bedroom again. It will be rather like Le Mans over again, with a billet
to live in, and officers to look after, but I shall miss the Jocks and
the others.
_Later._--Generals and "Red Hats" simply bristle around. A collection of
them has just been in visiting the sick officers. We had a big Good
Friday service at 11, and there is another at 6 P.M. The Bishop of
London is coming round to-day.
_Still Good Friday_, 10 P.M.--Who said Active Service? I am writing this
in a wonderful mahogany bed, with a red satin quilt, in a panelled room,
with the sort of furniture drawing-rooms have on the stage, and electric
light, and medallions and bronzes, and oil-paintings and old engravings,
and blue china and mirrors all about. It is a huge house like a Château,
on the Place, where Generals and officers are usually billeted. The fat
and smiling caretaker says she's had two hundred since the war. She
insisted on pouring eau-de-Cologne into my hot bath. It is really a
lovely house, with polished floors and huge tapestry pictures up the
staircase. And all this well within range of the German guns. After last
night, in the A.S.C officer's kind but musty little chilly second-class
carriage, it is somewhat of a change. And I hadn't had my clothes off
for three days and two nights. This billet is only for one night;
to-morrow I expect I shall be in some grubby little room near by. It has
taken the Town Commandant, the O.C. of No.-- F.A., a French interpreter,
and an R.H.A. officer and several N.C.O.'s and orderlies, to find me a
billet--the town is already packed tight, and they have to continue the
search to-morrow.
This afternoon I went all over the big French hospital where our men
are. The French nuns were charming, and it was all very nice. The
women's ward is full of women and girls _blessées_ by shells, some with
a leg off and fractured--all very cheerful.
One shell the other day killed thirty-one and wounded twenty-seven--all
Indians.
I am not to start work till to-morrow, as the wards are very light;
nearly all the officers up part of the day, so at 6 P.M. I went to the
Bishop of London's mission service in the theatre. A staff officer on
the steps told me to go to the left of the front row (where all the red
hats and gold hats sit), but I funked that and sat modestly in the last
row of officers. There were about a hundred officers there, and a huge
solid pack of men; no other woman at all. The Bishop, looking very white
and tired but very happy, took the service on the stage, where a Padre
was thumping the hymns on the harmonium (which shuts up into a sort of
matchbox). It was a voluntary service, and you know the nearer they are
to the firing line the more they go to church. It was extraordinarily
moving. The Padre read a sort of liturgy for the war taken from the
Russians, far finer than any of ours; we had printed papers, and the
response was "Lord, have mercy," or "Grant this, O Lord." It came each
time like bass clockwork.
Troops are just marching by in the dark. Hundreds passed the hospital
this afternoon. I must go to sleep.
The Bishop dashed in to see our sick officers here, and then motored
off to dine with the Quartermaster-General. He's had great services with
the cavalry and every other brigade.
_Easter Eve_, 10 P.M.--Have been on duty all day till 5 P.M. They are
nearly all "evacuated" in a few days, so you are always getting a fresh
lot in.
Another Army Sister turned up to-day in a motor from Poperinghe to take
the place of the two who were originally here, who have now gone.
At six this morning big guns were doing their Morning Hate very close to
us, but they have been quiet all day. Two days ago the village two and a
half miles south-east of us was shelled.
I found my own new billet this morning before going on duty; it is in a
very old little house over a shop in a street off the big Place. It is a
sort of attic, and I am not dead sure whether it is clean on top and
lively underneath, but time will show. The shop lady and her daughter
Maria Thérèse are full of zeal and kindness to make me comfortable, but
they stayed two hours watching me unpack and making themselves
agreeable! And when I came in from dinner from the café, where we now
have our meals (quite decent), she and papa and M.T. drew up a chair for
me to _causer_ in their parlour, to my horror.
At 8 P.M. the town suddenly goes out like a candle; all lights are put
out and the street suddenly empty. After that, at intervals, only
motorcyclists buzz through and regiments tramp past going back to
billets. They sound more warlike than anything. Such a lot are going by
now.
_Easter Sunday_, 3 P.M.--The service at 7 this morning in the theatre
was rather wonderful. Rows of officers and packs of men.
We have been busy in the ward all the morning. I'm off 2-5, and shall
soon go out and take E.'s chocolate Easter eggs to the men in the
hospice. The officers have any amount of cigarettes, chocs., novels, and
newspapers.
A woman came and wept this morning with my billeter over their two sons,
who are prisoners, not receiving the parcels of _tabac_ and _pain_ and
_gateaux_ that they send. They think we ought to starve the German
prisoners to death!
This morning in the ward I suddenly found it full of Gold Hats and Red
Tabs; three Generals and their A.D.C.'s visiting the sick officers.
_Easter Monday._--It is a pouring wet day, and the mud is Flanderish.
Never was there such mud anywhere else. A gunner-major has just been
telling me you get a fine view of the German positions from the
Cathedral tower here, and can see shells bursting like the pictures in
'The Sphere.' He said his guns had the job of peppering La Bassée the
last time they shelled this place, and they gave it such a dusting that
this place has been let severely alone since. He thinks they'll have
another go at this when we begin to get hold of La Bassée, but the
latter is a very strong position. It begins to be "unhealthy" to get
into any of the villages about three miles from here, which are all
heaps of bricks now.
I'm leaving my billet to-morrow, as they want us to be in one house. And
our house is the Maire's Château, the palatial one, so we shall live in
the lap of luxury as never before in this country! And have hot baths
with eau-de-Cologne every night, or cold every morning. And the woman is
going to faire our cuisine there for us, so we shan't have to wait hours
in the café for our meals. There is only one waiter at the café, who is
a beautiful, composed, wrapt, silent girl of 16, who will soon be dead
of overwork. She is not merely pretty, but beautiful, with the manners
of a princess!
I shall be glad to get away from my too kind billeters; every night I
have to sit and _causer_ before going to bed, and Ma-billeter watches me
in and out of bed, and tells me my nightgown is _très pratique_, and
just like the officers Anglais have. But she calls me with a lovely cup
of coffee in the morning. They've been so kind that I dread telling them
I've got to go.
An officer was brought in during the night with a compound-fractured
arm. He stuck a very painful dressing like a brick to-day, and said to
me afterwards, "I've got three kids at home; they'll be awfully bucked
over this!" He had said it was "nothing to write home about."
Another, who is chaffing everybody all day long, was awfully impressed
because a man in his company--I mean platoon--who had half his leg blown
off, said when they came to pick him up, "Never mind me--take so-and-so
first"--"just like those chaps you read of in books, you know." It was
decided that he meant Sir Philip Sidney.
Yesterday afternoon I had a lovely time taking round chocolate Easter
eggs to our wounded in the French hospital. The sweetest, merriest
_Ma-Soeur_ took me round, and insisted on all the orderlies having one
too. They adore her, and stand up and salute when she comes into the
ward; and we had enough for the _jeunes filles_ and the grannies in the
women's ward of _blessées_. They were a huge success. Those men get very
few treats. She also showed me the Maternity Ward.
_Tuesday, April 6th_, 10 P.M.--I am writing in bed in my lovely little
room overlooking the garden, and facing some nice red roofs and both the
old Towers of the town (one dating from le temps des Espagnols) in le
Château, instead of in my attic in the narrow street where you heard the
tramp of the men who viennent des tranches in the night. We had a lovely
dinner, served by the fat and _très aimable_ Marie in a small, panelled
dining-room, with old oak chairs and real silver spoons (the first I've
met since August). So don't waste any pity for the hardships of War! And
an officer with a temperature of 103° explained that he'd been sleeping
for sixteen days on damp sandbags "among the dead Germans."
Nothing coming in anywhere, but when it does begin we shall get them.
The A.D.M.S. is going to arrange for us to go up with one of his motor
ambulances to one of the advance dressing stations where the first
communication trench begins! It is at the corner of a road called
"Harley Street," which he says is "too unhealthy," where I mayn't be
taken. Won't it be thrilling to see it all?
Officers' "trench talk" is exactly like the men's, only in a different
language.
It has been wet and windy again, so I did not explore when I was off
this afternoon, but did my unpacking and settling in here. With so many
moves I have got my belongings into a high state of mobilisation, and it
doesn't take long.
Last night at the café, one of the despatch riders played Chopin,
Tchaikowsky, and Elgar like a professional. It was jolly. The officers
are awfully nice to do with on the whole.
_Wednesday, April 7th._ _In bed,_ 10.30 P.M.--It has been a lovely day
after last night's and yesterday's heavy rain. We are busy all day
admitting and evacuating officers. The lung one had to be got ready in a
hurry this morning, and Mr L. took him down specially to the train.
A very nice Brigade-Major came in, in the night, with a shell wound in
the shoulder. This morning a great jagged piece was dug out, with only a
local anæsthetic, and he stuck it like a brick, humming a tune when it
became unbearable and gripping on to my hand.
I was off at 5 P.M., and went to dig out Marie Thérèse from my old
billet, to come with me to Beuvry, the village about two and a half
miles away that was shelled last week; it is about half-way to the
trenches from here. It was a lovely sunsetty evening, and there was a
huge stretch of view, but it was not clear enough to make anything out
of the German line. She has a tante and a grandmère there, and has a
"_laisser-passer soigner une tante malade_" which she has to show to the
sentry at the bridge. I get through without. The tante is not at all
_malade_--she is a cheery old lady who met us on the road. M.T. pointed
me out all the shell holes. We met and passed an unending stream of
khaki, the men marching back from their four days in the trenches,
infant officers and all steadily trudging on with the same coating of
mud from head to foot, packs and rifles carried anyhow, and the Trench
Look, which can never be described, and which is grim to the last
degree. Each lot had a tail of limping stragglers in ones and twos and
threes. I talked to some of these, and they said they'd had a very
"rough" night last night--pouring rain--water up to their knees, and
standing to all night expecting an attack which didn't come off; but
some mines had been exploded meant for their trench, but luckily they
were ten yards out in their calculations, and they only got smothered
instead of blown to bits. And they were sticking all this while we were
snoring in our horrible, warm, soft beds only a few miles away. We went
on past some of the famous brick stacks through the funny little village
full of billets to the church, where le Salut was going on. We passed a
dressing station of No.-- Field Ambulance. The grandmère had two
sergeants billeted with her who seemed pleased to have a friendly chat.
Some of the men I said good-night to were so surprised (not knowing our
grey coat and hat), I heard them say to each other "English!" Marie
Thérèse simply adores the _Anglais_--they are so _gais_, such _bon
courage_, they laugh always and sing--and they have "_beaucoup de
fiancées françaises pour passer le temps_!" She told me they had
yesterday a boy of eighteen who was always _triste_, but _bien poli_,
and he knows six languages and comes from the University of London. When
he left for the trenches he said, "_Je vais à la mort_," but he has
promised to come and see them on Saturday or Sunday, "_s'il n'est pas
mort, ou blessé_," she said, as an afterthought. Her own young man is _à
la Guerre_, and she is making her trousseau. They do beautiful
embroidery on linen.
I was pretty tired when we got back at 8 o'clock, as it was a good
five-mile walk, part of the way on fiendish cobble-stones, and we are on
our feet all day at the Dressing Station. But I am very fit, and all the
better for the excellent fresh food we have here. No more tins of
anything, thank goodness!
_Thursday, April 8th._--Talking of billets, a General and his Staff are
coming to this Château to-morrow and we three have got to turn out,
possibly to a house opposite on the same square, which is empty. We live
in terror of unknown Powers-that-Be suddenly sending us down. The C.O.
and every one here are very keen that we should be as comfortably
billeted as possible. He said to-day, "Later on you may get an awful
place to live in." Of course we are aiming at becoming quite
indispensable! If you can once get your Medical Officers to depend on
you for having everything they want at hand, and for making the patients
happy and contented, and the orderlies in good order, they soon get to
think they can't do without you.
There are two nice tea-shops where all the officers of the 1st and 2nd
Divisions go and have tea.
On Saturday morning they sent three hundred shells into Cuinchy, in
revenge for their trench blown up (see to-day's _Communiqué_ from Sir
J.F.).
_Friday, April 9th,_ 10.30 P.M.--An empty house was found for us on the
same square, left exactly as it was when the owners left when the place
was shelled. It was filthy from top to toe, but we have found a girl
called Gabrielle to be our servant, and she has made a good start in the
cleaning to-day. There are three bedrooms--mine is a funny little one
built out at the back, down three steps, with two windows overlooking a
corner of the square and our road past the hospital.
It is my fourth billet here in a week, and Gabrielle and I have made it
quite habitable by collecting things from other parts of the house. We
are back in our own rugs and blankets again without sheets, and there is
no water on yet, but we filled our hot-water bottles at the hospital,
and are quite warm and cosy, and locked up--I shall have to let
Gabrielle in at 6.30 to-morrow morning. She is going to shop and cook
for us, with help from the kind Marie at the Château, who is aghast at
our present more military mode of living. The Château is now swarming
with Staff Officers, to whom Marie pays far less attention than she does
to us!
When the wind is in the right direction you can hear the rifle firing as
well as the guns--and they are often shelling aeroplanes on a fine day.
We have two bad cases in to-night--one wounded in the lung, and one
medical transferred from downstairs, where the slight medicals are.
A Captain of the ----, hit in the back this morning when he was crossing
in the open to visit a post in his trench, has a little freckled Jock
for his servant, who dashed out to bring him in when he fell. "Most
gallant, you know," he said. They adore each other. Jock stands to
attention, salutes, and says "Yes'm" when I gave him an order. Their
friends troop in to see them as soon as they hear they're hit. So many
seem to have been wounded before--nearly all, in fact.
Letters are coming in very irregularly, I don't quite know why.
_Saturday, April 10th_, 10.30 P.M.--It is difficult to settle down to
sleep to-night: the sky is lit up with flashes and star-shells, and
every now and then a big bang shakes the house, above the almost
continuous thud, thudding, and the barking of the machine-guns and the
crackling of rifle firing; they are bringing in more to-day, both here
and at the Hospice, and we are tired enough to go to sleep as if we were
at home; I shouldn't wonder if the Night Sister had a busy night.
We had to rig up our day-room for an operation this evening--they have
always taken them over to the Hospice, where they have a very swanky
modern theatre.
We couldn't manage to get any food to-day for Gabrielle to cook for us,
as our rations hadn't come up, so we went back to the café. She has been
busy nettoying all day, and the house feels much cleaner.
The dead silence, darkness, and emptiness of the streets after 8 o'clock
are very striking.
_Sunday, April 11th._--This afternoon they shelled Beuvry (the village I
went to with Marie Thérèse on Wednesday) and wounded eleven women and
children; the advanced dressing station of No.-- F.A. took them in. The
promise to send us in one of the M.A.'s to "Harley Street" (the name of
the first communication trench) has been taken back until things quiet
down a little. There was an air battle just above us this evening,--a
Taube sailing serenely along not very high, and not altering her course
or going up one foot, for all the shells that promptly peppered the sky
all round her. You hear a particular kind of bang and then gaze at the
Taube; suddenly a shining ball of white smoke appears close to her, and
uncurls itself in the sun against the blue of the sky. As it begins to
uncurl you hear the explosion, and however much you admire the German's
pluck, and hope he'll dodge them safely, you can't help hoping also that
the next one will get him and that he'll come crashing down. Isn't it
beastly? It was so near that the French were calling out excitedly,
"_Touché! Il descend_," but he got away all right.
Another officer dangerously wounded was transferred to my ward to-day
from the French hospital. He was feebly grappling with a Sevenpenny
which he could neither hold nor read. "Anything to take my thoughts off
that beastly war!" he said.
A small parcel of socks, cigs., and chocs, came to-day. Soon after, I
found the road below was covered with exhausted trench stragglers
resting on the kerb, the very men for the parcel. They had all that and
one mouth-organ--wasn't it lucky? One Jock said, "That's the first time
I've heard a woman speak English since I left Southampton six months
ago!"
Gabrielle cooked a very nice supper for us to-night--which I dished up
when we came in. It is much more fun camping out in our own little empty
house than in the grand Château--but I didn't have time to look at
nearly all the lovely engravings there.
Streams of columns have been passing all day; one gun-team had to turn
back because one of the off horses jibbed and refused to go any farther.
Though it is past 11 P.M. the sounds outside are too interesting to go
to sleep; the bangs are getting louder; those who _viennent des
tranches_ are tramping down and transport waggons rattling up!
_Monday, April 12th._--No mail to-day. This has been a very quiet day,
fewer columns, aeroplanes, and guns, and the three bad officers holding
their own so far. The others come and go.
_Tuesday, April 13th._--There is something quite fiendish about the
crackling of the rifle firing to-night, and every now and then a gun
like "Mother" speaks and shakes the town. Last night it was quite
quiet. All leave has been stopped to-day, and there are the wildest
rumours going about of a big naval engagement, the forcing of the
Narrows, and the surrender of St Mihiel, and anything else you like!
These Medical Officers have always hung on to the most hopeless, both
here and at the Hospice, beyond the last hope, and when they pull
through there is great rejoicing.
It doesn't seem somehow the right thing to do, to undress and get into
bed with these crashes going on, but I suppose staying up won't stop it!
_Wednesday, April 14th._--Very quiet day; it always is after exciting
rumours which come to nothing! But it has been noisier than usual in the
daytime. I rested in my off-time and didn't go out.
The Victoria League sent some awfully nice lavender bags to-day, and
some tins of Keating's, which will be of future use, I expect. Just now,
one is mercifully and strangely free from the Minor Scourges of War.
The German trenches captured at Neuve Chapelle, and now occupied by us,
are full of legs and arms, which emerge when you dig. Some are still
caught on the barbed wire and can't be taken away.
We are not being at all clever with our rations just now, and manage to
have indescribably nasty and uneatable meals! But we shall get it better
in time, by taking a little more trouble over it.
We had scrambled eggs to-night, which I made standing on a chair,
because the gas-ring is so high, and Sister holding up a very small dim
oil-lamp. But they were a great success. And then we had soup with fried
potatoes in it! and tea.