Diary of a Nursing Sister on the Western Front Part 16

_Sunday, January 31st._--We did go on to Rouen. B. is full to the brim.

We have only unloaded at B. three times since Christmas.

I'm beginning to think we waste a lot of sympathy on the poor wounded rocking in a train all night after being on it all day. One of mine with a bullet still in his chest, and some pneumonia, who seemed very ill when he was put on at Merville, said this morning he felt a lot better and had had the best night for five days! And my fidgety boy with the wound in his throat made a terrible fuss at being put off at Boulogne when he found he was the only one in his compartment to go and that I wasn't going with him.

I had the easy watch last night because of my cold, and went to bed at 1 A.M.; got a hot bath this morning, and lay low all day till a stroll between the Seine and the floods after tea (Sotteville). There are four trains waiting here, and the C.S.'s have been skating on the floods. We move on at 1 o'clock to-night. No.-- A.T. had a bomb dropped each side of their train at Bailleul, but they didn't explode.

The French instruction books have come, and I am going to start the French cla.s.s for the men on the train; they are very keen to learn, chiefly, I think, to make a little more running with the French girls at the various stopping places.

Two officers last night were awfully sick at not being taken off at B., but I think they'll get home from Rouen. One said he must get home, if only for ten minutes, to feel he was out of France.

_Wednesday, February 3rd._--Moved on last night, and woke up at Bailleul. Some badly wounded on the train, but not on my half.

On the other beat, beyond Rouen, the honeysuckle is in leaf, the catkins are out, and the woods are full of buds. What a difference it will make when spring comes. On this side it is all ca.n.a.ls, bogs, and pollards, and the eternal mud.

We found pinned on a sock from a London school child, "Whosoever receives this, when you return conqueror, drop me a line," and then her name and address!

_Thursday, February 4th._--For once we unloaded at B. and went to bed instead of taking them on all night to Rouen.

Moved out of B. at 5 A.M., breakfast at St O., where we nearly got left behind strolling on the line during a wait. We are going to Merville in the mining district where L. is.

3 P.M.--We have just taken on about seventy Indians, mostly sick, some badly wounded. They are much cleaner than they used to be, in clothes, but not, alas! in habits. Aeroplanes are chasing a Taube overhead, but it is not being sh.e.l.led. Guns are making a good noise all round. We are waiting for a convoy of British now.

It is a lovely afternoon.

The guns were shaking the train just now; one big bang made us all pop our heads out of the window to look for the bomb, but it wasn't a bomb.

A rosy-faced white-haired Colonel here just came up to me and said, "You've brought us more firing this afternoon than we've heard for a long time."

We are filling up with British wounded now on the other half of the train. It is getting late, and we shan't unload to-night.

_Later._--We were hours loading up because all the motor drivers are down with flu, and there were only two available. The rest are all busy bringing wounded in to the Clearing Hospital.

The spell of having the train full of slight medical cases and bad feet seems to be over, and wounded are coming on again.

Three of my sitting-up Indians have temperatures of 104, so you can imagine what the lying-downs are like. They are very anxious cases to look after, partly because they are another race and partly because they can't explain their wants, and they seem to want to be let die quietly in a corner rather than fall in with your notions of their comfort.

At Bailleul on our last journey we took on a heavenly white puppy just old enough to lap, quite wee and white and fat. He cries when he wants to be nursed, and barks in a lovely falsetto when he wants to play, and waddles after our feet when we take him for a walk, but he likes being carried best.

Some Tommies on a truck at Railhead brought him up for us; they adore his little mother and two brothers.

_Friday, February 5th, Boulogne._--We did get in late last night, and got to bed at 1 A.M. They are unloading during the night again now, and also loading up at night.

One boy last night had lost his right hand; his left arm and leg were wounded, and both his eyes. "Yes, I've got more than my share," he said, "but I'll get over it all right." I didn't happen to answer for a minute, and in a changed voice he said, "Shan't I? shan't I?" Of course I a.s.sured him he'd get quite well, and that he was ticketed to go straight to an eye specialist. "Thank G.o.d for that," he said, as if the eye specialist had already cured him, but it is doubtful if any eye specialist will save his eyes.

To-day has been a record day of brilliant sun, blue sky and warm air, and it has transformed the muddy, sloppy, dingy Boulogne of the last two months into something more like Cornwall. We couldn't stop on the train (there were no orders likely), in spite of being tired, but went in the town in the morning, and on the long stone pier in the afternoon, and then to tea at the buffet at the Maritime (where you have tea with real milk and fresh b.u.t.ter, and jam not out of a tin, and a tablecloth, and a china cup--luxuries beyond description). On the pier there were gulls, and a sunny sort of salt wind and big waves breaking, and a glorious view of the steep little town piled up in layers above the harbour, which is packed with shipping.

VIII.

On No.-- Ambulance Train (6)

ROUEN--NEUVE CHAPELLE--ST ELOI

_February 7, 1915, to March 31, 1915_

"Under the lee of the little wood I'm sitting in the sun; What will be done in Flanders Before the day be done?

Above, beyond the larches, The sky is very blue; 'It's the smoke of h.e.l.l in Flanders That leaves the sun for you.'"

--H.C.F.

VIII.

On No.-- Ambulance Train (6).

ROUEN--NEUVE CHAPELLE--ST ELOI.

_February 7, 1915, to March 31, 1915._

The Indians--St Omer--The Victoria League--Poperinghe--A bad load--Left behind--Rouen again--An "off" spell--_En route_ to etretat--Sotteville-- Neuve Chapelle--St Eloi--The Indians--Spring in N.W. France--The Convalescent Home--Kitchener's boys.

_Sunday, February 7th._--This is a little out-of-the-way town called Blendecque, rather in a hollow. No.-- A.T. has been here before, and the natives look at us as if we were Boches. There are 250 R.E. inhabiting a long truck-train here. We have given them all our m.u.f.flers and mittens; they had none, and the officer has had our officers to tea with him. Our men have played a football match with them--drawn.

We went for a splendid walk this morning up hill to a pine wood bordered by a moor with whins. I've now got in my bunky-hole (it is not quite six feet square) a polypod fern, a plate of moss, a pot of white hyacinths, and also catkins, violets, and mimosa!

I suppose we shall move on to-night if there is a marche.

Many hundreds of French cavalry pa.s.sed across the bridge over this cutting this morning: they looked so jolly.

One of the staff who has been to Woolwich on leave says that K.'s new army there is extraordinarily promising and keen. So far we have only heard good of those out here, from the old hands who've come across them.

9.45 P.M.--We are just getting to the place where all the fighting is--La Ba.s.see way. Probably we shall load up with wounded to-night.

There's a great flare some way off that looks like the burning villages we used to see round Ypres. It is a very dark night.

_Monday morning, February 8th._--We stood by last night, and are just going to load now. All is quiet here. Said to have been nothing happening the last few days.