A great number of wounded men sleep on deck, and, by Jove! they do look glad that they are out of it for a bit, although they want to get back after a change—some of them.
All the nurses are dears, dead keen on their job. I am not wounded, so I don’t like talking to them.
The badly wounded officers are in beds in a large saloon, and one can look over a balustrade and see them. They are patient, and they stick the monotony admirably.
One fine chap, a Captain, has a lump of flesh torn from his back by a bomb, and has to lie in one position. As I pass along the gallery overlooking the ward at all hours of the day I can see him, either calmly looking at the roof, reading or dozing, and always in the same position, in which he will have to lie for weeks. Bombs make terrible wounds. My friend Cox, of the Essex, is on board. He was the officer that I saw limping back after the battle on the Wednesday after we had landed, and we have some chats together about those thrilling days. He and his officers were on the Dongola, from which boat we landed, and I have mentioned how they played “The Priest of the Parish.” I never want to play that game again. A good percentage of those chaps have gone now. There are only two officers in the Essex who have not been hit.
Cox has been back to the Peninsula once, but is now going to Alexandria, sick. I am nearly fit, but bored stiff, and want to get back to my job. The sea is calm and it is a lovely day, and awfully peaceful and quiet on the ship.
The stewards are very attentive; they are natives, as are also most of the crew. I always think that the nigger makes a better servant than the white man. Colonel Bruce, of the Gurkhas, is on board wounded, and has his servant with him. A ravine up the gully that he captured is now called Bruce’s Ravine. This servant at the hospital in Lemnos was allowed to sleep on the floor beside his master’s bed, and if his master stirred in his sleep, he sat up watching him intently.
We all had to go before the Medical Board this morning, a R.A.M.C. General at the head.
We had another burial to-day.
July 9th.
We arrive at Alexandria at 6 a.m. and berth alongside about twelve. It is strange seeing the old familiar scenes again. At one o’clock a hospital train comes alongside, with all the carriages painted white with a Red Crescent on, not the Red Cross. Curious that our R.A.M.C. should use both the Red Cross and the Red Crescent! The Australian sick and wounded are taken off and sent on board this train, which leaves at three o’clock for Cairo.