Würzburg and all that nightmare in German hands were already slipping far away into the past. The reaction found expression not in hilarious excitement or placid contentment, but in an exceeding weariness of mind and body. Quite early in the morning the train stopped at a small station well over the German frontier. Two ladies came along the corridor with baskets full of cakes, oranges, tobacco, and other gifts. "Oh, you poor men," said a voice in English, "is there anything we can do for you?" It was the first Englishwoman's voice we had heard for a long time (it did seem such a very long time since we left Southampton Water).
The voice and the kind words acted as a stimulant, almost as a shock. Although the incident may seem to be a trivial one, it is stamped in my memory, for it awoke the memory of all that England is, of kind human sympathy, of those qualities so little understood by Germans.
We reached Flushing about 11 A.M. The British Consul and a number of very kind people came to meet the train and escorted us to the hotel which is just opposite the station. Owing to a very bad headache I had to spend the day in bed.
Those of our party who were able went for a walk as free men in the streets of Flushing. They saw the arrival of German prisoners from England, and compared their well-fed appearance in smart clean uniforms with the ragged miserable state of the unfortunate British soldiers. About seven o'clock we were allowed to go on board the steamer. In the dining-room of the hotel I met Major Chichester, who had arrived with all the one-armed and one-legged men from Madame Brunot's Hospital at Cambrai. Many stretcher cases were carried down the gangway, some with bandaged heads and smiling faces; but one or two stretchers were completely covered over, and one dared not think of the burden they carried. Yet others there were who, going back to England, would never see England again. "Are we downhearted?"—the cry was raised at intervals, and from every quarter of the ship came the answer in a convincing chorus.
During the long and very rough sea passage my mind was taken up with the misery of the sea, which in a bad sailor is able to dominate all else. However, the discomforts of the sea journey only intensified the relief of landing on English soil at last.
It was about 8 P.M. before the hospital train was ready to start for Charing Cross. At the end of the saloon in which we were travelling a large gramophone was playing a lively and rather catching air. I asked an orderly the name of the tune, and he, looking at me with an air of suspicion and hesitation, not knowing the tune was unfamiliar to us, replied at last, "It's a long long way to Tipperary."
Indeed the way had seemed long.
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Footnotes
[1]: See Convention concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land: The Hague, 1907, p. 47.