It was before this new commandant arrived that I commenced arrangements for sending news to England. A Sergeant Mandel, who had lost one arm at the shoulder, was to be exchanged, and I arranged for him to take it, as I thought him a likely person for exchange, but I wanted to run no risks. He was strongly for having it put in a crutch, or sewn into the sole of his boot; but as I anticipated a search of every particle of kit, I adopted my own plan. With my scanty money I bought candles. Having written my letter quite small and as carefully as I could with my bunged-up eyes, I rolled it up tightly in a small cylindrical shape, and making a paper mould around it, filled up the interstices with dripped fat, thus making a candle with the letter inside. This was to preserve it. I shaved it down, pushed it in a water-bottle, and ran the other candles boiling into it, thus filling the bottle two inches from the bottom. I shook it, and found it firm. The bottle was then filled up with strong tea. This was because it was not transparent, and cold tea was a usual drink—when one could get it.
I hoped this would answer, and that they would not suspect anything. Nothing rattled, and inside the water-bottle was quite dark.
One letter was to Lord Islington, and contained, besides a précis of information I had been asked to send from the senior officer of the prison camp, a statement by me of the condition of the men, and their treatment since the trek. I gave some information on the high cost of living, and the great difficulty of keeping oneself alive without cashing many cheques at a worthless exchange.
I had heard of a convention recently signed between England and Turkey at Berne about prisoners, and quoted some glaring cases of maltreatment which, as one of the original arrivals in Stamboul from provincial camps, I was in a position to know about. I sent also a few other matters of information about the state of Turkey. I prefaced all my letters with a statement, "I alone am responsible for statements therein, which are unknown to the bearer of the packet." I did this in case the letter was found.
I had scarcely got it away when I was sent to Harbiay Hospital for treatment. I had now left Kastamuni some ten weeks without receiving any medical treatment, except for one visit to a place called Tash Kushla, where a doctor examined my eyes, and said I was to be exchanged. Even in spite of my distrust, gradually a gleam of hope found its way into my mind, and grew to huge dimensions. I was afterwards coldly informed, however, that his actual written report was merely that Turkish eye treatment was preferable to German, and I was not to be allowed to go to German specialists!
At Harbiay I was put in a room with a half-mad Russian, who had been shot in the head, and some poor old Russian grey-headed men—sailors, I think—who smoked and cried most of the night. Here I had no food for thirty-six hours, and then only watery soup. We were not allowed to leave the room, and the postas were unusually brutal. The director of the hospital, who had been most kind to me at our first interview, offered to send me diet and books, and even medicine, and to attend to me himself—all of which I doubted. After about four days I was sent to a Turk, and an old savage he was, who said if God willed I would get right. Then a German doctor examined me, but was most aggressive and rude, and seemingly angry at being asked to diagnose an Englishman, and muttered something about this. He prescribed some special injection for my eyes. Then we were lined up, and were all dosed by a filthy Turk out of the same squirt, whatever our eye trouble was. This was a mistake, it appeared afterwards.
The next day, having hidden my trousers under my bed when I arrived (they always take away all one's kit on entering hospital) the guard was sent to get them. I put them on nevertheless, and then demanded to see the Director. It took all day to await my chance, but when the posta was off the qui vive I ran along in my trousers and a blue overall of the hospital towards his office. It was a huge building, and I got lost, but it was fatal to turn, so I went on through numerous corridors with an increasing train of postas at my heels, and finally fetched up in what appeared to be an ante-chamber of the Director's wife. The postas stopped short and peered in at the door. I apologized to the Turkish lady, who was arguing with some Armenian maids. She asked why I was running away from the postas. I assured her I was doing nothing of the kind, but I was merely running to the Director. She was tickled by my having trousers, and asked how I had managed it. I explained that the Director had given me a standing invitation to his office for any request and that I had hidden my trousers to be able to do so. She rebuked me for breaking rules, and asked me what I could possibly want. I said I wanted to give some urgent information to the Chef d'Hôpital. Finally, she conducted me to him. He heard me coming, and I saw his face over the posta's shoulder quite enraged and savage, and he said I was not to enter.
It was spoken in Turkish. I had, however, already entered! His face changed in a second, and he was the crafty Director, professed huge surprise at my statement that I had had no food and had not been allowed out of the room, or to cash cheques, or to receive any attention, and that I wanted to return to the garrison at Psamatia. He promised to remedy all things at once, and to send me "ée yemek" (good food) at that very moment. I extracted a promise to depart next day. How I loathed the place! The Russians alone made it unbearable, poor fellows. They seemed on the verge of suicide in that great empty room with hundreds of beds in it. Nothing else happened for two days except that a Turkish doctor came and injected some serum into my eyes, which he said was to happen three times a day. The Director himself came round next day, and tried to pretend he was busy, when I went for him. I made myself such a nuisance, and torpedoed his dignity so successfully, that he finally unmasked, and I knew him for the cruel, lying, and crafty type of Turk, veneered with excellent manners, but a brute at heart. It was the same fellow, as far as I can remember, who refused a dying Russian officer's daily request for permission to have one or two of his friends from Psamatia to see him in order to make his will and provide for his wife and children. I had been in Psamatia when our Russian friend (Roussine) had daily asked for this from their end. Their letters were never answered, but were destroyed by the old commandant, as were the dying man's by the Director. He died. When he had been dead some days the Director sent to Psamatia a kind request to the officer to come and talk to his friend, with private directions that they were to be told the man had just died when they came.
Anyway, by the end of the third day after the "torpedoing," my patience was at an end. I had learned, after many weeks, how difficult it was to get out of a hospital once one was in. After more scenes I left in the evening in an arabana, bearing a letter in Turkish, saying I had been excellently treated and had received the best attention possible. On arrival at Psamatia my little sad room seemed heaven again. I was alone, and the groaning of the Russians was somewhere away.