Over There with the Canadians at Vimy Ridge

by G. Harvey Ralphson

"Well, about the time I was able to get around without doing myself any harm--the gas effects kept me pretty weak quite a while,--I went up to Toronto to visit some friends. I was invited up there by one of the boys who was gassed at the same time I was. He and others had organized a 'Gas club,' consisting of fellows who had been gassed in the war. Grewsome idea, wasn't it? But it took famously. They wanted me to join, and I went up there and was initiated.

"Well, while I was up there, I saw considerable outdoor life. Several of us went hunting on snowshoes one day, and that capped the climax of my physical exertions. I ought to have been more careful, for I was not strong enough yet for such life. Well, I became ill on the way, and the boys got me to a hospital in the outskirts of the city and a physician examined me. The doctor said there was nothing serious the matter with me, only over-exertion in my weakened condition, so I did not notify father and mother.

"Two days later the doctor said I was in good enough condition to leave the hospital, but advised me to go straight home and not try any more such vigorous exercise until I was in condition to return to the trenches. This was in the evening, and I decided to remain in the hospital until morning. I was sitting up when the doctor called, and after he left I went out into the hall to find a telephone to call up my friend and tell him of my plan to return home next day.

"The building is an old brick structure that undoubtedly would have been condemned for hospital purposes if the interior woodwork had not been of the best material and well put together. However, the layout was decidedly old-fashioned and confusing to one accustomed to modern architecture. Anyway, I got lost, so to speak, in the hall while trying to find my way to the stairway.

"I found a stairway, but soon realized that it was not the one I wanted, and was about to turn back, when something caught my attention and held it for several minutes. I was on a kind of half-floor landing before an entrance into a low rear addition, and from that position found myself gazing into a laboratory in which something very strange was going on. Three men were in the room, one of them little more than a boy and in the khaki uniform of a soldier; the other two in civilian clothes. In the upper half of the door were two glass panels, through which I could see very clearly, and the transom over the door was swung partly open.

"There was something peculiar about the two older men which almost fascinated me. Both had a decidedly foreign look. One was smooth-shaven, except for a heavy kaiser mustache; the other, the older of these two, wore a full beard.

"The young fellow in khaki was seated on a chair, with his left arm bared above the elbow, resting on a table. The other two men were working over the arm in a most studious manner. Over them was a brilliant calcium light which illuminated their work. I could see the arm very plainly and it took me only a minute or two to determine what the two older men were doing to it.

"They were tattooing the arm, and a most remarkable kind of tattooing it was. They were extremely careful with their work and progressed slowly. Judging from the care they took and the slowness with which they progressed, they must have worked on that arm several days. Also, spread out before them, was a small sheet of white paper, to which they referred frequently.

"It is hard to describe to you the appearance of the result of their work, but I'll send you a copy of the original they were working from and explain how I got it. I think you'll agree with me that it looks more like a piece of kindergarten patchwork than anything else imaginable.

"While I was gazing in a kind of fascination at the strange scene, the man with the kaiser mustache turned suddenly and saw me. His next movement was just as sudden and much more astonishing. He sprang to the door, flung it open, and before I could realize what was taking place he had seized me by the arm and was dragging me into the laboratory. I struggled to prevent him from getting me inside, but, because of my weakened condition, was unsuccessful. My next impulse was to cry out for help, but the situation seemed to me so ridiculous that I decided I would only make myself look foolish by so doing. This hospital was surely a highly respectable institution, I reasoned, and the misunderstanding of which I was a victim would soon be cleared up. Perhaps these men thought I was a spying meddler bent on some malicious mischief.