Each of the members of the medical staff had a similar hospital to attend to, and all were managed on much the same lines. As a rule I finished my work in the forenoon, and had the rest of the day more or less to myself, except when it was my turn to attend at the main hospital, where once a week I had to be in attendance all night on emergency duty.
I was on friendly terms with the colonels of most of the regiments, and especially with Tewfik Bey, who used to keep me supplied with the latest news until he went to Lovtcha, and then I was thrown back on my own resources; but I found plenty of entertainment in watching the progress of the fortifications, trenches, and redoubts, which the troops were constructing with ceaseless activity under the direction of Tewfik Bey, who laid out the works before he went to Lovtcha.
Although not very particular as to what I ate, I got very tired of the incessant pilaf and scrambled eggs which my Circassian cooked for me, and both Weinberger and I always looked forward with lively pleasure to an invitation to dine with Dr. Robert, who was certainly very liberal in his hospitality. On these occasions we had European food admirably cooked by the Viennese housekeeper, and Robert always produced his best Bulgarian wine. I think I can see him now, dressed in his dirty yellow suit of Bulgarian frieze, with his long, sinuous fingers flying over the keys of his piano as he yelled out song after song in half the languages of Europe until far into the early hours of the morning. Peace to his ashes! He used to give us capital dinners; but I never could find out what happened to him eventually.
One little incident connected with him is perhaps worth recording here, though it occurred at a later period in the campaign. When the shells were falling fast in Plevna, Robert dug a large hole in his garden, and was accustomed to bury himself in it like a mole whenever the firing became particularly hot. One day, when I was watching outside his garden, I saw the housekeeper bring in his midday meal, steaming hot and very appetizing. Just as Robert sat down to it a shell exploded on the top of the house, and Robert was off to his hole in the ground like a fox with a pack of hounds at its heels. As he lay there quaking, it seemed a pity that the dinner should be allowed to get cold, so I vaulted the fence and ate it myself. The cutlets were simply delicious.
Of course Robert had nothing to do with the wounded men. He was simply a Bulgarian doctor, and was, moreover, strongly suspected of Russophile proclivities. Long afterwards I heard a rumour that he was shot as a spy before Plevna fell.
In those days of comparative quiet which preceded the second battle we only gleaned stray pieces of news from the outside world. The telegraph wire was closed to all private despatches, and the information which filtered into the town was consequently of the vaguest. The soldiers who came up from Sofia certainly brought us news as to the progress of the campaign in other parts of the Turkish Empire; and we learnt that while the army of the Lom was doing fairly well, Suleiman Pasha's forces had sustained a serious disaster at the Shipka Pass. The untrustworthy nature of the news, however, may be understood from the fact that for some days a persistent rumour was current that Great Britain had declared war against Russia, and that twenty thousand British troops were even then at Sofia.
In order to get a clear idea of the significance of the second battle of Plevna it is necessary to comprehend the position from the point of view of the Russian commanders, who realized that if they did not blot out their crushing defeat of June 20 by a great victory they would be compelled to abandon the initiative and fall back upon a tedious defensive policy with all its attendant disadvantages. It was clear that the most natural course to attempt was to crush Osman Pasha's army, for Plevna was much more accessible than either Rasgrad or Eski-Zagra; it was easier to concentrate a force there, and there was no immediate danger in any other quarter. To attack the Turkish army of the east would probably necessitate protracted siege operations; while if Osman Pasha were defeated, it would be easy to reinforce General Gourko, and afterwards advance against Suleiman Pasha's army. Thus it was that the Russian general staff, who were sixty miles away at Tirnova, resolved to attack Plevna, and entrusted the task to Prince Schahoffskoi and General Krüdener. Let us see with what result.
On the 27th and 28th of July our scouts reported the proximity of large bodies of Russians coming from Nicopolis and Poradim, and we all recognized that an attack was imminent. The 29th was quiet; but on the morning of the 30th, as I was at breakfast, I heard the boom of the heavy guns once more, and recognized that the Russian artillery preparation for the attack had commenced, and that the Turkish batteries were replying. The early morning had been damp and foggy; but when the fog lifted the sun came out strongly, and it became blazing hot. I had received no special instructions from Hassib Bey, my superior officer, and I resolved to see as much of the fighting as possible. So, when I had finished my work at the hospital, I saddled my horse, and galloped off as a free-lance with my pocket-case of surgical instruments and two large bags, one containing tiftig, or lint, and the other bandages. For weapons I carried a sword and a revolver, but no carbine. No field ambulance had been organized, and it occurred to me that I might be of some service to the wounded. So I headed in a south-easterly direction, where the firing seemed particularly heavy; and about a mile from the town I rode up the slope of a small colline, below the crest of which a regiment of Turkish infantry were lying under cover. The day was very hot, and the men had had nothing to drink since they took up their position five or six hours before. When I got there it was about ten o'clock, and the first thing I saw was a long procession of Turkish women of the poorer class, who were carrying earthen pitchers of water from a small stream at the foot of the hill to the thirsty troops lying in position. Some were ascending with full pitchers, and others were descending again with the empty vessels to replenish them at the stream. At this time the roar of the guns was terrific, and the Russian shells were screaming over our heads, some of them exploding in the air and others striking the ground behind us. The women, who were all dressed in white, with their yashmaks over their faces, and only their eyes showing, went steadily on with their self-appointed task, carrying their pitchers of water up to the men and back to the stream without a falter. When I was about two hundred yards from the crest where the troops were lying, a shell burst within a few yards of me, and a fragment of it struck one of the women in the arm. She screamed out as the artery spirted up over the white dress, and I made her my first patient in the battle.
As soon as the other women saw that she was wounded, they made a great fuss, chattering away like magpies. They placed her under a tree, and at first refused to let me attend to her, for a Giaour must not touch a Turkish woman under any circumstances; but when they could not stop the bleeding themselves, they became alarmed, and offered no objections when I approached with my bags of lint and bandages. I slit up the sleeve of her dress with a pair of scissors and stanched the bleeding; but the injury was only a flesh wound, and not serious. Osman Pasha got to hear of the women being there somehow, and presently an aide-de-camp came galloping up and cleared the whole lot of them off. They went back into the town, and I saw no more of them.