"The train has just arrived and even now some few wounded are being removed from the waggons, the gravest of all being given treatment in an improvised hospital by the sidings, others less serious, though bad enough in all conscience, are carried on stretchers to the central goods shed, where the commandant, aided by a large staff of excitable, bearded assistants, directs to what hospital they are to be sent.
"For some minutes we watch the unloading of these waggons. Preceded by orderlies the officer passes from door to door, entering some, and questioning briefly the men lying full length or sitting in what comfort they can upon the straw-covered boards. As the panel slides back a fetid odour of pus reaches the nostrils; startled by the unexpected brightness a couple of horses tethered at one end of the truck stamp and whinney. Carrying an acetylene flare, which makes weird effects of chiaroscuro on the bare walls and floor, an orderly comes in and collects the histories of the men. One man, wounded in the head, persists in taking him for a German, the others laugh and point to their foreheads. A little further on, in second and third-class carriages, men with arms in slings, and less serious body wounds, crowd in the corridors and clamour for food and drink."
What wonder after this that we are told that most of the wounds received in those early days were septic on their arrival at the base hospital?
How different it all is at the present time! Now well-appointed hospital trains move backwards and forwards from the clearing hospitals to the base. For the first time we enter the nurse's sphere. Everything changes when the nurse appears upon the scene. She loves order. Cleanliness is her life. She is trained in all the little arts of nursing which bring comfort and peace. She can do what no man can do. The doctor is splendid at his own special work, the stretcher-bearer, the ambulance man, and the hospital orderly at his. But it remains for women to do what man can never do, and with her light touch, and tender sympathy, to soothe and comfort and bless.
When pain and anguish wring the brow
A ministering angel thou.
The hospital trains are called "Kitchener's trains"—another tribute to the great man who, from his room at the War Office, seems to overlook everything and forget nothing.
Miss Beardshaw, writing to her old hospital—Guy's—gives a description of one of these hospital trains well worth reproduction here.
"Ours is known as the 'Khaki Train '—a Kitchener's Train; it is half Great Eastern and half L.N.W. There are 220 beds, stretcher ones, two layers. In between each carriage is a little department, a place for plates, mugs, dressings, &c. The officers' and sisters' part is at one end with their kitchen. Dispensary in the middle. Patients' kitchen and orderlies' quarters at the other end. There are three medical officers, one army sister in charge of wards A and B and the general run of all our work. I have C, D, and E wards, and Miss Wilson has F, G, H; a 'London' nurse has the three others. The army sister is an old Guy's, so I think we shall be very happy together. There are forty-five orderlies. The paint of the train white, bed frames dark red, curtains green, and blankets dark brown, so the general effect is very pretty. It is kept most beautifully clean, and the orderlies are very proud of their train—the best on the line, they say. We go up and down to the clearing station, so I am greatly looking forward to seeing Sisters Kiddle and Ames. I do hope they will not be moved before we get there. We often take convalescent patients about, often to Havre. Have been between Havre and Rouen twice these last few days."
What a picture this gives us of organisation at its best! "Beautifully clean!" Surely this is just what is needed, and we cannot wonder that over sixty per cent. of the wounded are able ere long to return to the firing line.
4. And then after the journey in the hospital train de luxe, there is the Base Hospital, with everything in perfect order, and all that can be done for the wounded men. I have written about the work in the base hospitals in the chapter on "Work at the Fighting Base." It is not necessary, therefore, that I should linger here. I will, however, add a tribute which the Rev. R. Hall (Wesleyan) pays to the nursing sisters. Says Mr. Hall: