November 12th. As I sit beside the dying embers of my office fire, in which great valleys and gorges are discernible in the glowing coal and a mountainous summit capped by a fairy castle, I wonder what happiness there is to equal the fireside that one has earned oneself.
It might almost be home (after all, all fires, like all winds and sunshine, or thunder and rain, are consolingly the same!), only instead of soft pile carpets and arm-chairs I have a packing-case for seat and an inverted saucepan on my knee for table. Instead of flowers, the trestled table is adorned with bandages and bottles of lotion and packets of dressings.
Instead of a gong to announce "dressing time," and soft décolletée frocks donned before long mirrors, and well-appointed dining-tables and the announcement that "Dinner is served," there are only the promptings of my hungry inside to tell me mealtime is due, and it would be as well to scrub up, remove the mackintosh apron, and smooth my hair under the unbecoming white cap before the dinner is gobbled up!
Yet, until one has worked five hours to earn five minutes' rest, one does not know the meaning of leisure.
Until one has felt the clinging of the helpless hand, or run to the call of a feeble voice, one does not know the greatest of all joys—the joy of service.
The rapidity with which the Gare Maritime Hospital is developing is marvellous. Instead of wallowing to our ankles in a slush of disinfectant and rain-water, the wards are well swept, with two strips of cheery red carpet on either side. Instead of boards and blankets, some 200 real beds have been installed, with sheets of coarse calico and pillows. Instead of empty crates (and those at a premium) there are chairs, whilst towels supplant the red handkerchiefs which now hang desolately from the lamps by night and day.
Just at present the casualty ward, in which an emergency operation theatre has been opened, is lying empty, so are the other wards. One wonders why? The truth is, things are looking fairly bad. The enemy is only forty-five miles from Calais and still presses on to the goal. There is a rumour that the Germans are through the lines everywhere, that we have no men to send (though the French are supposed to be reinforcing) until the 8th Division of "K's" untrained army comes out, and the evacuation of Boulogne is imminent. We are told to be prepared to leave at a minute's notice, for once through the lines the enemy can march here unmolested. Despite the violent storm, all the wounded whom it is possible to move have been sent home (an ominous fact, for their removal should betoken an advance on our part), and still the ambulance trains come back from the front empty. A pestilential battle rages at Arras; Dixmude has fallen (yes, several of the Censor's censors have been dismissed for letting us know this!) A hundred questions assail us. Will the hopeless cases have to be left behind? What will be done to the many millions' worth of stores in this spy-ridden place?
Heaven knows! We can but "wait and see."
We are lost in amazement at the lukewarmness of the masses at home who do not seem to realise the significance of this move.