile, and the then black outlook for Belgium! A year ago happier times came for the dear girl. For a number of years she had been engaged to a distinguished officer in the Belgian diplomatic service, and last December he was able to obtain leave for three months, and came to carry his bride off to a far-away, sunny country. I like to think of her, happily married to the man she has loved so long, in a charming house of her own amidst palms, hibiscus and tropical foliage, far-away from all the gloom and tragedy of her war-stricken country. May all happiness and wealth and peace be hers in this new life! She deserves them all. December, 1917.

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