The shells commenced to find range, and in a short
time the roof was lifted off. A wounded man died close to me. I can only
remember the purr of a motor as an ambulance rushed up. Then I saw four
stretcher-bearers; two grabbed the German, and two caught hold of me. We
were rushed to the ambulance and driven at maddening speed through the
shell-ridden town.
Though I was barely conscious, though I believed that I was nearing my last
moments, I remember how it struck me vividly,--the contrast in the methods
of fighting. German shells were blasting to pieces the shelter of wounded
men and nurses. German wounded were being cared for by those whom their
comrades sought to kill. The Hun might have killed his own. It did not
matter. What is a life here or there to a Hohenzollern? And the
Allies--here were two British stretcher-bearers bent under the burden of an
enemy patient. They were striving to save his life from the fire of his own
people.
I do not remember any more after I was put in the ambulance. I came to
myself in a base hospital in France. I was strapped to a water bed.
Everything round me was soft and fresh and clean, and smelled deliciously.
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