I arrived at Béthune, boarded a French civilian train and traveled for five hours, reaching a junction point where, in company with a number of wounded men who were able to walk, I boarded a box car.
The train was traveling at a funereal pace and the weather turned sharply cold; neither the wounded nor the well men, with one exception, had any blankets; the exception had seven blankets that he monopolized, refusing to share an inch of them with anyone. Such unparalleled hoggishness and meanness never went unpunished at the front, and I resolved that he would be no exception to the rule. In order to take the chill off ourselves, we jumped off the train every chance we got, gathering up some coal, until we had accumulated enough to make a fair-sized fire, which we kindled on the floor of the car; it was necessary to shove the burning coals here and there over the surface to avoid burning a hole through it. At one point I noticed a horse-car filled with straw bedding for the animals, and the train going here at a snail's pace enabled me to jump off and chuck an armful of the straw into our car; I did this with my friend of the blankets in mind. I threw the damp straw on top of the live coals and in a few minutes or less the car was filled with rank, reeking smoke that fairly made the eyes water. Up jumped the blanket monopolist, rushed to the window for a breath of air, and while inhaling the ozone I chucked his blankets out of the car door. When he returned to his nest, which was a nest no longer, he swore several swears, both large and small, but he was forced to fare like the rest of us,—on the bare boards.
All this time the pain in my jaw was gradually getting worse. A swelling had started and I was feeling a little the worse for wear.
It was morning when we reached Abbeville Station, where we were to wait until night before being able to resume our journey. Here there was a horrible mass of dead horses—about 500 in all—lying in the railroad yards; they had died in the cars on the way back for treatment. It was a fearsome sight.
In an hour or so my face was commencing to throb violently, and I hunted up the nearest dressing station, which was a casualty clearing station, and addressed myself to the nurse.
"What's the matter, Canada?" she asked, looking at my jaw.
"Why, I got hit, nurse."
"I can plainly see that, but what makes it that color? It looks like gangrene! Come in and see the doctor."
He examined me and found there was a piece left sticking there; I would have to be operated on at once, he said, and there was no time lost getting down to business. He extracted a small splinter.
"See that this man is put to bed at once; gangrene has just started."