FOREWORD
The greater part of A Surgeon in Arms was written before the United States entered the war in April, 1917. Therefore, the Americans are not mentioned in many paragraphs in which the soldiers of the other allies are spoken of. The Canadian soldiers on the Western front have won undying fame for their marvelous feats in many actions, from the first battle of Ypres in April, 1915, to Vimy Ridge in April, 1917. As soldiers they take a place second to none. And, I believe, the American soldiers will, in the lines, show the same courage, dash, and initiative, and win the same fighting reputation and honors as the Canadians; for do not Americans and Canadians inherit the same blood, literature, history, and traditions; do they not both live in the same wide spaces, speak the same mother tongue, aspire to the same ideals, and enjoy the same free institutions?
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. [Life in the Trenches]
II. [Over the Top]
III. [Overland]
IV. [Kelly]
V. [The Language of the Line]
VI. [Just Looking About]
VII. [Gassed!]
VIII. [Relief]
IX. [Dugouts]
X. [The Sick Parade]
XI. [Caring for the Wounded]
XII. [Cheerfulness]
XIII. [Courage—Fear—Cowardice]
XIV. [Air Fighting]
XV. [Staff Officers]
XVI. [The Battle of Vimy Ridge]
XVII. [A Trip to Arras]
XVIII. [Ragoût à la Mode de Guerre (Trench Stew)]
XIX. [Leave]
XX. [Paris During the War]
XXI. [Paris in Wartime]
XXII. [In a Château Hospital]
XXIII. [On a Transport]
XXIV. [Decorations]
XXV. [On a Hill]
A SURGEON IN ARMS
CHAPTER I
LIFE IN THE TRENCHES
Life "out there" is so strange, so unique, so full of hardship and danger, and yet so intensely interesting that it seems like another world. It is a different life from any other that is to be found in our world today. In it the most extraordinary occurrences take place and are accepted as a matter of course.
I am sitting in a dugout near Fresnoy. Heavy shelling by the enemy is taking place outside, making life in the pitch-dark trenches rather precarious. A number of soldiers of different battalions on this front are going to and fro in the trenches outside. The shelling gets a bit worse, so some of them crawl down into the entrance of my dugout to take a few minutes' rest in its semi-protection. They cannot see each other in the blackness, but with that spirit of camaraderie so common out there two of the men sitting next each other begin to chat. After exchanging the numbers of their battalions, which happen to be both Canadian and in the same brigade, one says,—