WORKING UNDER DIFFICULTIES
I have not written my diary for some weeks. I went home to England and
stayed at Rayleigh House. On my way home I met Mr. F. Ware, who told me
submarines were about. As I had but just left a much-shelled town, I
think he might have held his peace. The usual warm welcome at Rayleigh
House, with Mary there to meet me, and Emily Strutt.
I wasn't very tired when I first arrived, but fatigue came out on me
like a rash afterwards. I got more tired every day, and ended by having
a sort of breakdown. This rather spoilt my holiday, but it was very nice
seeing people again. It was difficult, I found, to accommodate myself to
small things, and one was amazed to find people still driving serenely
in closed broughams. It was like going back to live on earth again after
being in rather a horrible other world. I went to my own house and
enjoyed the very smell of the place. My little library and an hour or
two spent there made my happiest time. Different people asked me to
things, but I wasn't up to going out, and the weather was amazingly
bad.
I was to have gone back to work on the Thursday week after I arrived
home, but I got a telegram from Madame Sindici saying Furnes was being
shelled, and the hospital, etc., was to be evacuated. Dr. Perrin, who
was to have taken me back, had to start immediately without me. It was
difficult to get news, and hearing nothing I went over on Saturday,
January 23rd, as I had left Mrs. Clitheroe in charge of my soup-kitchen,
and thought I had better do the burning deck act and get back to it.
Mr. Bevan and Mr. Morgan met me at Calais, and told me to wait at
Dunkirk, as everyone was quitting Furnes. One of our poor nurses was
killed, and the Joos' little house was much damaged. I stopped at Mrs.
Clitheroe's flat, very glad to be ill in peace after my seedy condition
in London and a bad crossing. Rested quietly all Sunday in the flat by
myself. It is an empty, bare little place, with neither carpets nor
curtains, but there is something home-like about it, the result, I
think, of having an open fire in one room.
On Monday, the 25th, I went back to work at Adinkerke station, to which
place our soup-kitchen has been moved. I got a warm welcome from the
Belgian Sisters. It is very difficult doing the station work from
Dunkirk, as it is 16 kilometres from Adinkerke; but the place itself is
nice, and I just have to trust to lifts. I fill my pockets with
cigarettes and go to the "sortie de la ville," and just wait for
something to pass--and some queer, bumpy rides I get. Still, the
soldiers who drive me are delightful, and the cigarettes are always
taken as good pay.
One day I went and spent the night at Hoogstadt, where the hospital now
is, and that I much enjoyed. Dr. Perrin gave up his little room to me,
and the nurses and staff were all so full of welcome and pleasant
speeches.
On Monday, February 8th, I went out to La Panne to start living in the
hotel there; but I was really dreadfully seedy, and suffered so much
that I had to return to the flat at Dunkirk again to be nursed. My day
at La Panne was therefore very sad, as I nearly perished with cold, and
felt so ill. Not a soul came near me, and I wished I could be a Belgian
refugee, when I might have had a little attention from somebody.
On Tuesday, February 9th, a Belgian officer came into Adinkerke station,
claimed our kitchen as a bureau, and turned us out on to the platform. I
am trying to get General Millis to interfere; but, indeed, the rudeness
of this man's act makes one furious.
[Page Heading: ILLNESS AT DUNKIRK]
_14 February._--I have been laid up for some days at the flat at
Dunkirk. It is amazing to realise that this place should be one's
present idea of comfort. It has no carpets, no curtains, not a blind
that will pull up or down, and rather dirty floors, yet it is so much
more comfortable than anything I have had yet that I am too thankful to
be here. There is a gas-ring in the kitchen, on which it is possible to
cook our food, and there are shops where things can be got.
Mr. Strickland and I are both laid up here, and Miss Logan nurses us
devotedly. Our joy is having a sitting-room with a fire in it. Was
there ever anything half so good as that fire, or half so homely, half
so warm or so much one's own? I lie on three chairs in front of it, and
headache and cold and throat are almost forgotten. The wind howls, the
sea roars, and aeroplanes fly overhead, but at least we have our fire
and are at home.
_17 February._--Another cold, wet day. I am alone in the flat with a
"femme de ménage" to look after me. A doctor comes to see me sometimes.
Miss Logan and Mr. Strickland left this morning. There was a tempest of
rain, and I couldn't think of being moved. They were sweet and kind, and
felt bad about leaving me; but I am just loving being left alone with
some books and my fire.
I have been lying in bed correcting proofs. Oh, the joy of being at
one's own work again! Just to see print is a pleasure. I believe I have
forgotten all I ever knew before the war began. A magazine article comes
to me like a language I have almost forgotten.
_18 February._--This is the day that German "piracy" is supposed to
begin. We heard a great explosion early this morning, but it was only a
mine that had been found on the shore being blown up. The sailors'
aeroplane corps is opposite us, and we see Commander Samson and others
flying off in the morning and whirling back at night, and then we hear
there has been a raid somewhere. When a Taube comes over here the
sailors fire at it with a gun just opposite us, and then tell us they
only do it to give us flower-vases--_i.e._, empty shell-cases!
[Page Heading: SOME STORIES OF THE WAR]
Mr. Holland came here to-day, and told me some humorous sides of his
experiences with ambulances. One man from the Church Army marched in,
and said: "I am a Christian and you are not. I come here for petrol, and
I ask it, not for the Red Cross, but in the name of Christ." Another man
came dashing in, and said: "I want to go to Poperinghe. I was once there
before, and the mud was beastly. Send someone with me."
My own latest experience was with an American woman of awful vulgarity.
I asked her if she was busy, like everyone else in this place, and she
said:
"No. I was suffering from a nervous breakdown, so I came out here. What
is your _war_ is my _peace_, and I now sleep like a baby."
I want adjectives! How is one to describe the people who come for
one brief visit to the station or hospital with an intense
conviction that they and they only feel the suffering or even notice
the wants of the men. Some are good workers. Others I call
"This-poor-fellow-has-had-none." Nurses may have been up all night,
doctors may be worked off their feet, seven hundred men may have passed
through the station, all wounded and all fed, but when our visitors
arrive they discover that "This poor fellow has had none," and firmly,
and with a high sense of duty and of their own efficiency, they make the
thing known.
No one else has heard a man shouting for water; no one else knows that a
man wants soup. The man may have appendicitis, or colitis, or
pancreatitis, or he may have been shot through the lungs or the abdomen.
It doesn't matter. The casual visitor knows he has been neglected, and
she says so, and quite indiscriminately she fills everyone up with
soup. Only she is tender-hearted. Only she could never really be
hardened by being a nurse. She seizes a little cup, stoops over a man
gracefully, and raises his head. Then she wants things passed to her,
and someone must help her, and someone must listen to what she has to
say. She feeds one man in half an hour, and goes away horrified at the
way things are done. Fortunately these people never stay for long.
Then there is another. She can't understand why our ships should be
blown up or why trenches should be taken. In her own mind she proves
herself of good sound intelligence and a member of the Empire who won't
be bamboozled, when she says firmly and with heat, "Why don't we _do_
something?" She would like to scold a few Generals and Admirals, and she
says she believes the Germans are much cleverer than ourselves. This
last taunt she hopes will make people "_do_ something." It stings, she
thinks.
I could write a good deal about this "solitary winter," but I have not
had time either to write or to read. I think something inside me has
stood still or died during this war.
_21 February, Sunday._--The Munro corps has swooped down in its usual
hurry to distribute letters, and to say that someone is waiting down
below and they can't stop. They eat a hasty sardine, drink a cup of
coffee, and are off!
To-day I have made this flat tidy at last, and have had it cleaned and
scrubbed. I have thrown away old papers and empty boxes, and can sit
down and sniff contentedly. No convoy-ite sees the difference!
[Page Heading: THE COMMUNAL LIFE]
I think I have learnt every phase of muddle and makeshift this winter,
but chiefly have I learnt the value of the Biblical recommendation to
put candles on candlesticks. In the "convoi Munro" I find them in
bottles, on the lids of mustard-tins, in metal cups, or in the necks of
bedroom carafes. Never is the wax removed. Where it drips there it
remains. Where matches fall there they lie. The stumps of cigarettes
grace even the insides of flower-pots, knives are wiped on bread,
and overcoats of enormous weight (khaki in colour, with a red cross
on the arm) are hung on inefficient loose nails, and fall down.
Towels are always scarce; but then, they serve as dinner-napkins,
pocket-handkerchiefs, and even as pillow-cases, so no wonder we are a
little short of them. There is no necessity for muddle. There never is
any necessity for it.
The communal life is a mistake. I wonder if Christ got bored with it.
On Sundays I always want to rest, and something always makes me write.
The attack comes on quite early. It is irresistible. At last I am a
little happy after these dreary months, and it is only because I can
think a little, and because the days are not quite so dark. I think the
nights have been longer here than I ever knew them. No doubt it is the
bad weather and the small amount of light indoors that make the days
seem so short.
I am going back to-morrow to the station, with its train-loads of
wounded men. I _want_ to go, and to give them soup and comforts and
cigarettes, but just ten days' illness and idleness have "balmed my
soul."
_22 February._--Waited all day for a car to come and fetch me away. It
was dull work as I could never leave the flat, and all my things were
packed up, and there was no coal.
_23 February._--Waited again all day. I got very tired of standing by
the window looking out on a strip of beach at the bottom of the street,
and on the people passing to and fro. Then I went down to the dock to
try and get a car there, but the new police regulations made it
impossible to cross the bridge. I went to the airmen opposite. No luck.
There is a peculiar brutality which seems to possess everyone out here
during the war. I find it nearly everywhere, and it entails a good deal
of unnecessary suffering. Always I am reminded of birds on a small ledge
pushing each other into the sea. The big bird that pushes another one
over goes to sleep comfortably.
I remember one evening at Dunkirk when we couldn't get rooms or food
because the landlady of the hotel had lost all her servants. The staff
at the ---- gave me a meal, but there was a queer want of courtesy about
it. I said that anything would do for my supper, and I went to help get
it myself. I spied a roll of cold veal on a shelf, and said helpfully
that that would do splendidly, but the answer was: "Yes, but I believe
that is for our next meal." However, in the end I got a scrap,
consisting mostly of green stuffing.
"But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room"--ah, my
dear Lord, in this world one may certainly take the lowest place, and
keep it. It is only the great men who say, "Friend, come up higher."
"You can't have it," is on everyone's lips, and a general sense of
bustle goes with the brutality. "You can't come here," "We won't have
her," are quite common phrases. God help us, how nasty we all are!
I find one can score pretty heavily nowadays by being a "psychologist."
All the most disagreeable people I know are psychologists, notably ----,
who breaks his promises and throws all his friends to the wolves, but
who can still explain everything in his sapient way by saying he is a
psychologist.
One thing I hope--that no one will ever call me "highly strung." I wish
good old-fashioned bad temper was still the word for highly strung and
nervy people.
... I am longing for beautiful things, music, flowers, fine thoughts....
[Page Heading: LA PANNE]
_La Panne. 25 February._--At last I have succeeded in getting away from
Dunkirk! The Duchess of Sutherland brought me here in her car. Last
night I dined with Mrs. Clitheroe. She was less bustled than usual, and
I enjoyed a chat with her as we walked home through the cold white mist
which enshrouded La Panne.
This long war has settled down to a long wait. Little goes on except
desultory shelling, with its occasional quite useless victims. At the
station we have mostly "malades" and "éclopés"; in the trenches the
soldiers stand in the bitter cold, and occasionally are moved out by
shells falling by chance amongst them. The men who are capable of big
things wait and do nothing.
If it was not for the wounded how would one stand the life here? A man
looks up patiently, dumbly, out of brown eyes, and one is able to go on
again.
_La Panne. 27 February_.--I have been staying for three nights at the
Kursaal Hotel, but my room was wanted and I had to turn out, so I packed
my things and came down to the Villa les Chrysanthèmes, and shared Mrs.
Clitheroe's room for a night. In the morning all our party packed up and
left to go to Furnes, and I took on these rooms. I may be turned out any
minute for "le militaire," but meanwhile I am very comfortable.
The heroic element (a real thing among us) takes queer forms sometimes.
"No sheets, of course," is what one hears on every side, and to eat a
meal standing and with dirty hands is to "play the game." Maxine Elliott
said, "The nervous exhaustion attendant upon discomfort hinders work,"
and she "does herself" very well, as also do all the men of the regular
forces. But volunteer corps--especially women--are heroically bent on
being uncomfortable. In a way they like it, and they eat strange meals
in large quantities, and feel that this is war.
Lord Leigh took me into Dunkirk in his car to-day, and I managed to get
lots of vegetables for the soup-kitchen, and several other things I
wanted. A lift is everything at this time, when one can "command"
nothing. If one might for once feel that by paying a fare, however high,
one could ensure having something--a railway journey, a motor-car, or
even a bed! My work isn't so heavy at the kitchen now, and the hours are
not so long, so I hope to do some work of a literary nature.
* * * * *
[Page Heading: LA PANNE]
_To Miss Macnaughtan's Sisters._
VILLA LES CHRYSANTHÈMES
LA PANNE, BELGIUM,
_Sunday, 28 February._
MY DEAR FAMILY,
It is so long since I wrote a decently long letter that I think I must
write to you all, to thank you for yours, and to give you what news
there is of myself.
Of war news there is none. The long war is now a long wait, and the huge
expense still goes on, while we lock horns with our foes and just sway
backwards and forwards a little, and this, as you know, we have done for
weeks past. Every day at the station there is a little stream of men
with heads or limbs bandaged, and our work goes on as before, although
it is not on quite the same lines now. I used to make every drop of the
soup myself, and give it out all down the train. Now we have a
receiving-room for the wounded, where they stay all day, and we feed
them four times, and then they are sent away. The whole thing is more
military than it used to be, the result, I think, of officers not having
much to do, and with a passion for writing out rules and regulations
with a nice broad pen. Two orderlies help in the kitchen, the soup is
"inspected," and what used to be "la cuisine de la dame écossaise" is
not so much a charitable institution as it was.
One sees a good deal of that sort of thing during this war. Women have
been seeing what is wanted, and have done the work themselves at really
enormous difficulty, and in the face of opposition, and when it is a
going concern it is taken over and, in many cases, the women are turned
out. This was the case at Dunkirk station, which was known everywhere as
"the shambles." I myself tried to get the wounded attended to, and I
went there with a naval doctor, who told me that he couldn't uncover a
single wound because of the awful atmosphere (it was quite common to see
15,000 men lying on straw). One woman took this matter in hand, purged
the place, got mattresses, clean straw, stoves, etc., and when all was
in order the voice of authority turned her out.
This long waiting is being much more trying for people than actual
fighting. In every corps the old heroic outlook is a little bit fogged
by petty things. One sees the result of it in some wrangling and
jealousy, but this will soon be forgotten when fighting with all its
realities begins again.
I think Britain on the subject of "piracy" is about as fine as anything
in her history. Her determination to ignore ultimatums and threats is
really quite funny, and English people still put out in boats as they
have always done, and are quite undismayed. Our own people here continue
to travel by sea, as if submarines were rather a joke, and when going
over to England on some small and useless little job they say
apologetically, "Of course, I wouldn't go if I hadn't got to." The fact
is, if there is any danger about they have to be in it.
Some of our own corps have gone back to Furnes--I believe because it is
being shelled. The rest of us are at La Panne, a cold seaside place
amongst the dunes. In summer-time I fancy it is fashionable, but now it
contains nothing but soldiers. They are quartered everywhere, and one
never knows how long one will be able to keep a room. The station is at
Adinkerke, where I have my kitchen. It is about two miles from La Panne,
and it also is crammed with soldiers. There seems to be no attempt at
sanitation anywhere.
I wish I had more interesting news to tell you, but I am at my station
all day, and if there is anything to hear (which I doubt) I do not hear
it.
There is a barge on the canal at Adinkerke which is our only excitement.
It is the property of Maxine Elliott, Lady Drogheda, and Miss Close, and
to go to tea with them is everyone's ambition. The barge is crammed with
things for Belgian refugees, and Maxine told me that the cargo
represents "nearer £10,000 than £5,000." It is piled with flour in
sacks, clothing, medical comforts, etc. The work is good.
I am sending home some long pins like nails. They are called "Silent
Death," and are dropped from German aeroplanes. Boys pick them up and
give them to us in exchange for cigarettes.
[Page Heading: MRS. PERCIVAL'S SLIPPERS]
I want to tell Tabby how immensely pleased everyone is with her
slippers. The men who have stood long in the trenches are in agonies of
frost-bite and rheumatism, and now that I can give them these slippers
when they arrive at the station, they are able to take off their wet
boots caked with mud.
If J. would send me another little packet of groceries I should love it.
Just what can come by post. That Benger's Food of hers nearly saved my
life when I was ill at Dunkirk. What I should like better than anything
is a few good magazines and books. I get _Punch_ and the _Spectator_,
but I want the _English Review_ and the _National_, and perhaps a
_Hibbert_. I enclose ten shillings for these. What is being read?
Stephen Coleridge seems to have brought out an interesting collection,
but I can't remember its name. I wonder if any notice will be taken of
"They who Question." The reviews speak well of the Canadian book.
Love to you all, and tell Alan how much I think of him. Bless you, my
dears. Write often.
Yours as ever,
SARAH.
* * * * *
_1 March._--Woe betide the person who owns anything out here: he is
instantly deprived of it. "Pinching" is proverbial, and people have
taken to carrying as many of their possessions as possible on their
person, with the result that they are the strangest shapes and sizes.
Still, one hopes the goods are valuable until one discovers that they
generally consist of the following items: a watch that doesn't go, a
fountain-pen that is never filled, an electric torch that won't light, a
much-used hanky, an empty iodine bottle, and a scarf.
_5 March._--I went as usual to-day to the muddy station and distributed
soup, which I no longer make now that the station has become
militarised. My hours are from 12 noon to 5 o'clock. This includes the
men's dinner-hour and the washing of the kitchen. They eat and smoke
when I am there, and loll on the little bench. They are Belgians and I
am English, and one is always being warned that the English can't be too
careful! We are entertaining 40,000 Belgians in England, but it must be
done "carefully."
[Page Heading: THIEVING AND GIVING]
It is a great bore out here that everything is stolen. One can hardly
lay a thing down for an instant that it isn't taken. To-day my Thermos
flask in a leather case, in which I carry my lunch, was prigged from the
kitchen. Things like metal cups are stolen by the score, and everyone
begs! Even well-to-do people are always asking for something, and they
simply whine for tobacco. The fact is, I think, the English are giving
things away with their usual generosity and want of discrimination,
and--it is a horrid word--they are already pauperising a nice lot of
people. I can't help thinking that the thing is being run on wrong
lines. We should have given or lent what was necessary to the Belgian
Government, and let them undertake to provide for soldiers and refugees
through the proper channels. No lasting good ever came of gifts--every
child begs for cigarettes, and they begin smoking at five years old.
I often think of our poor at home, and wish I had a few sacks full of
things for them! I have not myself come across any instances of poverty
nearly as bad as I have seen in England. I understand from Dr. Joos and
other Belgians who know about these things that there is still a good
deal of money tucked away in this country. I hope there is, and we all
want to help the Belgians over a bad time, but it would be better and
more dignified for them to get it through their own Government.
I had tea with Lady Bagot the other day, and afterwards I had a chat
with Prince Francis at the English Mission. Another afternoon I went
down to the Kursaal Hotel for tea. The stuffy sitting-room there is
always filled with knickerbockered, leather-coated ladies and with
officers in dark blue uniform, who talk loudly and pat the barmaid's
cheeks. She seems to expect it; it is almost etiquette. A cup of bad
tea, some German trophies examined and discussed, and then I came away
with a "British" longing for skirts for my ladies, and for something
graceful and (odious word) dainty about them. Yesterday evening Lady
Bagot dined with me. This Villa is the only comfortable place I have
been in since the war began: it makes an amazing difference to my
health.
It is odd to have to admit that one has hardly ever been unhappy for a
long time before this war. The year my brother died, the year one went
through a tragedy, the year of deadly dullness in the country--but now
it isn't so much a personal matter. War and the sound of guns, and the
sense of destruction and death abroad, the solitude of it, and the
disappointing people! Oh, and the poor wounded--the poor, smelly, dirty
wounded, whom one sees all day, and for whom one just sticks this out.
I have only twice been for a drive out here, and I have not seen a
single place of interest, nor, indeed, a single interesting person
connected with the war. That, I suppose, is the result of being a
"cuisinière!" It is rather strange to me, because for a very long time I
always seem to have had the best of things. To-day I hear of this
General or that Secretary, or this great personage or that important
functionary, but the only people whom I see are three little Sisters and
two Belgian cooks.
To give up work seems to me a little like divorcing a husband. There is
a feeling of failure about it, and the sense that one is giving up what
one has undertaken to do. So, however dull or tiresome husband or work
may be, one mustn't give them up.
[Page Heading: THE POWER OF THE BIBLE]
_6 March._--To-day I have been thinking, as I have often thought, that
the real power of the Bible is that it is a Universal Human Document.
The world is based upon sentiment--_i.e._, the personality of man and
his feelings brought to bear upon facts. It is also the world's dynamic
force. Now, the books of the Bible--especially, perhaps, the magical,
beautiful Psalms--are the most tender and sentimental (the word has been
misused, of course) that were ever written. They express the thoughts
and feelings of generations of men who always did express their thoughts
and feelings, and thought no shame of it. And so we northern people,
with our passionate inarticulateness, love to find ourselves expressed
in the old pages.
I find in the Gospels one of the few complaints of Christ. "Have I been
so long time with you and yet hast thou not known me, Philip?" All one
has ever felt is said for one in a phrase, all that one finds most
isolating in the world is put into one sentence. There is a wan feeling
of wonder in it; "so long," and yet you think that of me! "so long," and
yet such absolute inability to read my character! "so long," and yet
still quite unaware of my message! The humour of it (to us) lies in the
little side of it! The dear people who "thought you would like this or
dislike that"--the kind givers of presents even--the little people who
shop for one! The friends who invite one to their queer, soulless, thin
entertainments, with their garish lights; the people who choose a book
for one, who counsel one, even with importunity, to go to some play
which they are "sure we shall like." "So long"--they are old friends,
and yet they thought we should like that play or that book! "So
long"--and yet they think one capable of certain acts or feelings which
do not remotely seem to belong to one! "So long"--and yet they can't
even touch one chord that responds!
We are always quite alone. The communal life is the loneliest of all,
because "yet thou hast not known me." The world comes next in
loneliness, but it is _big_, and with a big soul of its own. The family
life is almost naïve in its misunderstanding--no one listens, they just
wait for pauses....
... The worship of the "sane mind" has been a little overdone, I think.
The men who are prone to say of everyone that they "exaggerate a
little," or "are morbid," are like weights in a scale--just, but oh,
how heavy!...
... This war is fine, _fine_, FINE! I know it, and yet I don't get near
the fineness except in the pages of _Punch_! I see streams of men whose
language (Flemish) I don't speak, holding up protecting hands to keep
people from jostling a poor wounded limb, and I watch them sleeping
heavily, or eating oranges and smoking cigarettes down to the last hot
stump, but I don't hear of the heroic stands which I know are made, or
catch the volition of it all. Perhaps only in a voluntary army is such a
thing possible. Our own boys make one's heart beat, but these poor,
dumb, sodden little men, coming in caked with mud--to be patched up and
sent into a hole in the ground again, are simply tragic.
[Page Heading: "THE WOMAN'S TOUCH"]
_7 March._--"The woman's touch." When a woman has been down on her knees
scrubbing for a week, and washing for another week, a man, returning and
finding his house in order, and vaguely conscious of a newer and fresher
smell about it, talks quite tenderly of "a woman's touch."...
... There are some people who never care to enter a door unless it has
"passage interdite" upon it....
... The guns are booming heavily this morning. Nothing seems to
correspond. Are men really falling and dying in agonies quite close to
us? I believe we ought to see less or more--be nearer the front or
further from it. Or is it that nothing really changes us? Only war
pictures and war letters remain as a fixed blazing standard. The
soldiers in the trenches are quite as keen about sugar in their coffee
as we are about tea. No wonder men have decided that one day we must put
off flesh. It is far too obstrusive....
... To comfort myself I try to remember that Wellington took his old
nurse with him on all his campaigns because she was the only person who
washed his stocks properly....
... Surely the expense of the thing will one day put a stop to war. We
are spending two million sterling per day, the French certainly as much,
the Germans probably more, and Austria and Russia much more, in order to
keep men most uncomfortably in unroofed graves, and to send high
explosives into the air, most of which don't hit anything. Surely, if
fighting was (as it is) impossible in this flooded country in winter, we
might have called a truce and gone home for three months, and trained
and drilled like Christians on Salisbury Plain!...
... Health--_i.e._, bad health--obtrudes itself tiresomely. I am ill
again, and, fortunately, few people notice it, so I am able to keep on.
A festered hand makes me awkward; and as I wind a bandage round it and
tie it with my teeth, I once more wish I was a Belgian refugee, as I am
sure I would be interesting, and would get things done for me!
A sick Belgian artist, M. Rotsartz{3}, is doing a drawing of me. I go to
Lady Bagot's hospital, where he is laid up, and sit to him in the
intervals of soup. That little wooden hospital is the best place I have
known so far. Lady Bagot is never bustled or fussy, nor even "busy," and
her staff are excellent men, with the "Mark of the Lamb" on them.
I gave away a lot of things to-day to a regiment going into the
trenches. The soldiers were delighted with them.
_11 March._--There was a lot of firing near La Panne to-day, and a
British warship was repeatedly shelled by the Germans from Nieuport. I
went into Dunkirk with Mr. Clegg, and got the usual hasty shopping done.
No one can ever wait a minute. If one has time to buy a newspaper one is
lucky. The difficulty of communicating with anyone is great--no
telephone--no letters--no motor-car. I am stranded.
[Page Heading: FRENCH MARINES]
I generally go in the train to Adinkerke with the French Marines, nice
little fellows, with labels attached to them stating their "case"--not
knowing where they are going or anything else--just human lives battered
about and carted off. I don't even know where they get the little bit of
money which they always seem able to spend on loud-smelling oranges and
cigarettes. The place is littered with orange-skins--to-day I saw a long
piece lying in the form of an "S" amid the mud; and, like a story of a
century old, I thought of ourselves as children throwing orange-skins
round our heads and on to the floor to read the initial of our future
husband, and I seemed to hear mother say, "'S' for Sammy--Sammy C----,"
a boy with thick legs whom we secretly despised!
I have found a whole new household of "éclopés" at Adinkerke, who want
cigarettes, socks, and shoes all the time. They are a pitiful lot, with
earache, toothache, and all the minor complaints which I myself find so
trying, and they lie about on straw till they are able to go back to the
trenches again.
The pollard willows between here and Adinkerke are all being cut down to
build trenches. They were big with buds and the promise of spring.
_14 March._--I went to the station yesterday, as usual. Suddenly I
couldn't stand it any more. Everyone was cleaning. I was getting swept
up with straw and mopped up with dirty cloths. The kitchen work was
done. I ate my lunch in a filthy little out-building and then I fled. I
had to get into the open air, and I hopped on to an ambulance and drove
to Dunkirk. I had a good deal to do there getting vegetables,
cigarettes, etc., and we got back late to the station, where I heard the
Queen had paid a visit. Rather bad luck on almost the only day I have
been away.
I am waiting anxiously to hear if the report of the new British advance
yesterday is true. When fighting really begins we are going to be in for
a big thing; one dreads it for the sake of the boys we are going to
lose. I want things to start now just to get them over, but I rather
envy the people who died before this unspeakable war began.
* * * * *
_To Mrs. Keays-Young._
CARE OF FIELD POST OFFICE, DUNKIRK,
_17 March._
MY DEAREST BABY,
[Page Heading: CAPTAIN L. M. B. SALMON]
I have (of course) been getting letters and parcels very badly lately. I
am sending this home by hand, which is not allowed except on Red Cross
business, but this is to ask how Lionel is, so I think I may send it. My
poor Bet! What anxiety for her! This spring weather is making me long to
be at home, and when people tell me the crocuses are up in the
park!--well, you know London and the park belong to me! Are the catkins
out? We can get flowers at Dunkirk, but not here.
Not a word of war news, because that wouldn't be fair. A shilling wire
about Lionel would satisfy me--just "Better, and Bet well," or something
of that sort.
Always, my dear,
Your loving,
S. MACNAUGHTAN.
P.S.--Your two letters and Bet's have just come. To be in touch with you
again is _very_ pleasant. I can't tell you what it was like to sit down
to a pretty, clean breakfast to-day with my letters beside me. Someone
brought them here early.
I heard to-day that I am going to be decorated by the King of the
Belgians, but don't spread this broadcast, as anything might happen in
war.
* * * * *
_20 March._--I met an Englishman belonging to an armoured car in Dunkirk
a couple of days ago. He told me that the last four days' fighting at La
Bassée has cost the British 13,000 casualties. Three lines of holes in
the ground, and fighting only just beginning again! Bet's fiancé has
been shot through the head, but is still alive. My God, the horror of it
all! And England is still cheerful, I hear, and is going to hold
race-meetings as usual.
At the station to-day I saw a mad man, who fought and struggled. I
thought madmen raved. This one fought silently, like a man one sees in a
dream. Another soldier shook all over like an old man. Many were blind.
"On the whole," someone said to me in England, "I suppose you are having
a good time."
There is a snowstorm to-day, and it is bitterly cold. It is very odd how
many small "complaints" seem to attack one. I can't remember the day out
here when I felt well all over.
Last night some Belgians came in to dinner. It was like old times trying
to get things nice. I had some flowers and a tablecloth. I believe in
making a contrast with the discomfort I see out here. We forced open a
piano, and had some perfect music.
_21 March._--The weather is brighter to-day; the sound of firing is more
distant; it is possible to think of other things besides the war.
Mrs. ---- came to the station this morning. I think she has the most
untidy mind I have ever met with.
With all our faults, I often wish that there were more Macnaughtans in
the world. Their simple and plain intelligence gives one something to
work upon. Mrs. ---- came and told me to-day that last night "they
laughed till they cried" over her attempt at making a pudding. I should
have cried, only, over a woman of fifty who wasn't able to make a
pudding. She and ---- are twin nebulæ who think themselves
constellations.
* * * * *
_To Miss Mary King._
CARE OF FIELD POST OFFICE, DUNKIRK,
_22 March._
DEAR MARY,
My plans, like those of everybody else, are undecided because of the
war. If it is going to stop in May I should like to stay till the end,
but if it is likely to go on for a long time, I shall come home. I don't
think hot soup (which is my business) can be wanted much longer, as the
warm weather will be coming.
I have been asked to take over full charge of a hospital here. It is a
great compliment, but I have almost decided to refuse. I have other
duties, and I have some important writing to do, as I am busy with a
book on the war. I begin work as early as ever, and then go to my
kitchen.
[Page Heading: LONGING FOR HOME]
When I do come home I want to be in my own house, and I am longing to be
back. Many of my friends go backwards and forwards to England all the
time, but when I return, I should like to stay.
I am in wonderfully comfortable rooms at present, and the landlady is
most kind and attentive. She gives me a morning cup of tea, and the care
and comfort are making me much better. I get some soup before I go off
to my station, and last night I was really a fine lady. When I came in
tired, the landlady, who is a Belgian, took off my boots for me!
When I come home I think I'll lie in bed all day, and poor old Mary
will get quite thin again nursing me. The things you will have to do for
me, and all the pretty things I shall see and have, are a great pleasure
to think about!
Yours truly,
S. MACNAUGHTAN.