CHAPTER XI

EVACUATION—THE SANITARY TRAIN—THE HOSPITAL When I regained consciousness I was in the dug-out of an officer of the machine-gun section. He gave me some brandy, and I revived. Almost immediately afterward came the Boche counter-attack. It was met by the fire from their own machine guns, and was quickly beaten back. With my left hand I unloaded the six bullets of my revolver into the dark shadows advancing toward us. This much I could do for my soldiers. But when the danger was over, my nerve suddenly left me, and I was frightened, as frightened as a child in the dark. I was afraid to go alone to the dressing-station, and waited to walk along with the stretcher-bearers. We had to go a long distance. I realized that we had covered a good deal of ground in the morning, and I was filled with hope. Why should not our men do the same thing the next day, and then the next, until we could raise our heads and say: “Ours the victory!” When the surgeons had dressed my wound, I was placed on a stretcher and lifted into an ambulance. Then began the journey to the rear. A day and a half later, after a chaotic ride through the darkness, I reached the hospital of the beautiful little town of Arras, where the wounded are collected from the various dressing-stations. I was taken into a vast ward and undressed by two orderlies, who cut away my coat and jacket and put me to bed between clean sheets. In spite of a battery that was booming right beside the hospital, and in spite of the pain in my arm, I went to sleep, utterly worn out. The next morning I was helped into my clothes and put almost immediately into an automobile to be taken toward the rear, ever farther and farther from the din of battle, which was still going on. We met a great number of convoys of troops on their way to reinforce the front, infantry transported in heavy trucks, as we had been ten days before, artillery drawn by caterpillar tractors, and masses of cavalry waiting for the forward dash. Truly, everything seemed ready for pushing far ahead. And I was enraged at being wounded at such a moment, for the thought of our advance was magnificent and inspiring. The motor came to a stop in a little village of this luxuriant region of Artois. The hospital where we were cared for momentarily was in the schoolhouse. I was given a hypodermic of serum to prevent tetanus. The schoolmistress, who still kept a single room for her classes, learning that I belonged to the University, asked me to go home to lunch with her. She was exquisitely kind and thoughtful, waiting on me, preparing my food and helping me to eat. Then I lay down on her bed. I was at the end of my strength. Toward evening I was again put into an automobile, and again came a confused ride over torn-up roads. My arm was very painful. I felt my hand swelling and growing heavy and feverish. It was late when we reached the evacuation hospital, where I once more went to bed. I found there one of my companions in misery, an adjutant wounded in the thigh. The next morning very early we were awakened by violent detonations. It was German aeroplanes throwing bombs on the station and the hospital. One of them fell very near the building where we poor wretches were lying. Could the barbarians attack even us? In that immense hospital ward was every sort of horrible wound. No part of the body had been spared. But what impressed me most was an officer in the bed next to mine, totally disfigured by a shell—a repulsive monster, ignoble, with neither nose nor lips. I saw him plainly when they were dressing his wound. And it hurt me. At noon I got into an automobile again, this time to go only as far as the station, where the sanitary train was waiting for us. There were two kinds of coaches, one with comfortable swinging stretchers for wounded who were not able to sit up, and for the rest of us ordinary first and second-class coaches. I was in a first-class compartment with a lieutenant who was ill, a second lieutenant wounded in the hand, and a colonel who had a quantity of little shell splinters in his leg. I happened to be the worst off of any of them, and it was touching the way they all tried to do some little thing to make me comfortable. The colonel helped me get settled, cut my meat, almost fed me. He was like a father, and it was very affecting to see this old colonel, all covered with medals, waiting upon a little lieutenant who was scarcely out of his teens. At the big stations, Amiens particularly, they took off the wounded who were suffering most. But in spite of the pain and fever in my arm, I wanted to stay on the train. I kept thinking it was going to take me to the South, to the Riviera, where my family was at that moment. At nightfall we arrived just outside of Paris, and there the train waited until morning. It was the same station where we had stopped nearly twenty days before, on returning from the Meuse. In the morning the faithful ladies of the Red Cross came with cheerful smiles to bring us cups of hot coffee. Then the train steamed slowly out. We met some Boche prisoners who were also being evacuated. Be it said to the honor of the French wounded, no cry against the barbarians went up from our train; France knows the respect that is due a vanquished enemy. After that the train sauntered along all day in the direction of the Loire. We stopped at many stations in peaceful, shaded countrysides, and at each of these havens a few of the wounded got out. At every station young girls came to bring us flowers, fresh eggs, illustrated papers, and likewise their smiles, admiring, a little tender too, and grateful. I was especially touched by the flowers. They brought them by armfuls and loaded us down. We suddenly began to have a glimmering of our lofty estate as wounded. The attentions of those exquisite women made us almost imagine we had done something worth while. But this did not lessen the deep gratitude with which we accepted their gifts. The debt of gratitude that I vowed from that moment to the women of France has been growing daily greater since I have been in this hospital. I reached here late at night. At the station the wounded were divided among the different hospitals of the town and I was assigned to the hospital of _l’Union des Femmes de France_, a private institution, housed in the buildings of the Girls’ Normal School. At the entrance, white figures stood out against the dim light. When I went in, I was met by smiling faces, and two of the ladies accompanied me to my room. There they took off my clothes and gave me my first bath in many days, doing all this simply, gently, tenderly, laughing at me a little if I was embarrassed, as can well be imagined. Could anything be more wonderful than to see the devotion with which these delicately reared women perform all kinds of unpleasant and unwonted tasks? And always with the same cheerfulness, the same gentleness, the same patience, for wounded soldiers are far from being agreeable at times. If there is any virtue in the soldiers of France, a thousand times more worth are its women, whose very presence and smile brings healing. I fell under the charm of it at once, and my first night was a good one. But after that, fever came on. The violent shocks I had been through brought on cerebral congestion, and I knew nothing further for some days. When I came to myself, I found my mother at my bedside. She had been with me for a week, though I had not known her. After that my arm was treated to more purpose. It was necessary to operate several times. As soon as I was able to be out, I was loaded with invitations. All my nurses asked me to their homes, likewise the doctor, whom I had completely won over, it seems, by the very learned character of my divagations when I was off my head. I have come back to a life of perpetual pampering, sweet, active, calm, and unspeakably happy. My arm is in a plaster cast. I am writing with my left hand. My room opens out on a large garden, full of flowers and fragrance. I have got back to my books again, and I am growing stronger. To be alive is infinitely good. _June 25_. This morning I was decorated with the _Croix de Guerre_. For several days back my nurses have been going around with an air of mystery. They looked at me and whispered, and for all answer to my questions, did nothing but smile. They had become perfectly inscrutable. Even the doctor, who plied me with his usual volley of jokes, refused to enlighten me. Not until his visit of this morning did he deign to inform me that the general in charge of this section was going to take the trouble to bring me something. In the courtyard of the hospital, with its chestnut trees in blossom, and its decorations of flags, were assembled all the wounded who were able to be about, some seated, others lying in reclining-chairs. The ladies in charge of the hospital and all the nurses in their fresh white uniforms were laughing and talking. I was talking to a comrade and feeling not a little embarrassed. Finally the General arrived, together with several staff officers. The doctor presented the hospital staff to him and then he presented me. By way of a right arm, I had a big bundle of plaster and bandages which prevented me from being properly clad in my regimentals. The General unfolded a large paper and read in the midst of complete silence:— “Second Lieutenant R. N., the Army cites you in the Order of the Day for the following reasons:— “Lieutenant N., under a very deadly fire, led forward his section to the charge upon the German positions. With great gallantry, he pushed on with his men to a point in advance of the third German line, where he was wounded.” And the General came toward me as I stood there trembling a little, and pinned to my jacket the _Croix de Guerre_. Then he took my left hand and pressed it silently. I felt that everybody was looking at me. I was very much overcome. I must have looked foolish. The doctor, a sort of demi-god whom we all adore, began to say something. It was about me, doubtless, but I had not the least idea what. I longed for the whole thing to be over. He came up to me and embraced me. After that we went to the house of the directress and drank champagne. It all seemed endless, and my one wish was to be alone, quite alone, so as to give myself up to the immense, prodigious joy that was mine, the joy that came as a reward for doing my duty. How can I endure this waiting to get well? I must get back to the front. I will prove to my country that not in vain does she reward her children. THE END =The Riverside Press= CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS U . S . A ------------------------------------------------------------------------ TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES Page Changed from Changed to 28 the Germans call the Germans call “_Trommelfaren_,” or “drumfire.” “_Trommelfeuer_,” or “drumfire.” ● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained. ● Used numbers for footnotes. ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_. ● Enclosed blackletter font in =equals=. ● HTML alt text was used for images that didn’t have captions.