theatrical bandages, and one case of trench-fever. We're immensely
merry--all except the trench-fever case who has conceived an immense
sorrow for himself. We get impatient with waiting. There's an awful
lot of cheering going on somewhere; we suppose troops are marching and
can't make it out.

Ah, we've started! At a slow crawl to prevent jarring we pass through
the gates. We discover the meaning of the cheering. On either side the
people are lined in dense crowds, waving and shouting. It's Saturday
evening when they should be in the country. It's jolly decent of them
to come here to give us such a welcome. Flower-girls are here with
their baskets full of flowers--just poor girls with a living to earn.
They run after us as we pass and strew us with roses. Roses! We
stretch out our hands, pressing them to our lips. How long is it since
we held roses in our hands? How did these girls of the London streets
know that above all things we longed for flowers? It was worth it all,
the mud and stench and beastliness, when it was to this that the road
led back. And the girls--they're even better than the flowers; so many
pretty faces made kind by compassion. Somewhere inside ourselves we're
laughing; we're so happy. We don't need any one's pity; time enough
for that when we start to pity ourselves. We feel mean, as though we
were part of a big deception. We aren't half so ill as we look; if you
put sufficient bandages on a wound you can make the healthiest man
appear tragic. We're laughing--and then all of a sudden we're crying.
We press our faces against the pillow ashamed of ourselves. We won't
see the crowds; we're angry with them for having unmanned us. And then
we can't help looking; their love reaches us almost as though it were
the touch of hands. We won't hide ourselves if we mean so much to
them. We're not angry any more, but grateful.