patients into it as comfortably as we could on the straw. Each had a
parcel with a little money and a few delicacies our ever-generous Madame
D---- had provided. It was terrible to think of some of these poor men
in their shoddy uniforms, without an overcoat, going off to face a long
German winter.

So we said good-bye with smiles and tears and thanks and salutations.
And the springless wagons jolted away over the rough road, and
fortunately we had our bad cases to occupy our thoughts. An order came
to prepare at once for some more wounded who might be coming in at any
time, so we started at once to get ready for any emergency. The beds
were disinfected and made up with our last clean sheets and
pillow-cases, and the wards scrubbed, when there was a shout from some
one that they were bringing in wounded at the hospital gate. We looked
out and true enough there were stretchers being brought in. I went along
to the operating theatre to see that all was ready there in case of
necessity, when I heard shrieks and howls of joy, and turned round and
there were all our dear men back again, and they, as well as the entire
staff, were half mad with delight. They were all so excited, talking at
once, one could hardly make out what had happened; but at last I made
one of them tell me quietly. It appeared that when the wagons got down
to Charleroi station, the men were unloaded and put on stretchers, and
were about to be carried into the station when an officer came and
pointed a pistol at them (why, no one knew, for they were only obeying
orders), and said they were to wait. So they waited there outside the
station for a long time, guarded by a squad of German soldiers, and at
last were told that the train to Germany was already full and that they
must return to the hospital. They all had to be got back into bed (into
our disinfected beds, with the last of the clean sheets!) and fed and
their dressings done, and so on, and they were so excited that it took a